If you’re newer here, you may not know about my disdain for the Women/Men Tell All. Don’t get me wrong, I love mess, I love tea being spilled, but often this hour or two episode becomes a free for all.
All the contestants do is yell over one another. Oftentimes, the villains are given softball questions, and the person whose heart was “unexpectedly” broken isn’t able to produce enough tears in the hot seat to become the next lead.
I much prefer the contestants being messy on their own social channels and sharing their perspectives with us. Which we got plenty of this season.
Fortunately, tonight I was pleasantly surprised by what we saw. Shanae was forced to deal with her mess, we learned these women’s DMs have been full, and Dr. Kira decided to shoot her shot with Clayton a second time!
Overall, I was satisfied with the tea that was spilled. Clayton looked exhausted, beat down, and genuinely sad. I don’t think he’s doing well y’all. Meanwhile, the women all looked fantastic and came to play.
We start with Jesse Palmer welcoming everyone to the Women Tell All, with a chyron that reads “Not Clayton Echard,” because we definitely needed the distinction (no, seriously, we did).
Jesse let us know that if we think we’ve seen the mess, we ain’t seen nothing yet. I know they say this all the time, but when Jesse said this will be the most dramatic finale in Bachelor history, I believed him. I truly feel like we are about to see some pre-recorded mess in the fantasy suites and meeting of Clayton’s family and then we’re going to see more mess in the live portions of the finale next week.
So after the two hours of screaming, we all just witnessed, I have five takeaways for this season.
1. Claire’s night one exit lowkey makes her the GOAT.
Sis called Clayton boring on night one, got drunk, ate a bunch of free wings, and got enough screen time to get a seat at Women Tell All. I’m very sure we’ll see her on the beaches of Paradise later this summer and she ain’t even have to work that hard for it.
I call this strategy, I call this working smarter not harder. She didn’t get to roast the women in Toronto, she didn’t have to awkwardly share some trauma to a room full of strangers, nor pretend to give a fuck about random food at a market in Croatia. Bare minimum effort, maximum results. Love that for her.
2. Cassidy’s biggest crime was building Shanae up to be one of the worst characters we’ve seen in this franchise.
I said what I said. We spent too long talking about Cassidy’s fuck buddy for my liking. It began to get into slut shaming territory when we need to save that bullying energy for Clayton next week once his fantasy suite episode airs.
It wasn’t great that Cassidy *maybe* had plans to fuck this guy after going on the show, but also, who cares? She said she wasn’t going to cut good dick off if she wasn’t engaged and I support that. It’s not like the odds of finding love on this show are good, might as well keep someone on standby.
Cassidy’s biggest crimes were running her mouth too much to women she’d just met and giving us Shanae. She needs her ass beat for giving us Shanae. She built up that mess of a woman that was on our screen for way too long.
Clayton and production are likely at fault as well, but Shanae’s origin story really begins with Cassidy telling her to be more aggressive and not worry about making friends. That’s exactly what Shanae did and while Cassidy got sent home rather quickly, viewers got a smooth four episodes of Sha nae nae.
3. Production is still over manipulating storylines instead of letting ‘real life’ scenarios play out.
In the midst of a random yelling match, we find out Elizabeth was previously engaged. We also get more insight into the oversharing Sarah was doing to get inside the other women’s heads.
Why did we find out about Elizabeth’s engagement in passing, but gave Salley an entire storyline in episode one only for her to leave in the same episode?
I understand Elizabeth didn’t stay on the show *that* long for this info to come out. But this piece of information is an example of production creating drama instead of just working with what they’ve got.
Could you imagine a breakdown/confession in which Elizabeth shared the story of her failed engagement? Imagine front runners sharing with Clayton that Sarah was being a little messy and him ignoring them and keeping her? What if we got those conversations and frustrations?
I understand wanting to produce a good show and therefore needing to stoke some flames to ensure you get the drama you need, but honestly, us millennials and the Gen Z kids are messy enough, you’re gonna get what you need, you just have to be patient.
4. Jesse Palmer understood the assignment
I don’t like giving men credit, but Jesse did what needed to be done. When Chris Harrison would run these tell-alls, it often felt patronizing and like a dad was telling his teenage daughters to be quiet. I didn’t like the dynamic. Even in the few tell-alls Kaitlyn and Tayshia led, it felt similar.
So what does Jesse do? He lets the mess speak for itself.
