The Weird Offspring of M*A*S*H

This long-running tv series was spun off from a successful movie based on a semi-successful book.

Toy M*A*S*H latrine. I didn't have this, but I had the toy operating theater.

Eventually, it had its own spin-offs and semi spin-offs.

First, a semi-spin-off: Wayne Rogers (Trapper John McIntyre) playing a different comedic doctor in the tv spin-off of the Walter Matthau movie House Calls.

At a approximately the same time, Pernell (Bonanza) Roberts was playing the titular role in Trapper John. M.D., a hospital drama with only the most tenuous connection to the movie/tv series of M*A*S*H.

This was all very confusing to me as a child!

Then it got even worse: AfterMASH, the sequel spin-off, featuring three character actors from the show: Harry Morgan, William Christopher, and Jamie Farr. Oof! A big, lifeless flop. For years, I forgot that Father Mulcahy was in this--I thought Radar O'Reilly was the third one...but he just appeared in two episodes.

But wait, there's more! Gary Burghoff filmed a pilot called W*A*L*T*E*R in 1984!

You can read about the whole thing in the Wikipedia link, but here's the horrible plot:

The episode opens with Walter O'Reilly in his cousin Wendell Micklejohn's apartment. They are getting ready for their workday while watching the start of a television interview. The interview shows journalist Clete Roberts following up on the members of the M*A*S*H 4077th. The previous week Roberts had interviewed Hawkeye Pierce, and this week he is catching up with O'Reilly. At the police department and through store windows on the street, O'Reilly and Micklejohn catch pieces of the television interview, giving viewers of the pilot a chance to sample the potential series and to build a bridge between the events of M*A*S*H and W*A*L*T*E*R.

Viewers learn that O'Reilly returned to Iowa, where he failed at farming. He sold the farm and the livestock and sent his mother off to live with his aunt. His bride left him for another man after their honeymoon. O'Reilly decided to commit suicide, and went to a drug store to buy sleeping pills for an overdose (as well as aspirin, because sleeping pills give him headaches). The drugstore clerk, Victoria, cheered him up and they became good friends. His cousin Wendell helped him get a job on the police force. Walter solves a dispute between two strippers, and gets his wallet back from a young would-be thief whose father had died in Korea.