‘The Bachelor’ Recap, Season 22, Episode 7: The One With Bekah And The Crocodile Tears

Lights up on Tuscany, city of…Italy. There are seven women left, and there will be no Rose Ceremony on The Bachelor this week. Instead, there will be three one-on-ones and one group date, paring down the group to four women heading into Hometowns next week. But before we pare them down, we have to piss them off, by giving Becca her second one-on-one before some of the other girls have even gotten their first. Arie has “no real plan” for this date, except for the two of them to stroll through the Italian streets speaking English at uncomprehending bread, cheese, and meat vendors, and getting Becca touched inappropriately by strangers. But we won’t see that last part until the bumper. For now, it’s just Arie telling the camera that they have no real romantic connection, even though they’ve been sneaking so many secret touches in the weeks since their first one-on-one that I’m halfway convinced they’re already sleeping together.

They do the usual chitter-chatter of who Arie would meet if he came home with her, she tells him she’s starting to fall for his lil Dutch ass, and she does the mental gymnastics required to be able to tell him he’s the first guy she’s officially bringing home, even though her entire family ultimately met the man she was dating for seven years. Arie gives her the rose, they both share that they’re falling for each other, and they step carefully into their potential future together.

Much less sure of herself this week is Jacqueline, who’s feeling intimidated by the certainty of some of the women on this journey with her. After a tearful conversation with Kendall in which she admits that she had doubts on her date and doesn’t really want Arie to meet her parents, given the circumstances, she goes to knock on his door. She says part of her is really falling for him, but the other part doesn’t think he should take her to Hometowns, because as you might recall, she still has six more years of school, which is potentially more schooling than Arie has ever received in his entire life.

This relationship has no viability, and our girl realized it the moment she left the date and Arie wasn’t right in front of her face anymore. And you know what I say to that? RUN, JACQUELINE. RUN. This is your body telling you you’re not interested, you truly must leave. She obviously wants him to talk her out of it so badly, but thankfully, Arie is just not up for the task. “Are you scared of me?” he asks her, stabbing wildly at things that have worked on him before when they came out of Bekah’s mouth. But it’s too late; Jacqueline has made her decision. “If you have any regret, you come back to me,” he whispers into her hair, harder than he’s ever been now that someone’s about to walk off the show of their own accord. And someone who wasn’t willing to move to Arizona, of all places. Separately, those levels of disinterest both get his weenie hard, but put them together, and all the blood leaves his brain.

Back at home, when the women find out why Jacqueline left, it sets off a similar spiral of doubt in Bekah, and the zoom that producers give us on Tia make it clear that she wants to run straight to Arie and vomit all this info into his ears.

But that will have to wait, because first we have another silent film from Fouren. No I’m sorry, I’m being told by producers that it will be a one-on-one date, and that Fouren has been encouraged to speak this time. This is yet another woman who’s getting a second one-on-one before her compatriots got a first, and just a week after her last one. Again, pretty sure Arie doesn’t watch the show, because this just isn’t How Things Are Done in this neighborhood.

“You lead the way,” Fouren mumbles around her entire fist, which she’s cleverly inserted into her mouth, and the two begin their day of Italian Things Fouren Doesn’t Want To Do.

“It’s very Italian,” nods Fouren approvingly as the two of them explore the city. It’s a step up from the dozens of “wow”s last week, but not by much. But Arie disregards all of this girl’s hard work to open her jaw wide enough to get human words out, and makes her eat pizza. Which is such a hurtful thing to do to a hot girl on TV. Give her a salad, be a fucking pal. Fouren takes a slightly different stab at the mental gymnastics, saying that if she gets a Hometown, Arie will be the the first guy* she’s ever bringing home.

*…………since her ex-fiancé.

How romantic! Arie hardcore shows his hand by telling her that he’s scared to tell her how he feels about her. Which, as far as I can tell, is about how you feel about the most expensive item in your closet: he would hate to have to say goodbye to someone so beautiful, even if he never plans on wearing it. Fouren turns up the heat, though, by dropping the bomb, “I’m starting to fall in love with you.” Which is apparently so jarring that Arie has to get up and leave the table for a moment to compose himself without explaining why, which is totally great and super comfortable with Fouren, because she loves to be vulnerable without immediate validation.

