Yesterday afternoon my husband texted and asked if this was the finale of The Bachelorette. I pointed out that there were still three dudes left.
“Who is the third?” he asked.
Bryan. Everyone forgets Bryan.
Anyway, it doesn’t matter because tonight is the two-hour Men Tell All Special which is basically a clip show with Chris Harrison stirring up some shit periodically. According to Chris this episode is a “very” special episode.
Oh, fuck. I just realized this means Whaboom is back.
Pour yourself a drink. It’s time for the show!
The first person Chris Harrison targets is Whaboom, who I suspect is black out drunk. Apparently the cameras missed all his special moments with Rachel and he was totally “there for the right reasons.”
They quickly shift to DeMario.
Just to remind those of you who have purged your memory of this season, a woman named Lexie who claimed to be DeMario’s girlfriend approached Rachel during filming. She said she found out DeMario was participating on The Bachelorette when she saw him on the last season of The Bachelor when they introduced some of the dudes who would be on The Bachelorette. Lexie claims that at that time, she and DeMario were in a relationship and he had keys to her apartment.
When Chris Harrison asks DeMario about this, he doubles down that Lexie was just some random person who wandered in off the street to slander him.
“Is there any ocular facts that her and I dated?” DeMario asks.
“Wait…what does that…?” I’m not sure which dude said that but they all seem legitimately confused.
“Ocular facts means some kind of proof that her and I dated,” DeMario explains.
Ocular. Facts.
Chris moves on. “The…the fact is that I had this guy, DeMario, tell me he dated her and had been in a relationship with her.”
DeMario shakes his head frantically. “DeMario didn’t tell you that.”
“I have it on tape,” Chris says.
THE ROSE GOD KNOWS ALL, DEMARIO.
AND WHY ARE YOU REFERRING TO YOURSELF IN THE THIRD PERSON?
At one point Whaboom calls Iggy a joke and basically every other dude is like “DID YOU JUST CALL SOMEONE A JOKE WHABOOM?”
Ah, the struggle to stay relevant in the reality TV world.
Next up ABC continues to profit from Lee’s racism by bringing up the tension between him and Kenny. Lee is back with his stupid bouffant and, I imagine, the African Ringneck Parakeet that lives inside of it, Mr. Tweeters.
What ABC should have done was not invite Lee to the special because he’s a piece of shit and doesn’t need any more screen time.
Basically all the other dudes agree with me.
Except DeMario: “When all this happened with Kenny, I was confused.”
Yeah. Your confusion is hardly astonishing.
DeMario thinks Lee seemed like a genuine guy. Genuinely awful maybe. Genuinely harboring exotic birds in his dumb hair. Genuinely worth forgetting.
Next up Kenny gets invited to Chris Harrison’s Couch of Lurve to be interviewed.
Chris Harrison brings up the fact that Lee called Kenny “aggressive,” thereby continuing to exploit Lee’s racism for the show.
Lee apologizes to Kenny for “not taking the high road” or “being a better friend” which…what?
WHAT?
Kenny calls bullshit. He points out that during interviews Lee was clearly delighted by fucking with other people.
Then they bring out Kenny’s daughter Mackenzi, who hands him a long stemmed rose. Kenny left the show because he felt it was keeping him from his daughter.
It’s Kenny’s birthday so Chris announces that the show is sending him and Mackenzi to Disneyland to celebrate.
Then it’s Lee’s turn on Chris Harrison’s Couch of Lurve.
Chris Harrison pulls up some of Lee’s awful tweets. Example: “Guys…When is the last time you actually saw a pretty feminist? There is a reason for this.”
It’s at this point that Mr. Tweeters realizes he can no longer live in Kenny’s dumb hair. Even he has reached his level of toxicity. He bursts from the bouffant in an explosion of color and flies free, far from Chris Harrison, far from the Rose God, far from the Axe Bodyspray, and into the sunlight.
Then Chris pulls up Lee’s tweet comparing the NAACP to the KKK.
The room goes quiet.
“I feel like I have a lot to learn in that area….”Lee says.
“Everyone is sorry when they get caught,” Kenny says.
Josiah comes up on stage and asks Lee why he came on the show with a Black Bachelorette when at the same time he’s tweeting such awful, racist vitriol.
Josiah says, “People came before me so that I can go to the same school as you, so I can drink from a fountain like you, and if you’re comparing them to the KKK – the people who hung my ancestors – why are you trying to date a woman who looks like me?”
Lee counters that he “doesn’t like racism at all.” Then he says he was hurt when the tweets “came out.”
Basically it’s the same old, “sorry not sorry” bullshit…look at me I’m a victim.
None of the contestants, even DeMario buy this.
“It…cut it in half when it released it on Twitter…from my Facebook…” Lee scrambles, looking like an idiot. Which is appropriate.
Fuck this guy.
Can the rest of the show be us following Kenny and Mackenzi around Disneyland?
Then Chris Harrison flat out asks Lee if he’s a racist and misogynist. Unsurprisingly, Lee deflects. “I want to learn,” he says.
