Wonderful! - Ep. 79: Hometowns, Again

Episode Date: July 19, 2017

Join us for a whistle-stop tour of America as we follow Rachel's journey to meet her four suitors' families! They went ... mostly ... okay, with one pretty exploitative exception. Recommended reading:... http://jezebel.com/this-promo-is-all-you-need-to-know-about-how-bachelor-i-1797003991 https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/7/18/15990408/bachelor-in-paradise-season-4-sexual-assault-controversy MaxFunDrive ends on March 29, 2024! Support our show now by becoming a member at maximumfun.org/join.

Transcript
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Starting point is 00:00:00 Maybe, maybe you should go and do some contemplating. Right reasons, right reasons. Me and my girl, we're all the right reasons. Right reasons, right reasons. Me and my girl, we're all the right reasons. I'm the bachelorette and I'm rapping to your poolside. Here to find true love. Hi, this is Rachel McElroy.
Starting point is 00:00:19 Hi, this is Griffin McElroy. And this is Rose Buddies. It's a bachelor podcast. And, babe. Uh-huh? Let's just lay it all out there. Okay. We lost a dear friend and collaborator on the podcast,
Starting point is 00:00:36 somebody who's just always in the studio with us, making their presence known, impacting the show in some way or another, but you always know they're there. And I know the listeners, there's a lot of fan art. I'm talking, of course, about the Epson Workforce 520. It's gone. I didn't know where you were going with that.
Starting point is 00:01:00 Griffin replaced his printer. I replaced our printer. You can use it too babe to print your documents but this one is monochrome because i don't fuck with magenta anymore cyan fuck off yellow you're cool um yeah you know the workforce uh epson workforce 520 it served me well for about three months and then it was a big piece of shit for about four years and uh it was literally always touching me every time i recorded because i record in a weird little cinderella corner months and then it was a big piece of shit for about four years and it was literally always touching me every time I recorded because I record in a weird little Cinderella corner of my office
Starting point is 00:01:30 I don't know why you make me I'm usually over in the feminist corner though that's true well I don't know why we have to be so far away I do it's because of audio bleed but yeah what's your favorite workforce 520 memories do you you have any favorite times where? Oh, man. I mean, more than anything, I like the way that it made you contort your body. Yeah, yeah. In order to record. And I'll say this.
Starting point is 00:01:54 This printer, as far as I can tell, is just called Brother. Hey, Brother. Hey, Brother. And it's no slouch in the size department. It's also quite big. Yeah. I asked Griffin when he purchased this one. I was like, oh, will it be an appropriate size?
Starting point is 00:02:11 And you said very confidently that it would. I thought it would be, but I will say this about the brother printer. And that is, check this shit out. Check this shit out. What's up?'s up wake up baby come on baby brother get up oh yeah yeah yeah here it comes just like that it worked what so it prints yeah it printed. Do you remember how the last one didn't print? That was because you were buying cartridges that were not. I was buying them on fucking Gbay.
Starting point is 00:02:52 It was Bad News Bears. You were not getting endorsed cartridges. This one prints on both sides at the same time and it scans. Can you read that document to everybody? Griffin typed and then printed the word printer. Office supplies, baby. I'm having fun fun with it or did you type a question and the question was what are you yeah oh no brother no brother was like printer brother knows um and i know you're wondering did i do the funny office space joke with the other one and i said no it's bad for the environment probably now we put that out
Starting point is 00:03:23 for bulk trash pickup because that's what it was trash fuck you epson workforce 520 i'm glad you're dead brother's here to stay this printer is never gonna let me down what if this was our podcast printer reviews yeah just printers i would rather talk about printer reviews than the bachelor sometimes most of the time nowadays this week was a lot of rich content uh there's a lot of rich content but still with a lot of stink up on it all over including that truly righteously awful bachelor in paradise promo which we're going to talk about later in the show uh and also one of the dates was like one of the more exploitative things i've maybe ever seen on a reality television show yes and we're going to talk about all of that but first let's start off with your friend and mine eric eric bigger i think is this last name i think that's a fucking good last name good that's pretty good uh we are starting in baltimore and eric when he meets rachel charm city i
Starting point is 00:04:20 remembered i remembered that one i got i got called out once because I couldn't remember. You're like last week with champagne, just like blurting out, champagne. They're in Baltimore. When Eric meets Rachel, he says, this is the nice part of Baltimore. This is not where I'm from. They also do the little dance. The dance is so wonderful. It's their thing. Eric danced when he met her in the After the Final Rose thing.
Starting point is 00:04:43 And then just like every time they see each other, the dance happens. And it fills me with light and life and love and energy and warmth and heat. I wish we had something like that. I know. What we have is when I pour coffee in the morning, back when I used to wake up before you, I would say. Gosh, when did that happen? I mean, it was a long time. And I would pour you a cup of coffee and i'd
Starting point is 00:05:05 be like do you want a cup of coffee and you'd say yes please uh every morning for like 100 years and then every time i nowadays it's when i bring uh henry to daycare and i get back you say how do you do as if like the answer to that question is going to change ever like he laid perfectly still and then i set him down on the cushion so good i guess sometimes he's not happy when you put him down and i want to know about those times so that you can just feel bad about it great okay baltimore those are two things yes please and i didn't even realize that i had that routine until onesie i didn't say yes, please. And it freaked me the fuck out. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:05:47 I'm not kidding. Probably a thousand times, like over the course of our dating and living together and then being married until you realize it was probably a thousand times of yes, please. And then like, now it just doesn't happen. Isn't that polite though?
Starting point is 00:06:00 Isn't that nice that I do that? Yes, absolutely. You're the most polite person ever. Thank you. We're going so slow. You started it i'm sorry okay um so eric eric has said a little of this before but he reiterates that baltimore is a is a tough city he says it's one in the top 10 of toughest cities i did not fact check that yeah um but uh they go from the park where they met to a basketball
Starting point is 00:06:27 court near where he grew up is this where we meet ralph yes uh i wish i had a ralph somebody who's just boosting me up always no ralph comes out onto the court after they've they've shot a little ball yeah and then they try to think if i've ever seen you play basketball i i have one no i have two basketball stories both are middle school i think that was the last time i ever touched a christian you have a basketball hoop we should go over there and hoop around sometime i have two traumatic basketball memories in the same two-year period oh fuck what happened one i was playing um basketball with some friends in middle school this is when everyone began to be significantly taller than me. And I received the ball.
Starting point is 00:07:10 And once I gained control of it, I looked up and about four people were literally towering over me, creating kind of a dome around me, which was a little traumatic. It's allowed, though. You're allowed to do that. You're allowed to make a little traumatic. It's allowed though. You're allowed to do that. You're allowed to make a human dome. It was the end of the lunch period and I was walking out of the gym and I got hit in the head with a basketball and it hit me so hard I fell to the ground. Okay, that's pretty bad. And then always the person that wanted to make a joke as to save my embarrassment, I
Starting point is 00:07:47 yelled very loudly that I'd been shot. That's pretty good. But yeah. I don't think those two were bad enough to keep you off basketball for the rest of your living life. It was just one of the, I never knew anybody with a hoop. I did not have a hoop. Should have known me.
Starting point is 00:08:00 We had one growing up. Do you find that hard to believe? I do sometimes, but it's true. We had one for a very long time. that hard to believe? I do sometimes, but it's true. We had one for a very long time. Well, your brother Justin is called Hoops. That is true. No doubt. That's absolutely not why.
Starting point is 00:08:11 For his court prowess. So they play basketball and they meet Ralph. Ralph has a lot of nice things to say about Eric. He's just talking about how nice Eric is and smart he is and how proud of him. He says that he's a scholar and that he's proud of him and that he's always very positive. Says that he's a scholar and that he's proud of him and that he's always very positive. And it's kind of like a solid guy that everybody needs to have in their life. I don't know who I would ask to talk me up like that.
