After six weeks of spinning its wheels, Matt James’ “Bachelor” season got back on track Monday, at least insofar as the ostensible purpose of the show, which is him getting engaged. Let’s call it “The Fast and the Serious.” And I’m not talking about Jessenia’s “Hail Mary” one-on-one date, which involved a race car and “drifting.”
After weeks of telling pretty much every woman he spoke to that he was into them, Matt finally buckled down and separated the “maybe I can fall in love with you’s” from the “I kind of like you’s,” ending the episode with the four women who’ll get so-called “hometowns” next week.
But first there was a little detour into Red Herring Land. Yes, I’m talking about Heather Martin, who strutted in last week seemingly convinced that she could turn Matt’s head despite how far along the season was, all because her bestie Hannah Brown said Matt was perfect for her.
My eyes are rolling so hard over the idea that Heather jumped on a red-eye flight to Pennsylvania all on her own initiative that they’re doing backflips.
It was one of the more ridiculous production tricks we’ve seen and a mean one too. Like, duh, Matt wasn’t going to let Heather stay, even though he claimed he needed time to think about it. He even told Chris Harrison (who is host at least until the pretaped episodes run out, more on that later) with a straight face that he didn’t know what to do: “When someone I respect like Hannah, who knows me and has dated my best friend, puts her stamp of approval on somebody, that carries a lot of weight with me,” Matt said. Spare me.
In the meantime, Heather was getting the Mean Girl treatment from the other women. It started with a reasonable question from Serena P: Why hadn’t Heather tried to date Matt before he became the Bachelor? Then Pieper accused Heather, who was on Colton Underwood’s season, of Bachelor-hopping. And when Heather apologized for interrupting Pieper’s time with Matt, Pieper replied, “I still do not understand why you’re here Week 6.” Kit added, “Like, bitch, what are you doing?”
At that point, Heather started to cry and say that she felt sad, and Serena C. snarked, “OK, talk about it (in your) interview because I don’t want to hear your tears right now.” Heather walked away.
Was Heather coming there a dumb, dead-end move? Yes, but it was humiliating enough to get sent home by Matt without getting verbally torn apart for it.
Clearly Matt wasn’t listening in when the women unloaded on Heather — or when they cried and grumbled and blustered about her being there — because he commended them just before the rose ceremony for how they handled the “surprise.” Then he gave roses to Bri, Rachael, Serena P, Kit, Jessenia and Abigail, cutting Chelsea and Serena C loose.
The question then became who would get the two one-on-one dates this week. Since Jessenia and Abigail were the only women left who’d never escaped group date purgatory, it seemed logical it would be them. But then Serena P got her second one-on-one and blew that theory out of the water.
Mind you, Serena might have had second thoughts if she’d known Matt was taking her on a tantric yoga date. I mean, seriously, who thinks practically having to grind your partner on TV with some yoga instructor breathing down your neck is a good time? Oh wait, Matt thought it was great. Serena did not enjoy it and told Matt so, which made me like her even more.
As it happened, Serena’s intense dislike of tantric yoga seemed to be a main topic of their dinner conversation, with Matt blathering on about how much he liked her being real and honest and open and . . . sorry, dozed off there for a second.
Serena got the rose and with it a guaranteed hometown date, although hello, quarantine, so we won’t see Matt visiting Toronto.
The group date was next and sadly Abigail was on it, along with Pieper, Michelle, Rachael, Bri and Kit.
I really have no idea why Matt would give Abigail the first impression rose and not take her on a one-on-one. But that group date card was the kiss of death for the franchise’s first deaf contestant.
We never saw the daytime portion of the group date, just the cocktail party. Matt actually had the nerve to tell Abigail that all he’d wanted was more time with her. THEN WHY DIDN’T YOU TAKE HER ON A ONE-ON-ONE?
When Abigail told Matt she could picture a future with him you knew it wasn’t going to end well. He told Abigail that giving her the first impression rose had been a no-brainer and he’d been so comfortable in their relationship he’d decided to explore other relationships and, oops, those other relationships got stronger than theirs. None of that clears up the mystery of the missing one-on-one and, in fact, sounds like bullshit, but Abigail took her dismissal with grace and class.
And now, obviously, she’s in the running to be the next Bachelorette, assuming the whole franchise hasn’t blown up by then.
As for the rest of the group date: Bri confessed to Matt that she’d quit her dream job for the chance to be with him. Matt called that huge, but not huge enough to give her the date rose. He gave it to Rachael after telling her that he thought about her whenever he wasn’t around her, yet another indication of her front-runner status.
(As an aside, Rachael being a front-runner is obviously going to be a problem for a lot of people after she was called out — and issued an apology for — social media activities that were seen as racist. Chris Harrison has stepped aside as host for an unspecified period of time after defending Rachael, who as you can see is white, in an interview with former Bachelorette Rachel Lindsay, who is Black. I don’t think this controversy is going to just go away nor should it, but I don’t want to address it in detail as an aside in a recap.)
Seeing Rachael get the rose shook Kit, who had used her time with Matt to tell him she wanted to delay getting married and having kids until she finished her education and did some travelling. When Matt said he was cool with that, Kit figured it was full steam ahead for the two of them. But seeing Rachael get the rose and get whisked away for a private concert with Aloe Blacc spurred Kit to jump before getting dumped.
Kit went to Matt’s suite and told him she didn’t have the “clarity” she needed and was heading home. Matt tried to dissuade her, but Kit went anyway, saying it was “the right thing for both of us.” Except, in the SUV of Shame, she expressed doubt about her decision, which makes me wonder if she’s going to pop back up in a future episode.
Next on the list of lost causes was Jessenia’s one-on-one date.
Bless her optimistic little heart: after spending some time learning “drifting” with Matt, which looked like basically a lot of crazy-ass, reckless driving, Jessenia said, “Today really feels like the first day of what could be a long future together.”
That future was measured in hours, however. Matt, who talks a good game about honesty, led Jessenia on by asking her what meeting her family would be like and picking up the rose after she told him she was falling in love with him. He could easily have given her the “you’re great, but” speech without picking the damn thing up. What nasty producer taught him that trick?
Matt told Jessenia they were missing “that intangible love and connection” needed for an engagement and it was so long Jessenia, who was feeling blindsided.
Just like that, it was time for another rose ceremony. Predictably, Matt gave Bri and Michelle the remaining two roses, leaving Pieper feeling like her soul had been stomped on. Considering she just had a one-on-one last episode during which Matt told her to trust him with her heart I can understand why.
Next week, it’s “hometowns,” which means Matt meets the final four’s families at the Nemacolin resort. Expect the usual mix of protective parents and skeptical siblings — plus we’ll be another week closer to the end of this disappointing season.
You can watch Monday at 8 p.m. on Citytv. And you can comment here, visit my Facebook page or follow me on Twitter @realityeo
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