S25.E09: Week 9

[tennisgurl]

For such a wild season, this was a ridiculously boring WTA. I cant even be mad that I missed watching live, and that's most of the reason I watch this show! You could tell all of the women were on their best behavior, a lot of them (especially Victoria and the mean girls) have gotten a lot of blowback on social media for their shitty behavior so they were really trying to come off better, but it ended up making everything feel boring and stilted. A lot of awkward half assed apologizes, excuse making, and Bachelorette auditions. Anna of all people probably had the best apology, she actually took some personal responsibility which is more than most of them did, although I crack up every time she talks about what a "small town" Chicago is. Like @LBS so eloquently stated, the Chicago that seems to live in, the tiny bubble of the young, rich, and beautiful, is a small town, but Chicago itself certainly isn't. 

As much as the women tried to sound more polite, the means girls really seemed more pissed off at Katie for bringing their crap to light than at any of the people who were actually being crappy to each other. They seem to see being called out for their bullying as being bullied, and that anyone trying to stop drama is just causing by trying to deal with it. While I hate seeing anyone ganged up on, especially online, it seems like they can dish it out but they cant take it. Even while she was trying to be more dignified (and she finally looked halfway decent) Victoria still seems like a truly horrible black hole of a person. She seems actually unbalanced sometimes, and if she is then I feel bad for her, but she mostly just seems like an immature mean girl with delusions of grandeur. She cant even pull off queen bitch because she absolutely reeks of desperation and messiness, she fully seems like she lives on another planet, and that planet is super obnoxious. The perfect storm of dumb, mean, and trashy. She is literally the worst person this show has had in ages. 

Katie, Serena, and Abigail all seemed to be giving their Bachelorette auditions, as they all seemed to be liked by fans. I like Katie and Serena, but I think Abigail has the best shot of the women who are not still in the running. She's likable, pretty, seems to have a pretty good head on her shoulders, has a sufficiently tragic backstory, and the franchise is clearly looking to increase its diversity so having a deaf mixed race Bachelorette would be appealing to them. I thought her talking about feeling like she feels caught in the middle between the hearing and deaf communities was the most interesting conversation of the night, I think she would do a good job. Of course, its easy to look good this season, all you have to do is not call any of your fellow contestants a ho or call them a hooker for a few episodes. 

There are so many dates we never saw, its like there was a whole different show going on that we never got to see. Everything was so consumed with insufferable drama and Most Obvious Plant Ever Queen Victoria that we missed all of the things that this show is actually supposed to be about. We spent so much time fighting that I feel like we hardly even know most of the women, especially ones who weren't bullying the other women and hogging screen time. Its been a problem with this franchise for awhile, but this season was especially bad. They spend so much time on their contrived drama and asshole antics that we hardly get to see most of the people that could actually win, and it overwhelms the actual romance that this show is supposed to be about. 

[dizzyd]

Chicago is the 3rd largest city in the country after NY and LA, so it blows my mind anyone can refer to it as a small city. 

[b2H]

No comments here about the dates that didn’t get viewed by Bachelor Nation.

These producers went beyond the realm of reason and safety with all of those dates.  I suspect whatever passes for censors at ABC said no f-ing way are we broadcasting this crap.  Absolutely astoundingly absurd, all three of them.

And the bloopers weren’t all that.  Every season, we get bug stuff.  Big deal.

I watched the episode by myself so dear hubby didn’t have to.  He missed nothing and that’s an hour and a half of my life I won’t get back.

[Just Carol]

Very disappointed with Katie's bachelorette audition.  I was rooting for her, dammit! She really blew it with the "karma" comment.  Viewers had no clue that Chelsea was anything but sweet, so Katie airing a different truth was jarring.  

The editing of the TA were very careful not to show the face of the woman with the long, straight blond hair.  At the end, the camera panned across the faces of all the women, except the blonde.  What is up with that?

[deSchenke]

The blond was Heather. I have no idea why the entire episode ignored her.  Unless they did focus on her and things got out of control and nasty. Ya, they probably did (get out of control and nasty). But maybe that wasn't the narrative they wanted to follow.  They certainly had enough material to work with, with the other women.

