McHale's Navy (TV Series) The Day the War Stood Still (1963) User Reviews

Binghamton arrest Fuji as a spy.

[kfo9494 · 7/10 · 28 October 2014]

In this first episode of season two, Binghamton is on the war-path when a case of champagne comes up missing from a locked supply hut. Thinking McHale and his men are responsible, Binghamton sends the crew out on a mission as he goes over to McHale's island looking for the stolen case. What he finds over at the island is Fuji. So now Fuji is being held in the brig as a spy waiting transfer for interrogation.

When McHale returns he learns that Fuji is in jail and has to come up with a plan to free him. The scheme is to make the base think the war is over and then Fuji will not longer be needed. But the plan may backfire when Admiral Rogers makes a surprise visit to the base.

This is a rather routine script that produced little in the way of action. There was a few good moments as when Binghamton finds his champagne missing and the notable ending that must be seen- but otherwise it was just an average show to start off the second season with little new material. Season two comes in like a lamb.

Parker at his best doing different characters

[FlushingCaps · 10/10 · 19 October 2020]

Binghamton and Carpenter are moving a large crate marked "Top Secret" into a storage building, to be safely kept under lock and guards outside the door. The contents we learn are some 10-year old champagne the captain has had sent from San Diego, booze he is saving for his much-desired promotion. As the pair leave the champagne in the building when they leave, we see part of the floor open up with Gruber and Co. ready to swipe the "giggle juice" (what they call it) almost before the door outside is locked.

McHale's crew is next ordered to check out some island, not knowing it is a fake mission as Binghamton wants to search their island for the missing champagne. Instead, they find Fuji coming out of a pond in a scuba suit-luckily not in his PW uniform. Fuji pretends to not speak English. The captain radios for McHale to return to question the prisoner. McHale tries to convince Binghamton the man is only a native islander, but Binghamton is not buying it and sends for a Navy interrogator who speaks Japanese to come.

With only a couple of days before that happens, McHale comes up with a plan to free their personal POW-make everyone on the base think the war in the Pacific is over. Most of this consists of getting Binghamton to turn on his radio to a special frequency where McHale will have Parker and Tinker pretend to be various radio people, reporting from around the world, all celebrating the Japanese surrender. There's a bit where Parker, as FDR has Tinker barking in a deep voice before Willie reminds him (off mike) the president's famous dog Fala is small Scottish Terrier, so Tink barks again in a high-pitched sound.

Binghamton becomes convinced the war is over and he announces it to the whole base, prompting a wild celebration. The guards near Fuji join the celebration and he is released by his buddies.

Before everything ends, Admiral Rogers comes to the base and he happens to discover Parker and Co. doing the fake radio calls from the below deck portion of McHale's boat. Demanding an explanation from McHale, before Rogers gets an answer, McHale is saved by a surrendering Japanese PT boat, lured to surrender by the radio broadcast.

This was a wildly funny episode to me, with Parker at his best doing all his radio personalities. I loved the scene where Carpenter tells off Binghamton, even knocking him into the drink. Sure there were lapses in realism more than usual, but it was loads of fun.

The idea was so wild that Hogan's Heroes had an episode a few years later based on the same plot-our heroes convincing the Germans that the war had just ended so some prisoners would be released.

It was one of the most memorable episodes from when I saw it as a young boy, and I believe it deserves a 10.