FOLKS WE DONE DID IT – we survived another season of the Bachelor/ette.
I don’t know how, but I’m proud of us. We against odds managed to make it through ANOTHER quarantine season of this show. Without even travel to distract us or interesting dates (I’d even settle for original dates at this point) we did it.
We start with… After the Final Rose (ATFR)? But before the final rose? Again, there are many things to hate about COVID, almost all of them more important than this gripe, but this editing and the fact it isn’t live so production decided to put ATFR during the show? One of them. I hate it so much.
But whatever, we move on to Katie sitting on the Hot Seat, where we replay the Greg drama because ABC hates us and wants us to be super depressed before selling us on a love story.
Katie talks about how she was blaming herself for not saying the right thing and how hard that conversation was and how, at that point, she wanted to get on a flight and go home.
But don’t worry we have a super choppy cut back to the show so we can’t unpack that whatsoever!
Katie again is asking if she wants to stay when we all know the answer because two seconds ago she was narrating this moment. In fact, I feel like I’ve watched her ask this question minimum 14 times between this week and last week and I’m so exhausted, can we move on?
Thankfully we do! We get Blake and Justin sitting on the couch wondering wtf happened to Greg. Blake says that they ran into each other briefly but Greg was not in the mood to talk and he hasn’t seen him since. Tayshia and Kaitlyn come in and tell the guys that Greg left but Katie wants to continue her ~journey~ with each of them. Blake can’t pretend he isn’t happy that Greg is out and Justin gives the fakest “what” I’ve ever heard which makes me wonder how many times they “broke the news” to these dudes because there is no way that was genuine.
Also I love Justin becoming F2 on a technicality.
Because we’ve decided to continue business as usual, Katie and Blake have their Fantasy Suite date. They play balloon paintball which I didn’t realize was a thing outside of one of my favorite movies (10 Things I Hate About You) and now I’m wondering if it’s exclusively a Seattle thing? All I know is that I would love to play it and it seems super cute so naturally we get maybe two minutes of this date before we cut to them in a hot tub because even during the finale they don’t want to develop this love story.
Katie talks to Blake about her week from hell with both Michael and Greg leaving. And while weird that Blake is sort of playing therapist to Katie it’s honestly much better than Peter’s season when he just didn’t tell Hannah Ann that Madi left and then SAID MADI’S NAME DURING HIS PROPOSAL. Rather Blake know what’s going on and he be able to decide if he wants to move forward than that mess.
We then get to the evening part of the date, where Blake tells Katie that he’s falling in love with her. And despite all my hate for Blake, it’s actually super cute. It’s very romcom like where he talks about the moment it clicked for him and it’s heart-warming.
And in a surprise twist, Katie says it back!! Ms. I Am Not Saying It To Greg fourteen seconds later says it to Blake. This makes me conflicted because it’s so out of the blue, it can only be one of the few options:
1. Katie really wanted to get engaged and it was only Blake & Justin so might as well go all in
2. Once Greg left Katie was like wait I actually do like Blake the most even if he were there
3. Katie actually liked Blake the most THE ENTIRE TIME and that’s why she didn’t say it to Greg
My money is on 1 or 2, but I could also be totally wrong and production could have done Katie dirty and just cut out all of the cute moments between her and Blake because a love story isn’t nearly as dramatic as multiple people leaving and a blow up fight.
Katie invites Blake back to the Fantasy Suites and they definitely get to know one another more based on the disarray of clothes on the floor the next morning…
Katie then has a girl chat with Kaitlyn (who, for the record, does such a great job at the conversations during the show and is SO AWKWARD at ATFR). They talk about how Katie knows Blake is The One and how she’s so excited to move forward with him. To which Kaitlyn is like that’s great but what about Justin?
So we gotta go dump Justin!
Justin is getting ready for his date and talking about how excited he is to develop his relationship with Katie which honestly sounds fake. There is no way Justin is down to get engaged to Katie. Unless someone forgot to record like all of his interactions with Katie, he should have been F5 and both he and Katie know it.
Katie meets up with Justin and says the three little words he was waiting for: “can we talk?” They have a heart-to-heart (I guess?) where they both seem relieved that they don’t have to pretend anymore.
And because of this terrible editing, we get to immediately talk to Justin on the Hot Seat! He sheds a few tears (tbd if they are genuine or not) and talks about how he feels like Katie didn’t give him a fair shot. He asks Katie if he was her F2 only by default (yes, obviously) and she swerves that answer like someone who has been media trained.
They thank each other for their time together and wish each other the best and we get what we really came for: a reel of all of Justin’s facial reactions. A true icon. No chance we see more of him unless they shipped him off to Paradise immediately after getting dumped. But let’s be real, how fun would it be to see Justin as the next Bachelor and be unable to pretend to like or dislike anyone because he’s so expressive?
CUT BACK TO THE SHOW!
