A 'Bachelorette' recap: Love at First Dale
The Bachelorette begins, and also ends, when Clare Crawley lays her peepers on Dale Moss
Know a Bachelor-lover? A Bachelor-hater? Grant them the sweet release of snark by passing along TATBT. If this picture book of a recap is clipped by your email server, simply click the headline above to read it all on jodi.substack.com!
Well, The Bachelor(ette) finally did it. After 18 years of helicopter rides and private concerts; after 39 seasons of creating an atmosphere where precisely three dodgeball-based group dates and two candlelit dinners could result in an engagement; after spawning an ecosystem of a Instagram influencers, and after years of dodging spoilers, and countless hours spent hosing down the driveway of a crumbling mansion in Calabasas…
The Bachelor franchise finally managed to create that real-life fairytale they’ve been hawking at us for two decades — and I don’t mean Clare and Dale.
No, on Tuesday night, The Bachelorette debuted the kind of magical love story wherein a girl could meet a boy, feel that swoop in her stomach, get that catch in her throat, look deeply into his twinkling eyes… and consensually rub her face all over his face without fear of catching a deadly virus. Absolutely could not be me, still scared inside my house, telling men on Hinge that they can come over for a wild and crazy night of waving at me through my window, BYO Love Actually cue cards — but I’m happy for Clare Crawley and her suitors, nonetheless.
Technically, the only thing I’ve ever related to within The Bachelor franchise is that time when Sean Lowe’s runner-up took her heels off the moment she realized she hadn’t won. Other than that, I might as well be watching aliens every time MaKenna and Nichelle get in an argument over who stole whose romantic DIY pottery painting setup during the cocktail party, or whatever.
This Bachelorette premiere, however? This premiere that started off with Clare Crawley excited for all the opportunities that lay before her, feeling optimistic about the road ahead…
Only to have a worldwide pandemic shut down production, forcing her into a five-month long emotional battle between trying to put her own plight of not being allowed to make out with dudes as ABC’s Bachelorette into perspective—a real “Kim, there’s people that are dying” situation if ever there was one—while also being reasonably sad that the forward trajectory of her life as she knew it had come to halt, and she had absolutely no control over it…
Yeah, I guess I weirdly related to that.
Each season of The Bachelor(ette), Chris Harrison tells us that huge changes to the franchise’s formula are in store, and each year, that change is, like, a Bachelorette opting for a pool party over a cocktail party, or skipping a couple of rose ceremonies. Most often, the alleged series shake-up is a Bachelor trying to swap out his chosen bride for his second-place finisher like me trying to force my foot into a 9.5 stiletto from the TJ Maxx clearance wrack when I know, and every person in that TJ Maxx knows, that I have worn a 10 basically since birth, and will eventually have to return them for the leisure sneaker I was destined to choose all along.
But on this season of The Bachelorette, the promised changes aren’t just little dramatic flares that production carefully manipulated over the course of the season. No, these are changes they were forced into. And nothing creates change more efficiently than a lack of other options!
There was, of course, Miss ‘Rona, asserting her dominance over the formerly unsinkable S.S. Bachelor…
But in the lengthy six month interim while the Bachelor folks waited to produce Clare’s season, our society also began demanding racial equality with a determination that’s rarely been seen in the decades since The Bachelor franchise began rolling out its 38-out-of-39 white Bachelors and Bachelorettes.
Rather than openly acknowledge its role in institutional racism, the Bachelor franchise hurried to cast the first ever Black Bachelor. Two things can be true at once: I can be very excited for @MattJames919 — an eligible hottie if ever there was one — and still skeptical of The Bachelor’s commitment to creating change within their historically stagnant franchise. But I tend to take my lead from Rachel Lindsay on Bachelor matters, so if she’s feeling hopeful for the changes made this year, then I can too.
And for proof that diversity and inclusion can only improve this franchise, look no further than the fact that Clare’s cast of 31 men is by far one of the hottest and most compelling casts in Bachelorette history.
And all 31 of them are here for Clare Crawley: a woman who deserves to find love before she turns 40, at which point she will, of course, sprout her witch’s nose if she remains unwed, as is predestined by the Maleficent-style curse placed on all women at birth.
When Chris Harrison first tells Clare that she’s been chosen to be the Bachelorette, it’s with this very weird statement: “You’ve never given up on yourself, you’ve always believed in love, you’ve always fought for it—so we feel it’s only appropriate that we don’t give up on you either.” It seems agreed upon by all parties involved that this is Clare’s very last chance to find a husband, and should she fail, she will have no other choice but to light a pyre and send herself out to sea in a Viking-style funeral.
