10. I Hate a Mystery

Episode number, production number

Written by: Hal Dressner
Directed by: Hy Averback
Semi-regulars: Linda Meiklejohn as Nurse Leslie. Bonnie Jones as Lt Barbara Bannerman. Patrick Adiarte as Ho-John. Timothy Brown as Spearchucker. William Christopher as Father Mulcahy. Odessa Cleveland as Nurse Ginger.

Plot: There is a rash of thefts at the camp, with lots of stuff going missing. The frame from the photo of Burns's mother. Hot Lips's hair-brushes. Henry's new fishing reel. Trapper's watch. The boys' swizzle stick. Several handbags. Henry's spoon (from his hand!). Mulcahy's Bible. When Henry conducts a tent-to-tent search, the stolen items are found in Hawkeye's trunk. Now finding himself the prime suspect, Hawkeye becomes Sherlock Holmes for a while to find the actual guilty party. Using a rather clever bluff, he tricks the thief into giving himself away. It is none other than Ho-Jon, trying to raise some money to get his mother and sister down from the north. The gang decide not to take their stuff back.

Glitches: Burns calls Hot Lips 'Major Houlihand'.
Henry just twiddles the key vaguely in the direction of the lock - no wonder it was so easy for the thief to break in!
Why does Ho-Jon go to the meeting? He wasn't asked to go!
Trapper pronounces 'geisha' as gee-sha.

Great Lines: Mulcahy, picking up the book on his desk: 'As with everything else, it's all in here.' Hawkeye, looking at the title: 'The dictionary?'
Hawkeye, after being sprung yelling at Radar disguised as a bush: 'It's getting so a man can't talk to his own shrub around here.'
Mulcahy, talking Biblically: 'It was after he returned to the garden that he discovered that three of his apostles were missing.' Hawkeye: 'Well don't look at me...'

Continuity is for Wimps: It's 1951 by now... If Episode 200. A War For All Seasons (Season 9) is to be believed, Colonel Potter should be in command.
Additionally, the film the camp watch is Les Miserables. I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they were watching the 1935 black and white version. The other one, starring Michael Rennie, was from 1952, and that is still in the future...
Father Mulcahy's hair is VERY red today. I guess they reviewed the pilot and saw George Morgan's hair and dyed Bill's to match.
Ho-Jon is trying to get his mother and sister down from the north, but in Episode 1. The Pilot Episode, they are close enough that he can duck off from work to tell them about his acceptance to College.
In this episode, Hawkeye hints that there could be a transfer in it for Henry if he catches the thief. He had a transfer just last episode and threw it away!

Notes: Radar's teddy bear appears for the first time.
The film the camp see is Les Miserables.

Comments: This was fairly lacklustre as an episode. Hawkeye's Sherlock Holmes/Hercule Poirrot/Columbo mystery solving scene is funny, as is Radar tailing him around the camp. Not one of the better efforts for the season, though.

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