You guys, I just can't stand it.
I haven't recapped this horrid show in a couple of seasons because #pregnant and #newbaby, but I just can't sit idly by and let what's happened over the last few days go uncommented on.
WHAT IN THE HOT HELL.
I've decided to give each person in this horror show a pass/fail grade, just like your freshman biology class. And, much like the AP Bio teacher who once gave me an "8" on a test, I will be merciless. AND IT WILL BE GREAT.
Ready? OKAY!
ARIE'S MOM: Pass.
Whatever, this lady's nice enough. She told Arie to pick Becca, which was good advice, but she also puts ice cubes in her white wine which I really can't deal with. I guess she passes but just because...I don't know. Because I have meaner things to say about other people.
ARIE'S DAD: Fail.
This probably isn't fair, but this guy gives me the crippity-crippity-CREEPS. I don't know if it's the slightly European accent that keeps surfacing at weird moments, if it's the hair...I just feel like at some point, he's had someone tied up in his basement and has harvested their organs for sport. He also totally buys into the "you can be in love with two people at one time" thing which is upsetting and (like ol' Ice Cubes up there) WRONG.
Arie's dad did give us one of my favorite moments in the show, though, when he broke the cardinal rule of not mentioning Thing 1 to Thing 2. He pretty much talked about Lauren during his entire conversation with Becca. "So yeah, I think he likes you both pretty much the same. Lauren seems awesome." "Whoever Arie chooses, we'll be cool. But that Lauren girl...is it true her hair was spun into gold by tiny little witches?" "Do you think her liver and kidneys are in good shape? Asking for a friend."
You can practically see Becca's soul melting in this scene.
Brutal.
NEIL LANE: Fail.
Dear Neil, you are a clown who makes the same ring over and over and over and over and over and over and over.
At least Arie broke from tradition and chose an oval stone instead of a princess cut with a halo and baguettes on either side.
Neil, a question. How has the fact that you've built your career on furnishing empty proposals not tarnished your brand in any way? I don't understand it. People should be fleeing from Neil Lane engagement rings because of the massive amount of bad karma associated with them. I mean how many couples are still together after like 57 seasons of this show? 4?! Right. No, sweetie.
THE GREEK CHORUS OF EX-GIRLFRIENDS: Pass.
YES!! This was so beyond excellent. These girls were here to roast Arie on the spit like a big ol' pig. From top left to bottom right, we have Too Good For This Show, Dead Rat, Baby B, Who?, and Not Hoxie - all these ladies had a bone to pick and they good and well picked it.
I can even forgive the visible bra situation.
We got a lot of delicious morsels out of this. In fact, without Too Good For This Show, we never would've known that Arie's entire story about how he's "taking a risk" by breaking off the engagement to try things with Lauren was a total fiction. He knew in plenty of advance that he had Lauren in his pocket:
DRAG HIM!!
LAUREN: Fail.
Yecccccch, amiright?
Look, as Carrie Bradshaw once said, there are the simple girls, and there are the Katie girls. And our girl Lauren is a simple girl. This is not a comment on her mental capacity (Happy International Women's Day!) This is me saying, "You have chosen to have the depth of a single sheet of Kleenex in order to make this weird relationship work with Touchy McGag over there."
It's just so BAAAAAAAAAASICCCCCCCCCCCCC. I feel like Lauren watched this season in leggings with socks pulled up over them in a chunky cable knit sweater while cradling a hot beverage of some sort and gently weeping into her eyelash extensions.
Was that mean?
MAYBE IT WAS BUT I CAN'T FEEL ANYMORE BECAUSE THIS SHOW RUINED ME.
None of us can figure out why Arie chose Lauren over the infinitely more interesting, more solid, and more charming Becca. Every talking head of Arie's in the finale basically said, "Yeah - I mean, Lauren and I have this indescribable connection and I love making her feel safe, and Becca...well, she's just so confident, she's a rock, and I can talk to her about anything...so yeah. I'd say it's pretty even."
...
But the worst offense was her accepting Arie back with open arms when he clearly left another woman to be with her. It's just gross. And since she never watched the finale, she'll never know just how gross it was.
One time Jordan hit me in the head with a sock he'd been wearing all day. It was kind of wet and disgusting. Lauren is basically the equivalent of a wet sock.
Come on, girl. You're better than this.
Or, you know, maybe not.
BECCA: Pass. Obviously.
We needn't linger long on this one because it's just so clear that she's the best and everyone else is the worst and that's just that. Although I am disappointed that she allowed ABC to continue the manipulation by agreeing to star as The Bachelorette, she pretty much gets carte blanche to do whatever she wants. If she wants to set a guy's head on fire just for kicks, she can do it.
Go get 'em, girl.
Which brings us to our final contestant here on Pass/Fail.
ARIE. Fail, fail, fail, fail, fail.
Let's just run it down, shall we?
- Your laugh is terrible. That's personal and below the belt, but that weird forced hearty chuckle thing has got to go. Someone should tell you that.
- You have a 24601 tattoo on your arm because you "identified with the main character" in Les Mis. Sorry, do you mean the hero who carried his daughter's dying love interest on his back through a sewer? The guy who stole a loaf of bread to feed his sister's family and rotted for decades in jail? The guy who raised a dying prostitute's child as his own? THAT GUY?? THAT guy would not bring a girl on national TV to dump her, you stupid giraffe.
- You reached out to Wet Sock behind your fiance's back.
- You then lied to said fiance about the extent of your communication with Wet Sock.
- The you told the production BEFORE YOU TOLD BECCA that you were breaking the engagement, which meant they got to tag along for the worst moment of this poor girls life.
- You refused to leave even though she asked you to like A THOUSAND TIMES, creating further reason for the cameras to be in the house while she frantically tried to find a place where she could be alone (including in the actual toilet room, which somehow still didn't work).
- You fabricated the storyline that dumping Becca for Sockie was some kind of chance you were taking in order to make yourself look good.
- On ATFR, you used excuses like "You were working," to justify your decision to wait to dump Becca on camera.
- You then PROPOSED TO WET SOCK IN FRONT OF EVERYONE, to (soul-satisfyingly) tepid applause.
- You're the worst worst worst worst worst. Don't even. It's terrible, you're terrible, we all agree, go hide in a hole until we've decided what to do with you.
- Which brings us to:
CHRIS HARRISON: Pass.
Harrison you slippery son of a bitch, you've done it again. You've managed to exploit, humiliate, and degrade people into season-high ratings for what was otherwise a sleeper of a season. Your show needs a massive overhaul, and yet you go to bed every night on piles. of. money.
I hate you, but I respect you. You've got us all wrapped around your slimy little fingers and I rue the day I started watching this trash pile. I RUE IT, YA HEAR ME?!
Yeah, I know. You don't care.
Figures.
That, ladies and germs, is it. We've completed another season of mind-numbingly dumb TV. Maybe we'll tune in next season, where we'll get to see the real winner of this dumpster fire:
Into it.
'Til then.