Corrected entry: Throughout the series, several PA announcements are heard around camp, voiced by Sal Viscuso or Todd Susman. However, we never see anyone but Radar or Klinger manning the PA system, and as it is based in the clerk's office, it would seem odd for someone else to come in to make the announcements.
Quo Vadis, Captain Chandler - S4-E9
Corrected entry: When Sydney Freedman asked Capt Chandler if he wasn't in the Army or a B-29 bombardier, that would be impossible. The U.S. Air Force was established Sept 18th, 1947. They controlled all bombing missions and bombers with only U.S. Air Force crews only.
Correction: This may be taking "The Army" too literally. It may technically be incorrect, but in this case, one probably could substitute "The Armed Forces", especially out of the mouth of Sidney, who certainly isn't a stickler for military tables of organisation. What bugs me about this is that from the writers' perspective the distinction would have been much more of a given. I guess one could argue either way, so let the voting begin.
Peace on Us - S7-E2
Corrected entry: During the "red party", Col. Potter can be seen holding a glass containing tomato juice or a mixture thereof. From the episode "The Price of Tomato Juice," we know Potter is allergic to it. Having so recently been reminded of the fact, why would he drink more? (00:42:30)
Correction: Just because it's red doesn't mean it's tomato juice. It could be anything, especially given it's a "red party".
Agreed. It would be something highly alcoholic, not tomato juice. Unless it was a Bloody Mary, which really isn't a military drink.
Corrected entry: Major Houlihan is frequently shown with very long fingernails. This is against Army regulations and highly impractical in the Operating Room.
Correction: Margaret herself is the highest ranked nurse. As such, only the commanding officer of the unit would be able to put her on report. Neither Blake nor Potter seem to care about such things when they do not affect the stability of the unit. As well, Margaret herself is very well connected among the local generals and as such would be able to get away with minor details like that.
Corrected entry: In the Swamp, Hawkeye, Trapper and Radar are playing with red backed cards, and Ugly John is holding blue back cards.
Correction: Being in the middle of nowhere and a mobile facility, it's not hard to imagine a situation where some cards from both decks got lost and they decided to combine two partial decks. (They might then choose to ignore the fact that they could tell which cards are from which deck out of sportsmanship).
Correction: Ugly John had been sleeping for two hours. The others grabbed a new deck to avoid waking him up.
Corrected entry: When Margaret and Frank look over Tuttle's file, Margaret reads aloud the words "Berlinishes Polytechnikum". The correct German wording would be "Berliner Polytechnikum". While this could be ascribed to a mistake of Hawkeye or Trapper, no indication of that being the case is given in the show.
Correction: It is indicated. That is what Hawkeye says as he writes it down. He doesn't know German well.
Corrected entry: In many episodes throughout the show, much is made of the supposedly extreme weather the people of the MASH unit faced (especially in "The Interview," the final episode of season four). In actual fact, Korea is in the temperate zone. Although high humidity would have made winter temps seem colder and summer temps hotter, staff from many places in the states would not find these extreme in the least.
Correction: Korean winters might usually be merely cold rather than bitter, but the winter of 1950 was bitter. Additionally, a lot of the fighting in that year was in the interior at high altitudes; Chosin Reservoir is about 1,000 m ASL. And at the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, the mercury bottomed out at -35°F (-37°C) - only 10°F warmer than the record lowest temperature ever recorded in Korea. Troops were fighting out in the open in these conditions, with little of no shelter, for some 11 days. And that's just the lowest temperature recorded by a trained meteorologist; some unofficial thermometers at the hospital broke the -50 mark.
Corrected entry: It seems Colonel Potter has a love hate relationship with artillery/guns at the MASH. First, Potter orders Hawkeye to get rid of an artillery piece he received in lieu of payment of a gambling debt, for fear it will attract fire. In "Hey Doc", however, he loves the idea of having a tank in the compound to scare off snipers, with no concern that it too may attract fire. By the final episode, however, he again has an aversion to guns as he tires desperately to get a tank, left in the compound by a wounded member of the tank crew, removed as it is drawing fire.
Correction: The circumstances of the listed occasions are quite different. In case of Hawkeye's gun and the damaged tank, Colonel Potter does not want the camp to appear to be armed for fear of becoming a "valid military target" despite the red cross. In The Sniper episode however, the camp already IS under fire, so Potter tries to find a remedy. A tank as a countermeasure to snipers actually makes sense from a military Point of View: They can't hurt it, but it can hurt them. In my opinion, Potter is balancing risk against profit here. This is not a plot hole.
Corrected entry: After the propaganda bomb goes off and they read the pamphlets, the propaganda is written in English and not Korean, even though it's supposed to be aimed at the North Koreans.
Correction: As we see in the series, many North Koreans can understand and speak English, though not all can.
The Late Captain Pierce - S4-E4
Corrected entry: Captain Pratt refers to a comment made by George Orwell in 1984, however M*A*S*H is set in the 1950s. (00:19:40)
Correction: Nineteen Eighty-Four is a book written by George Orwell and published in 1949. Pratt had obviously read it by the early 50's.
