Christ, Bachelor In Paradise is an absolute trash-fire this week, isn’t it? Not only did Alex Nation take back Fuckboy Of The Century Bill yesterday, but now Alisha has had a brain fart and decided Jules, who treated her like a small poo fleck on his shoe for days before crawling back for a rose 10 minutes before the ceremony, is The One for her. Ladies, you are better than these dumbheads.
[jwplayer CSE6U6FK]
But I guess Paradise can be confusing, and they’re likely not seeing everything we see. And we see it ALL – once again, me (Mel, Senior Style and Features Editor) and Josie (Head Of Editorial) are here recapping this mess for you, because who bloody knows what went down, really.
JOSIE: Here we are back in Paradise, aka the Island of Lost Fuckboys and also of Legit Psychopaths, case in point Ivan who was continuing to have an absolute fit about Tenille throughout this entire episode. Honestly it was beyond a joke, he was throwing around some kinda alarming phrases like “She’s mine”, “she’s my girlfriend” and of course the charming, “she’s my territory to mark.” Ivan, doll. She is a human being and not a patch of grass that a Jack Russell terrier does a piddle on.
MEL: Christ Ivan needs to go so badly. I cannot stand how he is treating Tenille. It is the worst example of toxic masculinity EVERRRR. You know who else needed to go? Jules, who unceromoniously ditched Alisha for the 40th time to pursue “his amazing connection” with Tenille, who he had all but spoken 0.2 words to. I will say this – Jules’ admission to Ivan that he liked Tenille and would be pursuing her did gift us with what I can only call Ivan’s “anxiety dancing” – where he bodyrolled his way to a calm mind.
JOSIE: I feel like it was such a useful tool – fuck meditation, next time I feel anxious about something I’m just going to walk to a secluded spot of beach and awkwardly gyrate to music that nobody else can hear.
MEL: Quick segue to tell everyone our desperate pleas for free food were answered this week by Subway, who have not paid us money but have paid our stomachs in their new Panini’s and a shitload of cookies. They were delicious and I can attest that the Pizza Panini is basically a Pizza Pocket, but in an adult-appropriate sandwich form. If anyone else feels like giving us free food to eat, by all means please do. We will literally take anything because we have the diets of garbage bins.
JOSIE: We’re human trash receptacles and we love everything! Speaking of human trash, we need to go back to Jules and how when he took his “friend” Alisha aside to say he didn’t want to be with her, she managed to manifest a new bloke, Wes, through the door to nowhere.
MEL: Wes was SO HOT! The island was gifted two men within the space of what felt like 5 minutes – Hot Wes and Mack, the guy from last Bachelor In Paradise who was maybe obsessed with Ali? Regardless, Flo is not interested in either of them and would rather read her chick lit by the water, which was actually a damn mood and a half.
JOSIE: Flo keeps complaining while simultaneously moaning about Davey coming back, which I will always choose to read into… Davey coming back. Connor then ran through all the Paradise couples for Mack, and didn’t it just sound like one of those podcasts designed to make you fall asleep? Honestly, I’ve seen more chemistry in a bloody convent. Quick sidebar to when Jules tried to talk to Tenille and then she just wandered away and left him sitting there like the Lost Fuckboy he is.
MEL: Christ, I just have no idea how he even got it into his mind that he had a vibe with Tenille. You know what Jules is? He’s a softboy – a guy who presents as a sweet emotionally adjusted man but is actually a selfish, self-centred prick. But more on that later – so everyone is terrified Ivan is going to shank them in their sleep if they even look at Tenille. Like Nathan, who got a date card, asked Tenille if she’d be keen to go with him (she was) but then at the last second because Ivan was looking at him like this:
He randomly chose… Shannon?
JOSIE: He even took Cass away for a pep talk and she was like ‘duh take Tenille’ and he’s like ‘okay’ and then word-farts out ‘SHANNON’. Her face was absolutely priceless. She was literally like ‘Take me where?’
MEL: And then they went on this totally beige date that was useless for both of them. They’re not even friends I don’t think? Like dude if you’re going to panic just take Cass.
JOSIE: Exactly! Have a nice night out with your friend! Nathan had a better time later on with this tree.
MEL: Oh my god, huge mood just scaling a coconut tree, hacking down one of the bad boys and then having a drink.
JOSIE: So then while Nathan and Shannon were on their extremely cringe date, Jules finally took Tenille aside for an even worse date. In which “because she is a flight attendant”, he served up a literal box of Cadbury favourites.
