Clayton Echard might not get engaged — to be honest, I hope he doesn’t — Susie, Rachel and Gabby might all feel like chumps but hey, “The Bachelor” was the No. 1 trending topic worldwide Monday night, so at least ABC and Warner Bros. are getting their happy ending.
It’s pretty gross when you think about it. People were dying in Ukraine at the same time that millions of us were tuned into the equivalent of emotional torture porn on a reality show.
I’m not being holier than thou. I was watching and tweeting right along with everyone else, and now I’m writing about it.
This whole hideous season is coming down to a hideous two-part finale —the second half of “the most shocking finale in ‘Bachelor’ history” goes down tonight — and my guess would be that, if anything, it’s just emboldened the people who put the show together.
We hated that they chose Clayton as Bachelor; we hated “the Shanae Show”; we hated the way Clayton talked to Susie last week, but all of that just fuelled the show’s clout, so is it any surprise that Jesse sounded positively gleeful when he teased “the rose ceremony from hell” as the episode started?
And it was hellish.
For some unfathomable reason, Clayton decided that after his relationship with Susie blew up — since she couldn’t accept the fact he had sex with both Rachel and Gabby, and had also told both that he loved them — he might as well be “1,000 per cent transparent” with the two who were still standing.
When Rachel and Gabby showed up for the rose ceremony, in the dramatic Harpa concert hall in Reykjavik, Iceland, Clayton said the words that have been teased all season long: “I am in love with both of you and I also was intimate with both of you.”
Stunned, Rachel and Gabby walked off in different directions. Rachel sat on some steps and sobbed, her anguish echoing through the hall, wiping her eyes so much she wiped the makeup right off her face. “I’ve never felt pain like this before,” she said.
Gabby had a cry too, and came back with questions for Clayton and also some observations, and they were really good ones.
Like, for instance, exploring relationships fully “is not definitively loving.”
Also, after Clayton told her he meant everything he said to her, “but how do you, like, back that up?”
“Because ultimately, like, whoever I pick I love the most,” Clayton said.
It’s a good thing Gabby hadn’t heard Clayton tell Susie that he loved her the most or her head would have exploded.
“I don’t think you just tell multiple women you love them thinking there would be no consequences,” Gabby said in her voice-over. Exactly! “For him saying the woman I walk out with is the woman I love the most, like wrong fucking answer.
“I don’t want to be loved the most, I just want to be loved for who I am.”
Speaking of love, I don’t think I have loved Gabby more than I did at that moment.
Rachel was also struggling to understand how Clayton could love three people at once but, given how head over heels she was for him, it wasn’t a surprise when, as the rose ceremony got back on track, she accepted the first flower from him without recrimination.
But Gabby said no and I was so pleased for her. It’s too bad she didn’t just hightail it out of there. But she let Clayton talk to her and he somehow talked her into staying.
I have to pause here to defer to former Bachelor Nick Viall (yeah, I know), who was hauled onstage along with former Bachelorettes Michelle Young and Clare Crawley to comment on the spectacle unfolding. Nick said Clayton was “a guy focused on finding love for himself and not focused on finding love with someone else.” Also, “he never took the time to consider the position of power he’s in as the Bachelor.” Spot on Nick, spot on.
Back at the Harpa, Rachel was still trying to digest that fact that she would end up with Clayton by default rather than by design when Clayton and Gabby came back.
And this is the moment that I will cling to as I watch the rest of this train wreck: Gabby walked up to Rachel, told her “I’m sorry to make you wait,” and they hugged, and Rachel asked Gabby if she was OK and rubbed her shoulder.
Clayton does not deserve either of these women, which made it hard to watch as each of them met his family. Clayton’s family seems perfectly nice, but it was tough to see Gabby and Rachel get strung along a little bit farther.
Furthermore, his dad Brian and mom Kelly were as unimpressed with him telling three women he loved them as everyone else.
“I don’t know how you could be in love with three people,” said Kelly.
“You have to understand, they don’t want to be second or third, they want to be first. They have a right to be upset with you,” said Brian.
“You have screwed the pooch, in my opinion.”
Kelly added that Gabby, who they were about to meet, seemed like a consolation prize. “I don’t know if the love of your life has gone.”
Hold that thought.
Things went as well as can be expected when the man who’s just ripped your heart out and stomped on it a little takes you to meet his family.
Alas, Gabby told Kelly she still trusted in her relationship with Clayton. “I’ve never met anyone as genuine and open-hearted as him.”
I guess we can agree on the open-hearted part, all things considered; too open-hearted.
Rachel, meanwhile, told Kelly straight up that Clayton was perfect for her. And she told Brian she’d never been in love “the way I am with him.”
So Mama and Papa Echard were all in on whichever one Clayton chose as their new daughter-in-law. And then came the twist that practically had Jesse peeing his pants as he introduced the next segment.
CLAYTON COULDN’T STOP THINKING ABOUT SUSIE!
“I’ve just realized my heart, where it’s at,” Clayton told his folks. “Not to disregard what I have with Rachel and what I have with Gabby. It’s so special what I have with those women. It just was a little bit more special with Susie.”
THEN WHY DIDN’T YOU KEEP YOUR LIPS ZIPPED WITH GABBY AND RACHEL AND KEEP IT IN YOUR PANTS?
Brian and Kelly did their best to convince Clayton the Susie ship had sailed, but along came Jesse to helpfully tell Clayton that Susie was still in Iceland. Because of course she was.
And to add insult to injury, back in the studio, Jesse brought Rodney Mathews onstage, alongside Kaitlyn Bristowe and Cassie Randolph, the man who should have been Bachelor. Rodney is very much Team Clayton, but he did say that Clayton was “living in the moment a little too much.” Ya think?
I don’t believe “Bachelor” producers have yet figured out a way to infiltrate cast members’ brains and control their feelings, although it would not at all surprise me to hear they’d been using subliminal messaging to imprint the idea of falling in love with three women on Clayton.
Whether they knew or merely hoped he was going to want to reconcile with Susie, keeping her in Iceland instead of letting her go home was all part of the nefarious plan.
Since Jesse keeps saying he doesn’t know what happens, it seems likely Clayton and Susie aren’t going to kiss, make up and get engaged — maybe they agree to keep dating a la Cassie and Colton Underwood (and we all know how that turned out). It does seem clear that Rachel and Gabby are going to be discarded, which puts the lie to Clayton’s protestations of love for them.
Part 2 of this mess airs Tuesday at 8 p.m. on Citytv. And you can comment here, visit my Facebook page or follow me on Twitter @realityeo
Recent Comments