This week on The Bachelor: there are objectively too many dates, literally everyone, including Arie is weeping, and I learn an important geography lesson! Let’s not waste time, folks, time to get into it!

 

We’re in Tuscany this week! Both Tia and I are confused about what and where Tuscany is - we find out that it is a region, not a city, and in that region is Pisa and Florence and other places that I had no idea were even in a region! What can I say, geography was not my favorite subject in school. Chris Harrison meets with the remaining seven women - I’ll call myself out and say that I think in my last recap I erroneously said there were only six women left. But I am also confused by this odd number. Chris Harrison tells the ladies that there will not be a rose ceremony this week, only roses on the dates. Honestly, that’s better, like why was there ever a rose ceremony the week leading up to hometowns? This week there will be three one-on-ones and a group date. 

 

After Chris Harrison says he “hopes to see everyone soon”, which, you know, he won’t, but they all disperse and the women, and I, are wondering the order of these dates. The group date has to be last I guess? Second last? WHAT’S GONNA HAPPEN? They show up to their beautiful hotel that has a beautiful view and the first date card arrives: “Becca K.: Let’s fall in love under the Tuscan sun…Arie” Ooh! Love Becca. There’s little to no time to prepare because there’s so many damn dates this week, but Arie drives up in what appears to be the exact car that broke down on his date with Jacqueline last week. Becca runs out to join him and I’m loving her dress and also the fact that Arie not only opens her door for her, but also offers her the seatbelt! Safety first, folks! 

 

Arie says he chose Becca for this first date for a reason - since their first date, he says that they haven’t really built on their relationship and have kind of missed the romantic connection. Today, they’re going to have a quiet day, which sounds fun since I’m writing this on a work holiday and there’s literal constant jackhammering right outside my window. A QUIET DAY IN TUSCANY IS JUST WHAT I NEED. They walk around this cute little town and stop at a bread stand on the street (!!) and order A SMALL LOAF. Honestly, such a mistake. Always. Buy. The. Large. Loaf. 

 

Becca says that she’s never really been traveling with a boyfriend except for once to San Diego. How romantic. She doesn’t want to admit that she’s smitten, but she kind of is. They sit and have a little picnic after picking out some stuff for a charcuterie board and Arie tells her that, at the beginning of their relationship, he was super confident. He does, however, want to make sure the they’re moving forward, to which she agrees. She wouldn’t stick around if she weren’t interested. Now, lots of people are going to say exactly that this week, but honestly I don’t buy it. Would you really just leave? Who knows. 

 

They have a wonderful time all day it seems and Arie says that he’s always wanted it to be there with Becca and after today, he feels like it is - they found that passion and he can really envision himself falling in love with her. YES DO IT. They make out against a wall for the first time - what a joy for you, Becca!

 

Back at the hotel, Jacqueline says that she is not feeling well and has swirling doubts. She held off on developing feelings until their one-on-one and maybe because of that, this whole thing doesn’t feel feasible to her. Jacqueline doesn’t think that promising him that she’s ready to be in this serious of a relationship is acceptable if she’s having any doubts. She doesn’t know how to be in this situation that’s so accelerated, and perhaps worst of all, she can’t visualize his conversations with her parents. THE HORROR. 

 

Becca and Arie sit down to dinner and he asks her who he would meet if he goes to her hometown - he’d meet Becca’s mom and her mom’s boyfriend Tim, who is very observant. He’d also meet her Uncle Gary who will ask the right questions at the right time, but won’t be overbearing. Love those descriptions. Arie says he likes tough questions and it sounds like he’d probably be heading into that if he goes to her hometown. Although she was in a seven year relationship, this would be the first real time she’s brought someone home to introduce as her boyfriend since the last relationship was sp off and on. Becca feels comfortable and isn’t nervous after today and she’s definitely falling for Arie. She tells him she can see a future with him and his response is to kiss her and say absolutely nothing. 

 

Arie grabs the rose and says that he’s really happy that Becca feels so deeply for him and is really, really, really hopeful for them - he also tells her he’s here for her and he’s falling for her and can’t wait to meet her family. SO OF COURSE SHE GETS THE ROSE. I feel like Becca is the perfect Bachelor contestant, I’m glad she’s here. When Arie woke up this morning, he had his doubts, but he definitely feels like he made the right choice. To end the night, he finds another wall to push her up against and make out with her. Ah, bliss. 

