And now The Bachelor is in Canada, land of brown bears and waterfalls. And the time I'm fortunate to be at majestic Lake Louise, I have to remember that Sean and his harem came here, and make sure my vaccinations are up to date. Was there really no way we could hold them up at the border? Confiscate their passports and throw them in jail? Where's our Guantanamo? Not cool, Canada. NOT COOL.
Chris Harrison welcomes them to the previously unsullied beauty of Banff National Park and I wish there were a Mountie or two there to glower at them, in front of Chateau Lake Louise, which is amazing and expensive, although maybe not so much now that it's been all skanked up. Having The Bachelor there is worse than finding out that some hotel guests have set up a meth lab.
The date card arrives. Of the remaining women, Catherine, Daniella and Tierra have not had one-on-ones. This one is for Catherine: "Let's find our fairy-tale ending." I love the way whoever reads the date card says "Sean" at the end, in case the date might actually turn out to be with Chris Harrison.
And cut to Catherine waiting for Sean in a little bit of wind and snow, and she is "scared as hell" for some reason, like lady, if you think this is a blizzard, then I'd hate to see how you'd handle actual winter in Canada. Finally, Sean drives this huge snow bus up over the hill and apparently they've moved on to Jasper National Park, which is also nice but no Banff. They're at the base of the Columbia ice fields, and Catherine is melting over Sean's ruggedness.
Sean tells us he needs to "turn things around" this week, by which I hope he means he has to stop handing out roses to the head cases and maybe concentrate on spending time with women who are able to experience actual happiness. They go tobogganing and somersaulting in the snow, and Sean says he wants someone who can "enjoy life," like it's so hard to enjoy life when you're travelling North America on The Bachelor's dime. And then Sean says "Canada, eh," like FUCK YOU, SEAN.
And now after somersaulting in the snow to prove what an in-the-moment kind of woman she is, Catherine gets to ride some sort of horse-drawn carriage (they're no longer on a glacier, obviously). They visit an ice castle that Sean says was built just for them, which I can't believe is remotely close to being true. Can you imagine spending all that time to construct an ice castle only to be told it's going to host The Bachelor and whoever he's currently trying to get into bed? It's one of the most romantic settings he's ever been in, he tells us, and they cuddle on a couch under a blanket (neither of which are actually made of ice).
Back at the lodge, there's another date card, and Daniella says she'll be upset if she's part of a group date because she is "literally" the only one who has "not had, like, a long amount of time with him" and maybe she should just leave off using "literally" altogether, as she's the one who thought the Red team would "literally die" when Blue team showed back up at dinner last week/night.
It's a group-sex card for Tierra, Sarah, AshLee, Lindsay, Selma, Lesley and Daniella. "Let's bare our souls..." Who's it from? Oh, it's from Sean. Everyone seems to know Daniella's upset about not getting it, which I take to mean she spends every possible moment whining about it, and she reassures everyone that she's not suicidal about it, although her tears say otherwise.
Back at the ice castle! Catherine says she wants Sean to know why she is the way that she is. Do we even know what she is that she needs to explain? Oh, she's talking about a traumatic experience when she was twelve: She and her friend went to summer camp, and she was walking with a friend along a trail, and then a tree fell on the girl and killed her instantly. "At twelve years old, I realized that things can be taken from you very easily," she says And apparently this tree killing her friend is why she wants to find someone to spend the rest of her life with? I mean, that's what she says. Not to minimize her trauma, but that's a conclusion even people who haven't witnessed trees killing our friends manage to come to.
But she gets a rose because of course she does, because there's no way Sean's going to say, "I'm sorry a tree killed your friend, but I need a little more than that." And it sounds like Sean is thrilled to find out about this tragedy in Catherine's life because it gives him the hope that things are going to turn around here, not to mention a tragedy boner. I have no idea what is going on here, but Catherine seems nice enough and she's gorgeous so a tragic backstory is just icing on the cake for Sean.
Group-sex time! Sean is hoping that the good time he had with Catherine carries over to the group-sex date somehow. Well, let's hope they have some childhood catastrophes to share with him! He tells them he's got something "so fun" (have we all given up on that grammatical abomination?) planned for them. They're canoeing across the lake. Three canoes for eight people: three women in two canoes each, and one woman with Sean, and Lesley immediately volunteers to be the one in Sean's canoe. AshLee seems a little put out by how quickly Lesley jumped on it, but she forgets how suck-uppingly she ran ahead of all the other women to hug Sean when they arrived.
There is thrilling canoe video of them making their way across the lake, with Lesley kicking back and relaxing while Sean does all the work. Selma says she wanted a shark to eat them, and I hate to explain to her that we don't have SHARKS in CANADIAN LAKES and then she laughs in a way that suggests she's not actually from Earth, so I'm not going to worry about it too much.
