It's So Nice To Finally Meet You!

Meet the Staff takes a turn to the upstairs offices, as we find Demon Spawn (oh, I'm sorry...his actual title is "Excutive Producer/Creator," so I guess he's just an honorary demon spawn) Mike Fleiss explaining, "The viewers demanded that Bob be the Bachelor. There was just a groundswell of support that we couldn't deny." Wow, D.S. Fleiss. I wasn't aware that your production entity doubled as a self-sustaining Marxist utopia. "the viewers" want to evenly distribute the advance from his book deal amongst the people who spend the most time watching this show, and then they wouldn't mind if you'd make your staff retract any references to Aaron being so-called "great-looking." Thank you. God, I love socialism.

Scott Jeffress, co-executive producer, believes that "Bob's kind of like Everyman. I mean, everybody's got a buddy like Bob." I have a buddy like Bob, and it's ACTUALLY BOB. Right, Bob? We're best friends, aren't we, Bob? RIGHT? BOB? Oh, hi, officers. Nice "limo" you've got there. Bob walks down a pristine street that I swear I've walked down before, I think on my way to a sitcom taping. This is because it's not a real street. It's a backlot somewhere made up to look like "Main Street USA", and I think it's in Burbank. A suspiciously emotionally engaged group of well-wishers sits at an outdoor caf on the corner of "Entertainment Boulevard" and "This Media Stunt Is Totally Staged Street" calling out as Bob passes (and the cameras are just there BY TOTAL COINCIDENCE!), "Good luck, man." Bob waves, thanks them, and moves on. Wow. This soundstage employs some of the nicest paid extras in the business. And what divine providence that they came to the restaurant with body mics on! Scott Jeffress, co-executive producer, finishes us off: "America, you asked for Bob, and now we're gonna give him to you." Fine. Blame us, why don't you? It's all about "us" versus "you." See? This is why bullshit Russia tanked.

Has anything actually happened yet?

Alone, back at the Pad, RoboChris churns on to one lone camera: "When word got out that Bob was the new Bachelor, the response was unprecedented. Thousands of women from all across the country were willing to do anything for the chance to be Mrs. Bob Guiney. Let's take a look." Your call, Stalin. Let's then.

Montage! Montage! Montage! Supervising Producer Sally-Ann Salsano, who reminds me of everyone I went to high school with and who I therefore want to be my best friend, explains over shots of piles of mail, "We got prom pictures. Girls were cutting off their boyfriends' heads and putting in Bob's head. Bob was in family portraits. It was kinda weird." Yeah, kinda. In the Mad Libs entitled "A Visit To Bachelor Bob," under the blank "Woeful Understatement," I would write "kinda." You guys have to see these lunatic cut-and-paste whackjob projects. Seriously. Were shown a few clips of the audition tapes of nondescript blondes who weren't chosen to be on the show, and if I can't remember the names of the first twenty girls cut from the actual show, I sure don't have time to go into what these losers are doing. A stock footage shot of a plane we're supposed to believe is going to L.A. takes off, supposedly carrying their "favorite candidates." Girls are interviewed and seen making out with Bob cardboard cutouts, giving pee-pee samples, and telling us that they are "already in love." Hey, I think that girl actually ended up on the show. Co-executive producer Jason Carbone wants us to understand, "This is not something that is simple." Psychological exams. Blood tests. And, most importantly, as D.S. Fleiss tells us, "They have to look good in a hot tub." Cue completely excessive fully eightee-second-long (yes, I timed it. Stop looking at me like that) clip package of Girls Gone Wild Fourteen, featuring hot chicks running around, jumping into pools, frolicking and applying tan-enhancing oils on themselves and others. Please note that this stipulation to look good in swimwear was not a factor the last time the tables were turned, or else the guy America fell in love with would never have showed up on television in the first place. Everybody understand the paradox? Good. Now, if anybody's looking for me, I'll be over here, slamming my head against the glass ceiling right along with the rest of the double standards.

