u/Numerous_Tomato_1685

Not in the Navy and have never served (disclaimer) and would appreciate any feedback from the real experts.

Am incorrect that the The Last Ship artificially nerfed the Arleigh Burke destroyer to make it as useless as a a 1800s era battleship?

I just finished The Last Ship, and while I enjoyed it overall, I couldn’t get past how dramatically they downplayed the capabilities of an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. It felt loke the show nerfed the Nathan James destroyer to make it the opposite of one of the most capable surface combatants ever built.

Some examples:
It’s literally a missile destroyer that struggles to destroy missiles. Air and missile defense is the Burke’s defining mission, yet incoming missiles are repeatedly treated as nearly unstoppable plot devices.
CIWS/Phalanx is portrayed like it’s the primary weapon. The show makes it seem like someone is manually controlling it as the main defense. In reality, it’s an automated, last-ditch system. If Phalanx is firing, multiple earlier layers of defense have already failed.
Almost no anti-submarine capability. Flight IIA Burkes carry hull sonar, a towed array, VL-ASROC, torpedoes, and two MH-60R Seahawks with dipping sonar and sonobuoys. Yet submarines in the show often feel like unstoppable monsters.
The radar/EMCON scenes are bizarre. They repeatedly act like turning SPY-1 on for a split second somehow makes the ship nearly invisible. EMCON is a real concept, but an Aegis destroyer isn’t fighting by nervously “blinking” one of the world’s most sophisticated radar systems on and off like it’s hiding with a flashlight.
Electronic warfare barely exists. Decoys, jamming, and soft-kill defenses—which are central to surviving missile attacks—are largely ignored in favor of dramatic gunfire.
The helicopters disappear whenever they’d solve the plot. Two MH-60Rs providing over-the-horizon ISR and ASW would eliminate half the crises in the series, so they often seem to vanish.

I understand it’s television, and a completely realistic Burke would probably detect, classify, and destroy most threats long before viewers ever saw them. But some of these choices go beyond dramatic license—they fundamentally change what an Arleigh Burke is designed to do.
For those with Navy or naval warfare experience, am I mistaken? If not what inaccuracies bothered you the most? Which scenes made you think, “That would never happen on a real Burke?”

Thank you for your service and the discussion.

I could be mistaken though.