The M*A*S*H Finale: Saying Goodbye to the 4077th
Kristin Nilsen 0:00
And again I'm going to cry because she says, damn it. She says, You, dear sweet man, I'll never forget you. And then they hug, and every time you see Colonel Potter's face,
Carolyn Cochrane 0:14
he's crying, yeah, it's
Kristin Nilsen 0:15
real. You look at that face, I'm like, That's not acting. That guy is real. Every goodbye with Colonel Potter kills me.
Unknown Speaker 0:28
Singing, come on, get
Michelle Newman 0:39
happy. Welcome to the pop culture Preservation Society, the podcast for people born in the big wheel generation who definitely had an opinion on which was better, bubble, yum or Bubblicious.
Carolyn Cochrane 0:52
We believe that our Gen X childhoods gave us unforgettable songs, stories, characters and images, and if we don't talk about them, they'll disappear, like Marshall will and Holly on a routine expedition.
Kristin Nilsen 1:03
And today we'll be saving the TV series finale that went down in history as the most well everything. Today we'll be saving the series finale of mash.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:16
I'm Carolyn, I'm
Kristin Nilsen 1:16
Kristen,
Michelle Newman 1:17
and I'm Michelle, And we are your pop culture preservationists, you
Kristin Nilsen 1:43
one of the most memorable events of the Gen X era happened on February 28 1983 when people of all ages gathered around their TVs to say their final goodbyes to people they'd come to know and love over the previous 11 years. Hawkeye Pierce, BJ, Honeycutt, Colonel Potter, major Houlihan, Father Mulcahy, Corporal Klinger and Major Charles Emerson, Winchester, the third of MASH unit 4077, would say goodbye in the longest, most watched, and some say greatest TV series finale of all time, season 11, Episode 16 of the long Running comedy drama series mash was called Goodbye, farewell and Amen, and it marked the end of one of television history's most popular and innovative shows. The series lasted 11 seasons, which was eight years longer than the actual Korean War, which was a stand in for the Vietnam War, which was the actual conflict. The show was subversively criticizing the Vietnam War, by the way came to a close just a few years into the show. But audience weren't done with them yet, and it endured even after Colonel Blake was tragically killed in a helicopter accident over the Sea of Japan, and after everyone's beloved radar O'Reilly got his orders to return home to otawa, Iowa in their place, new characters kept coming to the furrow 7/7 and we didn't resent them. There was no cousin Oliver, there was no jumping the shark, just good, complicated, well written, increasingly well rounded characters that became a part of the mash family, as if they had always been there. And this is part of what made it so hard to say goodbye, and why half the nation gathered together in their living rooms to make history that night in 1983 was it a moment for you guys too? Were you there that night?
Carolyn Cochrane 3:26
I was there that night with my parents in our wood paneled family room, like the sunken one with two steps down. It's a memorable moment, just because we were all together watching it, because I want to just share this with you guys while I probably didn't realize the significance. While I was watching the episode in real time in 1983 I realize now, after rewatching it, that that TV show was part of my family's TV viewing for my entire childhood. Yes, okay, I know from the age of seven until I was a senior in high school, this show was a constant. And then I kept thinking this show was one of the few continuous threads that I can trace throughout my youth, I lived in three different houses in two different states. While this show was on, we had four different dogs and several different cars, yet mash was always there, and it's also one of the only shows I can remember, really, my dad watching religiously, and us watching together. I mean, we'd watch Mary Tyler Moore, but it sometimes would be in the background for my dad. You know, he's grilling. I've shared all those kind of stories. He's reading the papers, yeah, and he didn't sit down to watch Little House on the Prairie or happy days with us or anything. So re watching this episode which I hadn't seen since it aired in 1983 Wow. Was super emotional for me. Oh, God, sorry. Obviously this episode is incredibly sad, and we'll talk about that today in this episode, but I felt something much deeper and poignant. It's a feeling that's really hard for me to describe. I. Yeah,
Kristin Nilsen 5:01
I do know they gave me cry sorry,
Carolyn Cochrane 5:03
but I do know that when it was over, I really wish my dad was still alive so we could talk about this finale and the role that this TV show played in our lives.
Michelle Newman 5:14
You know what? Though Carolyn, it's like, but you still have it. That's the magic. It's the magic of Hulu, but for real, like, as emotional as that was for you the other night, aren't you just so grateful that you have it? Yes,
Carolyn Cochrane 5:30
that's grateful. And I say this, I say this repeatedly in the podcast, but that I have a reason to go back and watch this. I wouldn't have just probably done it on my own. I didn't realize again until I rewatched it, how impactful and what a role this TV show played in my life. It was just like I said through all those things, it was always there, and it was something that my dad enjoyed, and so therefore, you know, I enjoyed it, and it's, it's hard for me sometimes now, watching these things as an adult and having all these different feelings about it, and wanting to go to this person, my dad, and talk to him like adult to adult about these things that I experienced as a kid. But now have different you know, can see it a little differently, and that's, that's one of the hard things,
Michelle Newman 6:19
but it's such a connection, and it's so cool that, like you said, that we have an excuse now to talk about it, because it almost keeps your dad alive, right, in ways that he wouldn't be if we didn't have this podcast and reasons to talk about things like the mash finale, right? Yeah, I say that well and yes, and for me, it's on a much less emotional level. Again, I'm going to be the representative here of all of our listeners who either didn't watch the finale or don't remember if they watched once again, it's Michelle with her lack of memory of these TV things. Because I watched mash, I watched mash, but I think more in the early seasons, because I remember very vividly watching mash when clinger is wearing the dresses and when radar has the teddy bear. In fact, Kristen, you just said in your intro about, you know, radar's gotten his leave. I was watching this finale the other night going, where's radar, you know? Because, like, I don't have a memory of that. And again, I'm saying to Brian, my husband, did you guys watch this? Like, did you watch this finale on that night? He's like, Oh, absolutely, this was a show we watched in our family, and we did. And I said, I don't think I did. In fact, you guys, I might it might have been the first time I saw it the other night when I watched it, but I watched mash. So once again, I go back to, when did I watch mash? My mom would my mom, like we, you know, like you guys all know, we had years where we watched a lot of TV, years where the TV had to be in the closet. It was very, it was very unpredictable. She would have never, that would have never been a show that she would have liked. You know, probably in 83 we're watching The Love Boat together. We're watching Kate and ally, or whatever. So I go back to did I watch it the few times I was with my dad? Because I know all the characters. I know who they are. I know what their roles are. I know what they do in the 4077, however, a little bit like you Carolyn watching it the other night, and having these characters come back to life after decades of not seeing them and knowing exactly what their part is, made me think of my dad, so that's what maybe makes me think that I saw it with him.
