Happy fake Monday everyone!
I hope everyone had a wonderful five day weekend this fourth of July weekend! I personally did, most prominently because I didn’t pretend I cared enough about fireworks to trek a half hour to the river in the rain to maybe see them launch from the Boston Common this year and instead hung out with friends at my favorite local bar. Is this adulthood? Have I made it yet? Time will tell.
The Bachelorette also wished us a happy fourth with this definitely intentional color combo from our Bachelorette crew.
Let’s jump into it!
We start with everyone talking about how great it is that there is no more drama now that Thomas has left and it’s like okay you’re all a bunch of idiots if you believe that’s going to happen. But I appreciate that all the guys who truly believe that decided they wanted to go on this show despite clearly having never watched it before.
I am also now emotionally invested also in the Connor/Greg friendship and am now only here for the bromances, not the romances with Katie.
Blake is given a voiceover about how he’s going to join the house later in the day and how he’s sure the guys aren’t going to like him and OBVIOUSLY BLAKE why would they? If you don’t get open hostility then I’d count it as a win.
Because we need to stress about Blake rejoining, Katie goes to talk to Kaitlyn about the time Nick joined her season. Kaitlyn talks about how it definitely affected some of her relationships but she ultimately was glad that she brought him on because she wouldn’t want to have wondered about the what ifs. And don’t get me wrong, I’m glad Katie’s getting some advice, but let’s not forget that the situations are totally different. Nick and Kaitlyn were all but dating before her season and he full-on was like if you end up not being picked as the Bachelorette (her season had two for dudes to pick between the first week) let’s go out. And then he heard halfway through her season that she was in New York and just SHOWED UP without telling anyone and crashed a date and then was fairly antagonistic to everyone else. So yea, Blake joining is annoying, but it’s not nearly as problematic.
But the men still don’t know! So Tayshia walks in on the guys and lets them know that a man from her past is joining and then all begin to meltdown, most likely because she doesn’t tell them who it is going to be. We love a spiral.
What I can only assume is a few hours later, Blake comes strolling through and faces the standoff. He brings up all the reasons he assumes they hate him and then tries to blend in with the wall in the hopes that they forget he is here. But wait! A date card! Production gets Jealous Greg to read it and it appears they woke up and chose violence because Blake gets the 1on1 date this week. Blake flees as quickly as allowed under the pressure of the men’s angry glares.
Katie comes up to pick up Blake up and asks everyone how they are feeling (spoiler: NOT GREAT) and she tells them that Blake DMed her during Matt’s season and they had a short exchange (sure okay I can pretend I believe that) but she doesn’t really know him but is willing to give him a chance because at the end of the day it’s her season and she can do whatever she wants. She and Blake leave for their date.
Cut to the Blake date. They go for a horseback ride because Blake mentioned to production that he was terrified of horses as a kid (also, side note, is that a thing? Like Tyler Cameron on Hannah’s season was terrified of horses (so naturally he had like seven horse dates) and so is my dad and unless you had a bad experience with a horse, what about them is so scary??).
Blake talks about how he is a wildlife manager and volunteers to work with endangered species every year in different parts of the world and even though, again, I’m not really a fan that actually sounds really cool and he might be more interesting than I gave him credit for.
They at some point get off their horses and chat some which just ends up with them making out aggressively in the hay while the horses eat it around them, and instead of music overlay we get some voiceover of guys talking about how jealous they are of Blake getting the date which is true art from production.
We skip to the night portion of the date, where Katie talks to Blake about her sexual assault and he is compassionate and supportive (which feels like something that should be the bare minimum but you’d be surprised!) and he gets a rose. In true Bachelor/ette fashion the night isn’t over though, we have a C-list country singer that needs to serenade them while they make out. You know, super normal things.
Now that the 1on1 is over, we move onto the group date. Wells Adams (Sarah Hyland’s fiancé) and Franco Lacosta (the photographer) show up to host the Bash Ball Battle, a game ABC made up four seconds before the date started that involves a basketball net, tackling, and ridiculous costumes.
My favorite here is, I’m sure shockingly, Michael who points out that everyone is ripped and he’s over here with his normal person dad bod.
And to make sure everyone is reading to murder each other? Only the winning team will get to go on the evening date! So naturally someone (this time, Hunter) decides it’s time to get violent and try to STRAIGHT UP MURDER the other contestants because clearly Katie is looking for someone to do WHATEVER IT TAKES to win a stupid made-up game. Someone would say not only the true path to love, but the ONLY path.
Unsurprisingly, people get too extreme, and at one point Justin all but breaks Michael, who is down for the count. Justin gets a great edit because he doesn’t come off as psychopathic for breaking our lovable widower and is admittedly shaken up by how he was so down to get violent just because everyone else is. We get an appearance by our favorite character, The Ambulance, but Michael is obviously fine 45 seconds later and we had it just on standby juuuust in case.
Katie cancels the game because she hates the violence (sure) and declares they are all winners (ugh) even though if we actually looked at points they were not all winners. But whatever, it’s a made-up game we can have made-up rules and made-up winners and losers.
In the group date that evening we get rapid fire one on one times. Michael talks to Katie more about his deceased wife as it was her birthday the day prior and he’s honestly so kind I have no idea why he is on this show.
Next up is Connor with a ukulele singing a made-up song which I definitely could have passed on. In fact, I could have passed on it the way Connor passes on all of his buttons every time he puts on a shirt. I don’t know what’s up with Connor, but my boy showed up week one in a cat suit and has been shedding more and more layers each week. If next week he doesn’t even wear a shirt I won’t be able to say I’m surprised.