And the "so fun" part of the date is that they're going to join the "Lake Louise Polar Bear Plunge" club, which involves them jumping in the lake, which is just above freezing. Sean tells them they don't have to do it if they don't want to, but he hopes they will. Selma decides that any activity that requires an EMT on hand isn't for her, and opts out. Tierra is equally worried. Of course, ABC has been gleefully promoting the suggestion that she almost dies at every commercial break since last week, so we know this isn't going to go well. You know, assuming she's not just playing it up for Sean and the cameras.
Sean tells us a couple of women seem "stoked" to do it, while others seem "not so stoked" and he clarifies that he generally prefers women in the "stoked" category. AshLee is nervous about doing it, but she doesn't want to be a chicken. And of course Sean is completely lying when he says they don't have to, given the way he cajoles Selma into trying it. He badgers her, telling her this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. She correctly points out that she can jump in a lake ANY TIME.
They women get undressed and into the provided robes, with Lesley hoping that if she gets hypothermia, Sean will give her CPR, which DOES NOT FIX HYPOTHERMIA, like CRACK A BOOK ONCE IN A WHILE, YOU IDIOTS.
Peer pressure takes care of everyone (but Selma), and they all head out to the water, and take the robes off. Daniella hopes Sean appreciates this, which is hilarious since he's pretty much ignored her up until now, so it's not like this is an ultimatum with any kind of power. "Sean is hot, I'm hot, let's just jump in and get cold together," she says.
So they all run in, dunk themselves and run back out again, then bundle back up. Lesley, Sarah and Daniella actually seem to have enjoyed it. AshLee's proud of herself, but she's never going to do it again, she says.
Oh, and Tierra can't breathe, apparently. The EMTs wrap her up. Sean says he wants to do everything he can to help, but he's not a professional --- or an acting coach -- and he really hopes Tierra is OK.
Gritty handheld camera and dramatic music accompany the scenes of the medics carrying a shivering Tierra to an SUV. It's one of those totally serious life-threatening situations where the ca
mera crews are allowed to get right up close to everything. Then the medics wrap her up and put her in a wheelchair and bring her into the hotel and get her a coffee or a hot chocolate or something. Miracle of miracles, she's doing better! At this point I'd like to remind everyone of Canada's socialized health-care system, so it would have cost literally nothing for a trip to the hospital just to be on the safe side, but again Tierra needs emergency medical attention but recovers in time to obviate the need for proper examination.Catherine and Desiree run down to check on her. Desiree seems to buy the whole production. Catherine: "She literally had hypothermia. That's what she told us." Oh, Catherine, you dingbat. This is not hypothermia. This is Tierra feeling exactly as cold as the rest of them but milking it for Sean's attention. Lindsay, for one, is not buying it.
Sean comes to visit her, and Tierra pretends to be embarrassed by the whole affair, but apparently she's not too numb to make out with Sean, and it's great that the numbness she claims to feel in her extremities didn't prevent her from getting her makeup fixed or anything. Sean manfully declares that he's comfortable enough in his feelings for her that she doesn't need to come to dinner, since she should recuperate from her, cough, "hypothermia."
AshLee is happy Tierra's not going to be there because that's one fewer woman vying for Sean's attention at dinner, plus it's guaranteed to be drama-free. Lesley plans to let her guard down and let Sean know what her feelings are.
They sit alone together, and Lesley tells him it was "literally slow-motion" and this season has been a bountiful harvest of "literally" misuse, hasn't it? Sean tells her he loves her energy. "I just want you to know, I appreciate you so much," he says. He's really quite a poet, isn't he? Lesley's fooled, anyway. The two of them start kissing.
Then it's time for Sarah, who thinks everything has been so magical and perfect because fairytale romances always include a couple-dozen other women (one of whom is Tierra). She shows him childhood pictures, when she had a prosthesis so she could learn to crawl and tie her shoes, that sort of thing. There are pictures of her family. "Hearing her talk about her family was a reality check for me," says Sean, and I have no idea what that means. Oh, he wonders if he's ready to handle that. Listen, asshole, if you want a wife, you're going to meet the woman's family. This kind of sounds like he's preparing to dump her and is looking for an excuse. (Note after watching to the end: Told ya!)
A date card arrives back at the lodge for Desiree: "Don't be scared ... to fall in love." Who's it from? Oh, right.
Anyway, you'll never believe this, but Tierra has completely recovered from being "frozen to death" (her words) and is getting ready to come to the party, and she's completely open with us about what a hero she is for overcoming the earlier trauma to be with Sean.
