The real joke is from the character of physiatrist Sidney Freedman and in his last scene when he repeats what he said from his very first show appearance “pull down your pants and slide on the ice....”

While we're trying to make a big deal out of coincidences, I'd like to point out the very first spoken word on "M*A*S*H" was "Fore!" The very last word, in "Goodbye, Farewell and Amen" was "What?"

Final episode ? I was waiting for that final episode, but never happened, it started from season1, episode 1 all over again!? What happened to the final episode.

Trouble is, as a rule, "M*A*S*H" almost never referenced previous episodes. Winchester touching his nose, Trapper, Henry and Radar leaving Korea were among the rare times the show did bring up events from previous episodes. Generally, each ep was self-contained, happening in a sort of vacuum. That kind of continuity just wasn't part of the series' DNA.

Well, in 1950 nobody knew that today, only seventy years later, the little village of Uijeongbu, where the series was set, would have grown into a major South Korean city, meaning that that time capsule likely would be buried deep under a parking lot or high-rise and unlikely to ever see the light of day again.

How does an article like this get published here when the following is documented all over the internet?
“... “Korea, 1950. A hundred years ago.” You are taking literally something meant as satire. Larry Gelbart — who wrote the episode — said ‘I wrote the line to indicate how long ago the Korean War seemed in the minds of the American public.’ He is not stating the viewer is in 2050.”

For MASH fans, this is a good read:

"Due to the amount of time required for postproduction, the two-hour finale was shot the summer before the premiere of the shortened last season. The real last episode shot was "As Time Goes By." Hundreds of journalists and photographers from around the world waited outside stage 9 to capture the moment."

Source: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/features/mash-oral-history-untold-stories-one-tvs-important-shows-1086322

LovE Mash reruns I get tears along smiles 💋 just seeing what I missed by not watching this show when I was younger , LovE and miss these heroes i ♥️♥️♥️ Of Mash 4077

"A hundred years! Exactly when the time capsule was set to be opened."

Ummm... no. You're trying to match up two events from two different ends of the MASH timeline: The pilot which states is set in 1950 and the end of the war, in 1953. When Margaret says "...100 years from now..." that means the time capsule would be opened in 2053, not 2050.

So for this supposed "set up" of the entire show being found in a time capsule, Margaret would either have had to say, "...97 years from now...", or the caption in the pilot would have had to say "Korea - 1950, 103 years ago." Neither of which makes any sense.

"But for the cast and crew of M*A*S*H, "Goodbye, Farewell and Amen" was not adieu. They filmed one more episode after that, "As Time Goes By." It just so happened to air the week prior."

This doesn't make sense. The production code for "Goodbye" is 9B04. "As Time Goes By" has a production code of 9B10*. That means five episodes were filmed between "Goodbye" and "Time." The only way what is written in the article could be true is if they continued to film "Goodbye" while filming those five episodes. And even if that's true only short scenes would have been filmed in case a scene had to be re-filmed. In any case, I've never heard that happened. You can't say "As Time Goes By" was filmed right after "Goodbye."

*Note: Only ten episodes including the finale were filmed that season. The rest were holdovers from the previous season.

Now that it was pointed out to us ... yes ... the Pilot did indeed begin with Korea 100 hundred years ago. Truly weird. But then we've gone over all that down below. Wow those characters sure did look young in the Pilot!

Hello

one of my fav funniest scenes was Henry - shaking the stove pipe and getting a face full of soot- but it came back to Hawkeye in the Edwina Ep

Hi Metv - Please advise - What do I click on to view late evening schedule starting at 1:00am Weeknights: and Saturdays and Sundays after 10:00;m?

MeTV usually has interesting nuggets of trivia like the series "Salvage 1" starring Andy Griffith in which he played a junk dealer retrieving junk from outer space to re-sell on Earth. Had it not been for this website, I probably would never have known about it.

But this post is a stretch. The Pilot episode of M*A*S*H was written by Larry Gelbart who co-created the series with Gene Reynolds but Gelbart left M*A*S*H after the 5th season. "As Time Goes By" was written by Thad Mumford and Dan Wilcox who joined the M*A*S*H writing staff at the beginning of Season 8.

Larry Gelbart was a brilliant writer and I seriously doubt that when he left, he left behind instructions for a joke about the Korean War being 100 years ago to be used in some episode in the future to written by writers who aren't on staff yet.

M*A*S*H is my favorite TV show of all time. I saw every first run episode no matter where I was.

Makes Sense!

The MASH production team had no need to setup a (so-called) elaborate “joke” for the sake of its own contrivance. Although it's a very interesting topic for MeTV to throw out there. First of all it’s too complicated to be effective as any "joke." But it does set the mood of nostalgia (or intention) for the entire series. Meaning that the (Police Action) of Korean war was relevant to the generations who had gone through many wars, and would most deeply understand those complicated emotions. Particularly a war coming so close right after WWII. And for whatever the purpose of that “Police Action” was, the focus of MASH was on the insanity of death and suffering in trying to settle disputes … in the absence of diplomacy. (Look how much effort was spent on the episode which focused on an attempted (but failed) diplomatic attempt, as in the amount of deep frustration it caused Hawkeye). That … was really the point of MASH. Human suffering due to failure of human beings who are oblivious to the waste war creates from casualties and injuries. It was meant to examine (and I’m not judging here) what’s the real point. How much is war worth the sacrifices made.

Now (by Network standards) MASH would never be allowed if it straight-up (was perceived) to make any political statement. In those decades, Networks kept a tight rein on the broadcast of “political opinions.” (Look at what happened to the Smothers Brothers). By making the series an ultimate flashback, simply added more distance, for the purpose of suggesting an objective reflection. And to escape from making a concrete statement about more contemporary issues of the day. In other words, the MASH production was suggesting a “period piece” by using the statement “Korea, a hundred years ago.”

Perhaps not so effectively however, because of under-calculating how astute viewer/fans really are and were. But the only thing the MASH team really cared about was getting that show on the air!