‘The Bachelorette’ Recap: Luke Would Never Lie to Your Face … Intentionally

The Bachelorette perfectly captured the moment when this season turned from a fun and whimsical season to a dragging, never-ending fight about stuff nobody cares about. After being sent home from a one-on-one date without a rose, Luke was walking aimlessly into the Scottish night, when all of a sudden, he turned on a dime and went back to talk Hannah into keeping him around for another night.

ABC

First of all: what a weirdo. Normally if you’re walking away from something you love and decide that you have to turn around and fight for it, you do so after stopping to take a second to gather your thoughts (has he never seen a rom-com?). Instead, one second he’s walking full-speed away from Hannah, then the next he swivels and starts walking back toward her.

When Luke makes it back to Hannah, she allows him to stay until the next night’s cocktail party. That party is then—of course—ruined by Luke’s presence. The entire thing is spent essentially debating whether or not Luke was right to mention the names of other contestants during a conversation with Hannah, an argument that goes on for 40 minutes.

With that in mind, let’s do a recap of literally everything that happens in this episode (don’t worry, it won’t take long).

• Luke convinces Hannah to let him stay after their one-on-one date, even though he doesn’t get a rose.
• Luke and the rest of the men yell at each other about whether or not Luke did right by everybody else for roughly 40 minutes, with occasional visits from Hannah to tell them to stop.
• There’s a rose ceremony (Luke gets to stay; Kevin, Devin, and Unemployed Grant get kicked off).
• Everybody goes to Riga, the capital of Latvia (can’t wait for next week’s date at the Kristaps Porzingis Museum).
• Hannah talks to Chris Harrison in a café in Latvia for roughly 20 minutes about how she’s conflicted.
• Hannah and Chris Harrison then talk even more in the Bachelor mansion in Los Angeles about what has happened already this season, with clips from past episodes interspersed.

And that’s it! There were no dates. There weren’t really any new plot developments. At one point, Chris Harrison made a point about how normally he says we’re watching “the most dramatic season ever,” but this season hasn’t been so much “dramatic” as “drama filled.” It’s quite the distinction by Chris! While there is a ton of “drama” this season, with every episode devolving into a Luke vs. the world ruckus, it hasn’t felt dramatic, because the arguments have been pointless and unchanging. We always end up exactly where we started.

Luke sucks; he’s the ultimate guy who has everything going for him but gets so caught up in believing he’s being wrongfully persecuted that he doesn’t enjoy a second of anything. The other guys are understandably jealous of Luke for having so much of Hannah’s heart, and that jealousy is convincing them to join him in self-destruction by making every second into a Luke argument when they should just be getting out of the way. (Shout-out to Tyler and Peter, two front-runners who have smartly spent most of the arguments twiddling their thumbs while everybody else gets sucked into the Luke whirlpool.) Hannah keeps telling them to stop because she wants to marry a guy who doesn’t get caught up in petty, meaningless squabbles every day for their entire lives. At one point, she even yells out “ALL WE DO IS TALK ABOUT STUPID SHIT!” And yet, they just keep on arguing.

Seeing this fight once might have been entertaining, but after three two-hour long-episodes centered on it, I am exasperated. At least when women fight on The Bachelor, it’s entertaining. Guys just yell about, like, “honor” for an hour without budging. It’s like World War I all over again.

Best Summary: Hannah

This episode was bad, but at least Hannah’s frustration led to a GIF that will be useful for many Bachelorette seasons to come:

ABC

Do people who watch The Bachelorette like wine? Jury’s still out.

Most Incorrect Word Usage: Dylan

There was one positive to the final half-hour of the episode devolving into a clip show: This brief clip of Dylan talking about the way Luke talked about Other Luke.

“You schmeared him,” Dylan says. He then pauses for a moment to reconsider. “You smeared him.”

Very important distinction here. “Smearing” is the process of leaving a messy mark on something, often used metaphorically to refer to character assassination. “Schmearing” is how Jewish people put cream cheese on bagels. I have watched this clip roughly 10 times to clarify: Dylan very clearly says “schmeared” the first time. Then Dylan realizes he’s implying that Luke laid lox on Other Luke, sprinkled capers on top, and heartily applied globs of cream cheese to Other Luke with a knife. So he tries again, just to make sure everybody knows he’s actually talking about slander and not brunch.

I chuckled at this brief mix-up. It was the only thing I enjoyed in the entire episode.