[Just Carol]

I'm not sure where to put this, so I am putting it here.  After reading that Abigail is biracial, I googled and found her Instagram post where she explains that her biological father is Korean.  She further says that neither of her bio parents are deaf, and that she "100%" considers her step-dad as her dad.

This information is puzzling in light of statements she made on the show, for example, that her bio dad left the family because he was mad about the cochlear implants.  I  had assumed that if her dad was mad about the implants, then it was because he himself was deaf.  On the show, we heard her cry about her bio dad -- who I guess left the family when Abigail was two years old (when she got the implants) -- but not one word about her wonderful step-dad.  (Of course, this oversight could be due to editing.) But considering how happy she is about her step-dad, all the crying about being afraid that her husband would leave her for any one of a variety of reasons...  

At the time that the segment aired, I posited that Abigail was just as conniving or just as cuckoo as any of the contestants.  I stand by that assertion.

Edited March 3, 2021 by Just Carol

[RealHousewife]

Good-looking guys covering their faces with thick beards is such a waste of handsome. 

I found it endearing when Matt said to be honest, I didn't realize having my eyes open during kissing was a no-no. lol People always expect sexy looking people to be effortlessly sexy, and sometimes they just look a certain way, but aren't that cool, confident smooth type. Matt kind of comes across as a geek in a model's body. He has a nervous laugh too. There are some things about him I don't care for, but I kind of like that he's not the stereotypical pretty boy.

Edited March 3, 2021 by RealHousewife

[Arkay]

3 hours ago, dizzyd said:

Chicago is the 3rd largest city in the country after NY and LA, so it blows my mind anyone can refer to it as a small city. 

I'm a lifelong NYer, and I do understand this. For example, although I've lived in NYC all my life, and am now an old grandma, I do not move in the same circles in NYC as does Kit. Although I was born and raised in Manhattan, not far from where she lives in the Village, I lived a very middle-class existence in a nice co-op overlooking the East River. I did not go to premieres and red carpet events, have front row seats at fashion shows, and travel in gold Bentleys. Famous people did not come through my home, and had there been such a thing as a podcast then, I wouldn't have had one. 

It's been years since I've visited Chicago and I'm not familiar with the neighborhoods. In NY, different neighborhoods are in fact like small towns. Even when they are right next to each other, their characters are very distinct. It's entirely conceivable that Anna travels in a circle that overlaps with Brittany's. I don't consider Anna to be "from" Chicago, anyway. She's not born and bred. 

[Arkay]

11 hours ago, Rainsong said:

In a negative and a positive – or at least a neutral – way, Matt is a good case study in fatherlessness among male children.  He’s made no secret of his regret and resentment regarding his upbringing and, to his credit, acknowledges that he is rather emotionally stunted and untethered now because he’s had no example to follow.  It’s a pattern repeated in staggering numbers across the wider population and for every genteel Matt type there is at least one malignant product of fatherlessness, teeming with idiopathic anger and impulse control problems and taking it out on society.

These women wanted to believe in the catalogue photo and description:  tall, imposing, physically fit, emotionally open (apparently), ambitious, committed to charitable causes.  What they got was insecurity, inconsistency, diffidence, inarticulation and avoidance of commitment even if that avoidance came the form of cutting off a conversation to go in for a soul kiss.

This is a bit of a facile conclusion. I agree that often, fatherless boys do manifest malignant qualities, towards women and towards society, due to an absence of someone to mold them as men. I would argue, though, that Pilot Peter, fawned over by his father as well as his mother, was equally as indecisive, inconsistent, inarticulate and so on. Sometimes, inexplicably but indubitably, it works the other way around. 

My own dad was a fatherless boy, because his father died of tuberculosis when my father was three. Thank God for our family, my dad was and is a wonderful family man, despite not having a role model. Peter, whose father publicly cheered and applauded his son for having sex four times in a windmill, was a wretched and confused Bachelor. 