Corrected entry: When Radar gets his breakfast he is given a large dollop of mashed potatoes. When he sits down to eat, the potatoes are gone and there is something unidentifiable in their place. (00:02:30)
Corrected entry: Wouldn't Col. Flagg arouse suspicion to his superiors by regularly visiting an American medical unit? He wouldn't have been given orders on every occasion to check it out, and both Blake and Potter would likely have complained about his attitude towards their doctors (especially Hawkeye).
Correction: Because Flagg was supposed to be an intelligence officer and only appeared in 6 episodes between 1974-1979 it is likely his visits may not have gained much attention from superiors and he would probably often work unsupervised and somewhat undirected. As for Blake and Potter, as well as the rest of the MASH unit, Flagg was largely considered a joke and hardly worth the effort to seriously bother over.
Corrected entry: Season 1 Episode 1 "M*A*S*H - The Pilot". Hammond calls Margaret "Hotlips" and Hawkeye and Trapper react as if it is the first time they have heard the nickname. However, Hawkeye called her this earlier on at the beginning of The Party. (00:21:30)
Correction: They were surprised the General knew her nickname, which was created in the movie after the two Majors "enjoyed" themselves.
Corrected entry: Between season 2 and season 3, the interior decoration of the officers' club changes radically. Up to season 2, it's furnished with wicker chairs and tables and has a picture of General MacArthur at the wall, from season 3 on, it has the familiar look with the tables made from tires and the unit insignia on the wall.
Correction: As you say, it happens in-between seasons. Given the 4077th's successful track record, the higher-ups may reward them with better equipment for the Officers' Club. (At one point, they save the life of an officer's son, and he gives them an upgrade to the club as well. Who's to say that hasn't happened more than once?).
Actually, it isn't so much an UPgrade as a DOWNgrade. In the 2nd season, it had nice wicker chairs and tables and even local bartenders. In the 3rd season and on, both the decoration and the furniture have a much more home-brew/scrounged air to them. I think it's more likely the producers or production designers noticed the officers' club was out of whack with the rest of the production design and adjusted it.
Again, the officer gave them the upgrade, he'd get to pick the decor and they'd just have to learn to like it. What you call an upgrade and what he calls an upgrade might be two separate things.
The basic problem with what you say is always the same however: There is exactly nothing in the dialog to support any of your theories.
There's also nothing but your own personal flair for design to say that the officer's idea of "That's what I call an upgrade" was, in fact, a downgrade. The taste of the officer who's giving them the upgrade is what decides if it is or isn't, and if his "upgrade" sucks, there's not a lot that the 4077th can do but say "Gee... thanks... sir..." and learn to like it.
"In reward for your dedicated service, I decided to replace your barkeeper with no barkeeper. You also won't have to look at the ugly mug of MacArthur any more, I've found you some nice random unit insignia instead! What's not to love, eh?"
Yeah, it sucks. I hear it's this thing called The Army.
Corrected entry: In this episode, Potter and company are being introduced to white phosphorous that is starting to be used. But in Season 2, Episode 1, "Divided We Stand", as Henry and Hawkeye come out of the O.R. a wounded soldier is brought in on a Jeep with white phosphorous burns, and they knew what to do.
Correction: Even if they knew how to deal with it at the time, the information might not have been common knowledge. As WP came to be used more frequently, the Army would send instructors to field hospitals to make certain everyone was up on the latest technique for dealing with it. (Col. Potter was also not in the earlier episode you mention, and he wants to hear the information).
Understood, but Potter was there in Season 4, Episode 24 "Deluge" when a WP case was brought in.
Remember that the main plot of this episode is that Col. Potter made a rookie mistake that almost cost a kid's life, and is fearing that he's too old to hack it as a doctor anymore. If the Army's learned something he doesn't know, he wants to know it.
Correction: "New" to the doctors on the front lines and "new" to the doctors back at HQ could be two different things.
It might be old news to the 4077th but new to the Army in general. Without asking a real Army doctor, Instructional briefings like this aren't optional. They don't ask if you already know it. The point of the scene is NOT "How many times has the 4077th already done this?" The point is "Potter thinks he's too old and can't hack it anymore, so IF the Army has learned something new, HE wants to hear it." And also shows us "Potter is on edge about something. Maybe we should call Sidney Green."
You could be the world's top expert in White Phosphorus, but if you're in the Army, and they tell you "You're going to attend a lecture on White Phosphorus," That's called an order and you do it, Mr. White Phosphorus, whether you like it or not.
Correction: Captain Simmons said the new weapon is "white phosphorus rounds." Phosphorus before then was likely used as part of artillery shells.
Correction: I know you can't worry about MASH's timeline or you'll go insane, but six seasons pass between this episode and that one. The Army medics could have learned some new things about treating the injuries in whatever time passed. And again, Col. Potter thinks he's slipping in this episode, so he wants to hear every word, and that's the main point of the scene.
