I hope everyone has had a good week so far because it’s time for the trash fire that is The Bachelorette.
Pour yourself a stiff drink because we’re going to dive right in.
At the dinner they aren’t allowed to eat, Hannah tells Luke P that she can’t give him the date rose.
He asks if that means he’s going home, and she says yes.
She asks him to respect that decision.
Guess what he doesn’t do.
Luke tells the camera that he’s shocked and confused. He says he needs to fight for her. Instead of walking out to the Limo of Tears, he goes to the room where Hannah is.
“What are you doing?” she asks.
Luke P tells her that he screwed up by not showing her his emotions and by trying to be too perfect. “Yes, we talked in circles, and I couldn’t stand it,” he says. “I know that today sucked and I didn’t communicate how I felt.”
Hannah says she doesn’t know how she feels about this.
I know how I feel about this. He’s not respecting boundaries and needs to leave now, thank you.
He apologizes. She waffles. It goes on and on for awhile.
We cut back to the hotel where the other guys are waiting to see if Luke will be eliminated tonight or not. Luke shows up and tells them that Hannah decided she needed more time and that he didn’t get a rose, and would be facing The Dreaded Rose Ceremony with them. The other dudes are not happy.
Hannah tells the camera that if Luke P can continue to show true emotion, then he’ll get a rose.
Then it’s time for The Dreaded Rose Ceremony. Hannah opens up by telling the guys that she wants them to share the things that are uncomfortable and real about them.
First up, Garrett and his enormous hair have a private conversation with Hannah. Garrett asks Hannah if Luke P continued to bag on the other guys on their date. She says that he did mention names, and that she is aware the other guys hate him.
So of course Garrett confronts Luke P about talking shit about the other guys.
This is honestly just painful to type.
The other guys confront him about what was said and a bunch of arguing ensues.
Hannah marches in the room. “I am so frustrated about there always being fights in the house, and it’s pissing me off,” she says.
At one point Luke P starts to talk again and Hannah actually mimes zipping her lips closed.
“The thing I want to say to you all is, stay in your freaking lane,” she says. “Because I’m tired of hearing screaming.”
She marches off.
The guys resume arguing about whether or not Luke P talked shit about the other guys on his date. Hannah sits upstairs and fumes, drinking a glass of wine and listening. She throws back the entire glass, says, “Fuck,” and marches back downstairs.
“Stop the focus on him,” she says pointing to Luke P. “Because I can figure that out. And focus on me. And know that I’m a grown-ass woman and like I can decide if I want to spend my time figuring this out or if I don’t, but you’re not in my conversations with him, just like he’s not in my conversations with all of you.”
“None of you know anything about me and why I’m here and what makes me me and things I’ve gone through, and I feel uncomfortable because nobody’s even asked, because all you do is talk about stupid shit,” she continues. She’s tearing up now. “And so, I don’t want to talk to anybody. At this point I’m really defeated from all of you. I don’t want to do this.”
She walks away. She’s anger-crying.
Chris Harrison appears and gives Hannah a hug. She explains her frustration to him and he says, “It’s because they’re crazy about you. Believe me, this would be a lot easier if they didn’t care.”
I think it’s because they’re selfish and immature, Chris, but I realize you spend your off time in a dungeon where the walls bleed, so I’m guessing you haven’t had a lot opportunity to work on your emotional fluency.
Basically all Hannah is asking is that the guys be accountable and prioritize her feelings, something totally reasonable, and in it’s never-ending grossness, The Bachelorette is framing up their idiocy as “romantic.”
“Yes, they care, but they don’t respect or trust me enough to do this,” Hannah argues. She tells him, “Party’s over.”
Luke P, proving again that he’s an asshole, tells the camera that all of this Garrett’s fault and that the cocktail party was “robbed” from him.
So then we get to the actual Dreaded Rose Ceremony. Luke P gets a rose (Ed. note: fucking WHY?) and Devin, Grant, and Kevin go home.
After the three dudes go home, Hannah looks at the remaining contenders and says, “Now we talk. With everything that happened, I am just so mad.” She lays into them a bit and then finishes with, “Good-night!” She storms out.
So then they all go to Riga, Latvia.
Chris Harrison and Hannah have coffee. She admits to him that she doesn’t feel these relationships are going anywhere, and says she wants to have one cocktail party that “doesn’t go to crap at the end.”
“There’s been a lot of drama,” says Chris. “I understand the emotional toll that takes.”
What he doesn’t say is, “because I dine upon the suffering of others, and offer your tears up to the Old One that I serve.”
So then we get a commercial, and then weirdly an interview between Chris and Hannah that appears to have been taped after the show aired. Then we get a clip show of all the dudes being assholes.
Chris makes it sound like he and Hannah filmed the clip show just after their conversation in Riga, except they’re obviously filming in the McMansion. So either he’s implying they flew back to LA to film this segment or he just doesn’t care if it makes sense to the audience (it’s the latter).
I’m not sure what the point of this is, other than to fill up time.
Then the clip show continues to Hannah’s favorite moments and also some bloopers. It’s so weird that this is just inserted into the episode. I’m wondering if they had issues with the content from Riga and it had to be edited?
The clip show takes up a full 45 minutes.
And that’s it. That’s the whole episode. By Bachelorette standards it’s pretty disappointing, and that’s saying something.
Are you still watching?
“I think it’s because they’re selfish and immature, Chris, but I realize you spend your off time in a dungeon where the walls bleed, so I’m guessing you haven’t had a lot opportunity to work on your emotional fluency.”
I cannot adequately express how much I giggled over this!
