In addition, it wasn't really all that long ago, but is sufficiently removed to prevent it from being too close (as WWI would be). WWI is barely within living memory, and well, there's no way you could call that one "pretty".

That's true, but all the same, WW1 is quite popular, at least in the UK -- not the re-enactments bit, or the uniforms (which are rather dull anyway) but visiting battle sites. In my local library, there is quite a shelf-full of books about the sites, the trenches and so on.