How MASH is going

[sholio]

I keep meaning to post about this in more detail, but I've mainly just been watching and enjoying it. I've now seen about half of seasons 1 and 4, scattered episodes from 2 and 3, all of 6-8, and assorted episodes from the rest of it, including the finale. I don't normally watch things like this, but I keep deciding to watch straight through and then getting sidetracked by Yet Another Episode that I just have to watch. I really do intend to watch the whole thing; it's just looking like it's going to be all over the place. Then I might have to ACTUALLY watch it straight through to appreciate the evolution of characterization and writing. (One of the ??? of the Abyss is definitely rewatching the 11-season show you just watched to micro-analyze the character arcs in detail.)

It's somehow easier to throw random comments on Tumblr, where I've posted (spoilery) meta rambles about 8x22 "Dreams" and 11x03 "Foreign Affair" and I also got an unexpected amount of reblog traction surrounding this random screencap of Charles and kids.

(I continue to be completely gone on Charles, but I've also gone down a Hawkeye hole at a speedrun, I love Margaret's character evolution, and basically they're just all great.)

In random not-my-stuff, I recced this "Marching On" MASH vid in my previous MASH post, but it really is a brilliant encapsulation of the series, its mood switches, and all its many changes over time without being too spoilery. I've been watching it a lot.

Watch on YouTube

Comments

[sholio]

I watched the whole thing as a teenager (probably multiple times) but I haven't seen most of it since then except for sporadic episodes here and there, and it's just such a fascinating experience! I literally remember some things all these years later - the

disturbing spoiler with child harm

dead baby whose mom smothered it to keep it quiet

in particular has stuck with me without my remembering what it was from (I thought it was from something way grittier than MASH!) but also some of the playful jokey stuff; in fact I've realized that some of our childhood games and catch phrases came from jokes on this show. But it's been so interesting to also relate to it as an adult and get a bunch of new things out of it!

[timespirt]

dead baby whose mom smothered it to keep it quiet

I thought I saw an episode on Tour of Duty that dealt with that.

[nocowardsoul]

Like several of the show's plotlines, it was based on real life. Burt Metcalfe mentions it in this interview.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nBnJE2CA3BA&feature=youtu.be

[sholio]

Thank you for the link! Oh, that's really fascinating that the MASH units operated all the way into the 90s, and some of the creative team visited them for ideas.