Woof, Bachelor In Paradise isn’t showing any signs of slowing down to that piss-boring pace we all know and tolerate from reality TV shows, is it?
While normally by week two we’re just trying to learn people’s names and painfully wait through borza convos/dates/emo stories about how someones dead dog told them from beyond the grave to go on Bachie, BIP is just slinging shit around like it’s a toddler birthday party and someone let the baby crew eat baked beans out of a can. Sorry, that was too visceral.
Anyway, with that awful comparison out of the way, let’s recap!
So we come back to the aftermath of Jake ripping up all the fake plants, throwing them at Oshie and screaming something about friendship roses and his One True Love Megan Marx. Okay, that’s dramatising things a bit.
The girls are sitting around saying that they feel they’re serious about finding love, but the guys are just there for a bro holiday. Uh, yeah. They are. Did you not see when they basically did some kind of secret dick handshake when Alex the Seal beached himself on the sand?
Britt 2, who is burnt beyond the level of Jarrod and into the realm of “just jettisoned myself into the sun for a bit”, tells us she’s confused about Jamie and how he feels about her. Meanwhile, Jamie’s telling Timm over lunch that he’s now into… Helena? Timm, to his credit, has devised some sort of mind control method to block the sound of Jamie’s incessant over-analysis of things that don’t even exist out of his brain. It’s the only explanation I can think of as to why he didn’t shovel his cabbage salad into Jamie’s mouth and tape it there.
I do feel for Jamie though – for all his chaotic “now I like THIS girl who has never once given me any hint of interest”, he’s still the most genuine person in Fiji. He’s probably more genuine than Osher. He’s just… a weird unit.
Next thing we know, Keira’s stomping through that floating door to nowhere in these really uncomfortable looking plastic heels. I got really stuck on the heels. How sweaty must her toes be? Imagine the fluff between them!
Osher, who has gone really, REALLY hard on the party shirt memo today, tells her she’s going to be on what’s essentially a form of Blind Date except we can’t call it Blind Date coz Channel 7 owns that show, ha ha ha!
He wheels all the boys out, lines ’em up and gets them to answer a few questions. In the end, Keira picks Connor because he is the only one who isn’t a fucking lunatic, basically.
Then Oshie reveals Keira to the boys, and Jamie is beside himself about how he’s so happy it’s her, and he wanted it to be her? At this point I think Jamie would start analysing his feelings for, like, John Howard if he walked in.
Back at the ranch, Alisha tells everyone Keira hates her, so naturally everyone’s like HWAAAAT and drop their mango daiquiris in the pool. She says Keira was talking shit about her when she was in Paradise last season, and when she DMed Keira about it, the woman was less than apologetic.
Keira meanwhile is on her date with Connor. You guys, I can’t get over this – they have the most SMORGASBORDIEST OF SMORGASBORDS in front of them, all fresh shellfish and seafood, and they aren’t touching it. I spent the entire time waiting in anticipation for them to eat one (1) prawn, just one, just one lil’ prawny for me please god. But no. Eventually they go for a swim and leave all that seafood to go sour in the sun. Just the height of rudeness. At least invite Wais around to eat it, fuck.
Back at the ranch again, Jamie’s talking about how keen he is on Keira in FRONT of Britt 2. Then!!! He literally says he’s going to have a chat with her, see if she’s “awful” and if she is, come running back to Brittney. Unbelievable. The man has no fucking idea, hey.
She is understandably ready to grind his nuts off and feed them to those fucc-iguanas we keep being shown whenever anyone’s getting freaky, and I very much support her in this endeavour.
Jamie, unperturbed by Britt who has walked off in disgust, is now telling people he’s keen on RENEE. Another person he’s spoken two words to. She overhears and tells Niranga, who yells the information to Britt with his mouth full of hamburger. As always, we stan.
Osh arrives just about then, telling the crew there’s a Bula Bomboleo or whatever tonight, again. Is it just me or is all we do right now watch people get sunburnt and go to Bula Bomboleos? Mix it up, folks. For example, you could just send all the boys into the Fijian jungle, naked, and they have to find their way back to Paradise alive by the end of the season. Some may die, some may be bitten by a mysterious and deadly jungle bug, but that is the price they paid to be on reality TV. I don’t make the rules.
Anyway, just an idea.
