Anyway, we're back in Seattle at the houseboat that Jason and Ty are staying in, and we watch Jason packing because he's leaving poor Ty alone again, but it's worth it because he's going to four different hometowns to meet the families of the women he's auditioning to be his wife. He asks Ty how many shirts he should pack, and Ty glumly says, "twenty-one," which I hopes isn't one shirt for each day Daddy's away.
Jason says his relationship with Jill started off as a lot of fun, and she's got a sense of humour and is passionate about her career and is smart (her appearance on this show notwithstanding, I suppose). "There's some type of energy with Jill that isn't with anybody else," he says, as we watch them be all wacky with each other. Jumping on a bed. Playing chicken in the pool. Rolling hobos for spare change. He says life with Jillian would always be exciting, on the edge of his seat. Yeah, you have to be careful about getting onto that restaurant design carousel. Can you handle that, Jason? Despite having five minutes of "previously on The Bachelor" scenes, we now have to endure a Jillian montage of seemingly all the times he ever talked to her. "I'm not worried that she's too strong, but I'm looking for someone that's going to rely on me," says Jason.
And now we revisit Molly, who gave him butterflies when he first saw her, because she has the "most beautiful eyes" he's ever seen, only I think he meant "eye makeup." "When she wants something, she goes after it. And that's really flattering," he says. Also, on their first date, she jumped at the chance to spend the night with him, and "that's really cool." Well, who wouldn't think that was cool? "Molly's the type of girl I can see myself spending the rest of my life with," he says, but isn't that true of each of the four -- rather different, personality-wise -- remaining women? The only problem with Molly is that he "can't get deep enough" with Molly. Cough.
Naomi? "Naomi's amazing. She is gorgeous and beautiful and fun." She loves to travel. She has a passion for life, for giving back. For sulking? You don't mention the sulking? She has a passion for that, too. "I think Naomi's best quality is that her eyes are wide open to life," he says. He's just concerned that she might not be ready for his life of child-rearing and watching television. "I don't want to be the one to clip Naomi's wings."
He says he prejudged Melissa when she first got out of the limousine, that she was only there for a good time. Really? First we're hearing about this. Since Jason gave her the first solo date, doesn't that mean he only picked her for that because she's cute? Remember when Melissa cried after the General Hospital date? I'd almost forgotten too, but this damn show revisits it. Jason wonders if everything is "too perfect" with Melissa, and he's really looking forward to meeting her family, like he's not recording this after having already been snubbed by them, which we know is coming thanks to all the promos they show of it.
Ty helps his dad take his bags out to the car. Jason says the hometown date is a lot harder for him on this side of it, because he has to make a decision not just for himself but for Ty as well. Ty doesn't know anything! He thinks you should take twenty-one shirts!
So first up is Kelowna, B.C., where Jason is going to meet Jillian's family. He's still got some questions for her, like if she's into him as much as he's into her. Two things: A) Didn't they have that interminable conversation last week, and B) He's constantly expressing reservations about her, so I don't think it would be very hard to be as into him as he's into her.
So they leap into each other's arms, and Jillian explains to him that she grew up in Northern Alberta, but her grandparents moved out here when she was four or five, and then when she moved out of the house, her parents moved down here too. True story! Kelowna's gorgeous. I happen to be going there in a couple of months. Lake Okanagan. British Columbia in the fall, man. Surpassed only by Nova Scotia. Jillian tells him about Ogopogo, which is like the Loch Ness monster for Canadians. And Jillian claims to have stepped on him when she went tubing as a child.
Jason says he never thought he'd meet someone like Jillian, who loves everything about her life and wants to share it with someone. He's never met someone like that? What kind of dour people does Jason hang around with?
They head into the Mission Hill winery, and Jason thinks it's like a fairy-tale, only instead of marrying the handsome prince, four women compete to marry boring old Jason. "The winery is beautiful, but not nearly as beautiful as Jill," Jason says in an interview, like we're all supposed to melt at how sweet he is.
So they have some wine in front of the fireplace, and Jillian says she has something to tell him about her family that might "answer some questions" about her, and I might genuinely be curious to find out that her parents were axe-murderers or some such, if this show weren't intent on blowing every single surprise.
