Thursday, 6/8

You know, it really was a good question.

I've written about how "MASH" was one of those TV shows that made me into who I am today. Watching both the absurd comedy and the anti-war anti-establishment sentiment of the show when I was a little kid shaped the way I both think and write as an adult, and that's something for which I'm actually appreciative. Yes, I realize most 10 year olds in the 70s probably preferred "Good Times" or "Charlie's Angels", but even back then I was out of the ordinary.

So it's probably not a surprise I was a religious viewer of "MASH".

Anyway, I have a friend who started watching the show from season one and is determined to get through all 11 seasons of it. It's been cool being part of her journey, as she'll call or write me with the episode she just watched and her thoughts and/or criticisms about it. She's into the second season now, part of the golden age of the series, and asked a rhetorical question that's actually had me thinking since then--

"Why don't they make shows like this any more?"

That's actually a good question, considering that we're in what many critics call “Peak TV", where there are so many--so many GOOD--series out there that you can watch. But in a way she's right--despite all the quality around us these days, there really isn't a show like "MASH".

And that's a bit of a bummer.

I realize her question was rhetorical, but I've tried to come up with reasons WHY a "MASH” wouldn't float today, and I think I have two. The first is that it's not fifty years ago. It's not the 1970s, when Vietnam and Watergate sapped any lingering trust in authorities and official doings. Even though we're a lot more politically divided these days, we're divided on different (and sometimes the strangest) things. Back then, we were divided on the Vietnam War, and on the people running the war. We didn't care on which side you were on about whether or not there should be a rainbow flag on a can of beer; you thought the war was either good or bad. That's one vein "MASH" tapped into brilliantly, and a vein I don't think could exist today.

The other reason why I don't think it would work as a TV show these days? Larry Gelbart and the writers who surrounded him are all gone. Along with Gene Reynolds, Larry Gelbart adapted the show from the movie of the same name and was its head writer for the first four season of the show (By far the best seasons, in my opinion). They had all grown up writing for old-time radio, and it shows. Writing for radio comedians you had to have a certain punch, a certain flair with words, to get your point across. After all, you didn't have pictures, so you had to paint the gag in the listener's mind. Writers today aren't always the best at doing that, and even though we're in "Peak TV" that shows.

(Of course, havng writers who came up in the 40s and 50s also leads to moments on "MASH", especially in the early years, that just make you cringe nowadays with their treatment of women, charterers of colors, and certain interpersonal relationships. So maybe make that a THIRD reason why the show could never get made these days).

I realize that, in the end, no one really cares about the answers I came up with for that rhetorical question. But seeing as how "MASH' was one of the two shows that made me who I am today, I thought it appropriate that I put a little thought into it, anyway.

(jim@wmqt.com), forever guided (or, depending upon your point of view, warped) by "MASH”.