Mary’s upset because Connor is on a date with Keira and, apparently, she didn’t give him a friendship rose – she really likes the guy. When Keira hears that Mary’s got eyes for her dude she laughs for about 11,000 years. She says she’s basically Top Dog in Paradise and no one can have anything she wants.
Everyone sits down for Bula Bonsoir. It’s question box time again, which leads to Jamie admitting his rose for Britt was friendship-only. Then, Keira’s asked if she’s in Paradise for love, or to fuck shit up. Alisha laughs and someone is like OHOHOHO ALISHA WILL WANT TO ADD TO THAT. Shocked Alisha didn’t pull this face because I fucking would have.
Keira’s like, SOMEONE HATES ME??? THIS IS MY LIFEBLOOD HOOK IT TO MY VEEEEINS. She tries deflecting off the find love/fuck shit up question by being like “lol I don’t even know her”, like literally this Mariah gif:
But before any sort of showdown, Jamie is for some reason talking again. He’s asked who he’d give his rose to, and he’s like “Britt coz I couldn’t imagine Paradise without her”. She calls him on his shitty, confusing behaviour, and Alisha gets really upset – understandably, since as she explains, this is the exact shit she copped last year from Jules “Umbrella Of Ambiguity” Whatshisface.
So she’s crying, like properly crying, when Keira decides now would be the perfect time to start GOING FOR HER AGAIN.
Look I enjoy Keira. Her particular flavour of no bullshit is usually refreshing in a sea of people playing it safe. But like, can’t get on board with attacking someone when they’re literally in tears from other shit already. It was too low a blow, and everyone at the table is kinda thinking that way too – Alisha defends herself, Keira claps back, over and over until Glenn steps in and is like “wait so you’re allowed to talk shit about her online because you don’t know her, but it can’t go back the other way?”
I have never screamed “YEEEEEEESSSS!!!!” so loud to my TV screen. FUCK YEAH, GLENN!
He absolutely nails her into her coffin – while sassily sipping his beverage (maybe he didn’t I can’t remember but he had the AURA of sassily sipping his bev) he then says “here for love, eh? Not here to fuck shit up, eh?” HAHAHAHAHAHAHA FUCK.
Also we need to talk about Connor in the background just wondering what in the living shit is even going on. I think the man never even watched Bachie before this. He looks like someone who just got accosted by a flash mob.
Glenn is our hero, and he’s also Alisha’s hero – she tells us she’s never had a guy stand up for her like that. Good lord, in an ideal world they’ll just get married and have at least one adorable blonde (not children of the corn) child DURING Paradise. Please?
Connor has moved on from Keira after this whole fandango and decides to chat to Mary. They’re pretty cute? It’s basically just Mary word vomiting everywhere and Connor laughing.
Also I have to say, I have always been a big fan of a bedazzled choker and I really enjoyed this look for Mary?
So you may have noticed an absence of Jess in this commentary. That’s coz she’s been sick with what I assume is some sort of giardia illness from accidental sludge water ingestion. Side note: I asked my sister “what is the thing you get when you drink grot water, there’s like giardia and…” and she goes “meningococcal”? GOOD LORD NO. That escalated.
Anyway, she’s sick with some sort of sludge water disease (probably), so Ciarran does what every good temporary-boyfriend does. He climbs into bed with his ex.
To be fair, it sounds like it literally was just them having a chat. Both Renee and Ciarran tell the camera nothing happened – they climbed into bed for a d & m, fell asleep accidentally, and it meant nothing. But the clanger is, according to Renee Ciarran told her Jess “is great but she’s not you”. Not a good sign. Not exactly the foundation of a healthy, thriving relationship.
Jess emerges from Vom Zone and walks straight into this shit. PLUS, in chaotic energy from the producers, five minutes after Ciarran tells her about the Renee-bed situation… Kiki walks in.
Kiki was on Richie’s season of The Bachelor and according to other Paradise folks, her and Ciarran have gone to Bonetown before. Sadly, the episode ends there – not so sadly, I think we have about 560 episode of Bachelor In Paradise this week, so I will probably lose my goddamn mind but you bet your sweet bippy I’ll enjoy the ride, baby!!!!!!! Easy rider over here!!!!!!
(I think I’ve already lost my mind).
Melissa Mason is the Managing Editor (Sydney) at Pedestrian. You can find her posting sub-par thirst traps on Instagram and tweeting very sporadically on Twitter.