Can we be done with Lee now? I can’t drink enough to deal with this and be expected to go to work tomorrow.
We get a commercial break, then Dean (wearing a camo tux) gets to sit on Chris Harrison’s Couch of Lurve.
Dean says that he’s still hurt Rachel sent him home, but that he doesn’t regret exploring his estranged relationship with his dad on TV. Which totally seems like a thing you should regret, TBH. “Explore my relationship with my estranged dad on reality TV” is a phrase that should compel people to drink brown liquor.
Also Dean is going to be on Bachelor in Paradise.
Then Rachel comes out. She calls Chris her fairy godmother.
DO FAIRY GODMOTHERS DEVOUR SOULS, RACHEL?
Rachel tells Dean that her feelings for him were genuine, even though she decided to let him go. He doesn’t seem mollified.
She also offers to give Lee a Black History lesson and a lesson on women’s rights.
Adam asks why Rachel dismissed him when she did.
IDK ADAM MAYBE BECAUSE YOU SHOWED UP WITH A LIFE-SIZED PUPPET OF YOURSELF.
Fred tells Rachel that he thinks she never gave him a chance.
OMG THERE IS SO MUCH WHINING.
On the Women Tell All we got a lot of women being awesome and supporting each other and mostly ignoring Nick. The Men Tell All is apparently the dudes being unable to process rejection in a healthy way.
Finally. FINALLY it’s over.
We get some bloopers.
Josiah eats a lot.
Rachel stumbles a lot.
Random people wander into shot.
The dudes crash a golf cart.
Then Chris tells us that the finale is next week and reminds us that the final three dudes are Eric, Peter and…oh, yeah. Bryan.
Do you like the tell-all episodes? Are you still watching?
I am in the process of moving to a different town, and I was really kinda worried I’d missed an episode where *things* happened. But now I can rest easy that I’ve got at least a week to get my cable hooked up so I don’t miss any actual crazy-sauce-finding-love-for-the-right-reasons, rather than Actual Man Baby Meet Ups 2017. Thank you for taking the hit for me this week Elyse, I will be sure to pour out some of the wine I’ve got boxed somewhere in your honor!
Why do I feel like the phrase “ocular facts” will be showing up in a Kellyanne Conway interview sometime soon?
I would actually tune in for an hour of Kenny and Mackenzi at Disneyland. What a beautiful family. I hope, when the time is right for them, they’ll find someone to add to it (in a way that is not phony and exploitative).
*tone change*
Lee can fuck all the way off.
That panda gif is the most perfect thing ever.
There are not enough rolling-of-eyes gifs for the Bachelor/ette. Thank you for these. The Panda is also wonderful. As for the Bachelors … I’ll take the Panda. Thanks Elyse
the panda gif really says it all.
Oh dear, that was a terrible episode. I’m genuinely amazed Lee managed to come across as even more of a dickwad than he already was.
I’d say I’m looking forward to the next Bachelor season because more women and less men, but there’s still one man who’s going to be the focus of it all and eurrgh. Maybe lesbian Bachelorette is the way?? Hit me up ABC!
Ocular Facts is going to be my new excuse.
“Do you have any ocular facts that I didn’t pay my bill? DeMario didn’t tell you that!”
Yes, Mr. Tweeters, fly free! *ahem*
I would have tuned in to watch the father/daughter in Disneyland thingie (I’ve never watched a single episode before), but better they didn’t exploit that.
Ocular facts? I wonder what he actually meant to say.
I always get such great gifs to steal for my collection from these recaps.
Are ocular facts the ones that can be seen or the ones that see you?
Another delightful recap of American civilization crumbling before our eyes. I can only hope Mr. Tweeters goes on to Dancing with the Stars.
For the amusement of the Bitchery, I submit that at my previous company, VPs started saying “the optics of” in lieu of “how something appears” as in “we have to consider the optics of excluding Bob from this meeting.” I quit soon after this foolishness, but I think where DeMario’s “ocular facts” could catch on…
I doubt he knew it, but ‘ocular facts’ is a clear allusion to Othello.
Iii.iii.360 “Villain, be sure thou prove my love a whore; Be sure of it. Give me the ocular proof.”
Which actually seems pretty fitting!
I want to apologize up front for what I’m about to say: in the picture of DeMario and Lee, it looks like there’s a giant spider living in DeMario’s armpit. I cannot unsee it, and I apologize if now I’ve forced everyone else to see it as well.
But maybe the armpit spider can become friends with Mr. Tweeters?
Will be glued to forthcoming episodes of Bachelor Ettrick.
I’d really rather not watch the ridiculousness of this show and instead read these AMAZING reviews! hahah
“ocular facts”?!?!?! *dying* that’s a keeper!
Elise, I worship at your feet!! Hate this program (and, by the way, the “tell all” is the worst of the worst!) love your review. Lee is only on for his jerk factor let’s face it, gotta have drama. And, by the way one of the founders of the feminist movement (giving away my age here) Gloria S. was a Playboy Bunny.
ELYSE!!!
538 has graphs for you: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/rachel-lindsays-bachelorette-season-in-three-charts/