I'm rarely going to post here, but a conversation on the Kitchen Sink got me thinking about M*A*S*H. I don't know the episode title but the one in black and white that is a documentary where Father Mulcahey reflects on the surgeon warming himself in the steam rising from the patients newly opened body.

Before that moment M*A*S*H was a comedy that sometimes hit drama. After that point it was drama that often hit comedy.

Of course, that's IMNSHO.

Oh, the term "Jump the Shark" is coming from a web site that uses that term for when a series hit its highpoint. That isn't to say the rest of the series is unbearable, that is to say it was down from its highpoint. The phrase refers to when Fonzie "Jumped the Shark" on Happy Days.

Well, for me it JTS as soon as McLean Stevenson and Wayne Rogers left, but that's kind of an arbitrary distinction in terms of quality; there are a lot of classic moments starring their replacements, too.
Over on the real jumptheshark.com discussion, there seems to be a rough consensus that if a jump happened it was right around the end of the sixth season. I tend to agree.

I've seen pretty well every ep - a lot of them over and over again, thank you syndication - and it's amazing, how well those first several years hold up even now; brilliant black comedy, just brilliant. The messages are still there, but cleverly intertwined into the funny (frequently hilarious) business, not preached outright. Even when the 'War is Hell' stuff was more overt, it was handled quietly and without fanfare - Henry's famous speech in 'Sometimes You Hear the Bullet' actually only runs about four lines, and it's one of the best-beloved moments in the entire run. There's another scene in which Trapper comes very close to murdering a Korean patient who contaminated and killed Trap's patient; Hawkeye very quietly informs him that 'that's not what we're about', Trapper turns to him visibly wrestling with his anguish and fury, Hawk offers to 'buy him a drink', he accepts...fade to black. There's really nothing more you need to say, and in the early years they understood that much better.

By contrast, most of the later eps have that embarrassing "Erkkkk, I thought that was Significant?" quality I more usually associate with Duran Duran and Family Ties clip shows. The 'Dreams' ep...the one where Hawkeye goes on the waggon...the one where only Klinger can see the dead soldier...the one where the nurse steps on a landmine and Hawkeye reads her diary out loud at the funeral (the last line turns out to be 'I think I'll take a walk'...any number of ones where Hawkeye develops bizarre traumas and has to give that awful keening cry again. Errrrrkkkkk.
Now, they say it was all groundbreaking dramedy, and certainly there were still a lot of people watching at the end; but to me, twenty years on, it all looks very much like a bunch of actors gradually becoming so convinced of their own sainthood that eventually they were barely interesting, let alone funny.

All of the above, of course, is IMVHO. It's been festering in my mind for qute awhile now, and watching the Season two DVD kinda brought it to the fore.

kerriem,

IMVHO? Have some confidence, girlfriend.

Oh, I have confidence enough. It's just that M*A*S*H is one of those shows with fans [not necessarily the ones at NitC, but still] that if you don't put disclaimers on the negative, they'll find out where you live and come after you with blunt instruments.

and come after you with blunt instruments

Actually, wouldn't they use sharp instruments? After all, it's difficult to do surgery (even meatball surgery) with blunt instruments!

Touche. I think I'm gonna go off and become a Teletubbies fan now, thanks...

So what should we call you now, Kerrie? La La? Po? Or (gasp!) Tinky Winky?

Mike Farrell is one actor who, it it wasn't for his involvement in various liberal political causes, would be barely a blip on the Hollywood radar. Aside from his recent role in Providence, I don't think he has done a series since M*A*S*H, just a TV movie every other year or so.

I don't think the show JTS'ed, but I'm with Kerrie, in that the tone changed drastically when Rogers and Stevenson left. Alda began to take more control of the show, which, IMHO, made it less funny and more preachy.

M*A*S*H was a series that changed over eleven years. Henry's death was tragic, but was done in a realistic way. Potter was a great replacement for Henry, it was nice to see a competent, regular Army CO who knew when to compromise at times. B.J. and Charles manged to quickly find niches in the series, and thankfully were not carbon copies of Trapper and Frank respectively. Margaert and Klinger changed significantly over the couse of the series. However, the changes were slow, gradual and realistic. I could accept these changes, and other minor inconsistenices that are inevitable in any series. For me, M*A*S*H jumped the shark when Alan Alda became Executive Producer and got creative control of the series. Although the series was still entertaining and thought provoking, the tone changed in a big way. First, the show, which was initially a Comedy/Drama, stopped being a comedy. The gags and satire seen in the first seasons disappeared in later seasons. Any comedy in the episodes were confined to subplots only. In some episodes, they didn't bother using a laugh track. M*A*S*H became another medical drama. Secondly, the show stoppped being about South Korea VS North Korea. The main theme became Hawkeye Pierce VS the U.S.Army. Alda took every opportunity to slam the Army as incompetent fools and make Hawkeye appear to occupy the moral high ground in all things. The series was very one sided in this regard. Not all the Generals were idiots, and the Army occasionally managed to get things right (ask any South Korean!) Too bad Alda never tried to show both sides of the story and let the viewers decide for themselves. Finally, Alda shamelessly used the series to promote his own liberal beliefs on everything under the sun. All conservatives were knaves and fools with no redeeming features. It was done in such a high handed, in your face manner that it grew tiresome quickly. That being said, there were still some very good episodes in the later years, especially "Dreams", "Bless You Hawkeye" and "Follies of the Living, Concerns of the Dead." The series finale was an outstanding piece of work, and Alda, to his credit, delivered his finest performance in the series, portraying Hawkeye finally going over the edge and having a full scale nervous breakdown. A fitting end for a very unique series. T*H*E*E*N*D.