‘The Bachelor’: The dirty work of Hometowns

The Bachelor
February 20, 2017

Because The Producers have never met a situation they couldn’t turn into a cliffhanger, the previous episode ended after This Asshole sent Olya packing but before a rose ceremony could happen leaving the women — and by the women, I mean CorWin — panicking that he was going to send someone else home.

But within the first few minutes of the episode, This Asshole returns to the women’s house with four roses. Great news! Everyone’s families will be humiliated by a Hated Hometown, hooray!

Rose #1: SOOEY!
Rose #2: Valencia
Rose #3: CorWin
Rose #4: Rachel J.D.

First Hated Hometown: Hoxie, Arkansas

SOOEY! pulls up to meet This Asshole on a four-wheeler, wearing Daisy Dukes no less — a look that This Asshole calls “rugged” but which I call “MAGA” — while explaining that where she’s from they have fun by going “mudding” and “frog gigging.” She then drives him to a grain silo where they are stopped from climbing inside for some reason, by a cop who happens to be her brother.

I will give SOOEY! this: she does not hide her Arkansas.

After this dumb ruse with her brother, SOOEY! and This Asshole resume their four-wheeling, which ends with them rolling around half-dressed in a flooded field and NO. NO. YOU GET OUT OF THAT MUCK RIGHT NOW. DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU ARE ROLLING AROUND IN? DO NOT COME TO ME WHEN YOU GET E. COLI AFTER SPLASHING FILED SLOP INTO YOUR MOUTHS, YOU DISGUSTING HALFWITS.

 

Gross. You are both so gross. Stop being so gross.

At some point, This Asshole and SOOEY! find showers, hopefully infused with a low percentage solution of bleach, and head off to meet SOOEY!’s very decent parents, Tracy and Wesley.

Before the get-to-know-This-Asshole-who-maybe-wants-to-marry-our-daughter-maybe-is-just-stringing-her-along portion gets underway, however, SOOEY!’s dad has some good news to share with his daughter: after a battle with lung cancer, his doctor has declared him cancer-free. Yay! This is wonderful news! And everyone cries and it is very happy.

The first of our obligatory series of conversations is between SOOEY! and her father where she tries to talk about This Asshole, but he keeps talking about how he didn’t think he would live long enough to see her get married and how it doesn’t much matter to him who it is she marries, as long as he is the one who gets to walk her down the aisle.

But — and I really don’t mean to be an jackass here — but I can’t help but wonder if SOOEY! was so concerned about her father’s health why she would choose now to go be on a reality show for three months, possibly longer if she were chosen to be The Bachelorette or roll the STD dice on Bachelor in Paradise. And whoops, I was just an jackass.

SOOEY! then chats with her mother who after noting that This Asshole is not nearly as much of an asshole as she expected him to be, tells her daughter she’s concerned that SOOEY! won’t be able to tell This Asshole that she loves him. Which is a weird thing for her to be concerned about with a guy her daughter just introduced her to an hour ago? That’s weird, right? It’s not “trying to make rolling around in a giant puddle sexy” weird, but it is weird.

Meanwhile, This Asshole chats with SOOEY!’s father who also tells This Asshole that he not nearly as much of an asshole as he thought he was going to be, because these nice country folk clearly had Ideas about who This Asshole is. SOOEY!’s dad then expresses his confidence in his daughter’s choices, so if she wants to marry This Asshole, welp, who’s he to stop her, he’s just happy to not have the cancer anymore.

And with that, SOOEY! walks This Asshole out to the car, but, as her mother feared, does not tell him that she is in love with him, which is a whole thing with her (probably because The Producers pound it in their heads that this is the episode where they have to share their feelings). BUT DIDN’T SHE TELL HIM WEEKS AGO THAT SHE WAS FALLING IN LOVE WITH HIM? AT THE HAUNTED HOUSE? HAVE WE ALL JUST FORGOTTEN THAT?

Anyway, the point is This Asshole is free to leave Arkansas for forever and ever, amen.