Chris's voice-over chip is starting to smoke from overuse: "When the nation first met Bob on The Bachelorette, he was affectionately known as 'Fat Bob.'" Yes. AFFECTIONATELY KNOWN TO HIMSELF. Bob tells us that he was "proud of the fact that I was chosen to be on the show," knowing that it was "because of [his] character, because of [his] personality." And because he didn't require eighteen chick-a-wha-wha seconds looking good in a hot tub, right D.S. Fleiss? Bob makes a fat joke we saw earlier in this episode, and then another one at the mention of "Shamu." Trista didn't choose him, which led to Bob's losing thirty pounds. It's the best thing Trista has ever done for anybody, ever. Bob tells us that all he wants to do is have fun, and that he thinks this experience is going to be "off the hizzy." Is that gang talk? Should we be watching out for this guy? I saw that Detroit movie, with all the rap music and angry thugs. I think you know which one I mean. Bob tells us that even though he has "tremendous friends" and "tremendous family" -- sing it with me if you know the words, people: WAIT, IS THAT A FAT JOKE? -- there's "one piece" missing in his life, that being "someone to share all that with." Bob's sister Dee Dee reports, "I'm a real blonde!" Actually, what she says is: "He was a little concerned that maybe he couldn't be 'that guy' that some of the Bachelors had been. And our advice to him was, 'So don't be that guy. Be you.'" And so he's him, outside on the deck of what I'll guess is his parents' house. He raises a glass of wine and cracks up the faithful with the joke, "I made this wine myself. It's from my vineyard, the Guineystone Vineyard." Now, Bob. There's no love lost between me and Li'l Andy, but you can't go this far out of your way to prove how above it all you are. And lest we forget that Andrew's aged parents were born in Cleveland. Isn't that within several hundred miles of plains and prairie lands from the part of the country only one of you doesn't have the good sense to leave when the money starts a-coming? Back in his confessional, Bob tells us, "It could be a train wreck. I don't know. It probably will be." He then laughs a high-pitched, strident, baby-hyena- demonstrating- the-Doppler-effect cackle, which goes as quickly as it comes and leaves a vein pulsing dully in the very darkest recesses of my brain. That's okay. I'm sure, whatever it was, he has no designs of ever doing it again.

And now, "let's meet our twenty-five bachelorettes." Yes. LET'S.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Greenville (population: ? State: ?), where we find the back of the head of a baldheaded man carrying a disturbing array of helium balloons (what is this fucked-up Fellini Presents Il Bachelore shit going on here?), who knocks on a door and tells an ebullient Lindsay, "I have good news! You're going to be on The Bachelor!" Lindsay is a relatively nondescript twenty-five-year-old from South Carolina (well, that answers one of those questions anyway) from Mauldin (but I thought...oh, never mind) who works in -- sing it with me if you know the words, people...pharmaceutical sales! She tells us, "This is huge and I'm just so excited." She and her friends toast with hearty glasses of wine, her friends excited that the prettiest friend is leaving town for a few weeks and thus will soften the competition of Mauldin's cutthroat bar scene.

Here's what being at a disadvantage literally means, people: being Julie, the second-most attractive African-American women on a reality dating show.

But if Bob marries Shelly the dormouse, who will play the role of the dormouse? Like last season's TinaFab, she's also in pharmaceutical sales and also from an unpronounceable town (Wauwatosa) in Wisconsin. ShellyFab? Doesn't so much sound right.

Common sense and peer pressure combine in a potent cocktail for us all to think excellent things about Estella, a twenty-eight-year-old mortgage broker (and brunette!) from Bev Niner. She says all the right things about why she's doing this (forced by an old roommate) and what she expects to get out of it (making us think she's cool, natch).

Lee-Ann looks less cool by comparison and by reality. Her mother seems to run a Boston Market franchise out of her kitchen. ["I wish Lee-Ann's mother were my mother." -- Wing Chun]

The Prize Patrol van pulls up at the house of Kelly Jo, a bob-haired hayseed from Kalamazoo. Just for making me write the words "bob-haired hayseed from Kalamazoo," she should be punted from the show and, while we've got our punting shoes on, into space, trapped between Lanah and Antoinette inside a pain of glass to float in the great void of space forever and ever.

