M*A*S*H: The odd thing about Goodbye Farewell and Amen

[banquo's_bumble_puppy]

spoiler alert- although it has been 26 years since the finale first aired


Did anyone else think it odd that no one who had been on the bus with Hawkeye clued on the fact that it might have been what happened to the baby that caused him to go crazy? I mean why wouldn't a psychiatrist ask about things like that not just the patient but to those around him?

[CTM VT 2K]

I think everybody BUT Hawkeye knew. It was more a matter of getting him to come to accept what actually happened. He had to come to that understanding himself.

[banquo's_bumble_puppy]

true that had also occurred to me.....would considerably shortened the episode as well:

Sydney: "Hawkeye, tell me about the baby"....

resolution

war ends

goodbyes

and

roll credits

[Gillianren]

Banquo, it wouldn't have aided his recovery any to be told. After all, wouldn't he logically just say, "No, it was a chicken"? That's how the process works. That's why there's the popular image of a therapist just saying, "Tell me how you feel about that." The therapist has to know how you feel about things, and the more they get you talking, the more they get you thinking about how you feel and what happened. Just telling someone what their problem really is wouldn't solve anything.

[Nick Theodorakis]

...That's why there's the popular image of a therapist just saying, "Tell me how you feel about that." The therapist has to know how you feel about things, and the more they get you talking, the more they get you thinking about how you feel and what happened. ...

As an aside, whereas that might be a good (if somewhat trite) approach for many patients, it's nearly worthless for many others; see this article, e.g.:

Indeed, in therapy, the standard question, "How does that make you feel?" can draw puzzled looks from even mildly alexithymic male clients, psychologists say.

Nick

[Donnie B.]

I think everybody BUT Hawkeye knew.

Everybody but Hawkeye and the audience. The "reveal" was the big shocker in the episode; it would hardly have had the same impact if we'd heard Pierce and Stanley discussing it.

I must admit that I guessed the chicken/baby thing several minutes before the reveal on first viewing. I was hosting a "Last M*A*S*H" party. Fortunately I didn't say anything, and most of my guests got the full impact. There was an audible gasp.

[banquo's_bumble_puppy]

sigh....I miss that show....still have DVDS and re-runs though

[Fazor]

Call me crazy, but I never liked M*A*S*H

ETA: now I'm quite curious about the last episode though

ETAPS: Ah, and thanks to wikipedia, no longer curious

[Gillianren]

Call me crazy, but I never liked M*A*S*H

You're crazy. Also, you fail at periods.

[Fazor]

But they use the stars! It's one of the things that always bugged me about M*A*S*H.

ETA: Oh, you mean at the end of the statement. Well here, I'll use two to make up for it..

[mahesh]

Call me crazy, but I never liked M*A*S*H

ETA: now I'm quite curious about the last episode though

ETAPS: Ah, and thanks to wikipedia, no longer curious

Yeah...like Gillian says...about the periods...
and you are crazy Fazor...how could you not like Radar and Klinger and Beejay and Hawkeye and...Hot Lips, the Padre...i could go on...you are missing the whole party man!

[LaurelHS]

I think it was more than what happened to the baby that made Hawkeye go crazy. That was terrible, but I think it also had to do with how much suffering and death he'd already seen over the course of the war.

[banquo's_bumble_puppy]

triovia question-

How many times did Hawkeye "go crazy"? I count 4....

The dream episode where his childhood friends were having bad things happen to them.
The sneezing episode.
The sleepless episode.
Goodbye, Farewell and Amen.
Was there a separate sleep-walking ep.?
Also, Adams Ribs was borderline.....

Hawkeye just wasn't stable

[CTM VT 2K]

....
Hawkeye just wasn't stable

I don't know many people who could be stable under such circumstances. Look at the rest of them. I think that is part of the message of M*A*S*H, in the insanity of war (even the relatively safe hospital part of it) to the outside observer everyone is insane. My grandfather was an aid-station medic in WWII. It haunted him for the rest of his life. My uncle was a Combat Engineer who nearly didn't make it through the Battle of the Bulge - he was clearly a bit crazy to me 40 years later. War - especially dealing with the casualties of it - is a horridly sanity-draining experience. Despite all the jokes and humor of M*A*S*H that underlying message is quite clear. Much of the humor is clearly an example of normal human defensive mechanisms (the same kind of pranks and jokes are told among ER staffs and EMS crews).

If you can endure the stresses and challenges portrayed without cracking at least a little bit on at least one or two occasions then you are not human. Also remember, by the end of the run, it was pretty much just Hawkeye and Margaret who had been there in the pilot (not counting the original movie, though their characters were there). They both had more opportunities to crack during the 11 season run than the others who were there for fewer episodes.

And to the other point, I believe you left out Hawkeye's ranting to the Korean family after his jeep wreck (full episode stream-of-consciousness monologue).

[Donnie B.]

Curiously, the only sane person in the group was the one who spent the war in drag! Klinger was M*A*S*H's version of Catch-22.

I'm not sure post-concussion syndrome qualifies as "crazy", at least as we're using the term here.

[Moose]

IIRC, Radar and Potter weathered the stress remarkably well throughout their tenures as well. Potter's WWII experience would have helped, and Radar was young/innocent enough to let most of it roll off his back.

