Holy crap, are we actually here? Like this day is actually upon us? Kinda funny to think that Clare’s season was originally supposed to begin filming on March 13th (the day it became official we were in a worldwide pandemic), set to air in May, end in July, and now it’s Oct. 13th and we’re FINALLY getting her premiere. In reality, we should’ve already seen her season, already filmed and seen season 7 of BIP, and been a couple weeks into Matt James filming his season of the “Bachelor.” Damn you, COVID. You done messed up, A-A-ron (please tell me you get that reference). Anywho, here we are, about 6 months behind schedule but we finally made it. One positive to come from this? We’re about to have basically 6 consecutive months of “Bachelor” programming. “Bachelorette” will seemingly run through almost the end of December and as long as Matt James’ season of the “Bachelor” doesn’t have any sort of pauses in filming (more on that in a minute), his season is set to premiere the first Monday in January like it has for the past 8-9 years. Then we’re back on schedule and all will be right with the world. Well, at least Bachelor Nation world and their schedule.
Lets first discuss Matt James’ season. For those of you who haven’t followed anything since Peter’s season ended, a lot to get you caught up on, but mostly just know we’re in weird times since this is the first time a season of the “Bachelorette” is airing while the “Bachelor” is filming. Matt’s season began filming this past Saturday night in Pennsylvania at Nemacolin Woodlands Resort (where they shot episode 4 of JoJo’s season), and dates started yesterday. Whatever the date was, I was told about 10 minutes of fireworks were shot off around 11pm local time last night. So dates definitely started yesterday and we are underway for Matt’s season. Per usual, the social media activity of a lot of the women happened on Sunday and yesterday, so it’s pretty easy to see who has been eliminated. Women going from de-activated IG accounts to now private, some going from private to public, and they’re all adding each other as friends. I believe 10 were eliminated on Saturday night – among those Saneh Ste Clare, Nicole Rovner, Marie Dolce, Kennedy Taylor, Kimberly Courneya to name a few. If you have not seen the women released for Matt’s season, it was in last Wednesday’s column. They’ve already been taken down off of the Bachelor Facebook page, which they do every season. They release the contestants, leave them up for about 3-4 days, then take them down. Your guess is as good as mine. Makes zero sense.
Just like Clare’s season that was filmed on a closed set in one location, so will Matt’s. So I’m unsure how much info will actually get out while filming is happening since you can’t just walk around Nemacolin thinking you’re going to see filming. They aren’t letting anyone on the property, so, I don’t expect a ton to get out over the next 5 weeks of filming. What will that mean for spoilers? I guess we’ll have to see. Clare’s season as you know has been pretty limited and I hope before the finale I will find out what happens with Tayshia’s ending. We all know what happens with Clare. It’s the worst kept secret going. Yes, she is still with Dale and I think they’re engaged but haven’t gotten confirmation of it. “But Steve, the promos are making it so obvious she’s with him.” Yeah? And? The show hasn’t even acknowledged Tayshia’s presence this season in anything they’ve promoted for the “Bachelorette,” but I think by making it so obvious in the teasers Clare is with Dale, that’s their “nod” to the fact that, yeah, we have a new “Bachelorette” coming in later on. So while Tayshia hasn’t been shown at all, subtly and indirectly, they’re teasing her as coming on.
Unfortunately, for the first time Emily Maynard’s season, ABC did not release the first episode to the media on a username and password protected site. You know that every season I’ve been able to view the first episode and lay everything out for you before you watch, but for whatever reason, this season they didn’t do it. Sucks. I’ve always enjoyed going into the first episode not having to worry about taking notes and live tweeting, but I guess tonight I’ll have to. I have not seen it, I’m not going to see it, and I have no answers as to why. You’d have to ask ABC why it wasn’t posted on their screeners site like it has every season since Emily’s.
The spoilers that I have released on Clare/Tayshia’s season you can read here. I know. Not nearly as detailed as past seasons as I don’t have an episode-by-episode breakdown of things. Hey, might end up being the same for Matt’s season. Or not. I just never know. However, here’s something that I will guess. Once the pandemic is over and they are back to shooting seasons with travel, in public, and not on closed sets, I can pretty much guarantee spoilers will be back to normal. Just a hunch. So I’m not too worried and anything I get during the course of this season, I will pass along more and add it to the spoilers page. Times are different in the world and the pandemic has affected a lot of people’s lives and businesses. Mine is no exception.
On the site though, things continue as normal as we are back to our regular weekly routine for probably the next 6 months straight – with one minor change during “Bachelorette” season. Obviously with the season airing on Tuesdays, your recaps will be up on Wednesdays now and “Reader Emails” happening on Tuesday and podcasts on Thursdays. Today’s “Reader Emails” is very light just because with the return tonight, it just wasn’t on the forefront of people’s minds. I expect once we’re ramped up after tonight, and people actually have an episode under their belt, we’ll be back to more emails next week, so start getting them in now.