Starting point is 00:08:34 I don't know. That's what I'm saying. I need a Ralph in my life. You know what? Justin Minsker is kind of your Ralph. That's true. Justin Minsker is always saying very nice things. He's a very sweet man. I wonder if Eric doesn't become the next Bachelor,
Starting point is 00:08:48 which as a framing device, I think this date may have been the most concise sales pitch for the next Bachelor maybe ever. I think he'll become like a motivational speaker or something like that. Like I feel like I told you about that. Well, he's already a life coach. Yeah, yeah, yeah. he's already an inspirational guy i got an email from some like pr contact uh at polygon uh to like my polygon email account like saying uh and it wasn't written to me it was like
Starting point is 00:09:17 a pr blast like uh repping eric and like saying like if you want to talk to eric about his inspirational story and how he channels things into positivity shoot me a shoot me a shoot me in a message and i didn't do it but like i don't know i feel like i feel like dude could be the next oh what's that dude tony robbins oh i think that's unfair to eric it's probably unfair to eric i just couldn't think of another motivational speaker in that moment. Yeah, Eric tells Rachel about how he was always the friend that took care of everyone. And that he learned by example because all the women in his family were very strong.
Starting point is 00:10:05 And there was this ethic, especially with his mom, that if you can take care of yourself, you don't need anyone. And Eric kind of adopted that. And Rachel was like, well, would you let me take care of you? And he's like, no, no, no, I know. I need that. I know that that's something that I need. And they talk a little bit about her meeting his family uh and she's never brought a woman home before which yeah he says over and over again they ask ralph when the last time eric
Starting point is 00:10:31 brought a woman home was and ralph says prom well he says prom like even he's not sure if prom was the thing that happened um uh but rachel says that she is likely to freak out right before they walk in the door because it's specifically the fact that he has never brought a right home that makes her nervous there's a lot of talk about eric like finally being ready for love which is not an uncommon sort of thread for contestants on this show never been in love before yeah that's sort of his um his his through line throughout this date can we please talk about this family best fucking all time so they go to his um griffin says aunt i say aunt all right uh aunt renee's apartment and um they're right in front of the door were there multiple aunts
Starting point is 00:11:19 i guess there must have been we didn't really get to meet everybody it was a multi-aunt situation i think um but they're standing in front of the door, and Eric checks in with Rachel to see how she's doing, and she says she wants to go home. Jokingly, not like seriously. And then they walk in, and everybody just kind of bursts into this cheer when they walk in the door.
Starting point is 00:11:41 And she tells us that her nerves went away went away right right then um and then they talk about the night they first met and how special that was and they mentioned the dance and then everybody does it everybody in that room does an imitation of eric and rachel's dance in their little seats and it's just the best i yelped in a manner where I was like, I was certain that we woke up our baby. Cause I was so fucking excited. Excited that moment where all of them are dancing. The literal exact same,
Starting point is 00:12:15 like dance that Eric and Rachel do. It was so good. And then Rachel and Eric do it too. And it's just this moment of unity. Can we please talk about Aunt Verna, please? Is all Aunt Verna, I mean. Yeah. So did you see the scoop on her?
Starting point is 00:12:34 No. She is actually like a professional speaker. She has given a TED Talk before. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. Aunt Verna's the fucking best she's incredible she pulls rachel aside and also like sings eric's praises for a while um and it's the most like it's good that you've told me that she's a professional speaker because i could not
Starting point is 00:12:57 look away from her as she was talking and really a lot of the conversation that they had was like the same conversations that all these hometowns like kind of boil down to um uh but then she says let's bring up the r-a-c-e word race uh and they start again kind of in the way i i think this is maybe a little bit more directly than like uh this show has shown like rachel or anybody uh talking about it um but rachel talks about like in in a roundabout way like it's weird how the show doesn't like exactly show it or maybe like nobody's exactly saying it but i feel like the undercurrent is are you having a difficult time with the uh perception of who you send home and who you keep um and whether or not race is a factor in those decisions yeah it seems like her and verna are so on the same page that they're
Starting point is 00:13:56 almost kind of finishing each other's sentences because rachel talks about how she's being judged by two different groups uh which i'm assuming is the African-American community. Yeah. And the white community. I think she says and everybody else. Yeah. And and then the question comes up of kind of how are you approaching this? And we're not explicitly saying like what this this means exactly.
Starting point is 00:14:23 But in Rachel's answer, she was completely crystal clear about like what this this means exactly um but in rachel's answer she was completely crystal clear about like what her incredible i don't know if she'd thought about it before i mean she probably prepared she definitely had yeah that question but she said um you know i'm just gonna send home who i want to send home like any other bachelorette i don't yeah she says i have to i have to be selfish to get what i really want um which is love my journey shouldn't be different from the 12 other bachelorettes and it's like okay i think there's a conversation i think even you and i haven't really had of like eric is the only black man left on the show in a season where there were the most men of color that have ever been on the season uh brian is colombian um and the other two
Starting point is 00:15:06 dudes left dean and peter are both white um but that i i i think there was a week um like one of those huge weeks where like six people went home where it was just like okay eric is the only black man left in a season that like started out with um i want to say like 11 i don't remember the exact number it was the week where kenny and will went home yeah and i think correctly i i i know there were a lot of people especially in like the there were a lot of conversations happening in the rose buddies group of people being like really disappointed right like this is now there's just one black man left in a season where there were the most that there have that there have ever been and that's like kind of disappointing but at the same time like um you you have to like respect rachel's agency in in in how she um
Starting point is 00:15:51 you know finds a finds a literal husband um yeah i i don't know i think that's like kind of a tricky balance to walk and i think rachel's answer here was just like crystal clear like i'm not going to it's unfair for me to have to do this differently than any of the other women who have ever played this role before like the show has been and I I keep placing at the feet of the show there was that one episode where uh the Lee stuff was still going on and Rachel was like in tears and there was like the producer caption saying like, what do you want to do? And Rachel,
Starting point is 00:16:27 you know, we finally get to see Rachel talking about like, this is really hard being a black woman and, and, and doing this. And that was right before the rose ceremony where she had to keep Lee. Um, I,
Starting point is 00:16:38 I feel like this is, this is a conversation that like, I want to fucking really see this show get into. And I think maybe the reason I like Aunt Verna so much is, like, this conversation finally happened while she was talking to Rachel. Yeah, she just got to it. She just went to it in a way that felt comfortable and like a safe conversation to have. And Rachel just was ready. I mean, you could tell that it's not Rachel
Starting point is 00:17:08 that's been avoiding this conversation. So she then talks to Eric's mom. It goes really well. His mom also talks to Eric. And she says that she wants a lot for him and that there's been a lot of great men in his family, and they've been kind of tied to their mothers, and that he wants, or that she wants more for him.
Starting point is 00:17:36 Right. This conversation was about, if you remember from their one-on-one date at the amusement park, I think. Yeah. He talked about how he didn't get he didn't get love from his mom growing up and so that made him uh have difficulty in like establishing strong connections about that this whole episode oh yeah i mean this is this was the subtext for what they
Starting point is 00:17:57 were talking about and this this is what she was explaining like the reason that i didn't uh i wasn't you know extremely affectionate towards you uh growing up is because like there were just a lot of dudes in our families who were like too attached to their moms and i didn't want that for you and so um and and so that's why i sort of kept you at arm's length like i did but now i understand and and they also reference like conversations that they've had about this in the past so this is not some we will talk later about another sort of like family rift that is that has gone kind of completely unexplored but it sounds like this one is one that like as eric has become an adult they have like talked about yeah and so eric's mom tells us that um she Rachel has brought out the love that he's tried to keep inside.
