Diksha Sundriyal
Hulu’s ‘Good American Family’ brings its chaotic season to a close with its fifth and final episode, where Natalia dives into a legal battle with Kristine and Michael Barnett. Throughout the season, we see the differing narratives, each presenting the story from the perspective of the parties involved. While the show’s first half takes the Barnetts’ point of view into account, the last four episodes focus on Natalia’s side, presenting an entirely different picture of the family that she was brought into and then abandoned by. The question of her age and abuse remains, but even in all this mess, the girl ends up finding some semblance of closure. However, the road to it isn’t easy at all. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Natalia and the Barnetts Prepare for the Hearing
When the case against the Barnetts for abusing Natalia is brought to court, it is clear to both parties that public perception will play an important role in the way things turn out. The Barnetts are the first to try to take advantage of that by speaking out in public channels about how Natalia terrorised them. Eventually, however, the girl claps back by giving an interview of her own on Dr. Phil. She debunks all the stories made up about her and instead talks about how the Barnetts abused her. This makes the Barnetts panic as their lawyers try to figure out how to turn the case in their favour.
The best way to prove the Barnetts right in the court of law is to bring witnesses. They need people who can confirm their claims of Natalia being a sociopathic adult posing as a child. At first, it seems to be an easy task, but the more they start looking into potential witnesses, the more they realise they don’t have anyone to speak for them. Instead, everyone they claimed would back them turns out to support Natalia’s side of the story, revealing that they only ever saw her as a chil,d and it was the parents, especially the mother, who seemed a little unhinged.
At the same time, Natalia also becomes more open about all this stuff on her social media account. As her followers and sympathisers increase, the Barnetts see their chances of winning the case dwindle. The more it seems that they might lose the case, the more Michael’s lawyer leans towards the possibility of making a deal with the state, which means that Michael will have to testify against Kristine. At first, Michael seems easy about this, but Kristine starts to charm him again to think twice about turning against her.
Major Evidence and Witnesses Surface Against the Barnetts
With all the witnesses and whatnot, much of what is said about the Barnetts remains hearsay. But then, Natalia comes up with something new. She reveals that Kristine is particularly active on Facebook, which means that she must have talked to someone about the abuse she was inflicting on her adoptive daughter. This turns out to be right as the conversation heavily implicates Michael and Kristine as they use derogatory language for the girl they should raise as their own. At one point, Michael even talks about Kristine beating up Natalia, while Kristine dismisses it as usual.
Another thing that emerges in due course is Natalia’s birth mother, Anna Gava. She gives an interview to the Daily Mail in which she talks about being forced to give up her baby because she had special needs. She also confirms Natalia’s birth year to be in the 2000s, which would prove that she was still a child when she was abandoned. The mother’s testimony seems like a huge blow. Meanwhile, Kristine tries to get her friend, Val, to testify in court in her favour, but Val confesses that she never personally experienced anything untoward from Natalia. Whatever she knows has come from Kristine, so she cannot go to court and testify to the things that never really happened before her.
Around the same time, the revelation of the Facebook messages creates havoc for the Barnetts’ lawyer, and pressure mounts on Michael to take the prosecution’s deal and let the entire blame fall on Kristine. To prevent Michael from making that decision, Kristine tries to appease him. She takes him home to see the boys, whom he hasn’t seen in a long time. They go out for pizza, just like old times, and the couple even has a heart-to-heart where they seem emotionally vulnerable. But all of this seems nothing but a play to Michael, and at the end of the day, he decides to do what is best for him, because he, too, knows that if Kristine had the choice, she wouldn’t think twice before throwing Michael under the bus.
The Justice System Fails Natalia Yet Again
With all the evidence and the witnesses seemingly in Natalia’s favour, it seems that she would finally win the case. She can’t wait to be declared her actual age, so she can get to be a kid again, more than the confirmation of the abuse she suffered at Kristine and Michael’s hands. Interestingly, all that rests on the simple fact that Natalia was a child. However, before the proceedings can begin, Michael’s lawyer presents the decision of the court a few years back where Natalia tried to change her age but failed. He claims that when a previous court has already upheld the age issue, it shouldn’t be brought in again to waste the court’s time.
Unfortunately for Natalia, the judge agrees to this, and based on this, he directs the prosecution not to use any evidence or witness that refers to Natalia’s age in any context. Due to this, everything in Natalia’s favour is suddenly out of the picture. Because every witness talks about Natalia as a child, their testimonies are not considered. Because her birth mother talks about her age, her statement cannot be considered. All the documents, and even Kristine’s Facebook chats, cannot be used, which leaves Natalia with nothing. Her age remains the same, while Kristine and Michael Barnett are allowed to walk free. Still, enough damage has been done for them.
While she loses in court, Natalia tries to find closure by confronting Michael at his doorstep. When she asks him why they treated her like that and why he supported Kristine’s abuse, he claims to be a victim himself. He places Natalia and himself on the same level and calls Kristine the manipulator and the abuser who wrecked both their lives. Natalia quickly points out that they are not the same because she was a child while he was an adult who was supposed to protect her. Their conversation is interrupted when Kristine shows up with her son, Jacob, and Natalia is shocked when Jacob apologizes to her. He reveals that Kristine made Natalia up to be a monster when she was just a child. He wishes he’d acted differently towards her, but Natalia tells him he was a child, too, so he didn’t know better.
Natalia Wins in the Court of Public Opinion
The questions and doubts surrounding Kristine don’t end just here. When she is back home, Val reveals she has a few questions about the case, like everyone else. Previously, she had taken Kristine’s word for it. Still, after hearing the testimonies of all the witnesses who spoke in Natalia’s favour, even when their testimonies were not considered in the verdict, it speaks volumes about the stories Kristine perpetuated. While she doesn’t outright blame Kristine for everything, Val does wonder if there is a chance that she may have been wrong. This doubt infuriates Kristine, who reminds Val how Kristine helped Val’s daughter, and now she is doubting her.
The doubters appear for Kristine everywhere else, too. Val and Jacob are not the only ones questioning her side. People on the Internet turn hostile towards her, commenting on all sorts of nasty stuff that scares her. At the same time, the tide seems to be turning in Natalia’s favour. The justice and acceptance she did not find in the court seem to be there in public opinion. Everyone seems to love and support her, giving her more consolation than needed. At the same time, however, a rift appears to have emerged between her and Cynthia. Even over the course of the trial, she could see that her new adoptive mother didn’t seem to have the faith necessary to win the case.
The more she got involved in the proceedings, the more it irritated Natalia. When the verdict finally fails her, she lashes out at Cynthia, who refuses to become the punching bag when she is not the reason behind Natalia’s anger. While the show barely touches upon this conflict, the title cards at the end reveal that Cynthia and Antwon Mans have been accused of abuse, though the allegations against them have not been proven yet. They claim innocence on the matter, just as Krisntine Barnett still does. The great thing now is that Natalia has finally been able to overturn the verdict about her age, and now, she has officially been reverted to her original age, which puts her in her early 20s at the time of the show’s release, proving that she had been a kid all along.
Read More: Is First Path Adoptions a Real Adoption Agency? Is Sandy Mosley Based on a Real Person?
You must be logged in to post a comment.