Well, I thought I would be the first to mention the nit that covers the entire M*A*SH series. The Korean War/Conflict/Police Action didn't last 11 years.
Also I would like to go on the record as saying that M*A*S*H is one of my all time favorite shows.
Died of old age, serving for
12 years in a three year war.
Also, a related problem is that all of the Potter Episodes mus fall between 19 September 1952 and July 1953. (The date potter arrives to the end of the war.) Thus, Harry Blake was in command for 3 seasons or about 2 years; Burns was in command for a few episodes or a week or two; and Potter was in command for 7.99 seasons or about 10 months. Something is hugely wrong here. (Also, there ar 4 Christmas episode in a 3 year war.)
It was Henry Blake, not Harry.
MODERATOR - this can go away after the fact, but
under Characters:
Shouldn't Radar O'Reilly, Max Klinger, and Father Mulcahy be listed? They were in the opening credits. Also what about a minor character board for people like Zale, Igor, Col. Flagg, and Sidney (who's last name escapes me) the Shrink?
Note: This was posted here due to lack of any other location.
The rest of the characters are up!
-Amber Martin
Sidney's last name was Friedman.
Also shouldn't Klinger have been discharged
way before the end as he HAD served more than
his share,I believe that Klinger,Hawkeye,Father
Mulcahy and Hot Lips all served way beyond their
initial tour of duty.
BTW:I believe that Jamie Farr was the only member
of the cast to actually serve in Korea.
Thanks, Scott. Us Scotts have to stick together!
Col. Flagg once asked if Sidney's name was spelled "ei" or "ie" and Hawkeye replied, "It's with two e's, as in 'Freedom'. That's what got you confused."
Actually, there were a heck of a lot of nits over the years. Hawkeye went from having a mother and a sister to being an only child with a widowed father. Col. Potter went from a Methodist to a Presbyterian. Klinger went from having blood type B positive to AB negative. (And in an episode where they were in desperate need of AB negative, no one thought to get it from Klinger, Winchester, or Father Mulcahy, instead depending on a drunken sot who was terrified of needles.) Sophie the horse had a sex change. Freedman went from Milton to Sidney. Radar seemed to lose his virginity in an early episode ("I think I've been slaked.")but ended up leaving Korea still pure.
And on, and on, and on.
Henry's wife was called Mildred in Showtime, but she was later called Lorraine.
Also, "A War For All Season" showed Potter in com-
mand of the Four-Oh-Double-Natural at the beginning of '51, wasn't it? "Change of Command"
established Potter as taking over in September of
that year, I believe. Other nits: the Army was no
longer using the "points" system by the time of the Korean War, Potter once stated he couldn't wait to get home to Nebraska, Magaret early on re-fered to her parents in the past tense. Also, no metal gurneys were in use at that time. There are others, I just can't think of 'em right now.
In one episode Margaret said to someone (I think Col. Blake) "You know, you look just like my father did before he died." (Or maybe it was after he died. She was drunk at the time.)
Does anyone know exactly how many grandchildren Potter has? It's at least three. I've seen references to a five year old girl, a little boy, and a newborn girl. (Also, by the way Potter reacted to the letter "...by the time you read this, you'll be a grandfather," it certainly seemed like she was his first grandchild, but obviously not.)
I just saw another episode reiterating the fact that Potter's horse was male. It's the one where Radar had been promoted to second lieutenant, and Hawkeye speculated that Potter's horse might be promoted, too, "from gelding to stud."
What happened with Radar's animals? First he had a whole menagerie of them, complete with their own dogtags. Then later, after Potter's arrival, he wrote to his mother telling her about finally getting a pet--a guinea pig. Then he had a whole menagerie again. During the 2 episode bug-out, he had a goat, 2 guinea pigs (who had babies while they were away) and I think one other animal. Long after Radar left, a young Korean farm boy was helping take care of a menagerie again, but after he was sent to Iowa, I don't think the animals were ever mentioned again.
Here's another one: When Korean Hemorraghic (sp) Fever first came around, Frank caught it. When his kidneys finally started up again, they showed him trotting off to the officers' latrine, and afterwards feeling fine. Much later, when they had it again, they had the patient confined to bed when his kidneys started up again, and they were very concerned over his loss of sodium and potassium, and said the disease had a twenty or thirty percent mortality rate. The first time around, the only worry they had was about giving fluids to the patients for fear that they would drown in their own tissues.
I just saw another episode reiterating the fact that Potter's horse was male. It's the one where Radar had been promoted to second lieutenant
Don't you mean Father Mulcahy? Radar started and ended as a Corporal.
He was promoted to second lietutenant for one episode. A guy who was playing poker with Hawkeye owed him money and he worked at the promotions board. So instead of paying Hawkeye he agreed to promote Radar. At the end of the episode Radar asked Hawkeye if there was anyway he could get out of being a lieutenant and return to corporal. Hawkeye said he would work on it and his friend sent a letter saying the promotion was mistake.
Also in 1 episode Radar had 2 bunny rabbits, 1 male, 1 female. The female's ovaries had to be sacrificed to determine if Margeret was pregnant. At the end of the episode radar said to the rabbits, "Now I can keep you in the same cage."
