Watching United Bates of America

[pennsatuckey]

I watched the first episode last night for grins, and here are my observations:

 

 

• These kids should stick to playing instruments. The singing in the intro was pretty awful.
• The idea of the Valentine's party was cute, imo, even though changing the name from Valentine's Day to I Love You Day was kinda strange.
• You cannot sustain a family of that size on a tree cutting business alone. Unless you're cutting down a whole damn forest every month on your own, it's highly unlikely that cutting a few limbs off of a tree can really support a whole family like that.
• The Bates family appears significantly more articulate and perhaps more organized overall than the Duggar family.
• Whenever Gil is talking and Kelly is next to him, she never looks at the camera -- only at Gil.
• From what I can see, Kelly seems a lot more hands-on than J'Chelle. Except for the scene where it appeared that Tori was wearing Jeb in one of those baby-sling things (I'm pretty far off from parenthood, so I don't know what the term for that would be).
• How many ways can you spell Michael(ll/a)? Like do they forget how to spell it or?
• What are those things attached to the fronts of the younger children's clothing? They look like they'd attach to a leash or something.
• Isaiah was trying so hard to find something for Josie. He seems like he's a really thoughtful little kid.
• Jesus rollerblading Christ the older boys are attractive. I know that's been discussed quite a bit. Well, with the exception of Zach; he reminds me of my high school AP Spanish teacher.
• Gil seems like a lot less of a dick than Dim Bulb. I know he's just as shitty, but he at least seems a little more personable on screen.

 

 

I've still got more episodes to watch, but that's what I saw from just one episode.

[melon]

They have their pacifers attached to their clothing.Callie,Jeb and Judson.

[Bethella]

The thing with Michael's name is explained on here somewhere- Basically they named her Michal because it was from the BIBLE before realizing that the biblical character Michal is not someone they really want to name a baby after. So they went to change her name but to avoid paying court fees they could only change her name by one letter, so Michal became Michael, which is still her legal name. However because people automatically assumed that Michael was a boy they gave her the nickname of Michaela and Michaella (apparently since it was a nickname it didn't need a standardized spelling).

[pennsatuckey]

They have their pacifers attached to their clothing.Callie,Jeb and Judson.

That makes far more sense than the strange image I had of all of the younger kids walking on a mass leash. I know that's a thing parents do sometimes and with a group of children that big, it'd kinda make sense.

The thing with Michael's name is explained on here somewhere- Basically they named her Michal because it was from the BIBLE before realizing that the biblical character Michal is not someone they really want to name a baby after. So they went to change her name but to avoid paying court fees they could only change her name by one letter, so Michal became Michael, which is still her legal name. However because people automatically assumed that Michael was a boy they gave her the nickname of Michaela and Michaella (apparently since it was a nickname it didn't need a standardized spelling).

Huh. Interesting. Does anyone have any idea when the name change thing happened? Was this prior to their becoming fundie?