 

Back at the hotel, there’s a knock at the door with the next date card: “Lauren: Let’s break down our walls…Arie” Lauren and I both weren’t expecting that. Kendall tells her that this is an amazing sign that he’s really interested and Jacqueline just doesn’t feel that well. She says it’s hard to watch these women charge ahead in their relationships and she just doesn’t trust her instincts to make these decisons. The next thing I know, Jacqueline is KNOCKING ON ARIE’S DOOR. I JUST NEVER WOULD HAVE THOUGHT. 

 

Arie lets her in and instantly Jacqueline grabs his glass of wine and takes a big ole swig. Every time they give Jacqueline even a moment of on screen time, I find her more and more hilarious. She sits him down and says that, coming into this, she didn’t expect to develop strong feelings, but she got swept off her feet. Part of her is really falling for him, but when she thinks about hometowns, she’s just not confident enough in her feelings to take him home. She thinks that she don’t really have a base or a foundation and that other women here are extremely confident, that’s just not the case for her. I gotta say: I respect the shit outta Jacqueline for this move. Remember like two minutes ago when I was asking if anyone would actually leave at this point in the game? Well, Jacqueline has almost instantly proved me wrong. Arie seems to respect this move, too, and is glad that she came to him to tell him. She says she can’t even look at him so she just makes out with him instead. Lol. 

 

She leaves in tears after they kiss about a dozen more times and she just fully breaks down in the hallway. My favorite thing about her leaving is her summary of what she’s just gone through: “Hi Arie, you’re perfect in every way and yet I still don’t know if I can marry you. See ya!” Love it. Bai, Jacqueline! I know we’ve only known you for about 7 minutes total, but you were a welcome surprise in this season of Krystal. 

 

Arie is ready the next day for his date with Lauren, but he does say that his breakup with Jacquline was heartbreaking. Lauren and he are in the town of Luca and their date is that they’re going to be biking around a wall? That’s all I really got. They head off on their bikes and Arie is STANDING on his bike and I’m honestly amazed. They end up not at a wall, but rather, in a Piazza eating actual food which I find perhaps most stunning of all. Now is the time for him to re-evaluate and see if there could be a future between them. He asks Lauren about her family and how she sees her hometown going - he feels ready for this next step, but doesn’t know if she is. She is concerned because this would be the first guy she’d be bringing home since her last relationship with her ex-fiance. They’re apparently good with how the conversation left off and they find some children to go play soccer with. At this point, Arie says, Lauren is very hard to read and he’s really conflicted about her heading into tonight. He’s hoping for a breakthrough and if there isn’t one, he doesn’t feel comfortable giving her a rose. 

 

Back at the hotel, Kendall says that her decisions thus far have been to protect Arie. They all decide that they need to give feelings back to Arie, it’s not enough to just “accept roses”, which, like, yeah, of course. The third date card arrives: “Seinne: I’m searching for the one…Arie” V INTERESTING. That leaves Tia, Kendall, and Bekah M. for the group date. Two people in the final six who haven’t gotten a one-on-one? This seems like a franchise first. 

 

Wherever Lauren and Arie go to dinner is very beautiful and I would like to go to there. Arie wants to tell Lauren how he feels, which sounds exciting. They toast, with potentially the largest champagne flute in history, to breaking down more walls tonight. Have any walls been broken down at all at this point? Arie tells Lauren that it’s a great quality that she observes and thinks before she speaks, but he wants to know where her head is at and if she’s ready to bring him to her hometown. She’s really glad he brought up that question and then completely moves to another subject. She admits that she has a hard time connecting her emotions to what she says and that after their one-on-one she knew there was something different about him. She then reveals that she feels like she’s falling in love with him. He literally completely remains silent and stares at her for way too long and even she is like “you seem like you have something to say about that” and then he GETS UP AND LEAVES. I’M STUNNED AND CONFUSED AND OMG. 