So she talks about how during the '80s her family was on top of the world and traveling. She actually says, "They worked hard and they played hard," so I guess during the '80s her family lived in a light-beer commercial. Then her mom was diagnosed with depression, which lasted for fifteen years, and her parents separated, and got back together, and her mom tried to take her own life and ... you know, all the intensely private and personal family history that I wouldn't want my daughter airing on a show watched by millions of people. Jillian says she was really tough on her dad, because he wanted to leave, but he didn't want to leave her, and her mom was in the hospital for months on end. And then in the last couple of years her mom got better and she doesn't know why, but she's very lucky, and then she breaks down crying, and Jason says she doesn't have to apologize. She says she just wants him to know when he meets them how incredible they are and how lucky she is to have them. "I think they're lucky to have you too," he says, adding that he's got someone "like that" in his family too, so he understands. Then they start making out.
Jason says he understands now why she's the rock that she is. "If anything, it makes me care about her more."
Jillian says she is a "jumping jellybean" with excitement over Jason meeting her family. They arrive at Jillian's home with her family waiting with homemade signs and the Canadian flag, which Jillian's dad drapes over Jason. Jillian says she's never introduced to her parents someone whom she said she wanted to marry. You know, on the day decades in the future when my daughter introduces me to the man she says she wants to marry, I sure as fuck hope he isn't DATING THREE OTHER WOMEN WHO ALL WANT TO MARRY HIM TOO.
Mom Peggy, father Glen, cousin Tori and boyfriend Charles. She also hopes he gets a chance to meet her grandma.
And then for god's sake Jillian starts going on about Jason's hot dog preferences, and he's a mustard guy, which proves her theory for some damn reason because that's why he's here now. Meanwhile she's pouring wine with her foxy cousin, which looks like a fine idea to me. Then Charles claps his hands and announces dinner's ready.
Jillian's cousin then blathers on at Jason, wondering what it's like to be on the other side of the whole Bachelorette/Bachelor thing, because Jason hasn't already prattled on ENOUGH about the difference, so why not show him doing it one more time?
Then Jillian's mom reads a poem that -- well, I'm not going to slam a bachelorette's mom, not even when she gets teary-eyed reading an awkwardly rhyming, inconsiste
ntly paced poem. Let's just say it's certain this is an original composition and she's not quoting Al Purdy or anything. "Life is like a dance, and it's just like you to take this chance. We love you," she wraps up. Jason calls it beautiful and everyone toasts, and then Peggy orders Jason out back so she can grill him. "For Jillian's sake, I hope he's the one."Out on the deck, Peggy jokes that she has a couple of questions, and then unrolls the friggin' Old Testament, and then they have a good laugh. Her first question is about what he sees as his role as a partner. His answer? "To be a partner." Don't go checking the "Not A Moron" box off just yet, Peggy. How does he handle conflict? "In all honesty, I'm not a fighter," he says, calling himself more of a listener. She notes his BA in psychology, which she says will come in handy in this family. Jason laughs, probably trying to gauge just how much it's OK for him to laugh.
In an interview, Jason says he thinks she was impressed with his answers. Well, she'd be the only one. Inside, meanwhile, foxy Tori is talking to Jillian who is yammering on about the connection they have, and there's something about Jillian's voice lately that she always sounds like she's just holding back tears. Outside, Peggy talks about how Jillian had to have strength when she shouldn't have HAD to have strength, and Jason charmingly asks what advice she has to make a marriage last, and Peggy says life is a dance and you learn as you go, so I guess to all you newlyweds out there, just turn on a country music station for advice this good. In an interview, Jason says he better keep his dancing shoes on.
Jillian and her mom sit on a bed for a little heart to heart on what a saintly man Jason is, whose very touch cures cancer, and her mom thinks there's a lot of depth there, so I guess this must have been shot before he gave her a bunch of inane answers to her questions. And Jillian talks about the feelings she has, which she didn't expect, and now she wants to have a million cancer-curing babies who grow up to wander around shirtless. Meanwhile, Glen is talking to Jason instead of repeatedly punching him in the face. In an interview, Glen gets choked up about how strong his daughter has been, which is the running theme. Jillian! You're TOO GOOD for Jason! Stay in Kelowna and send him packing! "If Jillian gets married, you're going to see a pretty happy guy."
