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* The pilot has Hawkeye and Trapper raising money to get Ho-Jon to college. He appears in a few further episodes, then [[ChuckCunninghamSyndrome mysteriously vanishes.]] In the episode "Ping Pong," Hawkeye makes a throwaway joke about their houseboy being drafted two years ago. Did Ho-Jon get drafted? Or rather, "drafted," as we get multiple mentions about how South Korean draft boards were essentially kidnappings.
[[AC:FridgeLogic]]
* If one of the camp's four doctors was hopelessly incompetent, how did they have a 97% survival rate?
** I believe Hawkeye would say that Frank is responsible for the other 3%.
*** But given the volume of patients they regularly had, and only had '''four''' doctors, they could not have such a high success rate if one of those doctors, who shared in about 25% of the load, was totally incompetent, and killed more patients than he saved.
*** Not all the doctors perform ''surgery'' all the time. One has to man triage, for example.
*** But not every time. Throughout Frank's stay, all four doctors are shown in the [=OR=] at once the majority of the time, with Frank rarely doing triage.
*** Not all wartime injuries are life-threatening. They probably had a ''lot'' of lesser injuries and illnesses to treat, that would account for most of that 97%; we just don't see these less-serious cases very often because they're less dramatic than the life-or-death ones.
*** Henry, in an early episode, tells Frank that Pierce is a better surgeon "when the heat is on." Most likely, Frank is a qualified surgeon in his own right (before he got {{Flanderized}}, at least) but he can't keep his cool when he has to hurry, like when they are overwhelmed with patients. As long as he can take his time and go by the book, Frank will have a successful operation, but drops the ball when having to do 'meatball surgery'.
*** In at least one episode, someone states that Frank handles the simpler operations, so he gets less chances to screw up.[[note]]That was Major Houlihan in episode 5x13 "The Colonel's Horse". She was having her appendix taken out.[[/note]]
** He may be incompetent but not lethally so. So he can perform the needed work but not to the standard of the others, so he may leave excessive scarring, maybe nick an organ or mess something up while working in a way that negatively impacts the patient in a way that doesn't kill them.
*** Not to mention that we rarely hear about what happens to the casualties once they've left the camp, but there's no reason that the doctors couldn't have gotten word from the 121st Evac that one of their patients didn't make it. Who's to say that several of Frank's patients don't croak at the evac hospital? In multiple episodes he fails to diagnose simple conditions - hypothermia in one that leads him to write off a patient that was presumably saved, shock in another that nearly lets a patient die to renal failure - cuts corners, and has no investment in his patients. It all tallies up to put Frank squarely in the area of "we need every cutter we can get, no matter ''how'' incompetent he is." The same shortage that got the other surgeons out of so much trouble kept Frank from being reassigned to a morgue detail.
** The series is never entirely clear on whether Frank is wasting his true talent as a butcher or if he is fairly competent surgeon, though still nowhere near as good as the others, and they are just making fun of that fact. We really only have their word for Frank being terrible. He easily gets stressed and snaps at the nurses when he gets flustered and asks for the wrong instrument. He prioritizes American soldiers over all others, no matter the severity of the injuries, due to a strict interpretation of guidelines and on at least one occasion he nearly cut out the last kidney of a patient because he didn't look at the X-ray. But the camp still has a very high survival-rate, so he must at least be keeping his patients alive.
*** If we take the book as canon, Frank chose not to do a surgical residency, going straight into private practice with his father, who wasn't a qualified surgeon either, because he wanted to start raking in the money right away. Residency is an extremely important learning experience for surgeons, and I sure wouldn't let anyone perform surgery on me who skipped that step. This backstory is hinted at in "Chief Surgeon Who?" as well.
*** It is important to remember this was a different era. While residency training was rapidly becoming the norm, it would not at all have been uncommon to have a large number of non-residency trained physicians - including surgeons - in the community. Residency then was like a sub-specialty fellowship is today. While there are fellowships in things like "laparoscopic surgery" today, if you have your gallbladder taken out today it almost certainly will be done by a general surgeon who has not completed a fellowship in such things.
*** There are also references to Frank being just plain careless, quite apart from his skill level. For example, he removes part of a man's large intestine without exteriorizing it, simply to save time. Later in the episode, it comes up that a previous patient of his got peritonitis after he used the same shortcut. He shows no remorse. The perceived lack of skill may be a lack of interest in his patients' well-being.
** Their success is probably due as much to a superior nursing and support staff, as to the surgeons.
** A few things: First, in military medicine there is something known as "MASH Syndrome." This is the belief by line officers and politicians that casualties in a conflict are mostly if not exclusively surgical. In reality, the opposite is true. The only US conflict that had more soldiers lost to surgical rather than medical problems was the invasion of Grenada. In reality, the vast majority of patients cycling through a MASH would have been those needing basic medical care. In addition, the vast majority of patients would have needed very basic care, i.e. "flesh wounds", "fractures" and the like. Burns was not a completely incompetent surgeon, I believe Blake called him a "fair but competent" surgeon (or something like that.)
*** Henry even says to Pierce about Frank that the latter is "A good surgeon, and we need him" in the episode "Henry, Please Come Home", and that "[Hawkeye and Trapper should] lay off him"; which is the same episode where the 4077th gets their 90+% rating. It works with the timeline, where Frank's real problem is he doesn't cope well with pressure; and since the first few seasons all take place over a span of a few very hectic months, we see Frank arrive as no worse than an uptight but competent doctor and gradually crumble as the stress of the war, not to mention Hawkeye and Trapper's often egregious bullying, take its toll on him until breaks down entirely.
** We should bear in mind that, for the most part, the people saying that Frank was a terrible doctor were people who had a deep personal dislike of him. Not without good reason, of course, but the point is, they may have been predisposed to judge Frank as harshly as possible in just about any aspect of their lives. It is possible that they were making Frank out to be a worse surgeon than he actually was. They didn't do this with Charles, but that was likely because (1) Charles, unlike Frank, sometimes showed a good side to his personality, and (2) Charles was simply too skilled a surgeon for anyone to credibly say that he wasn't.
* One story has Potter and Klinger bartering with a Canadian unit for curare, an anesthetic banned by US officials. The unit they dealt with was the Princess Patricia's Light Infantry, an Alberta regiment. So what was an infantry regiment doing with surgical anesthetic? There were two Canadian medical units in Korea at the time, the No. 25 Canadian Field Ambulance and No. 37 Field Ambulance, yet the writers chose [[SmallReferencePools the most prolific Canadian infantry regiment]].
** They probably just wanted to use a unit name that Americans might recognize, but it also suggests a possible bit of fridge horror: since in the real world, curare was a weapon long before it was a medicine, and an infantry regiment would have no ''medical'' reason to keep a supply of a powerful paralytic, were the Canadian Forces involved in secret chemical warfare?
*** The episode (as do many others others) illustrates that anything of value could be put on the trading block between units. It's entirely plausible that the Canadian unit had taken in the curare in a previous trade, knowing it had high value to a medical unit.
*** The irony being that Charles almost kills a patient with curare early on, but is the first to tout its effectiveness in trained hands like theirs.
*** Which brings on even more FridgeLogic, since Charles would have likely studied everything he could about curare so he could avoid that mistake again in the future, meaning he'd be likely to know more about it than the others.
*** While Charles did mishandle the curare, the error was mistaking it for morphine when he was trying to relieve severe pain in a post-surgical patient rather than in how he used it for its intended purpose. (While he erred in not properly verifying the label of the drug he was about to administer, someone also made an equally serious error in putting a vial of a drug only useful in surgery in the ready drugs tray of the post-op ward. Such a drug should only be out for use in pre-op or the OR itself.)
*** That raises the question of why it was there to be misplaced in the first place. The US Army never approved its use to begin with (which makes the comment in the other episode that high command banned its use inaccurate).
*** The best explanation (if in the MASH universe the Army hadn't previously allowed it) is that while the Army didn't necessarily approve its use, they did tend to look the other way. Then in this episode, they refused to do that any more.
*** It seemed out of character for Charles to not look at the label first, given the extremely high standards to which he holds himself.[[note]]Consider the realistic way he initially assesses his work in "Major Ego", where he'd declared his patient's cardiac arrest "impossible, this is a routine operation!" -- before starting resuscitation.[[/note]] Sure, in meatball surgery there might not be time and you'd have to trust that the nurse or tech was giving you the right thing, but this was post-op. If he couldn't see, he'd take the bottle over to the light. His reaction to having screwed up was also more Frank-like. Since this was an early Charles episode, maybe they weren't sure of his character, so they had him do a Frank-like thing.
*** It shows that Charles thinks he is so much better that he thinks he couldn't possibly make a simple mistake as that one so he doesn't need to show immense care.
* How was the jeweler in "Patient 4077" able to reproduce Margaret's ring, down to the size and the font and type of the engraving, that she only notices it's a fake because it says "Over Hill Over Dale, Our Love Will Ever Fail", if he's never seen it?
** It was implied that Donald had bought her a cheap ring of the same design to give to her, and a ring size is easy enough to find out about a person (especially if Margaret had filed any sort of lost property paperwork). As for the font, it was probably wrong as well, given how quickly her eye was drawn to the inscription after Klinger gave the fake to her. A change in font, especially on a ring you didn't have very long, can be written off as a trick of memory, but the dropped letter was the giveaway.
** Possibly Penobscott, fake romantic that he is, used a common, unoriginal font. Conceivably, the jeweler could have chosen the same one by coincidence.
*** The jeweler recognized Penobscot's line as cheesy garbage (recall that he comments "Pee-yew"). It's not all that far-fetched to think he'd then deduce a cheap "meh, whatever" font had been used for the real ring and choose that same font for the fake.
** Mr. Shin (guy who sells it to them) says "a guy in Tokyo" sold it to him and makes them by the dozen. Presumably, the guy in Tokyo also sells the engraving tools by the dozen - meaning that he would have the same font.
** When Mr. Shin said that his friend in Tokyo makes the rings by the dozen, and describes it as "easy job, cheap setting, miracle glue," B.J. remarks, "Sounds like Penobscott's style." This could be interpreted as the show saying that Penobscott actually bought his ring from Mr. Shin's friend in Tokyo. If so, it would make sense that Mr. Shin would know what style of lettering to use, especially if his friend used the same basic style for all of those rings, which he probably would for such a cheap ring.
* Klinger is a deserter. Despite Potter not swearing him in, Klinger ''did'' sign a reenlistment contract, and the Army isn't likely to let someone out of it because they signed in the heat of the moment. By staying in Korea, and (assuming After MASH was a thing) later returning to Toledo, he should have been arrested on sight.
** Couldn't Potter--or even Klinger, himself--simply have "misplaced" the document before it was sent up the line to I-Corps?
** Not likely. The recruiter had the paperwork with him when he left, so odds are that it was processed even before Klinger's "Corporal Godiva" routine.
** The episode gives us to understand that the reenlistment wasn't final unless and until Klinger was sworn in, which he wasn't. I don't know if this reflects real life, but that's how it's presented in the show.
** The contract may have not been regarded as valid, because it's quite clear that Klinger was drunk when he signed it. That plus Potter seeming to know half the US military above the rank of Major, probably got it thrown out without much trouble. If nothing else, Klinger knows clerks at I-Corps who could disappear it.
** A reenlistment must be approved by the unit commander. Obviously, Colonel Potter did not give his approval given his behavior later in the episode. So the "contract" was not worth the paper it was written on.
* Hawkeye's gray hair in the later seasons is actually a lot more realistic than people may like to think. Hawkeye's hair remains jet black in the first three seasons, then starts to slowly, yet progressively gray more and more with each passing season, till right around Season Eight, where's definitely got a salt and pepper look to it. Now, ignoring the fact that the series ran three times as long as the actual Korean War, let's think of this: war takes a toll on people, not just mentally and emotionally, but physically as well. Three miles from the front, on call almost 24 hours a day, putting up with occasional deluges, mortar fires, and other such catastrophes, it was wearing down on him... not to mention, Hawkeye even lampshaded this idea with his father over his mistaken death certificate: "He just rattles around in that empty house all by himself, sells my things to the Salvation Army, ''and ages a couple of years for every day he thinks I'm dead.''" The same could be applied to others as well: B.J. came to Korea with brown hair that was a dirty blonde by the end, Father Mulcahy had bright red hair that too also got blonder and blonder, and Margaret was almost platinum by the end. The war took a physical toll on them as well.
** [[WordOfGod William Christopher]] even pointed this out in a recent interview on how he knew it was time for the series to end: "My hair was turning gray."
* As far as the series' timeline goes, the first season has to take place in less than nine months, because in the season finale, Henry receives word from home that his wife is about to give birth to another child, to which even Radar remarks, "At least you were home for the important part."
* In "The Joker is Wild," a big deal is made at the end of how Hawkeye was the only one who got pranked, as the whole staff was in on it. Except the bet was that B.J. could prank everyone on the staff, not just Hawkeye. B.J. didn't actually prank any of them because they were in on it and faked the entire thing. By their own admission, no actual pranks took place, not even the others allowing themselves to be pranked. So ''why'' does everyone say Hawkeye lost the bet?
** B.J., when leveling the proposal on the rest of the staff, never actually names ''himself'' as the person pulling the prank. The perpetrator is an unnamed "someone" who might theoretically prank the entire staff. Well, if the rest of the staff is part of this theoretical "someone" (which is also used to indicate an ambiguous number, not just identity), who else is there to prank but Hawkeye? B.J. never fesses up to the pranks that the rest of the staff pull on themselves. Even his taunting of Hawkeye after Klinger supposedly falls for it isn't an admission; when he holds up a finger, he isn't telling Hawkeye he's the last to be pranked. He's telling Hawkeye that there's only one member of the staff ''being'' pranked! Had Hawkeye not fallen apart, the ''rest'' of the staff would have lost.
