The Bachelorette: There’s No Crying in Dodgeball

There’s a Starbucks in my town located next door to a high school. For one hour before and after school it’s packed wall to wall with teenagers with better eyebrows than me ordering caramel frappucinos without worrying about the calories. Any sane person would avoid it during those hours like it’s a preschooler with a runny nose, but I have small children at the end of the school year, so stop judging me. Entering that store through the cloud of converse shoes and Instagram filters is how I imagine bachelorette Becca feels walking into the bachelor mansion. Slightly nostalgic and hopeful, but mostly annoyed that there are still 21 men in the way of her ultimate goal of never having to work again love.

This week on The Bachelorette there were men crying for no good reason, one really good kiss, Lil Jon, a bunch of blue balls, ex-girlfriend drama, and a male model who refused to wear clothing during the rose ceremony. I’d rather move into that Starbucks than trade places with Becca.

Group Date Obstacles

The season is in full swing with the first group date to a modern farmhouse Chip and Jo would be proud of, where eight of Becca’s boyfriends stripped down before changing into tuxedos. Becca was working hard to avert her eyes from the plethora of six packs, but I didn’t have the same affliction. It’s basically free advertising for all of the inevitable online personal training businesses coming to a hand held device near you. Sign me up. After they’d been properly objectified, they walked out to a field where a wedding obstacle course was set up by former bachelorette, Rachel Lindsay and her fiancé Bryan not-Peter who were there to judge. The only rule they had was to not cheat, so obviously Lincoln with the good accent cheated and won a kiss from Becca. A kiss he described as, “Flying to the moon on the back of a Pegasus while dancing with unicorns on a pile of gold.”

_source

So Much Crying

Here’s the thing about Lincoln: he never shuts up. We get it, Lincoln, you’re named after one of the greatest orators in American history, you can stop now. In this case, Becca gave Lincoln a framed picture of his group date victory earlier in the day that somehow turned Lincoln into Smeagol with The One Ring. He was kissing the picture, flaunting it, and generally rubbing it in the other men’s faces. Now in a real life situation I’d like to think these professional men would be able to ignore his antics. But this is week one without access to the internet or steroids so Connor (the one who doesn’t know how the top three buttons on any shirt work) lost it. He got so annoyed that he picked up the framed picture and threw it into the pool where is shattered into a million pieces. Lincoln cried like any of this actually mattered and stuttered that, “the picture is broken, my heart is broken.”

_source

Turn Down For What?

Because The Bachelorette can’t let the Arie drama go, the first one-on-one date featured Becca and the ox-rider Blake destroying reminders of her past relationship with mallets while Lil Jon deejayed. Yes, that Lil Jon. This date was ridiculous and hilarious as they smashed televisions replaying Arie’s first proposal while “Turn Down for What” played over the montage. Never change, Bachelorette, never change. Also never stop showing us more of Blake because he’s adorable and that kiss they had up against the wall was hotter than anything Arie did the entire last season.

_source

Even More Men

The final group date of the episode split ten of Becca’s boyfriends into teams of two for a dodgeball tournament. Basically, they threw blue balls at each other at increasingly high speed while a elementary aged girl yelled, “You think Becca wants trash?” at them. Even I need therapy after this one. Despite stuntman Leo’s heroic efforts, the green team won the incredibly phallic trophy topped with, you guessed it, two balls. I’m not mentioning who was on which team because I can’t remember and they won’t matter in a few weeks anyway. But, at the after party, Becca loved it when Chris R. said he wants to “treat my future wife the same way I treat my mom and sister, with respect,” if that tells you anything about how low the bar is set this season.

_source

More Drama Already

Speaking of low standards, at the dodgeball after party, former NFL player Colton admitted to Becca that he dated her friend and former Bachelor contestant Tia. For those of you keeping track, that means he has dated gymnast Aly Raisman, and two members of the Bachelor family. At this rate, he’s only one season of Bachelor in Paradise from getting a podcast. Colton is handsome and sweet, but something is off. For a long time everyone thought Tia would be the Bachelorette instead of Becca, so was he trying to stack the deck in his favor?

_source

Rose Ceremony

Becca went through the usual last minute conversations at the cocktail party before the rose ceremony, but who cares about any of them because it was pensive gentleman male model Jordan’s time to shine. Earlier in the episode Jordan said that before he puts on his clothes in the morning he puts on his confidence. Thankfully he also puts on his red boxer briefs because that’s all he wore to the rose ceremony. If only we all had the confidence of this 26 year-old white male from Florida, we could take over the world. I’m pretty sure that’s what happened in the last presidential election. You may hate him, but he’s such good TV, he’s not going anywhere anytime soon.

_source

Becca sent three more men home this week which means she only has eighteen boyfriends to go before she ends up like everyone else from this franchise, on Dancing with the Stars. Who is your favorite so far? How long do you think she’ll keep Jordan around? Could you date your friend’s ex like Becca is with Colton? Let’s talk in the comments.

Catch up on all of our Bachelorette coverage