I think it’s safe to say that this is essentially how we all feel about this season at this point.
Sarcasm aside, thanks to both my current LA fatigue and the fine work of the Cleveland tourism board, I was pretty intrigued by this Cleveland footage. Unfortunately poor Kiarra seems to be a bit too idealistic about her time here, based on her expressed desire to “try and see and do everything that this place has to offer.” Umm, you’ll be lucky if you get to leave the hotel more than once.
Victoria starts out the dates this week, and her pre-date mood is honestly me before I exit the car to meet any date, let alone one that involves facing one of my biggest fears.
While I was watching this date I had one of the most grandmotherly thoughts possible, as I wondered how Victoria F didn’t get sick after spending the entire day outside in the rain wearing a low cut crop top. Honestly I would LOVE to know what the Bachelor producers are feeding these contestants to keep their immune systems healthy enough to avoid [visible] illness over the course of multiple flights, insufficient attire, weakened mental states, and constant alcohol consumption, because I’ve never noticed a single sick contestant across multiple seasons.
But we soon see that falling sick is a much favorable fate to the one Victoria F actually has to face:
The producers have truly outdone themselves from a mental fuckery standpoint. Of all the contestants’ exes to plant, Victoria F’s is a solid choice from their perspective. Going off of previous episodes, her anxiety and subsequent tears were all but guaranteed. And then for them to watch Chase and Peter exchange numbers then look Peter dead in the eye as he blissfully states that he could see Chase playing at his hypothetical wedding to Victoria – if that isn’t savagery, then I don’t know what is.
In theory, Peter should have been tipped off by Victoria F’s unnatural level of comfort addressing Chase.
But this obviously wasn’t a tip-off, because he is absolutely flummoxed when the news breaks:
All in all, this is a total non-issue – as it SHOULD be, unless Victoria F were to admit to still having feelings for Chase at this point. And honestly, even if she did, Peter of all Bachelors would probably be the most likely to empathize given how this process started for him. Now had Victoria F admitted to also having dated the cellist in the past…then we may have an issue.
Now comes the obligatory sports date of the season, which this week happens to be football. This episode’s alignment with the week of the Super Bowl was honestly just in time for us to receive a vital crash course in how the game of football works – I truly would have been lost on Super Bowl Sunday without this nugget of wisdom:
Surprisingly (or actually not that surprisingly), this game was more exciting than most Super Bowls of recent years, as Shiann dominated yet still managed to be thwarted by an epic comeback from the other team. Unfortunately we see once again, that the winning strategy is to work smarter, not harder. You can tire yourself out scoring four touchdowns to get lifted momentarily…
…OR you can cite back pain and get sideline massages without doing any work whatsoever.
At this point, Peter is pretty upfront about his desire to see the girls be aggressive in their attempts to get his attention – it’s why Hannah Ann received the first impression rose after stealing him THREE times, going back for a second makeout, and most egregiously, referring to herself in the third person on night one – and it’s also the reason why Victoria P’s decision to steal him first after monopolizing part of his time on the sideline is rewarded with this response:
With that knowledge, why not even take it a step further? You got sent home?? Clearly he doesn’t know what he wants, so why not just go over his head entirely.
Thoughts about Alayah aside, which I will get into shortly, she does have a valid bone to pick with Victoria P, given the clear and provable inconsistencies between their stories.
In the episode 3 recap I mentioned that I had some episode 4 specific gripes about Victoria P, and now is finally the time to address them. I can’t deal with someone who tries to gaslight people as a diversion tactic when they get called out. When Peter calls Victoria P on saying something that has been fully contradicted (i.e. saying she only knew Alayah for 3 hours) she pivots to talking about “my truth,” which apparently differs from what the actual truth is. And then she goes on to cry and talk about how frustrated she is because she’s shown her “whole heart” and opened up, presumably in reference to the story she shared about her past. As if that absolves her of telling the truth, and it’s not possible to be both open AND honest in a relationship.