*** I'm inclined to doubt that. I don't think B.J. was ever that good a sport. Certainly, the fact that Hawkeye was visibly crumbling so completely made it ''easier'' for B.J. to claim victory, but even if Hawkeye had spent the entire day acting normally, B.J. probably would have still insisted that Hawkeye lost because he ''must'' have been feeling anxious about the impending prank, even if he didn't show it. The only real way that Hawkeye could have won the bet is if he somehow figured out that none of the pranks he'd been seeing played on the other characters were real and that B.J. was only making him think that he was going to be pranked when he wasn't. Even then, B.J. probably would have still claimed an out because there was no way that Hawkeye could have been sure that B.J. wasn't really going to do something to him.
*** In order for a bet to be valid, all participants must agree to it before beginning. Also, if you wish to change the terms of the bet, then you have to get all of the other participants to agree to the change. You cannot expect somebody to pay off a bet that he never agreed to, nor can you unilaterally change the terms of an agreement and claim that the other party is still bound by the agreement. That's absurd. B.J. obviously knew that, in Hawkeye's mind, they were all agreeing to a bet in which B.J. had 24 hours to prank all six of the other participants. Hawkeye never agreed to a bet in which B.J. only had to prank him alone in order to be declared the winner. Meaning that the only bet Hawkeye agreed to was one that B.J. did not fulfill the victory conditions for. It was completely unfair for Hawkeye to be judged the loser of a bet that either (1) his opponent did not win, or (2) he never agreed to in the first place. If I had been in Hawkeye's place, I would have absolutely refused to pay off the bet. I would have told B.J. and the others that they essentially outsmarted themselves, because they concocted a brilliant plan, but never realized that their brilliant plan didn't actually fulfill the victory conditions of the bet.
* The episode "Rainbow Bridge". The plot is that the 4077th is treating a number of Chinese prisoners, and is somehow contacted by a Chinese field hospital who has in its care some UN troops. The Chinese, not capable of treating the UN troops up to their level of care, want to arrange a prisoner swap at the titular bridge, on the condition that Hawkeye, Trapper, Radar and Frank come unarmed to the swap. When they arrive, they are confronted by numerous Chinese guards carrying submachine guns. When it's revealed that Frank snuck a handgun (a tiny derringer that looks like it could have come out of a box of Cracker Jack, really) the commanding Chinese doctor launches into an anvilicious tirade about US actions ("Is it not enough that your planes harass us day and night? It makes it impossible for me to treat my own people. We make a civilized gesture, and you respond by coming here with a gun ready to shoot us down.") and is about ready to call off the exchange. At which point, Hawkeye browbeats Frank into surrendering the gun and makes an impassioned plea for the exchange to go on as planned. The intended Aesop seems to be "take any proffered olive branch during a war, especially if it saves lives", but it falls apart when you consider ''the Chinese were flagrantly violating the very conditions they demanded of Hawkeye'' et. al. ''by bringing armed men to the rendezvous point.'' Granted, there was no explicit condition prohibiting this, but it's at least a DoubleStandard. Not to mention, the Chinese doctor complaining about trying to treat people while being bombed? If you watch the show, you'll see the 4077th in this exact situation frequently. As the Chinese ''could'' have been laying a trap and taken Hawkeye and the others prisoner or gunned them down with impunity, it seems more likely that the AccidentalAesop was "You know what? [[JerkassHasAPoint This once, in retrospect, Frank was probably right.]]"
** Where exactly does this become FridgeLogic or Fridge ''anything'' for that matter? Anyone with any brains (i.e. not Frank or Margaret) would realize that the Chinese would not go back on a deal like that to knock off or capture a couple of surgeons and corpsmen, what with the damage a betrayal like that would do to their ability to make future exchanges. If they proved by killing or capturing the 4077 crew that was sent, no future exchanges would be allowed. The doctor complaining about being bombed has nothing to do with the issue, and the Chinese troops having guns is reasonable since ''it's fifty miles behind their lines and they are making a gesture by handing over the prisoners without demanding anything in exchange.'' Of course it's a double standard, neither side has any reason to trust the other. For all the Chinese know the 4077 crew could have a bunch of soldiers with them to "rescue" their wounded and take a bunch of prisoners.
* In "Death Takes a Holiday", Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret try to keep a soldier alive past midnight (his wounds are fatal, it's only a question of ''when'' he dies) so his family won't have to remember Christmas as the day he died. In the end, they fail, and Hawkeye moves the hands on the clock and they falsify the record. They could have just said, "Hey, let's leave him and go to the Christmas party and check him after midnight. When we find him dead, who's to say what time he died?"
** Because they're going to do their best to do it legitimately, and it seems like Hawkeye only thinks to just falsify the death certificate when the soldier finally dies just before midnight. Besides, if ''you'' had just left a man to die, could you enjoy the party?
** Falsifying a death certificate is ''hugely'' illegal, and Hawkeye is the only one who thinks of it when they fail.
*** Actually, this is not correct. To be illegal, such falsification must be "material." With the time of death, there is always ambiguity and it is impossible to say that a 30 minute change in the time of death was actually material. In fact, in the military, the time of death is frequently misreported. A service member's family gets the most benefits if he dies within 30 days of being medically retired. So if a soldier came in to a military hospital essentially "dead", we would complete the medical retirement process (maybe 90 minutes, tops), and then - and only then - officially declare him dead. So what Hawkeye did was not at all unusual, and it is possible that this relatively common scenario was the basis for the story.
*** Even if the above weren't true, you still have to find a person willing to court martial. Giving the reason, I doubt even Frank (had he been there) would have.
** If anything, they were probably ''avoiding'' going to the party. At that point, Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret were all thoroughly depressed. They knew they wouldn't be able to enjoy the party. And if they went, it would be very difficult for them to hide how unhappy they were. If their friends at the party saw they were feeling down, they would naturally ask what was wrong, and it could wind up bringing the entire party down.
* Why did Klinger and Soon Lee manage to get married after only a day or two of being engaged, when [[Recap/MashS2E7LIPLocalIndigenousPersonnel "L.I.P. (Local Indigenous Personnel)"]] suggested it would take months? Simple: they didn't have Klinger's scrounging and Potter's connections to speed things up.
** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.
* In "Oh, How We Danced," a man named Key Yong Lu, who is grateful to the 4077 personnel for treating his grandson, offers to teach Charles karate after he is assaulted by an irate unit commander. The problem with this is that karate is a Japanese martial art, and is unlikely to have been known or taught in 1950's Korea. A Korean martial artist would be far more likely to practice and teach Taekwondo. Arguably, though, it might simply have been [[ArtisticLicenseMartialArts more practical for the show to use karate]] instead of Taekwondo in this episode, given that an American television audience would be more likely to know what karate is.
* In "Give and Take," Colonel Potter says, "General Crenshaw is demanding 100% participation" in the charity drive, with every officer expected to donate $10 and every enlisted person $3. It is also stated that if this is not achieved, then both Potter (as CO of the 4077th) and Charles (who was assigned the task of being charity collection officer) would get in trouble ... Okay, who exactly changed the definition of the word "charity"? How can it be an act of charity if people are ''required'' to donate? Aren't charitable donations supposed to be voluntary? The episode does not say that the personnel who didn't donate would be in trouble, only the unit's commanding officer and charity collections officer. But threatening to punish somebody else if the 4077th's personnel don't all donate to the charity drive is still pressuring, or arguably forcing, the staff to donate to the charity drive. Forcing people to make donations under threat of punishment is completely contrary to what "charity" fundamentally means.
** In Vietnam, soldiers who had just received their paychecks would be heavily pressured to donate to various charitable causes, as the charity table was set up right next to where they'd get their scrip (military money). The table would be staffed with an officer or two who would heavily imply that the soldiers should donate the recommended amount if they knew what was good for them. I know someone who was a company commander in Vietnam: he hated the practice, and he'd go with his men to the pay counter and loudly tell them ''"You don't have to donate if you don't want to."'' The brass wasn't happy with that, and he wasn't a company commander very long.
** The people who, as BJ puts it, "sent us to war to ''make peace''" aren't really concerned with things like the fundamental meanings of things. It's the same military that won't allow them any real amount of supplies or virtually anything that would make their job easier, for various absurd reasons. And as it portrays generals being particularly wacky about giving orders for things that made little sense ([=MacArthur=] was still around, after all, and Patton had left his mark) this isn't particularly unusual.
[[AC:FridgeLogic]]
* If one of the camp's four doctors was hopelessly incompetent, how did they have a 97% survival rate?
** I believe Hawkeye would say that Frank is responsible for the other 3%.
*** But given the volume of patients they regularly had, and only had '''four''' doctors, they could not have such a high success rate if one of those doctors, who shared in about 25% of the load, was totally incompetent, and killed more patients than he saved.
*** Not all the doctors perform ''surgery'' all the time. One has to man triage, for example.
*** But not every time. Throughout Frank's stay, all four doctors are shown in the [=OR=] at once the majority of the time, with Frank rarely doing triage.
*** Not all wartime injuries are life-threatening. They probably had a ''lot'' of lesser injuries and illnesses to treat, that would account for most of that 97%; we just don't see these less-serious cases very often because they're less dramatic than the life-or-death ones.
*** Henry, in an early episode, tells Frank that Pierce is a better surgeon "when the heat is on." Most likely, Frank is a qualified surgeon in his own right (before he got {{Flanderized}}, at least) but he can't keep his cool when he has to hurry, like when they are overwhelmed with patients. As long as he can take his time and go by the book, Frank will have a successful operation, but drops the ball when having to do 'meatball surgery'.
*** In at least one episode, someone states that Frank handles the simpler operations, so he gets less chances to screw up.[[note]]That was Major Houlihan in episode 5x13 "The Colonel's Horse". She was having her appendix taken out.[[/note]]
** He may be incompetent but not lethally so. So he can perform the needed work but not to the standard of the others, so he may leave excessive scarring, maybe nick an organ or mess something up while working in a way that negatively impacts the patient in a way that doesn't kill them.
*** Not to mention that we rarely hear about what happens to the casualties once they've left the camp, but there's no reason that the doctors couldn't have gotten word from the 121st Evac that one of their patients didn't make it. Who's to say that several of Frank's patients don't croak at the evac hospital? In multiple episodes he fails to diagnose simple conditions - hypothermia in one that leads him to write off a patient that was presumably saved, shock in another that nearly lets a patient die to renal failure - cuts corners, and has no investment in his patients. It all tallies up to put Frank squarely in the area of "we need every cutter we can get, no matter ''how'' incompetent he is." The same shortage that got the other surgeons out of so much trouble kept Frank from being reassigned to a morgue detail.
** The series is never entirely clear on whether Frank is wasting his true talent as a butcher or if he is fairly competent surgeon, though still nowhere near as good as the others, and they are just making fun of that fact. We really only have their word for Frank being terrible. He easily gets stressed and snaps at the nurses when he gets flustered and asks for the wrong instrument. He prioritizes American soldiers over all others, no matter the severity of the injuries, due to a strict interpretation of guidelines and on at least one occasion he nearly cut out the last kidney of a patient because he didn't look at the X-ray. But the camp still has a very high survival-rate, so he must at least be keeping his patients alive.
*** If we take the book as canon, Frank chose not to do a surgical residency, going straight into private practice with his father, who wasn't a qualified surgeon either, because he wanted to start raking in the money right away. Residency is an extremely important learning experience for surgeons, and I sure wouldn't let anyone perform surgery on me who skipped that step. This backstory is hinted at in "Chief Surgeon Who?" as well.
*** It is important to remember this was a different era. While residency training was rapidly becoming the norm, it would not at all have been uncommon to have a large number of non-residency trained physicians - including surgeons - in the community. Residency then was like a sub-specialty fellowship is today. While there are fellowships in things like "laparoscopic surgery" today, if you have your gallbladder taken out today it almost certainly will be done by a general surgeon who has not completed a fellowship in such things.
*** There are also references to Frank being just plain careless, quite apart from his skill level. For example, he removes part of a man's large intestine without exteriorizing it, simply to save time. Later in the episode, it comes up that a previous patient of his got peritonitis after he used the same shortcut. He shows no remorse. The perceived lack of skill may be a lack of interest in his patients' well-being.
** Their success is probably due as much to a superior nursing and support staff, as to the surgeons.
** A few things: First, in military medicine there is something known as "MASH Syndrome." This is the belief by line officers and politicians that casualties in a conflict are mostly if not exclusively surgical. In reality, the opposite is true. The only US conflict that had more soldiers lost to surgical rather than medical problems was the invasion of Grenada. In reality, the vast majority of patients cycling through a MASH would have been those needing basic medical care. In addition, the vast majority of patients would have needed very basic care, i.e. "flesh wounds", "fractures" and the like. Burns was not a completely incompetent surgeon, I believe Blake called him a "fair but competent" surgeon (or something like that.)
*** Henry even says to Pierce about Frank that the latter is "A good surgeon, and we need him" in the episode "Henry, Please Come Home", and that "[Hawkeye and Trapper should] lay off him"; which is the same episode where the 4077th gets their 90+% rating. It works with the timeline, where Frank's real problem is he doesn't cope well with pressure; and since the first few seasons all take place over a span of a few very hectic months, we see Frank arrive as no worse than an uptight but competent doctor and gradually crumble as the stress of the war, not to mention Hawkeye and Trapper's often egregious bullying, take its toll on him until breaks down entirely.
** We should bear in mind that, for the most part, the people saying that Frank was a terrible doctor were people who had a deep personal dislike of him. Not without good reason, of course, but the point is, they may have been predisposed to judge Frank as harshly as possible in just about any aspect of their lives. It is possible that they were making Frank out to be a worse surgeon than he actually was. They didn't do this with Charles, but that was likely because (1) Charles, unlike Frank, sometimes showed a good side to his personality, and (2) Charles was simply too skilled a surgeon for anyone to credibly say that he wasn't.