Corrected entry: In Henry's office, during several scenes there is a diploma hanging on the wall behind the stove. It is partially obscured, but if you look carefully you can make out that it says "Henry Clay High School". Beneath that in smaller print, you can make out "Lexington, Kentucky". (I live in Lexington and this is a real high school. That's why it caught my eye.) Henry claims to have been born and raised in Bloomington, Illinois, so this diploma makes no sense.
Correction: This isn't trivia, and not really a mistake, either. I was born in one city, raised in another, and graduated high school in another province entirely, returning to the city I was raised in after graduation. My diploma comes from a town in a province that I only lived in for 2 years. When asked, I say I was raised in the city I spent the most time in.
Corrected entry: In the opening title sequence the two helicopters go in front of the mountain. If you watch the lead helicopter very carefully when it first goes in front of the mountain it disappears for a split second and reappears.
Correction: This is not correct. It is merely the angle and the cropping of the shot. The two helicopters do come together, then the shot changes for a split second, and in later episodes/series the cropping of the shot shows only one helicopter. However, in earlier episodes/series the shot is not cropped so tightly, and when it changes the second helicopter is very close to screen right and disappears off screen almost instantaneously.
Corrected entry: When the champ comes in, several soldiers are lying in the post-op ward, and some of them don't look likely to get out soon. After the champ suffers his stroke, the ward is empty and Cavanaugh is the only patient there. Hawkeye even says "Afraid you're going to lose your private room, Champ?" What happened to the other wounded? (00:05:00 - 00:18:45)
Correction: Patients get transferred out all the time. If they knew that they were going to get more wounded in, they would transfer as many as could be feasibly moved. Obviously all could be safely moved.
No mention is made in the dialog of moving wounded out to make room, as it is in many other episodes. The wounded are just suddenly gone. While none is explicitly mentioned as being critical or unable to be transferred (transferring wounded just isn't touched upon at all in this episode), as detailed in the original mistake, some wounded look quite heavily injured, e.g. the guy in the body cast the champ talks to. In other episodes, the doctors show quite a lot of reluctance in moving patients with similar looking injuries.
Correction: They do things all the time without specifically mentioning it. The job of a mash unit is to fix up those in critical need and get them to a recovery/evacuation or their unit as soon as possible.
Corrected entry: BJ gives his home phone number as 555-2657; in the 1950's, phone numbers were generally given in a TWo-letter-five-number format e.g. "PEnnsylvania-6-5000" or "BEechwood-4-5789".
Correction: This is not a mistake. First 'generally' doesn't cut it - they might be the exception. Also, film makers are required by law to use unassigned telephone numbers, and have always used 555 as a prefix as such numbers are never used in real life.
They don't have to use the 555 prefix, it is just better that they do. They also used KLondike 5 or KL5 before the local area name was dropped.
Correction: 555 was never an area code. Original area codes all had a 0 or a 1 as the second number. 555 was an exchange that was never used for general public but it was used for some information numbers such as the time and weather. Usually Klondike 5 was used in movies or shows instead of 555 but either one is correct although in the 50's, it would be common to say Klondike.
Correction: The place name in the numbers mentioned actually translates to a three-digit code, the two letters merely were an abbreviation of that place name. It is simply an area code. The code 555 was reserved and never assigned to any real city in the US. To avoid people prank-calling numbers they heard in songs or movies, movie directors often used the 555 prefix. As detailed above, songwriters were often a lot less squeamish about using real, assignable phone numbers. There are several cases on file where phone numbers used in songs had to be reassigned and reserved, because people would call it "just to see whom it actually belonged to"
The place name and next number weren't the area code, they were the exchange. Usually giving the general neighborhood for the local number.
Good-Bye Radar: Part 2 - S8-E5
Corrected entry: Radar tells Klinger that "nobody helped me when I took the job." However, when Potter complains about Klinger's performance, Mulcahy tells him about Blake taking Radar under his wing and helping him grow into the job.
Correction: It is made clear that Colonel Blake was inept and had very little understanding of Radar's job. While Blake may have been supportive of Radar, Radar still had to learn the job on his own.
If he had little understanding of the clerk's job, then Mulcahy's statement that "Henry took Radar under his wing and helped him grow into the job" is moot.
Not necessarily as such. Both "taking under one's wing" and "growing into the job" are rather generic statements after all. Blake may very well have just kept his back while he learned the job, even though he may not have been such a great source of topical information on company-clerking in particular. For the question at hand however one should keep in mind that neither Radar nor Mulcahy are laying down historic facts when they make their respective statements, but try to make their points, which are, to wit: Radar thinks Klinger should stop bitching and try to find his feet, and Mulcahy thinks Potter needs to be supportive of Klinger.
Correction: Too much of an assumption. I think this unknown soldier falls into the category I call "Invisible Characters": those people on some TV shows who are nearby, but are never seen. Among such characters are Pete's wife Gladys on December Bride, Carlton, the doorman on Rhoda, Norm's wife Vera on Cheers and, of course, Niles' wife Maris on Frasier.
Bob Blumenfeld ★