Starting point is 00:18:47 She kind of confirms Eric's story that he has always been very careful about giving out love and getting attached and making himself vulnerable. And she kind of confirms that this is a new thing that she's seen in him. And Rachel tells Eric's mom that she likes that he challenges her. Yeah. Which, you know, we've seen a little bit of. They've kind of suggested that more of it has happened than we have seen. I mean, I think he does in the sense that, like, you compare him to, like, the dudes who are just like straight up
Starting point is 00:19:25 flatterers like fucking brian brian yeah brian's not the only one who does it but just like i'm a fucking bachelorette ass contestant and i'm here to like go for the gold and drop as many lines on you as i possibly can and eric has been explicitly not that the whole time yeah and so like i think yeah i think that's challenging but I also think it's like pretty real. Eric is very substance oriented. That's something I've noticed in his conversations with her. And it's actually something that comes out later.
Starting point is 00:19:55 Actually, that's a good transition. So he's talking to his dad later and he starts talking about Rachel and he says, you know, she grew up very structured. She couldn't watch PG-13 movies movies her parents have been married 37 years she went to church every sunday yeah and he just says these facts about her and griffin and i both turned to each other like he knows a lot about her yeah and i know more about that's the other kind of shitty thing is like i feel like i haven't really gotten to know rachel a whole lot better during this season which is like i don't know maybe that's true for all bachelors and bachelorettes it honestly is um but i was like i was blown away i was like that's some
Starting point is 00:20:35 you don't get much time with the lead you just straight up don't across the if you stay and you're in the final two um maybe maybe i guess fantasy suites counts as like a significant amount of time but before that like you do not get much time and for eric to like know stuff about her like that like i was very very very impressed and made me uh sort of like believe in eric a little bit more than I already did, which was a lot. So they all sit down for a meal and Eric toasts to his family members and the other people that are there that day and thanks them for helping him be the person he is and be able to attract a lady like Rachel in his life. That's very sweet.
Starting point is 00:21:21 That's very sweet. As is standard with hometown week, it's your last chance to see the bachelorette for a while because she's going to be jetting to other hometowns. So the pressure is on to say that you love her. Or else you're going to get luked right the fuck out. Yeah. So
Starting point is 00:21:37 Eric, who has never been in love before, said that, you know, I realize that I really love this girl and let me tell you what that means i really care about you um and rachel after is telling the camera you know he didn't exactly say it oh come on maybe she'd been pushed but even in the fucking like there's there i want a linguist to like break down the infinite different ways that people like rank saying i love you on this show from like i'm i'm
Starting point is 00:22:13 i'm beginning my first steps on the road to i can see the the exit on the highway to love i can see myself eventually one day potentially falling for you. And then it's like, I'm falling for you. And then it's like, I'm done falling for you. I have fallen. I've started to be almost in love with you halfway. It's like a verb conjugation. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:22:37 I will fall. I have fallen. Yeah. And so now we're on to Brian in Miami. In Miami, yeah. Can I say something about the, I don't know that much about Miami. Party in the city when the heat is on?
Starting point is 00:22:51 The heat is on, yes. All night on the beach till the break of dawn, yes. I'm not comfortable with the fact that that's like. It's our only touch point. I will say like, I don't know. I feel like folks know that like, I'm not the biggest Brian fan because I feel like he's just the like quintessential like gamesman of this show of just like i'm here for the lines
Starting point is 00:23:09 and i'm here for the i'm here for the like just drop and pick up lines and flattery and all that stuff um but but what i will say about this day is like i feel like i finally started to learn a little bit about brian that's all i want like i swear to god like i just want like a conversation that doesn't last like five seconds of him talking about himself before he like jujitsu flips it into like complimenting her in some way. So the date starts out with them sitting down and playing dominoes with some old men. That domino place looked fucking sick.
Starting point is 00:23:40 Yeah, it did. It looked great. It was like a big domino park with like tables and the tables had little domino racks built into them and the old men were there and they were just like having a great time you liked that there were tables and old men and domino racks yeah you know how you seen like searching for bobby fisher like you go to the park and like they're playing chess and like also in that one scene in independence day where jeff goldblum meets his dad and they're playing chess in the park and they have little tables with the chess boards in
Starting point is 00:24:04 them there at the park that's cool it's cool I've never seen that in real life before I love it okay every time I see that scene in Independence Day I think like well one wow Jeff Goldblum looks really handsome today and then two like I'd love to play chess in the park with a stranger sometime learn something from him okay well maybe maybe i'll make that happen for for christmas i mean it's 100 degrees right now i don't want to go outside uh so this is where we get to see brian speak um really comfortable conversational spanish yeah uh with these older men uh and rachel said rachel speaks at one point and she says like did did they ask if i'm your girlfriend and he's like oh no no we haven't talked about that yet yeah she just kind
Starting point is 00:24:49 of sits there while they talk about what is happening and those old men insult them because they beat them so so badly at dominoes i guess yeah uh this is where we learn about um them being called poyonas which is like a chicken like slang for i guess that's like a domino's based drag that you can lay down sometime uh so this is when they go to the 8th street cayocho area uh and eat arepas and those look good as hell they look very good and then they they try on um miami hats or at least rachel does they dance a little salsa dance in a like a an open venue and then they sit down at this same venue and brian talks a little bit about his family and said his dad is joe and he is charismatic and soft-spoken and charming and
Starting point is 00:25:41 that his mom is the opposite he says they- What does he say, a fireball? He says that opposites attract with my parents and my mom is a fireball and she's sensitive. Which to say that your dad is charismatic and charming and then to say your mom is the opposite. But it's charismatic, that's like not, yeah, my dad's not sensitive. He's not a fireball. Okay.
Starting point is 00:26:10 So just a backstory also, because last time they talked like the again, one of the only few like conversations where you got to learn more about Brian. He talked about how he had an ex and they went to a wedding together, I believe in Columbia. We talked about this last week. We did. But just to sort of set the stage for this conversation, things went really bad between his ex and his mom, and it sort of drove his ex away. And so...
Starting point is 00:26:28 Yeah, and Rachel asked about that again, and he says that it wasn't really the fault of his family. He implies that it was more the fault of his ex, that things didn't work out. Yeah. And then before they leave this setting and go home, Brian says, I just want to continue to make you smile it's something i'm kind of obsessed with okay yeah uh and then rachel kind of again kind of calls him on it a little bit says you say all the right things she never she says she says
Starting point is 00:27:01 it in like a voice where i think like this this has to be frustrating a little bit, right? She's like, oh, Brian, you always say all the right things. And I don't know if she's saying it like that in like an endearing way or like, I would be getting kind of fucking annoyed at this point with it a little bit. Like at what point do you say like, all right, hey, what don't you like about me? Like tell me something. You know, like those job interview questions where it's like, Yeah, I'm too passionate.
Starting point is 00:27:28 What's your worst quality? It's like, I work too hard. Yeah, I'm too passionate. It scares me. I'd be straight up like, IBS dog, I'm gonna be in the bathroom every hour on the hour.
Starting point is 00:27:37 You're gonna lose a lot of, I'm gonna do a lot of time theft in there. Straight up, half the time, it will be IBS related. The other times, it's because I'm playing Tap Titans. Straight up. I'm going to be honest with you.
