M*A*S*H (TV Series) Where There's a Will, There's a War (1982) User Reviews

A Very Human Episode

[Hitchcoc · 9/10 · 28 April 2015]

While B.J. is off getting a haircut and manicure, Hawkeye is forced to go to Battallion Aid because they have lost their doctor. It is supposed to be B.J.'s turn to go to the front and he is riddled with guilt. Hawkeye meets a doctor who works under horrific conditions, getting patients stable enough to send them off to the MASH. As he works there is mortar fire. It seem that the man he is replacing was killed. Hawkeye begins to pen a will. He leaves most everything to his father and then begins to think of appropriate things to give to his friends. They are items generally of no value, but right for the recipient. Back at the MASH no one knows if he is alive. This episode delves into the humanity of these people. It's hard to fathom how awful it would be to face death at every turn.

A*L*D*A

[safenoe · 8/10 · 19 October 2020]

This episode was directed by Alan Alda, and is very reflective. It's a season 10 episode so no wonder. Hawkeye confronts his own mortality when he's sent to a battalion aid station, when it was supposed to be BJ.

I like the Hawkeye/BJ/Potter/Winchester quartet. Hard to imagine this poignant episode being made during the Trapper John/Blake/Burns era.

Dead men's shoes

[ygwerin1 · 8/10 · 20 September 2023]

B. J. gets some R&R in Seul just when Colonel Potter, receives urgent news from Battalion Aid for a surgeon, and Hawkeye has to draw the short straw, and go in B. J.'s place.

A Battalion Aid station is no place for solitaire surgery, especially seeing so many of his patients, being shipped back to the 4077th where B. J., and the others are on tenterhooks about his conceivable whereabouts.

But it's most definitely the ideal place, for reflection over ones own mortality, and of remembering just how much, our colleagues really mean to you.

I really love Margaret especially, when she lets her gorgeous locks down, especially after all those times being lumbered, with Frank Burns and falling under, his pernicious influence.