Courtesy of ABC
Wow, this week JJ and Clint give us the drama all reality TV viewers crave. As they say, “A villain’s gotta vill.”
Let’s bitch it out…
When we left off last week, Kaitlyn had just kicked Kupah off. He’s still ranting and raving in the driveway. Kaitlyn goes out to talk to him because the producers told her to to protect the cameramen. After one last ditch effort at staying (because nothing is more attractive than oscillating between anger and juvenile begging), Kupah finally leaves.
At the world’s most dragged-out rose ceremony, Kaitlyn keeps: Tony the Healer (I’m assuming because the producers made her), Ben Z., Ben H., Shawn B., Tanner, Chris, Ryan (who?), Justin, Ian, Josh, Jared, and Joe.
The first date is Sumo wrestling, because last week’s boxing event only allowed Kaitlyn to see abs, and apparently we all need a little butt cheek. Or, in Joe’s case, everything he has (how did everyone else figure out how to tie it correctly except Joe?). One of the Sumo instructors is the largest Japanese person ever at 600 lbs (I feel like us Americans have that beat, easy). Some of the guys are very excited about this date, because it’s like JJ says, “I really like Japanese culture. I love sushi.” Ummm…yeah.
Besides seeing Joe’s junk and JJ’s dad bod, Sumo wrestling has Tony freaking out. You see, Tony hates violence. We know this because he’s aggressively screaming about it to the guys coming over. Oh boy… You see, Tony left everything to be here (his “career,” his dog, and his bonsai trees). So after some introspection – because Tony’s so deep and doesn’t want to “XXXXX his primal instinct” – he decides to leave. After putting on his best 1990s baha hoodie pullover, Tony gives Kaitlyn a condescending speech, ignores all the guys, and drives off into the sunset. Kaitlyn doesn’t even pretend to be upset that someone else left of their own accord.
On the post-wrestling group date, Clint decides he’s going to ignore Kaitlin because the ladies loves brooding guys. It backfires big time when Shawn B. pulls out the big guns (“I’ve never fallen so hard, so quickly”) and gets the date rose. Ben Z, who is the new front runner unless he starts making out with JJ, gets this week’s one-on-one date. I guess the production interns heard us complain about the same ol’ dates last week, because this one is horrific. It’s a basement haunted house set up with a scavenger hunt and a poor, bloody actor crawling around the floor. For those of you who were interested in setting this up in your house, but don’t like bugs, don’t worry, the pigeons, snakes and scorpions were added by The Bachelorette props crew, they are not part of the normal date package. Phew. They put that disclaimer up there as if we’re actually going to book this event and, if so, would be disappointed at the lack of maggots.
We follow up the horror show with a romantic night, in which Ben Z. shares he hasn’t cried in 11 years. He doesn’t explain whether he has seen Rudy during this time period. I think that would help us assess the situation further. Unsurprisingly, Ben Z. and his muscles get the date rose.
Our next group date is marginally better than a horror house: teaching sex-ed to middle schoolers. My first thought: how did a school agree to this? Don’t they need parental consent? Oh, the kids are actors. Phew.
Each man gets a topic and poor Joshua gets shafted with tampon demonstrations and female puberty. Also, I would like to see ABC’s guidelines on what to blur and beep. It seems totally arbitrary and confusing that we can talk about vaginas and demonstrate putting a condom on a banana, but saying “penis” and a tampon demonstration is a no-no. Is this sexist?
Ryan also gives a presentation, which is a good reminder that Ryan exists. Ben H. discusses fertilization and he nails it! Which is good, because he’s got a lot of competition from the other Ben (Z). He engages Kaitlyn and talks about love, and I have flashbacks to the video my mom made me watch when I was 8 that showed cartoon sperm in a swimming race in a lap pool and the winner married the egg. But I digress…Ben H. wins the date rose and Jared is PISSED. Like, “I might murder you in your sleep” pissed.
Courtesy of ABC
Now to the big elephant in the room: Clint and JJ’s everlasting romance. Turns out, just like magnets, d-bags are pulled to one another. They’ve bonded since they’re “the brainiacs” of the group. They teach each other wrestling moves, squeeze each other’s back acne in the shower (ugh), wear matching neon orange shorts, and gaze into each other’s eyes while strumming the guitar. A HUGE bonus should go to the editor who put together that montage.
At the rose ceremony, Clint tries to salvage his connection with Kaitlyn after giving her the cold shoulder. He cites a romance novel-level artificial obstacle (i.e. I like you so much and was so nervous that I sabotaged it). He almost gets away with it, too – if it wasn’t for those meddling kids. By which I mean the other tattle-tell bachelors who inform Kaitlyn that Clint and JJ are not “there for the right reasons.” Turns out that Clint IS that terrible, saying he kissed Kaitlyn because “I feel like I had the power, so I had to abuse it.”
Kaitlyn’s bullshit detector starts to buzz as she storms off trying to find Clint to confront him. I’m not sure why she’s only mad at Clint and not JJ, but I guess we’ll see next week if the boys both go off together, roseless.
What did you think? Are JJ and Clint actors or is it possible to be that naturally douchey? Should we be concerned that Joshua didn’t have his first kiss until college? Are you going to miss Tony the Healer? Sound off below!
The Bachelorette airs Mondays at 8pm EST on ABC. We highly recommend following it up with a dose of Lifetime’s UnReal, which basically eviscerates the fabricated nature of reality TV dating. Great combo!