Starting point is 00:27:47 I'm going to waste a lot of your time in the can. Sorry. We bought our house, actually, because the bathroom was directly across from Griffin's office. It's literally four feet as the crow flies. I could jump from my office chair and land on the toilet. You could stay on a conference call
Starting point is 00:28:04 from the bathroom, probably. Like, i haven't done that weekly dog sorry sorry griffin's co-workers this is where she meets the family yes uh they get to the house um this is where olga kind of sets the stage brian's mom ol Olga. And says, Brian's my life. Any woman that separated him from me, that would be terrible. She's telling this to us, but it's still pretty intense. She doesn't lock that part of her conversation
Starting point is 00:28:38 up to just the in the moment, behind the scenes interviews though. Yeah. Some of that does come out when she's talking to her child and his his beloved yeah uh she's talking to her son and brian says that he thinks rachel's the one uh and she says you've gone out with so many girls and then you go on this show and you fall in love cool yeah uh i mean okay let's couch it okay this show is buck wild it's a buck wild way to get a fiance and i get that yes and so like um i i think we'll probably end up talking about this
Starting point is 00:29:17 on peter's section too because peter's just a little bit hesitant about this whole idea um that's not what i found like disconcerting about this what i did was like he's my he's my he's my life and um anyone who tries to get in between me and him that would be terrible and it's like he's 39 like that's pretty old to still be like that protective i feel like yeah whatever i yeah i don't know that i want to get into it it was just like there was a lot of stuff like that where i was just like i couldn't help but think like he's almost 40 and that's kind of a that's a lot to lay down on somebody that he's dating i think i imagine that a lot of mothers feel that way.
Starting point is 00:30:06 But I think most would recognize that that is an unfair and unrealistic way to approach your child's relationship. Especially when you're on fucking national television giving a fucking shovel talk to the bachelorette. Like, what are you doing? What is a shovel talk to the bachelorette like what are you doing what is a shovel talk it's a it's a like if you hurt him i'll kill you um yeah like my grandma gave to you she did yeah she definitely she did a few pretty much the first like few times that met her, she laid that one down. Because Griffin comes across as a real bruiser. Yeah, that's me. I'm a heartbreaker. So then, and this is difficult for me.
Starting point is 00:30:53 I feel like in the past with hometowns, we get introduced to everybody in the room. This time we did not. So there is a woman that Rachel talks to next that might be his sister. I think it was his sister yeah i'm not 100 but she reiterates that the demise and she uses the word demise of brian's ex was that she wanted him all to herself and that she didn't want to be part of the family i'm just not thinking about it it's kind of wild that we got these two dates back to back where eric's mom like explicitly says like i saw men in our family be too attached to women and their mothers and so like i took a hands-off approach in mothering you to like uh my my 40 year old son is my whole is my whole life
Starting point is 00:31:38 and i'm going to tell his girlfriend that uh if she ever hurts him i'll kill her. It's wild that those two happened back to back. I'm sure that wasn't by accident. Yeah. I don't think of Eric and Brian as particular opposites, but maybe in some ways they are. Yeah. I don't know. So Rachel tells Brian's mom that she loved his confidence and how direct he has been.
Starting point is 00:32:08 And this is where the mom reiterates directly to Rachel that Brian is her life. And that she should know that you're marrying the family too. And that some men or some women only want the man for themselves. But Rachel should know that she will be part of the family. And Rachel says, yeah, I know. And I would want him to be part of my family, too. At which point the mom doesn't say anything. So much response to that one.
Starting point is 00:32:39 But the mom tells us that she could see in Rachel's eyes that she was a good person and that she'd be happy if Brian chose her. And the mom says that Brian is the love of her life, which was a lot. And then she says something about how when she dies, what was his quote? Oh, man. Something like, I would die. I would die happy knowing that like he is with a like a partner who's going to take care of him like I did. Oh, man. It's so it's very, very much. I'm happy that they have a good relationship.
Starting point is 00:33:16 Right. But like I have known show or I have known families like this on reality television. I have never known a family like this in real life. Yeah. reality television i have never known a family like this in real life yeah that that follows this this kind of intensity when they meet the partner of their child it's a whole lot yes um is that it for that date uh oh i guess that yeah brian does say that he's in love with her uh and rachel tells us that she believes it went well uh that she got more from brian and that hearing that he was in love with her was kind of above and beyond and she says
Starting point is 00:33:51 that uh she's letting herself feel all the feels she's super into brian i think brian's is i still don't think brian's gonna win i don't get it i do. Like she has fun with Brian and it seems like they have a connection and we don't know what we don't see. And maybe Brian isn't so much performing for her with all these pickup lines as much as he's performing for the camera or like it could be any number of things. But like she's obviously like very into him and they have obviously a very strong physical connection. And so like, I don don't know i feel weird saying like i don't get why she's into him because that's like that's between her and him it's just like i i my main frustration comes from the fact that like every conversation we see with this dude is completely insubstantial because it just boils
Starting point is 00:34:40 down to like yeah anyway you're so pretty let's talk about how pretty you are. It's the lack of vulnerability, I feel like, with Brian. I feel like with Eric and Peter and Dean, we learn a little bit about them that makes them more lovable. And I just, I don't know enough about Brian to love him. Yeah, it's true. Peter. Well, before we talk about Peter, can you think that i maybe can make you could maybe steal your way uh yes babe no babe no baby baby baby baby baby baby baby baby baby who's our sponsors this time uh it's thrive market oh fuck yeah love thrive market they reach for the stars thrive market is a online organic grocery option uh should you prefer to purchase whole food style products at a Costco price?
Starting point is 00:35:48 Did you make that up or is that in the? No, that's part of the copy. I was going to say, that's good, babe. I got chills. You pay just $60 a year to get things like healthy snacks, supplements, and foods to stock your pantry at 25% to 50% less than even the discount stores. Thrive guarantees you'll save more than your membership fee in your first two orders.
Starting point is 00:36:11 But, because you're a Rosebuddies listener. Oh, I thought you were just like, we're saying but. And then I was stupid. You can test drive it for free for 30 days and get an extra 20% off at thrivemarket.com slash rosebuddies. I went there. I've mentioned this before. And you can organize and sort your product choices by your diet. So if you're paleo or gluten-free, you can choose to only see products that meet your dietary needs.
Starting point is 00:36:41 So that's an extra 20% off at thrivemarket.com slash rosebuddies. So go right now to thrivemarket.com slash rosebuddies. I have a message here and it is more of a request for you, my friends. I want you to search for the Puffin Publishing Podcast on iTunes or your podcatcher of choice and subscribe because, and I'll tell you why,
Starting point is 00:37:04 and it's important that you listen to me very closely. Your life may depend on it. The Puffin Publishing Podcast is the show most capable of ruining bookstores for you forever. It's a hilarious monthly podcast brought to you in bright, digestible chunks with a smile. The Puffin Boys is, that's good. That is good. The Puffin Boys are veteran improvisers, and they're bringing their singular solve mysteries and they solve murders uh and they're bringing their singular murder solving gifts for giving strange characters life directly to you uh you don't need to know anything
Starting point is 00:37:35 about books to enjoy the puff pud pod in fact it's probably best if you can't read it all peter piper pick to peck of puff pod pod pub uh i've got another message here this message is for zila it is from deloren i apologize if i didn't say those correctly happy birthday season since me you i don't think season is a fun name for them i think they're saying happy birthday season, like the season of their birthday. Well, I know. I figured, but I don't know how to emphasize that appropriately. Happy birthday season.
Starting point is 00:38:13 Happy birthday season? I don't know. See? Yeah, it's tough. It's a tricky one. Happy birthday season. Since meeting you, I have been the happiest kitty. Even more than the love I have for you, for your constant support and kindness, is my respect for you. Watching you build your own business,
Starting point is 00:38:30 how you've helped so many of your students, has been my inspiration, and you my muse. Thank you, Griffin, for sharing these words. Gosh, Rachel. I knew it real quick. Ever since meeting you i've been happy as can be more than one for you as constant support kindness and respect for you and watching
Starting point is 00:38:50 you build business how you've helped me since been my inspiration you my muse thank you griffin for sharing these words gotta know if this is an actual cat or not gotta know if this is a cat that learned how to type on a keyboard and here's why it's wonderful to think about. You think they just bat at the mouse the whole time? Oh, gosh. That's cute. They don't even know where the home row keys are. They're probably trying to get the little crumbs out of the keyboard, but they can't because they keep batting at the mouse.
