Well, whaddaya know? “The Bachelorette” can still surprise us. Monday’s episode was about an hour and 40 minutes of “yeah, duh” followed by 20 minutes of WTF when a favourite got sent home, then appeared to come back but went home for real in the end.
First for the “yeah, duh” part. Katie Thurston had seven fellows still hanging around when the episode began, but two of these things were not like the others. Mike the Virgin and Brendan hadn’t had one-on-one dates. In fact, Brendan hadn’t even talked to her at the rose ceremony or the group date before that but, bless him, he was chatting with the other guys about hometowns as if he had a chance in hell of getting one.
His already flimsy hopes became even sketchier when Greg became the first dude to get a second one-on-one (more on that later). And when the episode’s other one-on-one went to Mike (more on that later too), Brendan asked the question that all of Bachelor Nation had been asking week after week: “Why am I still here?”
Give him points for going straight to the source by heading to Katie’s suite. I think in his mind he was going to tell Katie how much he wanted her to meet his family and drink beer with his dad and she’d be all “That sounds awesome!” In actual fact, Katie was still drying off after her date with Greg (yes, I’ll explain) and looked like even she couldn’t remember who Brendan was when he knocked on her door (after an emergency swipe of lip balm).
Bottom line: Katie gave Brendan the standard you’re-a-great-guy-but speech and sent him home on the spot. He departed with minimal fuss, stopping to say goodbye to fellow Canadian Blake Moynes first.
Now back to Katie and Greg.
All you really need to know is that they showed up wearing a similar shade of green shirt, just like on their first one-on-one way back at the beginning of the season when they wore matching plaid shirts over hoodies.
Other things to know: they threw large fish at each other in an approximation of what happens at the famous Pike Place Market in Seattle, Katie’s hometown. They also shucked oysters together, badly, and shared a bubble-gum kiss in honour of the famous Seattle Gum Wall, which I have to say is kind of gross (the real wall, not necessarily what Katie and Greg were doing).
I don’t get the people who tweet that they don’t think Greg is that into Katie because, if so, he has me fooled.
There was talk of Greg’s difficulty with the “Bachelorette” process, the fact he sometimes felt insecure and that Katie sometimes worried that he’d leave, but he told her, “I honestly feel like the luckiest guy in the world. You just amaze me in every way. If we do move forward into next week I am really excited to show my family the girl I’m falling in love with.”
“I hope you know how I feel,” answered Katie before handing over the rose and a guaranteed hometown date.
To complete the Seattle theme, Greg and Katie kissed — and kissed and kissed — and got soaking wet under torrents of fake rain. “I think that I’ve found the love of my life,” Greg said in his voice-over.
“Flowery with a twist”
For the final group date of the season, Katie took Michael, Justin, Andrew and Blake to an “art exhibit,” but all the canvases were of flowers that looked like lady parts, or “flowers that aren’t just flowers,” in Justin’s words. “Flowery with a twist,” was how Blake put it.
Although it wasn’t stated in the episode, the paintings were supposedly an homage to Georgia O’Keeffe, the famous artist who made her home in New Mexico, where the season is being filmed. Truth be told, they reminded me of that “Sex and the City” episode in which Charlotte is invited to sit for an artist who paints vaginas. But I digress.
The guys had to make their own art: Michael sculpted a replica of Katie’s butt; Justin painted a rose and what looked like little ghost people; Andrew painted, um, sushi, except one of the pieces had teeth and a tongue; and Blake painted something that apparently was so dirty it had to be blacked out.
With that bit of silliness over, it was on to the after-party and, with only four guys on the date, everybody got conversation and kisses.
Blake told Katie that he wasn’t in love with her, “but the way that we’re going it’s fucking inevitable.”
Michael worried throughout the episode whether Katie would fit in with his son, James, and his former in-laws, whom he “takes care of,” but she reassured him, “If it’s us in the end, that’s all that matters and we’ll figure it out as we go,” and also that every rose she gave Michael was also a rose for James. “I can assure you that no one can love you like I can,” Michael told her.
