Did anyone feel bad for Sgt. Hartman when Leonard "Gomer Pyle" Lawrence shot and killed him? I kind of did even though I remember being totally surprised that Lawrence had the guts to shoot Hartman.
shareYES, I did, but maybe sorry is not the right word. Hartman has a rough job and eventually 'Gomer' became a Marine and a man but lost his sanity, Sgt. Hartman did not deserve to go out that way. P.S. Great acting as Drill Sgt.
shareSomewhat.
I feel he was foolish to antagonize an armed off-hinge man he had bullied.
I felt badly for him for getting murdered, HOWEVER, it was a situation that could have been avoided had he handled the situation better.
The guy was a great Marine, however, people in position of power (cops, military, even teachers who deal with mentally unstable and violent students) HAVE to learn how to deal with situations like that and learn how to de-escalate situations and prevent them from getting worse. It seemed like Joker was trying to do that. Maybe with time, Joker could have talked him down.
To go in there, in full Gunnery Sgt. mode, yelling and barking was 100% the wrong thing to do. All Pyle was doing was waiting for a reason to pull that trigger, and the Sgt gave it to him. In a smaller scale, true life story, a teacher in a rough public school, was yelling at a very large and scary student. She screamed at him to go to the office. The kid left to go to the office. Rather than calming down and letting that be the end of it, the teacher kept yelling, yelling, yelling, and following the kid down the hall, while the kid kept telling her to be quiet. Instead of de-escalating the situation, the woman kept yelling. Guess what? The kid turned around and punched her, full force, in the face. Do I feel badly for the teacher? Yes. HOWEVER- it was something that totally didn't have to happen.
The fact that the Sgt. couldn't see that the man was OBVIOUSLY severely mentally unbalanced really makes me question his judgement. Was it a pride thing, that he kept pushing and pushing Pyle until he got shot? Was he trying to "save face" and be a big, bad, tough guy by making fun of him and "oh, poor little baby, didn't your parents love you?" On what planet would you say that to someone with a loaded gun, who is also really unbalanced? Did he think Pyle would say "Oh, wow. You are right, this is really stupid. Clearly I have issues. Let's go. I'm sorry" And put his gun down? It really makes me question how good the Sgt was at his job, beyond yelling and ordering around. Being a "tough guy" isn't the only important thing to being a military leader. It's about keeping you and your men safe. How he acted was stupid and reckless, and yeah, by that point it didn't surprise me at all that he got killed.
The fact that the Sgt. couldn't see that the man was OBVIOUSLY severely mentally unbalanced
NewCliches has won the entire Internet for their short, direct, complete, and wholly correct answer...probably the only one of its kind on IMDb. I wish I could grade that, NC; it's a beautiful thing.
That, chirrin, is how to be intelligent.
Yes. That kid was spoiled and he made a real man outta him, though shouting at someone with a loaded gun in their hand isn't the best way of getting the gun no matter who you are
shareAs I said once ago a few years ago when something similar came up on here, Hartman didn't know when to shut up.
If it would've happened in real life, you'd think Hartman would've told Joker to go get everyone out of the barracks and get the mps while he tries to talk him down. Anyone who says they would've done what Hartman did or rushed Pyle is an idiot.
He really didn't think Pyle would shoot him. Under-estimated.
Buy The Ticket, Take The Ride
Well, I don't know if you are supposed to like Sgt. Hartman, since he yells at everybody and insults them. I know he is trying to turn them into lean, mean, fighting machines and you have to be thick skinned to handle him, but I'm sure there were many people who quit over him and if they had heard of his death they didn't lose a wink of sleep.
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