Pop CultureBy Yaron Weitzman on

It was Fantasy Suite week on The Bachelorette, otherwise known as Double Entendre Week, or the episode where JoJo spends the entire evening dangling her lady parts in front of the contestants.

First, though, there was some unfinished business to address. Last we saw our favorite whiny white people, Luke was breaking Rose Ceremony protocol (THE NERVE!) and pulling JoJo aside so that he could, for the first time, confess his love to her. This, just minutes after JoJo told the cameras that she was going to have to send Luke home because she wasn’t sure where he stood (a phrase she might as well trademark at this point). They might be cruel puppet masters, but the producers of this slop sure do earn their cash.

That’s where we picked things up. And what did Luke’s last-minute declaration earn him? A one-way ticket back to the ranch, while the other three fellas got to go to Thailand.

GOING HOME

Luke: I’ll say this for Luke: he seemed genuinely shocked and heart-broken by JoJo’s decision. At first I wasn’t sure whether his last-minute “I Love You” chat was an actual come-to-Jesus moment or the result of some prodding from the producers. After seeing his reaction to being sent home, though, well, you be the judge:

Luke’s got the personality of a rock and the IQ of a mug, which is why I think he was one of the few contestants who genuinely went on the show to find love. He’s not cunning enough to manipulate the Bachelor machine and leverage it into fame. Luke may be the first contestant I’ve ever felt bad for. “I was in love with her, but I never got the chance to love with her,” he said after being sent home. That right sort of says it all.

Thing is, the more I think about it, the more I realize Luke never had a chance. JoJo’s after fame. She wants someone who can escort her down the red carpet of the Nickelodeon Teen Choice Awards, not a simple rancher more comfortable rocking jeans and no shirt.

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Luke never fit the bill. If not for having actual abs and rocking the only hair style that JoJo seems to be attracted to, he probably would have been sent home in Week 2.

Chase: My man! But before we get to why he, momentarily, became my favorite Bachelorette contestant of the season, and possibly ever, let’s re-live Chase making out with a fish.

It turned that would be the highlight of his date with JoJo. It was also the most action he got all day.

As a reminder, here’s how things work during Fantasy Suite Week: The dates begin with a shot of either the sun or the moon, then JoJo posing as if she’s in a J. Crew photo shoot, then each of the three remaining dudes get to spend the day with her. They bloviate about love and the future and pretend that they’re in a real relationship. JoJo reminds everyone, again, that she felt spurned by Ben Higgins on The Bachelor last season. Then, if JoJo feels adequately impressed, she invites the fella to her room for a night of sex. Except they can never mention the sex in the lead-up. Instead, they dance around it and use phrases like “spending the night.”

Anyway, it looked like Chase was going to achieve his dream of sexing JoJo up. The two had a good day-date, though I don’t remember a single thing they did, other than kiss a fish. (He was the third date of the week; by that time, the repetitive empty conversations start blending into each other.) But clearly he did enough. At the end of their date, JoJo invited him into the Fantasy Suite.

That’s where things went downhill.

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The two took a seat on the couch in JoJo’s room. There was leg-caressing and hair feeling. “This is it,” Chase must have thought to himself. “I’ll finally get to see JoJo naked!”

“I’m 100 percent in love with you,” he told her. He seemed to mean it, too.

How’d JoJo respond?

“Can you wait one sec?” she asked him, then got up and made her way out of the room. Yeah, not exactly the way Chase expected things to go. What was the problem?

“I just didn’t react the way I wanted to when he told me he loved me,” JoJo told the cameras. That, apparently, was all it took to cut Chase out of the picture, you know, because anytime you get a single negative feeling about your partner, it means the relationship is doomed. How any of these morons ever end up in a long-term relationship is beyond me.

After this, things got really entertaining. You know how most contestants break down and cry after being sent home? Yeah, that’s not how Chase rolls.

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“So now me saying I love you equals, ‘Get the fuck out’?” Chase responded. At that point, I high-fived my wife. Few things excite me more than the all-powerful Bachelor or Bachelorette being told off. Chase didn’t stop there, either. JoJo began crying and apologizing. She tried to defend herself. She claimed dumping Chase was her way of being nice to him, of not doing to him what Ben Higgins did to her.

“Yeah, that’s kind of exactly what you did to me,” he responded. BAM! He then walked off and delivered the Line of the Season (see below).

Also, no sex.

“Invite me to the fantasy suite and then do that… that’s like pulling your pants down and then getting kicked in the nuts,” Chase said.

