‘The Bachelor’: Happily never after

by Therese Odell, posted in the bachelor, the bachelor: season 26

The Bachelor
March 15, 2022

TL;DR last recap: Clayton told Bachelor Groupie and Pilot Rachel that he slept with both of them, was in love with both of them, AND ALSO in love with Hannah Brown, Jr. And yet, somehow — through some sort of sweaty jock black magic — somehow he managed to convince both of them to stick around to meet his family. After introducing these lovely two women to said family, he then declared to his absolutely incredulous parents that J/K, forget those two women they just met and who he said he could see marrying because he’s actually in love with the woman who dumped his dumb ass when she found out that he had made the sex with the other two women.

Right. So. OK.

What you should know about these dumb shows is that when people are eliminated, especially on these last dates, they aren’t just sent home immediately, despite the dramatic Go Away Now Van driveaways. They’re not headed to the airport: they’re going back to the hotel. The producers aren’t going to send individuals home alone, because that way leads to potential spoilers for the whole season.

And that’s why Hannah Brown, Jr., despite having dumped this toothy couch some four days earlier, is still in the Reykjavik Hilton, where Jesse Palmer can harass her. Jesse Palmer goes to her room and announces that Clayton wants to see her that day. She agrees to think about it but makes no promises. 

GIRL, GET AN ICELANDIC UBER TO THE AIRPORT AND PAY YOUR OWN WAY HOME. IT’S JUST NOT WORTH IT.

Clayton, meanwhile, is back at the Airbnb with his exhausted parents yammering at them about how special Hannah Brown, Jr. is and how she’s worth fighting for if she’ll just give him a second chance.

Clayton’s mom: It’s not going to happen.

Clayton’s dad: There is a slim to zero chance she’s coming here.

So, of course, that’s when the producers send Hannah Brown, Jr. in through the front door. She awkwardly greets his parents, and when Clayton invites her to sit down, she’s like, “Yeah, actually, this is not that. Let’s go outside and talk.”

There, she tells him that while she thinks he’s a “good human being …”

… she is still shocked at how everything ended and the way he turned on her. He made her question her inner voice, he treated her like a stray dog, shooing her out of his life. If he really loved her, how could he treat her like that?

FAIR QUESTION. STICK WITH THIS INNER VOICE, HANNAH BROWN, JR.

“Clayton sorry Clayton made Hannah Brown, Jr. feel that way.”

~pausing to remind everyone for the 47,000th time that saying you’re sorry for making someone else “feel” a certain way is not an actual apology for your behavior~

“But Clayton scared! Clayton see losing Hannah Brown, Jr. and Clayton scared! Me lose everything if Hannah Brown, Jr. leave! This worth fight for! Give Clayton second chance!”

Hannah Brown, Jr. doesn’t agree to do so, but she also doesn’t shut his ass down on the spot, either. Instead, she tells him that she’s not in a place to make a decision, and gets back in the SUV and drives back to the Hilton.

As for Clayton, he finally realizes that he has to break up with both Bachelor Groupie and Pilot Rachel. To illustrate how contemplative he is being about this decision, they actually show Clayton in bed “journalling,” as if this fool knows how to write anything besides his own name.

But you know what? Full credit to this talking thumb for finally realizing that he can’t keep dicking everyone around and that it’s time to take a real risk by letting his backup plans go without knowing for sure if Hannah Brown, Jr. will actually take him back.

And as quickly as we give that credit, we take it all back — and then some — when it is revealed that Bachelor Groupie and Pilot Rachel are waiting for Clayton together.

BECAUSE HE INTENDS TO DUMP THEM AT THE SAME TIME.

Sure enough, Clayton enters the room and is like “Clayton thought Clayton in love with three lady. Clayton no in love with three lady. Clayton in love with one lady and one lady no you. Me love lady Hannah Brown, Jr. OK, goodbye.”