Kristin Nilsen 8:24
But I think that's your answer, Michelle, even without a concrete memory, your dad came to you for a reason, right? I
Michelle Newman 8:32
remember laughing along with clinger, not at clinger, but I loved clinger. And addresses I,
Kristin Nilsen 8:38
I actually I can barely even say these words. I literally missed it, like I went to school the day after it aired, and everyone's talking about it, and I was like, oh my god, I missed it. And I was sad and embarrassed. I didn't want to let on that I didn't see it, yeah, because literally, the whole school was talking about it, and I remember being so touched that the boys it was, it was really the boys who were talking about it, this was their show, and they were emotional about it, not outwardly emotional, but, like, verbally emotional about it, how it was such how it was such an emotional or how it was such a big day For them, it was a big event for them. And I just kept it to myself that I didn't see it, and I felt such a sense of loss. And of course, it's over then it's 1980 Right, right? They're not going to rerun that. We had no notions of streaming to come. I thought I would never see it again until this week, and I had the opportunity to see it for the very first time, and it was very it was actually emotional, because I was thinking back to what I missed and how I felt that day, having missed it and putting myself in the shoes of the people who were watching it that night. I. When you know what you're in for, that opening is much more poignant. It would have felt to people in their living rooms that night, as if this is the last time I'm going to hear this song, this is the last time I'm going to watch these people run with stretchers. They didn't they also didn't know about streaming. They also didn't know that it would be in reruns, reruns for in in perpetuity. They didn't know that. As you guys know, that scene in the we've talked about this before, where the nurses running for the helicopter, I get goosebumps 100% of the time that those women are running, and I have since I was little, I sit there and I wait for that moment when those women are running, and when it came This is so dumb, it's just so all theoretical. But I'm crying when I'm watching it and I see those women running, and I'm thinking, if I had seen it that night, I would think, this is the last time I see those women running. And it was the whole experience of watching it, even rewatching it, is incredibly emotional. And I think that's really testament to what everybody has said for decades about the importance of of this series finale, all of the things, all of the hyperbolic things that people are saying, all of the superlatives. It's kind of true. I
Carolyn Cochrane 11:24
All right, everybody, let's get some fun statistics here. Okay, as Kristen mentioned, this series finale aired on February 28 1983 and was watched by over get this 105 million people, okay, making it the most watched television episode in US history. It is doubtful that this record you guys will ever be broken, because we just don't consume TV in the same way, like you just said, Right? Kristen, right? There will never be another time that 105 million people watch the same television episode at the same exact time. It's never gonna that's really sad.
Kristin Nilsen 12:05
I know can't it's not we've it's, it's a collective moment where we all get to be together and it's not gonna happen again. Yeah,
Carolyn Cochrane 12:12
Andy and I talked about that exact thing after we watched it the other night. Is, you know, we were all 105 plus million of us were all sad at the exact same moment. That's incredible. Wow.
Kristin Nilsen 12:26
Think a singular emotion was being experienced by 105 million people at the same time. People were crying at the same time. Yes, that is trippy, isn't
Carolyn Cochrane 12:37
it? Though? Yeah, it's crazy wild. And because 105 million people were watching it, you guys, this was treated as a national event. Okay, get this many businesses closed early on that night, colleges canceled classes to allow students to watch other networks. Even adjusted their programming to accommodate the special event and avoid competition. So that's how incredibly meaningful it was, not just to a certain few or probably even fans of the show, even if you didn't watch the series regularly, you weren't going to miss this. This was going to be water cooler talk the next day. This was a once at what we thought was a once in this time experience, right? Exactly, and you weren't going to miss it, right?
Michelle Newman 13:18
Did you guys read that in San Francisco, they had a big power outage because of weather, and so like half of the city their power was out and they didn't get to see oh,
Kristin Nilsen 13:33
no, that's per my comments earlier. Yeah, they're never gonna
Michelle Newman 13:37
see it. Can you imagine how I would like that some
Carolyn Cochrane 13:41
godly saint, the patron saint of television, or whatever television, let the NBC play it in San Francisco, like replay it, or something I
Kristin Nilsen 13:53
don't know. Yeah, that is tragic. Wow, that is tragic.
Carolyn Cochrane 13:57
Well, a couple other fun facts to share with you guys about that episode. So the finale. It was originally slated to run 90 minutes, but when an unfortunate brush fire broke out at the fox ranch set in Malibu Creek State Park, which is where they filmed mash all the outdoor scenes, and it burned the set. Okay? Literally, literally, actually, there is no more set. They decided, huh, this would be a great thing to write into this episode. So they went to the network and were able to add an extra 30 minutes, bringing the total air time of the show, including commercial, to two and a half hours. And, you know, it's kind of, I don't want to say serendipitous, because a fire isn't a good thing, but the fact that this fire happened when it did, and they were able to write it into this episode, and also legit feet have feelings, because the set that they have spent all of these years on and all these seasons on is no longer either. So a lot of that emotion, I'm sure that we see in this episode, is. Reflected in the fact that some of this stuff truly is gone. When that two and a half hours ended and we saw the last bit of this finale, did you guys know that, because of all the people in New York City that decided to go to the bathroom at that moment and flush their toilets, there was a huge water pressure drop causing a surge in the tunnels that bring water from the cat hills to New York
Unknown Speaker 15:23
stop it.
Carolyn Cochrane 15:24
Can you imagine? So like
Kristin Nilsen 15:26
at the like, credits start to roll, yes, and everybody runs to the bathroom.
Carolyn Cochrane 15:31
Oh my goodness, flushing at the same moment
Kristin Nilsen 15:36
is nutty. That's a lot of people watching your TV show. Just
Carolyn Cochrane 15:40
a couple of other fun facts that I wanted to share. This finale was the only episode to feature an on screen title, so that goodbye, farewell and Amen that we know this episode by that was in the beginning. All the other episodes, there was a title and it was at the end. And they were some really good ones, lots of great wordplay and tongue in cheek, stuff that unfortunately most of us don't even know, because we didn't even ever see the title. So yes, we got to see it. For that season finale, it featured the most writers of any episode, so we've got more people than have ever contributed to an episode, contributing to this one, and Alan Alda being one of those main people, and he also directed it. It was not the last episode for them to film. However, interestingly enough, it was filmed early in the season's production schedule. So I believe, and I'm going to be talking just from my mind here, but that, that extra 30 minutes they asked for after the initial episode was already in the can, or whatever. So they added this, that 30 minute part, into it, but it could easily been taken out. And the whole thing would have made sense, if that makes sense to you guys. Okay? And last, which, I think again, goes to the power of the show, and what it meant to our culture and our society is that a mash Smithsonian exhibit opened five months after the finale and included lots of things from the set. And it was called mash binding up the wounds was the title of the ex five exhibit months.