Starting point is 00:39:23 So, you want to talk about peter's date yeah mugs shirts stickers patches tanks and more are yours for the purchasing at max fun store.com hey you already love the podcasts so why not take this to the next level and outfit your home and bod with our merch max fun store.com because if you have to wear a shirt it should be one of ours we're in madison wisconsin no we're not we're in austin who is this character i don't know but he's full of piss i would have said beans he seems full of beans to me piss and vinegar and beans and beans it's a gross stew uh so this is where griffin took notes so don't put me on blasts like this
Starting point is 00:40:13 well i just i'm gonna i'm gonna refer to these and and you may have to help me okay uh so peter tells us that he is definitely falling for Rachel. He's on the road. On the first rung of the ladder, the love ladder. They are going to a big farmer's market, which I guess is a weekend thing in Madison. Yeah, at this point, it kind of feels like Rachel is house shopping a little bit because she's like, oh, what is this?
Starting point is 00:40:40 And he's like, oh, it's a farmer's market. I come here every Saturday. She's like, I love farmer's market. We could come here every Saturday. And it's like oh it's a farmer's market i come here every saturday she's like i love farmer's market we could come here every saturday and it's like okay all right uh she tells us though that she's concerned that peter is not ready uh because he said and we talked about this a little bit last time um he said that if he were to propose it would be because he was ready yeah he says like he's on the fence about whether or not he's going to propose at the end of this which i think is like
Starting point is 00:41:09 the most clear signal of like yeah i'm gonna win the question is am i gonna propose also are we just gonna be boyfriend boyfriend girlfriend at the end of this which has is it has happened um before where they get to the end of the season and they do not get engaged. They're just like, hey, we've known each other six hours. Let's date because I actually do like you. I'm a big proponent of that. Like, I do not think that that is that wild a request. Yeah, but they stage it in such a way that if you don't propose.
Starting point is 00:41:41 No, I know it looks super shitty. Yeah. To me, though, it feels more real because of how many, like, broken engagements have come out of this thing. Just to say, like, I really do like you and I think we should live together and date and then get married someday.
Starting point is 00:41:55 Yeah, but, I mean, couldn't you just give him the ring anyway and just say, like, I feel very good right now. Here's the ring. Maybe, but the pressure that comes with that of, like, I feel very good right now. Here's a ring. The pressure that comes with that of like after the final rose of just like, y'all got a date yet? Like get off my fucking jock, dad. Okay, so after the farmer's market, Peter takes Rachel to meet his friends at a bar.
Starting point is 00:42:28 And again, he's like very much setting it up like like this is a bar i come to all the time she's like it's not the whole time i just felt like it was like this is where we'll be going if we live in madison yeah and his friends kind of start out immediately giving him a hard time because she says right away how Peter had told her that he has mostly black friends. And they were like, oh, did you get a card for that? Do you have a card that says that you have black friends?
Starting point is 00:42:57 Where's your black friend card? Yeah. Then he's like, well, I'm gonna pull the guys away for some guy time. Yeah. And I was like, are they making him say that? I hope so. Is that real, Peter?
Starting point is 00:43:09 Because that's uncomfortable. I'm going to leave you with the, they were together with, I guess they were couples, or maybe there was just a couple of other friends who were women. And he's like, I'm going to steal the guys away and leave you with these total strangers. See ya. That's how it works on these hometowns. Yeah, I guess so. But the guys are are
Starting point is 00:43:25 very encouraging and so that she seems really genuine uh and they tell him to uh not f it up yeah okay they say the word they don't say f sometimes it feels right to me and sometimes it doesn't no i agree it would have been weird for you to say it in this moment i have to i have to be amped up. Our baby just woke up and I think Rachel's a little bit stressed out. I don't know. Maybe this is a circumstance where you would want to say it.
Starting point is 00:43:53 No. No, not yet. We'll let you know. No, I have to be, well, you know. Real peeved. I have to be jacked up. Jacked and peeved. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:44:03 It's my favorite T-Pain song. Jacked and peeved. Yeah. It's my favorite T-Pain song. Jacked and peeved. Did you ever see the adventures of Peeve and Peeve? All right. We gotta go. We have so much more to fucking talk about. So now we are meeting Peter's family. And that's his mom and his dad and his brother and his brother's wife and their kids
Starting point is 00:44:26 and peter tells the story of their first date and how he grabbed her butt which i don't remember oh yeah i think you were doing something this is why i was taking notes but um yeah he was telling a story about how like on their first date he went in for a big hug. And he just got, I guess, a big old, you know, fistful of cheek. Big old hunk of that Wisconsin cheese. And, well, no, he grabbed her butt. And so. I know, but in Wisconsin. They call butts cheese.
Starting point is 00:44:56 That's awful. Why do they do that? But they laugh that off. And this is where Peter starts playing with his brother's kids. And Rachel immediately like kind of swoons. Because Peter's just being a real good unky. Just a real tight unky. Peter's sister-in-law says that she thinks Peter is ready for marriage.
Starting point is 00:45:17 But that something's been holding him back. And then Peter tells his mom that he thinks he's ready to propose. Yeah, again, this is the thread of this day. And I don't think we're going to spend much time talking about this one because it really was just them hammering this one thing over and over again. It's just, is he ready?
Starting point is 00:45:35 Will he propose or won't he propose? But he tells his mom that he thinks he's ready, but he's not 100% sure about it. Rachel asks Peter's mom if he is emotionally ready and the mom says that he's ready for a family and he can commit but maybe not a proposal they're giving the editors just enough footage to like cut together a package of like maybe peter won't win yeah so at the end of the date where the other men have kind of laid it on the line as far as their feelings for Rachel. Peter just says, you got along so well with my friends
Starting point is 00:46:08 and it made me very hopeful. And now with my family, it just affirms how I feel about you and I'm just very happy. And Rachel says, I'm very happy too. And then it's kind of left there. There's a little bit of funk. Like there's no love mentioned. and then it's kind of left there's a little bit of funk like there's no love mentioned um and peter tells us that in order to take that next step he doesn't know what it's going to take
Starting point is 00:46:31 but he's not there yet yeah dean this by the way happens every single time this like i really feel like this happens every single time somebody doesn't say i love you and they're like they feel weird about it yeah um dean's date okay so let's let's set some parameters i guess uh dean just like backstory dean's mom uh passed away a little over 10 years ago when dean was 15 and this is something that he talked about on on their last date um and it kind of sent a rift down their family and that he felt like his dad, which the word he used to describe his dad was he's he became sort of eccentric after his mom passed away, did not really step in in that like nurturing role that his mom filled and that it kind of like sent a rift through the family and that he hasn't talked to his dad for a while. Um, and we got like a teaser that made us both kind of worried because it showed
Starting point is 00:47:33 his dad. Um, and he, uh, has converted to Sikhism and like has a turban and a big beard. Um, and like, I was really worried that the show was going to play this up
Starting point is 00:47:45 like look at this wacky dude um which like this whole bit made me so fucking uncomfortable like the entire time i could not believe that we were seeing these things unfold like i felt like we should not be seeing them like this should be a private thing that this show has made like public and is selling fucking downy commercials against um which made me really uncomfortable uh i think to like before we get into it i wanted to talk about dean's instagram post that he did um yeah during the weekend um he says over a picture of him just leaning up against an old wooden fence looking very pensive and handsome.
