Hi Steve,
Fan from New Zealand here. I don’t know if this has been covered before but several years ago we had a double Bachelorette season. To start there was just one Bachelorette and the second one was introduced several episodes in. You will be familiar with her, Lily McManus who was in the Bachelor Winter Games. It worked out okay as the original Bachelorette was in her early thirties and Lily early twenties. Half the guys were younger and half the guys older so they really ended up with their own dating pools anyway. I wouldn’t say I loved the season but it wasn’t messy like this season seems to be heading!
Comment: Yeah, I’m familiar that New Zealand did it, but I never watched it myself. I think starting next week, Rachel and Gabby’s season gets back on track. Because outside of Logan, everyone has their own dating pool.
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Hey Steve –
Last week some of us asked you to choose which women you liked better on different shows. Here is another: Emily or Haley Ferguson? I feel bad for the guy twins this season. They probably thought they would be the male equivalents of E&H and were presented as dullards. We’re what, 5, 6, years removed from first seeing the twins on Ben Higgins’ season? All I can tell you is that I still can’t tell them apart. Honestly. And I’ve MET Emily once at a Golden Knights game. But just in pictures on their IGs? I swear I can’t tell them apart.
Did you watch Winning Time on HBO? I’m not a sports fan but found it really entertaining. It was over the top, ridiculous, exaggerated, and too hokey for me. John C. Reilly was great as Jerry Buss, but actual people who were on those teams and coached those teams have all panned it. There’s a Hulu docuseries coming out in a couple weeks about the Lakers of the 80s that’s going to be much better, because it actually interviews the actual players to talk about that run through the 80’s. Looking forward to it.
Big Brother – Pooch’s exit reminded me of Brent the flight attendant from last season. Both guys thought they were in a good position and then got goodbye messages which indicated people didn’t like them. Not enjoying Michael’s turn towards arrogance in the diary room. Wondering if members of Po’s Pack will realize one day that they named their alliance after someone who came off as a mean girl / racist who appears to be going through a mental health issue to the more involved audience. Yeah, I think I’m most interested in hearing from Taylor when she’s eventually off the show and watches the episodes/live feed clips back and see if she’s down with Paloma like Paloma thinks she is. I don’t know how she can be.
Challenge – What do you think of the prevailing knock out the weak strategy? On MTV, that strategy helped keep CT safe to his last 2 wins. As we have seen upsets in elimination rounds on MTV, I would think it might make more sense to take the shot at a strong player.
Comment: Well, I don’t want to end up with a bunch of weak people in the finals if all the stronger ones end up getting out. But, outside of Tyson and maybe now Kyland, with this being everyone’s first time playing, I don’t even technically know who we can consider a strong player vs weak player.
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Hi Steve,
I’ve watched the show off and on over the years but took a break after Peter’s dumpster fire of a season. I kind of kept up with what was happening but hadn’t watched an episode until a friend recommended checking out this new season with having two bachelorettes the entire season. And now I’m back into listening to some podcasts and following the off-screen drama.
I wanted to email you about a few points brought up by the Game of Roses podcast. One was when they looked at how previous premieres treated their former bachelors, in particular, Andi and Becca’s first nights. It used to be that production protected their lead, final one, and possible next leads. In these premieres they frequently had old leads show up to give advice and the premiere focused on the new lead’s new start, journey, etc. We had none of that this season.
Producers now seem to be hell bent on destroying these relationships to where few recent leads would agree to do anything with the show again. Have you noticed this as well? This week in particular with having Gabby spend time on the group date with men who just wanted to tell her they were going after Rachel and then having Rachel offer roses to men who were going to reject her. Yes, I’ve noticed. So have many others. And no, the Katie’s and Clayton’s of the world are chewed up and spit out by production. They do not care about you, no matter what bill of goods they were selling you during filming.
Another point was while listening to older podcasts, I found an interesting conversation when Blake H. was on Game of Roses, he said he was out with producers post Becca’s season and it was brought up how much he was making from social media. He said something changed in their faces. This is pure speculation, but could that be partially why production has shifted against protecting certain people in order to tank their social media and possible income?
Thank you!
Comment: Their absolutely could be some jealousy there since these people are being worked to the bone and don’t/can’t make any money on IG/TikTok sponsorships as far as I know. And they have this sense of, “We made you” about them. I don’t know if they’re purposely tanking their possible income, because they’re gonna give people a negative edit every season regardless. But I don’t think it’s lost on them at all what a villain edit can do to a contestant. And they don’t care.
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Hey Steve!
