Last night belonged to Emily Maynard in 'The Bachelorette' premiere.
It's been nine weeks since 'The Bachelor' finale where we saw Courtney Robertson successfully woo that guy with the bad haircut. Last night we got to settle down and watch Emily Manard embark once again upon her journey (hopefully) toward love. It's a brave lady who looks for a husband twice on TV and our Emily, darling of the 'Bachelor' a 'Bachelorette' franchise has done it.
Spoiler lovers will know that Emily has whittled her way down to just three guys, so if you want to know who not to bother getting too attached to, read it here. But if you want a pure, unadulterated wallow in 'The Bachelorette' premiere hang on to your seat and here we go!
Cynics like me who love kids and who are skeptical of reality TV as a reliable hunting ground for a future husband and daddy to your young daughter may find this 'Bachelorette' season a rough ride. Couple that with the fact that Emily Maynard seems a pretty decent person and expect to shed a few tears and expect me to get mad at some total waste of space guys that are bound to feature this season.
"My ultimate goal in all of this is to meet somebody that I could marry and have children with and that could be that father figure in Ricki's life," said Emily.
Newly single host Chris Harrison introduced us to 25 guys hopeful of winning Emily Maynard's love.
Kalon (25) from Houston: A "luxury brand consultant" with serious money and a cute lisp, especially when teamed with those huge glasses. He aims to be "kind of responsible, down to earth."
Ryan (31) from Georgia: A former pro-football player now working as a trainer for athletes and kids. He says he thinks Emily is special, and we know she likes sporty types. Oh and he has a cute dog.
Tony (30 or 31) from Oregon: A plywood seller with a 5-year-old son, Taylor. He could be a playmate for Ricki! Oh and Tony is fit! Oh so fit!
Lerone (29) from California: Finally, finally, finally, a black guy finds himself center stage on 'The Bachelorette.' He's a realtor keen to have a family. I loved him up to the point I was told he finds Emily's status as a single mom "one of the most attractive things about her." Then I thought that was a bit creepy.
David (33) from New York: He is a singer and dancer who longs to be famous: probably why he's on this show, rather than to find love with Emily. At this point I so want him to be a douche bag, but we will see. He started well on that quest by apparently trying to sound smart, only to spill out this senence:
"We have all of these disparate facets that ultimately converge."
Charlie (32) from Tennessee survived a balcony collapse and worked his way back from a severe traumatic brain injury. I was loving this guy, even getting emotional. And then he said: "I may have had a head injury – but there's nothing wrong with my heart."
Jef (27) from Utah has a company which provides safe drinking water for those in need so I want to like him. But I found his Peter Pan complex and his primping and preening offputting.
Arie (30) from Arizona is a race car driver. Of course there had to be one. I like Arie, though, and I like his hair. SPOILER: He does quite well this season.
Those seemed the most memorable guys from their intros but others included Doug the "charity director/realtor" is another single Dad with an 11-year-old son, Jackson, the fitness model with the hot pink tie and his awful opening line:
"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but the number of moments that take our breath away. This is one of those moments."
Joe was enthusiastic and spilled some terrible pickup lines. Aaron made me laugh being so corny as to say,
"I'm a high school biology teacher, but I'm here to have chemistry with you."
I can see the teenagers rolling their eyes from here!
Jef rolled up on a skateboard that he is way too old for if you ask my opinion. But Emily really went for it. Sigh. She's been spending too much time with Ricki if she thinks that's entertaining.
She seemed to like Stevie the "party MC" busting his moves but her "I like to dance too" may just have been polite. Tony seemed to do better with his glass slipper as did Randy. But when Nate rocked up it was once again clear that masculine guys are who Emily goes for.
"He's so cute!" she dreamily whispered.
Yes. He is.
John seemed to have an identity crisis, informing Emily that everyone calls him Wolf. Well, we won't be doing that. Even for the couple of weeks we possibly have to write about him.
Travis spoiled his first impression for me as a sweet guy with his analogy of "this egg represents you and Ricki." That's just weird. OK we all came from eggs; it's not something we need to dwell on.
Michael gave Emily a guitar pick to remember him by. Alejandro from Colombia/San Francisco showed off his Spanish to say how 'hermosa' Emily looked. Ryan played it simple and sweet, telling Emily she was beautiful, which just made Kalon's entry by helicopter seem all the more effected.
Wolf John won some of my respect back at this point by declaring,
"Whoever this is, we're all gonna hate him."
"Golly, I'm nervous," Emily giggled.
Yes, I would be too, faced with these 25 guys as my choices for life partner. Getting te chance to spend some time chatting with her, they made their attempts to impress.
Brent showed her the photos of his six kids (run for the hills, Emily). Charlie pretended to bite off Emily's finger (where do they find these nuts!). But my personal favorite intro time (if not really the guy himself) was Chris who brought in two bobbleheaded dolls, carved to look like Emily and him. Sadly we couldn't be allowed to watch more of that and we had to endure Emily telling us how impressed she was with Jef who made "a great first impression" right after we (but not she) heard him say,
"Her fiancé, Ricky, died in a plane crash, and so I think she deserves the best."
It's sad and all, but not quite how it works.
Doug brought in a letter from his 11-year-old son telling Emily why she should choose his dad.
"I think you should know that my dad is one of the greatest dads ever, because he always tucks me in at night… and he is always giving me hugs."
I love that boy (Austin). I don't care what the bribe was to get him to write that letter, I still love him. Can Emily wait a few years for him instead?
Stevie and Kalon clashed almost immediately, as Stevie felt his rival was hogging Emily's attention. All this gave Arie time to tell Emily about what he does for a living and upon finding out he's a race car driver her eyes widened almost imperceptibly, but her composure didn't crack. Arie had to know, though, "Like, are you ok with that?" It took Emily a noticeable amount of time to be able to reply, "Yeah, I am."
But (thankfully, I think) a letter from your son trumps arriving in a helicopter or any other high jinx the hopefuls cooked up. Doug got the First Impression rose. I admit it: I'd have given it to Doug too.
Chris, Ryan, Kalon, Arie, Charlie, Jef, Nate, Sean, Joe, Kyle, Aaron, Alejandro, John, Alessandro, Michael, Stevie, Tony, and Travis all got roses.
Of those going home, Brent was a bit of a surprise for me, but I lost sympathy when he responded to his exit with "The kids will be sad.") Jackson perhaps regretted the pink tie. Randy and David were never likely to get far anyway and neither was Lerone.
So, so far, I'm loving Emily Maynard's 'Bachelorette' choices but am rather disturbed that I would have pretty much made the same choices. Is she about to drag me along on an emotional roller coaster ride? Oh I do hope so. Bring it on!
