1. The Pilot Episode

Written by: Larry Gelbart.
Directed by: Gene Reynolds.
Guest stars: Laura Miller as Knocko. B Kirby Jr as Boone.
Semi-regulars: Karen Philipp as Lt Dish. G. Wood as General Hammond. Patrick Adiarte as Ho-Jon. Timothy Brown as Spearchucker Jones. Linda Meiklejohn as Nurse Leslie. George Morgan as Father Mulcahy. Odessa Cleveland as Ginger. John Orchard as Ugly John.

Plot: Korea, 1950. A hundred years ago, if the caption is to be believed. Let's meet the guys: Hawkeye and Trapper are playing golf. Father Mulcahy is dozing in the sun. Henry and Leslie are opening a bottle. Frank and Hot Lips are reading and playing footsie. Radar and Spearchucker are throwing a football. Trapper's golf ball goes into the minefield and explodes. Then the choppers turn up, and we're into the opening titles.
The Swamp's Korean houseboy, Ho-Jon, is accepted to attend school at Hawkeye's alma mater back in the States. The cost is $2000 to get him there and pay the tuition fees. The boys decide to raise money to send Ho-Jon to Maine by having a $10/head all-you-can-drink booze fest and raffling a weekend in Tokyo with a nurse, Lt Dish. Dish, fairly naturally, isn't particularly thrilled with the idea of being a raffle prize. Hawkeye assures her that it will work out all right, although doesn't disclose how. With Henry gone to Seoul, Burns decides to disallow the party and raffle, but the boys sedate him and bandage him head to toe, then go ahead anyway. Hot Lips finds Burns and calls General Hammond and Henry back to the camp, just in time to see the raffle being drawn (rigged by Hawkeye, of course). The winner turns out to be the only man in camp who isn't after Lt Dish's honour - Father Mulcahy. Even though General Hammond tries to throw Hawkeye and Trapper in the stockade for disobeying orders and sedating Frank, after Hammond sees them in surgery they get let off.

BIMOL: Frank is very underused, being sedated for most of the episode.

Great Lines: Trapper, about his wife: 'She thinks I got sent to Korea as part of some secret plot to cheat on her.' Hawkeye: 'Well, didn't you?' Trapper: 'Yeah. But how did she figure it out?'
Henry: 'Seems like a good enough cause. Why don't I trust you guys?' Trapper: ''cos we're not trustworthy.' Henry: 'Maybe that's it.'

Continuity is for Wimps: Inconsistent? Where do I start? Well, there's Hawkeye's hair... Radar gets younger after the first episode... Father Mulcahy starts looking completely different shortly as well... but those aside...
Ho-Jon says he's got to go and tell his folks, but in episode 10. I Hate a Mystery, he says that his mother lives way up north. Maybe he was gonna yell real loud.
Hawkeye says that Ho-Jon could stay with his folks - Hawkeye Senior, the Dad of so many 'Dear Dad' episodes, and Mrs Hawkeye Senior, who later turns out to have been dead since Hawkeye was a little boy (this is mentioned in numerous places, for example in episode 140. Mail Call Three in Season 6). Perhaps they had her stuffed.
The still is a rather different machine in this episode, but since Burns broke it I guess they had to replace it.
The helicopter used is also a different make to the ones they have in the rest of the series, but still appears to be period 1950s Korea. (That's right - I made a research trip to the War Memorial museum. I am that boring a person).
Radar giving someone an injection?!? With his eyes open?!?!?

Suction: 'Some'.

Notes: Radar is precognitive, hence the nickname.
It was cute to see Father Mulcahy crossing flies away.
Trapper is married but has a fairly flexible arrangement.
General Hammond's first name is Hamilton.
Hot Lips recognises Burns from his backside!

Comments: This episode first aired in September 1972. Even though I am a huge fan of the series, I have this to say after viewing this episode: if I had been one of the suits who made decisions, I would have thought very hard before deciding to give them a series. There's too much in this episode which is just so loose. By contrast with the other 250 episodes, this is quite weak. However, there wasn't really anything like this on TV at the time. It is only with the benefit of seeing the rest of the series that it's possible to see quite how sub-standard the pilot really is.
Anyway, aside from that, I loved the montage of Hawkeye's attempts to pull Lt Dish. The episode was silly, but not really more so than any other this season. It sets up the situation and gives an immediate affinity with the major characters, even though some of them change a bit between this episode and the next.

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