I think Matt is not cut out to be a swashbuckling Bachelor, but I believe when he marries a real-life woman outside of reality TV, he will be a very loving and responsible father. This show is not for him. The whole setup feels now like it was a vanity project or a favor to the Hannah B, Tyler C axis of Bachelor Nation. 

[greeneyedscorpio]

3 hours ago, Just Carol said:

I'm not sure where to put this, so I am putting it here.  After reading that Abigail is biracial, I googled and found her Instagram post where she explains that her biological father is Korean.  She further says that neither of her bio parents are deaf, and that she "100%" considers her step-dad as her dad.

This information is puzzling in light of statements she made on the show, for example, that her bio dad left the family because he was mad about the cochlear implants.  I  had assumed that if her dad was mad about the implants, then it was because he himself was deaf.  On the show, we heard her cry about her bio dad -- who I guess left the family when Abigail was two years old (when she got the implants) -- but not one word about her wonderful step-dad.  (Of course, this oversight could be due to editing.) But considering how happy she is about her step-dad, all the crying about being afraid that her husband would leave her for any one of a variety of reasons...  

At the time that the segment aired, I posited that Abigail was just as conniving or just as cuckoo as any of the contestants.  I stand by that assertion.

Her love and appreciation for her step-dad doesn't erase the fact that her bio-dad abandoned her.  Abandonment changes a person and many times makes them insecure about being abandoned again. 

[Back Atcha]

3 hours ago, Arkay said:

I think Matt is not cut out to be a swashbuckling Bachelor, but I believe when he marries a real-life woman outside of reality TV, he will be a very loving and responsible father. This show is not for him. The whole setup feels now like it was a vanity project or a favor to the Hannah B, Tyler C axis of Bachelor Nation. 

Hooray!!!   Let's hope it's the end of the Chris Harrison Era...the more power he gained, the worse the shows became.

[JenE4]

Ok, these are pretty funny! And the mystery blonde was Heather, per the hot-take Tweet.

27 Of The Best "Bachelor" Tweets From The "Women Tell All"
Why did we all just sit through two hours of that?

Read in BuzzFeed: https://apple.news/AzOd1W-H4Qhe6Q3G1WRz2aQ

 

[Just Carol]

8 hours ago, greeneyedscorpio said:

Her love and appreciation for her step-dad doesn't erase the fact that her bio-dad abandoned her.  Abandonment changes a person and many times makes them insecure about being abandoned again. 

True, but I would be more upset that my hearing dad did not want me to have hearing.  Were the implants expensive? Maybe money was the issue?  I am guessing there was a lot more wrong with the marriage than just the argument about implants.  It is really a shame if Abigail thinks her dad did not want her to have hearing or left the family because she and her sister are deaf.  Very screwed up, if true.  (On a happier note, judging from the photo online, her half-brothers are in their late teens, meaning that her mom remarried soon after the breakup.  Abigail has her step-dad's last name.)

But speaking of screwed-up families, Matt James.  The promos with his mom and dad were rough! Dad: "Relationships suck!"  Mom: "Love is not the be-all, end-all."  Nice message for this show. Lol.  I wonder if the surprise ending is that Matt's parents get back together. But probably not, considering how miserable he looked on TWTA.

 

 

Edited March 3, 2021 by Just Carol

[Lamb18]

On 3/1/2021 at 9:26 PM, nittany cougar said:

Matt looks like a madman with that bushy beard.  He seemed off to me. 

I was getting Osama bin Laden vibes.

I watched the whole show but afterwards I watched a football game from 2009 and it was way more interesting.

[tinkerbell]

8 hours ago, Just Carol said:

True, but I would be more upset that my hearing dad did not want me to have hearing.  Were the implants expensive? Maybe money was the issue?  I am guessing there was a lot more wrong with the marriage than just the argument about implants.  It is really a shame if Abigail thinks her dad did not want her to have hearing or left the family because she and her sister are deaf.  Very screwed up, if true.  (On a happier note, judging from the photo online, her half-brothers are in their late teens, meaning that her mom remarried soon after the breakup.  Abigail has her step-dad's last name.)

cochlear implants are a hot button issue in the deaf community.  The issue is whether deafness is  a culture, or a medical condition.  The deaf community has their own language and culture, and some do not consider deafness to be a medical condition which needs to be fixed, but a difference that needs to be respected.   Children who get implants could end up not learning ASL, thereby denying the deaf culture they were born into. Implants are seen as a way of making everyone the same.  If deafness isn't a disease, then is it ethical to do surgery? 