Hannah does not sound like a happy camper, & I’d love to know what’s in her contract. Because Luke P should not still be there, & it sounds like she’s just OVER the guys in general.
Luke P makes me very nervous. I know producers like to cast a villain, and they amp up that he is dangerous. But I think he is actually dangerous, and they are casting it as romantic and that is upsetting. Dude is physically aggressive to other dudes, talks about enjoying the hunt, refuses to take no for an answer. This is stalker behavior.
@Deianira nailed it. Hannah is over it, but since she actually has more sense than to jump a fence and run off into the night, it doesn’t provide enough drama to fill an episode.
As Elyse so perfectly put it;
“There’s been a lot of drama,” says Chris. “I understand the emotional toll that takes.”
What he doesn’t say is, “because I dine upon the suffering of others, and offer your tears up to the Old One that I serve.”
This show would be infinitely improved if it aired with an MST3K-style commentary from a panel of witty mental health practitioners who could both snark and discuss the red-flag abuse behaviors.
I’m assuming that the producers elected to keep Luke P to further escalate/drag out the bullshit drama because either (a) there’s an obvious frontrunner to ‘win’ and so the narrative arc is not all that suspenseful or like in Arie’s slumberseason (b) it’s so damn boring they had to do something to red herring people into watching
Also, @Ren Benton: I would be so there for that. Could we also include a panel of women with a box of wine and a bad dating history to provide both commentary and a scoring system?
So the other women spying for her was just a one-episode thing? That sounded like the best part – possibly the only decent part – of the whole season.
I hope Hannah disappeared right after the coffee conversation and they’ve been looking for her ever since so they’re just going to use old footage of her and finish out the season somewhere, like when an actor dies in the middle of filming a movie.
HANNAH PLEASE BE OUT THERE LIVING YOUR BEST LIFE SOMEWHERE ELSE
I hope when Luke P’s eliminated, it’s right before a huge trip so he can be abandoned somewhere. (I have no hope for this because the producers are asshats, but.) Thanks for taking one for the team!
Also based on the talk of the Rose God I want to run a Sims Bachelorette game where losing dudes are fed to the vampire Sim in the basement of the McMansion. It feels cathartic.
I would totally watch the shit of the Bachelor franchise with commentary.
I wish Hannah would just admit she only wants one thing out of that Douche Canoe Luke, and then send him packing. Thanks to Arie (another douche canoe) we know the contestants can talk to each other.
I would love to see her send them ALL home and demand a fresh batch. She deserves that consideration after all she’s been through.
I would also love to see her friend-contestants following them around in the stealth van whenever they’re on a one-on-one date, making snarky comments and digging dirt up on Facebook about the guys.
You know it does sound as if the Bachelorette is staging a sitdown strike so they had to fill out an episode with something while her agent is re-negotiating her contract so she doesn’t have to spend the next month or so being seen with the “winning” guy they’ve chosen for her to find TRU LUV with.
I would truly love to find out someone developed some self-esteem on one of these shows and refused to take part in the final “rose ceremony” leaving the producers to substitute a CGI version for the final episode. You know the kind–long shot with shadowed face, closeup from behind, inserted clip of face, the long shot from behind with an actress/actor with a wig and fancy dress, anonymous manicured hand taking rose, etc. etc.
I give up on understanding just what the producers are doing with this show. It seems to get dopier every season! Luke is hopeless! Hannah must have some weird contract stipulations to put up with this sh*t.
I keep wishing Hannah would have a light bulb moment. Girl, if you are this annoyed with Luke P. right now, when your pantsfeelings are strong and obvs overriding all the red flags, how much worse do you think it will be when your pantsfeelings fade away and he’s still the Neanderthal robot he’s been this whole time?
You left out the part where we got a preview of the rest of the season. You know, where Luke P. said gross things like “keep the marriage bed pure” and heavily implied that if Hannah slept with any of the other guys, she would no longer mean anything to him because a woman’s worth is totally determined by whether or not she’s had a wang.
Personally, I think she’s keeping him around for the fantasy suites portion of the show, so she can resolve those pantsfeelings of hers.
She has so many better men to choose from – Mike, or how about Peter the pilot, who is the chillest, least-dramatic guy of the bunch? Girl, you got options.
Still don’t know why I am watching this show.
While I will never not appreciate these recaps, I truly can’t imagine why anybody watches this show when there are perfectly good re-runs of Northern Exposure* to see.
*or Married With Children
*or The Simpsons
*or The Flintstones
*or ALMOST ANY OTHER PIECE OF FILMED ENTERTAINMENT EVER MADE
when there are perfectly good re-runs
Heck, who needs reruns when you can cut to the chase and watch Divorce Court–which, incredibly, is still being produced even though no-fault divorce is a thing in all 50 states.
I looked it up. In about 1/3 of the states you’re not even allowed to argue fault. Weirdly, one of those 1/3 is California, which is one of the few states that still has a fault-based law about return of engagement rings. (If he jilts you at the altar, you can keep the ring.)
That was more information than I intended to get. I hope Hannah finds it useful.
@Ren I love MST3K!
@Ren and co., Try Terrace House on Netflix for a dating show with a Greek (or Japanese) chorus. Very fun. I started watching the Opening New Doors series after reading an opinion piece that it had the best love story on TV, reality OR scripted and it’s pretty true. You can stop watching after they leave if you want.
Every time something terrible happens on Bachelorette, I just remind myself that so much of it is scripted and determined by producers, and that helps with the rage.
This is my first time ever watching the show, and I’ve found myself becoming oddly protective of Hannah. Like, I kind of love her? My husband watched like 30 seconds today and said he didn’t like her, and I got really defensive??? I don’t even know what’s happening to me anymore.