There is enjoyable video of the women making fun of Tierra's cry-wolf routine, and everything goes hilariously silent when Tierra shows up. It's kind of hilarious the way she is just suddenly coming through the door, and it's kind of like when Samara crawls out of the well in The Ring only MUCH MORE TERRIFYING, and she stares at everyone, and everyone stares back. "I don't know what she's done throughout her life to be so good at this, but she is a professional at getting attention," says Lesley, who calls her a "Tierrarist," and now I think I love Lesley. Sean shows up and pulls Tierra aside, Tierra playing the brave little soldier. Lindsay flat-out says Tierra's faking it. And someone ventures the opinion that Tierra is too young to get married or have a family, like she's 14 or something.
And then Sean is sitting with the women and talking about how Tierra overcame hypothermia (i.e. "she was exactly as cold for exactly as long as everyone else") to be here tonight (the other women offer polite laughter), but in a surprise move, Sean gives the date rose to Lesley, because they turned a corner together. Tierra's not impressed. She says she deserved it because of all the shit she put up with, by which she means she put a lot of work into pretending to have hypothermia, but she's got nothing to show for it.
After dinner, Sean tells us that tonight was really refreshing, but a woman tonight said she really wants him to meet her family, but he doesn't see forever with her, so it's not fair to make her wait around for another rose ceremony. He shows up at the women's room and asks to see Sarah, throwing everyone into a tizzy.
She comes back to Sean's room, where he tells her that lately he's been trying to "force it" with her. "I so appreciate you showing me pictures of your family and everything," he says. But if he's being completely honest, he felt like they were reaching ("reaching," Sean? Really?). Sarah's hurt and caught off-guard. Sean wants to make it clear that she's definitely one of the most amazing women in the world, and then plays up what a hero he is for not making her wait around for a rose ceremony. "It's totally OK," she tells him, and it's too bad she's being such a doormat about this because his whole gallant won't-make-you-wait-around-for-the-rose-ceremony bullshit isn't fair.
He walks her out down the hall so she can tell the rest of the women she's going home -- instead of being allowed to leave on her own as ALWAYS happens when a contestant is dumped like this -- and Sarah doesn't manage to make it back without starting to cry. "I'm completely blindsided. I'm just embarrassed," she tells us. She doesn't know what happened. You said you wanted him to meet your family, duh!
She goes back to the room to tell the rest of them she's going home, and she breaks the heart of everyone watching by saying it's always the same thing for her: She's an amazing person and he wants there to be a connection, but there isn't one.
Hate Sean. Hate, hate, hate. Sean's really going to pretend that on a show with the sole purpose of marrying two people, the prospect of meeting a woman's family freaked him out? Especially when one of the signature episodes of this show is the hometown date? LIKE ALL OF THE WOMEN HAVEN'T TALKED ABOUT THEIR FAMILIES? You are never going to convince me that even if Sean legitimately liked her as a person, he ever considered her as a serious contender. He kept her around as long as he felt was necessary to not appear to be an asshole and, when no real reason for dumping her presented itself, he manufactured this nonsense that humiliates her and singles her out, instead of letting her be one of a group of three let go during a normal rose ceremony.
The morning (or whenever), Desiree gets ready for her date (by packing, in case she has to go home). Daniella in particular is annoyed because Desiree's getting a second one-on-one when Daniella hasn't had one yet. She wonders what Sean's looking for. Well, you've got two arms, Daniella, so that's a plus.
Desiree and Sean hike up Tunnel Mountain, and they're having yet another cheapo picnic date. Well, at least for this one they have to rappel down the mountain. "I am just beyond speechless," says Desiree. You know, whenever a woman on this show says she's speechless, they're always lying, goddammit.
And here we go again with the pretense that this show is risking dropping a couple of idiots to their deaths. Sean hopes that rappelling down the cliff eases all of Desiree's fears about where their relationship is heading. So they rappel down four-hundred feet, and it appears we're going to have to watch every agonizing inch of it. "It would be a lot harder if Sean wasn't here right now," she says. Actually, it would be a lot harder if the crew weren't here. And now Desiree is giving the requisite "ridiculous activity as marriage metaphor" speech that fits literally EVERYTHING they do on this show.
So they make it, and have their picnic, and kiss, and Sean patronizingly is proud of her and thinks she has
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a huge sense of accomplishment, like thank god Sean is around to always be helping women feel good about themselves. And now they are climbing a tree in the field and this is probably a fucking metaphor for relationships too, but I'm fast-forwarding again. And they are yelling "Hello, Canada!" and this caribou in a stream cocks its head, glares, and goes back to imbuing my home and native land with majesty and dignity.And now it is night and they are walking through the annoyingly bear-free woods to a giant teepee because we might as well shit on as many cultural touchstones as possible in the name of The Bachelor. They sit by a fire and talk about how they can talk about anything, but I'm not sure it matters if all you talk about is how you can talk about anything. And Desiree says they didn't have money growing up and she lived in a tent for four months. "I think that's why I'm so humble," she says. Not to mention shameless! And it was embarrassing for her to be dropped off at the trailer-park when her friends lived in multimillion-dollar homes. But her parents taught her to put others first, or whatever, and she wants a house full of love. It's amazing that every single woman's upbringing turned her into the same woman: An empty shell who wants to marry Sean.
