All the heterosexual nonsense I was forced to endure during episode ONE of The Bachelorette
It's our first recap!!!! Let's meet Brooke, and let's meet all the people who wanna smooch her
Hello! Gosh hello! my name is Patrick Lenton, and years ago in 2017 I was asked to recap the Bachelor by the editor of Junkee, and I said yes despite never having watched the show, because I was incredibly desperate for money and would do anything so I didn’t have to work hard at something (lifting, shovelling, taxing, etc).
Many many years have passed, I’ve gotten older but only more beautiful, and those recaps turned into a series with Rebecca Shaw (who many have called “the unstoppable erotic juggernaut of queer Australian TV comedy writers”) called All The Heterosexual Nonsense I Was Forced To Endure. We were with Junkee for many years, but we’ve moved here, and we’re so incredibly grateful and shocked and a little bit confused that you’ve all joined us on our own newsletter. Our lives are very silly and we couldn’t afford to do this for free, as much as we love it. Here, we are unbound by any editorial rules, we have no gods or masters, or standards. It should be very exciting.
I didn’t even watch the last season of The Bachelor, and I have a feeling most of Australia joined me in that. I was just… tired of this show, and felt like there’s been diminishing returns for a couple of years. I thought it was time for me to do literally anything else in the world (repeatedly donk my head with a rough brick, for example).
But oh my god… when I tell you I loved the first episode of The Bachelorette, you have to understand how HUGE that is. I’m so jaded, I’m a dangly earring store in Byron Bay (lots of jade earrings).
The show felt rejuvenated in so many ways. Brooke seems very calm and confident, which is lovely to see after the braggacio of a bunch of recent Bachelors. She is absolutely stunning. I love how she was dressed all episode like a fabulous gay widow. And the way she enthusiastically picked up every cue and invitation sent her way, with gentle excitement, was really lovely too. The contestants, while small in number, already seem super interesting. There are some very queer energies amongst the women, and some relatively hot men too (Darvid is very my type… handsome).
And… wow. Brooke’s connection, especially on the red carpet with some of those women is so palpable and exciting and ROMANTIC. I felt excited for her, I felt thrilled.
I’m not even gonna wax lyrical about how astonishing it is to see romantic representation of bisexuality on prime time tv. I’m not. But it meant a lot, and it felt enthralling.
When she was slow dancing with that girl, and doing that thing where your hands keep brushing and clutching at someone else with Jamie-Lee… I even had a moment where I wondered if this recap even had a PURPOSE anymore — because as you might be aware, we’re not so much a recount of things that happened for educational purposes, we’re more of a highly critical and biased collection of loose thoughts. And I thought, is this show now so genuinely romantic and interesting and enthralling that we don’t have a FUNCTION anymore???
Hahaha of course not. Because there are still men, men who seem to be mostly, if not entirely, straight. And boy of boy do they bring some hot dum-dum energy into the mansion.
We contemplated shirking the “heterosexual nonsense” part of our recap brand, because the show is now so gloriously queer… but look, there’s plenty of nonsense yet to endure.
So, let’s recap! For those of you who are new to the format, we rank by the things that annoyed us, the things that didn’t, and basically whatever our worm-filled brains can remember.
MOST ANNOYING
Some guy who gave Brooke a swimsuit
Listen, he was a brief moment passing by, a name lost to the mists of time and memory and the fact that i don’t particularly care. Also, I missed him doing it and wasn’t able to screenshot him. See what I mean when I say our standards have dramatically dropped? But now we have no legal team telling us not to defame people, which probably makes up for it (Matt Agnew has killed, and he WILL kill again).
Anyway, I’m assuming he’s just on the show to spruik his swimwear company, but the thing is, it’s not so much a romantic gift, and more like a christmas present from your grandparents on your dad’s side.
“If it doesn’t fit, you can wear it to bed!”
This man named Matt who briefly rapped
“What an interesting character” - Jess.
Darvid
Ok, so Darvid is VERY handsome, and very gentle, yet confident. YUCK!
No, look, I think I tentatively like him, and not just because he’s the kind of hot that makes me want to be thrown into the Kiama blowhole, also because he just seems really sweet and lovely. Yuck.
But he gets on the most annoying list because he drove his lawnmower to meet Brooke, and then claimed there was a backstory, which was “I’m a landscape gardener”.
That’s not a backstory, that’s a bio. Or an obituary…
Beau
Look, give the Bachelorette producers credit, because they are able to find some truly obnoxious men. Or maybe don’t give them credit, I’m sure they found Beau floating at the bottom of the pool one morning like a funnel web spider and had to scoop him out.
