'The Bachelor' 17×11; The Women Tell All Blindsides Sean

This week is another special episode of The Bachelor. With the finale next week, we get a break in the dates for a Women Tell All episode. These are always full of drama between the girls with a little anger/hurt left for Sean as well. What will he have to say for himself when confronted by all these women?

Instead of getting right to the drama, (because how could we possibly do that?) we get to see Chris Harrison and Sean Lowe surprise some fans for their weekly Bachelor Viewing Parties. It was actually really sweet to see them having fun and sitting down with the girls at these parties and watch the show. My favourite part was when they had the “fantasy bachelor” lists at one party, and when certain people got sent home the girls would cheer because they’re closer to winning the pot the all put their bets into. We’ve never seen Chris and a Bachelor do this before so I really enjoyed that it shows Sean and Chris really had a fun time with the fans this time.

When all the girls are introduced the obvious girl missing is Tierra, so I guess they’ll be talking to her first. All the girls discuss a little of her drama before she comes out, and Chris Harrison isn’t even sure it’s a good idea for her to do so. For good reason, too. It feels like he has to coerce the audience not to immediately boo her when she walks on stage, and as she starts talking about how full of joy and happiness she is literally everyone is exchanging looks acknowledging how fake she is. I didn’t realize this was a comedy show! She looks so happy to be in the hot seat even when she says it’s uncomfortable.

Tierra reveals that the girls hated her because she got the first rose and they thought she didn’t want to be friends with them, but Chris Harrison is able to knock down those comments by pointing out she didn’t want to be friends with them and other girls got roses and weren’t hated. I like that even Harrison isn’t taking Tierra’s talk. When she’s asked about whether there’s anything she regrets doing on the show she looks genuinely confused by his question. Apologize for something? What does that mean…”Off the top of my head, no” got a good reaction from the audience and the girls. Tierra calls AshLee a liar about St Croix which offends AshLee greatly, and then the battle of the words is on. At the end, we get a sort of apology from Tierra that really isn’t an apology at all and then get a description of her sparkle. She won Little Miss Nevada as a child (that explains everything!!) and since then her father has told her she has had a sparkle. She has an incredibly large ring on her finger and it turns out she got engaged to an ex-boyfriend after the show ended. At first when asked when she was engaged, she says “no comment” and later admits to getting engaged in January. Why say no comment? My only thoughts on that one is that she got engaged either while still on the show or very soon after leaving. Hmmm…

Next up we get to hear from Sarah. There’s a really long video clip from her and it’s heartbreaking to see her upset all over again. I think what I like most about Sarah is she’s so relatable. Her problem with getting the same “you’re great but not for me” line from every guy is

something that I can relate to and all the other girls also seemed to be nodding their heads to. It’s good to see that she’s moved on enough to be smiley and happy through most of her interview.

Desiree joins Chris Harrison on the hot seat next. She was my favourite girl for the season and even now that she’s gone I wish he’d go back to her, realizing his mistake. During the video montage of her time on the show, and then her discussion it’s so painfully obvious that she’s still hurting from what happened. We learn Desiree was falling in love with Sean at the time, but it troubles me when she’s standing up for her brother the way that she is. I love that she sounds so happy later on during the interview though. From this season she’s my favourite and I would love for her to be the next Bachelorette. (hint hint?)
Chris makes fun of himself as he calls AshLee onto the stage, because we’re going to need some humor before the depressing stuff begins. But let’s get on with it, she was upset when she left and she never said a ‘proper goodbye’ to him. She tells Chris Harrison about why she was so hurt when she left, but then reveals she is not still in love with Sean. That’s a big reveal, because normally you expect the girls to at least be recovering, whereas she flat out says she is no longer in love with him. After seeing Sean with the other girls on the show, AshLee realizes he wasn’t who she thought he was. I take that as he wasn’t only dating her, but that’s too easy of an assumption because you’re on a show called The Bachelor. She says it’s because he was a southern gentleman with her but he was a “frat boy” in general… No, that’s not right, you just had the wrong conceptions about this show.

When Sean arrives the first thing he has to deal with is AshLee’s wrath. He always knows what to say to make things better, like telling the girls he’s happy to see each one of them, but with AshLee that isn’t going to cut it. The show feels so real because in the middle of Sean’s explanation to AshLee, Chris interrupts asking her back on stage. I love the dynamic that a good host brings to a show. Anyway, Sean and AshLee… Where to being? Sean tells AshLee that he wanted someone he could laugh with, and (as we saw in the show) she never laughed. She seemed so angry when just talking with Chris Harrison, but now she’s having a normal conversation and it’s so different from what I expected. Wouldn’t it be awful if a few months after every breakup all your exes got together to chat about you and corner you? No one in the audience or of the group of girls seems to understand AshLee’s point of view, and I’m glad because I disagree as well. After Sean broke up with her, she wanted him to come check on her? No… That’s definitely not right. Even he seems confused.

The bombshell of the episode comes when AshLee asks Sean why he told her that he “had no feelings for any of the other women.” I’m looking at this as they slept together and she got a little crazy wither her feelings afterwards, but who knows. He immediately denies it and holds his own that whole time. He actually seems bewildered by what she’s told him he said, and she’s holding her ground so they’ve come to a bit of an impasse. Definitely an awkward moment in the show, and as Sean has shown nothing but consistency through his two seasons on this series I immediately believe him. Throughout the episode we’ve had some useless, behind-the-scenes moments and now it all makes sense… During the break, Sean and AshLee had quiet little chats about her ‘no feelings’ comment, with neither of them caving to their former lover. Would Sean really say something like that? I can’t believe he would, and although it makes little sense that AshLee would come up with something like that, it wouldn’t surprise me that she’d be spiteful.

After the AshLee drama, Sean deals with his decision to leave Desiree home. They still seem totally perfect together and I wish they ended up together. Maybe that’s the surprise ending? The question still remains for who is the letter from and I’d still like it to be Desiree and Sean ends up choosing her, but that isn’t very likely. How many Bachelors does it take to open a bottle of wine? During the bloopers we get more than one instance where Sean has problems opening wine and champagne bottles and the girls have some freak outs over bugs and ducks. Wasn’t that….not very funny at all. Lastly, we get a preview of the finale which is next Monday. From the previews, I want Lindsay to get the proposal, but

Come back tomorrow for the three hour finale including the After the Final Rose!