He picks up the rose, and says he had so much fun, and he knows there have been times when she's questioned where things were going, but after slowly dropping down a mountain and climbing a tree, they're totally copacetic, so she accepts the rose, and then they make out. I will say that I like Desiree more than a lot of the women here, which is why I think I would have preferred to see her escape Sean's boring clutches.
Oh, and then she talks about growing up in a tent and falling in love in a teepee, so I'm over Desiree.
Cocktail party! Apparently, the women who don't have roses yet are nervous, according to Lesley. This is the kind of fascinating insight you only get this late in the season. And Tierra's pouting because she didn't get the coveted frostbite rose. As usual, the other women are talking about Tierra. "Let's be honest: You're going to wife that?" asks Selma. Not if Selma's cleavage has anything to say about it, that's for damn sure.
Sean tells us that he's emotionally invested in all of them, but if he can't picture them raising his children (I mean, raising a family with him) he can't keep them around.
Selma decides that since she didn't jump in a frozen lake, she'd better piss her mom all the way off and kiss Sean. And the kiss involves her moving her tightly closed lips onto his and then just holding them there, motionless. She tells us this is a huge shame for her family, but she had to "bring out the big guns." Not a single person watching didn't make a joke about her breasts just now.
And now he's spending time with Lindsay, who wants to know what he liked best about Canada, and he says the thing he liked best is how much fun she had because he has no brain. She's giddy and probably drunk, and when he asks her to tell him something he doesn't know, she says she sleeps naked. "I respect that," says Sean, who pops a boner and then she gives in to kissing him, which I guess was something she wasn't going to do, despite not being Muslim? I guess? They're making out now, so I guess Linsday's over whatever it is.
And now AshLee is sitting with him and talking about how jumping in the lake was a metaphor for moving out of her comfort zone, or something equally inane, and then she gives him a scarf to blindfold her so she can trust him to lead her around. And then she seems surprised that he's actually going to do that, and now she is crying again about her mom and dad not wanting her, and now Sean is carrying her and pardon me for not being overly impressed by AshLee trusting Sean to not drop her on her head or anything. I mean Sean is so boring and awful that all he has to do to impress a woman is not drop her? And now they are kissing, and by this point you hope Sean just carries around a Costco-sized bottle of mouthwash to try to at least wash some of the taste of the woman out of his mouth.
Chris Harrison shows up to take him away, and Sean says in stark contrast to last week, he's confident that his wife is in this group (you know, what with this show's solid matchmaking track-record and everything) but he doesn't know who he's dumping yet.
Rose ceremony, three roses to hand out. Desiree would celebrate if Tierra went home, since Tierra is such a mess. Chris Harrison lectures them about how disappointing they all were, with the drama and whatnot, and how much better behaved they were in Canada (glad to see we've rubbed off on them) and how much more pleased Sean is this week. Nice job, ladies!
And then Sean comes in and says "y'all" a bunch of times and then gets to the roses. Lindsay and Ashlee get the first two, so it's down to Daniella, Tierra and Selma for the last one. I know who I'd pick, but I have a brain (although if I'm being honest it wouldn't be my brain making the call on this one), and so I'm not at all surprised when Sean gives the rose to Tierra. Obviously it wasn't going to be Daniella. Selma looks stricken, since her last-ditch family-shaming wasn't enough. She hugs Sean, who gallantly tells her he really enjoyed getting to know her. Man, Tierra doesn't even look happy to have won! Selma tells us she's leaving with a heartbreak and a memory, and she couldn't believe he gave that last rose to Tierra. "I honestly don't think that Tierra is the right person for Sean, and he'll soon see that too."
Daniella can't believe that after not getting to spend time with Sean that she's now going home. "I was vulnerable and I want to find love really badly," she says, and she starts to cry and pout.
Sean wants to let the other women know that that was very difficult -- for him -- but he reassures them that they are TOTALLY his top six, which probably gives them a nice warm romantic glow. And as much as he loved Canada, it's time to "heat things up." So they have to bring their bikinis, he says, even though this show just proved that they have to bring their bikinis even when they're going to a frozen lake in Canada. They're going to St. Croix!
And then during the credits Sean tells a story about a time when he was a kid and pissed in a desk and Lindsay thinks it's hilarious but I'm pretty sure everyone else watched this and found it as horrifying and unsettling as I did.
Daniel is a writer in Newfoundland with a wife and a daughter. When Sean and the bachelorettes arrived, he felt a great disturbance in the Force, eh. Follow him on Twitter (@DanMacEachern) or email him at danieljdaniel@gmail.com.
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