Justin gave Katie a painting of butterflies and a blue rose, and she said she felt “110 per cent myself” with him.
Andrew recreated his and Katie’s one-on-one date with strings of lights and a suspended pink envelope. The note inside said, “I’m falling for you.” And Andrew added, “I really am.” Based on the way Katie kissed him after he said it you might have thought she was falling for him too. But it was Michael who got the date rose and the second guaranteed hometown.
“At some point every boy has to move on”
You might wonder what the point was of Mike getting a one-on-one date when it was certain that he didn’t stand a chance of getting a hometown rose. All became clear when a woman known as “Cuddle Queen Jean” greeted Katie and Mike in the woods and guided them into various poses that involved bodily contact. Would producers pass up the chance to make the season’s token virgin do something that might make him uncomfortable? Yeah, duh.
Indeed, both Mike and Katie seemed rather uncomfortable given all the nervous laughter when they first began hugging and spooning, but then Mike relaxed because Katie is “a nurturer and man, do I love nurturers! She reminds me of my mom.”
Yes, that’s correct, Mike putting his body next to Katie’s put him in mind of his mom’s cuddles.
“Katie’s a better cuddler, there’s no question about it,” said Mike. “My mom’s gonna hate me for saying that, but at some point every boy has to move on.”
Mike even whispered “You remind me of my mom” to Katie while he was lying behind her with his arms around her. To Katie’s credit, she didn’t run off screaming right away, but she did let Mike go before they made it as far as dinner.
I have to say Mike was very gracious in his exit. “I’m bummed I don’t get to experience life with you. It doesn’t mean I’m not gonna be rooting for you,” he said.
“She knows what husband she’s looking for . . . it’s not me”
With Mike and Brendan gone, and Greg and Michael already in possession of roses, it seemed obvious that Blake and Andrew would make up the rest of the final four. Sure, Katie liked Justin, but his one-on-one had come late in the game, and she and Andrew seemed to have bonded over their difficult childhoods.
I actually expected Andrew to get the first rose at the ceremony, but it went to Blake and then Katie gave the final rose to . . . Justin?
With tears rolling down both their cheeks, Katie told Andrew she was building stronger connections with the other men “and you deserve more than what I can give you.”
“It’s bittersweet, but just know that I will forever hold you dear to my heart,” Andrew told her.
It kind of makes it worse when the men are so damn nice despite getting their hearts stomped on.
In the SUV of Shame, Andrew said, “She knows what husband she’s looking for and who that’s gonna be, it’s not me so . . .” wiping away tears.
Katie was a crying mess and, since there were still about 15 minutes left in the episode and she was telling some faceless producer that she wasn’t fully confident about the decision she’d made, it seemed obvious Andrew was going to return.
And return he did, knocking on Katie’s door the next day and telling her he came back so they could part with smiles instead of tears. As they hugged goodbye yet again, Andrew gave her an envelope and told her to open it when he was gone. Inside was a note that read: “If you change your mind . . . I’ll be waiting.”
Cue Katie running down the hall, following Andrew down the stairs and leaping into his arms when she caught up to him, as dramatic music swelled. And she asked him if he wanted to stay a little longer and he said . . . no.
“I want my future wife to choose me and I wasn’t chosen so I had to say no,” he explained.
In other words, no matter what the card said he wasn’t actually waiting for her, so the whole thing was a production trick. At least he and Katie got in one last smooch before he was driven away for good.
Katie, still wiping away a few tears, concluded, “This journey just wasn’t for us at the end of it.”
But given the fact the Twitter campaign has already begun to make Andrew the next Bachelor, his journey might just be beginning.
Next week, we get hometowns and Men Tell All in one episode.
You can tune in Monday at 8 p.m. on Citytv. And you can comment here, visit my Facebook page or follow me on Twitter @realityeo
CORRECTION: Man, this is embarrassing. I totally did not realize until I read someone else’s recap that Blake’s painting had been blacked out by ABC and he didn’t just paint a black square and say it was about sex. What can I say, I’m out of practice with my black bars, especially when they cover a whole freakin’ canvas.
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