I'm so fucking tired.

I would suggest we twenty-seven (the bachelors. And me. And Wing) sit together now and break bread with some montage-cakes, but these girls wouldn't touch a carb. That, and Wing is all "cannot attend THAT gathering." ["Much as I hate to turn down any opportunity to hang with Djb...yeah." -- Wing Chun] Anyway, they're leaving their houses, by car, by airplane, by magical pane of glass.

I don't think I'm recapping anything else Chris Harrison says tonight. Except when he tells us that there's only one rose left. Because if he doesn't tell us, how will we know when there is only one rose left?

If they wanted to be really clever about it, why not have this season take place IN Bob's hometown? His family is everything.

I'm losing the recapping thread here.

Lee-Ann is excited to meet Bob, "finally."

Christine is saving herself for marriage. And she wanted YOU to know.

Twins! Twins! Twins! Come and play with us, Bobby. Come and play with us. Better just turn around and ride your Big Wheels right out of there, friend, because I continue not to like where it's going with those two AT ALL.

Stacey Stacey Bo Bacey Banana Fana Fo Facey. Me Mi Mo Macey. Stacey.

Chris actually interrupts the proceedings here to let Chris know that having met ten women means there are fifteen more to go. Yet another pointless missive fired off from the fine folks at The Department Of Inessential Tasks. Check out their website at www.bachelor.gov/departmentofissentialtasks.html. Don't forget to sign the guestbook!

No, actually, I don't remember when The Bachelor became a government agency.

Kelly-Jo requires a hug.

Shelly is vaguely foreign, I think. Dutch or something.

Shea is wearing a pretty red dress. Wait, here's something telling. As she walks past Bob and into the grand ballroom, she gives a thumbs up and smiles. It comes to my attention that many of the girls have gestured excitedly at this point, even before there were enough people in the room to be performing for. It's starting to look like there's someone standing on the side, just to the left of the camera's gaze, holding a sign that's like, "Do something stupid or you won't get a rose!" It's a little stagy. Just something to look out for as we meet all of the girls. Again.

It's something in Lindsay's hair I don't like. She's so glad to finally meet him.

Mary speaks Spanish and waves at the person who tells her to wave. Was Spanish the national language of America when she was first learning to speak? Before all of the big purchases and annexes, I mean?

Lauren has a regimented view of when she should be married, and tells us she'll do "whatever it takes to get a rose." Will she be Estella?

Hi, Estella! She tells Bob she's totally nervous, and then leans provocatively into him to show him how fast her heart is beating. Because you know what the heart is right under, don't you? That's right! The boobies! Estella then walks past Bob and, on her way into the other room, wipes out big-time. Just like she said she would! How utterly coincidental. I have no idea what to do with it. Fortunately for Estella, she bows nicely on the dismount and I manage to find her winning again.

"I'll take one of you with nothing on it!" Oh, pipe down, Kristi. She outlines her life with Bob, telling us that she "sees herself in the future." And she's married to...a robot! No, not that kind of future, I guess. Her fantasy is a little more Harlequin, in which her homemaker life is briefly stirred by the arrival home of Bob, who will make everything better.

Y'know, I like Fiona Apple just as much as the guy (a lot more than the guy, if you want to know the truth of it), but Lanah didn't write "Paper Bag" OR date Paul Thomas Anderson OR look that much like Fiona Apple in the first place, except for one second when she steps out of the limo and seems all haggard and wanting to write a song about the heartlessness of men and the desolation of the soul. She'll have a lot more time to think those concepts over on a limo ride outta town, coming soon. She thinks it's nice to finally meet Bob.

Heather. "I don't know if I would say I feel like I'm in love with him already, but..." Honey, that's all you needed to say.

Another limo. Man, the proms that were supposed to be tonight are bummin'.

Jenny thinks it's nice to finally meet Bob.

Antoinette thinks it's great to finally meet Bob.

Karin thinks it's so nice to finally meet Bob.

