Another one I used to think about growing up. Carol wasn't his mother and Greg is asking her about playing football and she didn't want him to, as if Greg was her real son. He even comes home injured and tries to hide his rib injury from her. If there is one thing I can say about the Brady Bunch, it's that the kids looked up to and listen to their stepparents. Try doing that today and what reply would you get, "You're not my mother/father".

Irene, I see you loved the Brady's too. That was my first favorite show until the other ones started coming on.

I agree. If there's a dispute, the natural parent should prevail.

Besides, she didn't mind when Peter played football. :D

Another one I used to think about growing up. Carol wasn't his mother and Greg is asking her about playing football and she didn't want him to, as if Greg was her real son. He even comes home injured and tries to hide his rib injury from her. If there is one thing I can say about the Brady Bunch, it's that the kids looked up to and listen to their stepparents. Try doing that today and what reply would you get, "You're not my mother/father".

Irene, I see you loved the Brady's too. That was my first favorite show until the other ones started coming on.
Yeah, I enjoyed watching it when I was a kid growing up. Then, when it made it's way to syndication, OMG, i was watching it over and over and over again!!!

Yeah, now that I look back at that episode, I didn't see why Greg didn't mention the "you're not my mother" bit. But also, Peter played, so what was the difference?

I agree. If there's a dispute, the natural parent should prevail.

Besides, she didn't mind when Peter played football. :D

Well, I always assumed that both parents adopted each others' kids, since the girls took Mike's name and that generally doesn't happen without an adoption. So if you follow that logic, then the bit about the "natural" parent prevailing is moot.

That said, I thought Carol was completely out of line in that episode, and Mike should have stood up for Greg.

Carol must have gotten over her fear of football later on, though, because Greg was playing football again in "Quarterback Sneak".

Well, being adopted at birth, I was guilty of saying the infamous "Why did you adopt me then??" Pure stupidity on my teen-age part. I hate for ever having said that. But, I think it wouldn't have been appropriate, for the series, at least, to have Greg say that, but a part of me inside wishes that somehow it was insinuated, if not directly to Carol, then to someone else.

I agree. If there's a dispute, the natural parent should prevail.

Besides, she didn't mind when Peter played football. :D

I haven't seen this episode for quite a while, but my memory is that it was not just the fact that Greg was playing football, but the fact that he got hurt playing football, that totally turned Carol against the idea of him playing.

When Carol originally found out Greg wanted to play, she reluctantly agreed to let him do so. Once he got hurt, Mike agreed that he shouldn't play again until his injury healed up. Otherwise, Greg could do a lot more damage to himself by playing, especially if he got hit again in the same spot...

I think there are two differences between Greg and Peter's situation as they related to football...

1) Peter didn't get hurt playing football, but Greg did.... but I'm sure if Pete did get hurt, Carol would insist he not play any more until his injury heals. And Mike probably would have agreed.

2) Greg was in high school, and the thought of her boy getting hit by gargantuan (to Carol) high school football players was more than she cared to think about... Pete was playing in a low level little league, where all of the players are pretty much the same size, and she figured he'd be safe not having to play against some 150 pound behemoth...

Naturally, I think Greg accepted that Carol was his mom, but not his real mom, but he listened to her anyways. Mike had probably discussed this issue with the boys previously, and the boys listened to Carol with no questions. :)

Naturally, I think Greg accepted that Carol was his mom, but not his real mom, but he listened to her anyways. Mike had probably discussed this issue with the boys previously, and the boys listened to Carol with no questions. :)


exactly right... Mike and Carol, when one of the "other's" kids did something wrong, didn't go to each other and say, "Gee hon, one of your kids did something bad here, what do you think the punishment should be?"

Mike and Carol saw each other as equals when it came to parenting... they both took total parental responsibility with each and every one of the kids, regardless of who the birth parent was. And the kids treated the "other" parent with the same respect that they showed to their "own" parent.

I know that this rarely, if ever, happens today...it's always "your kid" and "my kid", with kids saying "you're not my (mother/father)"... But after a couple of early conflicts, the Bradys decided practically right off the bat that they were one family, and would treat each other as such. I think Mike covered this in a speech in one of the early episodes....

Of course, it wasn't as if Mike's first wife was alive, and would then have some say in the way the boys were raised... and who knows what happened to the girls' father, Carol's first husband (notwithstanding the Brady Bunch movies)... so it makes sense that the Brady's acted as if they were natural brothers and sisters,and that Mike and Carol were their "real" parents.