“My truth in that moment” seems to be the equivalent of what’s most convenient for whatever narrative is being spun.
What’s most frustrating in this is that Peter is STILL blinded by this. Even though Victoria has been outed as a liar, he is still under her spell enough to be comforting her in this moment.
Have you ever gone to brunch and been torn between a sweet and savory option? These items are diametrically opposed to one another, and objectively pretty terrible for your health. But they’re tempting, and more eye-catching than some of the other sensible menu items (looking at you, oatmeal). You know you shouldn’t order either, but you have a moment of weakness and say “fuck it,” before placing your order for both. That is essentially what Peter did by keeping both Alayah and Victoria P around in the face of multiple red flags.
I would like to point our that this is the second time Peter has extended a woman an invitation to return to the mansion in a mere four episodes.
While Peter isn’t exactly nailing the group date thing, he is batting 1000 in terms of one-on-ones. As tempted as I am to roll my eyes every time he says “You’ve really shown your heart throughout this process,” or “I can tell you have a beautiful heart, etc, I do feel like he’s being earnest about how he feels. And his raw display of emotion on Kelsey’s date only furthers my confidence about it.
Kelsey has really come a long way in my mind since episode 2, and all of her irrational behavior seemingly evaporated along with the remnants of that Des Moines champagne as she gives the most reasonable response to the Alayah situation (and subsequently wins MAJOR points with Peter). Honestly, who would have thought that Peter would eventually be describing KELSEY in this sentence:
Or this one:
And most importantly, she’s provided a peek behind the curtain to demonstrate how the women on this show consistently pull off these seemingly spontaneous jumps without falling:
One peek behind the curtain was very much UNappreciated, however, and that was Alayah’s Chase Rice reveal.
I have to hand it to Victoria F – she had to face a fear of heights, an ex-boyfriend, and subsequent gossip about that ex-boyfriend in the span of a single episode, and clearly by this point she has had it.
All of the girls’ frustrations finally come to a head during the cocktail party, to which Peter drives up blissfully unaware in what I’m pretty sure is the same car he couldn’t stop raving about from Lexi’s entrance.
I can just hear the hypothetical narrator now – “Peter did NOT, in fact, know what he was doing.”
In a surprising move, Deandra beats Natasha to the punch when it comes to calling Peter out in front of all of the women, and yet again, Kelley kills me with a not-so-subtle smirk at the ensuing drama.
What’s really frustrating about this though, is that Victoria P uses the collective frustrations of the house as justification to continue gaslighting Peter, with absolutely zero acknowledgement of her dishonesty. From my perspective, her insistence over the fact that Peter asked her opinion makes it seem like she’s upset by the fact that he didn’t end up sending Alayah home for good, as if he’s required to blindly take her recommendation.
Of course in this case it certainly WOULD have been the right decision to commit to sending Alayah home, for a multitude of reasons at this point. I could see Peter going through all of the accusations against Alayah and feeling confused by them, because they’re all behaviors he hasn’t experienced first hand (e.g. stirring the pot with the Chase news, asking Victoria P to withhold info from producers, acting generally fake). But at the end of the day, it IS important to listen when a multitude of people are piping up with the same concerns about one person. First of all, she is the common denominator across multiple conflicts, and clearly some of these issues are being raised by women whose opinion he actually trusts (Victoria P happening to be one of them). And even if you DO feel that she’s in the right, think about the constant stresses that lie ahead if you choose to date someone who clearly rubs people the wrong way on such a consistent basis.
I’m not feeling extremely compelled to single out any particular frontrunners or chopping block victims, but I DO want to pose the following:
Outstanding Questions:
What could have possibly happened to break through to both Natasha and Tammy to make THEM cry?? Now, and only now, will I take the drama in the house seriously.
How is it possible that everyone in the mansion avoids getting sick season over season, yet it’s impossible to get through any season without an ambulance getting called?