Bachelor Groupie gets up and leaves because, honestly. Clayton follows her down the hall and asks to talk, and she’s like, “ALRIGHT. LET’S TALK. I SPENT TWO EXTRA DAYS AWAY FROM MY FRIENDS AND FAMILY BECAUSE YOU BEGGED ME TO STAY. BUT THE ONLY REASON YOU DID THAT WAS BECAUSE YOUR PRIDE WAS HURT AFTER HANNAH BROWN, JR. LEFT YOUR ASS. YOU COULDN’T STAND NOT BEING THE ONE IN COMPLETE CONTROL, SO YOU CONTROLLED US.  AND IF THAT WASN’T BAD ENOUGH, YOU THEN DUMP US AT THE SAME TIME? LIKE IT WAS A GROUP DATE? THIS IS BULLSHIT, YOU ARE RIDICULOUS, AND YOUR BRAIN IS BROKEN.”

Clayton asks if he can walk Bachelor Groupie out and she’s NOT. HAVING. IT.

Hero. Goddamned hero.

Back in the Bachelor Studio, Jesse Palmer invites Bachelor Groupie — who, as far as I am concerned has, through that one act of FUCK YOUness, now earned her actual name: Gabby — to the couches.

On her way onto the stage, she spots her grandpa, the Cassandra of this whole mess:

 … and gives him a big weepy hug.

Jesse Palmer asks how she’s doing, and she notes that watching everything back has been a rollercoaster, but seeing all sides of the story has helped give her a lot of clarity.

Jesse Palmer asks about Breakup Day, and she’s like, “Yeah! That was some bullshit! I was really unhappy at the rose ceremony, but he convinced me to stay to meet his family, so I really thought it was going to be me in the end. SO IMAGINE MY FUCKING SURPRISE.”

Jesse Palmer asks Gabby if she was really in love with Clayton and she insists that she was: that he was her “safe space” and “allowed [her] to be [herself].” Jesse Palmer asks if she has thought about what she wants to say to him now, and she assures him that she has: “FUCK YOU, CLOWN.”

So, Clayton comes out.

And after an awkward hug, Gabby is like, “Look. You misled me. You weren’t forthcoming with all the information about what was going on. You betrayed me.”

Clayton is all, “Me sorry you feel that way.”

He also tells her that she has “every right” to feel that way, because he, obviously, is the final arbiter of other people’s emotions. I CAN NOT SAY THIS ENOUGH: FUCK THIS PERSON. YEET HIM INTO THE SUN.

Gabby tells Clayton that she knows he had no malicious intent, but reminds him that while he said he was being “transparent” at the rose ceremony, he wasn’t. He told her that he would be leaving Iceland with the woman he “loved the most,” except that he neglected to mention to Gabby or Pilot Rachel that he had already told Hannah Brown, Jr. that he loved her the most.

Additionally, Gabby explains, in the moment she believed that he was really able to compartmentalize their individual relationships, but that, upon watching it back, it is clear he was pitting them against each other, when she had been clear she didn’t want to be in a competition.

And let’s just all pause here in our love for Gabby to just point out to her that SHE IS SAYING THIS AS A CONTESTANT ON A REALITY DATING SHOW. I understand her point: that she expected to be judged based on her compatibility with him separate from his feelings for the other women, but that is 1. not how this show works, and 2. honestly, not how life works. I don’t think this comment is dumb as much as it is drinking the Kool-Aid that The Bachelor producers must feed these people to keep them from one day waking up, looking around, and realizing that they don’t actually have to fight 25 other women for the same worthless man.

ANYHOODLES. Clayton insists that he did love both Gabby and Pilot Rachel, and Gabby is like, “Yeah, about that ‘love.’ When you love someone you are accepting responsibility to protect them, to care for them, to not hurt them. And, buster, you didn’t do any of those things.”

The Bachelor Studio audience and all of America:

Gabby goes on to tell Clayton more truth: his words have weight, not that he seemed to realize it or care.

Jesse Palmer asks Clayton if he regrets telling Gabby that he was in love with multiple women, and he’s all, “Me no want withhold.”

“Yeah, except the part where you withheld from both Pilot Rachel and me that you were in love the most with Hannah Brown, Jr.” Gabby reminds him.

Clayton apologizes for making assumptions about her feelings and Jesse Palmer cuts them off there because otherwise we’d be here all night watching Gabby ripping Clayton a new asshole.

