Original Air Date: 12/2/75
Written by: Larry Gelbart & Gene Reynolds
Directed by: Burt Metcalfe
Wounded arrive at the 4077th, including a Col. Chaffey (Warren Stevens), who is carrying a rare, antique pistol as a side-arm. Radar takes it and locks it up in the gun bin--Standard Operating Procedure--but not before Frank takes a few moments to drool all over it, in a display of machismo.
Later, when Radar returns to the gun bin, he sees that the Colonel's gun is missing!
He tells Col. Potter, who starts an investigation to find it--otherwise, Radar could go to jail for years. Radar is paralyzed with fear: "I won't get out until I'm thirty--that's almost dead!"
Col. Potter fails to find the gun, and has to break the news to Col. Chaffey, who is enraged and wants to speak to the "Non-compoop" who lost his gun.
Meanwhile, Frank shows Hot Lips an antique gun that he "got from home." He asked it to be sent because he "missed his old pal."
Hawkeye and B.J. confront Frank, insinuating he took the gun, and now that its gotten Radar in trouble, he should give it back. Frank, not giving an inch, notices how everyone is entitled to be innocent until proven guilty, except for him. Hawkeye and B.J., annoyed that Frank is actually right for once, back off.
Radar gets drunk, sure is he is going to the stockade. In the middle of the night, he staggers over to visit Col. Chaffey, to protest his innocence. While there, they both hear a gun go off, causing everyone to run outside.
In the confusion, Frank makes his way to Hot Lips' tent, with a gun shot wound to his foot. He at first tells a tall tale about getting into a fight with someone he saw lurking in the Supply Shed, but Hot Lips forces him to tell the truth--that gun isn't his, it never was. While he was trying to return it, it accidentally went off.
Hot Lips is mad at Frank for stealing and lying, but Frank has learned his lesson: "Yep--when you steal something, don't ever try to return it."
The gun now returned, all of the charges against Radar are dropped. Col. Chaffey apologizes to Radar, and Col. Potter suggests the gun is more trouble than its worth, maybe he should think about donating it to a museum. Col. Chaffey will have none of that, insisting he'll keep it until the day he dies. He rides off.
The next day, Hawkeye and B.J. hint at the true source of Frank's wound. Just a guess, really--a "shot in the dark."
Fun Facts: Col. Potter tells a story about a time when he almost got crushed by a runaway portable latrine. Another installment of The Young Col. Potter Adventures!
Favorite Line: When Radar, drunk, points his teddy bear at Col. Chaffey, we hear a gunshot from outside.
Radar, shocked, stares at his teddy bear and exclaims, "My bear went off!"
4 comments:
My favourite line by Radar is "I'll go in there in my puberty and I won't get out until my adultery"
I really like the end, when Radar is hungover and can't see straight. Potter says he can't see straight either, but didn't have anything to drink....and they end up switching glasses. Classic.
Can't help but feel that Frank was already becoming a one-dimensional buffoon by this point in the season.
He still has some great moments (as in "Der Tag") where we sense that this is a character who could have been expanded upon more, if only for comic relief and in a sympathetic way. Yet, by now he appears ever more hypocritical, petty and ethically challenged. If I were Larry Linville, I might well have been frustrated as well.
Goofs-Hollihan claims this is Colt .45 Cavalry Pistol {19th Century} like her father used to have-in fact is is a Model 1917 revolver
Also-during the "Big Mac" Episode she implies her father is an artilleryman-although in this epsiode and when he comes to vist her-he was changed to a cavaryman!
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