War Is Bad

I was scrolling through a social media site, and said out loud, "Oh, I'm not even gonna read that one."

"What?" my son asked.

"An article titled, '20 TV Character Deaths You Still Haven't Gotten Over.'"

My son knows me. "Henry?" he said.

"YES. Henry."

Lieutenant Colonel Henry Blake was the first commanding officer on TV's "M*A*S*H." I loved Henry, in spite of himself. He wasn't really the kind of person I generally admired. He was bumbling, he was easily bulldozed over by those with stronger personalities, he cheated on his wife. But putting all that aside, he was well intentioned (one of my "musts" for people), he was a good surgeon, he was a loyal friend. The company clerk may have been the organizational brains of the outfit, but you couldn't really hold that against Henry; he may have been its heart. He cared about those under his command, and he cared about the wounded who came through their hospital. He could behave like a parent frequently, and like a commander when he had to, but he was always a good doctor.

My age was in single digits when "M*A*S*H" premiered, and I was only 10 when Henry got his orders to head home.

Home; they all wanted to go home. He'd miss the men, we'd miss him, but Henry was excited to go.

Maybe the story lines were kind of heavy for a kid in elementary school. My parents kept me - all of their kids - from things they were afraid would traumatize us or be over our heads, but "M*A*S*H" didn't fall into that category. We only had one TV, so whatever was on, we watched together, and we discussed it. It was one of my favorite shows. I understood the horror of war, the great lengths they went to in order to keep the horror at bay, the humor.

I understood that Henry was going home because the actor, McLean Stevenson, hadn't renewed his contract; that made me a bit sad, but it was OK. I'd watched the cast be shuffled on shows before. We'd have all summer to get used to the idea before the show returned.

I watched Henry say his goodbyes, watched him call his wife back home. He had a child he'd never met, born while he served in Korea. "Let's not tell anyone," he said to his wife. "Let's just show up for dinner at the club." He was so excited to think about the surprise his friends would experience.

He took off his uniform - he took off his ubiquitous fishing hat - and he put on a suit. He saluted Radar, his clerk, and he climbed on to the helicopter.

That's where the script they'd all been given ended. During filming, the producers told the cast, "We have one more scene. Gary (Burghoff, who played Radar) is the only one with any lines. Just react to Gary." They set up a scene in the ER - then they handed Burghoff the script.

We, the viewers, found out through interviews that Burghoff gave afterward that he looked at the lines and felt punched in the stomach. "You sons of b*****s," he says that he told them. "You're going to win an Emmy for this."

The reaction you see when Radar walks into the ER - that's the actor's reaction to the lines he was given only seconds earlier. He walks through the door, and Wayne Rogers, taking to the direction to "react to Gary," says, "Radar, put a mask on!"

Burghoff reads the lines. I know them by heart. "Lt. Col. Henry Blake's plane was shot down over the Sea of Japan. It spun in. There were no survivors."

OH. Oh. Oh.

It was so painful. I cried then. I cry now. I cry every time I see the episode, every time I talk about that moment.

The reactions you see from the other actors - those are their actual reactions. Loretta Swit weeps.

I was not prepared for the reaction of some fans, though. The producers got nasty letters - "How could you? There was no reason for that!" "How can you treat your fans this way? We've been so loyal, and you hurt us!" "This is entertainment! We watch this show to laugh, not to cry!"

Even as a 10 year old, I understood what they were doing. This is why war is bad. This is why it is a thing to be avoided. Because people you love, people with everything to live for, people with wives and children and babies they'd never met, with friends and relatives and jobs waiting for them at home, die. Many of them are still too young to have wives and children, and they die anyway. War is indiscriminate; it takes everyone. And yes, TV is entertainment, and the show is a comedy, but it would be remiss if it didn't show that war takes lives, and not just the lives of soldiers, and not just people you don't know.

So, yeah, they ripped my heart out. Yeah, it still hurts. That's how I know they did their job. Because if there was a single sentence, with words of one syllable, that summed up "M*A*S*H," it would be, "War is bad." Because too many people die.

So, thanks, 20th Century Fox - even though it hurts.

And oh, yes - that episode won an Emmy.