It's only in the first season that an issue was made about parents/step parents, and questioning whether Carol could love the boys as her own, and whether Mike, and Alice, could love the girls just as much. After that, they might as well have been a biological family all along; and in fact, my mother, who caught some of the shows as we watched them in syndication, thought that was the case. The only reminder that they are a blended family, the theme song, she apparently did not pay much attention to. And, though I might be wrong, I don't remember an episode after the first season in which they explain that they were 2 families merged; instead they just let anyone they met believe they had always been the one family.

But the question of whether Carol had the authority to "veto" Greg going out for football... that's a question independent of parent/stepparent, and I really think it's more of just a 'mother or father' question. TBB began in 1969, when TV comedies (almost all of them) still presented the highest position for a wife and mother to be no more than that-- there for her children when they come home, concerned with domestic issues only, maybe a few clubs if they didn't interfere with that. But the mother was also the one to be more concerned about their safety more than their ambitions. So Carol thinks Greg at 14 and Marcia at 13 still need a babysitter, she doesn't want Greg to drive as soon as he is old enough, or to buy a car, and the kids can't even try a trampoline without her saying, "Oh, don't jump too high!" One line, I forget which episode, follows right along with this when she says, "I don't have to be logical,-- I'm a mother!" It's not realistic how she knows so little about football ["That's what you and Greg watch on TV, where those big monsters try to kill each other"]. She looks like the type who probably went out for cheerleader. But she should have trusted Mike and Greg more; then unfortunately the plot seemingly confirmed her fears. They never get around to later, when Greg's rib was healed up to where he could practice again, whether she still took issue and tried to force him to quit, but of course we do see later in the series that Greg continued to play.

... It's not realistic how she knows so little about football ["That's what you and Greg watch on TV, where those big monsters try to kill each other"]. She looks like the type who probably went out for cheerleader.....


Not only that, but didn't she DATE "Tank" Gates in high school? "Tank" was a former Westdale High School football star (who went on to become an All-American in college, and an All-Pro in the NFL), who recreated his famous state-championship-winning touchdown run in the Brady's living room, diving into the couch to score the tying TD, and then drop-kicking a pillow into a vase and breaking it (not Carol's favorite vase, of course)....or maybe it was a lamp he broke...

Speaking of football, I think it's hilarious in the Joe Namath episode when, after Bobby tells Mike and Carol what he told his friends, Carols says to Mike, "We don't even KNOW Joe Namath, do we Mike?"

That always cracks me up when she feels she has to ask Mike if they know Joe Namath...

... she doesn't want Greg to drive as soon as he is old enough, or to buy a car...


Yeah, didn't Carol say something to Greg along the lines of "I was worried enough when you got a bicycle"... even though Greg would have undoubtedly had a bicycle by the time Mike and Carol got married....



And of course, there was the time when Greg was singing his famous "Clowns Never Laughed Before" song, and Mike and Carol were listening to his fine singing in the living room, and Carol claims that Greg got his talent from her side of the family... giving the impression that she actually gave birth to the boy...

Yeah, didn't Carol say something to Greg along the lines of "I was worried enough when you got a bicycle"... even though Greg would have undoubtedly had a bicycle by the time Mike and Carol got married....



And of course, there was the time when Greg was singing his famous "Clowns Never Laughed Before" song, and Mike and Carol were listening to his fine singing in the living room, and Carol claims that Greg got his talent from her side of the family... giving the impression that she actually gave birth to the boy...

"her side of the family". Now the writers were going overboard.

You guys are right. Some of her lines didn't make sense.

Mike and Carol probably knew eachother and their previous spouses a long time before they were married. Meaning, Carol and her first husband were like a second set of parents to the boys, and same thing with Mike and his first wife being like a second set to the girls. Both families were real close. Than, when Mr. Martin and the first Mrs. Brady both died, Mike and Carol fell in love with eachother and got married. Than, as mentioned in "Kelly's Kids", Mike adopted the girls and Carol adopted the boys. Than, along with Alice & Sam, became one huge happy family.

Are you just joking? If not, what is it that leads you to believe the families were close long before Mike and Carol married?

Take a good look. The way Carol treats the boys as her own and the way Mike treats the girls as his own proves it. Greg might have showed Carol and Mr. Martin his bike when he got it, and Carol, being a second mother to the boys, was worried. As far as the "music from my side of the family goes", she might have only been kidding around. Maybe Greg got his talent from his birth mothers side, because Peter made glee club, and Bobby was a good singer starting in the 4th season and beyond. The girls got their talent from Carol.