So then Jason sits around with the hosers making jokes about their Canadian accents, and I'd just like to point out that saying someone has a "Canadian accent" is like saying someone from the south or someone from the Bronx has an "American accent," and meanwhile Jillian says something was "seriously missing," which was her grandmother. And we don't know why granny's not there, but she isn't. And then she is! "I literally catapulted up off the couch," says Jillian, like what is it with this woman and misusing "literally" in regard to medieval weaponry?
Grandma says "oh my goodness" and "oh my god" over and over. In an interview, she says Jason is a gorgeous guy, and she'd been planning to take Jillian up to Northern Alberta to marry her off to a Ukrainian. Grandma has a present for Jason: Joe Boxer underwear with the Maple Leaf all over it. Yes, because nothing makes you more comfortable when meeting your girlfriend's family for the first time than Grandma giving you underwear. She puts it on his head, or she just can't tell the difference between that and his ass. She says he won't be sorry if he marries into the family because they're "the craziest bunch." In an interview, he says the funny genes definitely run in the family.
As Jason gets ready to go and DO THIS ALL OVER AGAIN THREE MORE TIMES, Jillian talks about how he did great. "I'm very proud of him and I would love to go to the level with him," she says, adding that she's aware she could get her heart crushed, but the more she spends time with Jason, the more she falls in love with him. For his part, he calls her "unreal" and says, "To have someone in my life, why would I want to let that go?" BECAUSE THERE ARE THREE OTHER WOMEN. THAT'S WHY. THAT IS EXACTLY WHY. They kiss and Jason leaves, off to ingratiate himself into the lives of at least two more families he doesn't plan to join. "The bar is high after today's date," he says, adding that he can't imagine a date going any better than that.
But now we're in Grand Rapids, Mich., where Molly is waiting for Jason on the golf course. She says she hasn't seen Jason in a few days, so she's probably contracted scurvy by now. We talk again about how her parents' approval of her boyfriend is very important for her, because her last boyfriend strained her relationship with her dad, so she's not going to date someone they don't like. "If it's a no-go for her family, I'm sure it's a no-go for Molly," says Jason. I still don't understand this. I mean, if they didn't like the guy because he was an asshole, shouldn't the goal be to not date assholes? Because if he was a good guy and they still didn't like him, then I wouldn't exactly be depending on their approval.
So anyway, they play like two holes of golf, and Molly calls it "sexy" that he knows how to golf for god only knows what reason, and then it's off to meet the family: Mike, Maryann, Katie and Nick.
So they pull up at the house, and Molly has a very huggy reunion with her parents, and they all go inside and talk about GOLF for about five hours, like maybe Molly secretly wants Jason to shoot himself out of sheer boredom. And then he says the day Ty learned to crawl, he took him to the golf course to crawl around on the putting green, which I'm sure the other golfers must have really appreciated, and then the mom is hauling out these HATS for some reason, like she has on this giant floppy orange foam hat, and she gives Molly a tiara to wear, and she gives Jason some sort of native headdress, and he thinks that makes him TONTO for god's sake, and Molly's dad puts on a hat that looks like a foaming mug of beer. "Leave it to Maryann to embarrass me in front of Jason." I can't imagine calling my mom by her first name.
And then Molly's sister Katie and Katie's boyfriend/husband/parole officer/I don't know Nick shows up, and Jason is all good-naturedly throwing hats on them, showing what an amazing good sport he is. In an interview, Maryann says Molly has never talked about having feelings for a guy before. "It resonated with me, and I just wanted to know who he was." So she takes Jason into some kind of little art room where she gives him a can of pencil crayons and tells him to draw a picture that reminds him of Molly's face in a special moment. Here's hoping he has the good sense not to draw Molly with her eyes closed, mouth open, tongue sticking out. Here's also hoping Molly's parents don't watch earlier episodes with the closed-captioning on, so they don't have to see "[moaning]" on the screen while their daughter spends the night in a tent with a guy she just met.