* One story has Potter and Klinger bartering with a Canadian unit for curare, an anesthetic banned by US officials. The unit they dealt with was the Princess Patricia's Light Infantry, an Alberta regiment. So what was an infantry regiment doing with surgical anesthetic? There were two Canadian medical units in Korea at the time, the No. 25 Canadian Field Ambulance and No. 37 Field Ambulance, yet the writers chose [[SmallReferencePools the most prolific Canadian infantry regiment]].
** They probably just wanted to use a unit name that Americans might recognize, but it also suggests a possible bit of fridge horror: since in the real world, curare was a weapon long before it was a medicine, and an infantry regiment would have no ''medical'' reason to keep a supply of a powerful paralytic, were the Canadian Forces involved in secret chemical warfare?
*** The episode (as do many others others) illustrates that anything of value could be put on the trading block between units. It's entirely plausible that the Canadian unit had taken in the curare in a previous trade, knowing it had high value to a medical unit.
*** The irony being that Charles almost kills a patient with curare early on, but is the first to tout its effectiveness in trained hands like theirs.
*** Which brings on even more FridgeLogic, since Charles would have likely studied everything he could about curare so he could avoid that mistake again in the future, meaning he'd be likely to know more about it than the others.
*** While Charles did mishandle the curare, the error was mistaking it for morphine when he was trying to relieve severe pain in a post-surgical patient rather than in how he used it for its intended purpose. (While he erred in not properly verifying the label of the drug he was about to administer, someone also made an equally serious error in putting a vial of a drug only useful in surgery in the ready drugs tray of the post-op ward. Such a drug should only be out for use in pre-op or the OR itself.)
*** That raises the question of why it was there to be misplaced in the first place. The US Army never approved its use to begin with (which makes the comment in the other episode that high command banned its use inaccurate).
*** The best explanation (if in the MASH universe the Army hadn't previously allowed it) is that while the Army didn't necessarily approve its use, they did tend to look the other way. Then in this episode, they refused to do that any more.
*** It seemed out of character for Charles to not look at the label first, given the extremely high standards to which he holds himself.[[note]]Consider the realistic way he initially assesses his work in "Major Ego", where he'd declared his patient's cardiac arrest "impossible, this is a routine operation!" -- before starting resuscitation.[[/note]] Sure, in meatball surgery there might not be time and you'd have to trust that the nurse or tech was giving you the right thing, but this was post-op. If he couldn't see, he'd take the bottle over to the light. His reaction to having screwed up was also more Frank-like. Since this was an early Charles episode, maybe they weren't sure of his character, so they had him do a Frank-like thing.
*** It shows that Charles thinks he is so much better that he thinks he couldn't possibly make a simple mistake as that one so he doesn't need to show immense care.
* How was the jeweler in "Patient 4077" able to reproduce Margaret's ring, down to the size and the font and type of the engraving, that she only notices it's a fake because it says "Over Hill Over Dale, Our Love Will Ever Fail", if he's never seen it?
** It was implied that Donald had bought her a cheap ring of the same design to give to her, and a ring size is easy enough to find out about a person (especially if Margaret had filed any sort of lost property paperwork). As for the font, it was probably wrong as well, given how quickly her eye was drawn to the inscription after Klinger gave the fake to her. A change in font, especially on a ring you didn't have very long, can be written off as a trick of memory, but the dropped letter was the giveaway.
** Possibly Penobscott, fake romantic that he is, used a common, unoriginal font. Conceivably, the jeweler could have chosen the same one by coincidence.
*** The jeweler recognized Penobscot's line as cheesy garbage (recall that he comments "Pee-yew"). It's not all that far-fetched to think he'd then deduce a cheap "meh, whatever" font had been used for the real ring and choose that same font for the fake.
** Mr. Shin (guy who sells it to them) says "a guy in Tokyo" sold it to him and makes them by the dozen. Presumably, the guy in Tokyo also sells the engraving tools by the dozen - meaning that he would have the same font.
** When Mr. Shin said that his friend in Tokyo makes the rings by the dozen, and describes it as "easy job, cheap setting, miracle glue," B.J. remarks, "Sounds like Penobscott's style." This could be interpreted as the show saying that Penobscott actually bought his ring from Mr. Shin's friend in Tokyo. If so, it would make sense that Mr. Shin would know what style of lettering to use, especially if his friend used the same basic style for all of those rings, which he probably would for such a cheap ring.
* Klinger is a deserter. Despite Potter not swearing him in, Klinger ''did'' sign a reenlistment contract, and the Army isn't likely to let someone out of it because they signed in the heat of the moment. By staying in Korea, and (assuming After MASH was a thing) later returning to Toledo, he should have been arrested on sight.
** Couldn't Potter--or even Klinger, himself--simply have "misplaced" the document before it was sent up the line to I-Corps?
** Not likely. The recruiter had the paperwork with him when he left, so odds are that it was processed even before Klinger's "Corporal Godiva" routine.
** The episode gives us to understand that the reenlistment wasn't final unless and until Klinger was sworn in, which he wasn't. I don't know if this reflects real life, but that's how it's presented in the show.
** The contract may have not been regarded as valid, because it's quite clear that Klinger was drunk when he signed it. That plus Potter seeming to know half the US military above the rank of Major, probably got it thrown out without much trouble. If nothing else, Klinger knows clerks at I-Corps who could disappear it.
** A reenlistment must be approved by the unit commander. Obviously, Colonel Potter did not give his approval given his behavior later in the episode. So the "contract" was not worth the paper it was written on.
* Hawkeye's gray hair in the later seasons is actually a lot more realistic than people may like to think. Hawkeye's hair remains jet black in the first three seasons, then starts to slowly, yet progressively gray more and more with each passing season, till right around Season Eight, where's definitely got a salt and pepper look to it. Now, ignoring the fact that the series ran three times as long as the actual Korean War, let's think of this: war takes a toll on people, not just mentally and emotionally, but physically as well. Three miles from the front, on call almost 24 hours a day, putting up with occasional deluges, mortar fires, and other such catastrophes, it was wearing down on him... not to mention, Hawkeye even lampshaded this idea with his father over his mistaken death certificate: "He just rattles around in that empty house all by himself, sells my things to the Salvation Army, ''and ages a couple of years for every day he thinks I'm dead.''" The same could be applied to others as well: B.J. came to Korea with brown hair that was a dirty blonde by the end, Father Mulcahy had bright red hair that too also got blonder and blonder, and Margaret was almost platinum by the end. The war took a physical toll on them as well.
** [[WordOfGod William Christopher]] even pointed this out in a recent interview on how he knew it was time for the series to end: "My hair was turning gray."
* As far as the series' timeline goes, the first season has to take place in less than nine months, because in the season finale, Henry receives word from home that his wife is about to give birth to another child, to which even Radar remarks, "At least you were home for the important part."
* In "The Joker is Wild," a big deal is made at the end of how Hawkeye was the only one who got pranked, as the whole staff was in on it. Except the bet was that B.J. could prank everyone on the staff, not just Hawkeye. B.J. didn't actually prank any of them because they were in on it and faked the entire thing. By their own admission, no actual pranks took place, not even the others allowing themselves to be pranked. So ''why'' does everyone say Hawkeye lost the bet?
** B.J., when leveling the proposal on the rest of the staff, never actually names ''himself'' as the person pulling the prank. The perpetrator is an unnamed "someone" who might theoretically prank the entire staff. Well, if the rest of the staff is part of this theoretical "someone" (which is also used to indicate an ambiguous number, not just identity), who else is there to prank but Hawkeye? B.J. never fesses up to the pranks that the rest of the staff pull on themselves. Even his taunting of Hawkeye after Klinger supposedly falls for it isn't an admission; when he holds up a finger, he isn't telling Hawkeye he's the last to be pranked. He's telling Hawkeye that there's only one member of the staff ''being'' pranked! Had Hawkeye not fallen apart, the ''rest'' of the staff would have lost.
*** I'm inclined to doubt that. I don't think B.J. was ever that good a sport. Certainly, the fact that Hawkeye was visibly crumbling so completely made it ''easier'' for B.J. to claim victory, but even if Hawkeye had spent the entire day acting normally, B.J. probably would have still insisted that Hawkeye lost because he ''must'' have been feeling anxious about the impending prank, even if he didn't show it. The only real way that Hawkeye could have won the bet is if he somehow figured out that none of the pranks he'd been seeing played on the other characters were real and that B.J. was only making him think that he was going to be pranked when he wasn't. Even then, B.J. probably would have still claimed an out because there was no way that Hawkeye could have been sure that B.J. wasn't really going to do something to him.
*** In order for a bet to be valid, all participants must agree to it before beginning. Also, if you wish to change the terms of the bet, then you have to get all of the other participants to agree to the change. You cannot expect somebody to pay off a bet that he never agreed to, nor can you unilaterally change the terms of an agreement and claim that the other party is still bound by the agreement. That's absurd. B.J. obviously knew that, in Hawkeye's mind, they were all agreeing to a bet in which B.J. had 24 hours to prank all six of the other participants. Hawkeye never agreed to a bet in which B.J. only had to prank him alone in order to be declared the winner. Meaning that the only bet Hawkeye agreed to was one that B.J. did not fulfill the victory conditions for. It was completely unfair for Hawkeye to be judged the loser of a bet that either (1) his opponent did not win, or (2) he never agreed to in the first place. If I had been in Hawkeye's place, I would have absolutely refused to pay off the bet. I would have told B.J. and the others that they essentially outsmarted themselves, because they concocted a brilliant plan, but never realized that their brilliant plan didn't actually fulfill the victory conditions of the bet.
* The episode "Rainbow Bridge". The plot is that the 4077th is treating a number of Chinese prisoners, and is somehow contacted by a Chinese field hospital who has in its care some UN troops. The Chinese, not capable of treating the UN troops up to their level of care, want to arrange a prisoner swap at the titular bridge, on the condition that Hawkeye, Trapper, Radar and Frank come unarmed to the swap. When they arrive, they are confronted by numerous Chinese guards carrying submachine guns. When it's revealed that Frank snuck a handgun (a tiny derringer that looks like it could have come out of a box of Cracker Jack, really) the commanding Chinese doctor launches into an anvilicious tirade about US actions ("Is it not enough that your planes harass us day and night? It makes it impossible for me to treat my own people. We make a civilized gesture, and you respond by coming here with a gun ready to shoot us down.") and is about ready to call off the exchange. At which point, Hawkeye browbeats Frank into surrendering the gun and makes an impassioned plea for the exchange to go on as planned. The intended Aesop seems to be "take any proffered olive branch during a war, especially if it saves lives", but it falls apart when you consider ''the Chinese were flagrantly violating the very conditions they demanded of Hawkeye'' et. al. ''by bringing armed men to the rendezvous point.'' Granted, there was no explicit condition prohibiting this, but it's at least a DoubleStandard. Not to mention, the Chinese doctor complaining about trying to treat people while being bombed? If you watch the show, you'll see the 4077th in this exact situation frequently. As the Chinese ''could'' have been laying a trap and taken Hawkeye and the others prisoner or gunned them down with impunity, it seems more likely that the AccidentalAesop was "You know what? [[JerkassHasAPoint This once, in retrospect, Frank was probably right.]]"
** Where exactly does this become FridgeLogic or Fridge ''anything'' for that matter? Anyone with any brains (i.e. not Frank or Margaret) would realize that the Chinese would not go back on a deal like that to knock off or capture a couple of surgeons and corpsmen, what with the damage a betrayal like that would do to their ability to make future exchanges. If they proved by killing or capturing the 4077 crew that was sent, no future exchanges would be allowed. The doctor complaining about being bombed has nothing to do with the issue, and the Chinese troops having guns is reasonable since ''it's fifty miles behind their lines and they are making a gesture by handing over the prisoners without demanding anything in exchange.'' Of course it's a double standard, neither side has any reason to trust the other. For all the Chinese know the 4077 crew could have a bunch of soldiers with them to "rescue" their wounded and take a bunch of prisoners.
* In "Death Takes a Holiday", Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret try to keep a soldier alive past midnight (his wounds are fatal, it's only a question of ''when'' he dies) so his family won't have to remember Christmas as the day he died. In the end, they fail, and Hawkeye moves the hands on the clock and they falsify the record. They could have just said, "Hey, let's leave him and go to the Christmas party and check him after midnight. When we find him dead, who's to say what time he died?"
** Because they're going to do their best to do it legitimately, and it seems like Hawkeye only thinks to just falsify the death certificate when the soldier finally dies just before midnight. Besides, if ''you'' had just left a man to die, could you enjoy the party?
** Falsifying a death certificate is ''hugely'' illegal, and Hawkeye is the only one who thinks of it when they fail.
*** Actually, this is not correct. To be illegal, such falsification must be "material." With the time of death, there is always ambiguity and it is impossible to say that a 30 minute change in the time of death was actually material. In fact, in the military, the time of death is frequently misreported. A service member's family gets the most benefits if he dies within 30 days of being medically retired. So if a soldier came in to a military hospital essentially "dead", we would complete the medical retirement process (maybe 90 minutes, tops), and then - and only then - officially declare him dead. So what Hawkeye did was not at all unusual, and it is possible that this relatively common scenario was the basis for the story.
*** Even if the above weren't true, you still have to find a person willing to court martial. Giving the reason, I doubt even Frank (had he been there) would have.
** If anything, they were probably ''avoiding'' going to the party. At that point, Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret were all thoroughly depressed. They knew they wouldn't be able to enjoy the party. And if they went, it would be very difficult for them to hide how unhappy they were. If their friends at the party saw they were feeling down, they would naturally ask what was wrong, and it could wind up bringing the entire party down.
* Why did Klinger and Soon Lee manage to get married after only a day or two of being engaged, when [[Recap/MashS2E7LIPLocalIndigenousPersonnel "L.I.P. (Local Indigenous Personnel)"]] suggested it would take months? Simple: they didn't have Klinger's scrounging and Potter's connections to speed things up.
** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.
* In "Oh, How We Danced," a man named Key Yong Lu, who is grateful to the 4077 personnel for treating his grandson, offers to teach Charles karate after he is assaulted by an irate unit commander. The problem with this is that karate is a Japanese martial art, and is unlikely to have been known or taught in 1950's Korea. A Korean martial artist would be far more likely to practice and teach Taekwondo. Arguably, though, it might simply have been [[ArtisticLicenseMartialArts more practical for the show to use karate]] instead of Taekwondo in this episode, given that an American television audience would be more likely to know what karate is.
* In "Give and Take," Colonel Potter says, "General Crenshaw is demanding 100% participation" in the charity drive, with every officer expected to donate $10 and every enlisted person $3. It is also stated that if this is not achieved, then both Potter (as CO of the 4077th) and Charles (who was assigned the task of being charity collection officer) would get in trouble ... Okay, who exactly changed the definition of the word "charity"? How can it be an act of charity if people are ''required'' to donate? Aren't charitable donations supposed to be voluntary? The episode does not say that the personnel who didn't donate would be in trouble, only the unit's commanding officer and charity collections officer. But threatening to punish somebody else if the 4077th's personnel don't all donate to the charity drive is still pressuring, or arguably forcing, the staff to donate to the charity drive. Forcing people to make donations under threat of punishment is completely contrary to what "charity" fundamentally means.
** In Vietnam, soldiers who had just received their paychecks would be heavily pressured to donate to various charitable causes, as the charity table was set up right next to where they'd get their scrip (military money). The table would be staffed with an officer or two who would heavily imply that the soldiers should donate the recommended amount if they knew what was good for them. I know someone who was a company commander in Vietnam: he hated the practice, and he'd go with his men to the pay counter and loudly tell them ''"You don't have to donate if you don't want to."'' The brass wasn't happy with that, and he wasn't a company commander very long.
** The people who, as BJ puts it, "sent us to war to ''make peace''" aren't really concerned with things like the fundamental meanings of things. It's the same military that won't allow them any real amount of supplies or virtually anything that would make their job easier, for various absurd reasons. And as it portrays generals being particularly wacky about giving orders for things that made little sense ([=MacArthur=] was still around, after all, and Patton had left his mark) this isn't particularly unusual.
to:
* The pilot has Hawkeye and Trapper raising money to get Ho-Jon to college. He appears in a few further episodes, then [[ChuckCunninghamSyndrome mysteriously vanishes.]] In the episode "Ping Pong," Hawkeye makes a throwaway joke about their houseboy being drafted two years ago. Did Ho-Jon get drafted? Or rather, "drafted," as we get multiple mentions about how South Korean draft boards were essentially kidnappings.
[[AC:FridgeLogic]]
* If one of the camp's four doctors was hopelessly incompetent, how did they have a 97% survival rate?
** I believe Hawkeye would say that Frank is responsible for the other 3%.
*** But given the volume of patients they regularly had, and only had '''four''' doctors, they could not have such a high success rate if one of those doctors, who shared in about 25% of the load, was totally incompetent, and killed more patients than he saved.
*** Not all the doctors perform ''surgery'' all the time. One has to man triage, for example.
*** But not every time. Throughout Frank's stay, all four doctors are shown in the [=OR=] at once the majority of the time, with Frank rarely doing triage.
*** Not all wartime injuries are life-threatening. They probably had a ''lot'' of lesser injuries and illnesses to treat, that would account for most of that 97%; we just don't see these less-serious cases very often because they're less dramatic than the life-or-death ones.
*** Henry, in an early episode, tells Frank that Pierce is a better surgeon "when the heat is on." Most likely, Frank is a qualified surgeon in his own right (before he got {{Flanderized}}, at least) but he can't keep his cool when he has to hurry, like when they are overwhelmed with patients. As long as he can take his time and go by the book, Frank will have a successful operation, but drops the ball when having to do 'meatball surgery'.
*** In at least one episode, someone states that Frank handles the simpler operations, so he gets less chances to screw up.[[note]]That was Major Houlihan in episode 5x13 "The Colonel's Horse". She was having her appendix taken out.[[/note]]
** He may be incompetent but not lethally so. So he can perform the needed work but not to the standard of the others, so he may leave excessive scarring, maybe nick an organ or mess something up while working in a way that negatively impacts the patient in a way that doesn't kill them.
*** Not to mention that we rarely hear about what happens to the casualties once they've left the camp, but there's no reason that the doctors couldn't have gotten word from the 121st Evac that one of their patients didn't make it. Who's to say that several of Frank's patients don't croak at the evac hospital? In multiple episodes he fails to diagnose simple conditions - hypothermia in one that leads him to write off a patient that was presumably saved, shock in another that nearly lets a patient die to renal failure - cuts corners, and has no investment in his patients. It all tallies up to put Frank squarely in the area of "we need every cutter we can get, no matter ''how'' incompetent he is." The same shortage that got the other surgeons out of so much trouble kept Frank from being reassigned to a morgue detail.
** The series is never entirely clear on whether Frank is wasting his true talent as a butcher or if he is fairly competent surgeon, though still nowhere near as good as the others, and they are just making fun of that fact. We really only have their word for Frank being terrible. He easily gets stressed and snaps at the nurses when he gets flustered and asks for the wrong instrument. He prioritizes American soldiers over all others, no matter the severity of the injuries, due to a strict interpretation of guidelines and on at least one occasion he nearly cut out the last kidney of a patient because he didn't look at the X-ray. But the camp still has a very high survival-rate, so he must at least be keeping his patients alive.
*** If we take the book as canon, Frank chose not to do a surgical residency, going straight into private practice with his father, who wasn't a qualified surgeon either, because he wanted to start raking in the money right away. Residency is an extremely important learning experience for surgeons, and I sure wouldn't let anyone perform surgery on me who skipped that step. This backstory is hinted at in "Chief Surgeon Who?" as well.
*** It is important to remember this was a different era. While residency training was rapidly becoming the norm, it would not at all have been uncommon to have a large number of non-residency trained physicians - including surgeons - in the community. Residency then was like a sub-specialty fellowship is today. While there are fellowships in things like "laparoscopic surgery" today, if you have your gallbladder taken out today it almost certainly will be done by a general surgeon who has not completed a fellowship in such things.
*** There are also references to Frank being just plain careless, quite apart from his skill level. For example, he removes part of a man's large intestine without exteriorizing it, simply to save time. Later in the episode, it comes up that a previous patient of his got peritonitis after he used the same shortcut. He shows no remorse. The perceived lack of skill may be a lack of interest in his patients' well-being.
** Their success is probably due as much to a superior nursing and support staff, as to the surgeons.
** A few things: First, in military medicine there is something known as "MASH Syndrome." This is the belief by line officers and politicians that casualties in a conflict are mostly if not exclusively surgical. In reality, the opposite is true. The only US conflict that had more soldiers lost to surgical rather than medical problems was the invasion of Grenada. In reality, the vast majority of patients cycling through a MASH would have been those needing basic medical care. In addition, the vast majority of patients would have needed very basic care, i.e. "flesh wounds", "fractures" and the like. Burns was not a completely incompetent surgeon, I believe Blake called him a "fair but competent" surgeon (or something like that.)
*** Henry even says to Pierce about Frank that the latter is "A good surgeon, and we need him" in the episode "Henry, Please Come Home", and that "[Hawkeye and Trapper should] lay off him"; which is the same episode where the 4077th gets their 90+% rating. It works with the timeline, where Frank's real problem is he doesn't cope well with pressure; and since the first few seasons all take place over a span of a few very hectic months, we see Frank arrive as no worse than an uptight but competent doctor and gradually crumble as the stress of the war, not to mention Hawkeye and Trapper's often egregious bullying, take its toll on him until breaks down entirely.
** We should bear in mind that, for the most part, the people saying that Frank was a terrible doctor were people who had a deep personal dislike of him. Not without good reason, of course, but the point is, they may have been predisposed to judge Frank as harshly as possible in just about any aspect of their lives. It is possible that they were making Frank out to be a worse surgeon than he actually was. They didn't do this with Charles, but that was likely because (1) Charles, unlike Frank, sometimes showed a good side to his personality, and (2) Charles was simply too skilled a surgeon for anyone to credibly say that he wasn't.
* One story has Potter and Klinger bartering with a Canadian unit for curare, an anesthetic banned by US officials. The unit they dealt with was the Princess Patricia's Light Infantry, an Alberta regiment. So what was an infantry regiment doing with surgical anesthetic? There were two Canadian medical units in Korea at the time, the No. 25 Canadian Field Ambulance and No. 37 Field Ambulance, yet the writers chose [[SmallReferencePools the most prolific Canadian infantry regiment]].
** They probably just wanted to use a unit name that Americans might recognize, but it also suggests a possible bit of fridge horror: since in the real world, curare was a weapon long before it was a medicine, and an infantry regiment would have no ''medical'' reason to keep a supply of a powerful paralytic, were the Canadian Forces involved in secret chemical warfare?
*** The episode (as do many others others) illustrates that anything of value could be put on the trading block between units. It's entirely plausible that the Canadian unit had taken in the curare in a previous trade, knowing it had high value to a medical unit.
*** The irony being that Charles almost kills a patient with curare early on, but is the first to tout its effectiveness in trained hands like theirs.
*** Which brings on even more FridgeLogic, since Charles would have likely studied everything he could about curare so he could avoid that mistake again in the future, meaning he'd be likely to know more about it than the others.
*** While Charles did mishandle the curare, the error was mistaking it for morphine when he was trying to relieve severe pain in a post-surgical patient rather than in how he used it for its intended purpose. (While he erred in not properly verifying the label of the drug he was about to administer, someone also made an equally serious error in putting a vial of a drug only useful in surgery in the ready drugs tray of the post-op ward. Such a drug should only be out for use in pre-op or the OR itself.)
*** That raises the question of why it was there to be misplaced in the first place. The US Army never approved its use to begin with (which makes the comment in the other episode that high command banned its use inaccurate).
*** The best explanation (if in the MASH universe the Army hadn't previously allowed it) is that while the Army didn't necessarily approve its use, they did tend to look the other way. Then in this episode, they refused to do that any more.
*** It seemed out of character for Charles to not look at the label first, given the extremely high standards to which he holds himself.[[note]]Consider the realistic way he initially assesses his work in "Major Ego", where he'd declared his patient's cardiac arrest "impossible, this is a routine operation!" -- before starting resuscitation.[[/note]] Sure, in meatball surgery there might not be time and you'd have to trust that the nurse or tech was giving you the right thing, but this was post-op. If he couldn't see, he'd take the bottle over to the light. His reaction to having screwed up was also more Frank-like. Since this was an early Charles episode, maybe they weren't sure of his character, so they had him do a Frank-like thing.
*** It shows that Charles thinks he is so much better that he thinks he couldn't possibly make a simple mistake as that one so he doesn't need to show immense care.
* How was the jeweler in "Patient 4077" able to reproduce Margaret's ring, down to the size and the font and type of the engraving, that she only notices it's a fake because it says "Over Hill Over Dale, Our Love Will Ever Fail", if he's never seen it?
** It was implied that Donald had bought her a cheap ring of the same design to give to her, and a ring size is easy enough to find out about a person (especially if Margaret had filed any sort of lost property paperwork). As for the font, it was probably wrong as well, given how quickly her eye was drawn to the inscription after Klinger gave the fake to her. A change in font, especially on a ring you didn't have very long, can be written off as a trick of memory, but the dropped letter was the giveaway.
** Possibly Penobscott, fake romantic that he is, used a common, unoriginal font. Conceivably, the jeweler could have chosen the same one by coincidence.
*** The jeweler recognized Penobscot's line as cheesy garbage (recall that he comments "Pee-yew"). It's not all that far-fetched to think he'd then deduce a cheap "meh, whatever" font had been used for the real ring and choose that same font for the fake.
** Mr. Shin (guy who sells it to them) says "a guy in Tokyo" sold it to him and makes them by the dozen. Presumably, the guy in Tokyo also sells the engraving tools by the dozen - meaning that he would have the same font.
** When Mr. Shin said that his friend in Tokyo makes the rings by the dozen, and describes it as "easy job, cheap setting, miracle glue," B.J. remarks, "Sounds like Penobscott's style." This could be interpreted as the show saying that Penobscott actually bought his ring from Mr. Shin's friend in Tokyo. If so, it would make sense that Mr. Shin would know what style of lettering to use, especially if his friend used the same basic style for all of those rings, which he probably would for such a cheap ring.
* Klinger is a deserter. Despite Potter not swearing him in, Klinger ''did'' sign a reenlistment contract, and the Army isn't likely to let someone out of it because they signed in the heat of the moment. By staying in Korea, and (assuming After MASH was a thing) later returning to Toledo, he should have been arrested on sight.
** Couldn't Potter--or even Klinger, himself--simply have "misplaced" the document before it was sent up the line to I-Corps?
** Not likely. The recruiter had the paperwork with him when he left, so odds are that it was processed even before Klinger's "Corporal Godiva" routine.
** The episode gives us to understand that the reenlistment wasn't final unless and until Klinger was sworn in, which he wasn't. I don't know if this reflects real life, but that's how it's presented in the show.
** The contract may have not been regarded as valid, because it's quite clear that Klinger was drunk when he signed it. That plus Potter seeming to know half the US military above the rank of Major, probably got it thrown out without much trouble. If nothing else, Klinger knows clerks at I-Corps who could disappear it.
** A reenlistment must be approved by the unit commander. Obviously, Colonel Potter did not give his approval given his behavior later in the episode. So the "contract" was not worth the paper it was written on.