I couldn’t have said it better myself. I was so happy and proud…

Until he returned during the Rose Ceremony, shirt tucked in once again (seriously, dude, it’s OK to loosen up every now and then), so that he sort of apologized to JoJo.

“I’m proud of you, impressed by you, and I think you’re amazing,” he said. It was like he was a completely different person. Why the 180?

I believe a certain group of producers would love for Chase to be the star of a certain reality love show next year and informed him that, in order for that to happen, he’d have to end this season with a clean image. I have a feeling we’ll be hearing a lot more from Chase in the weeks to come.

STILL HERE

1. Jordan: Have you noticed that he’s always the first one to hear his name called during the Rose Ceremony? Yeah, that’s no accident. As I’ve been saying all season, Jordan is JoJo’s guy; the rest of this is just a facade.

I will say this, though: Jordan got screwed on his date, and I’m not just talking about in JoJo’s Fantasy Suite (get it?).  The other bros got to relax and enjoy Thailand. Jordan was stuck trekking up a mountain. Not only is this cruel to his body, but clearly JoJo doesn’t care about the amount of effort our favorite failed QB puts into doing his hair. If she did, she wouldn’t drag him on a hike where there’s no chance his precious ‘do remains in place.

As for the conversations between the two, well, they were the same as always. JoJo told the cameras how attracted she is to Jordan. The two joked about how hard it was to not make out while visiting some Thailand temple. JoJo then interrogated Jordan, again, about how he envisions his future. She then, again, expressed displeasure with his answer. Jordan, again, responded by saying how much he loves her. JoJo, again, told the cameras that she’s so happy that Jordan showed her what she needed to see to alleviate her fears. Yawn.

After that, it was time for sex.

Here’s my question: we always see the couple in lying happily in bed the morning after, but are you telling me there’s never been any, let’s say, equipment or performance issues (or anything of the like) in the Fantasy Suite? Between the pressure and all that built up tension somewhere along the lines of this series someone must have malfunctioned at some point. THAT’s the morning-after discussion I want to hear.

2. Robby: Jordan may be the favorite, but Robby clearly has a chance. JoJo told us about five times how much she loves him, though she wasn’t so sure when her date with him started.

“I like Robby, but whether I invite him to my Fantasy Suite depends on how our conversation goes tonight,” she said to the camera. Remember when I said earlier that JoJo spent the entire evening dangling her lady parts? THIS is exactly what I’m talking about. It’s Seinfeld‘s sponge-worthy episode, but in real life.

Still, it didn’t long for Robby to win JoJo over.

And for this. he deserves a lot of credit. First off, he’s clearly altered his genes so that he never sweats. Dude’s walking around Thailand during a 90-degree day in white button down and somehow the thing’s not see-through. I’m impressed.

Also, during dinner he pulled out a note that, he claimed, was written to him by his father. He said he found in his bed last week. He had JoJo read it out loud. The basic gist: Dad had never seen Robby so happy before and thinks JoJo is “the one” for him.

Yeah, I’m calling Robby penned that thing himself. And it certainly worked. JoJo’s response: “You proved yourself to me. I shall reward you my vagina.” OK, those weren’t her exact words, but that’s essentially what she said.

They spent the evening off camera (probably discussing geo-politics) and then Robby, not quite done, even stopped by her room for a surprise visit before her date with Chase even though you’re not supposed to get multiple days with the Bachelorette during Fantasy Suite Week. Does this mean that the three guys and JoJo are all staying on the same resort, meaning they can bump into each other at lunch or in the gym or go knock on JoJo’s door whenever they want? If so, that seems kind of strange? And if not, that means the producers must have dropped Robby off at JoJo’s room.

Either way, this was just another reminder that this whole thing is a sham.

Lines of the Night

“We took a big step last night, in a really exciting direction.”— JoJo, on her night in the Fantasy Suite with Jordan. 

I bet you did.

“[Last night] I got to see a side of JoJo that you don’t see when the cameras are on.”— Robby

C’mon, now you guys are making my job too easy.

“Oh, is this my fantasy suite?”— Chase, after being kicked off, to the van escorting him home.

See you on Wednesday for the Tell All (!) episode recap.

About Yaron Weitzman

Yaron Weitzman is a freelance writer based in New York whose work frequently appears on The Comeback, SB Nation and in SLAM Magazine. He's also been published on SB Nation Longform, The Cauldron, Tablet Magazine and in the Journal News. Yaron can be followed on Twitter @YaronWeitzman

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