Starting point is 00:48:26 He says, I'm asking for a favor. When I said my father was eccentric, I was not referring to his Sikh faith or the turban he wears on his head. I'm not asking you to spare his feelings or mine, but instead be cognizant and accepting of the millions of people that belong to the Sikh community. Although he and I are not close, I respect my father's decision to follow his heart and pursue the life he has chosen.
Starting point is 00:48:43 Let us not criticize him for his appearance or his beliefs, because by doing so, we are disparaging an entire faith and culture that includes millions of people. And I know we are all better than that. That is all for now. Hashtag end rant. Happy Saturday, people. Oh, dude. He comes at you at the end and it's like he's got like a genuinely like very cool and like sensitive preface for this episode i feel like in
Starting point is 00:49:10 this this might be i don't know i'm not meaning to make this sound patronizing but i feel like we've watched dean grow up a lot maybe and that's i mean straight up we had our introduction to dean was the after the final rose i'm gonna go black and never go back thing um and that was rough and i feel like it cast dean in a pretty negative light and we were certainly very critical of him and sort of not willing to let that go and now he's like i don't know he's stuff like this this shows like I do think it shows like a certain level of, uh, maturity beyond his 25. I think actually he's turned 26 during the show years. Um,
Starting point is 00:49:52 so yeah, that's sort of the framing for, for this. And like his dad seemed like not a great dude, um, or at least not a great, like dad necessarily. Like he,
Starting point is 00:50:02 even in this, this episode of television that he got one quarter of dedicated to his like family life. Like he seemed like sort of a manipulative dude a little bit. And like, I feel like it corroborated this picture that Dean sort of painted. And so we're going to be like critical of him. And I,
Starting point is 00:50:21 I really hope that you all know that that is not a read on his faith or, you know, the faith at large. No, yeah. And I think, well, I think Dean comes across as very relatable in this episode. And it only kind of highlights the differences between him and his dad as far as his dad's approach to these conversations they have sure you can just tell that the dean is is bringing a lot of strength to the conversation i also want to reiterate like this felt really exploitative and gross and ultimately i feel like shouldn't dean and his family should not have been subjected to this in a way um and that is my over overriding sort of response to this i will also say like it was one of the more like um
Starting point is 00:51:15 it was one of the more like real things i've ever seen not just on this show but any reality show like the dynamics of a family that goes through a loss like this and how that how that can impact a family like again like that's a very very private thing it should be a very very private thing and there were conversations happening here that i feel like should be should be private but like and this was not my situation at all when when my mom passed away like at at all but like it's certainly like there were shades of like conversations that we had to have to like iron out like okay this is how it's got to be from now on um and I don't know it was it I've never I've never really seen anything like that on on a reality television show before. And so like this, this really this really resonated with me.
Starting point is 00:52:11 And I say that at the same time, also thinking like they really should have. This really should have been something that they talked about before the fucking cameras and everything were there. I don't think that this was a play act. and everything were there. I don't think that this was a play act. It really, really, really felt like Dean was confronting his dad about being absent after the death of his mom on the fucking Bachelorette. It was very, very tough.
Starting point is 00:52:38 Yeah, it's just kind of amazing, I guess. Usually when people are on shows like this and they have this kind of confrontation with a family member there's a certain performative quality to it that comes from just being on camera that was not this this this this this was dean like on the on the verge of tears talking to his dad who was trying to just like brush it all under the rug for i feel like we've been prefacing this day for like let's get 10 minutes but yeah uh so rachel and dean um before this family moment happens they ride atvs because they are in aspen colorado and it is it is
Starting point is 00:53:17 beautiful that's so nice um and rachel tells us that dean is what she likes to refer to as her beautiful surprise. He's all our beautiful surprises. And she says that they think a lot alike, that the more time she spends with them, the more that she realizes that there's a lot of similarities between them. And Rachel says, if I'm able to meet all his family members today, it will be the first time they've all been in the same household in eight years. And that Dean hasn't talked to his dad in particular in two years. And so she asked him about that and says, why haven't you talked to him in two years? And he says, I don't know, is it my responsibility to make sure that happens? And she says, well, have you tried? And he says, not really. If he wasn't there when I needed him,
Starting point is 00:54:15 I don't really see why it has to be me. I get why she was like talking to him about this. It felt like the prequel to like the the exploitation a little bit well yeah she says have you ever said to him that he wasn't there when you needed him and he says no and she says well maybe you should um he also kind of sets up for rachel kind of what she's walking into you know says that you're going to meet my brothers and my sister uh and you're going to meet my dad who has changed his name yeah his name is parumroop and uh it means divinely beautiful he says it means divinely beautiful and the fact
Starting point is 00:55:00 that he gave himself that name tells you a lot about my dad. And his wife. Who is also converted Sikh. And Dean says that he's actually only met his dad's wife twice before. I didn't catch that part. Yeah. And that, wow. Yeah. Wow, that adds a lot to the evening.
Starting point is 00:55:21 Yeah, well, if he's only seen him. Yeah, I guess that's true. You know, he hasn't seen him in the past two years. Dean tells us that there's a certain level of fear that comes along with this, which we can all feel at this point. And as they're
Starting point is 00:55:35 walking up towards the house, Dean says, this is not a good indication of who I am. And then he says, this is going to be awful. And she says, no, this is going to be awful and she says no this is going to be fine um she says i'm gonna be there the whole the whole way she's like trying to let him know like you're not alone we're doing this together uh and dean walks in and you can tell i mean this is a man who's not seen his father in two years he looks around and he's like where's the table
Starting point is 00:56:02 like he walks in and he is like genuinely surprised there's no table in the room yeah he seems they all they all seem like pretty awkward yeah uh and not in the like oh we're on tv way but in the like oh we're on tv and we need to pretend like everything's cool yeah so they they're all um the whole family, including Rachel are on the floor. Um, and Dean's dad gets out a gong and asked them all to point their head towards the gong and talks about kind of the, the calming, um, impact of the gong. It, you can tell that Dean is kind of uncomfortable. Dean is just eyes open the whole time, just like rigid as a board. He tells us, he says, I'm suppressing every emotion. It's a lot for him. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:56:51 To bring somebody that he cares about into this environment where he feels like so uncomfortable. Also kind of a stranger, right? Like that's the thing. Like it's not like, I imagine at this point he can't tell Rachel a lot of stuff about his dad as he knows him now. And, like, that alone has got to make this whole thing so fucking uncomfortable. And then how do you have a conversation with your dad about, like, yeah, so let me tell you about Rachel that doesn't have the specter of, like, the rest of the shit going on cast over it. I just like, I know that the Dean circumstances is unique in a lot of ways, but there's something so relatable that you don't see a lot on these hometowns where somebody is like, hey, I have this family.
Starting point is 00:57:37 Obviously, I love them very much. I don't feel connected to them necessarily in the way that maybe a lot of people do. And I don't know how to introduce you to them and feel comfortable and feel like this is representative. You know, there was something about that moment that just felt like, yeah, this is a lot of people's experience. Although Dean's, again, is you can tell very, very painful for him. So Rachel is kind of being a good sport. She says, you know, Dean's family is not a typical family, but everybody's been very welcoming. Dean's dad actually gives her a gift and gives, I think, multiple, if not everybody.