Meanwhile, Jason apparently heard Maryann say "Please paint my daughter as if she were Jack Nicholson as the Joker in Batman," because that's what he does, and he paints her with long straight brown hair, and promises never to "dabble in art" and I would much rather he dabble in art than continue to dabble in television, and then Maryann says she doesn't want to give the impression that they're always "this crazy" like YOU TALKED ABOUT GOLF FOR TEN HOURS, LADY, and then everyone's hanging out in the living room drinking and then Jason is apologizing for his art skills, because he had to give Molly the long brown hair because otherwise she looked like a boy. And then the date is over, and ... really? That's it? Over already? Not that I'm complaining. No, wait, all I do is complain. You know what I mean. Molly talks to her dad, who says all he wants is for her not to cry in the limo if she doesn't make it to the end. Thanks for the pep talk, dad.
Molly says she knew everything would change once she brought him home to meet the family: "They did love him, so
I want to let myself go, be absolutely vulnerable to Jason and let myself fall in love with him." Jason says that he "can't get enough of Molly" and he hates saying goodbye because it means he's not going to see her for a while. That's right, because you'll be trying to convince us that you're also madly in love with Naomi and Melissa as well.So it's off to Lake Elsinore, Calif., which is Naomi's hometown, and she's all dressed up like a cowgirl waiting for him, and he asks if this "cowgirl" is really her, because yes, all cowgirls wear tons of makeup and giant hoop earrings, and Naomi tells us that Jason had some concerns just before the last rose ceremony that she wasn't ready to settle down, and she wants to prove that she is ready to settle down and have a family, and so to prove it, she's adopted a couple of starving kids in Africa and is now pregnant herself! Awesome!
So we listen to Naomi yammer on about how ready she is to settle down and be married, and you know, if the number of times a person says "like" in a sentence has anything to do with maturity, then she's completely ready.
Anyway, it's off to meet the relatives, and Naomi -- she has an "interesting" family. Not just interesting, they're crazy! Crazier than Molly's golf-loving whack jobs? Naomi and Jason show up at her home, where mom Joanne, dad Hector, sister Davina, brother Josiah, niece Mariah, nephew Derek, and half-sister Olivia are all hanging out in the backyard. Naomi says her parents divorced when she was eleven, but hopefully they can all get along.
Then Naomi's mom comes out with a dozen or so hula hoops and orders everyone to use them in a hula-hoop contest, and we get to watch Jason make a total hash of it ("Be one with the hula hoop!" Naomi's mother earnestly tells him), while Naomi and her mother are amazing, and so is one of the little squirts, who manages to keep five or six going at the same time.
And now hula-hooping time is over, and Naomi's mom starts telling a story about hitting a dove with her car (although she maintains that the dove committed suicide by ... purposely running into it, I guess) and eventually comes around to the point, which is she saved the bird and brought it home so they could bury it and Jason could give the eulogy. "The dead bird is in here!" gleefully shouts Naomi's nephew, running out of the house with a paper bag. "I was seriously like, 'Are you (bleep) right now?'" Yes, Naomi. They are seriously (bleep) right now.
Jason, who grimly appears game no matter what's being thrown at him, admits he was not expecting to give a eulogy. The more I think about it, the more I think the dead dove is a rather apt symbol for the show, which has taken something pure and beautiful, and HIT IT WITH A FUCKING CAR. So Jason eulogizes the dead dove while Naomi's insane family buries it in the back yard with a garden trowel. And they do such a great job burying it that the time it rains the dead bird's going to pop out of the ground like in Pet Sematary.
Inside, Hector starts lecturing Jason on how it's important to have inner strength in Jesus, and on how they raised Naomi from a biblical perspective, and meanwhile there are a couple of SLOT MACHINES in the living room, like can SOMEONE EXPLAIN TO ME WHAT IS GOING ON HERE, and Jason comes clean about not having a whole lot of religious background, but if there's some sort of god who responds to pointless greeting-card sentiment about connection and love, then Jason's the bishop. "Today I learned that Hector loves Jesus," Jason tells us in an interview.