 

It’s a sad state of affairs when the most dramatic moment in this episode is when someone leaves a table. Lauren, rightfully, starts crying because how the hell are you supposed to feel when you tell a guy you’re falling in love wth him and then he immediately LEAVES??? It’s so unclear what is happening and why he left and poor Lauren, who I don’t even like that much, is stuck there thinking about what he’s doing and what is running through his head. She’s worried that she said too much too soon and now she’s even regretting being this vulnerable. Eventually he returns to the table and then just NEVER EXPLAINS WHAT HAPPENS. He kinda sorta says that he got nervous when he was thinking about her parents?? She gets the rose and like WHAT?? NOTHING IS EXPLAINED?? WHY ISN’T SHE JUST SO CONFUSED??? He then reveals that he felt some things that he hasn’t felt in a very long time and feels vulnerable and he’s falling DEEPLY in love with her. He even tells us (not her) that he wants to tell her he loves her??? Like WHAT were these past 2 minutes my mind is spinning?!?!?

 

These past two dates have set the bar high for Arie so for Seinne I’m a little worried - she meets him and they go and meet GUILIO THE TRIFFLE HUNTER. Omg and his truffle dogs. I want this life. I’m sure it’s an Italian word, but is anyone else concerned that Guilio keeps saying “MAGA”? Arie and Seinne and Guilio and the truffle dogs go into the woods to find some rare truffles and wOULDN’T YA KNOW IT, THERE’S MANY TO BE FOUND. I smell collusion. Speaking of MAGA. Once they’ve found far too many truffles to be convincingly accurate, they head to Guilio’s house and honestly this is the date of a lifetime. Arie and Seinne get to make homemade pasta and talk to this family about love and it’s honestly my DREAM date. The family grills both Arie and Seinne and it seems to be going really well for them - I don’t know why but all of a sudden I’m very into the two of them together. 

 

For dinner, Arie says that he can tell that Seinne really, really likes him. I’m back to only sort of liking them together. He talks about how Seinne is logical and he is a person that leads with his heart. He wants to know what their future would look like, which is a valid question. Basically, he doesn’t want to get to the end of this and fall in love only to realize that they are not at all on the same page. Arie straight up asks her if she feels like she’s had enough time to take their relationship to the next level and she kinda says no. Apparently she shuts things off when she’s not with Arie, which does not seem like a great thing, but kind of understandable in this situation. Just when it seems they’re about to get down to the truth of something, literally BELLS interrupt them. Despite full BELLS interrupting, neither of them acknowledge the BELLS?? I think the moment these bells go off, though, is the moment that Seinne realizes that she’s probably about to go home empty handed. 

 

Back at the hotel, everyone is freaking out about Seinne’s date because if she doesn’t get a rose, there will be two available on the group date. Speaking of, time for the final date card: “Bekah M., Tia, Kendall: Meet me at Villa Reale…Arie” Are these girls supposed to know where this is? 

 

Seinne tells Arie that she doesn’t want this to be the end of their relationship and she’s not ready to not have him in her life anymore. For him, it’s hard to picture sending Seinne home, but something is off and he’s struggling to find that deep emotion that he’s had with the last 2 dates. He grabs the rose and tells her that there isn’t anything wrong with them, but he just hasn’t felt things that he thinks he should be feeling at this moment. He thinks they should be further along and he just can’t give her the rose. She turns slightly robotic in the moment and is just like “Okay, good luck!” Does she have emotions? I do have to give it to her, though, when she tells him that they might actually be further along if he had taken the time to express some of his concerns. TRU. The PA assigned to bag duty takes Seinne’s bag from the hotel and the girls lose their damn mind. Except for Bekah who literally just says that her odds went up. Tacky. 

 

Kendall, Tia, and Bekah M. meet Arie at this Villa that is mostly a field. It’s v beautiful and I would also like to go to here. They sit down in this little seating area outside and the food available for them at this table looks BOMB. Why is no one eating this focaccia????? Arie asks Kendall to hang out, which is a cute way of asking, and they walk into the distance. Kendall doesn’t worry about their chemistry, she just wants to know how they would fit together. She tells Arie that she’s extremely close to her family and her family will probably be concerned about how late they started. She’s never been in a long distance relationship, but she’s thinking ahead and realizing that if they get to the end of this, she’d probably consider moving to be with him just because it’s so important for her to be in the same place as someone she’s dating. 

 

While Kendall and Arie are making out, Tia and Bekah are miraculously ignoring this delicious looking food and Tia asks Bekah if she has any doubts about being ready for all this. Bekah’s response is basically that she’s ready to be back at her house with her family and friends. Ok then. Tia likes Bekah, but she just doesn’t think she’s all that serious. 