Second Hated Hometown: Dallas, Texas

 

This Asshole’s next stop is Dallas where he meets Rachel J.D. and she literally takes him to church.

This Asshole is very comfortable and fits in seamlessly:

 

 

Rachel J.D. then brings him to her parents house to meet her formidable mother, her two sisters, a cousin and her white brother-in-law, and all anyone wants to talk about is race. It is literally every question that they face, as if it is just now news to them that they are an interracial couple.

So, we haven’t talked here about the fact that we know Rachel J.D. is our next Bachelorette (though I’ve mentioned it on the blog somewhere else), but the fact that it is public knowledge before she has been eliminated from the series does create a great deal of dramatic irony and makes this entire Hated Hometown utterly meaningless. Who cares if Rachel J.D.’s brother-in-law is desperately trying to bond with the other white guy with a dumb beard? Who cares what Rachel J.D.’s mother thinks about this white boy from Wisconsin? Who cares if This Asshole reminds Rachel J.D.’s mother of her husband who couldn’t be bothered to show up to this sham? None of this matters because these people are never going to be This Asshole’s in-laws and, in fact, he’ll never see them again unless he watches her Bachelorette season finale.

Third Hated Hometown: Miami, Florida

 

Well, this is fitting: for her Hated Hometown, CorWin meets This Asshole at some upscale mall in Miami where she takes him shopping and buys him $3,000 worth of clothes which amounts to a pair of skinny jeans, a t-shirt and maybe a pea coat, it’s unclear if he decided if he actually needed it or not.

And honestly, I’m not sure which is grosser: making out in a mud puddle or allowing someone you’ve been dating on a reality TV show to buy you thousands of dollars worth of sportswear.

Spending more on casual wear than most people spend on their mortgage works up an appetite, and to this end This Asshole and CorWin grab a bite to eat. There, CorWin announces that she is in love with This Asshole because she, unlike some contestants, knows how to take the Producers’ suggestions.

CorWin then brings This Asshole to her very Greek parents’ high rise apartment where she, an adult woman, still lives. There, This Asshole meets her father, who already thinks This Asshole is an asshole, her mother, who is also pretty sure This Asshole is an asshole, her sister and the famous Raquel.

After a dinner of marinated olives and a lot of wine, CorWin chats with her father who points out to his daughter that she’s only been dating αυτό το μαλάκα for six weeks, and is understandably skeptical that she can really be in love with him. Her father then asks a much more interesting question: so what is it that αυτό το μαλάκα does for a living? Software sales? Does she really think software sales is going to keep her in the lifestyle in which she is accustomed? And if not, is she cool with being the breadwinner in the family? CorWin insists that she is fine with all of this; her American Express black card begs to differ.

Meanwhile, This Asshole receives the nanny’s blessing.

CorWin’s mother reminds her that there are still three other women in this thing and that THIS WHOLE STUPID SHOW IS JUST ONE BIG STUPID FANTASY THAT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH REAL LIFE. So, I guess she’s not Team This Asshole?

And in the other room, This Asshole chats with CorWin’s father who, after bragging about his 15-year-old single malt scotch, proceeds to ask This Asshole about his earning potential and whether his male ego could handle making less money than his wife. This Asshole, literally:

But after all this, CorWin’s father “gives his blessing” in the sense that he shrugs and is like, “if CorWin’s happy, great.”

 

 

 

And then CorWin walks This Asshole out to his car where she kisses him goodbye while her ENTIRE FAMILY WATCHES FROM THEIR APARTMENT.

Hated Hometown #4: Montreal, Quebec which is in Canada, guys. 

This Asshole’s final Hated Hometown takes him to Montreal to visit Valencia, and it’s a spectacular shitshow.

To be fair, it starts off well enough. First Valencia takes This Asshole to her school where she is reunited with her adult special needs students. She then engages the students in some slave labor busy work, having them create a scrapbook of her memories with This Asshole, while encouraging her students to say they like This Asshole. They are not convinced.