* Hawkeye's gray hair in the later seasons is actually a lot more realistic than people may like to think. Hawkeye's hair remains jet black in the first three seasons, then starts to slowly, yet progressively gray more and more with each passing season, till right around Season Eight, where's definitely got a salt and pepper look to it. Now, ignoring the fact that the series ran three times as long as the actual Korean War, let's think of this: war takes a toll on people, not just mentally and emotionally, but physically as well. Three miles from the front, on call almost 24 hours a day, putting up with occasional deluges, mortar fires, and other such catastrophes, it was wearing down on him... not to mention, Hawkeye even lampshaded this idea with his father over his mistaken death certificate: "He just rattles around in that empty house all by himself, sells my things to the Salvation Army, ''and ages a couple of years for every day he thinks I'm dead.''" The same could be applied to others as well: B.J. came to Korea with brown hair that was a dirty blonde by the end, Father Mulcahy had bright red hair that too also got blonder and blonder, and Margaret was almost platinum by the end. The war took a physical toll on them as well.
** [[WordOfGod William Christopher]] even pointed this out in a recent interview on how he knew it was time for the series to end: "My hair was turning gray."
* As far as the series' timeline goes, the first season has to take place in less than nine months, because in the season finale, Henry receives word from home that his wife is about to give birth to another child, to which even Radar remarks, "At least you were home for the important part."
* In "The Joker is Wild," a big deal is made at the end of how Hawkeye was the only one who got pranked, as the whole staff was in on it. Except the bet was that B.J. could prank everyone on the staff, not just Hawkeye. B.J. didn't actually prank any of them because they were in on it and faked the entire thing. By their own admission, no actual pranks took place, not even the others allowing themselves to be pranked. So ''why'' does everyone say Hawkeye lost the bet?
** B.J., when leveling the proposal on the rest of the staff, never actually names ''himself'' as the person pulling the prank. The perpetrator is an unnamed "someone" who might theoretically prank the entire staff. Well, if the rest of the staff is part of this theoretical "someone" (which is also used to indicate an ambiguous number, not just identity), who else is there to prank but Hawkeye? B.J. never fesses up to the pranks that the rest of the staff pull on themselves. Even his taunting of Hawkeye after Klinger supposedly falls for it isn't an admission; when he holds up a finger, he isn't telling Hawkeye he's the last to be pranked. He's telling Hawkeye that there's only one member of the staff ''being'' pranked! Had Hawkeye not fallen apart, the ''rest'' of the staff would have lost.
*** I'm inclined to doubt that. I don't think B.J. was ever that good a sport. Certainly, the fact that Hawkeye was visibly crumbling so completely made it ''easier'' for B.J. to claim victory, but even if Hawkeye had spent the entire day acting normally, B.J. probably would have still insisted that Hawkeye lost because he ''must'' have been feeling anxious about the impending prank, even if he didn't show it. The only real way that Hawkeye could have won the bet is if he somehow figured out that none of the pranks he'd been seeing played on the other characters were real and that B.J. was only making him think that he was going to be pranked when he wasn't. Even then, B.J. probably would have still claimed an out because there was no way that Hawkeye could have been sure that B.J. wasn't really going to do something to him.
*** In order for a bet to be valid, all participants must agree to it before beginning. Also, if you wish to change the terms of the bet, then you have to get all of the other participants to agree to the change. You cannot expect somebody to pay off a bet that he never agreed to, nor can you unilaterally change the terms of an agreement and claim that the other party is still bound by the agreement. That's absurd. B.J. obviously knew that, in Hawkeye's mind, they were all agreeing to a bet in which B.J. had 24 hours to prank all six of the other participants. Hawkeye never agreed to a bet in which B.J. only had to prank him alone in order to be declared the winner. Meaning that the only bet Hawkeye agreed to was one that B.J. did not fulfill the victory conditions for. It was completely unfair for Hawkeye to be judged the loser of a bet that either (1) his opponent did not win, or (2) he never agreed to in the first place. If I had been in Hawkeye's place, I would have absolutely refused to pay off the bet. I would have told B.J. and the others that they essentially outsmarted themselves, because they concocted a brilliant plan, but never realized that their brilliant plan didn't actually fulfill the victory conditions of the bet.
* The episode "Rainbow Bridge". The plot is that the 4077th is treating a number of Chinese prisoners, and is somehow contacted by a Chinese field hospital who has in its care some UN troops. The Chinese, not capable of treating the UN troops up to their level of care, want to arrange a prisoner swap at the titular bridge, on the condition that Hawkeye, Trapper, Radar and Frank come unarmed to the swap. When they arrive, they are confronted by numerous Chinese guards carrying submachine guns. When it's revealed that Frank snuck a handgun (a tiny derringer that looks like it could have come out of a box of Cracker Jack, really) the commanding Chinese doctor launches into an anvilicious tirade about US actions ("Is it not enough that your planes harass us day and night? It makes it impossible for me to treat my own people. We make a civilized gesture, and you respond by coming here with a gun ready to shoot us down.") and is about ready to call off the exchange. At which point, Hawkeye browbeats Frank into surrendering the gun and makes an impassioned plea for the exchange to go on as planned. The intended Aesop seems to be "take any proffered olive branch during a war, especially if it saves lives", but it falls apart when you consider ''the Chinese were flagrantly violating the very conditions they demanded of Hawkeye'' et. al. ''by bringing armed men to the rendezvous point.'' Granted, there was no explicit condition prohibiting this, but it's at least a DoubleStandard. Not to mention, the Chinese doctor complaining about trying to treat people while being bombed? If you watch the show, you'll see the 4077th in this exact situation frequently. As the Chinese ''could'' have been laying a trap and taken Hawkeye and the others prisoner or gunned them down with impunity, it seems more likely that the AccidentalAesop was "You know what? [[JerkassHasAPoint This once, in retrospect, Frank was probably right.]]"
** Where exactly does this become FridgeLogic or Fridge ''anything'' for that matter? Anyone with any brains (i.e. not Frank or Margaret) would realize that the Chinese would not go back on a deal like that to knock off or capture a couple of surgeons and corpsmen, what with the damage a betrayal like that would do to their ability to make future exchanges. If they proved by killing or capturing the 4077 crew that was sent, no future exchanges would be allowed. The doctor complaining about being bombed has nothing to do with the issue, and the Chinese troops having guns is reasonable since ''it's fifty miles behind their lines and they are making a gesture by handing over the prisoners without demanding anything in exchange.'' Of course it's a double standard, neither side has any reason to trust the other. For all the Chinese know the 4077 crew could have a bunch of soldiers with them to "rescue" their wounded and take a bunch of prisoners.
* In "Death Takes a Holiday", Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret try to keep a soldier alive past midnight (his wounds are fatal, it's only a question of ''when'' he dies) so his family won't have to remember Christmas as the day he died. In the end, they fail, and Hawkeye moves the hands on the clock and they falsify the record. They could have just said, "Hey, let's leave him and go to the Christmas party and check him after midnight. When we find him dead, who's to say what time he died?"
** Because they're going to do their best to do it legitimately, and it seems like Hawkeye only thinks to just falsify the death certificate when the soldier finally dies just before midnight. Besides, if ''you'' had just left a man to die, could you enjoy the party?
** Falsifying a death certificate is ''hugely'' illegal, and Hawkeye is the only one who thinks of it when they fail.
*** Actually, this is not correct. To be illegal, such falsification must be "material." With the time of death, there is always ambiguity and it is impossible to say that a 30 minute change in the time of death was actually material. In fact, in the military, the time of death is frequently misreported. A service member's family gets the most benefits if he dies within 30 days of being medically retired. So if a soldier came in to a military hospital essentially "dead", we would complete the medical retirement process (maybe 90 minutes, tops), and then - and only then - officially declare him dead. So what Hawkeye did was not at all unusual, and it is possible that this relatively common scenario was the basis for the story.
*** Even if the above weren't true, you still have to find a person willing to court martial. Giving the reason, I doubt even Frank (had he been there) would have.
** If anything, they were probably ''avoiding'' going to the party. At that point, Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret were all thoroughly depressed. They knew they wouldn't be able to enjoy the party. And if they went, it would be very difficult for them to hide how unhappy they were. If their friends at the party saw they were feeling down, they would naturally ask what was wrong, and it could wind up bringing the entire party down.
* Why did Klinger and Soon Lee manage to get married after only a day or two of being engaged, when [[Recap/MashS2E7LIPLocalIndigenousPersonnel "L.I.P. (Local Indigenous Personnel)"]] suggested it would take months? Simple: they didn't have Klinger's scrounging and Potter's connections to speed things up.
** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.
* In "Oh, How We Danced," a man named Key Yong Lu, who is grateful to the 4077 personnel for treating his grandson, offers to teach Charles karate after he is assaulted by an irate unit commander. The problem with this is that karate is a Japanese martial art, and is unlikely to have been known or taught in 1950's Korea. A Korean martial artist would be far more likely to practice and teach Taekwondo. Arguably, though, it might simply have been [[ArtisticLicenseMartialArts more practical for the show to use karate]] instead of Taekwondo in this episode, given that an American television audience would be more likely to know what karate is.
* In "Give and Take," Colonel Potter says, "General Crenshaw is demanding 100% participation" in the charity drive, with every officer expected to donate $10 and every enlisted person $3. It is also stated that if this is not achieved, then both Potter (as CO of the 4077th) and Charles (who was assigned the task of being charity collection officer) would get in trouble ... Okay, who exactly changed the definition of the word "charity"? How can it be an act of charity if people are ''required'' to donate? Aren't charitable donations supposed to be voluntary? The episode does not say that the personnel who didn't donate would be in trouble, only the unit's commanding officer and charity collections officer. But threatening to punish somebody else if the 4077th's personnel don't all donate to the charity drive is still pressuring, or arguably forcing, the staff to donate to the charity drive. Forcing people to make donations under threat of punishment is completely contrary to what "charity" fundamentally means.
** In Vietnam, soldiers who had just received their paychecks would be heavily pressured to donate to various charitable causes, as the charity table was set up right next to where they'd get their scrip (military money). The table would be staffed with an officer or two who would heavily imply that the soldiers should donate the recommended amount if they knew what was good for them. I know someone who was a company commander in Vietnam: he hated the practice, and he'd go with his men to the pay counter and loudly tell them ''"You don't have to donate if you don't want to."'' The brass wasn't happy with that, and he wasn't a company commander very long.
** The people who, as BJ puts it, "sent us to war to ''make peace''" aren't really concerned with things like the fundamental meanings of things. It's the same military that won't allow them any real amount of supplies or virtually anything that would make their job easier, for various absurd reasons. And as it portrays generals being particularly wacky about giving orders for things that made little sense ([=MacArthur=] was still around, after all, and Patton had left his mark) this isn't particularly unusual.kidnappings.
[[AC:FridgeLogic]]
* If one of the camp's four doctors was hopelessly incompetent, how did they have a 97% survival rate?
** I believe Hawkeye would say that Frank is responsible for the other 3%.
*** But given the volume of patients they regularly had, and only had '''four''' doctors, they could not have such a high success rate if one of those doctors, who shared in about 25% of the load, was totally incompetent, and killed more patients than he saved.
*** Not all the doctors perform ''surgery'' all the time. One has to man triage, for example.
*** But not every time. Throughout Frank's stay, all four doctors are shown in the [=OR=] at once the majority of the time, with Frank rarely doing triage.
*** Not all wartime injuries are life-threatening. They probably had a ''lot'' of lesser injuries and illnesses to treat, that would account for most of that 97%; we just don't see these less-serious cases very often because they're less dramatic than the life-or-death ones.
*** Henry, in an early episode, tells Frank that Pierce is a better surgeon "when the heat is on." Most likely, Frank is a qualified surgeon in his own right (before he got {{Flanderized}}, at least) but he can't keep his cool when he has to hurry, like when they are overwhelmed with patients. As long as he can take his time and go by the book, Frank will have a successful operation, but drops the ball when having to do 'meatball surgery'.
*** In at least one episode, someone states that Frank handles the simpler operations, so he gets less chances to screw up.[[note]]That was Major Houlihan in episode 5x13 "The Colonel's Horse". She was having her appendix taken out.[[/note]]
** He may be incompetent but not lethally so. So he can perform the needed work but not to the standard of the others, so he may leave excessive scarring, maybe nick an organ or mess something up while working in a way that negatively impacts the patient in a way that doesn't kill them.
*** Not to mention that we rarely hear about what happens to the casualties once they've left the camp, but there's no reason that the doctors couldn't have gotten word from the 121st Evac that one of their patients didn't make it. Who's to say that several of Frank's patients don't croak at the evac hospital? In multiple episodes he fails to diagnose simple conditions - hypothermia in one that leads him to write off a patient that was presumably saved, shock in another that nearly lets a patient die to renal failure - cuts corners, and has no investment in his patients. It all tallies up to put Frank squarely in the area of "we need every cutter we can get, no matter ''how'' incompetent he is." The same shortage that got the other surgeons out of so much trouble kept Frank from being reassigned to a morgue detail.
** The series is never entirely clear on whether Frank is wasting his true talent as a butcher or if he is fairly competent surgeon, though still nowhere near as good as the others, and they are just making fun of that fact. We really only have their word for Frank being terrible. He easily gets stressed and snaps at the nurses when he gets flustered and asks for the wrong instrument. He prioritizes American soldiers over all others, no matter the severity of the injuries, due to a strict interpretation of guidelines and on at least one occasion he nearly cut out the last kidney of a patient because he didn't look at the X-ray. But the camp still has a very high survival-rate, so he must at least be keeping his patients alive.
*** If we take the book as canon, Frank chose not to do a surgical residency, going straight into private practice with his father, who wasn't a qualified surgeon either, because he wanted to start raking in the money right away. Residency is an extremely important learning experience for surgeons, and I sure wouldn't let anyone perform surgery on me who skipped that step. This backstory is hinted at in "Chief Surgeon Who?" as well.
*** It is important to remember this was a different era. While residency training was rapidly becoming the norm, it would not at all have been uncommon to have a large number of non-residency trained physicians - including surgeons - in the community. Residency then was like a sub-specialty fellowship is today. While there are fellowships in things like "laparoscopic surgery" today, if you have your gallbladder taken out today it almost certainly will be done by a general surgeon who has not completed a fellowship in such things.