 

Tia and Arie go to chat and she starts out by telling him about her reservations with Bekah and how she’s not serious enough about this. She thinks she’s on a different page than the rest of the women and she just hasn’t had enough experience and hasn’t been in love. I agree with this, but this is literally the exact same argument Krystal had against Kendall a mere week ago. They move on rather quickly and Tia says that she’s ready for Arie to meet her family and she has no doubts in her mind. Her feelings for Arie have been the one constant thing throughout this whole experience and then they make out for awhile and tell each other that they love each other’s lips. Cute?

 

Tia returns to the great looking food and decides to talk to Bekah about what just went down - first, she says that it concerns her that Bekah has doubts in this and then she does tell her that she told Arie about her concerns. I’m loving how straightforward these women are this year, like YES. Bekah starts crying almost immediately, which I would do, too, for sure. Bekah’s sick of people saying that she’s not serious about all of this and feels hurt and misunderstood. She doesn’t like it when she’s not seen for who she is. We get a Lauren Conrad level mascara cry, it’s pretty excellent. 

 

Arie finds Bekah crying and she tells him about her conversation with Tia. She tells him that she would not still be here if she didn’t care about Arie and it was so upsetting to her because everyone, including him, feels like she isn’t serious about this. Valid. She just wants to be seen for her heart. They move on, also pretty quickly, and she tells him that her family is very skeptical about this process. She cares about their opinion a lot and she apparently facetious them every day??? THAT CANNOT BE TRUE GIVEN THAT YOU WERE MISSING A SINGLE WEEK AGO AND THE INTERNET HAD TO CLOSE YOUR MISSING PERSONS FILE. Maybe I’m clouded by the absurdity that this bitch literally “went missing” to go work on a marijuana farm, but clearly she’s not as close with her family as she’s pretending to be here. Anyway, she tells Arie that she doesn’t foresee her family having a big problem with their age difference and then they look through her hair to find some white hairs. Mmk. 

 

They head back to the table with still the sAME AMOUNT OF FOOD AS WAS THERE WHEN THEY ARRIVED. Where is Corinne Olympios when you need her????? She would NOT let this delicious looking food just sit here the whole time. Arie grabs the first rose and talks about how high pressure this date has been, but there is one person that he feels really confident in. Congrats to KENDALL FOR GETTING THE ROSE. I’m actually so thrilled for this. We’ve had some true weirdos on this franchise, but none usually make it to hometowns, how exciting! 

 

A few hours pass and they’re all back at the Villa for dinner or just drinks or whatever you call it when three people are on a date and one of them is about to be crushed. Tia felt really confident a few hours ago, but not so much anymore. Tia toasts to being open and honest and direct and finding love at the end of this. THE PERFECT TOAST. She and Arie head outside and immediately Tia is just like “comparison is a bitch”. TRU TRU. She’s very stressed out, clearly, but she is still falling in love with him and feels like her love for him grows every time she sees him. She’s given him a piece of her heart and she wants him to protect and take care of it - something none of her past boyfriends have ever been able to do. 

 

Bekah and Arie lay down on a couch and she begs him to have a little faith in her 22-year-old self. She describes them both as logical people that lead with their hearts, which I think is kinda the opposite description of himself as told to Seinne. She thinks she’s falling in love with him and she wants him to have a little more faith in her. I don’t think faith in her is the problem, which is probably why it’s not so surprising when TIA GETS THE FINAL ROSE. YAHS GIRL, I’M SO EXCITED FOR YOUUUU!

 

And with that, I say to you, BAI BEKAH THE BULLY. Arie walks her outside and she tells him that this will end well for him and she bursts into tears in the van. She’s not a very attractive crier. It’s hard for her to accept that this journey is over and THAT SENTENCE RIGHT THERE IS EXACTLY HOW I KNOW SHE WAS JUST TRYING TO BE THE BACHELORETTE THE WHOLE TIME. NO ONE CALLS IT A JOURNEY UNLESS YOU’RE AIMING FOR THE LEAD. Ugh. Arie starts to cry and says that he liked her a lot, but he just did not see their lives fitting together. SAME. 

 

Next time on The Bachelor: Hometowns! Lots of taxidermy will be found, they’ll eat some cocktail wienies in Weiner, Arkansas, and these families look really intense. CAN’T WAIT.