Back in Iceland, having NOT walked Gabby out, thankyouverymuch, Clayton returns to Pilot Rachel, who is clearly stunned. She begins talking about when she fell in love with him, how her mother knew she was in love with him, and “HEY REMEMBER THAT TIME FIVE DAYS AGO WHEN YOU SCREAMED AT ME THAT YOU WERE IN LOVE WITH ME? Yeah, and then … then … putting us through that rose ceremony and telling me that this would make us stronger and that we were worth fighting for. And I BELIEVED you! Like a CHUMP! Only to have you pull this bullshit right now? Bub, when you look back on this, the fact that you let me go, it is going to haunt you.”

Clayton: “Me understand you frustrate.”

“I FOUGHT FOR YOU,” she yells at him, “AND YOU NEVER ONCE FOUGHT FOR ME.”

Clayton is “sorry [she] feel that way.”

As Pilot Rachel sobs and smears the mascara across her face, Clayton insists that “No me love you when no me 100% in it.” He then asks if he can hug her goodbye, and unlike Gabby, she agrees.

And soon, he’s leading her out the front door of the hotel to put her in the Go Away Now Van EVEN THOUGH SHE IS IN A T-SHIRT AND THEY ARE IN ICELAND AND IT IS NOVEMBER.

My dude. I know you’re in a hurry to be done with this, but LET THE LADY PUT ON A COAT.

As he’s shoving her bare-armed into the van, Pilot Rachel is still sobbing and insisting that she never gave up on them, and will never stop fighting for him, “and OH MY GOD ARE YOU REALLY PUTTING ME IN THIS CAR RIGHT NOW?”

He is, not that she’s going to the airport right now, but instead to just drive around Reykjavík aimlessly and have a good cry.

In the Bachelor Studio, Pilot Rachel is out on the couch, watching all of this, and having another good cry, while in the audience, her dad Big Tony fantasizes about murder.

Pilot Rachel discusses with Jesse Palmer how hard it is to watch it all back, seeing someone about to be completely blindsided. And while that definitely sucks, the hardest part was knowing how hard she fought for the relationship only to be, along with Gabby, completely disrespected. He broke her heart once at the rose ceremony, but she kept going, only to have him break her heart a second time, and without the FUCKING DECENCY TO DO IT ONE-ON-ONE. 

Jesse Palmer notes that as Clayton was putting her in the Go Away Now Van, she was telling him that she would never stop fighting for him. Is she still in love with him today?

“AWW, HELL NO, ARE YOU CRAZY?” Pilot Rachel goes on to say watching back the way he disrespected both her and Gabby from the beginning of their time in Iceland, she realized he never acted like someone who truly loved her.

With that, Clayton is brought out and Pilot Rachel opens by telling him that he better not mistake any of her emotions as being for him. As an angry crier, I GET IT. She goes on to call him selfish and disrespectful and there are zero lies detected.

Clayton talks again about making assumptions and how he’s sorry that he made her go through all of that, but she’s not interested.

Pilot Rachel points out, again, that for all his talk of transparency, isn’t it interesting that he left the most important part of the Hannah Brown, Jr. story out: that he told her that he loved her the most? HE HAD TO HAVE KNOWN THEY WERE GOING TO WATCH THAT BACK, RIGHT?

And then to make her and Gabby go through that rose ceremony? To convince them to stay? To convince them to meet his parents? ONLY TO BREAK UP WITH THEM SIMULTANEOUSLY? Clearly, he was in a hurry to cast both of them aside as quickly as possible so that he could get back to “the person he loves the most.”

Jesse Palmer then turns to the glowering and dangerous Italian in the room, and asks Pilot Rachel’s dad, Big Tony, if he has anything to say.

Jesse Palmer asks Clayton if he has anything to say to Pilot Rachel’s family, and she again is all, “Me so sorry, me learning. Me try grow, be better talking refrigerator.”

Jesse Palmer asks Clayton if he’s “haunted,” referring back to the amazing curse Pilot Rachel placed on him on her way out the door.

Clayton says a bunch of mouthwords, but at the end of the day the answer is, “Nope. Not haunted.” Because for Clayton to have been haunted, he would have had to have been in love with her in the first place.

Jesse Palmer then gives Pilot Rachel one last question, and she asks Clayton straight up if he told her he loved her just to get into her pants. Clayton denies it, but she’s like, “whatever, liar.”

And we leave it at that because otherwise, Big Tony might storm the stage.