“I like to look good, i like to dress good, everyone calls me a pretty boy” says Beau, and despite the fact it sounds like he’s quoting me… I did not like it.
Anyway, Beau did so many things to basically make him top this list, including calling Brooke “Brookey” the whole time. Actually you know what, that makes me so angry, that’s it. He’s the worst, he is the most oblivious man I’ve seen in a long time.
Oh and the editors know it and they are cutting him REAL dirty, and it’s very funny.
The Loveseat
Oh my god, this stupid chair is why we watch this show. This stupid stupid chair. Oh god.
So, Konrad (Aldi brand David Beckham) came dressed as a tradie (kinky), and built Brooke a chair and then made her promise that they would sit on it later at the party (thus fulfilling the chair’s function, and giving its contorted frame meaning). As far as red carpet gambits go, it’s not the worst, although I hate the outfit.
So as the cocktail party went on, the boys found themselves absolutely walked all over by the girls when it came to getting Brooke’s attention. This is good. It is very funny how flustered they got. But Konrad kept talking about when it was respectful, he’d take Brooke to his weird little plain wooden chair and make her sit on it so they could have a moment.
I gotta say I like Konrad so far, but Im worried I have another Ciarran on my hands (BOO HISS).
“people judge me by appearance and think that i’m just going to be athletic and staunch…”
I feel ya buddy, I have long toiled under this burden myself.
“But I love love”.
Cute.
ANYWAY. It became such a **thing** that other people started getting invested in the goddamn chair.
“There was apparently a man here who built a chair????”
Including Taje who taught him the concepts of cushions and padding, instead of plain wood.
““Thats such a boy thing, your seat is too uncomfortable”
But THEN before Konrad can even take Brooke to his chair, Jess decides to steal her AND the chair, in a move that can only be described as BRUTAL.
Anyway, I LOVED this whole nonsense thing, but it’s also hilariously annoying how much everyone talked about it.
LEAST ANNOYING
Every single lady being on the screen being romantic to a lady
From Holly’s slow dance, which would have been… so cringe from a man, but was weirdly affecting, to Carissa bringing her dead mum and rainbows into things and drawing a lovely picture and it SOMEHOW being super meaningful to Brooke, to the fact that Bec literally said to Matt “I think women are more intimidating than men”…
.. it’s all just lovely and good and enjoyable to see!!!! I feel like a lot of the girls got montaged, but i’m excited to meet them.
The girl who brought a mini-horse
Look, I tweeted this and I got some questions, but - bringing a mini-horse to a queer dating show in order to woo a woman is such an incredible power move, like bringing a gun to a knife fight. You are automatically doing so well honey.
BISEXUAL KISSING ON CHANNEL 10
OK, so the fact that Brooke and Jamie-Lee not only made out in the first episode, but technically, technically, moved in together… why that’s peak queer culture. That’s the epitome of queer women dating.
That kiss has me feeling JAZZED. You can’t take that back, mainstream Australia! You’ve seen it now, and so have your CHILDREN and they are ALL GAY NOW.
Oh i feel alive.
Anyway, I love Jamie-Lee coming back. Not only is it a face crack, it’s SO queer. Spending your entire date talking about how you both used to be into each other years ago? That’s every queer woman I know. Yearning for three years? more queer than a fancy parade. Referencing the movie Sliding Doors? my god.
Anyway, I think this is good and i’m here for it, but I do think that it’s sometimes also queer culture to basically talk yourself in and out of relationships with people who you just find super hot… so idk.
NEVER TO ANNOY OR NOT ANNOY AGAIN
Johann
Ah, my tight handed king.
Did he do anything this episode? I don’t think so. That suit was a mistake. He is good looking in a “non-speaking bad guy role from Die Hard” way. Anyway, farewell. I will simply never think of you ever again, and that’s ok.
AHHHH that’s IT!!!! We did it. I’m so jazzed, I’m gonna go and have a run around the neighborhood, curfew be damned. Tomorrow, our queen Rebecca Shaw will be recapping, and I’m genuinely so excited - the funniest person I know? Yes, yes she is.
These recaps this week are free and open to everyone, but please subscribe if you’d like to read our recaps of the rest of the season. We’re recapping EVERY EPISODE.
BYE!!!!
Patrick Lenton is an author and journalist. His latest book is called ‘Sexy Tales of Paleontology’.