Thursday will be a sad day for MASH fans who watch it on ME TV. Next Thursday at 7:00 they will show the last episode of season 3 then at 7:30 start showing season 4.:(

An even sadder day is when season 6 starts!

an even sadder day is when season 8 starts

Yep

After season 3 MASH was never the same

Yep

no, it certainly wasn't. And especially after season 7; CBS made a HUUUUGE mistake by letting Alan Alda take over the typewriter and directors chair. Almost every other week it was "oh we're doctors and we're nurses...and we save lives which makes us so good...and death is such a bummer...and war is hell..." and on and on!

The writers in the later seasons had no idea how to write for the characters. Tonight on MeTV, Father Mulcaye told Col. Potter that he can't write to the kids back in the states because he (Mulcaye) has never saved a life. Any MASH fan knows that Mulcaye saved at least two lives outright before this episode (Letters, S9 Ep2).The soldier he and Radar saved with the treciatimy and when he realized a soldier was still alive when he was giving him Last Rights.

But instead of mentioning those heroic efforts, Father Mulcaye told a story about saving an old, drunkin' dog by getting him to stop drinking!! Absolutely embarrassing to be a MASH fan after Larry Gelbart and Gene Reynolds saw the writing on the wall and left the show.

tonight they started season 9:(

tonight they started season 9:(

I know, yuck!

I know, yuck!

:yeahthat



although this is more appropriate::barf:puke:

A true M*A*S*H fan would like all the seasons, or at least most of them. There were weak episodes but no weak seasons. And to not even consider anything after season 3 (a small minority of the show's well deserved long run) is just sad. Harry Morgan and Mike Farrell were wonderful cast additions, and later on David Ogden Stiers. The entire regular cast on this show was first rate all 11 seasons.

A true M*A*S*H fan would like all the seasons, or at least most of them.

Based on what? MASH had different producers, directors, writers, and some actors in the later seasons, so your comment is ridiculous.

now they're on season 6:(:(

When I was old enough to watch in primetime, they were already in the BJ/Potter era, so those episodes are more familiar to me.

I thought season 4 was still good because Larry Gelbart was still in charge. And season 5 was good because Frank was still there. For me, the cutoff is with season 7 and BJ’s stupid mustache. And Alan Alda gains more control (I tend to skip the heavy-handed episodes that he writes/directs). But the first six seasons are OK with me, and selected episodes thereafter.

I don't think any of them are really bad and I haven't seen that many episodes. In fact, I just started watching again after many, many years and some of the first ones I saw were the ones where Hawkeye and Margaret were hinting at a romance.

now they're on season 8 again.:(:(:(:(

MASH in many ways is several different shows. One really feels it hits its groove early on just as main cast members depart. The fact that they got another 8 seasons out of it says a lot for the creative forces behind it. That being said, as with any aging series, it is hard to keep quality up for so many years and I think after a very solid season 7, it starts to run out of steam afterwards.

I for one welcomed the change of Frank to Winchester as, after Margaret got engaged, they didn't know what to do with Frank Burns. He'd wander into a scene, get insulted, then say "Go peddle your fish" or words to that effect and leave. It would have been interesting to see him hang around until the end. I've always wished that they would have had the opportunity to treat his exit from the series with a little more attention / respect especially when you see the direction the series was heading at that point. Frank cracks up in the movie (spoiler alert) and on the show all of his antics happen off screen as if the actor died and they're trying to fill in a blank (a la Freddie Prinze as an example). I would have loved to see how Larry Linville handled that if they would have filmed an episode to give the character (IMO) a proper sendoff.