Here We Go Again!

I've mentioned before that I've been quite a fan of The Bachelor this season and gotten caught up in all the spoilers, mostly reading Reality Steve and observing the crazies on the show's official discussion board. Last weekish Reality Steve announced all the information he had from his sources and I believe him. I think. I hope there's more and to it and I hope maybe he's twisting it just a little the wrong way. Despite what I knew I watched the finale and train wreck After the Final Rose(s). I know it's a reality show and I know I should keep my expectations for human decency low, and I feel like a naive idiot when I say this, but I'm disappointed.

Everything Reality Steve has said that we would be shown was correct. Jason picks Melissa. Breaks up with her for Molly. Molly and Jason happy. Chris gives them the tent. Jill's the next Bachelorette. All of this I can understand. I can sympathize with everyone involved in this. What a bittersweet ending. I'm glad Jason found a nice girl and even though she wasn't my first pick, Molly's seems like a great person.

According to Reality Steve though, there's more to the story than that. It will never be "official," but he has it on good authority from people who wouldn't lie to him and why would he lie to us. (I feel the need to reiterate that when I read my own words I do realize how ridiculously caught up in this I am and how lame it all really is.) He's been blogging about reality shows for seven years. Mostly just recaps and jokes about the season. Why should he start publishing lies now and not just continue on comparing the breasts of the contestants and making fun of the criers? So I'm going to guess that he's right when he says that Jason wanted Molly from about half-way through the taping. ABC wanted a good story so they told him to pick Melissa (who was his #2) and then dump her. Just Jason and the producers knew about this when the finale was taped. Apparently Molly was notified shortly after filming wrapped not to hate Jason too much because he wanted to be with her. Melissa was pretty much left in the dark about this whole thing until she was dumped on national TV. There have also been some e-mails released that someone hacked from Melissa and Jason's accounts that suggest that Melissa knew nothing, or close to nothing. I mean, she knew he was talking to Molly (which he keeps denying) and that their relationship wasn't going great, but was not expecting to be dumped.

I like to think that the producers somehow forced Jason to do this, although I don't know how they could have. Apparently he does get paid for the show, maybe they threw in a douche-bag-bonus to secure Ty's college fund? Clearly if you go on a reality dating show (twice!) you probably have some issues, I mean Mother Theresa wouldn't have chosen this path, but I liked to think that he was a generally decent person. And I would hope that ABC wouldn't stoop so low for ratings. I feel like that's all really naive to say, but did they have to make him dump Melissa on TV? Couldn't they have just announced it at the start of the show and brought them on to talk about it? They could have had Melissa and Molly talk it out! That could've been...amusing? But to make Melissa the fool in all this?

On the other hand, I guess the contestants know what they're setting themselves them up for. Molly got her heart broken on national TV so why should Melissa be spared? I know they do lots of "clever" editing to create characters and a story, I know it's not really really real, but I would hope that they wouldn't be that shady with how it ended this season.

And Jill's going to be The Bachelorette. And I'll probably watch. It's the summer anyway, when nothing else is on TV. And Reality Steve already has some exciting tidbits on it and it doesn't start filming for another two weeks! Here we go again!

By the way, Jason's most recent Jimmy Kimmel interview was priceless!