I came to this week’s Fantasy Suites episode with one burning question: why did Joey get far and away the most screentime during last week’s hometowns, including nearly twice as much as Dotun? The Evil Genius Producers (EGPs) are very intentional about the stories they are creating and screentime plays a large part in their narratives. One theory I have is that we are being led up to a bad breakup with Joey and his being the next Bachelor.
Xavier is the first date shown of the trio of him, Joey, and Dotun. Xavier’s disastrous end-of-his-journey date is best summarized as follows. He waited way too long to drop the bomb on Charity that he got repeatedly busy over a period of several days with some body that wasn’t his ex. And while he’s sure in his heart that he won’t do that to Charity, he can’t be sure that his head shalt not lead him unto temptation, but, yeah, let’s go ahead and get engaged and see if I end up doing the do with someone that’s not you.
After much hesitation, Charity solves his dilemma for him by setting the interwebs on fire with one of the great kiss-off lines in Bachelor franchise history. “I’m not here to fix anybody, I’m not here to build a man. Like, this isn’t build-a-man workshop.”
Then we got this spot for Zach coming on Kimmel which elicited a simultaneous, “WHY?”, from My Daughter Cassandra (MDC) and me.
Joey is up next. They start out riding in an ATV which conveniently breaks down near a romantic natural pool and waterfall. Convinced that the EGPs may have had something to do with that convenience, MDC suggested this meme.
In storytelling, water is often used to represent a mental rebirth, some type of cleansing, or transformation. We can check all of the above as Joey and Charity talk candidly about the hometown situation where his uncle told her that she may not be seeing the “real Joey.” They have a lot of feeler-to-feeler talk, she drops the L-word, and their connection goes to the next level.
As with last week’s hometowns, Dotun’s date is saved for last, and not only last again, his was the shortest in terms of screentime. While I don’t know or have a theory of why, I am certain the EGPs have their reasons. There isn’t much to say about this date except that this feels like her strongest connection. It’s obvious how into each other they are. They just seem like pieces of a puzzle that fit. And she feels very connected to his family, too.
One random thing I noticed was that Charity held the bottle of bubbly on the beach with the label turned away from the camera. I wonder if that has anything to do with their purveyor of pathetic wines sponsor Apothic.
Finally, we get the gift that keeps on giving negative vibes – the return of Aaron which was indicated early in the episode. He indicts Charity for perpetuating the crime of sending him home for fraudulent reasons and offers as evidence the fact that she said that she wasn’t sure if she was making the right decision. She openly confessed that she has been conflicted from that night and every morning waking up and wondering if she had made the right choice and still doesn’t know [cue Keel If Love Is a Crime (I Wanna Be Convicted].
We were left hanging on a cliff that has three men in suits, Aaron being one of them. Of course, the EGPs gave us zero context for those suits. In the brief shots of each guy, Joey, and Dotun are wearing ties, while Aaron is not. In theory, there would be one final cut to the Final Two to meet with Neil Lane or his representative to pick out a ring. Do a tieless Aaron and a tied-up Joey and Dotun imply that the latter two will be making proposals?
Because we have to suffer through The Men Yell All and be introduced to The Bachelor: Old Guy Edition, we won’t get answers to the questions next week that the EGPs have so cleverly put before us.
See you next week. I think.
P.S. This week’s viewing wine was procured by MDC at her quaint hometown wine shop Provisions in Northampton, MA. It’s Freedom Blend, a blend of grapes indigenous to Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia. It was created to celebrate 20 years of freedom from the Soviet Union. It is fantastic.
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