In last night's rerun there was a General Steele who bore an uncanny resemblance to Col. Potter.
Ah, yes General Steele. He had a mind like a aluminium trap.
Here's one I just remembered: Klinger got married over the radio. Much later, when his wife had built up a nice bank account with the money he sent her, she divorced him. I always wondered why Klinger didn't simply arrange to have the marriage annulled. After all, the marriage was never consummated. An annullment would mean that the marriage never took place, and therefore LaVerne would not be entitled to any of his property.
Oh, yes. Regarding the marriages of service men to Local Indigenous Personnel. One episode had men and their girls standing in line to get medical tests before getting married, including Dennis Dugan trying to marry a call girl just to send her to the states. Seemed simple enough. However, in another episode, Hawkeye had to wade through masses of red tape to help a serviceman wed the woman who had borne his child. They ended up using a little blackmail. In still another episode, Larry Wilcox abandoned his woman and son to Radar when he was ready to go home. At the last minute, he came back for them. They did not seem to anticipate any problems whatsoever. Also, at the end of the series, Klinger did not seem to have much problem in getting married (or staying behind in Korea, for that matter.)
I don't know which season or episode had this, so I'll ask here. They get a mystery novel called "The Rooster Crows at Midnight" (Or Crowed.) They don't want to wait for one person to finish reading it, so it starts getting torn apart. Of course the final page and solution are missing so they call the 90-year-old author at home, she tells them who done it, and that turns out to be wrong!
So, who did do it?? And why didn't they order another copy of that novel? Why didn't they ask for other paperbacks to be sent?
And finally, so many details of the novel are revealed (except the ending) I wonder if anybody ever actually wrote the novel? I know somebody wrote a bunch of MASH paperbacks like MASH Goes to Las Vegas, so it seems reasonable to write that mystery novel as well.
In a fourth season episode, Sidney visits the camp during a rash of practical jokes. (We later find out it's BJ having a little harmless fun.) As the episode opens, the gang is playing poker in the swamp, and someone comments on the unusual earrings Klinger is wearing. He replies that to get out of the army, he'd wear hula-hoops in his ears. All well and good. Fast forward seven years to the final season, and you'll see an episode in which Klinger invents the hula-hoop. He tries to get Charles to finance it, but the major will have nothing to do with it.
And of course you all know why you never saw Radar's left hand, don't you? Gary Burghoff has a deformed left hand, only three fingers. In reality, this would make it impossible to serve in the army in the 50s. Watch any episode, and you'll see he's always got it gloved, under his arm, holding a cup, microphone, etc. They went out of there way to hide it from us.
In the episode where they're all attending "the conference", which was actually a poker game, Edward Winter makes his first appearance, though he goes by another name (not Colonel Flagg. In fact, he's supposedly a Captain.) In subsequent episodes, he's known as Colonel Flagg. The problem though comes in the fourth season, in an episode where Bomber Pilot Arnold Chandler believes he's Jesus Christ. Both Flagg and Sydney show up in this episode, and when they meet, Flagg reminds Sydney that they played poker once - a reference to the conference. But in that episode, he wasn't Flagg.
He was probably using a phoney ID that time. In 1 ep I recall that he used 2 or 3 different IDs. At 1 point he even impersonated a Jewish Chaplain.
Seems I made an error. "A War For All Seasons" took place from New Year's Eve 1951 to New Year's
Eve 1952. Potter took command of the 4077th in
Spetember, 1952. I'm surprised (and a little re-
lieved) no one caught my error.
By the way, a little trivia question for y'all:
There were four promtions in the series. Who all
were promoted? To what rank? (In the order the
promotions happened.)
The only ones I can think of are:
Radar to 2nd Lt. (revoked)
Father Mulcahy to 2nd Lt. (did he get promoted to 1st Lt? later?)
Did Klinger get promoted to SGT?
Yeah, Klinger was promoted. Frank was also promoted after he went nuts and got shipped home.
Mulcahy was actually made Captain.
In last night's rerun, where Radar thought he had rabies, he had a racoon, a white rabbit, a turtle, a skunk, and possibly 2 other animals that weren't shown.
Something just occurred to me, thinking about Sidney; in the episode (and I really wish they'd labeled them on the air; there's only a few that I can reliably name) where Hawkeye was sleepwalking and having nightmares, they called in Sidney. Hawkeye asked Sidney if he were going crazy, and Sidney said no. Then he said "Actually, Hawkeye, you're probably the sanest man I've ever met." That having been said, consider the number of times Sidney was called in for him: the sleepwalking, the time that the smell of musty water brought back a repressed memory and made him start itching like crazy, the time the whole camp was going a little loony, and the final episode, where Hawkeye was hospitalized following the hideous incident in the bus (which I understand was based on an actual incident.)
Of course, you have to wonder about a psychiatrist who says, "Ladies and gentlemen, take my advice. Pull down your pants, and slide on the ice." He seems to be advocating indecent exposure AND getting your buns frozen.