It's an interesting issue, much like the issue  of autism - is it a different way of being, or a disability to be "fixed?"  

[Just Carol]

21 minutes ago, tinkerbell said:

cochlear implants are a hot button issue in the deaf community.  The issue is whether deafness is  a culture, or a medical condition.  The deaf community has their own language and culture, and some do not consider deafness to be a medical condition which needs to be fixed, but a difference that needs to be respected.   Children who get implants could end up not learning ASL, thereby denying the deaf culture they were born into. Implants are seen as a way of making everyone the same.  If deafness isn't a disease, then is it ethical to do surgery? 

It's an interesting issue, much like the issue  of autism - is it a different way of being, or a disability to be "fixed?"  

This is why I think it is such a big deal to note that neither of her parents are deaf.  They are not part of the deaf community..  Or, more accurately, Deaf community.  I have a hard time believing that her bio dad's motivation was that he wanted her to be part of the Deaf community.  Maybe he was a Christian Scientist?  It is strange.

[RealHousewife]

Abigail is a total catch imo, beautiful and kind. I hope she finds a good guy. 

[call me ishmael]

I have to say that watching this WTA (which I really hadn't planned to do) brought home to me how much this show has lost the thread.  There was CH sitting there like an aristocrat in Pompeii unaware that there was a volcano nearby.  Then you saw all the things that they didn't show because they wanted Victoria or some other conflict every moment....LITERALLY.  But there were also the dates that were simply disgusting and cruel.

Basically the show now seems to be all about making sure that people are demeaned and turned against each other.  Part of it is the hothouse nature and the young age of the contestants.  But it seems to me that there just is a lot more cruelty and structured embarrassment and humiliation organized by TPTB.  The lack of self-reflection that CH manifested in his interview is all in keeping with this. 

If the host was sitting there with a large goblet of wine on a great throne it would fit right in. 

[ljenkins782]

23 hours ago, RealHousewife said:

Good-looking guys covering their faces with thick beards is such a waste of handsome. 

I found it endearing when Matt said to be honest, I didn't realize having my eyes open during kissing was a no-no. lol People always expect sexy looking people to be effortlessly sexy, and sometimes they just look a certain way, but aren't that cool, confident smooth type. Matt kind of comes across as a geek in a model's body. He has a nervous laugh too. There are some things about him I don't care for, but I kind of like that he's not the stereotypical pretty boy.

My problem with his beard is that it looks super weird on his tall, narrow, bald head. If he's going to grow out the big beard, I feel like he needs to also grow out the hair on his head. One of the best things to come out of of the pandemic was bald guys growing their hair out. Trevor Noah is my top example, he's so much better looking with his hair grown out.

I did like his response to the open-eyed kissing segment, it was quite good-natured. It also revealed to me that it was definitely a topic of conversation in the house and probably led to some "eh, not my bag, but he's the only guy here so I have to pretend" feelings among some of the contestants.

Quote

 

I have to say that watching this WTA (which I really hadn't planned to do) brought home to me how much this show has lost the thread.  There was CH sitting there like an aristocrat in Pompeii unaware that there was a volcano nearby.  Then you saw all the things that they didn't show because they wanted Victoria or some other conflict every moment....LITERALLY.  But there were also the dates that were simply disgusting and cruel.

Basically the show now seems to be all about making sure that people are demeaned and turned against each other.  Part of it is the hothouse nature and the young age of the contestants.  But it seems to me that there just is a lot more cruelty and structured embarrassment and humiliation organized by TPTB.  The lack of self-reflection that CH manifested in his interview is all in keeping with this. 

