13. Edwina

December 24, 1972 (J-312)

Written by: Hal Dresner
Directed by: James Sheldon
Guest Stars: Arlene Golonka as Nurse Eddie.
Semi-regulars: Marcia Strassman as Nurse Cutler. Linda Meiklejohn, as Nurse Leslie.

Plot: After Nurse Edwina Ferguson is depressingly reminded of her single status, the nurses stop fraternising with everyone in order to pressure someone to take the incredibly clumsy Eddie on a date. Hawkeye is the unlucky loser. In a date where many things (including Hawkeye) get broken, Eddie gets her confidence back, and Hawkeye becomes quite fond of her. The end of the scene involves Eddie knocking the chimney down on Hawkeye's head. Eddie is eventually shipped out, still alone but now much happier.

Glitches: While Eddie is opening her presents, filmed from the side she is in front of Trapper on her left and a woman in a hat on her right. From the front, the woman in the hat is on her left, and another woman on her right.
So is Hot Lips in on this 'no interaction' rule or not? Later episodes such as 101. The Nurses (Season 5) will show that she doesn't get on so hot with the other nurses, so it seems unlikely she'd be in on it. Yet Burns is right there when the boys discuss the problem (true, he condemns the straw-drawing, but until then he looks rapt). She and Burns do get together later, but by this point, Hawkeye has interacted with Eddie, thus lifting the ban.
Is it really all that much nicer to Eddie to set all this up without telling her? To make her go on a date with some guy who doesn't want to? Doesn't exactly sound the sort of thing she was looking for at the start.
In the mess tent Eddie's clipboard has some typing on the first page but all the others are blank.
The tray Eddie knocks on the floor in the Swamp has three glasses on it in one shot and four glasses when it falls on the floor.
Eddie's hands change position back and forth after she knocks the chimney onto Hawkeye.

BIMOL: Hot Lips sort of just raises her head to give a line or two at Eddie's party and later in the mess tent.

Great Lines: Hawkeye: 'Now, based on my three classes in psychology, two of which I cut...'
Eddie: 'You wanna sit together?' Hawkeye: 'I've tried sitting apart. It's very painful.'
Hawkeye: 'Trapper took a correspondence course in interior decorating. He failed it, of course.'
Hawkeye again: 'I don't mind a wet T-shirt. It saves me the trouble of sweating.'

Continuity is for Wimps: Radar's attempts to pull a nurse in this episode are rather at odds with his behaviour later in life. Never mind that we find out in the next episode that he's engaged at this point!
I don't recall there ever being a lab table in post-op before - or since.

Suction: One.

Comments: A very silly episode. Worth watching for the Hawkeye/Eddie date. The set-up sequence, of the two of them dressing, is quite hilarious. Hawkeye wears the same yukata he had in Tokyo in Episode 9. Henry Please Come Home.
Despite the episode having the feel of a rather second-rate sit-com, there's some very sweet dialogue. Radar with cake on his glasses is very cute.

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