The Women Tell All is my least favorite episode of every season. Just a bunch of girls looking for one more shot to be on TV, all yelling at each other, while we have to watch replays of the drama we were already forced to watch entirely too many times during the season. Snooze fest. But rather than just not watch it and spend my time on more useful pursuits, I am choosing to watch and commentate on the spectacle. Why does this garbage franchise have such a hold on me?
I have told many of my friends that if any of the girls from this season are chosen as the Bachelorette, I will protest the franchise. As long as protest means continue to watch every single minute of it but complain the entire time. If you haven’t heard already, Clare Crawford from one billion seasons ago is the next Bachelorette. She is 38, and I’m hoping for a real change in the dynamics for the next season. Let’s get some grown men on this show, and a few less super douche haircuts and high water pants with loafers and no socks. Let’s see some DILFs up in here. Dad’s I’d Love Forever, obviously.
Before we dive into sane women calmly discussing their differences, let’s go back down unda’, mates. To continue fretting about who did and who did not go unda’, so to speak.
Peter arrives on scene to ask Papa Chris if he can call his mom to pick him up, because he wants to go home. He’s trying his very best, darn it, and it’s hard and stupid and his forehead hurts. Chris shoos him away to usher Hannah Ann and Victoria to stand awkwardly together and compare notes from foregoing their individual rooms. Hannah Ann chose a bedazzled flapper dress that I find somehow both confusing and cute, and Victoria wears a white shiny sheath dress that causes me to feel sweaty and bloated just imagining having to wear it. I would look like the Michelin tire man, but she looks like a smoke show. A very crazy and unstable smoke show, but nonetheless, I am sure Peter is struggling to regret their night together.
Madison finally shows up, wearing bee earrings to symbolize that she is angry. If the bee earrings don’t sent the message, the perma-scowl on her face will do it. Hannah receives the first rose, and as she hugs Peter, Madi’s eyes narrow in a very clear expression of disgust. She instantly remembers that this is one of the two women with whom Peter very recently bumped uglies and their extended hug is just salt in the wound. Peter now must choose between a very angry Madi and a very crazy Victoria, and looking like he is going to throw up, he calls Madison’s name.
She stomps forward, and very begrudgingly accepts the rose from Peter, looking like she just agreed to watch his dog while he’s on vacation, and not to possibly get engaged.
Peter and Victoria perch on a bench so Peter can deliver his platitudes of real feelings, and Victoria stares off into the distance, imagining leaving with Chase Rice when she had the chance.
Peter walks back to the podium and delivers the least convincing monologue of all time about how excited he is to continue this journey and spend time with each of them. I’ve never heard someone say such optimistic words while looking so nauseous.
Madi champions an incredibly passive aggressive toast of “Here’s to seeing if love can conquer all”, which is a diplomatic way of saying “Here’s to seeing if I can forgive you for being a big skank.”
We rejoin Chris Harrison on stage at the WTA. Chris is aging like a fine wine. He gets better looking and more believable as a concerned host each season. I believe him every time he says this season is the most dramatic ever. I believe him when he says he doesn’t know how this season will end, despite it being a complete impossibility of either of these statements being true.
Allow me to pause the show for a moment to hypothesize what will take place during the Women Tell All portion of this goat rodeo.
- Mykenna will cry a lot.
- Kelsey will cry a lot.
- Girls I’ve never seen before will have strong opinions and be very loud.
- All of the girls will yell over each other and point ratchet fingers at each other while Chris stares at the camera with a facial expression that’s a mix of sort of endearing and apologetic “Kids! Whatcha gonna do about them” and an inside jokey “Lol can you even believe this is my actual job?”
Let’s get into this.
We’ll start by introducing all of the girls. This is an excellent way to start, because I could sit next to the entire back row of women on a plane and never even have an inkling of a memory that they were once of my television screen looking for love.
Chris Harrison announces that everyone is here. Untrue. Where’s Kelly?? And Natasha? Did they not want to come? Not get invited? I’m very curious. If you have theories or some hot goss on the sitch, spill it.
I have a question about the signs in the audience. Do you have to get your sign approved by Mike Fleiss? Do they pre-make signs and give them to selected audience members? They just appear a bit too well done to be random signs made by fans.
We quickly revisit the drama of the season, because it’s been nearly 2 weeks since every other sentence was about Alayah and Victoria P and Tammy and their various absurdities.
Let’s discuss the notable wardrobe choices going on here. Alayah is dressed in head to toe black sequins. Victoria P is dressed in wrist to ankle blue satin. Tammy is wearing a shattered mirror half shirt. Long sleeves, plunging necklines, and short hems reign supreme. This is a puzzling distribution of fabric. What possible temperature would require your arms to stay warm, while your sternum and legs could stay comfortably bare?
