Rosie Reviews: SO MUCH BEACH-GAZING. SO MANY MUSCLES. Because Bachelor.

By ROSIE WATERLAND

Shhhh. Everybody be quiet. Our Bachie is doing some serious kayak-thinking. You can just tell by the way he’s flexing his muscles that he really respects women. Something about love something something water/boats/sunshine.

Cut to Ridge Forrester’s house, and the ladies are just casually sitting around in the living room being totally casual with each other just casually chatting about casual things.

And oh look! We were just totally sitting here being totally casual and Osher has unexpectedly arrived to pay us an unexpected visit! But we were just sitting here being casual! etc etc etc. Osher’s hair has the date card. He informs those struggling to follow along that it is the date card. He leaves, and heads straight to Priceline to get a fresh box of Nice ‘N’ Easy.

Holly the netballer/real estate person gets the single date. Everyone is pissed. Especially Anita, who hasn’t yet realised that the only reason she is still in the competition is because Oprah keeps answering my television prayers. You’re welcome, Anita.

Holly is really excited about the date because she’s never been ‘swooned over’ before. She’s really looking for someone who will make her feel special. So, a guy who is currently forcing her to compete in a Sparkly Hunger Games fight to the death is the perfect choice. She is definitely going to come out of this feeling like a princess. At least, more than Diana, who still thinks her namesake is living with Prince Charles in a castle at Disneyland.

Holly sees Blake. Gives him a hug. Explains to the camera that the thing she just did where she put her arms around Blake is in fact called a hug. Well this is going to be a thrill –

OH MY GLOB IT’S A SEAPLANE. We have our first seaplane of the season, ladies and gentlemen!

Blake and Holly fly to a very exotic location called Palm Beach, which is definitely not only a 45 minute drive from Sydney.

Somehow able to acclimatise to this mysterious locale, Blake gets to talking to Holly about who she is and netball etc. His first and only question is designed to find out exactly what level of ticklish she is. It’s Blake Wiggum in fine form.

Holly can’t even deal with how much work Blake put into the date/she’s so touched that he planned this special date/she can’t believe how lucky she is that Blake organised all this date. Some hard-working producer is definitely not getting enough credit for all the work they put into this.

There’s an orchestra on the beach, filled with musicians who are wondering exactly where they went wrong in their lives. Holly bursts into tears. Blake Wiggum gives her a very earnest hug. “I know,” his little pats on the back say. “Let it out. I’m fucking incredible.”

Cut back to Ridge Forrester’s house, and the ladies have moved their casual hanging out just being casual from the casual living room to casual hanging out just casually being totally casual on the casual lawn.

There’s a group date card, and some girl does a dignified victory dance when her name is called out. Last. In a group of nine.

More single date stuff/awkward small talk/Ralph Wiggum/do you like stuff etc.

Next up at the house: ‘Casual Hanging out just being Casual – The Onesie Edition’. This involves all of the aforementioned living room/lawn casual hanging out, but in onesies. Casual onesies. See below for a comparative analysis:

Meanwhile, back at the single date:

Sun rising/birds flying/clever ways to indicate it’s a new day.

GROUP DATE TIME!

Twenty seconds in and already there’s some DRAMAAAAAA: The date is on a farm, and Amber is allergic to horses. She cries about being allergic to horses. There has been no indication that the actual date will involve horses. Amber says something about her life being threatened and flees in a flood of tears to escape the killer horses.

She heads back to Ridge Forrester’s house, where the unlovable losers who weren’t invited on the group date are shocked to see her. She talks for a while about being allergic to killer horses and needing to run for her life in case there were killer horses. Then she realises she’s too traumatised to talk about her near-brush with death, and she flees to her room, BECAUSE SHE DOESN’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT PLEASE JUST RESPECT HER PRIVACY.

The girl who just did a victory dance (Chantal? Chevy? Charles?) when she was invited on a competitive date with 8 other women mentions without a shred of irony that she thinks Amber’s killer horse behaviour is a little embarrassing.

The date that Amber definitely had to flee because it involved life-threatening killer horses doesn’t end up  involving any horses. Well, except for the one that Blake Wiggum slowly walks in with to demonstrate ‘Coyboy Bachelor’, but that bit of nature is quickly ushered away by a non-important horse-managing person.