Blake is going to meet Katie’s family: her mom and aunt. And while the mom is appropriately hard on Blake and asks about life plans, Katie’s aunt is truly awful.
There is a line between asking legitimate questions and being an asshole. And her aunt is clearly in the latter category, calling him “the beard” and grilling him, interrupting him, and speaking down to him.
Katie and her aunt talk about Blake and Katie also seems pissed that her aunt is being terrible. Truthfully I was disappointed Katie didn’t tell her aunt off some, because you should never stand for someone speaking to a loved one like that, but I also get family dynamics are weird. But jeez. She’s MEAN. She makes Peter’s mom Barb look kind. I didn’t even realize that was possible.
In a silver lining though, Blake wins over the mom who asked some hard questions about the future but seems to have basic respect for people.
I also legitimately can’t imagine how any of the other guys would have survived this date. Blake is secure enough in himself (his best trait truthfully) that he can handle this nonsense, but her aunt would BREAK Greg. Plus if Justin did this he would have to be like I don’t even like your niece enough to put up with this nonsense.
For the record Katie later in ATFR mentions that she didn’t tell her family that she got engaged AND THIS IS WHY! If you are trash to people your daughter/niece cares about then you will just be cut out. Welcome to raising teenagers 101. The more you hate on someone, the more attractive they are! Plus Katie is THIRTY and doesn’t need some random aunt’s approval to move forward in a relationship.
But whatever, onto the final date. Tbh it’s really weird and boring so I tuned out and scrolled on Twitter during the majority of it. But they do some kind of fear-sharing thing and then they burn their fears into some random effigy that should have been both of their #1 fears. I’m sure they bond or something though which I guess is good?
Now we’re at decision day! Tayshia helps Blake pick out a Neil Lane ring for Katie and he is STRESSING, probably because he’s known Katie for less than a month and last week she would have run off with someone else but he’s contractually obligated to get on a knee so he needs to hype himself up. It’s awkward and I wonder if other dudes normally have this baby freak out but ABC just doesn’t show it because they normally have enough drama between the two dudes and with just Blake they need to stir up stress somewhere else.
But he picks one and heads to the proposal site! Katie is all secure talking about how he’s the one and how excited she is to get engaged to him which only stresses me out more as they play “apprehensive music” according to subtitles.
Blake shows up looking as stressed as I am and Katie and Tayshia kick him in the butt and tell him to go propose to Katie.
When he gets there Katie gives him her little speech about how much she loves him, can’t wait to build a life with him, etc. etc. and Blake has the longest pause in history while he figures out what to say.
He then starts off strong, declaring his love and whatnot, things we love to see in proposals. But then does this weird thing where he sounds like he’s going to break up with her?? But then doesn’t?? It full on sounded like he was saying he didn’t want to hold her back and he wasn’t sure he was the guy for her but then he’s on a knee? I feel like something must have been edited out? Because it was so awkwardly cut and didn’t make any sense, but apparently it was good enough for Katie because she starts crying and saying yes.
And instead of ending there we have to go to the rest of ATFR, where we can get some more Greg/Katie time, aka what I didn’t need after the proposal.
I won’t lie to you guys, I started getting ready for bed during this because three hours is A LOT on a Monday night, but I feel like I got the highlights. Basically Katie lays into Greg for being the worst to her and Greg tries to justify himself but did not prepare for a fight so comes off like he’s grasping at straws and splitting hairs on word choice.
And listen, I get it. You can be in a happy relationship and still feel angry about how an ex treated you. But it was a lot from Katie. I think she was still hurt that he treated her so poorly and wanted to make sure that he didn’t get the Golden Boy edit and become the next Bachelor after he hurt so much and, in her opinion, used her for his own gain. But it is a choice that doesn’t make her look great when she could have played the “I’m happy now and you mean nothing to me” card. Instead, she sounded like someone who had dived a little too deep into the Bachelor subreddit (hi, welcome) and was copying and pasting some insults and arguments others had made after too many hours spent arguing about it with Internet strangers. Also for anyone wondering, gaslighting does NOT mean what Katie defined it as, and here is a resource to learn more.
But then from that nonsense, we move onto Blake!
At this point I’m basically falling asleep, but they seemed fine to me. Are they a little stilted? Yes. Do I think they are going to last and be married forever? Meh. But Clare and Dale are still together and I had that blowing up within a month on my Bingo card, so I’m clearly not any kind of expert. At the end of the day, they seem very well suited for one another – they seem to have similar humor, there is a lot of security there, and nothing like a little hate from the Internet to bond over. The last time an F1 got such a weird edit was Bryan from Rachel’s season and they are married now. So I guess we’ll see!
And on that note, that’s the last from me for a bit! I will most likely be watching Bachelor in Paradise but won’t be recapping since my dedication hasn’t fully transferred to the spinoff (yet). But Michelle’s season starts back up in October so catch ya in two months!
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