Then Joanne kidnaps Jason to talk about Naomi being very "psychically strong" and an "indigo kid," which apparently has something to do with wanting to see injustices righted, which only fits Naomi if she's secretly on The Bachelor to destroy it from the inside. "I feel like we're in the same soul family," says Joanne, who then asks how Jason feels about reincarnation. "I feel like anything's possible," says Jason, because he can't very well say, "You are a nutjob." Joanne suspects Jason may have been, I swear to god, a "temple priestess" in a life. On the plus side, Joanne is gorgeous, and maybe Naomi will age just as gracefully.
Outside, Hector tells Naomi that he talked to Jason about her Judeo-Christian upbringing, which is something he thinks she needs to consider. "I think Jason knows I am a spiritual person," she says, and I don't think Hector realizes Naomi means "spiritual" in its "I don't want to appear shallow but I also don't want to appear to want to marry Jesus" sense. She also says she honestly doesn't care if they believe in the same things or not. Really? Check out your own parents, Naomi, to see if it helps to believe the same things. Hector says he trusts them to make the right decision (appearance on The Bachelor notwithstanding, I imagine) and that he'll support her whatever decision she makes. Silly Hector! She has no control over this! It's entirely up to the man!
Jason and Naomi play tag with the kids in the backyard until it's time for Jason to go, like before Joanne swats a mosquito and orders Jason to eulogize it. Naomi walks Jason outside. "After Jason said goodbye to everybody, I knew 100 percent that I am falling in love with this man," she tells us, and then she and Jason suck face for ten minutes by the garage. She tells us that after her last relationship, she said the time she fell in love would be with the man she's going to marry. Back inside, she tells her family that the time she sees them, she could be engaged: "Isn't that crazy?" In this house? Nah. Naomi's sister asks if she'd say yes to his proposal after having known him for only six weeks, and Naomi says "yes!" and everyone toasts "new beginnings." This is what it sounds like when doves cry.
After the commercial break, Jason's in Dallas, "Ready to see Melissa and meet her family." Yeah, and it's totally going to happen, the whole "meet her family" part! Way to build the drama by having Jason constantly talk about it when WE ALREADY KNOW IT ISN'T GOING TO HAPPEN.
So Melissa has a little mini-picnic set up by a pond and she gives him a tooth fairy box for Ty to put his teeth in, and Jason thinks it was awesome that not only was she thinking of him but thinking of Ty as well, and he'll be sure to mention how impressive that was when he totally meets her family later, and eventually Melissa gets around to breaking the news to him: "You today will be meeting some of my best friends," she says. "My parents are not comfortable with the ... publicness, I guess of this." Jason asks how she feels about that, and she says it bothers her. Jason tells us it was disappointing that he's not going to get to meet them, because it's important to see how he gets along with the family. Melissa's also distressed by it, because he's going to get to meet all the other bachelorettes' families, and I hate to tell her that I think this is an advantage for her, and I'd like to say thank god for Melissa's parents who just don't want to have video cameras in their faces over what should be a family moment. "I don't want this to sway any decision he has on me." If it does, he's a dick, so don't worry about it, Melissa.
So it's over to her friend Stephanie's house, to meet her and husband Joe, and a nameless friend from Oregon and her husband Jason, and two adorable daughters, Corinne and Leah. So there's a little bit of hanging out in the living room, and Jason remarks on the girls being drawn to Melissa, and how it's "literally a gift" to be that good with children.
Back from commercial, Melissa is saying that she's disappointed that -- HOLY SHIT WE GET IT, YOU WANTED JASON TO MEET YOUR PARENTS, TALK ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD.
So the friends are all having dinner, and then they talk about how they never get to meet her boyfriends, and how maybe she didn't want her friends to meet them. In an interview, Stephanie says, "I don't really want to say that Melissa's past boyfriends have used and abused her, but in a way it see
ms they have," and I am getting really unsettled by all this. "Used and abused" her? What does that mean? In an interview, Joe, who looks like he's wearing eyeliner, jokes that they want to marry her off because they're sick of the fifth wheel hanging around all the time.So in lieu of chatting with her parents to see what they think of the boyfriend who dates a bunch of women at once, Melissa asks her friends what they "think of the boy," adding, "I really like the boy." Why? Because he makes her feel "like, worthy" and "like, beautiful." Aw. That's, like, touching! They all hug.