 

Yeah, while I'm glad someone thought twice about airing those dates, I sure wish someone had thought twice before staging them. The "grab the ring from the disgusting aquarium" competition was especially gross. I want to be super indignant about the cliche of women being so desperate for a ring that they'd stick their hands into fire cockroaches or whatever, but then I remember what show these women voluntarily signed up for, so it's harder to feed bad for them. But in general, it was a stupid, insulting competition and I would have respected someone who just refused to do it.

And thick pancakes followed by a full beer (and did they run afterward)? Just why??? Just what every guy wants, some extra quality time with someone with a bloated stomach who may or may not have just thrown up. 

The WTA segment was just okay. I personally really like it without the audience because the practiced soundbites to elicit the over-the-top oohing and aahing from the audience is so irritating to me. 

I did get a kick out of the shot of Anna covering her giant teeth when there was a conversation about the internet hate they've all been getting. I guarantee she got a lot of commentary on those chompers, and it was most noticeable in the moment where she was trashing that other girl and that clip got played over and over and over. If not for her comments about that particular woman, she'd have been background material and the teeth wouldn't have gotten so much attention.

If I had to choose a B-ette from this crowd, I'd go with Serena P (? the one who sent herself home). She seems like she's got the confidence and I noticed that most of the bloopers involved her, especially the ones that made Matt look like a dummy. It just seemed like she got him to let his guard down. Do I think she'd genuinely find "her person" (god, that expression makes me gag)? Nope, but I think she could carry a season and the guys would be into her.

[SassyCat]

I don’t know if anyone has noticed but I’ve rarely thrown in my 2 cents in since the Clare debacle. She was just ridiculous using lust as her guide and blocking any efforts from the other men to win her affections through great personality or depth. We never got to see if any of them had great personalities or depth until Tashia came along. Her season was unwatchable because she was so out of league of any of those men. She was a professional in the way she handled and talked to all of those men. In my opinion, none of them was good enough for her, and I am in no way a Tashia fan. I see her as more of a rubbing elbows with the high society crowd. She would do well there.

 

Then along comes the Matt season. When he was on his first date, driving the atv like a complete childish asshole, that was it for me. I didn’t like him at all. Then he went on to practically kill his date, driving like an asshole while taking her life in his stupid jerk hands. Thank God she wasn’t hurt badly. I think her name was Bri. The season was so  underwhelming I never did learn the names of the women, I was constantly distracted by watching the paint on my walls peel. So much more interesting. I do think that Serena C was drop dead gorgeous tho. I do remember her name.

 

In my few glimpses caught while trying to pay attention to this show I did not see one single spark of real connection between Matt and any of these girls. Maybe I missed it. I don’t know. It was just so borrring, none of It could hold my attention. I couldn’t bring myself to watch the women tell all episode except for the first five minutes before I changed the channel to watch Supermarket Stakeout episodes on Sling. Much more entertaining in my opinion. This franchise has lost me. It used to be fun to watch and have a snark fest here in the forums (the best part). Now it’s a chore to try to be interested in the patented false drama created by the producers and the not so great picks for the lead. They chose Matt because he looked great with his shirt off and looked no further than that. Matt’s personality was a dud,  but who cares? As long as he looked good with water streaming down his torso that’s all that matters.

[tinkerbell]

On 3/4/2021 at 1:55 PM, SassyCat said:

Then along comes the Matt season. When he was on his first date, driving the atv like a complete childish asshole, that was it for me. I didn’t like him at all. Then he went on to practically kill his date, driving like an asshole while taking her life in his stupid jerk hands. Thank God she wasn’t hurt badly. I think her name was Bri. The season was so  underwhelming I never did learn the names of the women, I was constantly distracted by watching the paint on my walls peel. So much more interesting. I do think that Serena C was drop dead gorgeous tho. I do remember her name.

Yes, and then on a later date he goofed around on a bicycle and hit his date's bike.   He just seems like a 12 year old, pulling a prank on a girl to show that he likes her.   I never got a sense of his personality, or that of most of the women on the show.    there were a few who seemed smart and funny, but I forgot their names.