It feels like just yesterday when we were toasting our warm goon to Alisha and Glenn on Bachelor in Paradise, so how the hell are we now analysing who Locky Gilbert will fall in love with on The Bachelor?
I know how – because it literally has been a day since BIP. Well, kind of. A few days, whatever. Essentially, Bachie content is never ending right now and I’m not exactly sad about it – I have nothing else to do with my life right now besides botch a few pilates online classes and cry into some Milo and icecream.
We start of our first episode of The Bachelor 2020 with… Osher and a lot of flammable plastic roses situated near literal flames.
He’s all blah blah, welcome to The Bachelor, love, romance, help me my leg is on fire. You know the drill! On to our introduction to Locky Gilbert.
Quick thirsty side note here – I’m deeply obsessed with Locky after interviewing him for P.TV and deciding our one (1) 40 second conversation that wasn’t related to the filming bit had “vibes”. Hands in the air if this is how you also romantically operate in 2020!!
Anyway, Locky if your love story has now gone up in flames, hit me uuuuup!
Ok I promise that’s the last time I blatantly hit on someone via a recap they probably won’t read until… the finale episode. Promise!
So we get the usual sexy montage of our Bachelor. Locky rock climbing shirtless!
Locky wandering the Balinese jungle shirtless!
Locky pulling things on Survivor! Shirtless.
When he eventually parkours his way to the Bachelor Mansion, we hear the usual spiel. Never has time to meet anyone on account of parkouring all over inanimate objects, falls in love heaps fast, wants to get married. Imagine if we got a Bachie who was like “yeah just here to pash some chicks and build my Instagram following, Osh! Would be sweet if one of those chicks was bonza, ay.” I mean…. I’m not saying that’s how it is…
Anyway! Let’s believe in love, shall we? We should be like Osher, whose face goes like this when Locky tells him he wants to meet the girl he’s going to marry.
First up! It’s Burrito Girl!
We are calling her Burrito forevermore, since the first convo she has with Locky is this kind of sex orgasm over burritos with beef in them.
Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhh I mean look I also love burritos? Who doesn’t love burritos? Aren’t we done with the “I’m a hot girl who eats burritos 5 times a day” thing yet?
Anyway, Burrito (Steph) is very confident. She’s all “YOU’D BETTER BE GETTING YOUR BURRITO WITH CHIPOTLE SAUCE” and “DON’T WORRY I WILL TEACH YOU HOW TO EAT A CHILLI WITHOUT NEEDING A NAPPY.”
Locky laps it up – they basically stand there cackling about burritos for twenty minutes.
UGH, then Locky is like “any girl who looks like Steph but can smash a burrito is AMAZING.” LOCKY!!!! This is your strike one, mate. Can we not with the bullshit “I want a size 0 woman who eats like a brickie who just finished a 12 hour shift but also manages to retain her tiny figure and flawless skin”? Enough!
He is STILL going on about burritos hours after Burrito is yoinked off into the mansion’s bowels. I’m so burrito happy to have met burrito Steph she’s such a burrito girl.
The word burrito has no meaning anymore. When you think about it, what ARE burritos but a slab of severed meat inside a soggy flappy bread? I hate burritos now.
Okay am I high or is this show next level for 2020? Now we’ve got this woman:
Marching in with a Downton Abbey dinner plate. It gets worse – she tells us she’s keen for someone who makes her laugh, that if you’re not making her laugh to the point of an asthma attack (??) you’re not the guy for her.
Luckily, Asthma (I actually missed her name but also Asthma is literally her entire personality at this point) laughs at fucking everything. Literally everything. She laughs as she says hello, laughs when Locky says he’s nervous, laughs when… her puffer falls out of her undies????
Seriously, her puffer “accidentally” falls out of her dress from somewhere, and she grabs it very noticeably and puts it in her dress.
Anyway, eventually she lifts the lid off the Downton Abbey plate – it’s two hot chilis. HAHAHAHAHA THIS IS A BRILLIANT STITCH UP FROM THE PRODUCERS!
He eats some, lol times ensue. When Asthma walks off she’s apparently taken her heels off? Is this The Cliche Cool Girl Show now? STOP IT. I’m shocked she didn’t walk in with two beers.
Next we get the dancer woman, Nicole. This one:
As we already knew from promos, she spends her time wheeling Locky around in a very tepid salsa or something. It’s cute, I guess. I don’t know I haaaaate the meet-cutes, it’s so awkward like in what world would you show up in your flamenco gear to a date being like SPIN ME!!! SPIN ME NOW!!!!
Anyway. Locky loves Nicole like he’s loved everyone so far. Then in comes Irena who he also loves. She’s a nurse and tells him to find her at the cocktail party so she can check his pulse and “see how he’s going”. Imagine if she checked it and was like:
Next is this DOG!!!!!! A DOGGY!!!!!! DOGGY TIME!!!
I would die for Annie. Kick everyone else off this show and just make it The Bachelor: Annie Enjoys The Mansion please.
Then we have Areeba, the Boss Lady.
She explains how she’s the boss at work and the boss at home and the boss in a relationship and guys, I don’t know if Areeba is a boss?
