Hey Steve! First timer here but this is driving me crazy and I would love your personal opinion on it. Everyone on Instagram and other platforms are clearly all over the place on who they want between the final 3 however, we know she chooses Nayte at the end so it really doesn’t matter what anyone thinks lol. But here’s my thing….. nothing about her body language says she is happy as of RIGHT NOW during her interviews or even MTA. She expresses all sorts of emotions during normal conversation but the moment someone brings up the ending she fixes her hair or loses eye contact, deep swallows and keeps the same monotone face during any answer she gives. She has also thrown in a lot of whether or not she has a man comments and I understand that because she has established herself as independent woman but I genuinely do not know if this is how she avoids giving away that she is engaged and to who but if it is, she’s got one hell of a poker face. I 100% believe she chooses Nayte and they leave engaged. I am just getting the feeling things may have gotten rocky post show. I really hope I’m wrong because I do believe their connection is real. I love reading your articles every week and we usually feel the same way in most situations so I’m ignoring social media’s bandwagon mentality and just judging her presence. I never really care who they choose on the show, I get invested afterward when they get in the real world and if they can ACTUALLY be a couple or not. So short story long, I would love to know if you have personally caught the vibe I’m catching from the last couple weeks of press or not. Also, any new dirt on if they are currently happy (I know you said they are still engaged) or not wouldn’t hurt haha! Thanks Steve!
Comment: It’s impossible for me to gauge people’s happiness when it comes to this show. We’ve seen people post how much they were in love with someone, then be broken up weeks later. We’ve seen supportive social media posts and pictures together, only to see a breakup shortly thereafter. Not even just with this show, but even regular people in our lives. So we don’t really know what’s going on. All I know is they’re still engaged. I guess you can judge when you see them together at the ATFR if you think they’re gonna last.
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Hi Steve,
Since you mentioned your emails are low I thought I’d send these questions I’ve had.
– Johnny Bananas for Bachelor?!? He posted an article last month (attached) suggesting it. Could you imagine? How he’s treated women over the years and being a cheater. But it sure as hell would be entertaining and change from the “nice guy”! Zero chance. This show does not go outside of the franchise. And even if they did, they’d choose an unknown or maybe some lower end athlete. They’d never choose someone who’s been on reality TV as much as Johnny has. If that were the case, the men and women who are contestants they’d pull from other shows as well and they never do that.
-Curious if your friendships with people from BN changed after your “scandal” earlier this year? Were you dropped by some to save face? One did. All others have remained the same. At least privately. Can’t say publicly they’ve all stayed the same. But I get it.
-I feel like I haven’t seen a podcast from BN people recently. Are you trying to stray away or having trouble getting people?
Comment: Because I can’t get anybody on that’s remotely relevant. They’re all told to stay away from me. So anyone worth a damn, like the ones you hear on the BN podcasts, or anyone within a year of their finale airing are out. And then anyone who wants to stay in good graces with the show or possibly be on a future season isn’t coming near me. So yeah, while there are options of people from older seasons, I feel I’ve had a lot of them on already. I mean, at least ones you’d want to hear from. Could I ask a first night eliminatee from 10 seasons ago? Sure, but what are we gonna talk about? There will still be former contestants on from time to time, but they are definitely few and far between. It’s just much tougher now because they don’t want to rock the boat. I don’t even ask most of them because I know they won’t do it.
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Hi Steve,
Im surprised that I didn’t see any mention of the streaker in your recap. How much do you think they paid him?
Comment: $5? I mean, I doubt that person even got paid to do that. Remember, a lot of the audience members are SAG-AFTRA workers, so they’re getting paid to be there already and sit through a 6-8 hour shoot.
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Hey Steve!
First off I want to say that I enjoyed reading your breakdown of John Hersey’s Reddit post. I think you hit the nail on the head. You may not remember but about two weeks (give or take a couple days) before Katie and Blake officially announced their breakup I emailed you and asked you your thoughts on Katie and John’s friendship/social media activity. Obviously at the time there probably wasn’t much cause for concern or judgement. And I guess I was not surprised when Katie ultimately deleted the breakup post from her Instagram account. I feel like she did the opposite of what that joint statement said which was asking for “privacy and kindness”. Regarding her 12 Days of Messy and her being petty towards Blake, the only other one that seemed to get some attention was the one for Michael A. Even though her intention with the whole thing was obviously to announce her relationship with John, I still found Michael’s response to the song she chose for him interesting as he kinda turned the tables in a way and friend zoned her. But I guess there was probably no other way to respond besides not responding at all if he so chose, right? She absolutely did the opposite of what she wrote in their breakup post. I honestly don’t even know what Michael’s response was. I missed that.
Over the weekend some of the more recent franchise “villains/seemingly controversial figures” (Anna, Tammy, Chris, Alana etc), including Katie and John, seemed to have a little too much fun on TikTok relishing their “villain status”. Would you say that they know they’ll probably get a rise out of people by doing that or should people really just see it as a joke etc?
Comment: They did it to acknowledge the haters and get a rise out of people. It’s whatever at this point.
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Based on phrases like “bury the hat and be bygones” , it appears that producers seed contestants with incorrect phrases and nonsense words and then laugh about it in the back room.
Other examples:
befumbled
finasco
lingeree
rest in pizza
Do you believe this to be the case?
Comment: Well, I thought the “lingeree” comment was definitely organic. I think she thought that was the pronunciation. Same with “finasco.” “Rest in Pizza” just sounds like Peter’s thing. And I don’t remember who said “befumbled.”
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Hi Steve,
Just wondering if you reckon that the whole sudden shift of them going from back-to-back Bachelor to another Bachelorette after Clayton’s season has anything to do with Tayshia being single again? Since they also briefly talked about her breakup on MTA, I’d assume that’s laying groundwork for her to have “a second chance at love”. Not to mention she only really had a half season because she shared it with Clare. Just wondering if that could be why because it seems she’s an extremely popular persona in the franchise, so I could see them potentially making this decision.
Comment: I don’t think that has anything to do with it. I fully expect the next “Bachelorette” to be one of Clayton’s women. Tayshia doesn’t need to do this show again.
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Hi Steve,
First and foremost I would like to just say thank you for the time and effort you put into delivering recaps of the episode. I’m from South Africa and we don’t often get to watch the show until 2 months after it’s already aired in the US. I really look forward to your reader mails and recaps on a regularly basis and appreciate what you do for the bachelor nation community at large.
I have two questions however,
1) I am not sure if you have answered them before or if you are allowed to but I know you mentioned Michelle is engaged to Nayte. Just out of curiosity, are you able to let us know how you got the confirmation you needed and what exactly it was that solidified the deal? Ha ha, no I can’t share that. But if I could, I think you’d be amazed.
2) Has the ATFR been filmed already? If so when and if not do you know when it will be taping?
Once again thank you for the work you do!
From a South African fan 🙂
Comment: South Africa in da house! The ATFR is live on Tuesday the 21st, right after the 2 hr finale airs. Basically back to the way it always was pre-pandemic.
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Send all links and emails to: steve@realitysteve.com. To follow me on Twitter, it’s: www.twitter.com/RealitySteve. Instagram name is RealitySteve, or join my Reality Steve Facebook Fan Page. Talk to you tomorrow.