Hunter also gets some time alone with her and talks about his kids, shows her pictures, etc. and talks about how he envisions a future partner fitting into his family. Mike also goes and they have their first kiss. Katie during her and Greg’s time tells him he has Resting Sad Face which is hilariously true even though he protests a ton because just typing that out sounds pathetic. All super run of the mill.
But wait! We have gone 30 minutes without a clear villain because somehow Blake snuck under the radar! Thankfully though, Aggressive Aaron decides that he hates Hunter this week, for reasons I don’t entirely understand, most likely because he was better at the made up game than Aaron was earlier, so Aaron starts talking to the other guys about how shady he is to build up a coalition.
During all of Katie’s alone time though, we do get a sweet moment that isn’t Aaron pretending he’s on Survivor. Michael opens up about his wife and how it was her birthday the day prior and talks to the men about how she died and how grateful he was for all of the time they did have but how he’s gotten so much better at appreciating how finite life is. Not all the guys knew he was a widow and they almost all tear up at his story (making me at home doing the same a few weeks ago much more normal) and have a big hug and it’s very heartwarming.
Despite Michael getting absolutely destroyed earlier and having the saddest story of the bunch (and being the best of all of them as humans), Hunter gets the rose. For truly no other reason than to slowly unravel Aaron I’m sure. But he’s excited and talks about how clearly Katie loved how aggressive he was today so he’s going to keep being that way despite that being a very incorrect takeaway from the day.
Next up is Andrew’s 1on1, which was a bit shorter than I expected, considering there was no day portion of the date, it was strictly evening activities. They do some sort of truth game where they pick out cards and share what’s on the card which is honestly probably a great date for this show. Sure flipping an ATV is cool, but do you know what’s cooler? Knowing the middle name of the person you are proposing to.
What I loved about the Andrew date in particular though was the evening portion. He talks a bit about how his dad wasn’t around and how hard that was growing up and how when he has kids he is going to want to make sure he goes to everything, no matter how small. That alone is a wonderful conversation to have, especially considering Katie has divorced parents and this show has a history of romanticizing contestants from traditional family structures as though that’s something they personally decided on.
But then! Andrew becomes a front runner for Bachelor (if he doesn’t win) by being able to have difficult conversations around race. He talks about how in a previous relationship he (a black man) was dating a white woman and she was worried about the prospect of having biracial children and that was part of the reason they ended up breaking up. So he needs a future partner to be understanding of the fact that she and their children won’t have the same cultural experience growing up and they will need to be cognizant to how their children, specifically any boys they have, will experience difficulties that she didn’t have. Katie responds well, talking about how she would want to do anything and everything for any children they might have while simultaneously admitting that as a white woman she is naïve to those struggles and would need to educate herself more to properly support any children.
It’s very well done and again highlights how there is a way to have complex conversations about weightier topics on light television shows and how normalizing these conversations is so important. Obviously, Andrew gets a rose because he’s wonderful and then they leave the dinner and make out in a hot tub.
Flash forward to the cocktail party! Someone says they are excited there is no drama and I knocked on wood for whichever idiot thought that was a smart thing to say.
Katie shows up and gives some cute little speech which you can’t hear because someone YET AGAIN decided her iced drink needed a mic and she begins pulling people away.
Justin starts with a cute game about whether or not Katie agrees or disagrees with statements, giving him more air time than I think we’ve seen all season, and then Hunter grabs her to do a cute telescope date. Hunter already has a rose though, which means some of the guys (led by, you guessed it, Aaron) are whining about the unfairness of him spending time with her before they have.
James says he’s been burned before (note: my best friend immediately shouted “yeah, clearly on your face” because the only sun protection James has apparently been using was hiding in a box night one) and tries to interrupt Hunter and then when he gets another minute comes back and is like DATE’S OVER, TIME TO GO and then he and Katie talk / make out.
Naturally there needs to be a confrontation, so Hunter goes to talk to Tre, Aaron, and James. I realize that the Internet says that Hunter is evil because he stepped out of line trying to get more time at the rose ceremony and was weirdly aggressive during the sports date, but I thought he conducted himself very appropriately during this little standoff. I get he has a rose, but there is a rose ceremony every week! Why wouldn’t he want to continue building his relationship with Katie? Plus let’s not forget that it was JUSTIN who murdered Michael during the sport date and no one is mad at him because he’s hotter and has more gifs from his funny faces. Anyways, Hunter apologizes but that means nothing on this show so Aaron is going to take him down next week if it kills him.
Cut to the rose ceremony! Blake, Hunter, and Andrew had roses from the dates and are joined by Greg, Aaron, Michael, Connor, James, Justin, Mike, Brendan, and Tre. Some dudes that I don’t know the names of without racking my brain left, so I feel like we are finally whittling down to our main cast on this show. Except Brendan. I have no idea who he is except that his hair grows upwards more and more each week.
End of the night we get a speech, in which Aaron starts and is cut off by Hunter who takes over the speech. Aaron looks at Hunter as if he won’t live to see the morning and at this point I feel like Hunter is just in it for the screen time because there is NO WAY that he thought that was a good idea unless he’s stupid and production convinced him it would be a smart move or if he was promised a starring role next week as a new villain (or, most likely, was told Aaron would be the villain if he just went along).
And that’s our episode! ALTHOUGHHHHH we got the mid-season preview and I won’t lie, it looks pretty dramatic. Some would even say it looks like ~the most dramatic season~ ever. And truly, wouldn’t it be hilarious if the first season without Chris Harrison that was true? Watch it here and make your next week picks based on it here!
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