Our Bachelorette has three moods in this premiere: crying, having a great time, and crying about having a great time. I have never in my life been as passionate about anything as Clare is about finding love. Because Clare is not afraid of looking a little unhinged…Clare is not afraid of failure…Clare is just not afraid.
Though this Bachelorette premiere mostly goes down just like any other (save for one 6’3 caveat with a movie star smile), it feels quite different than the premieres of recent seasons — because for the first time in a long time, it feels like there’s an adult at the wheel. That’s not to suggest that a 26-year-old isn’t paying taxes and checking their oil just like the rest of us. But with Colton and Peter, and even with Becca and Hannah, there was a strong sense that they were figuring out this process as it went along — and then continuing to try and crack it far after their seasons had ended.
Even if Clare completely crashes and burns, there is no question that she’s starting this process off with a sure hand. As she tells us over and over again, Clare is a woman who knows what she wants because she’s spent a lot of time and energy figuring it out.
At one point, while Clare is talking to the camera about being excited to eventually tell her mother who has Alzheimer's that she’s found someone to share her life with, Clare suddenly breaks down: “Do you know how many days, how many nights even before quarantine, that I’ve felt like — I’m tired of braving this world alone. I’m tired of having to be strong all the damn time.”
A bish is tired! And she is ready! Clare is prepared to make decisions and to make them fast because she doesn’t just know what she wants, she knows why she wants it. She says this repeatedly. Constantly. Chris Harrison says it a lot too—Clare Crawley is a woman who knows what she wants, and that’s why we made her The Bachelorette. There is only one thing Clare and Chris say with more frequency than this…
Okay, considering Clare’s prolific Bachelor run, that last one might just be a sick burn from Chris Harrison…
But for a woman who is so sure of what she wants, Clare’s only listed expectation for what she’s looking for in a life partner is that they “show up.” This is the kind of well-intentioned Glennon Doyle word salad that I never quite understand. But to be fair, it was harder, and did require a lot more PPE for this particular group of dudes to show up this season. However, once the “showing up” bar is met, Clare seems to go on instinct alone — and when she says that she’ll recognize what she wants when she sees it, sis really is not joking around.
For the first half of the episode, Chris Harrison is all, Yesss, we love this about our adult-woman Bachelorette, we love that your decisions are your own, Claaaare!!! [Ed. note: You nkow how Chris Harrison talks?] But the moment Clare goes and proves it by picking her husband on the first night, you better believe this franchise is going to come at her all kinds of sideways.
WHEN PEOPLE SHOW YOU WHO THEY ARE, BELIEVE THEM, CHRIS HARRISON!!!
LIVIN’ LA QUINTA LOCA
In order to provide an environment where 32 strangers could safely rub their faces together at their leisure, the entire cast and crew of this season’s Bachelorette is staying at the La Quinta Resort & Club in Palm Springs.
You may think this is the same thing as a LaQuinta Inn, but it is not. I know this because La Quinta Inns are one of the few chain hotels that allow dogs, and so I have stayed at a number of them. Once, while my mom was in the shower and my dad and I were across the street at a Waffle House, our dog got out of the hotel room, and…pooped on the floor of a La Quinta Inn’s kitchen.
This is not that. Things are much more sanitary at the La Quinta Resort in Palm Springs where all 31 of Clare’s potential suitors had to quarantine for two weeks when they arrived. During that time, they were charged with filming their own introductions, which I am here to tell you is much more charming than watching a guy sit in a fake office with empty bookshelves, then wander into a local park to yell, “I’M GONNA MARRY YOU CLARE!” followed by B-roll footage of a bunch of birds taking off in flight.
Instead, we get to see these men slowly going insane for two weeks. Reality TV contestants—they’re just like us!
I’ve been pretty exclusively communicating with people via MarcoPolo these days, so there’s something comforting about first meeting someone through a front-facing camera. Plus, giving these men the opportunity to express their actual personalities was a great way to zero in on all the hot nerds, my own personal hot-man genre of choice…
But the best—the very best—part of getting to meet Clare’s boyfriends before they don their banana suits and stethoscopes for the limo introductions…is getting to watch them take their COVID tests.
Of course I don’t wish a full-penetration COVID test upon anyone…
But if the brain swab is already happening, and it’s all in the name of love, then I’m happy to be along the ride as a bunch of giant, professional-sport-playing dudes try and fail not to cry because someone stuck something up their nose. [Ed. note: I also recommend the current season of Hard Knocks for this exact same experience.]