Kristin Nilsen 17:10
So usually it's only right in the rear view mirror where you can see the importance of something. And this is five months and opening three five months. So that means they pretty much started working on at the minute the minute the finale ended exactly,
Carolyn Cochrane 17:24
and it ran for a year and a half. So wow, I wonder. I mean, I'm guessing they probably still have some of those items in absolutely, you know, that area where the
Kristin Nilsen 17:34
because they're icons, all of those things are icons, right? So, a couple fun facts that's interesting. So in this, in this two and a half hour episode of mash, we are doing three things. We are introduced to the real possibility of armistice, the thing that we've been wishing for, or they have been wishing for for 11 seasons, right? This is always our goal. It's kind of like Gilligan, like, are they ever gonna get rescued? No, is that? Where ever gonna end? Then in the event of that armistice, we were given the chance to say goodbye to each of the characters that we've known for so long. And finally, we are laying bare the true horrors of war that this has been their purpose the entire time of this show is to make people understand the horrors of war and also the repercussions of those events on the mental health of those in the trenches, this was something that they felt like was being ignored. So the episode opens, unlike any of the previous 288, episodes, with gentle bird song and a lush green lawn with big trees, there's a person getting pushed in a wheelchair, and there are lots of people walking around very gingerly in white coats, and they have clipboards, and they're comparing notes on their clipboards. But then someone unlocks a door that says authorized personnel, only alluding to the fact that there's something dangerous behind this door. And what we learn is that behind that door are people, people who might be a danger to themselves or others. The door opens into a dark room, and you hear the familiar voice of one of mash's most popular guest stars. It's Dr Sydney Friedman, the psychiatrist who visits the four oh 7/7 on occasion. And he says, so how are you feeling? And that's when the camera turns to Hawkeye. This is how we are introduced to the fact that Hawkeye is hospitalized, and since Sydney is his doctor, it's not for a broken bone. Hawkeye has suffered a psychological trauma, and this is where our episode begins. It establishes mental health as the cornerstone of this episode.
Michelle Newman 19:36
We learned very quickly Hawkeyes story and reason for being in there, which we'll get to in just a minute, but that he's suffering from PTSD, and that just wasn't very well understood or received back in the 1980s and really, I think we need to give mash a lot of credit for putting this issue before the public in as realistic manner. As they did, and Alan Alda for writing it, it's something that and like I said, I didn't watch all 11 seasons, but I feel like, even if they've, they've touched on mental illness or the mental repercussions of the war before, I'm gonna, just gonna assume never, like they did in this finale, they went for it, and you need to, you needed to, in this finale, right? And also,
Carolyn Cochrane 20:28
wow,
Michelle Newman 20:28
it's Hawkeye, yeah, it's Hawkeye, like he's unflappable, basically, right? Yeah, that's
Kristin Nilsen 20:35
what we've been led to believe. It was very progressive for the times it was. It's the portrayal of his trauma or his mental health difficulty is more in keeping with how we would treat it today, not in how we were treating it in 1983 it's shocking actually, and it's really incredibly accurate, like Sidney's excavation of Hawkeyes trauma was really incredibly it was a very realistic representation of the actual practice of therapy, how it's done. There was a very not how it's shown on TV, yeah, right. There was no one laying down on a couch, yeah. There was nobody smoking a pipe, and, have, you know, wearing a tweed jacket. It was very it was all very casual. It was not stereotypical. And again,
Carolyn Cochrane 21:20
you know, this is something that, with our adult knowledge and our 50 something year old eyes, as I say, we can go back and look at this and talk about the PTSD and the things we know now as mature adults, what was happening in this scene. But I'd be so interested to know, of course, I was a kid. I don't really know what I mean. I wasn't a kid, I guess I was in high school, but how much of that really sunk in? And then I'd really love to know what some conversations were the next day around those water coolers from people that had maybe been in Vietnam or because now you've kind of cracked a door open a little bit where maybe you have this something you can use to talk about this stuff that you didn't have before. So I think that a lot of the mental health part, I didn't know that's what was happening in real time when I watched it the first time, but something was sinking in that not just for Hawkeye, but for all the characters, there was an emotional toll, an emotional aspect to it that was going to affect these characters well beyond the end of the war. Like the war might be ending, but the consequences of it will live on with these people.
Kristin Nilsen 22:35
And that's really what they were trying to do for the whole 11 years. That was their whole point. And so they just went for it with this final episode, no holds barred. So the other thing that was really interesting to me is that this seems revelatory, because this, this small detail, sheds light on the whole 11 years in therapy with Sydney Hawkeyes humor is being revealed as not helpful. It's being revealed as a coping mechanism. This time. It's not for laughs. And you know, it's things like, Sydney will say, how are you sleeping? And Hawkeye will say, on my back. And you're like, Hawkeye be serious, and you can see that it's meant to help you see what Hawkeye has been doing the whole time. All of this humor that we've been laughing at so hard for 11 years is actually Hawkeye just trying to survive. And there comes a time where it's not helpful anymore, and he's hit. He's running up against that right now. It's getting in the way of his healing. And I thought that was really revealing, not just about the character, but about the whole, his entire character arc. That's who he is. He's the jokester, right? He's the guy who does quips. They also use the mental health crisis as the tension in the episode, because we don't know what happened to Hawkeye. It's as if there's a mystery afoot, and it's the job of the episode to help us solve the mystery. Why is it a mystery? Because it's also a mystery to Hawkeye. He is repressing the actual event that happened. So hawkeye's trauma is the foundation of our episode. But in the midst of his treatment and his return to the 4077 the idea of armistice is announced quite literally. It is announced over the loudspeaker. You've heard this all before. Attention, all personnel, right? You know it now in your sleep. Attention, all personnel, and they say, Armistice may be announced in mere hours. It's the thing that we never thought was possible, but it's happening in this episode, and it provides both a vehicle for ending the story of mash and a way to add a ticking clock to the episode, and that ticking clock comes in the form of more announcements throughout the episode, almost like alarms. 12 hours to peace, three hours to peace. And as the clock ticks down, each character, including Hawkeye, gets to flush out their story. Story, they get to complete the story arc that began with for them 11 years ago, and also say goodbye, because our characters are not just leaving us, they are leaving each other, and we can't pretend that they're not. Every single one of the characters gets their own storyline. It's incredibly ambitious, because usually you have a primary storyline and you have a secondary storyline. In this mega episode, you get like nine storylines. So let's start with Hawkeye. We know the story of his recent trauma, but how does that speak to what unfolds in the episode?
Michelle Newman 25:36
So like we've said, Hawkeye has experienced a nervous breakdown, really, that was incited by a bus ride that much of our 4077, crew were on after a great day off at the beach, which was this on the way back to camp after the day at the beach, the bus stopped and picked up some wounded soldiers and refugees on the side of the road, but there was an enemy patrol nearby, so they had to pull off to the side of the road, cut their lights and keep completely silent now, as Dr Friedman tries time and time again to draw out Hawkeyes experience of this bus ride, Hawkeye is agitated and Kristen, like you said, he keeps deflecting quips, jokes, I mean, rapid fire, one after the other. It's all an avoidance of him having to accept it and relive it. Obviously, you know, as you do, I don't know anybody who would write that. In fact, he starts to realize he's actually repressing some of the memories by remembering details incorrectly. And the biggest one is this, when they were in danger of being detected by the enemy patrol, one of the refugee women's chicken Hawkeye says, kept squawking. Keep that chicken quiet. He says he remembers saying to her sternly, and it kind of does a flashback in the episode, and you see him kind of angrily, walking toward the back of the bus. Keep that chicken quiet, he's saying. And he tells Dr Friedman, the woman smothered her chicken so that it wouldn't be heard by the enemies. But very quickly, he breaks down as the actual memory returns that it wasn't a chicken that was squawking, but her crying baby. She smothered her baby, and as he realizes it, he breaks and he screams and sobs. I didn't mean it. I didn't mean to, you know, to shout at her.