OH MY GLOB. This date isn’t a date. It’s a MECHANICAL BULL CHALLENGE. The lady who stays on the longest wins 5 whole minutes alone with Blake. Because every woman on The Bachelor really needs another way to make her parents proud.

Osher is wearing a checkered shirt and he actually says the words ‘bucking, fearless mechanical bull’ and I officially need nothing else from this life ever again.

Audrey Day-Knight wins the challenge, and Blake Wiggum leads the victor into the bush for five minutes of alone time because he definitely respects women and the strict, binding rules of mechanical bull challenges.

The girls bitch about Audrey Day-Knight while she sits in the bush with Blake on magic two-seater made of hay cushions. She tells him that her life is pretty awesome, and she wants to share it with someone. He seems confused by the concept of having to fit into her life and not the other way around. He looks perplexed. Why isn’t she crying about how moved she is by these hay cushions in the middle of the bush? Poor Bachie is frightened. They head back to the group and find some women who fawn over him the appropriate amount.

(Aside – I know the other girls hate her a lot, and she is basically a bogan robot, but does anyone else kind of feel like Audrey Day-Knight keeps accidentally talking sense?)

There’s a dance in a barn because this is TRUE-BLUE COUNTRY STRAYA and that’s what happens in TRUE-BLUE COUNTRY STRAYA.

COCKTAIL PARTY TIME!

Highlights:

Amber talks to Blake about that thing she definitely doesn’t want to talk to anyone about. Something about a near-death experience and having a mechanical bull intolerance.

Some girl called Amanda who I’ve never seen before is worried because she didn’t get to prove her love by gyrating on the giant phallic vibrator.

The Anita/Audrey Day-Knight Drama. Okay. This is complex. Deep breath:

Anita is no longer being edited as the crazy girl who hides in bushes and feverishly hunts for Bachelor pubes because this week she is a sweetie-pie who gets anxious and just wants five minutes alone with Bachie and while she’s doing that Audrey Day-Knight asks Amber if she should interrupt and Amber is like ‘yeah do it’ so Audrey Day-Knight does it and then Anita gets sad and feels disrespected even though she spent last week watching everyone else’s dates from the bushes and then Sam yells at Audrey Day-Knight for being a biatch and Amber yells at Audrey Day-Knight for being a biatch and Audrey Day-Knight is all ‘Whaaa? But you told me to go and interrupt’ and Amber is all ‘Nuh uh I’m Canadian sass sass sass etc’ and then basically everyone hates Audrey Day-Knight and I feel kind of sorry for her because it’s not her fault that she’s a bogan robot and that’s the end.

Oh my glob. That was exhausting. Just send this week’s unlovable loser home so I can take a nap.

Hero of the night is some girl called Lisa who is normal and has therefore not appeared on screen until this moment. She comes into the kitchen and gives Bogan Robot Audrey Day-Knight a hug because it’s not her fault she’s a bogan robot and she didn’t deserve to get yelled at for interrupting Anita’s conversation with Blake Wiggum.

ROSE CEREMONY TIME!

Osher explains the maths but I’m so exhausted from all this fighting that my brain doesn’t understand. Help me Osher! I’m confused!

One girl is going home.

Thanks Osher.

“This is by far the most challenging part of the week for me,” Bachie says, with his serious Bachie face on. That’s funny – I thought it might have been the part where you laughed while girls fought over you in a mechanical bull competition.

OH MY GLOB MID ROSE-CEREMONY DRAMAAAAAAA:

Holly feels sick. End of drama.

Everyone gets through to next week except for some random that nobody cares about. I think it’s one of the Liarnars/Briarnars/Ziarnars.

Who cares. I’m tired.

There’s more fighting after the rose ceremony. Amber says some rude words to Audrey Day-Knight and storms off to recover from her not-really brush with killer-horse death.

But my poor little brain can’t take it. It just wants to curl up on the couch with Osher’s hair and do a crossword.

Next episode: Planes AND helicopters! And some kind of netball-related emergency that makes the netball girl cry. Bachie heaven.

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