*** There are also references to Frank being just plain careless, quite apart from his skill level. For example, he removes part of a man's large intestine without exteriorizing it, simply to save time. Later in the episode, it comes up that a previous patient of his got peritonitis after he used the same shortcut. He shows no remorse. The perceived lack of skill may be a lack of interest in his patients' well-being.
** Their success is probably due as much to a superior nursing and support staff, as to the surgeons.
** A few things: First, in military medicine there is something known as "MASH Syndrome." This is the belief by line officers and politicians that casualties in a conflict are mostly if not exclusively surgical. In reality, the opposite is true. The only US conflict that had more soldiers lost to surgical rather than medical problems was the invasion of Grenada. In reality, the vast majority of patients cycling through a MASH would have been those needing basic medical care. In addition, the vast majority of patients would have needed very basic care, i.e. "flesh wounds", "fractures" and the like. Burns was not a completely incompetent surgeon, I believe Blake called him a "fair but competent" surgeon (or something like that.)
*** Henry even says to Pierce about Frank that the latter is "A good surgeon, and we need him" in the episode "Henry, Please Come Home", and that "[Hawkeye and Trapper should] lay off him"; which is the same episode where the 4077th gets their 90+% rating. It works with the timeline, where Frank's real problem is he doesn't cope well with pressure; and since the first few seasons all take place over a span of a few very hectic months, we see Frank arrive as no worse than an uptight but competent doctor and gradually crumble as the stress of the war, not to mention Hawkeye and Trapper's often egregious bullying, take its toll on him until breaks down entirely.
** We should bear in mind that, for the most part, the people saying that Frank was a terrible doctor were people who had a deep personal dislike of him. Not without good reason, of course, but the point is, they may have been predisposed to judge Frank as harshly as possible in just about any aspect of their lives. It is possible that they were making Frank out to be a worse surgeon than he actually was. They didn't do this with Charles, but that was likely because (1) Charles, unlike Frank, sometimes showed a good side to his personality, and (2) Charles was simply too skilled a surgeon for anyone to credibly say that he wasn't.
* One story has Potter and Klinger bartering with a Canadian unit for curare, an anesthetic banned by US officials. The unit they dealt with was the Princess Patricia's Light Infantry, an Alberta regiment. So what was an infantry regiment doing with surgical anesthetic? There were two Canadian medical units in Korea at the time, the No. 25 Canadian Field Ambulance and No. 37 Field Ambulance, yet the writers chose [[SmallReferencePools the most prolific Canadian infantry regiment]].
** They probably just wanted to use a unit name that Americans might recognize, but it also suggests a possible bit of fridge horror: since in the real world, curare was a weapon long before it was a medicine, and an infantry regiment would have no ''medical'' reason to keep a supply of a powerful paralytic, were the Canadian Forces involved in secret chemical warfare?
*** The episode (as do many others others) illustrates that anything of value could be put on the trading block between units. It's entirely plausible that the Canadian unit had taken in the curare in a previous trade, knowing it had high value to a medical unit.
*** The irony being that Charles almost kills a patient with curare early on, but is the first to tout its effectiveness in trained hands like theirs.
*** Which brings on even more FridgeLogic, since Charles would have likely studied everything he could about curare so he could avoid that mistake again in the future, meaning he'd be likely to know more about it than the others.
*** While Charles did mishandle the curare, the error was mistaking it for morphine when he was trying to relieve severe pain in a post-surgical patient rather than in how he used it for its intended purpose. (While he erred in not properly verifying the label of the drug he was about to administer, someone also made an equally serious error in putting a vial of a drug only useful in surgery in the ready drugs tray of the post-op ward. Such a drug should only be out for use in pre-op or the OR itself.)
*** That raises the question of why it was there to be misplaced in the first place. The US Army never approved its use to begin with (which makes the comment in the other episode that high command banned its use inaccurate).
*** The best explanation (if in the MASH universe the Army hadn't previously allowed it) is that while the Army didn't necessarily approve its use, they did tend to look the other way. Then in this episode, they refused to do that any more.
*** It seemed out of character for Charles to not look at the label first, given the extremely high standards to which he holds himself.[[note]]Consider the realistic way he initially assesses his work in "Major Ego", where he'd declared his patient's cardiac arrest "impossible, this is a routine operation!" -- before starting resuscitation.[[/note]] Sure, in meatball surgery there might not be time and you'd have to trust that the nurse or tech was giving you the right thing, but this was post-op. If he couldn't see, he'd take the bottle over to the light. His reaction to having screwed up was also more Frank-like. Since this was an early Charles episode, maybe they weren't sure of his character, so they had him do a Frank-like thing.
*** It shows that Charles thinks he is so much better that he thinks he couldn't possibly make a simple mistake as that one so he doesn't need to show immense care.
* How was the jeweler in "Patient 4077" able to reproduce Margaret's ring, down to the size and the font and type of the engraving, that she only notices it's a fake because it says "Over Hill Over Dale, Our Love Will Ever Fail", if he's never seen it?
** It was implied that Donald had bought her a cheap ring of the same design to give to her, and a ring size is easy enough to find out about a person (especially if Margaret had filed any sort of lost property paperwork). As for the font, it was probably wrong as well, given how quickly her eye was drawn to the inscription after Klinger gave the fake to her. A change in font, especially on a ring you didn't have very long, can be written off as a trick of memory, but the dropped letter was the giveaway.
** Possibly Penobscott, fake romantic that he is, used a common, unoriginal font. Conceivably, the jeweler could have chosen the same one by coincidence.
*** The jeweler recognized Penobscot's line as cheesy garbage (recall that he comments "Pee-yew"). It's not all that far-fetched to think he'd then deduce a cheap "meh, whatever" font had been used for the real ring and choose that same font for the fake.
** Mr. Shin (guy who sells it to them) says "a guy in Tokyo" sold it to him and makes them by the dozen. Presumably, the guy in Tokyo also sells the engraving tools by the dozen - meaning that he would have the same font.
** When Mr. Shin said that his friend in Tokyo makes the rings by the dozen, and describes it as "easy job, cheap setting, miracle glue," B.J. remarks, "Sounds like Penobscott's style." This could be interpreted as the show saying that Penobscott actually bought his ring from Mr. Shin's friend in Tokyo. If so, it would make sense that Mr. Shin would know what style of lettering to use, especially if his friend used the same basic style for all of those rings, which he probably would for such a cheap ring.
* Klinger is a deserter. Despite Potter not swearing him in, Klinger ''did'' sign a reenlistment contract, and the Army isn't likely to let someone out of it because they signed in the heat of the moment. By staying in Korea, and (assuming After MASH was a thing) later returning to Toledo, he should have been arrested on sight.
** Couldn't Potter--or even Klinger, himself--simply have "misplaced" the document before it was sent up the line to I-Corps?
** Not likely. The recruiter had the paperwork with him when he left, so odds are that it was processed even before Klinger's "Corporal Godiva" routine.
** The episode gives us to understand that the reenlistment wasn't final unless and until Klinger was sworn in, which he wasn't. I don't know if this reflects real life, but that's how it's presented in the show.
** The contract may have not been regarded as valid, because it's quite clear that Klinger was drunk when he signed it. That plus Potter seeming to know half the US military above the rank of Major, probably got it thrown out without much trouble. If nothing else, Klinger knows clerks at I-Corps who could disappear it.
** A reenlistment must be approved by the unit commander. Obviously, Colonel Potter did not give his approval given his behavior later in the episode. So the "contract" was not worth the paper it was written on.
* Hawkeye's gray hair in the later seasons is actually a lot more realistic than people may like to think. Hawkeye's hair remains jet black in the first three seasons, then starts to slowly, yet progressively gray more and more with each passing season, till right around Season Eight, where's definitely got a salt and pepper look to it. Now, ignoring the fact that the series ran three times as long as the actual Korean War, let's think of this: war takes a toll on people, not just mentally and emotionally, but physically as well. Three miles from the front, on call almost 24 hours a day, putting up with occasional deluges, mortar fires, and other such catastrophes, it was wearing down on him... not to mention, Hawkeye even lampshaded this idea with his father over his mistaken death certificate: "He just rattles around in that empty house all by himself, sells my things to the Salvation Army, ''and ages a couple of years for every day he thinks I'm dead.''" The same could be applied to others as well: B.J. came to Korea with brown hair that was a dirty blonde by the end, Father Mulcahy had bright red hair that too also got blonder and blonder, and Margaret was almost platinum by the end. The war took a physical toll on them as well.
** [[WordOfGod William Christopher]] even pointed this out in a recent interview on how he knew it was time for the series to end: "My hair was turning gray."
* As far as the series' timeline goes, the first season has to take place in less than nine months, because in the season finale, Henry receives word from home that his wife is about to give birth to another child, to which even Radar remarks, "At least you were home for the important part."
* In "The Joker is Wild," a big deal is made at the end of how Hawkeye was the only one who got pranked, as the whole staff was in on it. Except the bet was that B.J. could prank everyone on the staff, not just Hawkeye. B.J. didn't actually prank any of them because they were in on it and faked the entire thing. By their own admission, no actual pranks took place, not even the others allowing themselves to be pranked. So ''why'' does everyone say Hawkeye lost the bet?
** B.J., when leveling the proposal on the rest of the staff, never actually names ''himself'' as the person pulling the prank. The perpetrator is an unnamed "someone" who might theoretically prank the entire staff. Well, if the rest of the staff is part of this theoretical "someone" (which is also used to indicate an ambiguous number, not just identity), who else is there to prank but Hawkeye? B.J. never fesses up to the pranks that the rest of the staff pull on themselves. Even his taunting of Hawkeye after Klinger supposedly falls for it isn't an admission; when he holds up a finger, he isn't telling Hawkeye he's the last to be pranked. He's telling Hawkeye that there's only one member of the staff ''being'' pranked! Had Hawkeye not fallen apart, the ''rest'' of the staff would have lost.
*** I'm inclined to doubt that. I don't think B.J. was ever that good a sport. Certainly, the fact that Hawkeye was visibly crumbling so completely made it ''easier'' for B.J. to claim victory, but even if Hawkeye had spent the entire day acting normally, B.J. probably would have still insisted that Hawkeye lost because he ''must'' have been feeling anxious about the impending prank, even if he didn't show it. The only real way that Hawkeye could have won the bet is if he somehow figured out that none of the pranks he'd been seeing played on the other characters were real and that B.J. was only making him think that he was going to be pranked when he wasn't. Even then, B.J. probably would have still claimed an out because there was no way that Hawkeye could have been sure that B.J. wasn't really going to do something to him.
*** In order for a bet to be valid, all participants must agree to it before beginning. Also, if you wish to change the terms of the bet, then you have to get all of the other participants to agree to the change. You cannot expect somebody to pay off a bet that he never agreed to, nor can you unilaterally change the terms of an agreement and claim that the other party is still bound by the agreement. That's absurd. B.J. obviously knew that, in Hawkeye's mind, they were all agreeing to a bet in which B.J. had 24 hours to prank all six of the other participants. Hawkeye never agreed to a bet in which B.J. only had to prank him alone in order to be declared the winner. Meaning that the only bet Hawkeye agreed to was one that B.J. did not fulfill the victory conditions for. It was completely unfair for Hawkeye to be judged the loser of a bet that either (1) his opponent did not win, or (2) he never agreed to in the first place. If I had been in Hawkeye's place, I would have absolutely refused to pay off the bet. I would have told B.J. and the others that they essentially outsmarted themselves, because they concocted a brilliant plan, but never realized that their brilliant plan didn't actually fulfill the victory conditions of the bet.
* The episode "Rainbow Bridge". The plot is that the 4077th is treating a number of Chinese prisoners, and is somehow contacted by a Chinese field hospital who has in its care some UN troops. The Chinese, not capable of treating the UN troops up to their level of care, want to arrange a prisoner swap at the titular bridge, on the condition that Hawkeye, Trapper, Radar and Frank come unarmed to the swap. When they arrive, they are confronted by numerous Chinese guards carrying submachine guns. When it's revealed that Frank snuck a handgun (a tiny derringer that looks like it could have come out of a box of Cracker Jack, really) the commanding Chinese doctor launches into an anvilicious tirade about US actions ("Is it not enough that your planes harass us day and night? It makes it impossible for me to treat my own people. We make a civilized gesture, and you respond by coming here with a gun ready to shoot us down.") and is about ready to call off the exchange. At which point, Hawkeye browbeats Frank into surrendering the gun and makes an impassioned plea for the exchange to go on as planned. The intended Aesop seems to be "take any proffered olive branch during a war, especially if it saves lives", but it falls apart when you consider ''the Chinese were flagrantly violating the very conditions they demanded of Hawkeye'' et. al. ''by bringing armed men to the rendezvous point.'' Granted, there was no explicit condition prohibiting this, but it's at least a DoubleStandard. Not to mention, the Chinese doctor complaining about trying to treat people while being bombed? If you watch the show, you'll see the 4077th in this exact situation frequently. As the Chinese ''could'' have been laying a trap and taken Hawkeye and the others prisoner or gunned them down with impunity, it seems more likely that the AccidentalAesop was "You know what? [[JerkassHasAPoint This once, in retrospect, Frank was probably right.]]"
** Where exactly does this become FridgeLogic or Fridge ''anything'' for that matter? Anyone with any brains (i.e. not Frank or Margaret) would realize that the Chinese would not go back on a deal like that to knock off or capture a couple of surgeons and corpsmen, what with the damage a betrayal like that would do to their ability to make future exchanges. If they proved by killing or capturing the 4077 crew that was sent, no future exchanges would be allowed. The doctor complaining about being bombed has nothing to do with the issue, and the Chinese troops having guns is reasonable since ''it's fifty miles behind their lines and they are making a gesture by handing over the prisoners without demanding anything in exchange.'' Of course it's a double standard, neither side has any reason to trust the other. For all the Chinese know the 4077 crew could have a bunch of soldiers with them to "rescue" their wounded and take a bunch of prisoners.
