You wouldn't think a show called Amish in the City could really be any good.  But you'd be surprised!  Here are a few reasons why it's worth watching:

1) The idea is that 5 Amish kids are living in a house with 5 "city kids" as they generally refer to them.  One of the first things they do is all go to the grocery store together.  One of the Amish boys requests fatback and the spacey vegetarian girl (who, by the way, seems to honestly think that cows come from outer space) says, "Ew, that's so unhealthy." 

AMISH KID: Abraham Lincoln ate fatback every morning.
VEGETARIAN GIRL: Well, I bet he died at, like, thirty.
 AMISH KID: I don't think that's why he died.

2) Who knew that a bunch of Amish people seeing the ocean for the first time could be so touching?  But it was!  They were all so excited and cute. 

3) Three words: Mose!  Mose!  Mose!  Mose is awesome.  He's the doughy, dorky Amish guy, and I just want to make an album with him or something.  At one point he's in a hot tub (for the first time!) and really grooving on the fact that the jets are puffing up his big, baggy black swim trunks.  "So," he says, "I thought to heck with it.  I was underwater, no one could see me anyway..."  He goes to take off his shorts and you start to worry that they're showing Blind Date there on the farm, but then you see that under his swim trunks he's still wearing underwear!  And he's kind of paddling around the hot tub in his briefs and it's remarkably endearing.

4) At the end of the second day (Mose almost drowns) the city kids are making fun of the Amish kids.  So, of course, their "challenge" the next day is for the city kids to put on Amish clothes and go out in public.

Now, there's probably a logical place to go at this point, somewhere to really drive the point home.  But do the producers send them to that place?  No they do not.  They send them to a go-cart track.  To race go-karts.  In their Amish clothes.

At this point, I realized I really liked the show. 

It did drag a bit in the last 15 minutes as it descended into Real World-style squabbling over chores, and maybe it'd be better at a half hour.  But, it's sort of hard to complain when you've got that many points in your favor, and besides, as long as I get a little more Mose, I'm good.

POSTSCRIPT: I do feel like kind of a dingus for watching this instead of the early part of the evening's Democratic Convention coverage, but whatever, I'll see the Sharpton speech online.  Edwards' speech was excellent, and I did catch that l-i-v-e.

posted by Mike B. at 7:42 AM 0 comments