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M*A*S*H

Discussion in 'Shows' started by Harrison Gentleman, Dec 18, 2017.

  1. Harrison Gentleman

    Harrison Gentleman Old-School Gentleman

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    So, anyone here a fan of M*A*S*H, the Korean War action-dramedy that was a thinly veiled allegory for the Vietnam War?

    Personally, I love it. I just started watching it on Hulu and Spike TV and it's a good show. Even if it's just thirty minutes of Alan Alda playing grab-ass with his squad-mates every episode, I love it.

    Oddly enough, my uncle, who served in Afghanistan, says that M*A*S*H is one of the more accurate depictions of life in the military. When you're deployed in a war zone, you spend most of the time bored out of your wits and looking for anything to pass the time and relieve the tension. M*A*S*H captures that quite well, actually, at least according to him.

    My favorite characters are Hawkeye and Radar O'Reilly. Anyone else here a fan of the show?
     
    Last edited: Dec 18, 2017
  2. Erika

    Erika RL incel hunter

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    MASH is a great show, I watched it twice as a kid and as an adult, I will say do not watch the movie after you have seen the show. The film is amazing don't get me wrong, but fuck it's dark. It's got some humor but it's not zany BJ hunnicut pulling pranks style. It's hard to do.

    I really liked the show but when Alan Alda got in control it got really preachy, and dumbed the show down, slowed plots and killed humor off. I don't think anyone watched it thought oh wow war is neat and I like this. We understood, it was people in a stressful sad situation trying to make sanity in anyway, be it chasing skirts, drinking, jokes.

    All the spin offs are god awful, like words beyond. A funny thing Klinger was always my favorite and as a kid I had no idea his favorite baseball team was real. Now I can go to my grave saying I've seen the mud hens :)

    MASH also has set a lot of records and has a lot of famous moments in it, like when (spoiler) col blake died. Radar went in to read the news with out telling any of the actors what the scene was so that whole heart wrench, was ad lib. Very impressive. At its time and for a long time running MASH's last episode was the most watched thing ever on tv. It was a touch over 75% of TVs in the US were watching it.

    Like it or not, MASH probably should be one of those shows protected like really old movies in the library of congress.
     
  3. ICanFeelTheCosmos0704

    ICanFeelTheCosmos0704 friend of little cat

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    I really like M*A*S*H too, and like the others said, it's a great piece of Americana.

    I remember someone on KF saying that military units are like the one in the show, too, because you have no idea what the future is going to be like so you might as well try to have as much fun with your buddies as possible. They also say being in the military is 10% terror and 90% boredom.

    I think I like most of the cast, even Frank Burns, although I liked Winchester better, even if he was an arrogant, patrician Bostonian. Yeah, Klinger is also one of my favorites, and he meets people even crazier than he is in the course of the series who get Section 8'ed out of the army.

    Also, Klinger's fate is pretty hilarious

    He marries a Korean girl and looks for her family, so he stays in Korea

    My favorite episode is probably the one when the old Korean cavalry soldier takes Colonel Potter's horse, and Potter lets him have his horse until the old Korean guy dies.
     
  4. Erika

    Erika RL incel hunter

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    That's another thing MASH did so well, Frank and Winchester, were great foils, not even bad guys, just foils. When shit hit hard, the care of being doctors, and your fellow service member kicked in.

    Frank was just a by the books to a fault semi selfish, guy. Winchester, was interesting since both him and Hawkeye were rich boys from New England. Being the holidays time, there's that one episode where Winchester shows a heart of gold with donating to the kids it's really sweet and he tries to hide it to keep his snobby attitude. It's a great blend of wacky and heart felt.

    Also, MASH had a ton of big guests stars one of the first shows to really do it.
     
  5. Thomas Jerome Newton

    Thomas Jerome Newton That's right the Mascara Snake, fast and bulbous

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    I remember watching this show a ton when I was a kid. It's one of my mom's favourite shows, so back then it was almost always playing on our T.V. I can only imagine how much of the show must've flown over my dumb little 6 year-old head back in the day. Hearing Suicide is Painless with the lyrics for the first time shocked me when I realized that this was the original version of that cheery theme song from the show. I should probably watch it for real now that I'm an adult. I remember thinking that the History Channel doesn't play it nearly as much as they used to nowadays, but I don't watch cable anymore so what the hell do I know.
     
    Harrison Gentleman likes this.