* In "Death Takes a Holiday", Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret try to keep a soldier alive past midnight (his wounds are fatal, it's only a question of ''when'' he dies) so his family won't have to remember Christmas as the day he died. In the end, they fail, and Hawkeye moves the hands on the clock and they falsify the record. They could have just said, "Hey, let's leave him and go to the Christmas party and check him after midnight. When we find him dead, who's to say what time he died?"
** Because they're going to do their best to do it legitimately, and it seems like Hawkeye only thinks to just falsify the death certificate when the soldier finally dies just before midnight. Besides, if ''you'' had just left a man to die, could you enjoy the party?
** Falsifying a death certificate is ''hugely'' illegal, and Hawkeye is the only one who thinks of it when they fail.
*** Actually, this is not correct. To be illegal, such falsification must be "material." With the time of death, there is always ambiguity and it is impossible to say that a 30 minute change in the time of death was actually material. In fact, in the military, the time of death is frequently misreported. A service member's family gets the most benefits if he dies within 30 days of being medically retired. So if a soldier came in to a military hospital essentially "dead", we would complete the medical retirement process (maybe 90 minutes, tops), and then - and only then - officially declare him dead. So what Hawkeye did was not at all unusual, and it is possible that this relatively common scenario was the basis for the story.
*** Even if the above weren't true, you still have to find a person willing to court martial. Giving the reason, I doubt even Frank (had he been there) would have.
** If anything, they were probably ''avoiding'' going to the party. At that point, Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret were all thoroughly depressed. They knew they wouldn't be able to enjoy the party. And if they went, it would be very difficult for them to hide how unhappy they were. If their friends at the party saw they were feeling down, they would naturally ask what was wrong, and it could wind up bringing the entire party down.
* Why did Klinger and Soon Lee manage to get married after only a day or two of being engaged, when [[Recap/MashS2E7LIPLocalIndigenousPersonnel "L.I.P. (Local Indigenous Personnel)"]] suggested it would take months? Simple: they didn't have Klinger's scrounging and Potter's connections to speed things up.
** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.
* In "Oh, How We Danced," a man named Key Yong Lu, who is grateful to the 4077 personnel for treating his grandson, offers to teach Charles karate after he is assaulted by an irate unit commander. The problem with this is that karate is a Japanese martial art, and is unlikely to have been known or taught in 1950's Korea. A Korean martial artist would be far more likely to practice and teach Taekwondo. Arguably, though, it might simply have been [[ArtisticLicenseMartialArts more practical for the show to use karate]] instead of Taekwondo in this episode, given that an American television audience would be more likely to know what karate is.
* In "Give and Take," Colonel Potter says, "General Crenshaw is demanding 100% participation" in the charity drive, with every officer expected to donate $10 and every enlisted person $3. It is also stated that if this is not achieved, then both Potter (as CO of the 4077th) and Charles (who was assigned the task of being charity collection officer) would get in trouble ... Okay, who exactly changed the definition of the word "charity"? How can it be an act of charity if people are ''required'' to donate? Aren't charitable donations supposed to be voluntary? The episode does not say that the personnel who didn't donate would be in trouble, only the unit's commanding officer and charity collections officer. But threatening to punish somebody else if the 4077th's personnel don't all donate to the charity drive is still pressuring, or arguably forcing, the staff to donate to the charity drive. Forcing people to make donations under threat of punishment is completely contrary to what "charity" fundamentally means.
** In Vietnam, soldiers who had just received their paychecks would be heavily pressured to donate to various charitable causes, as the charity table was set up right next to where they'd get their scrip (military money). The table would be staffed with an officer or two who would heavily imply that the soldiers should donate the recommended amount if they knew what was good for them. I know someone who was a company commander in Vietnam: he hated the practice, and he'd go with his men to the pay counter and loudly tell them ''"You don't have to donate if you don't want to."'' The brass wasn't happy with that, and he wasn't a company commander very long.
** The people who, as BJ puts it, "sent us to war to ''make peace''" aren't really concerned with things like the fundamental meanings of things. It's the same military that won't allow them any real amount of supplies or virtually anything that would make their job easier, for various absurd reasons. And as it portrays generals being particularly wacky about giving orders for things that made little sense ([=MacArthur=] was still around, after all, and Patton had left his mark) this isn't particularly unusual.
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** Potter's not stupid; he knew damn well what Klinger was up to with the signatures. But he also knew that he and the other officers had been too hard on Klinger about the office decorations, and since Klinger had gone on his R&R and come back without incident, it stands to reason that Potter understood Klinger had had a change of heart about going AWOL. This was Potter's way of saying he appreciated Klinger had come back while still letting him know that he'd known exactly what Klinger had been initially planning.
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Changed line(s) 50 (click to see context) from:
* In the episode [[Recap/MashS8E21GoodbyeCruelWorld Goodbye Cruel World]], Klinger tries to forge Potter's signature on the discharge package to I Corps. After filling a legal pad with "Sherman T. Potter"s, he finally settles on the "perfect one." Later, Potter discovers the pad and mentions, "You put too much swoop on the 'T'". Potter seems like it's a joke but he probably figures that there may be a time when his signature is needed but he can't do so and would instruct Klinger to sign for him. He wants to make sure the signature is a good one.
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* In the episode [[Recap/MashS8E21GoodbyeCruelWorld Goodbye Cruel World]], Klinger tries to forge Potter's signature on the discharge package to I Corps. After filling a legal pad with "Sherman T. Potter"s, he finally settles on the "perfect one." Later, Potter discovers the pad and mentions, "You put too much swoop on the 'T'". Potter seems like it's a joke but he probably figures that there may be a time when his signature is needed but he can't do so and would instruct Klinger to sign for him. He wants to make sure the signature is a good one. Radar openly admits to forging Potter's signature on documents for official reasons at one point (and Blake's at another), so presumably by this point Potter trusts Klinger enough to not do anything ''too'' outrageous with his signature.
Changed line(s) 59,62 (click to see context) from:
---> '''Frank''': I understand okay. Death...or worse.
---> '''Hawkeye''' (to B.J.): Besides my life, Frank wants my virginity.
---> '''B.J.''': We all do.
---> '''Hawkeye''': If only I'd known.
---> '''Hawkeye''' (to B.J.): Besides my life, Frank wants my virginity.
---> '''B.J.''': We all do.
---> '''Hawkeye''': If only I'd known.
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---> '''Frank''': I understand okay. Death...or worse.
--->worse.\\
'''Hawkeye''' (to B.J.): Besides my life, Frank wants myvirginity.
--->virginity.\\
'''B.J.''': We alldo.
--->do.\\
'''Hawkeye''': If only I'd known.
--->
'''Hawkeye''' (to B.J.): Besides my life, Frank wants my
--->
'''B.J.''': We all
--->
'''Hawkeye''': If only I'd known.
Changed line(s) 148 (click to see context) from:
** In Vietnam, soldiers who had just received their paychecks would be heavily pressured to donate to various charitable causes, as the charity table was set up right next to where they'd get their scrip (military money). The table would be staffed with an officer or two who would heavily imply that the soldiers should donate the recommended amount if they knew what was good for them. I know someone who was a company commander in Vietnam: he hated the practice, and he'd go with his men to the pay counter and loudly tell them ''"You don't have to donate if you don't want to."'' The brass wasn't happy with that, and he wasn't a company commander very long.
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** In Vietnam, soldiers who had just received their paychecks would be heavily pressured to donate to various charitable causes, as the charity table was set up right next to where they'd get their scrip (military money). The table would be staffed with an officer or two who would heavily imply that the soldiers should donate the recommended amount if they knew what was good for them. I know someone who was a company commander in Vietnam: he hated the practice, and he'd go with his men to the pay counter and loudly tell them ''"You don't have to donate if you don't want to."'' The brass wasn't happy with that, and he wasn't a company commander very long.long.
** The people who, as BJ puts it, "sent us to war to ''make peace''" aren't really concerned with things like the fundamental meanings of things. It's the same military that won't allow them any real amount of supplies or virtually anything that would make their job easier, for various absurd reasons. And as it portrays generals being particularly wacky about giving orders for things that made little sense ([=MacArthur=] was still around, after all, and Patton had left his mark) this isn't particularly unusual.
** The people who, as BJ puts it, "sent us to war to ''make peace''" aren't really concerned with things like the fundamental meanings of things. It's the same military that won't allow them any real amount of supplies or virtually anything that would make their job easier, for various absurd reasons. And as it portrays generals being particularly wacky about giving orders for things that made little sense ([=MacArthur=] was still around, after all, and Patton had left his mark) this isn't particularly unusual.
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Changed line(s) 82 (click to see context) from:
** Relates to the episode where Canadian patients praise the quality of the food and say they've nt eaten this well in a long time - and explain that their field kitchens and rations are [[HollywoodCuisine provided by the British]].
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** Relates to the episode episode where Canadian patients praise the quality of the food and say they've nt not eaten this well in a long time - and explain that their field kitchens and rations are [[HollywoodCuisine provided by the British]].
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Changed line(s) 96 (click to see context) from:
*** In at least one episode, someone states that Frank handles the simpler operations, so he gets less chances to screw up.
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*** In at least one episode, someone states that Frank handles the simpler operations, so he gets less chances to screw up.[[note]]That was Major Houlihan in episode 5x13 "The Colonel's Horse". She was having her appendix taken out.[[/note]]
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Changed line(s) 82 (click to see context) from:
** Relates to the episode where Canadian patients praise the quality of the food and say they've nt eaten this well in a long time - and explain that their field kitchens and rations are [[CordonBleurgh provided by the British]].
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** Relates to the episode where Canadian patients praise the quality of the food and say they've nt eaten this well in a long time - and explain that their field kitchens and rations are [[CordonBleurgh [[HollywoodCuisine provided by the British]].
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Poisonous Friend is no longer a trope
Changed line(s) 48 (click to see context) from:
* It's likely that Frank Burns fulfilled a role of PoisonousFriend for Margaret, considering that she used to be basically a female version of him over the course of Burns' entire role here, but began to mellow out after Frank left and loosened up to an extreme degree over the rest of the show.
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* It's likely that Frank Burns fulfilled a role of PoisonousFriend ToxicFriendInfluence for Margaret, considering that she used to be basically a female version of him over the course of Burns' entire role here, but began to mellow out after Frank left and loosened up to an extreme degree over the rest of the show.
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* When Bigelow is hurt by the falling watertower, Margaret brings her a makeup kit. Why would she do that? Because she knows that Hawkeye is beginning his shift in Post-Op in a few minutes and also that the storm interrupted their date.
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Changed line(s) 146 (click to see context) from:
* In "Give and Take," Colonel Potter says, "General Crenshaw is demanding 100% participation" in the charity drive, with every officer expected to donate $10 and every enlisted person $3. It is also stated that if this is not achieved, then both Potter (as CO of the 4077th) and Charles (who was assigned the task of being charity collection officer) would get in trouble ... Okay, who exactly changed the definition of the word "charity"? How can it be an act of charity if people are ''required'' to donate? Aren't charitable donations supposed to be voluntary? The episode does not say that the personnel who didn't donate would be in trouble, only the unit's commanding officer and charity collections officer. But threatening to punish somebody else if the 4077th's personnel don't all donate to the charity drive is still pressuring, or arguably forcing, the staff to donate to the charity drive. Forcing people to make donations under threat of punishment is completely contrary to what "charity" fundamentally means.
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* In "Give and Take," Colonel Potter says, "General Crenshaw is demanding 100% participation" in the charity drive, with every officer expected to donate $10 and every enlisted person $3. It is also stated that if this is not achieved, then both Potter (as CO of the 4077th) and Charles (who was assigned the task of being charity collection officer) would get in trouble ... Okay, who exactly changed the definition of the word "charity"? How can it be an act of charity if people are ''required'' to donate? Aren't charitable donations supposed to be voluntary? The episode does not say that the personnel who didn't donate would be in trouble, only the unit's commanding officer and charity collections officer. But threatening to punish somebody else if the 4077th's personnel don't all donate to the charity drive is still pressuring, or arguably forcing, the staff to donate to the charity drive. Forcing people to make donations under threat of punishment is completely contrary to what "charity" fundamentally means.means.
** In Vietnam, soldiers who had just received their paychecks would be heavily pressured to donate to various charitable causes, as the charity table was set up right next to where they'd get their scrip (military money). The table would be staffed with an officer or two who would heavily imply that the soldiers should donate the recommended amount if they knew what was good for them. I know someone who was a company commander in Vietnam: he hated the practice, and he'd go with his men to the pay counter and loudly tell them ''"You don't have to donate if you don't want to."'' The brass wasn't happy with that, and he wasn't a company commander very long.
** In Vietnam, soldiers who had just received their paychecks would be heavily pressured to donate to various charitable causes, as the charity table was set up right next to where they'd get their scrip (military money). The table would be staffed with an officer or two who would heavily imply that the soldiers should donate the recommended amount if they knew what was good for them. I know someone who was a company commander in Vietnam: he hated the practice, and he'd go with his men to the pay counter and loudly tell them ''"You don't have to donate if you don't want to."'' The brass wasn't happy with that, and he wasn't a company commander very long.
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** If anything, they were probably ''avoiding'' going to the party. At that point, Hawkeye, B.J., and Margaret were all thoroughly depressed. They knew they wouldn't be able to enjoy the party. And if they went, it would be very difficult for them to hide how unhappy they were. If their friends at the party saw they were feeling down, they would naturally ask what was wrong, and it could wind up bringing the entire party down.
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** We should bear in mind that, for the most part, the people saying that Frank was a terrible doctor were people who had a deep personal dislike of him. Not without good reason, of course, but the point is, they may have been predisposed to judge Frank as harshly as possible in just about any aspect of their lives. It is possible that they were making Frank out to be a worse surgeon than he actually was. They didn't do this with Charles, but that was likely because (1) Charles, unlike Frank, sometimes showed a good side to his personality, and (2) Charles was simply too skilled a surgeon for anyone to credibly say that he wasn't.