But yeah, in his strange way, Klinger was a rock throughout the series. I guess the Section-8 antics were a great way to blow off a lot of steam, very quickly. Of course, neither Radar nor Klinger had the burden of life-or-death so constantly on them like the doctors and nurses did.

[Nick Theodorakis]

It seems that the writers, and perhaps everyone else, grew tired of Klinger's section 8 antics because by the end he was more conventional in his manner.

Nick

[Moose]

It makes sense in a way, for two reasons: first, as Alda's influence on production grew, the show trended away somewhat from its early sitcom format.

In story, it makes sense for Klinger to have settled down a bit once he inherited the full burden of Radar's responsibilities. And by then, he certainly wasn't under any real expectation that the Section 8 game would work. It was something more-or-less reserved for visiting brass and blowing off steam.

[Buttercup]

I think everybody BUT Hawkeye knew. It was more a matter of getting him to come to accept what actually happened. He had to come to that understanding himself.

Yes, that was my take on it too. First saw that episode in re-run about 7 years ago. I couldn't imagine why Hawkeye would have a nervous breakdown over a smothered chicken, and figured something much more ominous and tragic had occurred.

I could like MASH better if it weren't for the '70s hairstyles and "1960's Berkeley protesters" style writing. I'm referring to a desire for authenticity here.

My father was in the Korean War and based on his sharp recollections of the 1950's, that war and its times...let's just say I don't see/recognize that reflected in MASH. Half the time I think it's the Vietnam War they're in [no surprise].

Otherwise, yeah: A good show overall. Radar is my favorite, and then Father Mulcahy.

[ToSeek]

Moved from OTB to SM@L, with a redirect.

[Nick Theodorakis]

...
Half the time I think it's the Vietnam War they're in [no surprise].
...

Especially no surprise since it's generally accepted that MASH was actually an allegory about the Viet Nam war, or war in general.

Nick

[Buttercup]

Especially no surprise since it's generally accepted that MASH was actually an allegory about the Viet Nam war, or war in general.

Yes, yes...but it's misleading/misrepresentative of my father's generation and Korean war vets to portray them thusly. My father was born in 1932, was a product of The Great Depression. While rock 'n roll was blasting onto the scene [just as dad was off to Korea], men his age were still "old school" and didn't go around lipping off to authority and making "I hate war" 60's-ish type comments [especially not to the media, as MASH characters were apt to do]. Theirs was a Ours is not to reason why; ours is just to do or die mindset. Obey authority. Etc.

I'm not trying to criticize either generation, btw. Things changed.

And of course MASH was on the air during the Vietnam era. Obviously the writers "took a different route"; but still, it doesn't represent my father's generation.

[Gillianren]

Buttercup, you are aware that it's based, however loosely, off a book by an actual Korean War MASH surgeon, right? Further, they got a lot of their stories from other actual Korean War vets. There's a tradition of drafted men protesting wars that goes back as long as there's been a draft--and just about everyone there was drafted.

As for the ranting to the Korean family, yeah, that doesn't count as Hawkeye being crazy. Just minorly brain-damaged. It's also one of my favourite episodes. I also like all the ones where Hawkeye actually does go crazy, not least because I've always really wished I could have Sidney as my doctor. Also, I've had a crush on Hawkeye about as long as I can remember.

[Buttercup]

No, Gillianren, I didn't know that.

They may have gotten the stories from actual Korean war vets, but not the attitudes. Not to hear my father and his buddies speak of it anyway...

But I wasn't there.

[Gillianren]

Okay. If that's what you think.

[Donnie B.]

The actor who portrayed Father Mulcahey liked to playfully assert that M*A*S*H was a show about a chaplain in Korea.

[SolusLupus]

Yes, yes...but it's misleading/misrepresentative of my father's generation and Korean war vets to portray them thusly. My father was born in 1932, was a product of The Great Depression. While rock 'n roll was blasting onto the scene [just as dad was off to Korea], men his age were still "old school" and didn't go around lipping off to authority and making "I hate war" 60's-ish type comments [especially not to the media, as MASH characters were apt to do]. Theirs was a Ours is not to reason why; ours is just to do or die mindset. Obey authority. Etc.

I'm not trying to criticize either generation, btw. Things changed.

And of course MASH was on the air during the Vietnam era. Obviously the writers "took a different route"; but still, it doesn't represent my father's generation.

My grandfather grew up in that age, and I know that he was rather disillusioned in the Korean War; it was one of the many reasons he refused to go into the Vietnam War, even though he was offered a relatively cushy job in a relatively "safe" area there.

Also, perhaps your father isn't the authority that you think he is? It's one person and his group of friends, in a war that had many many more soldiers involved; we could play "war of the anecdotes" if you wish, but I don't think that it would lead anywhere, as it seems to be a case of projection (projecting one person's experiences and personality over a much larger group).

[Rue]

Ironically, this is the only show to get banned from the Armed Forces Korea Network, the TV channel for US service personnel stationed in Korea. The censors said it portrayed Koreans as "typical Asians."

[SolusLupus]

I wouldn't know, honestly; I'm not much of a watcher of the show. I have lived in Korea for 1/4th of my life, though.

[Daffy]

M*A*S*H*: A great show that went on about 2 seasons too long.