M*A*S*H - Season One (Collector's Edition)

This is the best show in the world. It's that simple. I didn't find a thing wrong with it. And the laugh track is a cool bonus. If you like M*A*S*H but your not getting your fill of it on tv then this is what you want. I've said it once and I'll say it again this is the best show in the world. If I could I would give it ten stars. Same goes for all the seasons.

I got this as a gift for my father for fathers' day, he loved it! He has always been a huge fan of the show and loved that he could now watch the episodes whenever he wants! I'll definately be getting him the rest of the seasons for future gifts.

Every once in a great while someone comes along with a great idea for a TV show. They tell just the right person and they just happen to come together and are the best possible writers for this kind of show. They just happen to find some broadcasting company crazy enough to trot out a pilot.

Then by chance they assemble actors that are so good at playing their roles that they become synonomous with them.

You add in some of the greatest TV directors of all time and you have M*A*S*H.

Season 1 starts out with a bang with some of the more memorable episodes like, the desk and yankee doodle doctor.

I love this show, and would reccomend it to everyone.

'MASH' is one of the finest American TV series ever to come out of the old network system. As practically everyone who searches Amazon for information on this great show will have undoubtably already read the excellent highlighted reviews, I'd like to add my case for starting your 'MASH' collection with this particular DVD set.

First, as this was the first season, the show has yet to fully evolve into what we all remember it as from syndication. There's an endless parade of cute young nurses, and multiple characters from the film appear here and nowhere else in the series. Also, much of the comedy leans toward what other military-based sitcoms had already done. Thus, certain things happen in this DVD set that we don't usually associate with MASH. I don't regard this as a debit as it keeps this particular box set from being predictable.

Second, continuing with the shock of surprise comes the revelation that the producers seldom insisted on period accuracy. The aforementioned nurses, for example, wear 'mod' hairstyles and Radar O'Reilly reads comic books that weren't published until the 1960s long after the Korean War was over. The nonconformist attitudes of many of the doctors is definitely not what one would have expected in the 1950s and neither are most of their haircuts. Back in the early 1970s, this might have been seen as a flaw. Today, it helps to remove the 'period piece' stigma that so many other early 1970s sitcoms suffer from. Coupled with the use of film stock rather than videotape and this is certainly one of the freshest-looking TV comedies over 30 years old.

Third, there's the opportunity to appreciate actors portray characters who either were not there for the full run of the series or who evolved into something very different. McLean Stevenson's Colonel Blake may never win awards as a model of military efficiency, but I sure would love to have someone that easygoing as my boss! Wayne Rogers' approach to Trapper John make him seem like Dean Martin to Alan Alda's Jerry Lewis-like Hawkeye Pierce. Gary Burghoff's early version of Radar O'Reilly is a very sly, shifty, deceptively dimwitted corporal who is far removed from the lovable innocent we all remember. And was there ever an actor better capable of playing a pompous twit than Larry Linville as Frank Burns? Linville also shows incredible ability as a straight man to both Rogers' and Alda's antics; the same jokes would likely fall flat without a steady straight man as a target.

On the downside there are no extras. We do get the chance to turn off the laughtrack, which makes the TV show seem even more cinematic than before. But there are no cast interviews (not even contemporary talk show interviews), no still galleries, no commentary tracks. We do get a mostly noninformative booklet with some tiny photos and a track listing, along with original airdates. I didn't feel cheated by this, as the price of the set makes it very affordable, but I do think it's a missed opportunity.

In sum, I was very impressed with how fresh 'MASH' is, and how nearly impossible it is to 'date' the series. The first season may not be as 'good' as the later ones, but to me the differences are so slight that this DVD set easily deserves 5 stars. I strongly suggest you start with this set and then work your way through the others in sequence.

Season 1 of M*A*S*H is sometimes uneven but shows flashes of the brilliance that is yet to come. Perhaps because it was a film first, the main characters spring to life fully-formed in the pilot episode (which I had never seen before). And they are a great bunch of characters - the anarchic surgeons Hawkeye and Trapper, the laid-back C.O. Henry, Radar with his sixth-sense ability to anticipate everyone's needs (and to sense when the Medivac choppers are on the way), etc. Even Father Mulchahy and Klinger are here in a few episodes, although neither are theme-song identified. The only problem (which will continue through more than half the series) is Frank, foil for Hawkeye and Trapper. He's just not bright enough to provide much challenge (unlike the later Winchester), and is basically the one-note incompetent boob that always bumbles around and provides the comic relief. Not much better is Hotlips Hoolihan, although we know she eventually comes into her own and so we can cut her some slack. Memorable guest appearences by "Ronnie" Howard and Leslie Neilson round out the casting for the season.

The writing is somewhat uneven this early in the series. There are some truly brilliant episodes (some that are laugh-out-loud farce, some full of that bittersweet cynical humour for which the series is best known). Unfortunately, there are some forgettable and even bad episodes that are cringe-inducing to watch.

So, for the season itself, I'm willing to give it about a 3.5 out of 5. When it is good, it's very good. There is also a very welcome option to turn off the laugh track (you can play the audio with it on or off). Mercifully, the menus are not animated, although there is an annoying episode submenu for each episode. The transfer looks and sounds great, and obvisouly the shows are uncut. But I have to deduct another 1/2 star for the lack of extras. Surely Alan Alda wasn't so busy on Season 7 of the West Wing that he couldn't have provided a commentary or two!