Back in Iceland, one last time. Clayton does the “pensive walk-around-town” bit talking about how much he wants to win Hannah Brown, Jr. back. “Me know long shot, me do what take.”

Jesse Palmer delivers a letter from Clayton to Hannah Brown, Jr.:

“Journey be test. TEST HARD. Sorry me hurt you. Without you, Clayton nothing. Me respect you, me respect you need time. So meet me tonight and tell me you decision.”

THAT IS NOT HOW ONE RESPECTS SOMEONE NEEDING TIME, CLAYTON. GODDAMMIT.

Clayton is driven to what can only be described as Game of Thrones Wildling hut fantasy. In reality, it’s a Viking restaurant called Ingólfsskáli, which serves preserved horse meat. And suddenly Clayton being chosen for this season begins to make a little sense:

There, Clayton waits for Hannah Brown, Jr. to arrive, and to his — and the producers’ — great relief, she shows up. Inside the Wildlings’ hut, Clayton tells her, “Me never stop fight for Hannah Brown, Jr. Me be man Hannah Brown, Jr. want me be, if Hannah Brown, Jr. give Clayton chance.”

Hannah Brown, Jr. is like, “Listen, I know you’re a good guy and I believe you have feelings for me. But. I don’t love you the way you love me. I’m leaving Iceland by myself.”

Clayton asks if Hannah Brown, Jr. thinks there could be a chance between them: “Me take time if Hannah Brown, Jr. need time. Me no let go til Hannah Brown, Jr. tell me it over.”

Hannah Brown, Jr.: “It’s over.”

The Bachelor Studio audience and all of America:

Clayton walks her out to the Get Me Away From Here Now Van, and watches her drive away while standing morosely in the rain.

Sad Clayton is sad.

Jesse Palmer notes that this is the first time in Bachelor history that a Bachelor has been dumped in the final episode — and honestly, it couldn’t have happened to a more deserving guy. On the couch in the Bachelor Studio, Clayton talks about his “journey” and his “growth” and how “Clayton learn lessons” and how what needed to happen happened.

But, Jesse Palmer prompts him: the story didn’t end there, did it? And Clayton reveals that “someone” reached out to him after he returned home.

That someone? To everyone’s disappointment?

Hannah Brown, Jr., who joins Clayton on the couch and announces that he’s her “boyfriend.”

GOD DAMMIT, HANNAH BROWN, JR. YOU GOT IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME. WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? IS YOUR BRAIN SMOOTH?

Hannah Brown, Jr. reveals that they were able to reestablish a relationship after they took some time apart. In that moment in Iceland when she correctly dumped his ass for a second time, she needed to choose herself. But that allowed them to reconnect and have necessary conversations.

Clayton notes he was as surprised as anyone when she reached out, but that they just took it one conversation at a time and rebuilt what they had.

Jesse Palmer asks Hannah Brown, Jr. if she loves Clayton and she says she does, insisting that she always had love for him, even before she fell in love with him.

They talk for a hot minute about the backlash they expect to face, before Jesse Palmer teases that Clayton might propose to Hannah Brown, Jr. right then and there. Because that would definitely be a SUPER cool thing to do in front of Big Tony and Gabby’s Grandpa. Instead, Clayton offers Hannah Brown, Jr. the final rose, and she accepts it.

But we end the episode on a high note: Jesse Palmer announces that Gabby and Pilot Rachel will be the next Bachelorettes TOGETHER. The producers were so impressed by how much they supported each other through this entire catastrophe, that they trust they will continue to be able to support each other while simultaneously dating the same 30 guys.

Mike Fleiss insists that they won’t be pitted against each other.

This is my skeptical face.

Still, you know where I’ll be when this nonsense returns (thankfully not until July).

Here are the ladies who have been eliminated along with their very not good nicknames:

Here is the woman who is still “dating” Clayton:

The Bachelor airs on ABC and streams on Hulu. It will, whether we like it or not, return in January.

One thought on “‘The Bachelor’: Happily never after”

  1. I fought for you and you never fought for me could be the last word for all the remaining women. Thsnk God the toothy dummy is left standing agape. I love daddy Tony to death. DESE ASSHOLES be gone. Here’s to strong woman not playing Bullshit. Love Gabby especially. ❤

    Reply

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