Eventually, everyone dries their eyes and prepares for the first cocktail party, including Clare. Well, let me rephrase that, because Clare’s eyes are almost never dry for the entire premiere. And I don’t blame her. Clare is already an emotionally expressive person, and then she spent the last six months by herself, attempting to comfort her mother with dementia when she couldn’t physically be with her, and wondering if The Bachelorette was going to give up on her even though Chris Harrison promised they wouldn’t.
In the thick of shelter-at-home, a wine glass slipped out of my hands and shattered while I was washing it, and I wept as though someone had told me I’d never be able to see another person again for as long as I lived. At that moment, dropping the wine glass somehow represented that. So, I’m not surprised that everyone filming this in May is kind of freaking out when they actually get to hug one another, or that one guys squeezes Clare’s hands so tight, it somehow breaks skin.
In their pre-party sit-down, Chris and Clare make sure to point out a number of times that Clare is actually the only single woman in America who can safely date a bunch of dudes right now. If you had told me that one day The Bachelorette would be the least awkward form of casually dating when compared to socially-distanced porch dates spent doing the mental math of what level of attraction warrants what level of risking your own life and the lives of others…
Well, anyway, that would have been surprising information.
So I can’t fault Clare for seizing this opportunity once it arrived, nor can I fault Clare for seizing the interim opportunity to stalk all of her boyfriends on social media until the very moment they landed on her doorstep, dismantling the full suit of armor they were wearing to reveal that — oh, they’re the man Clare had ranked 12th-hottest in her mind!
Because, truly, only Clare’s access to the internet, combined with her very special form of romantic intensity can explain…
THE DALE OF IT ALL
Like I said in the Bio Breakdown, my favorite thing about Clare—and absolutely the most intimidating thing about her—is that she’s not afraid to look wacky. Clare is the most seasoned woman in Bachelor franchise history. She knows that if she declares which man is going to be her husband on Night 1, not only will that declaration air to the nation, but eventually, whoever she chooses will see it too, no matter who they may turn out to be…
But this is the power of Clare—she is that intense in her convictions. And there’s no doubt that Clare is crafting a little narrative in her head, and that narrative is love-at-first-sight for herself and the hottest man on earth: Dale Moss.
I mean, Dale is Men’s Health hot. He is what your 10-year-old mind conjured up when you imagined yourself and the boy from My Cousin Skeeter growing up and getting married at Disney World [ed. note: NOT THE PUPPET!!!].
Dale has a giant head, and a rocking bod, and a face for billboards, and every inch of it is gorgeous.
Thank goodness his name is at least Dale, because if it was anything remotely less nerdy, it might actually be impossible to speak to this man. As it is, when Dale steps out of the limo, Clare can barely keep it together. She’s already met 30 hot men, and she’s been totally charming with all of them: warm, reassuring, ready to riff off whatever silly or sweet entrance they throw her way. But when Dale gets out of the limo, Clare actually goes googly-eyed.
Let me be clear—nothing magical happens in this initial conversation between Dale and Clare. He does pick her all the way up when he hugs her, which Clare seems to like, but other than that, these things happen in this order:
Dale exits the limo
Dale’s eyes twinkle like a soap opera star
Clare’s eyes do that thing that cartoon’s eyes do when they roll like a slot machine, settling on two giant hearts
Clare coos, “Come on over!”
Dale comes on over
He says he’s been waiting to take this journey with Clare for a long time, and he couldn’t be more excited that it’s here…
Dale look how he looks
Clare looks like this at Dale looking how he looks…
And that’s it! They hug again, and Dale walks into the mansion. Clare calls out, “I’ll see you inside!” while he’s walking away, and I genuinely thought she might just follow him in there. But, as if everything about Clare wasn’t already screaming that she’d just found her frontrunner, the most shocking part is still to come...
The moment Dale walks inside, Clare starts shaking her hands out and laughing under her breath; she looks out into the distance, and with every ounce of Anne Hathaway “It came true” energy inside her, Clare exclaims: “I knew it!” Then she takes another breath for dramatic flare and drops the guillotine on this season:
Now, my read on Clare first saying “I knew it!” and then saying that she felt like she just met her husband, is that from her all her quarantined months of watching Instagram stories and googling “did so-and-so actually play in an NFL game or just practice squad,” she determined that Dale was her top choice. And when he got out of the limo and managed to not, like, call her the c-word in his introduction or anything, that was all the confirmation she needed that he was the right one.