Starting point is 00:58:22 Yeah, it was Feathers. She said that, he said that before my wife passed, she said that Feathers would be her sign, her signal. And so I wanted to give these to you as a blessing. Yeah, he said some very nice things about her and that they were married for 27 years. His current wife, when Dean's dad gets kind of emotional says you know he doesn't cry so this is very unique yeah uh and rachel really appreciate that she says i love symbolic things and i love that he incorporated something with the past and the present it was it was a very sweet it was a
Starting point is 00:58:57 really sweet gesture right and i feel like everything like they made um they made dinner for them um a some sort of vegetarian dish that Dean didn't eat. He said he ate ahead of time. And that, oh man, that really gut punched me. You ate ahead of time of your fucking hometown date on television? Like, all right. But everything up to this point, you couldn't exactly see the stuff Dean was talking about. And I feel like it's because everybody, and especially Dean's dad, like trying to put on this like it's all cool here yeah front and i here's what
Starting point is 00:59:31 i here's what i think about that i don't think that was necessarily for tv like i feel like that's i feel like that's been the standard operating procedure there like that's that is really it felt like the subtext of this whole thing was this is how this family has like tried to carry on and stay together um without like confronting the the bigger issues yeah and dean dean tells us he says he worries his family is putting on a front because it's it's gone so smoothly you know whereas some people griffin and i were talking about whereas some people would have been like, oh, thank God, you know, my family is behaving in this acceptable way. Dean is like not comfortable.
Starting point is 01:00:12 Well, where it breaks down is Dean gets in a room with his dad and they're sitting down on the floor and Dean's dad is talking about like, I'm just so proud of you and you're such a strong guy and um to you know attract a woman like rachel like says a lot and i'm just so proud of how you've grown and um i guess that means i did a pretty good job raising you and that is when dean is like do you though is is that what you think like i feel like
Starting point is 01:00:48 that was the moment where dean was like hold on let's actually get right down into it yeah dean and his dad i guess have had some conversations in the past about dean's frustration. And his dad says, I didn't have those arguments. You did. This is, this is where I feel like we started to see the guy that, that Dean has kind of described of like that line really, really stuck out to me. We didn't have those arguments.
Starting point is 01:01:20 You did. What do you, what do you say? What does that mean mean because it sounds fucking horrible he talks about um i forget everything he did but he was very evasive he he acknowledged that they had had conversations about how dean didn't think he was nurturing enough or present enough after um after his mom died well and he says dean says this this really powerful thing where he says in that moment when
Starting point is 01:01:46 all that was happening we could have come together as a family and we didn't any oh god there's a the part that like i was on the verge of tears watching dean because like it was it was and i was i got so fucking angry that this had to be happening on the, on the show. The, the part where Dean was like talking about when he found out that his mom died. Do you remember when he was like, I remember everything. Like you were sitting there in the room and I was wearing this and it was this time of day and you came into the room and said, your mom died 30 minutes ago.
Starting point is 01:02:22 I remember everything about that moment. And then you like weren't there for me after that like yeah it was unbelievable it's unbelievable that like this was this was televised like it was heartbreaking yeah and the conversation starts to sour a little bit because dean's dad is being like very evasive and like a little little gaslighty a little bit it felt like yeah dean is expressing some of his frustrations with his dad and not not in an aggressive way i didn't feel like just in like a here's how i feel and his dad says whatever you think of me is what you think of yourself um so it's just it's it's this kind of language that
Starting point is 01:03:08 isn't exactly dismissive but doesn't validate what dean is saying it's extremely fucking dismissive he he also says like and the the piece de resistance is like oh so i guess i didn't love you is that what you're saying and he was like no of course you I didn't love you. Is that what you're saying? And Dean was like, no, of course you did. And I love you too. And this is when Dean's dad just like stands up and storms out of the room. Yeah, Dean says, you're so stubborn. You're not letting us deal with this and have this conversation.
Starting point is 01:03:36 And his dad is really frustrated at this point and says, you've still got one foot stuck in the past. You still got one fucking foot stuck in the, like they start trading some some some cusses so yeah and then dean's dad says dean this is important too like as dean's dad is like leaving the house dean like says like i love you and like that's not going to change and his dad says whatever and leaves and it was like it went from zero to 60 to like we're just going to put on this front to like okay that's the
Starting point is 01:04:06 that's the dude that dean has been describing this whole time and it was man it i'm i'm getting choked up like talking about right now because it fucked me up like i i it it reminds me that like it's not that it's not a when when your family goes through something like that like there's no default there's no like and then we when your family goes through something like that, like there's no default, there's no like, and then we came together and everything was great. Like everyone changes when shit like that happens. And when those changes send you off in like different ways and people aren't like there to help everybody else with their changes,
Starting point is 01:04:41 this is, this, this is what happens. And yet it feels like this family and dean's dad is just trying to like muscle through it without like acknowledging what really happened like there were there were there were so many things exposed here that were so painful and so real. And as much as I appreciate this show, like getting into real relatable shit, this felt like way too far.
Starting point is 01:05:12 Like this, these, I, like, again, I know I've said this a hundred times, like it felt irresponsible for this confrontation to be happening on television. Well, I don't know how to say this. I mean, clearly they put Dean in a situation where this confrontation was kind of forced. But the conversation that was had was clearly motivated by real feelings and honesty. Yeah, sure.
Starting point is 01:05:43 You know, so i understand that it feels exploitative i'm not saying they exploited dean to make him have this conversation i'm saying that like like this is an episode that people are going to like talk about and like abc is going to like inherently profit off of it like it's their show and they sell ads against it and this show need this show is a furnace that burns drama it is an engine that burns drama to go and this drama that they used for this episode it didn't feel like it should be theirs like it just didn't feel like it should be theirs no i do see what you're saying i mean i think the argument I'm making is that reality television is kind of structured for these moments.
Starting point is 01:06:30 Yeah. And they cast people with powerful stories in the hopes that these moments will happen. And if you have people like Dean who seem to be very strong and very honest it's more likely and there are a lot of people that watch this episode and are better because of it you know so maybe yeah i see that i i guess i see what you're saying it feels it feels like we got a window into something that we shouldn't have been able to see and now it feels weird that we've seen it and that we're talking about it on a podcast. Well, let's also frame it, bookend it with this.
Starting point is 01:07:10 And like, this is kind of a spoiler, but whatever. We're an hour 15 in. Dean goes home this episode. And that's the piece that's just like, thanks for the drama. Yeah. Now we got the story. We got the footage. Get the fuck out of here.
Starting point is 01:07:24 Yeah. now we got the we got the story we got the footage get the fuck out of here yeah it's it it i i it's i get what you're saying like i and i i agree somewhat like i think there's people who see this and it's cathartic and there are people who see this and are better because of it but i i feel like the cost for dean and his family is like, I don't know, too high. So I should just say really quick, Rachel tries to talk to Dean's dad as he exits the house. And his dad is still upset and very resistant, but walks with her to the bonfire and says that Dean is an incredible man. And in some ways, your relationship with me will be through him. So I wish you blessings if it goes further. You're more than welcome to come back.
Starting point is 01:08:16 And then he kind of he kind of recognizes that he just like doesn't want to participate in this conversation anymore. And Rachel is trying to say, you know, Dean and I have something special. And I just want you to know that. And he says, I honor that. I honor the whole thing. And then walks away from her. So Rachel goes back inside. Dean is still very upset and says, it's all kind of coming together at once and it's really hard for me and then he says that he is falling in love with rachel and rachel says that she is falling in love with him too and that's the end of it right yeah yeah we have a couple articles about the bachelor in paradise ad do we want to talk about that now let's finish the let's do the roast ceremony we'll talk about that fucking shitty ad and then we'll let you go yeah um so we go to dallas which is rachel's hometown uh and she meets with chris harrison before the rose ceremony um and chris harrison and her talk about the week
Starting point is 01:09:19 uh and she kind of runs down all of the men uh And so she has kind of a new energy with Eric, but that he's never been in love before. And that gives her pause. And that she was excited that Brian said he was in love with her. And Peter is still the most reserved, and she's worried that he's not ready. And with Dean, that she's been able to go much deeper. And then Chris is talking to her about making the decision.