Elsewhere, the men are ruining a perfectly good game of pool by talking Melissa's past relationships, especially the long one she had in which the guy would rather hang out in Dallas with his friends than be with her, and it took them a lot of work to convince her that she was better than that.
And then Jason gets to talk to the women and we find out that Stephanie, whom Melissa said was one of her oldest friends, only met her parents once, and Melissa doesn't really talk again, which may be important to remember the time Melissa whines about how important it is that Jason meet them and how sad it is that he's not going to. In an interview, he says he would have thought that her closest friends would know her parents. In an interview, Melissa says she's disappointed that Jason didn't get to meet her parents and she's worried that might affect the decision. My GOD I need a GUN.
Well, here's an advantage to not meeting the parents: Jason and Melissa can spend the night drinking and cuddling if they want. Jason tells us that Melissa had "her suite" done up all nice... her suite? Doesn't she live in Dallas? They talk a little bit about Jason not meeting her parents, and Melissa saying that they're very private people who didn't even come to any of her Cowboys games. After more pointless talk about her parents, which I can't even bother to summarize, the two of them start making out. Melissa says she's fallen harder for Jason than she's fallen for anyone in a long time.
Back in Seattle, Jason said he had a great week, and his decision is going to be -- wait for it -- "ridiculously tough." This would be in stark contrast to all the other weeks that seemed to be such a breeze for him, right?
Chris Harrison crashes the houseboat so he can get the dirty details on the hometown dates and this show can be even more padded by showing us scenes that we've already watched tonight. Jason says he's even more confused after meeting all the families, and I can't say I blame him, what with the golf and the hats and the dead-animal disposal going on. After rehashing the dates, Harrison notes Jason has some thinking to do, and he'll see him later, and that means we get some more of those hilarious shots of Jason trying to look thoughtful while staring out over the water.
So it's back over to the Fairmont Hotel, where the women are lined up in this huge banquet room, awaiting Jason's verdict. "I don't even know where to start," says Jason, starting in on his weekly lip service about how hard a decision this was for him, because he's been on the other side. It manages to get even more annoying each time I hear it.
He tells "Mel" that meeting her friends was "awesome," and he knows where Jill comes from, and Naomi's family is wonderful, and meeting Molly's family was unbelievable. He says it's a lot harder now that people's friends and families are involved, and he thanks them all for inviting him to their hometowns: "it meant the world to me."
First rose: Molly. "The hats didn't scare you away?" she says. No, not after the voodoo ceremony at Naomi's place. Jillian's .
And the final rose goes to, after about five hours, Melissa. Naomi seems a little bit stunned, and then recovers enough to smile. She hugs the other women, telling them that she loves them (and I have to say that the final four women do -- and even going back to include Stephanie -- seem to genuinely like each other more than I remember happening before).
Jason sits down to tell Naomi that it had nothing to do with her as a person or her family, but just that he thinks they're in "different places" right now. She pleasantly tells him that that wasn't the reason she wanted to hear, because she is ready to settle down, so she would have rather heard that he feels stronger about the other women. He says she's incredible, and she says she wishes nothing but the best for him. In an interview, he tells her he felt bad sending her home because she's gorgeous and full of life and blah blah blah, but "it just wasn't the right time."
He packs her off in the limo, and she slowly starts to cry more and more as she talks about how it stinks that the very reasons she told him she didn't want to go home are the reasons she is going home, and she didn't want to have her heart broken again, and she's starting to feel like she's better off on her own. Aw. "I have no idea where I go from here. It sucks," she says, covering her face with her hands.
Jason says he knows he made the right decision, but it was still hard to do that to someone, and he knows he's going to have to do it again (and again). Then again, he and the other women are all smiles as he toasts them and their families, and he's going to see them all in New Zealand! The bachelorettes are going to New Zealand for the skanky and not at all romantic overnight dates!
Daniel metaphorically catapults into the shower after watching The Bachelor. He can be reached at danieljdaniel@gmail.com.