The Bachelor Season 20, Episode 2: I Am Not a Crazy Girl at All

the-bachelor-week-2-benWeek two already! The time is really flying, y'all. I wasn't prepared for tonight's episode and I bet you weren't either! So to kick off tonight's recap, I'd like to tell you a story. I recently went on an online date (thank god for dating apps) and we went to a bar for drinks. Nothing special, but still a good time, you know? Anyway, I thought about it and then realized that every date I've gone on in the last two years has been to a bar. Is The Bachelor the only place on earth where you can go on a date that doesn't involve a bar? Someone help. My liver is starting to hurt.

Anyway, on to week two! I feel like I say this every season, but man, oh man do the contestants get crazier with every passing year. These girls are completely loco. Episode two opens up with the first group date card: Jackie, LB, Lauren H., Becca, Amber, Mandi, Jojo, Jubilee, Jennifer and Lace. The challenge? They'll be learning about love. I'll tell you who needs to learn something: it's Lace, and she needs to learn to stop trying to make Ben makeout with her every three seconds. Either way, the girls show up to their date … and it's a high school. High school. Bachelor High. Who's the principal? Chris Harrison, because this is the high school of middle America's nightmares.

Basically, the girls have to compete in different tasks themed after classes in high school in order to win homecoming queen and, subsequently, Ben's heart. Maybe. The first class is science, where they have to, and I quote, “make Ben's volcano explode” in order to advance to the next round. Lace and Jubilee get knocked out first since Lace can't follow simple directions. Because she's the worst. The next class is lunch — and I wasn't aware that lunch was a class — where the girls have to bob for apples. This is when the claws start to come out, as Jackie has a difficult time bobbing for apples and one of the Laurens (everyone is named Lauren. I'm Lauren, you're Lauren, we're all Lauren!) passes a remark that “Jackie is not great with her mouth, unfortunately.” Twenty minutes into the episode and we're already going all out with the sexual innuendo. The next class involved geography, where the girls had to place a cutout of Indiana on a map of the United States. Too bad no one knows where Indiana is ever. Jojo and her teammate, whose name I can't be bothered to remember, placed it horizontally because apparently Indiana is synonymous with Pennsylvania. I've had it with this season already. Mandi and Amber win a free throw contest so they then have to compete against each other, literally racing to Ben and leaping over hurdles to make it to him, which Mandi surprisingly wins. The girl is athletic! Who knew?

At the end of the date, Becca is able to grab Ben to get some one-on-one time which is great because I LOVE HER. She's way more genuine than Nick and I'm excited to see where the show takes her.

However, we're going to pause our in-depth analysis of tonight's episode to question something — why does Olivia spend so much time with her mouth wide open? I saw this tweet which expresses my feelings perfectly and I hope you enjoy it too. Back to the recap …

Lace interrupts everyone's time with Ben so she can get more ~ quality time ~ with Ben. This chick could not be worse at dating, but then Jubilee comes in and saves the day with normal person conversation. She really opens up to Ben and personally I think she's too cool for every single person on this show. Lace freaks out again and tries to get more time with Ben and even though she spends the entire time talking over him, she thinks he's just not getting anywhere with him. Want to know why? Because you won't shut up. There's your answer.

Ben is a really great Bachelor in that he gives everyone time. If you watched Chris's season (which we recapped!) you know that he spent most of his free time with Britt, yet somehow ended up putting a ring on it with Whitney? He takes Jojo up to the roof for a romantic skyline view, there's a lot of awkward clawing — yes, clawing — between the two of them, and she ends up getting the rose. I like Jojo, I hope she sticks around for a while. She gets the first rose of the night, so I guess we've at least got her for another week!

The solo date card goes to Caila which kind of grosses me out because she's the ~ 50 shades of crazy ~ girl from the first episode who made me want to slam my head into a wall. I guess her “we both sell software!” joke really got him, huh? Since this is the second week, we're getting our celebrity guests who happen to be Ice Cube and Kevin Hart. By the way, don't forget to see Ride Along 2 in theaters this Friday! BTW, did you ever lie awake at night wondering what is the most romantic thing Kevin Hart has ever done? Don't worry, we have an answer for you: “I cooked some fried chicken one time in a crockpot.” Nice.