Brooke just says "finally."

Meredith thinks she's going to be the last one standing, adding, "Thanks, Trista. She let a good one get away, I think." Trista is just excited that someone on TV still thinks to say her name every one in a while.

The Ambassador from the Department Of Inessential Tasks tells Bob go in and meet the ladies he's just met.

Oh, this is just sick. The pep rally for Team Bob kicks into highest as he ambles into the ballroom. Initial bantering at the entryway, and they raise a glass and Bob wishes a "Cheers, y'all!" Yee-ha! I just done shot my rifle into the air in cel-ee-BRAY-tion!

The bachelorettes ask for the Running Man. So I guess the dance is the Running Man. He tells them it's retired. So then actually it's NOT the Running Man.

And, the play by play is underway: Krazy-Eyes tells us she has not gotten to speak with Bob yet. HouseMouse steals him away from someone, and then Karin runs interference until Lindsay #1 asks for some private time after an indeterminate period. Lee-Ann emailed Bob once, but we never learn how or why because Kristi steals him away. Bob thinks Lee-Ann has a good "attitude," if by "attitude" he means "fake, fake boobies." The twins are in their own creepy dark shadow room just off this dimension from the rest of the show. Bob remembers their names and runs like hell. Bob says that he feels like everyone already knows him, deeming that "cool." THAT. Is terrifying. Some chick asks all seriously, "Why are you doing this? Because that's important to me." Yeah, let's not pretend we have the power position, Girl I've Never Heard Of. Bob tells us that it's "more work" being the Bachelor. And "more responsibility." Like, more paperwork and stuff?

Mary speaks Spanish to Bob, and he asks her if that was a fat joke.

Kelly-Jo steals Bob away to a quiet corner of the lanai, shaking her bob and telling him how nervous she was in the limo. "I don't know if I'm just gonna sit and make out with him, or..." Maybe the sequitur of that statement is buried somewhere in the hyphen of her name, because I'm having some trouble locating it. Then they kiss, which is a bit premature as well. Don't peak too soon!

Stacey judges Kelly-Jo as "aggressive." Stacey says that that's "not the approach" she takes. She takes the approach of "losing."

Misty is mad she had to share her one-on-one time, and then got interrupted by Estella. So that's okay. Estella is from Kansas. Which is near Bob, right? But she lives in L.A. now. Kiss on the cheek. She walks away carefully, because her schtick is "falling." Well, gotta get a gimmick.

Bob banters hilariously as Chris comes in with a glass and a self-serious stare, telling them, "I'm not gonna take Bob to the Deliberation Room yet." Not a speck of irony, folks. More: "There's [sic] gonna be a few surprises this season. I have invited one more guest to tonight's party." Hee. "I have invited." Like he went and sent out the invitation himself, all Mr. Body inviting Lesley Ann Warren to the Bachelor Pad so he could expose all of her lies and then kill her. But instead, this: "I want you ladies to meet a woman who will definitely have a say in who her future daughter-in-law might be." General merriment, and Bob looks all punk'd when his mom enters with the joke, "I thought I was in the neighborhood and in though I'd drop by." Boo-ya! That Guiney humor doesn't skip a generation, does it?

Bob and Mom -- a family of roving palindromes, draped in hilarity, split up for further investigation. Mom finds out that Karin has never been married, Fiona Apple is twenty-seven, some brunette is a makeup artist, Julie is a "wimp in the cold," and Kelly-Jo is "blessed" to have met Bob. Nora (that's Mom) reminds us again that she is "the first Mrs. Robert Guiney." And she's decked out like she's there to snag a man herself. So if you're wondering where Bob's poor father is, well, he's already dead as the Oracle had once foretold. Stay away from the fireplace accessories, Bob, because the eye-gouging officially tolls for thee.