Things take a turn for the worse at Valencia’s mother’s house. Valencia’s parents are divorced and have chosen to not get over themselves long enough to host a single dinner together. At Valencia’s mother’s home, This Asshole meets everyone important in Valencia’s life (except her father and step-mother) which amounts to approximately one thousand Italians, including her siblings, her nonna and nonno, cousins, cousins, friends, aunts.

After a huge dinner, because Italians gonna be Italian, Valencia talks to her brother and sister, both of whom ask her if this thing works out with This Asshole, where will she live? Where will she work? Is she willing to give up her career, her dreams to be with This Asshole? And you’ll be shocked to learn that even though we are two weeks away from these people possibly getting engaged, they have not, in fact, discussed any of these very basic questions.

Meanwhile, This Asshole is grilled by Valencia’s mother, who demands to know what is it about her that This Asshole is drawn to, and This Asshole is like, “She’s pretty?” Shockingly, this does not impress Mama Cathy. Next, This Asshole talks to her sister who asks This Asshole the same questions about what their plans are post-show, and This Asshole is like, “I dunno?” Sister is all, “THIS IS NOT A FUCKING JOKE, GUY, AND SHE IS PUTTING ALL OF HER HOPES AND DREAMS ON THE LINE FOR YOU AND YOU BETTER NOT FUCKING BREAK HER HEART OR I WILL CUT YOU.” And This Asshole, I shit you not, he starts crying again.

So that went well.

Finally: Valencia’s father’s house where This Asshole meets Valencia’s father and step-mother, and things, somehow, manage to go from very bad to much, much worse.

Like her mother, Valencia’s father demands to know from This Asshole what it is, exactly, that This Asshole finds special about his daughter, you know, since he’s DATING THREE OTHER WOMEN. This Asshole makes some noises about how she makes him feel like he can be himself around her, that they have a level of trust and blah blah blah safe blah.

This Asshole then cuts to the chase and asks if he can have Valencia’s father’s blessing if he chooses to propose to his daughter and Valencia’s father is like, “First of all, I just met you so, I’m not exactly inclined to give you permission to marry my daughter. But second of all: did you ask the other parents for their blessing to marry their daughters?” When This Asshole admits that he did, Valencia’s father is like, “So then what does a blessing mean to you, exactly? Imagine you had a daughter and some asshole you had known for all of five minutes asked for your daughter’s hand in marriage, what would that mean to you?” And This Asshole makes a dumb word salad and Valencia’s father is like, “Ugh, fine, whatever. Sure, you can ‘marry’ my daughter if she wants to marry you.”

AND THEN IT GETS EVEN WORSE because when Valencia speaks with her father, he tells her about This Asshole asking for his blessing and how he begrudgingly gave it and Valencia brightens. But then her father informs her that This Asshole asked all the other parents for their blessings, too. “BUT THAT MAKES IT LESS MEANINGFUL,” she whines.

 

With that, Valencia walks This Asshole out and there are tears and she talks about how worried she is that and I swear, I will never not be surprised by the idiots who come on this show either never having watched it before or come on it thinking that somehow their experience will be different, as if they have any actual free will in this entire exercise. Poor dumb dummies.

And then everyone is sent to New York City where they spend their time waiting for the next Rose Ceremony by standing on balconies and staring into the middle distance pretending to be pensive.

However, This Asshole’s balcony time is interrupted by a surprise visitor: Andi “What the Hell Are You Doing Here” Dorfman. OH, GIRL, I HOPE YOU’RE HERE TO SCREAM AT HIM FOR ALL THE STALKING AND SLUT-SHAMING HE DID TO YOU.

Here are the ladies who were eliminated along with their dumb nicknames:

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And here are the women along with their nicknames who are still stuck dating This Asshole:

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The Bachelor is on Mondays at 7/8 p.m. on ABC and NEEDS TO GET OUT OF THAT PUDDLE.