Reminder: the twins still freak me out.

Ben and Caila go on a literal ride along with Kevin Hart and Ice Cube, which was actually funnier than I expected. Thank god they were there, because the conversation between Ben and Caila was seriously stilted — they talk about their favorite colors and that's the most interesting conversation they have. The date ends with Ben, Caila and Kevin Hart in a hot tub … in the middle of a hot tub store. It was weird, but she got the second rose of the night, so I guess all's well that ends well?

The second group date card arrives: Emily, Shushanna, Sam, Olivia, Haley and Amanda. The clue? “Are we a perfect match?” Let me tell you something, I did not expect to see what I saw for the next twenty minutes on my television. They went to a love lab where a doctor actually performed tests on them to see if the girls were a physical match to Ben. This is legitimately the weirdest episode of television I have ever seen, and while I'm a known exaggerator, this is not one of those times. Also, Shushanna can speak English. That was bothering me for a while.

The women run through challenges such as testing if their pheromones attract Ben — he tells Sam she smells sour, which is kind of horrible — and if their body heat corresponds to each other. At least, I think that's what it was. I have to be honest that I stopped paying attention once Olivia came on the screen because I was too busy looking through tweets comparing her to frilled dragons. Olivia won this challenge and Sam lost (I guess due to her sour pheromones) and Ben and Olivia end the date making out. She also gets the third rose because of course she does. These girls really hate Olivia and they aren't even close to being passive aggressive about it a la season 19's Kelsey … they just straight up talk about how much they don't like her. It's sort of admirable but also sort of boring. They don't even pretend to like her.

The night of the rose ceremony arrives and Olivia steals Ben, of course, because no one else can speak to him even though she already got a rose for the night. Can anyone guess who's going to be the Britt of this season? As I was watching this episode, I kept thinking to myself that it would be so great if Lace tried to fight Olivia and when Lace asked Olivia to step outside, I honestly thought I was going to get my wish. Sadly, Lace was just drunk and trying to convince Olivia to step aside so Lace could get more time with him. While all this was going down, Lauren B. was busy totally winning Ben's heart. I have a feeling she's going to make it pretty far this season, but I could be wrong. Ben gets a bunch of the girls he didn't get to spend time with presents: Lauren B. gets a photo of them talking on the first date, Amanda gets barrettes for her daughters (Kinsley and Charlie, whose name I thought was Jarley, but that's a story for another day).

The rose ceremony and the following lucky ladies get roses: Amanda, Jubilee, Lauren B., Leah, Becca, Rachel, Lace (somehow by the grace of God has been given a third chance at not embarrassing herself on one of the most widely watched shows in the country) Jennifer, Emily, Jami, Lauren H., Shushanna, Haley and Amber. LB was originally given a rose, but she opts out as she's not comfortable on the show anymore.

This means Mandi is now gone forever. Our Ashley S. burned too bright, too quickly. Good night, sweet princess.

Thoughts & Feelings

  • How does Ben know what passionfruit smells like? I don't even know what passionfruit smells like.
  • Does anyone else think that Amanda the mom sounds like the guidance counselor from Glee?
  • Would you run away crying if someone told you your pheromones smelled weird? I probably would.
  • Chris Soules is shockingly funny on Twitter — who knew? See here and here.

Texts from my editor

Unfortunately, Brittny wasn't able to watch this week's episode and live text it with me (V5 issue production is in full swing!) … so I'm leaving a quote from The Bachelor Live spoken by my second favorite person in this world besides Drake:

“Some of these girls really need to calm down.” – Kris Jenner

See you all next week for what is sure to be the worst episode of television in the history of the world at the rate we're going!

Photo credit: ABC.com

Past Weeks:
Episode 2: Are You a Chicken Enthusiast?

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Meghan is a recent graduate of SUNY Geneseo with a degree in Personal and Professional Communication. You can find her at the nearest Chipotle tweeting about Drake, her sorority little and Project Runway.

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