Thanks for all you do…
Okay so how is the rest of the season going to work with only 9 guys each. Is that a normal amount for a single bachelorette to have after 3 episodes? It feels low to me… are they just going to eliminate one guy per week until home towns? I feel like we usually still have some bigger cut episodes left at this point.
Comment: Usually when travel has begun in the past, it’s down to 15/16. So we’re only 2 more, which is 1 for each. And while on a normal season hometowns is with 4 people, we know that hometowns this season will be with 8 total (even though I don’t know who Gabby’s fourth is yet). So 10 people will be eliminated from episodes 3-6 (assuming Paris, Belgium, and Amsterdam get one episode each). In a normal season, you’d see roughly 11 people getting eliminated from episodes 4-7. So it’s really not all that different. It’s why they only cut 3 after night 1 and still had 29 guys.
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Hi Steve,
I’ve followed you for a very long time, Jason Mesnick’s season. Thank you for everything you do! I truly believe you are the only person keeping my interest towards this show.
Did you hear Blake’s entire interview on on Kaitlyn’s podcast? In it, he mentioned that the producers of the show he was on couldn’t manipulate contestants since they were competing for money. Apparently it’s a law. Have you heard that before? No, I didn’t listen to the whole thing. Is that part of game shows where the prize is money? Yes. You’re technically never supposed to interfere in the integrity of that because of the money prize. However, if you don’t think Survivor producers and Bachelor Pad producers ever pulled any manipulation tricks, you’d be mistaken. So while the rule is there, whether or not every show abides by that rule is a case by case basis.
If this is true, how did Bachelor Pad get around this? I didn’t follow Bachelor Pad as much as I did with Bachelor/Bachelorette, but I still think there would be just as much manipulation.
Any thoughts or insights?
Comment: I mean, they just did. It’s been so long but I absolutely remember hearing stories back then about how producers would sway votes to keep certain people on or make sure others were cut. It’s not like they physically changed the votes. But all it takes is getting in a contestants head about who they’re voting for and that’s basically all they needed to do to get the narrative they wanted.
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Hi Steve,
Interested in your take on 2 things.
Do you think Gabby’s Grandpa offered her any behind the scenes comforting while she spiraled last episode, or would TPTB have kept them apart to ramp up her insecurities? Her 1-1 was enough of a therapy session for me, but she seems like an endless sucking pit of need who isn’t going to make it through the “journey” without some reinforcement. Tough to say. But I gotta believe he was there to comfort her in some way, no?
Given what you know about F4 outcomes so far, any early opinion on the identity of the next Bachelor (presuming they cast the role out of this crop of guys)?
Thanks for all you do!
Comment: Haven’t heard anything.
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Hey RS!
First, I’m looooving your daily roundup podcasts. Obsessed. I feel like that’s the greatest gift you’ve given to your fans. I CANNOT believe you’re taking time daily to do that for us, so thank you!!! You’re welcome. Glad you’re enjoying them.
On that note, I do have a random question for you. Have you ever considered joining a radio station somewhere? I’d cry if you stopped doing what you’re doing, but you’re also really talented in your podcasts and just sound like a radio personality. Is that something you have ever considered doing or would be interested doing in the future? Well radio is my background. It’s what I did on and off for the first 11 years after graduating college. It’s why I went into podcasting though because I want to control my content, and how much time I get, and what I can talk about, etc. I love doing radio hits whenever a station contacts me wanting to come on the show. Those are fine. But to actually be a full time radio host again? I don’t see it.
Last thing I want to say: one reason I enjoy listening to you/reading your columns is how respectful you are towards women. I often feel dehumanized by men’s takes on pop culture, but I don’t feel that way listening to you. I almost feel like you’ve become an advocate for us women. Idk how to explain it, but it just is uplifting. So thank you for that.
Please don’t stop the daily roundups, okay?
Comment: I won’t. And thank you for that. I try in any way I can. God knows I’ve said and written things in the past that wouldn’t align with what you said. But I learned from it, stopped trying to just follow the crowd and be “cool” by parroting what others were doing and saying because the culture allowed it, and started to actually read up more on difficult subjects. I’m not perfect by any means. I’m sure I’ll say something that’ll ruffle someone’s feathers at some point in the future. If it happens, I think you know it’s not being done maliciously. Talking every day on a podcast now, I’m sure I’ll misspeak at some point. But I think anyone who’s read or listened to me in the last year and half, or anyone who’s listened to my podcast for the 5.5 years I’ve had it should know the effort I’ve made and the changes I’ve made to my coverage of women. If you haven’t, then you haven’t read or listened to a thing I’ve done. Thanks for the kind words.
