#soon lee klinger

[purty-pumpkin]

Wanted to show some love for some underappreciated M*A*S*H ladies!

(and while we're at it, have some art based entirely on @onekisstotakewithme 's fanfics with Mechanic! Peg : D)

[majorbaby]

you're right about the overwhelming whiteness in mash fandom; somebody made a post about soon-lee (an on-screen woc) not receiving as much content and attention compared to peg and there were people who seemed to a) brush it off, b) actually be bothered by it, or c) equate their experiences??? like ???? and don't even mention how much of the racism toward klinger is brushed off

exactly. i think you explained it well but lemme unpack further:

peg appears on screen twice but never in corporal form next to any of the other characters. and her appearances are marred by the fact that she exists in the narrative only in relation to BJ. as his life-line and a source of his pain. that is not my interpretation of what she should be, it's how she was written. i'm not saying she's not important or that BJ does not love her and I'm not commenting even on the state of their marriage right now, i'm just saying peg as a human person with thoughts, feelings, ambitions is not something that the narrative focuses on. where there is Peg, there is always BJ somewhere - either having a meltdown because he misses his life back home or reminding us that he loves his wife and child.

i never did publish my fridging essay because it was long and it became about dc comics rather than MASH but... the suggestion that the peg character is 'fridged' or otherwise 'ignored' by the fandom is funny to me because, well, the show did it first. if you want something to rally against, why not start with the dudes who actually wrote her as being a phantom limb of BJ's and then i can maybe listen to you make the connection between that and how and why fandom is the way that it is about women characters. provided you expand that argument to at least include margaret because i don't i could be convinced using just peg as an example.

i could go on and on about peg's portrayal as being the real being affront to stereotypes of 50s women on MASH as compared to like, the various nurse ables or even Margaret but that would be touching the s1-3 vs 4-11 mess for the second time today so let's move on.

soon-lee is a strong, though not perfect, departure from that. like. really strong, imo. she's got 2 hours to make an impression on us and she does. she does not exist in association to klinger. she's had a life before klinger and though she expresses her sadness around it, she's willing to give up a life with him if she has to in order to find her family. and that one line in no way does justice to soon-lee's footprint on the show, but that's another post that i will write eventually.

basically, soon-lee is the heavylift for the show wrt women AND race, which isn't exactly fair to her to have to do but i'm still grateful for soon-lee. she seems to be an intentional contribution to the western tv canon of varied representations of racialized women and they did that in 1982. we haven't done much better since then on shows that primarily center white experiences, so that's why i think she's of note.

it does both women a disservice to equate their experiences in the narrative and also their treatment in the fandom - both are uneven. peg has way less agency in the narrative than soon-lee, yet soon-lee is nowhere near as present in fanwork as peg.

why is that? lots of reasons i think: peg being closely associated to BJ and BJ being the most popular character in fandom (next to hawkeye but i'm starting to wonder if he actually eclipses hawkeye) gets peg some points. people feeling out of their depth with what exactly to do with klinger and soon-lee's relationship bc it's pretty well resolved by the end - there are absolutely opportunities for future conflict with them being like, a mixed korean-lebanese couple in post-police-action korea but i admit even for me, someone who might be interested in writing something about that, i'd feel a certain responsibility to do my homework.

then again i've seen (and done) all manner and depth of academic research conducted by fanartists to write slowburn white m/m slash or even m/f fic so i'm not taking the race out of the picture completely. and that's the last, important, uncomfortable difference between peg and soon-lee - peg is white and soon-lee is not. i respect and appreciate the goal of any call to diversify the space (provided it doesn't come with any sort of weird guilt trip, which is a line i try to toe all the time) but we have to be careful that in doing that we're not denying racialized people their experiences. or at least acknowledging that there are different ways to move through the world.

[nimuetheseawitch]

Klinger and Soon Lee. That's all.