Kristin Nilsen 27:31
He says, I didn't mean for her to kill it. No, he
Michelle Newman 27:34
finally breaks down. But then in the very next breath, again, this is such, this is so realistic. In the very next breath, he's angry, and he shouts at Friedman, you son of a bitch. Why did you make me remember it? And that was also pretty groundbreaking to have him say, you son of a bitch. And Friedman just, you know, calmly looks at him and he says, Well, you had to remember it. And now we're halfway home,
Carolyn Cochrane 27:59
the scene with the chicken and the bus, and then realizing it's a baby. That is the only thing that remained with me about that first episode. I the final
Michelle Newman 28:09
episode. You mean, yeah, yeah. Of the of that final Yeah, same with Ryan. So
Carolyn Cochrane 28:14
much so that I would recall it probably a couple times a month in my mind. Wow, yes, if you would ask me what the finale was about, I would have said it is about a chick. It's about a baby that was suffocated. I even thought, I think, for a while, that it was actually Hawkeye that had smothered the baby, but I know that now is not the case, but it just impacted me. I guess, thinking of this poor, innocent child, and again, just these consequences of war that you don't even think about, like this baby died, not from like a bomb going off near it, or, you know, anything like that. It was like this consequence. It's
Kristin Nilsen 28:55
the most tragic. It's as tragic as you can possibly get. I feel like the reason that you remember that, and the rest of us remember it. It goes beyond the tragedy of it. I think it goes to the movie making of it, and so that that is all thanks to Alan Alda, because he was the director of this because, as Michelle said, He will Hawkeye would tell Sydney about what happened with the chicken they were at the beach. There was a party on the bus, and they're showing the party on the bus. They're showing the chicken and then in the next and then the film will flip and show what actually happened. It was filmmaking at its very best, because it's as if you're in hawkeye's mind trying to sort it all out. It's not being presented to you chronologically, truthfully. In reality, it's being presented to you as it is in hawkeye's mind, which is not clear and is just desperately clinging to something to help him survive, which is, I can't watch that baby die. It's just, it's just horrible. And. I think it has stuck with everybody our age. Yeah,
Michelle Newman 30:04
when I said to Brian, oh, we need to watch the mash finale tonight, he's like, Oh, that's the one with the chicken. I do think too, though you might assume that something that would cause, you know, a mental breakdown like this, or a PTSD from a surgeon in a mass unit is going to be a lot more bloody and gruesome and something like that, and he feels responsible. And it's not, and it's, you know, this is a refugee and her baby. This isn't an American soldier that some that he made a choice, that something happened to and so I think this elevates this episode to the next level as well. When they wrote this and making that story up, that it's going to be hawkeye's responsibility for something that he didn't even have his hands on, his surgical hands on, right? It was something he said, and that was the tipping point for him. So back to the episode. So only a few days after Hawkeye has this breakthrough, Dr Friedman sends him back to the 4077, but now, after weeks where he's been insisting to get back, you know, he's suddenly very hesitant and uncertain about getting back to surgery. He's very nervous something will go wrong, and he'll, you know, ultimately feel responsible for it again, and then we get to ultimately see that he's better, because an eight year old girl comes into the or and he hesitates. He's like, I don't think I can operate on her, but ultimately he's able to do the surgery. I definitely didn't see that, though, as he's all better, hooray. I mean, you see that he's made a lot of progress, but this was a good illustration of how much farther they all still had to go, even after the war was over. So
Kristin Nilsen 31:47
major Margaret Houlihan, let's learn about what's going to happen to her after the war has ended. If you recall, Margaret's father loomed quite large in her life. He was a big army muckety muck, and he was pulling strings to provide her with the best opportunities possible after the war, and she's getting all these telegrams from him. First, her father had arranged to have her assigned to administrative post in Tokyo, and then, no forget Tokyo. He knows someone who can get her a job in Belgium. He says, You should do this. You should do that. And she's so excited for her father's help. But she also uses her dad's connections to help Winchester without his consent get his dream job at Boston mercy. And this actually leads to a conflict between the two of them, as he chides her for being taken care of by her daddy. And this conflict actually feels like they're kind of working out their love and affection for each other. She's like, Where would I be without my father's help? I'm so grateful for it. You should be grateful for my help, too. And he says, I don't need your help. You're just a daddy's girl. I am a self made man. And after they do get out like this, Margaret pivots when he accuses her of just trying to please her daddy, she decides she's not going to take her father's help and recommendations to climb the ladder of success. Again, what is this? What is success? What are our definitions of success? She decides she's going to go back to the states, she's going to work in a hospital. She's going to be a nurse, not an administrator. But there's a very full circle moment there, because you always saw Margaret as being an army person, an Army brat. She was going to be in the army, and she's going to climb and climb and climb and get all those little medals on her chest. She's like, No, I'm done too. I'm going to be a nurse. Because I like to be a nurse. I've always looked to my father for guidance when he makes up his mind about something, he does it no matter what anybody says. And that's what I'm going to do, what I've wanted to do all along, work in the States, in a hospital.
Unknown Speaker 33:46
There's a lot of my Father in me, it's never been his way to tell people how he feels about them,
Unknown Speaker 33:55
so I guess that's why I never told my nursing staff what I told other people about you, it's been an honor and a privilege to have worked with you. I'm very, very proud to have known you. Okay,
Carolyn Cochrane 34:16
so now let's talk about Charles Winchester. Charles Winchester was played by actor David Ogden steers. And if you remember, Charles was this pompous upper class surgeon with a superior attitude. He had this love of classical music, and he'd often listen to classical music throughout the series. He had record little record player in his tent, I guess, which I always wonder, how they get all that stuff there. But
Kristin Nilsen 34:41
anyway, in their trunk? Yeah, it's all about the trunk. In
Carolyn Cochrane 34:46
the finale, we have a scene where Charles has to leave the camp to relieve himself because the latrine has been demolished by a tank. Okay, so he has to go take care of his business, and while he's out there doing that, he encounters a group of. These refugees who happen to be musicians, and he thinks maybe they're going to get him, you know, they're going to capture him. And he's all worried, but it soon comes out that they pull out musical instruments, and he's like, Huh? And then they it's almost like he's the pied piper who goes back to camp, and they are, like, following him. And he's not quite sure what's going on, but it turns out they are surrendering themselves, and in turn, are going to become prisoners of war at the camp. So as I said, these are musicians, and Charles bonds with these men over their shared love of Mozart, and because of that shared love, he decides to teach them the Mozart clarinet quintet. This is a haunting melody that we actually hear throughout the episode, okay, it's like Charles is this conductor, and he's meeting with them daily, and they're progressively getting a little bit better. Even though they do not speak the same language, they do not share a culture. His big thing is he wants them to kind of understand what Dolce means. So that's like the big That's right, so we're working toward that. But you can tell this bond between the musicians and Charles is growing. And again, it doesn't matter that we don't speak the same language, we don't share the same culture, we share this love of music. So when the musicians actually have to leave the camp in a POW exchange, you can actually you can feel the sadness that Charles is experiencing as the musicians serenade him with that clarinet quintet, And they kind of get the DOL shape part right.