I’ve already stated that I live for Clare’s self-assurance…but I’ve never claimed hers is a particularly sound sort of decision making. After all, Clare has signed on for eight weeks of whittling down 31 men into one future husband…
And Chris is going to make sure she remembers it. This man literally comes out of the bushes after Clare says she just met her husband, and is like: “What’s that now?” I do so enjoy watching Chris Harrison have to actually work for his paycheck.
Chris keeps demanding to know how Clare could possibly already declare which man is her husband. And Clare keeps responding that, at 39, you just know these things. Chris reminds Clare that she has about three soccer teams’ worth of men inside waiting to talk to her, and Clare is like, Oh yeah, for sure, I’m still gonna go through the motions, let’s do this, Chris!”
SO YOU’RE SAYING SOME NON-DALES HAVE A CHANCE?
No, I’m not saying that at all. I am absolutely not saying that.
But I am saying that Clare walks into this cocktail party and charms the pants off every single dude inside. There’s not an ounce of disinterest in her as she speaks with all of the non-Dales. Which is good because I’m assuming that Clare’s B-team is who Tayshia will eventually get stuck with once the producers smuggle her in with their weekly shipment of deli meats…so Clare’s non-Dale frontrunners are still important.
Let’s start with EAZY, who really is the unexpected protagonist of this premiere. The moment he’s introduced, Eazy becomes the social coordinator, comedic relief, and narrator of the Non-Dales. I mean, the man’s name is Eazy, and he is pulling it off (his full name is actually Uzoma Nwachukwu, which he is also pulling off).
And Clare likes him too! They have a sweet little conversation about how their moms always want to know if they met anyone at church, but my personal favorite Eazy moment is when he gets miffed that everyone keeps showing up with food for Clare.
On the opposite side of the camera-time spectrum is BRANDON, who we literally only lay eyes on during the limo introductions, but if Dale hadn’t later laid claim to the most magical introduction moment, it surely would have belonged to Brandon. He’s introduced in this sexy haze, while we hear another guy in voiceover talking about someone not being husband material, as if the editors are trying to tell us: Here he is — the husband material has arrived.
And the camera pans up to to Brandon looking like a Disney prince had a love child with an Armani ad. We see no interaction between Brandon and Clare other than the limo introduction, but judging by the way Clare goes on and on about Brandon kissing her on the cheek, I think she might be open to sewing a few wild oats before she totally cuts ties with her 30 other hot boyfriends.
And Dale is actually not Clare’s first kiss of the night. That honor goes to my personal crush, BLAKE MOYNES — yes, there are two Blake Ms, so they have to go by their full names — who Clare uses to sell the narrative that she definitely, for sure, absolutely never DM’d with any of the contestants before the filming started.
Apparently, during the months that the show was on hiatus, Clare’s mother fell in her care facility and was pretty badly hurt. Clare posted about it on her Instagram, and Blake Moynes messaged her saying that he knew it could risk his time on the show, but he really wanted Clare to know that he was thinking about her and praying for her mom.
So, at the cocktail party, Clare sits Blake down for some one-on-one time and gives him this speech about how he was the only one who broke the rule about reaching out to her, and at first it seems like she’s about to kick him off…
But then—BOOM, Clare says that Blake reaching out meant everything to her. He took the risk and broke a rule in order to offer her some support, and she loved it.
And then this guy who definitely looks more cuddly-teddy-bear than smooth-operator, is like, speaking of risks, and just lays one on her!
And for one brief moment, I think Clare forgot about Dale. But then, y’know…she remembered Dale.
Clare and Dale definitely have chemistry during their time together, but if you can believe it, it’s a very intense, serious kind of chemistry, rather than the warm, friendly kind of energy Clare has had with everyone else. Dale tells Clare that he’s an empath, which she loves, although I have slight concern for two people experiencing all of Clare’s emotions at once.
When Clare presents Dale with the first impression rose (duh), he seems surprised, which might be our first indication that just because we already know Dale is the storyline of the season, that doesn’t mean he does yet.
For example, after Clare pins Dale with the rose, he seem seems to be prepared to seal it with a gentlemanly hug, to which Clare says, NAH.
STIR THE POT, OR THE POT STIRS YOU
Given that we already have our Prince Charming, we desperately needed a few clowns and villains to give us some sort of entertainment, and four guys really stepped up to the plate in the premiere.