[i-your-friendly-neighborhood-emo]

Klinger and Soon Lee>>>>>>> Miles and Keiko

[mash4077confessions]

[variousqueerthings]

post-canon klinger still makes and wears clothes and soon-lee is supportive + maybe discovers some elements within herself related to sexuality and gender through their journey together... (I wanna see rosalind chao in a nice suit)

[cotton-glass]

It's a travesty that there's basically no klinger/mulcahy content

[redhatmeg]

Keiko O'Brien: Miles is always proud of his Irish roots but see, I have Japanese, Korean and Lebanese DNA! My ancestor met a man named Klinger at the end of Korean War and they got hitched.

[cuddleswinchester]

Thinking about how Liv is such a late addition to the extended 4077 family like Erin and Becky and Kathy are all teens+ and have this little toddler to play with and fuss over. God.

[thebreakfastgenie]

@a-star-that-fell me when I found out Rosalind Chao was in M*A*S*H to begin with

[cassianwren]

i'm watching aftermash right now and yeah it has a lot a lot or problems but i enjoy it so much!! i'm just happy to see more of my favourite character

[raedroid]

One of my favourite things from the finale of MASH was the fact that Soon-Lee wanted to see Klinger in a dress. We stan a supportive wife in this household lol

[majorbaby]

so is Private Habib in on Klinger's i-only-speak-Arabic-now scheme or did Klinger dupe him too? he seems kinda earnestly concerned for Klinger but you know... not unlike how Trapper was "earnestly concerned" for Hawkeye in Bananas, Crackers and Nuts like........

I know I've said society if Klinger replaced Trapper as Hawkeye's improv partner but what if Klinger-Habib replaced the Trapper-Hawkeye duo and together they just dunked on the army brass in two languages for the rest of the show. And what if they were also clearly in love with each other while they did all of that.

[mashhistorian]

On this day, 41 years ago, the M*A*S*H spin-off series AfterMASH debuted on CBS! The hour-long pilot episode followed Col. Potter, Father Mulcahy, Klinger, and Soon-Lee after they returned to the United States from Korea. By the end of the episode, they were reunited in Missouri at a veterans’ hospital.

[shiveringsoldier]

mash and/or becket for the fandom meme

I'll do M*A*S*H. Thank you!

My favorite female character

Margaret by default. I wish there had been more than one woman in the main cast, but Margaret has some very satisfying character growth. As a bonus, my favorite minor/one-off female characters are Soon-Lee, Kyung-Soon, and Helen

My favorite male character

Hawkeye. I have nothing to say about him that hasn't been said already; he's just a wonderful character

My favorite book/season/etc

I go back and forth between season 3 and season 5. Season 3 is when the show really finds its footing. It has some landmarks with the first episode of the show to not feature a laugh track and the first episode of any sitcom to kill off a main character. It also has a great comfort episode in "Springtime" and the criminally underrated "Bulletin Board." Season 5 has just the right blend of comedy and drama. It has one of the best Sidney episodes with "Dear Sigmund," and it really hones in on Margaret's development. Season 5 is a turning point for both her and Hawkeye; as Margaret starts to grow and improve, Hawkeye (or more specifically his mental health) starts to take a turn for the worse.

My favorite episode (if it's a TV show)

I'm cheating and saying two. I adore "Dr. Pierce and Mr. Hyde" for the same reasons you highlighted here, and I love "Dear Sis." When Mulcahy's anger issues are brought up in the show, it's mostly played for laughs, but "Dear Sis" takes it seriously. He assaults a patient, and that has personal repercussions. Also, the scene when the 4077th sings Dona Nobis Pacem in the mess tent makes me cry almost every time.

My favorite cast member

Alan Alda by default. I don't know most of the cast members' lives outside of the show, but Alan Alda has had such an interesting and eclectic career. I like his podcast, although I haven't listened to it in a good while, and I like his memoir Never Have Your Dog Stuffed: And Other Things I've Learned. It has a killer opening sentence.