Starting point is 01:09:51 And that's when she starts to get emotional. And she says, oh, gosh, here they come. And she starts crying. And Chris says, it's OK to struggle. And Rachel says, I just feel so selfish making these decisions. And then it's time for the rose ceremony and we thought eric was gonna go home yeah i knew i mean i think final two is peter brian right because we saw the clip of brian eating i know a lot of people in the rose buddies group were like all right brian and when she told dean that she was falling in love yeah okay yeah did we talk we did talk about that um
Starting point is 01:10:27 and it just didn't feel like she could send dean home after this but she does and their send-off is very surprisingly dry yeah dean's really confused because he's totally caught off guard by this and she says i just i wonder if you're really ready for the things that i'm ready for and he's like you know i said that i was falling in love with you i meant that uh and i thought you meant it when you said it back and she said that she meant everything she said it's also she never says and like not that this is why this was not not that this was her motivation but i just expect her to say it at some point like this isn't because of your your your family this is but like she never really said that and that was kind of weird and then like just dean gets in the limo
Starting point is 01:11:13 and drives off he's like i'm really confused i'm really upset and i think she made a mistake end of episode like i don't know i feel like i don't know maybe he was just like shocked and that's why it was so dry. Okay. So there were two, well, it was the same ad for Bachelor in Paradise and they ran it twice in like the back hour of the show. And I can't, I can't believe it. Like it showed like open up on a stormy sky and it says, you thought that the paradise was lost. And then it shows like tweets from people like oh, no, Bachelor in Paradise canceled?
Starting point is 01:11:48 Oh, no. Oh, no, I'm so sad. I'm depressed. What am I supposed to do this summer? Summer's canceled. And then it says, like, but a ray of sunshine off the, and then it shows tweets from people saying, like, oh, it's back. It's back it's back and the whole time like you're seeing some uh clips of i guess the new the new cast it was very confusing like
Starting point is 01:12:14 yeah like iggy iggy was in the mix and it was like how did when would that okay um and then a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot of that like bip tone shit of like a parrot like shitting into somebody's crocs. And like a crab like crawling into a woman's open mouth as like a clown farts 100 feet away. Do you know what I'm talking about? That like, uh-oh, there's like a crab crawling around a margarita glass and it falls off show we have yeah look at this zany show framed with this you thought it was gone it was almost lost paradise was almost lost but now it's found yeah like um isn't it miraculous and wonderful that our show is going to be on they they said it wasn't and now it is it fucking sucks it is and and i do not envy the person that has to advertise
Starting point is 01:13:15 bachelor in paradise now but like this is the worst imaginable it feels like the worst imaginable it feels like it's like going for the people who when this show got canceled just completely ignored the allegations surrounding that cancellation and were just just bummed that their show was gone and it's just fucking targeting those people um like hey we need your guys help to help us push through this thing and pretend like it never happened yeah that's how it felt like to me like it was almost gone yeah you know why you know why it was almost gone though dude yeah it reminds me of like a little kid that apologizes because he gets in trouble. And then you realize very soon after that he was never actually sorry. He just apologized because he got caught. Like that's what it felt like. joke yeah and considering how like completely non-transparent they have been about all of the all all of the things that happened um last i guess last month it is astonishing to me that
Starting point is 01:14:35 they are taking on this tack like and i guess i shouldn't be surprised by this shit anymore but it's still like it laid me out low man i can't i can't believe that's the direction they're going yeah the the tone the tone just felt really strange like it's one thing to pretend like it never happened but what they seem to be doing with that ad is turning it into like this triumph story of like look look what we've overcome. And here we are. And we're going to present you with the show you want. Without.
Starting point is 01:15:10 Yeah. Anyway, here's a Jezebel article. This promo is all you need to know about how The Bachelor in Paradise will handle misconduct allegation from Kate Drees, who says, I'd love to say I have no idea what ABC is thinking by airing this promo for the forthcoming season of their show, which seems to treat the sexual misconduct allegations that shut it down like some sort of joke. But we have a good idea because an internal investigation dismissed the charges and because the two players involved will be returning to the show. However, briefly, I think they're going to be on the reunion episode. I know Corinne is. I don't actually know. I know Corinne is going to be on the reunion episode
Starting point is 01:15:45 which like i and and i guess demario is too um uh because the two players involved would be returning to the show however briefly they seem to think the best way to promote the season is with the same light-hearted tone they promoted all others it does not bode well nor does it indicate they've taken much responsibility in terms of the environment being created and the education the staff receives or that the information will truly be imparted to the audience in a clear productive way um one more article from uh vox uh bachelor in paradise's new promo turned sexual assault allegations into playful drama from carolyn frankie um nowhere does this promo demonstrate that anyone involved in the show understands the gravity of the season being shut down to investigate claims of sexual assault or the complex questions that subsequently arose about producer responsibility and drunken drama as a reality show staple. I don't envy the marketing team that had to figure out how to package Bachelor in Paradise's fourth season, but I don't think glossing over the messy realities of what unfolded
Starting point is 01:16:45 was quite the way to do it in fact it only confirms the suspicions held by many that bachelor in paradise and other reality shows like it don't understand the seriousness of claims like the ones that shut down the set uh in the first place nor do they care to if they can simply weather any controversy and move on yep that's what they're doing fucking like we got we you know we got away with it we're coming back i i and i think i i don't even know if they think they got away with it i think that they know that like this whole day this is going to be a season of fucking primetime television like this, like this ad that is just like, let's just get through this fucking thing and show a bunch of crabs being picked up by seagulls and dropped in some dude's hair and just have for a season of television and just heads down all seagull shit and don't fucking sweat it. and just heads down all seagull shit and don't fucking sweat it. It's going to be a miserable,
Starting point is 01:17:50 for folks who watch it, unless you completely turn off that part of your brain, I don't understand how this isn't just gonna be like a, wow, you guys are really just gonna try to power through this one, huh? Yeah, as a reminder reminder we will not be covering bachelor in paradise yeah no no shit like um largely because of stuff like this like i this is fucking super super super gross i yeah i can't imagine trying to make jokes and recapping
Starting point is 01:18:25 this season. Yeah, I have no interest. I have no interest in watching it. So like, I don't know why anybody would want to listen to us talk about it. Yeah, it stinks on ice. We got I guess two more episodes proper
Starting point is 01:18:41 of the Bachelorette and then we'll have the. The Mentel All. Mentel All. And then the finale. So we're almost done. I guess Bachelor in Paradise starts August like 11th or something at some point. So like we've, we're like right up against it.
Starting point is 01:18:57 We're like three weeks away, I guess. So we're almost done. I'm gonna, it's been like, there was some definite dog shit this season but like i'm gonna miss rachel she's been so good yeah i and a lot of the dudes are so good at this rose ceremony like um i knew brian wasn't gonna go home but i was like sad about the idea of brian or dean or eric taking off you were sad about brian really oh no peter okay there we go that's all i got sad about brian really oh no peter okay there we go that's all i got yeah i guess it's pretty late it's tough when we have to stop in the middle because our baby woke up we lose we lose a lot of of that what they call um in sports that mo we lost that mo is that the aggro crag
Starting point is 01:19:40 yeah that's the aggro crag so when he says let's take it to the leaderboards mo and then the aggro crag yeah that's the aggro crag so when he says let's take it to the leaderboards mo and then the aggro crag would animate thanks for listening to rose buddies thank you we'll be in it back next time there's no more stuff to talk about till next time i'm griffin i'm rachel stay with us on this journey of joy spoiler alert she ends up with Soulja Boy! Right reasons! Right reasons! Kidding, video, all four seasons! Maximumfun.org Comedy and culture. Artist owned. Listener supported.
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