He didn’t try to yell over the women too much, he didn’t tell them to calm down, he just let them fight with one another for a minute and then found an in to invite women to the hot seat, or ask his questions.
Maybe it was masterful editing, but I felt he came off calm, collected, and like a professional. Almost as good as Andy Cohen at a Real Housewives reunion.
I know these tell-alls (and all reunion shows tbh) feel mostly like petty drama, and I suppose they are, but I also imagine when you’re dealing with someone like Shanae for weeks, it can become a lot more than petty bickering. I felt like Jesse’s questions, facial expressions, and tone of voice never reduced the women’s issues to petty drama. He was also such a patient interviewer, we saw this during Sarah and Teddi’s hot seat interviews as well.
I’d still like to see celebrity hosts for Bachelor in Paradise and Kaitlyn or Tayshia for Bachelorette, but Jesse seems like a good presence for Bachelor.
5. This show cannot hide from the real world off the show and it needs to give in.
In Shanae’s hot seat alone, we got:
Shanae claiming Genevive fucked Aaron Clancy from Katie’s season
Shanae and Genevive fighting about who slid into whose DMs first
A mention of which contestants overuse Instagram and social media filters
A comment about making it onto Paradise
This franchise has been trying to deny that people come on the show for a ticket to Paradise and Instagram/TikTok followers, but the more they deny it, edit most conversations about it out of the show, the worse it’s going to get.
They should lean into it. Show us the villains that are honest about being there for followers, or wanting to fuck someone in Bachelor Nation. Gives us more footage like what we saw between Cassidy and Sierra, we want the mess! Not the overproduced mess, the mess that already inherently exists in these flawed people (because that’s what we all are).
I think production is scared of getting played and doesn’t want to ostracize the contestants who come on the show ‘for the right reasons’ or the viewers who watch for love stories, but I think it’s a mistake and they need to figure out how to navigate it.
What do you all think? Would you still be into the show if contestants were honest about their intentions in interviews with production or within the house?
Honorable Mentions
I couldn't end this without acknowledging two things:
How much the women talked their shit to Clayton
Sierra’s perfect Paradise audition (as if she needed one)
So often I watch this show and wonder if contestants understand that it isn’t just about the lead finding their forever, those feelings have to be reciprocated.
Clayton may have been the one giving roses out each week, but the women who stayed each week were also making a choice. By the time Clayton’s hot seat came along, I was so ready for these women to drag him.
While Clayton seems like a fine young man, his decisions on this particular show have been disappointing. To know that he makes even worse decisions (based on the previews) is disappointing. I’m just glad we finally got to see women demanding legit answers from a bachelor.
It got the vibe that the women piled on even more than we saw and that Clayton didn’t have much of a response. That was likely a good move on his part. What else could he have really done? Yelled back at them? That wouldn’t have ended well. So, he just sat there and took it. At least that’s what it seemed like.
Now, let’s shift to my girl Sierra. Not only did she give us glow after glow and look after look throughout her time on the show, but tonight, she came prepared.
From the first time Sierra called Shanae a little bitch, she really ain’t let her foot off the gas. She came with the receipts, the tough questions, and ready to throw any and all shade that she could. If her performance didn’t earn her a spot in Paradise, then this show and its producers are trash.
Here’s to hoping Aaron Clancy and Sierra make it to Paradise and gather all the other contestants together. Like a better version of Demi and Jordan Kimball.
Before ending the night, we get a montage of bloopers, which I have come to expect and love. They bring some levity to an otherwise trainwreck of a show. I also appreciated the reel of Jesse’s season, since I’ve never seen it.
Before the night ends, we get a super trailer of the last few episodes. We’ve been teased all season about how chaotic Clayton’s last few weeks are and the more we see the final moments of his season, the worse it seems.
Seeing him tell at least two women that he slept with them has hit differently than the build-up of Colton’s fence jump. The fence jump was always going to be about Colton running away from something, which meant he wasn’t necessarily going to be hurting anyone by jumping the fence. In comparison, Clayton’s tomfoolery clearly hurts all of the women he has left, and it makes him look like a dumbass.
I have so many thoughts and questions about his choice to share what he does with these women after fantasy suites, I cannot wait to watch it unfold tomorrow night!
And I was appalled they didn’t address how Elizabeth’s mental health was made fun of.
Sierra was the truth-teller last night. I’d love to see her become a lawyer if she wants to.