My favorite ship

Hawkeye and Trapper maybe, although I don't have any serious ships. I love their yes/and comedy dynamic, and I love ho much they clearly care about each other

A character I’d die defending

Klinger - not from the fandom but from the show. He is subjected to more and more racism as the show progresses, whether it's jokes about his nose or the abhorrent "Goodbye, Cruel World." His pivot from a man desperate to escape the Army to a moneygrubber makes absolutely no sense to me, and that feels rooted in racism as well. And it sucks that he is subjected to so much cruelty when he is perhaps the most consistently kind and selfless character in the show.

A character I just can’t sympathize with

Flagg. I don't even enjoy him as a comedic character some of the time. Some of his episodes I like ("The Abduction of Margaret Houlihan" makes me laugh very hard every time), but other episodes I can't stand.

A character I grew to love

Charles. I still don't love him as much as some of the fandom loves him - I think his bigotry is much deeper and more insidious than Frank's, and it seems like neither the fandom nor the show is willing to call him out - but man does he have a good arc. I didn't like him at first, but I eventually warmed up to him. David Ogden Stiers is just so good in the part. Also, his plot in the series finale is my favorite and the one that left the biggest impact on me, although that could be because I didn't know anything about his plot while other plots had been spoiled for me. I don't think I'll ever recover from the "He wasn't even a soldier. He was a musician" scene.

My anti OTP

I'm glad the show had the sense to not make Margaret and Hawkeye a couple; they're much better as friends and wouldn't be suitable romantic partners. In terms of ships I've seen in the fandom, I can't get behind Charles/Klinger at all. I know they have some moments of connection in the show (I love their last scene in "Death Takes a Holiday"), but I don't understand why people are shipping Klinger, a Lebanese, working-class man, with someone as egregiously racist and classist as Charles.

[nimuetheseawitch]

mash for the ask meme

Favorite character: today, my favorite character is Klinger

Least Favorite character: probably one of the generals

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): traphawk, hunnihawk, burns/flagg (still gotta write that someday), Klinger/Soon Lee, and Charles/Donna

Character I find most attractive: physically? I am very basic and Lt. Dish is hot. Overall including personality? Hawkeye.

Character I would marry: absolutely no one, thanks. Marriage isn't something I'm interested in.

Character I would be best friends with: Kellye

a random thought: I've been thinking about repetition in the show recently.All of the actions that are repeated over and over that range from comforting routine to pathologically repetitive behaviors. There's stuff that's repeated over and over in an episode to make a point, things that are repeated throughout the show, both with and without purpose, and plots that are (probably accidentally) repeated. We see so many of the characters dance along the lines of what is repetitive and comforting and routine and what is unhealthy attempts at coping. My thoughts are kind of nebulous at this point, but I think I'm going to take this into my next rewatch, whenever that happens. Partly because there are definitely moments in the later seasons where Hawkeye is really kind of asking if they are finally going mad because they keep on doing the same things over and over expecting something to change, but the war keeps going.

An unpopular opinion: I don't know what's popular or unpopular these days, but even though I'd personally love to see Margaret out of the Army, a stateside posting is actually a really good move for her and the one that makes sense with canon. The Army is her career and gives her the ability to be independent in a time it would be difficult to be a single woman.

my canon OTP: Klinger/Soon Lee

Non-canon OTP: I used to be all aboard the hunnihawk train, but I think I don't really have an OTP

most badass character: Margaret

pairing I am not a fan of: Margaret/Donald. I know we're supposed to hate him, and I do.

character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): they mistreated Klinger. He was still himself, but he (like pretty much everyone) got a little less anti-military and other characters treated him like shit in some uncharacteristic ways.

favourite friendship: Margaret and Hawkeye. I mean, I love Hawkeye and Trapper too, but Margaret and Hawkeye got the space to grow really wonderfully.

character I want to adopt or be adopted by: nope, no way, absolutely not.