Just how many Christmas episodes did they run?
I believe there were 4. The of the last 2 one was slightly before Christmas, the last one was just after Christmas. I tried to divide the season into real years using this. It worked out to 3 Christmases during the show.
I'm impressed. If there had been 11 Christmas episodes, it would have been rather odd, wot?
Of course, soap operas manage to have Christmas and the Fourth of July fall at the right times, even though it takes 5 (real-time) days to go through about four (soap opera) hours!
If anyone's interested, there's a great M*A*S*H page at http://mash.users.netlink.co.uk/
Among other things, it's a good source for the episode titles.
Didnt Nurse Kelley get her name in the opening credits near the end of the series' run too? Shouldn't this place her in the Characters Folder?
Nurse Kellye never had her name in the opening credits. She did get the one episode, "Hey, Look Me Over" in season 11, and maybe that's what you're thinking of, but it was never anything more than a recurring role.
Okay, really picky nit:
In the episode OR, Trapper or Henry, I can't remember which, is standing over a patient with a stethoscope hanging around his neck. It has the trademark double lumen of a Sprague stethoscope. However, I don't think Sprague-Rappaport Co. was even around during the Korean War. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong.
I don't know how a stallion could go from gelding to stud, because a gelding is a castrated stallion, & therefore sterile.
ah,shouldn't Klinger's second wife be charged
with bigamy?After all she did marry Miles O'Brien
later on on STNG episode Data's Day!!!!!)
(Just joking!!!!
)
But seriously just wanted to point out that
Rosalind Chao did play Klinger's KOREAN born
wife before playing Keiko O'Brien on STNG/DS9
the JAPANESE wife of Miles O'Brien.
Rosalind Chao did play Klinger's KOREAN born
wife before playing Keiko O'Brien on STNG/DS9
the JAPANESE wife of Miles O'Brien.
So does that make any movie in which Kenneth Branagh plays an American (with a flawless American accent no less) a nit because he usualy plays British (and is British)?
One nit I noticed was the length of Hawkeye's and Klinger's over the ear hair. I don't think that their length would go over well in the 1950's.
Don't forget the movie, Harvey-Elliot Gould as Trapper had a huge, bushy mustache, definitely non-regulation. Also, some of the patients and other G.I.'s during the series had hair that would be non-reg then. And B.J. Hunnicut also had longer hair and later on a big mustache.
I of course was just joking about the fact that
Rosalind Chao playing both Klinger's wife on
M*A*S*H and AFTERM*A*S*H and O'Brien's on TNG
and DS9.Maybe Keiko's descended or related some
how to Klinger's wife?
It is interesting though that the only characters
that ever leave in the course of the show are
Henry(killed),Frank(went batty)and Radar(discharged).
btw:In the novel Hawkeye and Trapper John know
each other prior to being stationed at the 4077th.
The novel also reveals how Trapper got the nickname of Trapper.
Scott, there was also Trapper (discharged)
Rosalind Chao is of Chinese descent, by the way.
Also amazing is the "Trapper John" M.D. spinoff with Pernell Roberts. Not one mention of Trap's time with the residents of the 4077 are ever mentioned.
And the 2 head nurses Clara 'Scorch' Willoughby &
Ernestine Shoop supposedly both served with Trap in Korea yet we never see them during Trap's tenure in Korea. Either the movie or the series.
Also amazing is the "Trapper John" M.D. spinoff with Pernell Roberts. Not one mention of Trap's time with the residents of the 4077 are ever mentioned. - Joseph J. Coppola
Actually, Joseph, I believe the very first episode of Trapper John, M.D. mentioned McIntyre's time in Korea with Hawkeye. Of course, my personal feeling is the Trapper of Trapper John, M.D. exists in an alternate reality than the one we saw in M*A*S*H. The movie is a third, separate universe.
Incoming!
Benn: I will defer to your better memory, it has been some time since it was on the air.
Is that a "Star Trek" "Mirror" universe?
Does that explain the Spockian facial hair on Trap??
LOL!
http://www.poobala.com/mashandtrap.html
This link gives a good detail of the first episode.
And why TJMD is a "Spinoff" of the Movie and not the series.
The first episode of Trapper John was one of the few I've seen. I never liked the show. Pernell's Trapper, was not the real Trapper John, McIntyre to me.
I think that in Pernell's Trapper's office, there was picture of the 4077th. It was shown like once and that was it. The last mention of the link between Trapper Adam Cartwright and the Korean War. ("Trapper Adam Cartwright"? Maybe that's how I should refer to Pernell Roberts' character from here on out?)
There was one nurse in the first three season who could've been Knocko. But I don't think she was refered to as such, but from what I remember of the two characters, they looked enough alike. Knocko did exist in the movie and the original novel, though.
I'd heard about the legalities of why Trapper John, M.D. was a spin of M*A*S*H the movie and not M*A*S*H the TV series. I'd forgotten about it, though. Thanks for the reminder, Joseph! And thanks for the link to the Crossover site. I hadn't seen it in a while. I'd almost forgotten about it.
"Incoming!"
None of the cast wore a true military-style haircut.