The real difference is that Flagg is a comedy antagonist - so anything done to thwart him is comedy material. The other officer was a drama antagonist, so drama rules apply.
See Frank Burns (comedy) vs. Winchester (drama)
I get that. And I said I have no problem with either episode on it’s own.
Understood. MASH is just a weird case because it has both comedy and drama opponents, and so the viewer can get whiplash even though either episode alone seems fine.
It’s entirely possible the writers didn’t remember. They might not even have been the same writers from four seasons ago. And even if they were, viewers (and readers) often have a much firmer grasp of continuity issues like that than the writers themselves. Arthur Conan Doyle famously had all sorts of continuity errors in the Sherlock Holmes stories which were spotted by readers. Marvel Comics had a long-standing tradition of the “No-Prize” awarded to readers who spotted a continuity error and then fanwanked a justification for it.
I was watching Kelly’s Heroes one time and my mother commented: “There weren’t really any hippies in the army in World War 2.”
Gee, thanks for the history lesson, Mom.
If that bothered you, Harry Morgan appearing as a loon early on and then returning as a different character to command the whole thing must have really driven you nuts! It bothered me, and I barely watched the show (not because I didn’t like it, but because my academic parents weren’t much for TV and so we didn’t have one for most of my childhood).
Henry wasn’t regular Army, was he? So he would have handled the staff differently than a professional officer.
It was in the B&W television interview where Potter emphasized the doctors weren’t regular Army. He understands that and wouldn’t treat them as if they were, because he wouldn’t get the same results.
In the documentary on the making of the show (narrated by Mary Tyler Moore), Alda said they had originally wanted to recycle the appendectomy episode the way it was, but Mike Farrell objected, saying BJ would never do that. They were arguing the point when they realized Farrell’s objections would actually make a much better episode, so they changed it I thought it was interesting that in neither episode did Hawkeye express any remorse for his surgical mutilation.
For reference:
No, he wasn’t – like the others, he was a civilian doctor who got drafted. And, as noted above, when the rest of the 4077th discovered that a “regular Army” officer would be replacing Henry, there was initial trepidation, and fear that he would be running the unit “by the book.”
Seven seconds of research indicates that the movie version may have been an even bigger offender, hair-wise:
Living in the field with hair like that, head lice would be a constant problem. Which is why the military insists on men (and I suppose some women too) having short haircuts.
A brief aside: MASH wasn’t the only show where hairstyles were a problem. Gene Roddenberry wanted the males on Star Trek to adopt a futuristic cut, by they refused. The pointed sideburns they eventually wore were a kind of compromise solution. (Though one does wonder what they would have done if Shatner had decided to along with the futuristic plan. His rugs would be real collectors’ items today. 
)
Okay, end of hijack.
As someone who was around at that time, I must point out that short hair wasn’t just military discipline, it was the style back then. We kids had to get haircuts every two weeks, and adults were no different.
There was one episode of MASH where they were getting a temporary CO. Before he left for wherever he was going, Potter warned Hawkeye and BJ that his stand-in was “a real stickler for military regulations, especially hair length.” I don’t recall how the story ended, but I’m pretty sure no one got their haircut.
When he first arrived, Col. Potter put the kibosh on Klinger’s cross-dressing (“I’m finished – I gotta burn my bloomers!”) to the extent that Klinger gets a psychosomatic rash from his uniform. After a marathon surgery session Potter, Hawkeye and BJ bond in a drinking session and Hawkeye brings up Klinger. The next scene is Klinger showing up in a girly-sailor suit. Potter says, “Nice outfit!” to which Klinger responds “It’s from the Shirley Temple collection!”
Potter asserted his authority several times in ways Henry Blake never would, but he realized he had good people working for him and that he should let them run through their paces. He never shied away from reprimanding them when they went off the reservation, such as the time Hawkeye got shit-faced before a surgery.
General Steele!
Scotty’s third season haircut was weird.
True, and that makes sense for the doctors and nurses. But the 4077th had plenty of grunts, as well - you’d think Potter would be a little more stern with the motor pool guys (like Rizzo) or the cooks (like Igor).
You can’t maintain good order and discipline in a unit if you let officers break the rules but insist on strict adherence by the enlisted. If there are relaxed hair care standards for the officers, the enlisted have to be allowed the same relaxed standards. And most of those enlisted are also draftees, and Potter knows that the unit works a lot better if he treats draftees differently than he would career soldiers.
Plus, of course, the actors all have 70s hair, and it’s a convenient narrative conceit to justify that.
True. But on the other hand, RHIP. And the officers only have to answer to Col. Potter. The enlisted guys have sergeants.
Of course, this is all in-universe fanwank. As you say, it’s a bunch of actors with Seventies hair.
And Seventies porn 'stache.