Locky seems a bit afraid of her boss energy but generally upbeat.
Next is penguin girl!
I actually love penguin girl? She’s just obsessed with penguins and has her own penguin cup she takes to bars and makes them use? Pre COVID I assume, lol. Anyway you could not pay me enough money to rock up on national TV in a penguin suit but I love this for her.
OH MY GOD GUYS. GUYS OH MY GOD. WE HAVE A BEER LADY.
Am I psychic? What did I say!!!! I’m shocked someone hasn’t rocked up with Cool Girl Beers and here we are!!! This is Zoe-Clare and she is terrifying. Real Keira Maguire energy of “I will fuck you up if you cross me” shit. Hundo here to cause drama and not to be a real contender, you know?
Anyway, Cool Girl can open beers with her teeth!!!! Of course she can! She can probably also open them with her vagina because she’s SO COOL!
More girls arrive, then this girl arrives to a full Lebanese drumming group.
While this girl Laura sits in the car complaining about the drumming group.
She’s the Louis Vuitton girl – the one from the ads who wanted an LV bag for her birthday? Clearly another drama making Keira 2.0 vibe from her.
Then we get Charlie, who is the first woman to know Locky is from Survivor. She also absolutely CHARGES down the red carpet. Charges!
In the waiting room/purgatory everyone’s like oooh what it’s Locky from Survivor? But honestly all I cared about was:
Anyway Charlie is really, REALLY trying to make “swear on my eyebrows” happen, and it’s not going to happen. DON’T LET IT, YOU GUYS. Please I beg you.
Annie is totally judging her.
Anyway it doesn’t even matter because Bella is clearly the winner. She gets the FULL Cinderella entrance.
Locky gets “lost in her eyes” and they spend a lot of time just staring at each other and giggling.
We go back to the purgatory room where Penguin is just being the best? I love her?
You know what the best bit is? Locky immediately takes Penguin for some one-on-one time!! Fuck yeah, Penguin!
They chat for a bit while these two, who I already can’t stand, bitch over some mimosas.
Anyway, Penguin pulls off her penguin costume to reveal a SEXY LADYYYYYY UNDERNEATH! Like guys she wasn’t ACTUALLY a penguin. That would be way too exciting and excellent for Bachie.
Anyway, then Zoe Clare takes Locky for a chat. You know who hates this? I’m A Boss Areeba.
She decides to go interrupt, and since we already knew Zoe Clare hates interruptions, it naturally turns into this absolute shitshow:
But! Areeba clearly has harnessed the leftover energy of Keira in the mansion because she manages to out-stare Zoe-Clare, who walks off in shame.
Then, she bitches to every single person who will listen, including a few who are maybe just cardboard cutouts they’re using the fill the room.
While she’s doing that, Locky’s with Irene taking his shirt off. These two are VERY cute. Surely it’s down to Irene or Bella.
Zoe-Clare is still bitching about Areeba, but with added “I have red hair, did you know I have red hair” zest on top. It’s like watching your drunk mate having a d & m with the bouncer.
Then shit gets really weird. She’s talking to-camera about how she has red hair, and how mean it is that Areeba interrupted her, and then the producer is like “why has this upset you so much” and Zoe-Clare kind of makes it about…. discrimination???
Like basically saying she’s being rejected (??) due to her red hair. It is so bloody bizarre – like obviously kids in school get bullied for red hair so it’s not too shocking if she has some issues about this shit, but… Areeba is literally a woman of colour. And also, no one was saying anything about her red hair.
Hooly dooley.
Moving along from that trainwreck scenario, the dancing lady is like HAHAHA I LIVED IN MANILA ON A CRUISE SHIP DANCING HAHA WHO DOES THAT I’M SO CRAZY, HAHA I’M CRAZY – but then Locky is like “nah that’s not crazy” and she’s all:
Absolutely majestic areas. They do the Dirty Dancing lift, he says “every time” he’s with her (all of two times so far) he feels great.
Wait! Somewhere in there Locky sat down with Bella and basically got married to her, I forgot because it was literally 3 seconds of them being in love.
Back to the important shit – what the fuck is going on with Zoe-Clare. Now she’s worked up the courage to actually confront Areeba and honestly, I think I love Areeba now?
Like she literally just eats a sandwich while Zoe-Clare yells at her, it’s outstanding stuff. I don’t think we’ve ever seen someone so flat-out unruffled before, right?
Anyway, she absolutely comes out on top in the Zoe-Clare fandango. Like, wipes the floor with the woman all while eating a ham sanga. An energy I aspire to.
Eventually, Locky comes in with that special rose I forgot to talk about amidst all this drama. It’s giving the lucky recipient 3 times the dates and a solo date and a date in the Bach pad or some shit. They make it more complicated every year.
Shockingly, dancing girl (Nicole!) gets it.
It was pretty shocking only because the whole edit of this episode was like BELLA and IRENEEEEE so dancing girl was really a dark horse.
Then it was rose ceremony time and literally it was just two women I’ve never seen before in my life who went home, nothing to report here!
Until tomorrow!
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.