And they're just driven away from camp, and it's almost like you see this transition again, acting with no words. I think Charles does. His face says so much. He didn't even want the guys to leave either. He He wanted them to stay there for a while, but no, this was the deal they had to you know, they were being exchanged for prisoners war. So fast forward a little bit, and Charles is devastated when he learns that musicians were killed in a bombing just before the war ends. And I just want to say something for a second you guys, that kept coming into my mind. I could not fathom that the fighting kept going, even though there was a deadline of the war ending. Why didn't it just stop at the moment? Right? Because the musicians would have stayed alive. A lot of things would have been different. Why is there this time frame and you're still allowed not only to fight, but it said that the fighting was even escalating. So it was like, we're going to get rid of all of our ammunition before this thing comes to an end. So that makes it even more heartbreaking that we're so close to this end, and yet these musicians are again a casualty, a human casualty, of this war. And all they wanted to do, and all they were meant to do was to share.
Kristin Nilsen 37:55
They weren't soldiers, they were musicians. And that is a really good point Carolyn, that is a thread that also runs through the entire episode, where they make these announcements to five hours to peace, three hours to peace, and you'll hear bang, bang, bang. You continue to hear the shelling and or they'll say, five hours to peace, and then here comes a whole new crew of casualties, and they have to run to the OR and AND operate on people. It's like it's never ending, like, when is the piece? When does it finally come? But so, so sad.
Michelle Newman 38:26
There's even they do such a good job in this episode of illustrating that with not just the fighting doesn't the fighting might end, but everything else, all the other trauma is still going on, because when it's 10pm Yeah, I mean, they the you can hear the blast, the blast, the blast and the scene. They're all around an operating table operating on someone, and there's been a whole bunch of activity in the operating room and lots of noises. But they all listen to the the radio. Everybody stops and listens. So it's silent in the operating room, and you hear the radio announcer say, there it is. That's the sound of peace. And then they wait a beat, and then the or hustle and bustle and noise continues, and surgeries back on, and they're still trying to save these lives desperately. So, yeah, peace. What's peace? Right? What's right? Like,
Kristin Nilsen 39:16
they took like, three seconds of peace, and the camera pans around to all of their faces, where they're they're stunned with the knowledge that the war is actually over, and then their heads go down and they continued on.
Michelle Newman 39:27
Yeah. I was really struck by that scene that like, wow. That was a beautiful scene to show that what's peace? Yeah, not here, not in the OR, it's not peace,
Carolyn Cochrane 39:37
right? And the consequences of this war are going to go far on, yeah. Are going to go far beyond this 10 o'clock when the war is over.
Kristin Nilsen 39:46
Okay? So that, that moment where the the Chinese pow, who is the musician, is brought into the or Charles runs over to the strip, that's just a moment that I just want to come back to, because it was a very striking moment when Charles. Charles runs over to the stretcher. He recognizes the face of one of the musicians, and he says, no, no. And he realizes that he can't save him. He can't save him. And then he looks around and like Carolyn said, he says, the others, the others are like, no, they're all gone. And that's when Charles runs back to his tent. He puts the record on, the Mozart record on. He listens for maybe three seconds, and then he scratches the record, pulls it off of the turntable, and he smashes it. And that's when you realize that Charles has now been traumatized in a similar way to Hawkeye, that he's trashed this record that was so important to him, that he worked with these men for so long on this one record. And he smashes it
Carolyn Cochrane 40:42
in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter that David Ogden steers did, and he talks about that exact scene, and he recalled the emotional impact of it. And he said, quote, It was a very sad moment, and I think it was a very real moment for the character, and it was a very real moment for me to play, and I think you could see that for now. It was just the reality of all of that. Yeah, and, you know, the end of this series too. It was just a lot of emotion packed into that scene. And I think that this scene, maybe more than any other, really, you guys in this episode, truly depicts the human cost of war, because it's not just we've obviously, we've lost these lives of these innocent musicians, and the cost that Winchester is going to have to pay for the rest of his life. What this is the people that live on there, the toll that it takes on them is incredible. And so I think this scene really, at least for me, the emotional impact of that scene just shows that this human cost of war is beyond just the casualty of well
Michelle Newman 41:53
then, like the mother smothering or innocent baby, they weren't even soldiers, right? They
Kristin Nilsen 41:57
they're all innocent people well, and many people have said that the Charles storyline with the musicians is the second most important storyline in this finale. Oh, I would say, yeah.
Carolyn Cochrane 42:10
Well, actually, writer Patrick Lyons says this about that whole storyline in the finale. He said, When all is said and done, the most powerful part of the whole episode and perhaps the whole series was Charles's storyline and that haunting clarinet quintet, you guys and that quintet that music plays in different scenes like I don't even know if we realize as viewers that music had a real impact on
Kristin Nilsen 42:39
it did. Apparently there was a classical music station that played this clarinet quintet just shortly after the airing of the episode. Unbeknownst to them. They did not know that this piece was included in the episode, and little did they know that apparently people were pulling over to the side of the road and having a good cry because they had just watched this episode, and that piece of music was now burned into their brains and connected with this story. And much like Charles, who would probably never be able to listen to it again, these people were being impacted in the same way as Charles and this and this classical music station had no idea what they had done. Right
Carolyn Cochrane 43:18
the power of music.
Kristin Nilsen 43:20
It's true.
Michelle Newman 43:31
Moving on to Colonel Potter, there was really nothing major. Colonel, Colonel for his character's ending storyline, except, I would say just the continuation of his stalwart and patriarchal presence
Kristin Nilsen 43:51
among them. All right, in a good way, patriarchal in a good way,
Michelle Newman 43:55
absolutely yes, in a very good way, he's the rock, he's the one, he's the solid. And, you know, there's a couple of tear jerker moments that he has. I think we're going to get to that later and the goodbyes, but yeah, I think his he sort of just took a backseat in this episode and was just kind of a really good supporting character. And I mean that literally, in a way, for many of the other characters, storylines, literally,
Kristin Nilsen 44:19
yeah, he is the support system for all of those people. He is the father figure for all of those people. And so what is Colonel Potter gonna do? He's gonna go home and be a husband to his wife in Hannibal, Moe and,
Carolyn Cochrane 44:31
yeah, and that was not his, his first rodeo, so to speak. I mean, yeah, that was the other thing that thought of when he was saying that, you know, he's finally gonna go home, but he'd been gone for so long. I mean, there had been another war, like he's, yeah, oh yes, wasn't his first war. And I don't know, just he'd seen a lot. There
Michelle Newman 44:49
is a really cute scene where he gets a letter from Marge, and it's the, like, the longest list of the things she wants him to do when he gets home. So that was cute, because it just kind of. It illustrates, you know, who he is, besides Colonel Potter, yeah, you know.