This man, ZACH J, gets out of the limo with his chiseled jaw and 2006 good looks, and decides that his best course of action in wooing Clare is to get down on one knee, open up a ring box, and present her with a farting butt. And he loves himself for it. Now, I can’t really be mad at Zach J for taking a prop given to him by production, and trying to stand out a little bit. But I can be mad at him for presenting me (and Clare!) with this visual…
Because it’s not like this was just a box that made a fart sound, or even just a butt inside a box. This is the image of a man with his pants pulled down, bending over to fart. And I just don’t know if actual buttholes are the image you want your future betrothed to conjure when she thinks of you, Zach J?
Still, buttholes might be a better visual than JAY’S, who gets out of the limo in a straight jacket, telling Clare, “It’s been 128 days since I was first supposed to meet you, so clearly I’ve gone a little crazy in that time.” And that’s…whatever, not a great take on mental health, but probably in league with butthole boxes in terms of nuance.
The actually-insane part of Jay’s straightjacket bit is that he stays in the straightjacket the entire night! For what has to be at least 14 hours! In the summer hear of Palm Springs! Clare has to pin a rose to the straight jacket!!!
But Jay is no villain, just a very dedicated and uncomfortable personal trainer.
No, in the villain arena, we’re being set up for a classic switcheroo, wherein we’re bated with one guy, who’s ultimately revealed to be much more of a chump than a threat, only to then be sidelined by someone who might have actual skeletons in their closet.
BENNETT is our chump, and I know he sucks, but I love him for how good he is at it.
Do “they,” Bennett???
This man is (allegedly) 36 years old, which means that he graduated from college 14-15 years ago, and yet his degree from Harvard remains his defining characteristic. It does feel like Bennet is at least a little in on the joke though, given the way he cosplays as Patrick Bateman from American Psycho for literally the entire premiere:
But Bennett is not who we need to worry about. No, according to the many times I paused the season preview, that would be YOSEF, who has cold shark eyes, and who talks about his daughter like the fact that he was able to reproduce a human female means that he innately understand how to respect women, when it’s pretty clear from the jump that he’s a manipulative weirdo (remind you of anyone Clare’s dated before?).
When they sit down at the cocktail party, Yosef tells Clare that having his daughter made him want to be the best man possible, “and that involves showing you how a woman is supposed to be treated, as well.”
Um, excuse me? I assume we can only blame Dale’s twinkling eyes for sending Clare into the kind of fugue state that could prevent her from unleashing fire and brimstone upon on anyone who would dare suggest that she needs a man to know how she’s supposed to be treated. Unfortunately, Clare will actually have to pay attention to Yosef soon, because he finds her again later to inform her that someone at this La Quinta Resort & Club is trying to drag his name through the mud.
That someone is a square-jawed lawyer from West Virginia — with the unfortunate fate of being named TYLER C in the year of our Lord and Savior Tyler Cameron — who isn’t exactly dragging Yosef’s name through the mud, but who did privately confront Yosef about a rumor he’d heard before coming on the show.
Okay, and I guess he did tell some of the other men in the house too…
(I love Jordan.)
Unfortunately, Mini McConaughey should have realized that if this guy Yosef was even a little bit duplicitous, he was going to get out in front of this story and try to make Tyler C look bad instead.
For the record, the rumor itself is very unclear…something about a girl who lives in the same town as Tyler C receiving video DMs from Yosef that seemed like they were mass messages he was sending to a lot of girls. Which is just pretty hilarious in general — is this what life is like for people who are hot enough to move through their life in DM slides? The story itself isn’t particularly damning, but Yosef’s sputtering around to never really deny it is.
In the end, Clare super does not care what either of these guys have to say. She sends Tyler C home and keeps Yosef, I assume in exchange for the producers promising to slip Dale her room key that night.
Or, I guess I should say that morning, because the sun is at high noon when Clare cuts loose her first seven men, including my boyfriend Mike who brought Clare sandals in case her feet started hurting during the cocktail party. So Clare, you owe Mike $14, and Mike, you owe me one of these DM videos everyone seems to be sending around these days.
The preview for this season looks truly bananas, and for once, I truly cannot wait to watch it all unfold. That doesn’t mean these recaps will get done any faster, but it does mean that I have 120 screenshots of the three-minute video above, and I’m not afraid to use them.
See you back here next week for a recap of episode 2, and any morsel of a clue about Clare’s departure or Tayshia’s arrival. As always, if you know anyone who appreciates a good early 2000s reference, or a recap that takes longer to read than it does to watch the source material, please do forward this newsletter their way. Congratulations — I just blew up your inbox!