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*** In order for a bet to be valid, all participants must agree to it before beginning. Also, if you wish to change the terms of the bet, then you have to get all of the other participants to agree to the change. You cannot expect somebody to pay off a bet that he never agreed to, nor can you unilaterally change the terms of an agreement and claim that the other party is still bound by the agreement. That's absurd. B.J. obviously knew that, in Hawkeye's mind, they were all agreeing to a bet in which B.J. had 24 hours to prank all six of the other participants. Hawkeye never agreed to a bet in which B.J. only had to prank him alone in order to be declared the winner. Meaning that the only bet Hawkeye agreed to was one that B.J. did not fulfill the victory conditions for. It was completely unfair for Hawkeye to be judged the loser of a bet that either (1) his opponent did not win, or (2) he never agreed to in the first place. If I had been in Hawkeye's place, I would have absolutely refused to pay off the bet. I would have told B.J. and the others that they essentially outsmarted themselves, because they concocted a brilliant plan, but never realized that their brilliant plan didn't actually fulfill the victory conditions of the bet.
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** When Mr. Shin said that his friend in Tokyo makes the rings by the dozen, and describes it as "easy job, cheap setting, miracle glue," B.J. remarks, "Sounds like Penobscott's style." This could be interpreted as the show saying that Penobscott actually bought his ring from Mr. Shin's friend in Tokyo. If so, it would make sense that Mr. Shin would know what style of lettering to use, especially if his friend used the same basic style for all of those rings, which he probably would for such a cheap ring.
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*** I'm inclined to doubt that. I don't think B.J. was ever that good a sport. Certainly, the fact that Hawkeye was visibly crumbling so completely made it ''easier'' for B.J. to claim victory, but even if Hawkeye had spent the entire day acting normally, B.J. probably would have still insisted that Hawkeye lost because he ''must'' have been feeling anxious about the impending prank, even if he didn't show it. The only real way that Hawkeye could have won the bet is if he somehow figured out that none of the pranks he'd been seeing played on the other characters were real and that B.J. was only making him think that he was going to be pranked when he wasn't. Even then, B.J. probably would have still claimed an out because there was no way that Hawkeye could have been sure that B.J. wasn't really going to do something to him.
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Changed line(s) 140 (click to see context) from:
* In "Oh, How We Danced," a man named Key Yong Lu, who is grateful to the 4077 personnel for treating his grandson, offers to teach Charles karate after he is assaulted by an irate unit commander. The problem with this is that karate is a Japanese martial art, and is unlikely to have been known or taught in 1950's Korea. A Korean martial artist would be far more likely to practice and teach Taekwondo. Arguably, though, it might simply have been [[ArtisticLicenseMartialArts more practical for the show to use karate]] instead of Taekwondo in this episode, given that an American television audience would be more likely to know what karate is.
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* In "Oh, How We Danced," a man named Key Yong Lu, who is grateful to the 4077 personnel for treating his grandson, offers to teach Charles karate after he is assaulted by an irate unit commander. The problem with this is that karate is a Japanese martial art, and is unlikely to have been known or taught in 1950's Korea. A Korean martial artist would be far more likely to practice and teach Taekwondo. Arguably, though, it might simply have been [[ArtisticLicenseMartialArts more practical for the show to use karate]] instead of Taekwondo in this episode, given that an American television audience would be more likely to know what karate is.is.
* In "Give and Take," Colonel Potter says, "General Crenshaw is demanding 100% participation" in the charity drive, with every officer expected to donate $10 and every enlisted person $3. It is also stated that if this is not achieved, then both Potter (as CO of the 4077th) and Charles (who was assigned the task of being charity collection officer) would get in trouble ... Okay, who exactly changed the definition of the word "charity"? How can it be an act of charity if people are ''required'' to donate? Aren't charitable donations supposed to be voluntary? The episode does not say that the personnel who didn't donate would be in trouble, only the unit's commanding officer and charity collections officer. But threatening to punish somebody else if the 4077th's personnel don't all donate to the charity drive is still pressuring, or arguably forcing, the staff to donate to the charity drive. Forcing people to make donations under threat of punishment is completely contrary to what "charity" fundamentally means.
* In "Give and Take," Colonel Potter says, "General Crenshaw is demanding 100% participation" in the charity drive, with every officer expected to donate $10 and every enlisted person $3. It is also stated that if this is not achieved, then both Potter (as CO of the 4077th) and Charles (who was assigned the task of being charity collection officer) would get in trouble ... Okay, who exactly changed the definition of the word "charity"? How can it be an act of charity if people are ''required'' to donate? Aren't charitable donations supposed to be voluntary? The episode does not say that the personnel who didn't donate would be in trouble, only the unit's commanding officer and charity collections officer. But threatening to punish somebody else if the 4077th's personnel don't all donate to the charity drive is still pressuring, or arguably forcing, the staff to donate to the charity drive. Forcing people to make donations under threat of punishment is completely contrary to what "charity" fundamentally means.
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Changed line(s) 139 (click to see context) from:
** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.
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** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.home.
* In "Oh, How We Danced," a man named Key Yong Lu, who is grateful to the 4077 personnel for treating his grandson, offers to teach Charles karate after he is assaulted by an irate unit commander. The problem with this is that karate is a Japanese martial art, and is unlikely to have been known or taught in 1950's Korea. A Korean martial artist would be far more likely to practice and teach Taekwondo. Arguably, though, it might simply have been [[ArtisticLicenseMartialArts more practical for the show to use karate]] instead of Taekwondo in this episode, given that an American television audience would be more likely to know what karate is.
* In "Oh, How We Danced," a man named Key Yong Lu, who is grateful to the 4077 personnel for treating his grandson, offers to teach Charles karate after he is assaulted by an irate unit commander. The problem with this is that karate is a Japanese martial art, and is unlikely to have been known or taught in 1950's Korea. A Korean martial artist would be far more likely to practice and teach Taekwondo. Arguably, though, it might simply have been [[ArtisticLicenseMartialArts more practical for the show to use karate]] instead of Taekwondo in this episode, given that an American television audience would be more likely to know what karate is.
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Changed line(s) 52 (click to see context) from:
to:
* In Colonel Flagg's last appearance, he busts up a card game that turns out to have the mayor and police chief of Uijeongbu in it. The police chief says, "I got a lot of big contacts at I-Corps; they'll fix your wagon!" It seems likely that someone at I-Corps did just that, and the reason why we don't see Flagg after this was that he was [[ReassignedToAntarctica sent somewhere he couldn't cause any more trouble]].
----
----
Changed line(s) 137,139 (click to see context) from:
** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.
** In Colonel Flagg's last appearance, he busts up a card game that turns out to have the mayor and police chief of Uijeongbu in it. The police chief says, "I got a lot of big contacts at I-Corps; they'll fix your wagon!" It seems likely that someone at I-Corps did just that, and the reason why we don't see Flagg after this was that he was [[ReassignedToAntarctica sent somewhere he couldn't cause any more trouble]].
----
** In Colonel Flagg's last appearance, he busts up a card game that turns out to have the mayor and police chief of Uijeongbu in it. The police chief says, "I got a lot of big contacts at I-Corps; they'll fix your wagon!" It seems likely that someone at I-Corps did just that, and the reason why we don't see Flagg after this was that he was [[ReassignedToAntarctica sent somewhere he couldn't cause any more trouble]].
----
to:
** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.
** In Colonel Flagg's last appearance, he busts up a card game that turns out to have the mayor and police chief of Uijeongbu in it. The police chief says, "I got a lot of big contacts at I-Corps; they'll fix your wagon!" It seems likely that someone at I-Corps did just that, and the reason why we don't see Flagg after this was that he was [[ReassignedToAntarctica sent somewhere he couldn't cause any more trouble]].
----home.
** In Colonel Flagg's last appearance, he busts up a card game that turns out to have the mayor and police chief of Uijeongbu in it. The police chief says, "I got a lot of big contacts at I-Corps; they'll fix your wagon!" It seems likely that someone at I-Corps did just that, and the reason why we don't see Flagg after this was that he was [[ReassignedToAntarctica sent somewhere he couldn't cause any more trouble]].
----
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** In Colonel Flagg's last appearance, he busts up a card game that turns out to have the mayor and police chief of Uijeongbu in it. The police chief says, "I got a lot of big contacts at I-Corps; they'll fix your wagon!" It seems likely that someone at I-Corps did just that, and the reason why we don't see Flagg after this was that he was [[ReassignedToAntarctica sent somewhere he couldn't cause any more trouble]].
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Changed line(s) 50 (click to see context) from:
* In the episode [[Recap/MashS8E21GoodbyeCruelWorld Goodbye Cruel World]], Klinger tries to forge Potter's signature on the discharge package to IKOR. After filling a legal pad with "Sherman T. Potter"s, he finally settles on the "perfect one." Later, Potter discovers the pad and mentions, "You put too much swoop on the 'T'". Potter seems like it's a joke but he probably figures that there may be a time when his signature is needed but he can't do so and would instruct Klinger to sign for him. He wants to make sure the signature is a good one.
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* In the episode [[Recap/MashS8E21GoodbyeCruelWorld Goodbye Cruel World]], Klinger tries to forge Potter's signature on the discharge package to IKOR.I Corps. After filling a legal pad with "Sherman T. Potter"s, he finally settles on the "perfect one." Later, Potter discovers the pad and mentions, "You put too much swoop on the 'T'". Potter seems like it's a joke but he probably figures that there may be a time when his signature is needed but he can't do so and would instruct Klinger to sign for him. He wants to make sure the signature is a good one.
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Changed line(s) 72 (click to see context) from:
** Jones was only transferred to the 4077 in the first place because the unit needed a ringer for a football game. It's possible that the transfer was never intended to be a long-term one, and he simply returned to his previous posting.
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** Jones was only transferred to the 4077 4077th in the first place because the unit needed a ringer for a football game. It's possible that the transfer was never intended to be a long-term one, and he simply returned to his previous posting.
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** Jones was only transferred to the 4077 in the first place because the unit needed a ringer for a football game. It's possible that the transfer was never intended to be a long-term one, and he simply returned to his previous posting.
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** Relates to the episode where Canadian patients praise the quality of the food and say they've nt eaten this well in a long time - and explain that their field kitchens and rations are [[CordonBleurgh provided by the British]].
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attack of the grammar nazis
Changed line(s) 75 (click to see context) from:
** This episode plays fast and loose with the rules for the Purple Heart. The criterium is not that the injury occur in a combat zone; it must be due to hostile action. Neither Frank nor Wendell would receive a Purple Heart in this episode if it were done realistically.
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** This episode plays fast and loose with the rules for the Purple Heart. The criterium criterion is not that the injury occur in a combat zone; it must be due to hostile action. Neither Frank nor Wendell would receive a Purple Heart in this episode if it were done realistically.
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Changed line(s) 71 (click to see context) from:
*** The Doylist explanation is that Fox needed to cut costs (notice at nearly the same time the characters of Ho Jon, Ugly John, Lt. Dish, and Nurse McCarthy also disappeared. The "no black surgeons" was an excuse because they knew that they couldn't keep getting away with a character whose name was a racial slur.
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*** The Doylist explanation is that Fox needed to cut costs (notice at nearly the same time the characters of Ho Jon, Ugly John, Lt. Dish, and Nurse McCarthy [=McCarthy=] also disappeared. The "no black surgeons" was an excuse because they knew that they couldn't keep getting away with a character whose name was a racial slur.
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** It's probably also a matter of the war being over by that point and Klinger choosing to stay in Korea vs. bringing Soon-Lee home.
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*** The Doylist explanation is that Fox needed to cut costs (notice at nearly the same time the characters of Ho Jon, Ugly John, Lt. Dish, and Nurse McCarthy also disappeared. The "no black surgeons" was an excuse because they knew that they couldn't keep getting away with a character whose name was a racial slur.
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Changed line(s) 51 (click to see context) from:
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* Col. Potter's presence allowed Margaret to mellow out. When Henry was running the outfit, it was clear that he was a competent medical man, but was, by his own admission, in over his head militarily. To someone like Margaret, who was Regular Army, Henry's lack of military protocols must have been galling, which is why she latched onto the only person who seemed as patriotic as she felt herself to be, i.e. Frank. Potter, however, was also Regular Army. And demonstrated quickly and in short order that he had a handle on things. He had an air of authority, and could quickly shut down Frank when he went on one of his spiels. After seeing that Potter was competent and capable, she was able to relax a bit, and allow herself to be more human with others, because she felt they now had a decent leader at the helm.
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* In the episode [[Recap/MashS8E21GoodbyeCruelWorld Goodbye Cruel World]], Klinger tries to forge Potter's signature on the discharge package to IKOR. After filling a legal pad with "Sherman T. Potter"s, he finally settles on the "perfect one." Later, Potter discovers the pad and mentions, "You put too much swoop on the 'T'". Potter seems like it's a joke but he probably figures that there may be a time when his signature is needed but he can't do so and would instruct Klinger to sign for him. He wants to make sure the signature is a good one.
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* In the episode "Margaret's Engagement", Houlihan compares her new fiance to Frank Burns thusly, and I didn't catch the GettingCrapPastTheRadar of that last example until several years later:
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* In the episode "Margaret's Engagement", Houlihan compares her new fiance to Frank Burns thusly, and I didn't catch the GettingCrapPastTheRadar implications of that last example until several years later:
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*** In Frank's case he deliberately lied in order to get the medal by claiming he'd been wounded by a shell (which was actually an egg shell.) And Hawkeye gave Wendell the Purple Heart because the kid was so obsessed with getting one to impress a girl back home.
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*** In Frank's case case, he deliberately lied in order to get also twisted a non-combat injury (throwing his back out dancing with Margaret) into a Purple Heart, so the medal by claiming he'd been wounded by fact that he cheated his way into it makes the theft a shell (which was actually an egg shell.) little more sympathetic. And Hawkeye gave Wendell the Purple Heart because the kid was so obsessed with getting one to impress a girl back home.