Carolyn Cochrane 45:05
And like, I think they were saying in that scene, you know, all these things that you didn't want to do when you were home, like before, this mundane, normal kind of aspects of life that you'd be like, Yeah, take out the trash. Like, they're never going to take those for granted again. So we also
Kristin Nilsen 45:22
need to say goodbye to Father Mulcahy. We have known father Mulcahy to be the most benevolent member of the four, oh, 7/7, and that continues to be true in this final episode. So during a very dangerous episode of heavy shelling, Father Mulcahy leaves safety in order to set free some POWs that are in the line of fire, and in the act of saving them, he is the one who is injured, including a loss of hearing that could be progressive and possibly even permanent. And this is devastating. He's a priest. He counsels people who talk to him. He's also afraid that he'll be sent home, because, unlike everybody else, he doesn't want to go home. He feels like the orphans in the area depend on him for food and medicine, and they'll continue to need him. So he doesn't want to go home. And he makes BJ, who is the one who diagnosed the hearing loss, he makes BJ promise to keep it a secret, don't tell anybody only BJ knows that he can't hear what people are saying. And in true father Mulcahy style, he looks for the bright side, and he decides that when the war is over, he could do good work as a priest for people who are deaf and hard of hearing. And this makes so much sense and is such a natural and satisfying ending for the story of father Mulcahy. It is new and different and yet exactly the same all at the same time.
Carolyn Cochrane 46:44
Yeah, I love, love, love father. Mulcahy, yes, I know he's a favorite of so many people. And I think you said just a constant. I mean his his persona and his mission, and his, you know, moral compass, all of that just was always that constant. Now we are coming to one of my other favorite characters. This would be Maxwell Q clinger. He this character was played by Jamie Farb and gosh, talk about a storyline that's kind of full of irony as it kind of comes to a resolution. So if you remember, klinger's character throughout the series is defined by his really kind of unorthodox efforts to try and get sent back home. He doesn't want to be there, and so I think we mentioned earlier, he cross dresses. He does some crazy things to make them think that he is crazy and needs to be sent home. Lots of this is really funny, but also, as an adult now realizing the deep kind of commentary that's also being subtly provided that I don't even know we got at the same time. But basically, while this may be in a different time, the army would have not wanted to have what appeared to be maybe a homosexual cross dressing person in their forces. When push comes to shove and you're at war, you will take any living, breathing, anything with a pulse, which makes it super sad, because it's like these lives aren't important. It's like we just need bodies. We just need more bodies, right? Yeah, so you're not valued, but yet you are devalued when you're not need we
Kristin Nilsen 48:28
loved clinger, but how do trans people today? How do transgender people today view the character of clinger? Was that a good thing or a bad thing? Well, there are some messages taken away like well, if you if you dress up in women's clothing, people will think you're crazy. They'll think you're so crazy that they'll send you home for the from the army. So that part isn't super helpful. There were other people who said that they could actually see themselves in him, and so that was nice to see at least a portrayal, even if there were loaded messages attached to it. Of course, not only are we looking at a series that was filmed in the 70s, it actually took place in the 50s. So we have to do we have to take all of that into account that in those days, it was illegal to be gay, right? The army, you would be sent home that was illegal and transgender. Forget about it like they couldn't. They probably didn't even have a word for it. You're just nutty. And go home. That was the law. So they portrayed it as such.
Carolyn Cochrane 49:24
So in this final episode, we learned that clinger has fallen in love with soon Lee. Now soon. Lee is a Korean woman who is in search of her parents again, this other casualty of war, innocent people living their lives. And now soon, Lee is separated from her parents, and she wants to find them, and Klinger has decided he wants to help her. So when this armistice is announced, Klinger reveals that he and soon Lee are going to get married, and he is going to be staying in Korea to help her find her family. Another person staying, staying. This character that. Spent our the entire series basically trying to leave and get back and now he I mean, talk about a change of well, it's what love can do to you. It is what relationship can do to you. It's when you can find meaning, how your whole value system can change. And I think we saw that 100% with clinger's decision to remain in Korea. I love
Michelle Newman 50:24
the scene when he shows her the wedding dress and she thinks someone's died, and he's like, but I love when he says, like, I wore this, like there was a time when I wore this, and she's like, well, who died?
Kristin Nilsen 50:34
It's a funeral dress, right? Again,
Carolyn Cochrane 50:37
a cultural difference, but it didn't keep these two people from falling in love. So a language barrier, culture difference, all of this stuff. We are just people. At the end of the day,
Unknown Speaker 50:46
people. We
Michelle Newman 50:48
are human beings. Age difference between them kind of creeped me out. But okay, how
Kristin Nilsen 50:52
does anyone know how old was Jamie Farr? I
Michelle Newman 50:54
don't know, but when they're standing there getting married, she's so young and beautiful. She looks like she's about 18 and he's got gray hair, I said to Brian. I was like, Oh, he could be your dad. He looks like he's about 30 years older than she is. She looks
Kristin Nilsen 51:07
20. Yeah, I think you're about right. He looks 50 and she looks 20. And so, as beautiful a story as this is, I've always been uncomfortable with it. Like clinger, how old are you? And so, Lee, why do he's like your dad? I don't get it, so I actually, do you mind if I look that up right now? Yeah, just gotta find out that never crossed my mind. Okay, so right now he's 90, so 45 years ago he was so he's basically 45 years old. So we're not that far off. We don't know how much, how old soon Lee was? Maybe she's very youthful, but she wasn't 40 and she wasn't 35 oh, no, she's
Michelle Newman 51:46
supposed to absolutely be like 18 to 20 in that and he
Carolyn Cochrane 51:50
went, I didn't see him as 45 in it either. Oh,
Michelle Newman 51:54
I did. When you look at him close, he has so much gray in his hair. I
Kristin Nilsen 51:57
thought he was old, see,
Carolyn Cochrane 51:59
I thought he got there when he was probably in his early 20s. I mean, like, as a kid, as a character,
Michelle Newman 52:05
oh my goodness. Well, I
Carolyn Cochrane 52:07
thought he was kind of kid, like, or something, wanting to go home, like he didn't want to be there. Yeah, and that he was maybe in his like, early 30s when this was happening in go back and watch
Michelle Newman 52:17
the wedding scene. And because they're really close up on their faces, and not only do you see all the gray in his hair, but he's really wrinkly, like he looks like he's in his 40s. He's got a lot of crow's feet and the so I was like, I'd like
Carolyn Cochrane 52:28
to know what they thought. And but again, is if this was maybe what happened, I mean, a lot
Michelle Newman 52:36
of Yeah,
Kristin Nilsen 52:37
so she would be a war bride. And so there are lots of reasons for that to happen, some of them naturally occurring, and some of them not naturally occurring. And in this one, they definitely portray it as naturally occurring, but you're right, it was very common. So maybe I need to get over myself. And this was, yeah, this was a common occurrence. And maybe to her, that meant, like stability and well,
Michelle Newman 53:02
and it could have been very intentional to write that storyline in because of what you just said, because that was very a common occurrence to have the older gi marry that anyway, yeah,
Kristin Nilsen 53:11
and this was, this is to this date. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that I'm right on this. This is the most watched wedding ever seen on TV.