The Virgin tells Bob she's a virgin. He's amused and horrified, masquerading as accepting. "Speaking of wives, what happened with yours?" Antoinette leads off (and when the leadoff spot ends with an out, it actually sucks for the whole team). Bob tells her that he has "scars" that have "made him a lot stronger." They Photoshopped in another blonde, and she's asking the same question. Estella tells Ma Guiney that she's happy to have met her. Milling and wandering. Lee-Ann tries the "you don't look old enough to be a mom" line, which actually totally works on my mom. Bob and Mom make off to compare notes, and Mom tells us, "I really like Kristin." And also Lee-Ann. And Karin. "I would be thrilled with any woman that you picked that cares about you." Uh huh. Bob is afraid of sending home somebody he might "have a wonderful future with." And just like that, Ma Guiney is gone. Jenny "felt pretty good" about the whole thing. I don't know who "Jenny" is. The twins think "rose or no rose" will happen together. Heather thinks she'll get a rose. Lee-Ann thinks she's going home. Bob thinks Christine looks like Ashley Judd. More confusingly mixed banter, and Chris appears again -- this time, to take Bob with him.

Pictures of the twenty-five women meet Bob and Chris in the Room Of Reckoning. Bob frets that he won't make the right decision, talking about how "flattered" he is that people came there just for him and were jumping up and down in the limo, crying out his name. Bob offers the names Lee-Ann, Estella, Julie, Karin, and Shea as people who jumped out at him from Moment One. Chris tells him, "You've already kissed one of them." Bob laughs like he's kind of embarrassed, proclaiming it "a moment." Of sickness and horror. Chris asks if he's worried about "sending Mrs. Guiney home," and Bob gets stuck in one of those joke loops he seems so prone to, responding, "We sent her home earlier tonight." Now we've said it before and we'll say it again: you cannot marry your mom. Chris asks whether Mom gave him any good advice, and Bob tells Chris, "She didn't really give me any advice," even though he explicitly thanked his mother for her great "advice" after she read him the "follow your heart" slip from inside of the Bachelor Fortune Cookies. How come people always get that one? Chris takes his leave to let Bob let his clichs be his guide, and he voices over that he used to be skeptical, but he's hopeful now that "it could happen" for him. He's excited about "what the future might hold." Dude, is that a fat...oh, never mind.

"Good evening," Chris welcomes the ladies. He presents the standard disclaimer that "if Bob is someone you would not consider marrying, you can and should reject his invitation." No one budges. I guess it's my speakers that so affects The Laugh.

Kelly-Jo, will you accept this rose? Whah, mee? Whah, I don't know nothing 'bout no roses or lovin' a man, but...well, suh, if you say so!

Lee-Ann, will you accept this rose? Kelly-Jo seems surprised to discover she hasn't already won.

Misty, will you accept this rose? I don't actually think she received one the first time I watched this episode. Weird.

Lindsay from California, will you accept this rose? Definitely. Good, because he doesn't want to have to ask again. And by that, I mean you will never, ever, ever be asked again.

Kristi, will you accept this rose? She really is pretty. Too bad she ends up with that robot, which...oh, never mind.

Mary, will you accept this rose? Mi Dios! La rosa es una cosa hermosa. Pronto, crecer vieja, y los ptalos rojos que ahora la adornan son predestinados dar vuelta al negro, descomponerse, y morir. Es como mirar el final de la juventud. En mi cultura, las rosas son el smbolo de la muerte. Por lo tanto, puedo pensar en nada ms apropiado que se levant aceptar esto. Gracias. Bob. Bob responds, "Era eso una broma gorda?" ["slow clap." -- Wing Chun]

Jenn, will you accept this rose? I actually have music on in my apartment right now. Loud music.

Karin, will you accept this rose? Wilco's "A.M." thinks you should. It's all right there, in their song "Casino Queen."

Brooke, will you accept this rose? Though it appears in many prisms through the filter of her Krazy Eyes, she lays a head on in and puts a peck on Bob's cheek.

Estella, will you accept this rose? This recap his been nothing more than a list of all of the women appearing on this show this season, three times.

Antoinette, will you accept this rose? She "certainly will." Furtive glances of fear start creeping into some of the women's eyes. Furtive glances outside -- where I have not been for going on twenty-four hours -- creep into mine.