The second episode of our Bachelorette
double-header found us in, uhh, Connecticut. It’s no South Korea, but it
is the home of Mohegan Sun. I’m a big fan, but I’m also have a pretty
crippling gambling addiction. If I were Andi, I would have probably
conducted all of my dates at a craps table. One of the many, many reasons
why I am not the Bachelorette.
The first one-on-one date tonight went to
Dylan. This was perfect for him, as he was very anxious to tell about his
dead relatives. Like, literally, that was all he wanted to do.
Dylan spent every minute of the beginning of that date looking for an
opening. He somehow managed to work it in during a conversation about
past relationships (“My ex got engaged, and that was okay except that she got
engaged the day after my brother’s funeral.” “Oh, okay.”). He finally
finds just the right segue, and goes into an admittedly sad story about losing
both his brother and his sister to drugs. Not to be insensitive, but this
story would have had a much greater impact had we not heard in verbatim the
night before when he told it to Chris. Also lessening the impact was that
Dylan made sure to point out to Andi how open he was being and how quickly his walls
were coming down. Of course, after that story, Andi pretty much had no
choice but to give him a rose and despite her protestations, that was most
definitely a pity rose. Now, I like Dylan, so I’m hoping he finds a new
topic of conversation because he is way too depressing at this point. And keep
in mind the timing here – he points out how important it was that he be there
for his mother, who was just crippled by these deaths. This happened in
NOVEMBER. If this was airing in live time, which it is not, we’re talking
6 months later. Really, he probably up and left like 2 months afterward.
The rest of the guys (other than Marcus) were up for a group date. Was it just me, or was Tasos genuinely excited to be sent on the date with 11 other guys. Wonder what that’s about. Turns out the guys were going to hoop it up, as I like to call it. When a bunch of very scary ladies appear on the court, Josh “recognizes” some of the them from their careers in the WNBA. Yeah, okay. Right. I’m sure Josh is very familiar with WNBA players, much like the rest of the country. Still, the women absolutely crush the guys in a game. The final score was something like 50 to 12. After that embarrassment, it’s time for the guys to play each other. They change into tank tops, and, cool tribal tattoo, Patrick. Obviously, Brian is very into this. He is now going full coach. Everyone apparently is now calling him Coach, which I don’t like. There’s only one Coach, and y’all better recognize.
This game seems like they’ve been going for a
while and I think we saw like 15 baskets, and yet the halftime score is
6-6. What? The red team crushes the hopes and dreams of the white
team (but only after the producers showed a clip of every single dude on the
white team telling us that there was no way they were going to lose), who then
goes back to the locker room and cries like a bunch of bitches. It’s not
like your brother and sister both died of tragic overdoses, you lost two hours
hanging out in the Mohegan Sun casino. Life goes on (not for you, Eric).
Surprisingly, the producers seem to have cut the scene where Tasos tried to
break the tension by encouraging everyone to hop in the group shower.
The winning team gets to go sit on couches
somewhere in the vicinity of the casino with Andi, and I hope that the
producers at least gave them a couple of bucks to gamble with (that might be my
addiction talking). Eric and Andi share a moment that does not go well
after she tells him that he’s not opening up enough. He complains about
how structured their interactions are and I question whether he understands
that he is on a television show. He tells Andi about how he grew up a
Mormon and left the church and I was pretty bummed that it didn’t turn into an
exposé of secret Mormon rituals but apparently Andi and I do not share common
interests because she did not immediately ask him about them. Brian,
whose mysterious black eye seems to finally be healing, brought Andi back to
the basketball court and made a pretty solid half-court shot. The
combination of that shot and Brian’s khaki pants, argyle sweater and pools of
sweat drove Andi wild, but instead of going in for the kiss, Brian went with a
classically romantic high-five. Nice job, buddy! He does, however,
manage to beat out a very handsy Nick for the group date rose.
Finally, it’s time for a one-on-one with
Marcus, who kind of looks like the German villain from a Die Hard movie.
This was a classic “overcoming your fears date” rappelling down a hotel and
Andi is TRIPPING OUT. Why is she requesting dates to overcome her own
fears? That’s not what this show is about. She’s not supposed to be
the one who looks dumb. It was a pretty cool moment for feminism when she
needed Marcus to save her and talk her through it. Strangely enough,
their rappelling adventure takes them past the window to the guys’ suite who
bang on the window but also mock Marcus for crying, which was pretty funny.
Marcus is rewarded for his bravery with a concert with a guy whose name is
apparently Jon Pardi! I had to look this guy up online and it wasn’t
easy, and yet Marcus allegedly knows the words? I really don’t get the
patented raised stage in the middle of a concert that the bachelor does.
It is so, so awkward. Overcome by the sweet dulcet tones of Jon Pardi,
Marcus tells Andi that he’s falling in love with her. Are we not like 8
days in? Seems a little premature, it’s not even hometowns yet!
Can’t possibly go wrong.
The cocktail party is where things start
getting a little nutty, and this season finally gets interesting. Before
we even get to the Eric debacle, I would be remiss to not give credit to Andi
for how “urban” she gets around Marquel. First, she said he has “swag”,
then she told him her favorite color is black, now she wanted to come up with a
nickname for him and went with Marquel Fresh. I respect the effort, but
for someone from the ATL, this is a pretty weak showing. You can do better,
Andi. She then proceeds to choke him out. Really. I hope they
don’t end up taking a trip to Thailand this season because things could get
weird.
Then the fireworks started. Eric pulled
our dear Andi aside for a chat where he starts by informing Andi how open he
has been with her, but that she hasn’t been open with him. He also does
this charming thing where he tells her that she’s not being herself (because he
knows her so well) and that he “came on this to meet a person, not a TV
actress”. I suppose you could say that she didn’t take this
well. In fact, Andi is pissed which leaves Eric smugly satisfied (“This
is the real Andi I was talking about”). Fucking Eric. At least he
recognizes he’s done and gets the hell out of there. Andi comes back in
and has a minor freak-out which
sadly did not turn into this.
Instead of a rose ceremony, however, we got a
very special Chris Harrison moment for yet another segment on Eric’s terrible
horrible no-good very bad paragliding excursion. According to Chris, it
didn’t seem important who did or didn’t get a rose. Umm, maybe not to
you. The rest of us have a game to win. The timing is particularly
interesting as a tribute to Eric since he was such a dick in his last
scene. We do find out that Tasos was sent home. We didn’t even get
to say goodbye! We didn’t even get to discuss that he’s a wedding
planner! Life isn’t fair!
No episode next week, so it looks like we’re
going to have to wait a pretty long time to find out who Andi’s secret admirer
is!
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