Mykenna and Kelsey sit together to bolster each other up in the onslaught of Feelings that is about to ensue. Tammy chose her mirrored shirt so all of the insults flung at her would bounce off of her and stick to the eyelash glue of whichever angry blonde is hurling them. To be clear, I am not taking Tammy’s side here. I am always on the side of sanity, and there is none of that to be found on that stage.
Mykenna quickly scrolls her Pinterest board for the perfect empowering quote to really stick it to Tammy. She later makes a note to remember to remove Tammy from her top 8 on her myspace page and change the song to Kelly Clarkson’s “Behind These Hazel Eyes”.
Time for Kelsey to talk about her only memorable moment on the show. If I had a nickel for every time we’ve had to watch champagne come out Kelsey’s nose, I would be able to buy a guitar so I could take up guitar lessons instead of watching this show. To sum up this entirely too long portion of the show, Kelsey has a lot of feelings, Tammy’s eyes about rolled outta her head, and Ashley Iaconetti came out to tell her that even people who cry like unstable toddlers on television can eventually find love.
Victoria F is wearing the politician equivalent of the hot cop stripper outfit, with a crop top red blazer and miniskirt. The editors compile a 30 second highlight reel containing the only 30 seconds of the entire season where Victoria was not crying. In her time in the hot seat, Victoria vehemently denies that she’s been the cause of broken marriages, is endearingly self deprecating, and momentarily makes me forget about the veritable carnival mirrors of lies and circular conversations she tortured Peter with the whole season.
Next, we watch Peter, his parents, and Chris Harrison crash the most epic Bachelor viewing parties of all time. Geez, all of this time I’ve been mostly watching this show while running on the treadmill. Previous to this, I would have said I’m a big time Bachelor fan, but compared to these people, I’ve barely even heard of the show. There are costumes. Themed snacks. Decorations. Chants. Then we are exposed to a clearly orchestrated and nauseating scene of Peter’s parents making out in the back of the SUV. I will not dignify that eye roll worthy fabricated scene with further conversation, but I will briefly segue to a related story.
When I was 13 or 14, I went to the movies with a boy I had a massive crush on. After my parents picked us up from the theater (ha), they dropped us off to get some ice cream while they waited in the car. I walked out of McDonald’s with my crush, and to my complete and abject horror, my parents were in the driver’s seat, all the way reclined, making out like teenagers. I banged on the door in horror while my crush pleaded for the sidewalk to open up and swallow him whole. My parents were laughing their heads off. I think they were laughing too hard to pretend to be making out. My horrified crush and I sat in the back and drove home in mortified silence while my parents continued to bust out laughing and high five-ing. I was not amused in the slightest when it happened (understatement of my preteen angst), but I now think my parents are hilarious geniuses.
Anyway. Back to this dumpster fire, Peter takes a seat to have a casual chat with dozens of women he dumped on television. His most recent dump-ee, Victoria F, sits with Peter and the two have a very boring conversation about their very surface level relationship. A girl named Savannah that I have zero memory of asks Peter if he regrets choosing a bunch of dramatic jokers over and over again instead of hanging on to some possibly sane ones, and Peter recites his favorite line of “following his heart.”
Peter, I have bad news. Your heart is a very bad decision maker.
Chris invites us to give it up for America’s favorite pilot. (Uhh Victoria already did, heyooo.) Also, Chris… come on, let’s be real.
Bachelorette Rachel and Chris deliver a rattling PSA about online harassment. To be clear, I agree completely that there is entirely too much hate on the internet, and so many cowards hiding behind the anonymity of the internet to write cruel things about people they don’t know.
Listen, I love to poke fun at fake boobs and right reasons, but I know these are real people with real lives. I don’t know anything about them besides the caricature of them shown on a silly dating show. And I’m reminded that even the most obnoxious girl on TV is still a human being with feelings. So while I will continue to make jokes about cold sternums and FabFitFun, I will continue to try to keep my comments light hearted and good natured, and never make cruel jokes at the expense of real people on this show.
Anyway, let’s make fun of Peter some more. Peter walks through a barren Australian dessert, symbolic of the wasteland that is his heart. His scar buns, because Voldemort is nearby and ready to pounce on whichever girl he doesn’t propose to. In the teaser for next week, which- why do we need 2 nights to get through this? Come on, Chris. We don’t care about your live studio audience and your proclamation before and after each commercial break that this is the most dramatic finale ever. I’m dying to know what Chris tells Peter right before the final rose. True to this show’s form, he is probably telling Peter that there is a fantastic sale on his favorite pomade, and if he doesn’t act now, they will be sold out.
What are your predictions for next week?? This is a spoiler free space!
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