MEL: I could not believe it – but what I could believe was Tenille “just friends-ing” Jules, because she… never gave him one iota of a hint that she was keen on him. That man, honestly.
JOSIE: Never has my favourite GIF been so relevant.
MEL: Meanwhile poor Tenille gets back to base camp and has to endure a new style of dance from Ivan, “love dancing”, where he ground himself on her stomach in an attempt to win her heart. Once again – please don’t.
MEL: I know, by now I’m like Jesus woman, just blow this guy off. What on Earth is appealing about a controlling, quick-to-anger man who thinks rubbing his penis on your stomach is the peak of sexiness? GOODBYE. Like Ivan was literally screeching TENILLE IS MY GIRLFRIEND SHE’S MY TERRITORY. He is not a good catch.
JOSIE: Don’t complain for 20 minutes of the episode that he’s too clingy and then decide after he literally sits astride you, that he’s fine. But SPEAKING of people going back on their word, is it time to talk about the absolute shit-show that was Jules and Alisha?
MEL: CHRIIIIIST. Okay so at first I was so into Alisha’s attitude – she was all confidence and self-respect, clocking out of her shit “thing” with Jules and focusing on new dude Wes. And then of course, as soon as Jules was rejected by Tenille and realised there would be a rose ceremony, he came crawling the fuck back.
JOSIE: She came into the cocktail party looking like an absolute boss, her outfit was on point and she was confident AF, even telling Ivan that Jules was outta there. You and I were there in our work meeting room cheering at the laptop, like “Yasss gurl get it”. But then everything went terribly wrong.
MEL: So Jules stops the bloody rose ceremony – literally tells Osher to hold up, which NO ONE should be allowed to do frankly – and asks to talk to Alisha. AGAIN.
JOSIE: At one point I said to you: ‘If she picks Jules I’m going to break my laptop in half and tell our boss that I dropped it’. That’s the level of tension I was feeling.
MEL: We were screaming at the laptop “NO! DO NOT ENGAGE!” – I know how hard it is when you like someone and they’re treating you like shit, but say what you want to hear. I just wish Alisha didn’t believe his bullshit because sure, him saying “I have a connection with you”, “I want you” would feel fucking fantastic but let’s look at the context…
JOSIE: I mean you could definitely see what her predicament was. She really liked Jules and only felt a connection with him, not any of the other guys. So her heart was telling her to keep him there because she liked him, and the worst thing about this kind of thing is you can’t switch off your feelings even if someone treats you like shit. Not straight away, anyway.
But her brain was telling her to throw him into the nearest bin because he had acted so badly. At one point she said “As soon as I met him I knew I could really like this guy”. What I wish I could have said to her was, doll you only liked the idea of him. If he’s this shit within 5 days then he’s not the guy for you.
MEL: EXACTLY! I said this to you – well, screamed it in your face – when you said that to me while we watched, I so, so agree. Jules seemed like a fun guy but actually he’s a big piss-baby man child who is selfish, self-absorbed and likes to use “Im an idiot!” as an excuse to lead people on while he tries it with other girls. Fuck that. I was so mad that she chose him, I get the confusion but I also just felt disappointed I guess.
Like contextually, this guy was looking elimination in the face and until Tenille rejected him he had told Alisha in no uncertain terms that he didn’t want to pursue their connection anymore. He’d made his bed and then his bed turned out to be really cold and had a shitty polyester blanket that gave him static, so he crawled back to the nice, 100% wool Alisha-bed and she let him!
JOSIE: It’s just really annoying from her. I feel like Tyra Banks in that meme.
We were all rooting for you, Alisha! And then you went and rewarded this dipshit with a rose. Even as she did it you could tell she regretted it. She looked like she was gonna hurl.
MEL: Richie meanwhile looked like he was preparing for someone to throw a grape into his mouth.
Yeah I can’t imagine she’s going to give him an easy run of it in tomorrow’s episode but I was just disappointed, mainly because Wes was a) a babe and b) seemed like a nice guy with more potential than Awful Jules. But anyway. Great TV, great drama.
JOSIE: But the guys have the power next so it was a risky move from her. Even if she does give him hell, where does that leave her? I worry for her, I really do. But what a killer episode. My throat hurts from screaming.
Love Mel and Josie? Read their Game Of Thrones recaps here, or listen to their true crime/mystery podcast, All Aussie Mystery Hour.
