Well, we guess Chris Harrison wasn’t lying when he said things were about to change on The Bachelor.
The host told us this week that these next two weeks would be huge for the season, and that Nick would be rattled by an unexpected date. What he did not tell us was that half of the remaining women would all be sent home by the end of tonight’s episode. He also did not tell us we were about to witness the saddest, angriest game of beach volleyball that has possibly ever been played.
It’s as if everyone suddenly realized this isn’t just a vacation that alternates between bikinis and cocktail dresses, and it was time to either get serious or go home.
We started with the aftermath of Taylor returning to the one on one, and Nick told her that he simply didn’t feel that their relationship was where it needed to be, regardless of the lies she thought Corinne was telling him. The plain old truth was that he felt something with Corinne, and felt nothing with Taylor. It was obvious to us, and as angry as it made her, it was obvious to Taylor, too. She left, and was gone forever.
Then, it was time to get to the rose ceremony. Nick canceled the cocktail party—which all Bachelor fans will know is the most devastating thing that could possibly happen—because he already knew what he had to do. Alexis, Josephine, and Jaimi (all women with bold, tag-friendly personalities) all left without roses, and we barely had time to mourn them before the rest of the women were whisked off to St. Thomas.
As all destinations are on this show, St. Thomas is the perfect place to fall in love, but there was very little falling in love actually happening this week. Instead, it became the place where Bachelor dreams come to die.
Kristina’s one-on-one could have been the only date that didn’t end in heartbreak tonight, but even though she got the rose, our hearts still got broken. She told Nick all about her childhood, growing up in Russia with her mother, who one day kicked her out (when she was five or six!) for not following the rules of not eating for the whole day (by eating lipstick). She spent the next seven years in an orphanage until she was adopted by an American family at age 12.
Nick was stunned. We were stunned, and we were glad to then hear Nick just keep asking her to tell him more, because we also wanted to hear more. We want a movie about Kristina.
Up next, six of the remaining women went on a group date to a beach, where they donned bikinis and played volleyball, and they hated it. Things turned sour real fast, with Vanessa and Jasmine both losing their mind about having to literally compete for this guy.
There were tears. There was depressed beach sitting. Nick worried that the volleyball game had only driven everyone further apart, and Jasmine worried about how she was the only one who had never had a one-on-one.
She didn’t shut up about her concerns in front of the women, and once she finally had his attention, all the did was ramble about how worried she was. And since he did not reciprocate her nervous feelings, he knew it was time to send her home, making her casualty number four of the night. Raven, meanwhile, got the group date rose, which was nice because Raven seems lovely.
Then, it was time for another two-on-one for some inexplicable reason. Whitney and Danielle L. were sent to a beach to fight to the death for Nick’s heart, even though we’ve barely seen them speak to each other, so pitting them against each other was sort of strange.
First, Nick said goodbye to Whitney, simply because he felt more with Danielle L. But then, when he and Danielle were enjoying the traditional dinner after abandoning the other girl on the beach while they flew away in a helicopter, she said she was falling in love, and he sent her home too because he certainly did not feel the same way.
Nick followed this up by showing up at the hotel room where the six remaining women were shocked by multiple suitcases being dragged away, instead of just one. (The traditional removal of the loser’s suitcase is possibly the best part of two-on-ones, by the way.) He cried and said he was just not sure this was going to work out, and then he left. He went down in the elevator, and left the hotel. It’s unclear if he was leaving the hotel to go to his own hotel, or if he was staying in that hotel and was leaving to clear his head.
Either way, it was dramatic, and a solid end to a truly eventful episode.
Next week, we finally get to hear about Corinne’s platinum vagine, so at least there’s something to look forward to.
The Bachelor airs Mondays at 8 p.m. on ABC.