He’s just tromping around in the forest, she’s regretting telling him anything, and finally he comes back and makes it all better with a very suave, “Sorry about that. He says he’s nervous, and that’s why he just straight up walked away from the table. You know, just like you would in real life! “I just felt some things that I haven’t felt in a very very long time,” he says. Like apparently the need to go peepee in the woods somewhere. He says he feels vulnerable with Fouren, and veers dangerously close to a Higgins with the admission, “I’m falling so deeply in love with you it’s crazy.” Are we…allowed to say that?? Be careful out there, bud. These aren’t race cars, these are women.

She gets the rose, duh.

Sienne gets the third one-on-one, which is a truffle-hunting expedition with Julio the Truffle Hunter. Julio has a dog who seems to be called MAGA, and he’s a very talented truffle-hunter. He also invites Sienne and Arie to come over for pasta-making and extremely personal question, asking, including a fun chant that lets strangers tell you when to kiss!

“I can tell that she really really likes me,” Arie confides to the camera, which should have been our first indication that he’d end up sending her home. The other women have been brave enough to tell Arie they love him, so if Sienne doesn’t — because, say, she didn’t grow up that way — it’s gonna be hard to stand out. Neither one of these two wants wants to move away from where they live, which for Sienne is Newport Beach, CA. Which certainly seems drivable from Arizona, especially for someone who drives cars literally…for a living.

Arie isn’t feeling the same deep emotion that he felt on the last two dates, so tragically, even though nothing’s wrong…

She’s blindsided, but honestly girl, you dodged a bullet. Run for the hills and don’t look back. The only thing behind you is Bekah, Tia, and Kendall on a group date, and if you want to have a meal you don’t eat with three people who don’t care about you, surely you can find a way to do that at home. You can even join in at home by drinking every time Arie says the phrase, “I love that.” You’ll be in the hospital in no time.

But even without that drinking game, this is a particularly exciting three-on-one. It has two roses for three women, and sometime during it, we know Tia is gonna blow up Bekah’s spot about not being ready for this. I was all ready to be indignant on Bekah’s behalf, but apparently she’s been saying openly in the house that she wants to go home, and misses her family and friends, so that’s not great. But neither is Tia’s feeling that it’s her “duty” to inform Arie of what’s going on. Bark twice if the other girl is here for the wrong reasons, girl!

She spends most of her alone time talking about Bekah, but says she has no doubts about Arie meeting her own family. And you know what? He loves that. Tia also goes out of her way to tell Bekah that she had her name in her mouth while she talked to Arie, and what follows are some of the most unsuccessful attempts to squeeze water out of a human woman I’ve ever seen.

Bekah is really upset and pretending to cry, but she doesn’t have the tears ready by any stretch of the imagination. She’s contorting her face and wavering her voice, but she doesn’t have it. And on The Bachelor, you better have it. Krystal could make her eyes glisten wetly at the drop of a hat, so you better come correct.

She’s so busy trying to eke out some genuine sadness that Kendall gets the first rose, and Bekah experiences her first setback of the show. Which is followed very swiftly by her second setback of the show, which is not getting the second rose, either. It’s an insane reversal from where he was with her a few weeks ago, when I was so sure Bekah was gonna win, but she did seem to sort of see it coming. In their conversation before he made his fateful decision, her eyes were darting all over his face trying to trigger their usual eye contact.

But she couldn’t get it, and she never will again. Nor will she get any kind of explanation from Arie about exactly what went wrong. He just shuts her in the car like he has every other woman he’s eliminated, and waves cheerfully as she pulls away to sob (???) in the backseat. Or maybe breathe really hard and weird until a single glistening tear rolls down her cheek.

Perhaps we’ll have better luck with real tears next week, if the previews are any indication. We all need a break after watching the lengths Bekah just went to for a few measly dribbles.

Alexis Rhiannon (@mindtheclam) is a freelance writer and comedian who grew up in Portland, Oregon, and is now located in New York City. Her interests include reality television, bar trivia, pop culture conspiracies, and someday cleaning her apartment. She can be seen monthly at the improvised show Live Dubbed Sitcoms at Videology in Williamsburg.

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