On TV there are documentaries on various famous wars and combat throughout history. WWII documentaries are aired quite frequently, but there are even shows on the US Civil and Revolutionary Wars, or conquests of the Roman Empire. Considering the impact, scale, and devastation of WWI, why is it never talked about? Is it so completely overshadowed by WWII that few consider airing programs about it?
My knowledge of other wars is fairly thorough thanks to a diverse set of documentaries frequently airing on the Military or History channels, but I know very little about WWI because I've never seen programs on it. Without consulting Wikipedia I don't even know what countries were involved or where troops were moved at various points throughout the war.
This is a difficult question to give a cited answer for, so you'll get nothing more than a strong set of opinions from me, assuming you're from the United States:
WWII had a pretty clear "good vs evil" story. It's much easier to put into entertainment form because of that.
It featured much more involvement from the United States. This is the big one. This was the war that we were directly attacked. America had limited involvement in WWI and was there at the end mostly to seal the deal. America was a key player in WW2 and was a major player in a major theater which leads me to --
Although the United States certainly came out of WWI in a stronger position and as a burgeoning world power, we came out of WWII as literally the world economic and military superpower. WWII is seen, by many, as a changing of the guard from a more isolationist United States into a superpower which dictates world diplomacy.
Lastly, and I'll be honest about my own field here, it's a sexier topic. WW2 was a war of dramatic offensives, massive re-militarization, huge defeats and huge comebacks, completely new strategies being employed and the first war where we can begin to associate more familiar 'modern warfare' with. WWI is seen as a war where two sides sat across a field from each other and blew each other to smithereens pointlessly. It's not a sexy topic to put on television or to make a mini-series about or a fancy history channel documentary.
I know it's a bit fucked up to talk about war like this, but WW2 is ultimately just more marketable than WWI. When I study the great war the major themes are abstract. Imperial ambitions, nationalism, the concept of a nations prestige. When I read the military history of it the major themes are the futile, grinding nature of it. Generals using men as living crash test dummies to try and figure out anything that can break the stalemate.
WW2 has the Battle of Britain. It has Iwo Jima. It has Stalingrad and Kursk. It has the North African Campaign and Pearl Harbor and Guadalcanal and the Bulge. These are all 'sexy' topics to look at from a marketing and entertainment standpoint, to put it bluntly. They have clear beginnings and ends, massive territorial gains, clear objectives, and clear winners achieving said objectives -- something many WWI battles can not boast.
Despite my unending passion for the Great War I can admit it that the Somme and Verdun and Ypres are not attractive topics to air television compared to what I just described. It just doesn't hold the same interest and flair; especially in a primarily American market dealing with European battles and figures that they likely never went into in their education.
There are plenty of them...but not so much in the US. The war deeply impacted most of Europe and is very important in their psyche and in their history. But the US was only in the war for the tail end--about a year and a half. US casualties were far lower than in ww2 and the Civil War. It was still important and veterans cared a lot about it, but the number of soldiers in ww2 was so much greater that they get a lot more attention. But in England, for example, there's an enormous amount of literature, poetry, and writing about the First World War, which is seen as fundamentally changing British society.
If you're aching for some WW1 documentaries, then you're in luck; since this is the centennial anniversary of the beginning of the war, many studios have produced documentaries and docu-dramas concerning the thing. The BBC have made this into a full-blown project which will go on throughout all of 2014.
You can find a lot of new text and audio/video on the BBC website. A list of programming concerning the conflict can be accessed here, although much of the programming will be inaccessible for non-Brits. You may find that some individuals have uploaded these programmes for general access by other means, in breach of copyright. This is illegal and you should not take advantage of this.
The slightly older 2003 series 'The First World War' is, in my opinion, very good, although it is now a little dated and so doesn't include more recent analysis of the war.