That last episode of M*A*S*H must have been a mutha

It was a great show at the start. It was irreverant and it was comedy, instead of the more serious comedy. In the early years, it was wise guy comments and practical jokes. MacLean Stevenson, Wayne Rogers and Larry Linville all fit in perfectly. The funny thing was none of them ever had as much success or noterity after that, but it was a case of the sum total being greater than the sum of the parts.

I doubt any series television show will ever surpass MASH in terms of audience. There are too many cable channels and too much audience fragmentation. I would doubt the Cinderella in the 50s could attract over 100-million people. In the first place, there weren't as many people in the entire USA (there were more than 100 million, but when I was in elementary school in the 60s, the population was something like 180 million) and everybody didn't have a television - some areas only had two or three stations.

 

I wondered about that too when I read it, but since those stations in small cities were usually CBS and NBC (ABC was called the third network for a reason), it was almost a captive audience. Watch this or that, or nothin'.

 

The Waltons, too -- late in its run, the boys were sporting Beatles-style hair that wouldn't come into style for 20 more years, and the girls started wearing the Farrah shags, too.