Michelle Newman 53:20
Well, it has to be, right,
Kristin Nilsen 53:23
if the most watched television episode of All Time, then this is the most watched wedding. That's why Rhoda is wedding is the second most watched wedding. You think, yeah, yes, that's
Carolyn Cochrane 53:33
a good trivia question, because nobody would think of this. That's right. That wasn't the central plot. But yeah, that was so good. Okay, moving
Michelle Newman 53:41
on. BJ, Honeycutt, I love BJ, Honeycutt, I
Kristin Nilsen 53:45
was in love with BJ, yeah, he's
Michelle Newman 53:46
a good looking guy. Yeah, you know, he's married in real life to one of the nurses on mass show.
Kristin Nilsen 53:53
I did not know that. It's a fun fact. He
Michelle Newman 53:56
gets orders to go home for his daughter, Aaron's second birthday. Now he hasn't seen Aaron, like armistice since she was an infant. Yes, this is like, they don't know armistice is about to happen. Yeah, when he gets the orders, and he's very excited, Hawkeye, though, his best friend, is still in the mental hospital, so he goes to visit Hawkeye, is he going to tell him he's leaving? We're not sure, because someone actually asks him pointedly, are you going to tell him you're leaving? He's like, I'm not sure. He doesn't end up telling Hawkeye that he's leaving. The moment he gets on the helicopter and he takes off, clinger opens a letter that tells them that the orders have been rescinded. Helicopters taking off into the sky. He tells Colonel Potter, and I love it. Colonel Potter just acts like he didn't hear. It's like, well, yeah, don't, I don't know. However, Honeycutt only gets to Guam before he gets sent back. And so that's why I mentioned before they end up having a birthday party for Aaron at the orphanage. By the way, when Hawkeye read. Turns to the 4077, and is out of the hospital. Honeycutts gone. He's in Guam I guess, right. Where's Honeycutt? Where is he? And they're like, Oh, didn't he left? He got he's going back home. Didn't he tell you goodbye? And he realized that he left without telling him goodbye, just like his other best friend, Trapper John, had done,
Kristin Nilsen 55:18
and that was years ago. He's super bitter six years prior. I mean, I just think that's really indicative that they, well, they pull that little nugget out into the
Michelle Newman 55:26
Wow, and they have to, because let's not forget, this is all going to come back in the very final scene. So this is a really important plot point, actually, this whole goodbye thing, this theme going through, which is going to come back as we get to the very end. And it's
Kristin Nilsen 55:39
sort of like Hawkeyes time in the hospital has really, I don't want to say, turned him into a pessimist. That's, that's the wrong word, turned him into a realist. Or he's, he is looking at this toll of war. One of the tolls is that this person who has been basically like a wife to him, right? They've been so close, they share living quarters, they share a job, they share every moment together. They will no longer be friends, because BJ lives in San Francisco, and he lives in Maine, and it's the 1950s and you don't just hop on a plane to go to San Francisco. So he's being a realist and wanting to engage BJ in that reality. Yeah.
Carolyn Cochrane 56:19
And you know what kept coming back to for me is that they're gonna go back home and live those lives, and there were like, you watched people die in front of you. You could have died like the intense relationship that all of these people had in the 407 with each other. And when you leave you good chance, you're not going to see these people ever again, but yet you, I mean, that's so it's like another consequence, like a human toll that this has taken, because there's probably these people know stuff about you that your wife or those people will never know. And it's like over, it's a
Michelle Newman 56:57
loss, right? It's one more. It's a huge loss. And did you guys feel that so tremendously? Watching it this past week, I felt as as we as we are now getting to the end of the episode, and we're gonna have to start having the actual goodbyes. I felt such a tremendous sense of loss watching it. I'm feeling a loss for the characters having to say goodbye to each other after everything they've been through and but I'm also feeling a loss in real life for the characters they're set burned down. That's so sad. I mean, it was like, blew it up, little house, blew their set up. And so that was sad. But then they actually have to say goodbye to each other, yes, who they've been working with for so long. So, and it is, it's
Kristin Nilsen 57:39
time, it's yeah, let's go there. It's at a certain point in the episode, it's going to be time to say goodbye. Quite literally, we must say our goodbyes. Everybody must say goodbye. The last 15 or 20 minutes of the episode is just characters saying goodbye to each other. So just Yes, just cue the waterworks. Basically, you just cry for the whole ending of the thing. I should have kept a tally of how many times I cried. The tear jerker moments are numerous, and the end is excruciating, possibly because all of the good I'm gonna cry again because all of the goodbyes feel as if they are actually saying goodbye to each other because they are Yeah, to your point, Michelle, right. They're saying goodbye to their set. They're saying goodbye to their friends. They're not going to go to work with each other anymore. It's just, it's a lot of crying. Did
Michelle Newman 58:35
you guys also feel like you then put yourself in their characters, but also in the actors, it's too full. And you know, how much time they've all spent together. Didn't you feel like, even though they all the goodbyes were written so perfectly? I was like, Well, that was so short. That's all you have to say to this. You know, for instance, Colonel Potter's goodbye to Margaret is so beautiful. He says, I know you've got your career in order, but don't forget to have a happy life too. That's it. And then gone. And I'm like, wait more. The
Kristin Nilsen 59:05
Colonel Potter and Margaret moment was a big one for me, because as short as it is, her response to him is so heartfelt that I almost wondered if it wasn't scripted. And again, I'm going to cry because she says, damn it. She says, You dear, sweet man, I'll never forget you. And then they hug. And every time you see Colonel Potter's face, he's crying. Yeah, it's real. You look at that face, I'm like, That's not acting. That guy is real. Every goodbye with Colonel Potter kills me. Goodbye, Margaret,
Unknown Speaker 59:40
I know you've got your career in order, but don't forget to have a happy life, too, dear sweet man, I'll never forget you
Kristin Nilsen 59:51
the Christ. Oh,
Michelle Newman 59:53
I mean, there's nothing that's gonna make me cry like a scene with an animal. Oh. Let's just say goodbye to Sophie, the horse, beloved horse. Oh, that was, that was
Kristin Nilsen 1:00:05
horrible. And there, this is a. This is what mash does so well, is they combine the comedy and the tragedy together. And so when it's time for Colonel Potter to say goodbye to BJ and Honeycutt he, it is, it is a, it's a sad moment. And he climbs on his horse, and he clip Clops away. And as it's supposed to be kind of funny, he's riding a horse out of camp, and they and they salute him, which is a gift to him, because, of course, they were always thumbing their nose at the government, and this time, they're saluting him and giving him respect for the authority that he has, and his Eclipse, Clops away on that horse. I'm just crying. Cry.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:00:45
Yeah. I mean, I, I have a thing about goodbyes in general, and I probably have shared with you the story of my sister when I was moving and yeah, and I told her I would be back at the house. And I wasn't. I left, because I just hate goodbyes that much. And I'm, I am. BJ, Honeycutt, 100% and yeah, when you said before the realist and the idealist, I'll take the idealist any day. But that comes at a price too. So all these good buys just hit me. I don't know. I just don't I don't like them. I don't like what they mean and signify and all of that. So it was, it's like a gut punch. Each one of those I just
