Hmmm…I’m not sure about that. Anyone know how we can find out? I thought we knew his name from before.
My recollection from some of the anniversary get togethers is that they said this was the first time his actual name is given.
I am not certain, but I would bet serious coin that Radar’s given name of Walter had been known about for several seasons before this episode.
(Afterall, it had BJ on it, telling Frank that just because he prayed for chocolate pudding and didn’t get any, that it didn’t mean the guy wasn’t really Jesus, so it was at least in the 3rd or 4th season—It also had Col. Potter, who was pissed off at Major Sidney Freedman for saying that as far as he could tell, the guy might just be The Real Deal…)
AFAICT, his given name was only used four times: by himself in episodes nine & 14 of season four, by Winchester in episode five of season 8, and by “Jesus” in episode 9 of season four.
I read somewhere that that anecdote was told (as factual) to the screenwriters by someone who served in a real MASH unit.
Wikipedia is so damn smart:
mmm
Since we’re doing favorite Frank Burns quotes: “I don’t chew my cabbage twice.”
And while I’m at it, one of my favorite Hawkeye quotes: (He and Margaret are in a jeep when they get a flat tire. Margaret insists on changing the tire so as not to endanger Hawkeye’s surgeon hands. She begins jacking the Jeep up while Hawkeye is still sitting in it. Margaret pauses and says, “the least you can do is get out of the Jeep.”) Hawkeye: “Never let it be said that I didn’t do the least I could have done.”
mmm
flips the switch from “irreverent” to “maudlin”
I like the Hawkeye quote when he was talking about refusing to carry a gun.
[QUOTE=Hawkeye]
I will not carry a gun… I’ll carry your books, I’ll carry a torch, I’ll carry a tune, I’ll carry on, carry over, carry forward, Cary Grant, cash and carry, carry me back to Old Virginia, I’ll even hari-kari if you show me how, but I will not carry a gun!
[/QUOTE]
I enjoyed MAS*H years ago, but two things have always bugged me about the show:
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Klinger’s attempts to get a section 8 dischage because he was “crazy”. Now, I was fairly young when the series first aired, but by the time I got to college and watched the show it reruns, it was pretty clear he was intending to fake homosexuality, but the standards and practices folks in the 60’s-70’s thought that was just too provocative, hence the coding of "crazy (BTW, is the army regualtion against homosexuality called something liek “section 8”?).
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“Spearchucker” Jones; around for just the first few episodes, I guess the writers figured out pretty fast that this kind of blatant racism was a really, really bad idea. A shame, because I think MAS*H could have benefitted from a regular African-American character (and a little less of the 4-5 interchangeable asian guest stars playing Korean; really, how many times was Mako on the show?).
Actually, he really just wanted them to think he was crazy. When they had Dr. Freedman come to interview him, the good doctor said straight out that he would note that Klinger was a homosexual and a transvestite and that he’d be sent home. Klinger was outraged at this assessment and refused to accept a discharge on these grounds. Cite.
Potter and Father Mulcahy were my favorites.
I loved the episode that taught the meaning of the word tontine
Also the episode where a solider asks for sanctuary inside the “church”. The Father wants to give it to him but others argue that it is really a mess tent. That was great episode.
I love love love MAS*H. One of my favorite episodes that hasn’t been mentioned: Blood Brothers (that’s the one where Father Mulcahy is tying to impress a visiting Cardinal.
but when he talks to the soldier with leukemia, realizes he has been rather selfish.
A strong secondary motivation was using his cross-dressing ways as a coping mechanism given the horrors around him, even if Klinger would deny it if you pointed it out to him.
I also recently finished watching it. It definitely suffered later in the run, but to me, it wasn’t so much Hawkeye’s increased preachiness, but the fact that the writers seem to have forgotten how to end an episode with a decent punch line. One example is when someone was writing a letter home, and one of the events described was Colonel Potter’s attempt to break a free-throw shooting record, which at the time was 31, but in the letter incident, he fails. Then, as the writer finishes his letter, Colonel Potter walks in and triumphantly yells, “32!” - and that’s how the episode ends. That’s…not dramatic, nor funny. From approximately season 7 and on, that flatness is sort of how most of the episodes ended.
It seems to me that Hawkeye is more screwed up than anyone else in the camp. I remember he’s claustrophobic in the CAV*E episode, he has repressed memories of his buddy trying to drown him, and there must have been other issues.
Winchester was by far my favorite character on the show, his haughty manner made his human moments that much more memorable. My favorite episode is the one in which he is introduced, where Hawkeye discovers that Winchester had moved the snake Hawkeye had put in his bed to Hawkeye’s bed, screams, and Winchester calmly says (in echo of Hawkeye’s earlier sarcastic comment) “Please…Mozart.” Beautiful.
The final episode was definitely above the level of the average episode of the later seasons.
He also had psychosomatic hiccups, if that is the right term. He thinks about his friend the pushed him into the water as a kid, nearly drowning him.
Honestly, the over-simplification of psychology is one thing the show was weak about. They have that episode where the soldier suffers from amnesia and hypnosis reveals he found his dead brother after a battle…the whole thing is a bit lame.
I loved that one. I remember Hawkeye’s dream really creeping me out as a kid. ISTR hearing the cast members wrote their own dreams?
I remember watching Major Fred C. Dobbs (S01E22) on a black and white TV. I didn’t know what Frank was pointing out on the ground at the end, or understand the humor of the jeep, until years later.
“Tonight’s double feature is Greed, and The Major was a Miner, starring Frank “There goes my transfer” Burns.”
It was sneezing, not hiccups. And really, really badly done sneezing. They should have had a stunt sneezer for Alan Alda, because his sneezes sounded like very fake screams.
I agree, a lot of the psychology was done very poorly. I especially groaned at Dr. Friedman meeting the Asian-American soldier just once, figuring out what was wrong with him and hypnotizing him to twitch his wrist.
Thought of another funny moment from early in the series. Radar talking to Burns about the time difference between Korea and the U.S. when trying to make a phone call:
I was never a Flagg fan, but some of the lines wrapped around him are wonderful.
Flagg: “I have no home, I am the wind.” and out the window he goes. crash
Hawkeye: looking out the window “I think the wind just broke his leg”
I just came in to post my favorite Frank Burns bit:
Frank: Why does everyone take an instant dislike to me?
Trapper/Hawkeye/BJ/Whoever: It saves time Frank.