The “Bachelorette” Clare – Episode 1 Recap, Ratings, Yosef, & Luke Parker Thoughts

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I gotta admit, it was actually a little bizarre seeing the show on again last night. It’s the first time in, what, 10 years that we’ve had to wait that long in between a season? Peter’s finished in March. It’s freaking October. And if anyone thinks March was actually 7 months ago, well, you’re wrong. March 2020 was about 7 years ago in case you haven’t noticed. Just think, there were days when this franchise DIDN’T have a “Bachelorette” season or BIP. How did we function as human beings? Beats me. Well, we’re back into things and if you missed yesterday, or anything over the last 7 months, you know now that barring any shutdown of filming on Matt James’ season which began this past Saturday at Nemacolin Woodlands Resort, we are looking at essentially 6 straight months of Bachelor Nation programming. Probably be a week or two break in December from this season ending and Matt’s beginning, but that’s it. So get ready I tell ya’. A lot of work ahead of us. So much going on and with this show on Tuesday nights now, things are tad weird. As you saw yesterday, not a ton of “Reader Emails.” In the past, I was always able to tell you in Tuesday’s recap to get your “Reader Emails” in. Now I’ll be doing that on Wednesday for something that won’t run until 6 days later. Hope you guys don’t forget. So just keep that in mind.

I think one thing about last night was they were pulling teeth for drama. In terms of first episode drama, Tyler C versus Yosef was about a 1. We’ve seen soooo many more dramatic night 1 controversy than that. That wasn’t even tea. Or anything. Now, was it true? Absolutely. But ultimately, Yosef isn’t a major player on this show so it really becomes irrelevant. However, I do wanna say something in regards to what he was accused of. Was he emailing, DM’ing, texting multiple women pre-show? Yes. Some have contacted me, I’ve seen his messages, etc. It’s whatever to me and here’s why. When that original cast posted in March (that Yosef was a part of) had to leave filming because of COVID, not one of them knew what the future held. You can’t expect these guys to not get online and start going to town talking to women. He wasn’t the only one who did it. Did he probably do it with more than he should’ve? Sure. But that whole “he was talking to me during quarantine,” to me, honestly isn’t that big of a deal because none of these guys knew if/when they were even going back on the show. Are they not allowed to live their life from March until June-ish when they probably found out they were going back?

The issue with Yosef is way more to do with what he does when he’s actually on the show, not what he did pre-show. That’s peanuts. Yosef shows his ass (not literally) this season and that’s where you can make your judgment if this guy is setting a good example for his 4 year old daughter. Answer: He isn’t. And what he does and what he says to Clare says way more about him than anything he was doing pre-show. He makes a fool of himself. And yeah, in case you couldn’t tell, the clip they’ve showed a 1000 times of Clare going off saying “…because of men like that!” is her response to Yosef after he goes off on her. As I’ve mentioned on podcasts and my IG live, I’ve heard plenty of negative stuff about a lot of these men pre-show. Nothing that’s newsworthy as of now, but just your basic stuff you hear every season. Seen receipts for most of them too. If there’s something major that comes my way, I’ll report it. But just know that not every guy is an angel, not every guy who was spewing glorious compliments on night 1 really meant it, and just take it for what it is – people making a TV show and saying things that make good soundbites. Not saying everything is a lie, but c’mon. EVERY GUY is there and so excited and can’t wait to fall in love with Clare? Please.

Tonight I’ll be doing my weekly IG live with Ashley Spivey at 8ET/5PT. Looks like it’ll probably be Wednesday’s going forward for the time being, but we’re honestly on a week-to-week basis. All depends on scheduling. I know it’s during Big Brother, but hey, it’s almost over and, c’mon, this season hasn’t been the greatest. Not to mention if you follow the live feeds, or what’s reported on them, you already know what’s happening on the Wednesday episode in terms of who won the Veto and if they decided to use it. And again, this week’s podcast guest tomorrow is Kat Dunn, who after she came on the podcast April 23rd of this year, we started dating. So she wanted to do a podcast that we both could post where we talked about whatever, drank wine, and played “Answer or Drink.” Or whatever the hell we called it. Either way, it was a good time, it’s a little over 2 hrs long, and we argue about Reddit. Fun times.

A lot of you have seen the story of Luke Parker being sued by NZK Productions for $120,000 because they say he violated his contract. We haven’t heard anything from his side as of now. No idea if he’s fighting this, when the money is owed, if he has it, etc. But this is such a bad look for the franchise, I’m sorry. Suing your contestants? Really? Especially making an example out of one person that did something so many other contestants before him have done as well? Shows you what this show thinks of its contestants. They literally pay them nothing, exploit them on TV and do whatever they want, throw them back out to society without offering any sort of help, then stick them with an iron clad contract that says, “We can do anything to you, but you can do nothing to us.” I think Reality Blurred’s Andy Dehnart said it best when he said,

“But I find it very disturbing that a production company connected to Warner Brothers and ABC…would be so petty and punitive that it’d not just be content with trashing a contestant on a national stage, but now is forcing him to pay for attempting to defend himself.

The fact that multi-million dollar corporations profit off of people and then won’t even let them talk about their experiences seem, I don’t know, somewhat imbalanced. Why wouldn’t they want reality show cast members to talk freely about their experience? Do they have something to hide?”

That’s always been my issue. I know no one’s forcing them to go on the show. And yes, the contract clearly states what you can and can’t say publicly once the show ends. Yet plenty of contestants ignore it and the show picks and chooses who they’ll make an example of. It’s the worst contract anyone can ever sign to begin with but, and I even brought this up in the Nick podcast before being completely dismissed by Mr.-Know-It-All and his producer, who told me the show has to protect itself. Ummm, if they have nothing to hide, the show is organic, and they aren’t pushing people to do/say anything, why would they have to do that? Then again, Luke is probably just misremembering what happened to him anyway. How could I be so stupid? Look, Luke didn’t do himself any favors for some of the things he said and did on that show. You heard him on my podcast and should judge him more off that anyway. But this is more about the power this show wields over anyone they want. Horrible look for them to do this, I don’t care who it is.

Ratings are in and the premiere actually was on par with Hannah’s premiere last May on a completely different night. Last night drew 4.7 million viewers and a 1.3 rating. Hannah’s premiere drew 4.67 million viewers with a 1.3 rating. They gotta be happy with that. I think overall when we get into November and December, maybe the rise in viewership every week won’t be as high, but this is a good start for them. Hannah may have drawn 4.67 million and a 1.3 in her premiere, but 2 ½ months later, her finale drew 7.4 million viewers and a 2.1 rating. That’s what the key is. How much do you build during the course of your season? No doubt the finale will be higher than the premiere. All seasons are. The question is how much higher? I’ll be keeping track every week for sure. But I guarantee this is a higher number than they expected for the premiere given what we’re going through right now.