Kristin Nilsen 1:01:24
this must be excruciating for you. The end of this episode, it was, it
Carolyn Cochrane 1:01:28
was very much so yeah, for a lot of reasons, as I said in the beginning. But then the goodbyes are just the like
Kristin Nilsen 1:01:34
and Loretta Swit agrees with you, because she says that goodbye she had with Colonel Potter, Harry Morgan, yes, her goodbye, where she says, You, dear sweet man, I'll never forget you. She said it was she struggled to get through that moment because she was saying goodbye to this man who had become like a father to her in the last years of this show. He literally not the character, but the man had become a father to her, and she was going to say goodbye to him on camera, and she said it took everything she had to get through that moment.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:02:09
Yeah, and this is another idealist thing that I used to think, once you were in a TV show or a movie that was kind of intense with like another actor, you guys were gonna be best friends forever, like you were going to go over to each other's houses and all of that. And to think that for some people, that's maybe the last time they really had any interaction with this person that they had maybe spent the last, you know, 810, plus years with, it's just, oh, makes me
Kristin Nilsen 1:02:35
sad. And even, you know, we talked about the comedy and the tragedy together, that that's what this that's what the show did so well, even the Margaret and Hawkeye moment, where, instead of saying goodbye, they grab each other for a long, deep, powerful kiss. That is 11 years in the making, and it is sort of, it's meant to be this catharsis after 11 years of will they or won't they, right? She was always his object of affection and she was never gonna break. And this is the they just slam together like magnets and start kissing. And it's supposed to be funny, but it feels poignant. It feels like a bursting of the dam, and I'm gonna cry again, but they but
Michelle Newman 1:03:17
it's so my favorite part of that whole kiss is after it. They go, well, so there's the comment, the writing, yeah, that's so brilliant. Well, you
Carolyn Cochrane 1:03:29
know what, in my mind, she goes to Boston. That's where her, like,
Kristin Nilsen 1:03:34
she works. Here we go. That's right, yeah. And,
Carolyn Cochrane 1:03:36
you know, she and Charles still hang out, because he's the head of thoracic surgery there, and Maine is not very far from Boston. And so the three of them. And then, you know, yeah, nicely
Kristin Nilsen 1:03:46
done, Carolyn. And
Michelle Newman 1:03:47
then they spend Thanksgiving in Mill Valley with BJ honey. They make the
Kristin Nilsen 1:03:52
trip to mill, and it's so far away they have to stay there for Christmas too, sure, because you can't go there for just giving it's really far for the holidays. Okay, you have to know Carolyn that Mike now calls this Carolyn. He's like, I'm gonna Carolyn this moment right here, and I'm gonna say that that tree was gonna it was gonna die anyway, it was just gonna fall down. And so it was ready. The tree was ready. That's called Carolyn. Yeah,
Carolyn Cochrane 1:04:14
that's my coping mechanism, I guess, for especially all these goodbye moments. Yes, what I do.
Kristin Nilsen 1:04:20
But at the end, it really comes down. How will I ever get through this? Really to BJ and Hawkeye saying goodbye to each other, which, of course, BJ has refused to do. He just wants to be like a See you later. See a pal, and Hawkeye wants this to be real. The helicopter arrives to pick up Hawkeye. BJ will be the last one to leave. And BJ says, hop on my motorbike. I'll drive you up there. And he drives him up to the landing pad. And that hug that they have Hawkeye just like, grabs his head, cleans up like. As a child. And again, you can feel the two men saying goodbye to each other,
Michelle Newman 1:05:05
but then Hawkeye does just say, I'll miss you like really heartfelt. And BJ says, I'll miss you a lot, does it? And he says, and I can't imagine what this place would have been like if I hadn't found you here. So they after all that joking, we did get some very real emotion from them. I
Unknown Speaker 1:05:23
want you to know how much you meant to me. I'll never be able to shake you whenever I see a big pair of feet or cheesy mustache. I'll think of you
Unknown Speaker 1:05:38
whenever I smell mugged old socks. I'll think of you the next time somebody nails my shoe to the floor, somebody gives me a martini that tastes like lighter fluid.
Michelle Newman 1:05:53
Miss you. I'll miss you a lot. I can't imagine what this place would have been like if I hadn't found you here. And then he said, Then he says, I've left you a little message. And this is the, this is the place
Kristin Nilsen 1:06:05
where, like, cue, the water works like if I wasn't crying before, and now it's going to be open mouth crying, because as the helicopter goes up Hawkeye, can't take his eyes off of him. It's like, you know, I referred to him as a wife before. It's like, it's the person that he's loved for so long, and he's going up in the sky, and he can't take his eyes off of BJ, and as the helicopter gets higher and higher and higher, he looks down and he can see that BJ has formed the word goodbye In white rocks, and then the theme song begins. You Oh, and it's the last time you'll hear it, and it's over for real. And
Carolyn Cochrane 1:06:48
then you look over at your dad, your dad is crying,
Unknown Speaker 1:06:52
like, what I know, you know,
Michelle Newman 1:06:53
those were rare times
Carolyn Cochrane 1:06:54
that, you know, you could count on probably one hand how many times I'd seen my dad cry. So, yeah. So, yeah, it got everybody. So
Kristin Nilsen 1:07:03
marriage had been like family for millions of people for 11 years, and when those characters said goodbye to us, it was like the world's biggest group hug. It was more than the cessation of a show. It was the end of a war and the end of a story that some of us had been watching for literally our whole lives, just like Carolyn said, often surrounded by our families and the people who are important to us, Hawkeye and BJ and Colonel Potter and the rest were real people with complicated feelings and relationships, and they were pulling us With comedy and artistry to become more caring and compassionate human beings. I hope we've done them proud. Thank you so much for listening today, and we will see you next week.
Michelle Newman 1:07:50
And this episode was brought to you today by our wonderful and generous supporters on Patreon, who honestly are who keep us afloat and trucking. We couldn't do any of this without them. Today, we're giving a special thank you to Allison, Liz Courtney, Carla, Erin, Debbie, Lisa Raquel, Jill, Christine, Tanya, Allie, Gina, Melanie, Julie Susie, Elizabeth and Sherry.
Kristin Nilsen 1:08:23
Oh, my God. Very thank you so much. Thank you so much. In the meantime, let's raise our glasses for a toast, courtesy of the cast of Three's Company, two good times,
Michelle Newman 1:08:39
two Happy Days, Two
Carolyn Cochrane 1:08:41
Little House on the Prairie. Cheers. Cheers.
Kristin Nilsen 1:08:45
The information, opinions and comments expressed on the pop culture Preservation Society podcast belong solely to Carolyn the crushologist and hello Newman, and are in no way representative of our employers or affiliates. And though we truly believe we are always right, there is always a first time the PCPs is written, produced and recorded in Minneapolis, Minnesota, home of the fictional wjm studios and our beloved Mary Richards, Nanu. Nanu, keep on truckin and May the Force Be With You. You.