The Bachelorette Recap: Charity’s Brother was Right

Heidi

Heidi is currently obsessed with watching people make bad decisions…

Bachelorette Monday started off in a burst of gold when they announced 71-year-old Gerry Turner as the first ~~boomer~~ Golden Bachelor. Then it devolved into brown with the sh*tshow which was Charity Lawson’s fourth episode of The Bachelorette.

Just the way I like it.

That’s not Forks

So long San Diego, this week Charity and her ten remaining boyfriends are in Stevenson, Washington. While the men did their zoomies around the resort acting like they’d never seen a hotel before, I was pausing on the b-roll shots of the mountain ranges to see if I could find the Cullen family climbing them like spider monkeys.

Sadly, Stevenson is 5 hours east of Forks and there wasn’t a sparkly emo teenager to be seen.

(Other than Brayden.)

Dotun has the it factor

The first date of the week went to Dotun the 30-year-old Integrative Medical Consultant from Boston. Dotun has been a slow burn on the periphery of Charity’s mediocre fboy phase, but now it’s time for him to shine.

It’s not a Bachelor date without some extreme pun for falling in love being involved, so Charity and Dotun spent their morning bungee jumping off of a 20-story tall bridge. Charity was so scared that she was crying and clinging to him like Bella on Edward’s back.

That was my last Twilight reference, I swear.

Clearly, they jumped, and obviously, they made numerous correlations between jumping off of a bridge with a glorified rubber band tied to your waist and falling in love.

That night they made s’mores beside a bonfire while they exchanged stories of their childhoods. Dotun’s story is that of a first-generation immigrant from Nigeria with all of the challenges that presented. While Charity’s story was shaped by growing up in a predominately white neighborhood. They both turned to an achievement mindset that made them strive for perfection.

Y’all, I think Dotun is the one. They don’t have the fiery chemistry of Charity and, let’s say, Joey, but Dotun gets her in a way that feels real.

Then he got the date rose and they made out in a hot tub.

Girl Scouts on the group date

The next morning, Tanner, Joey, Brayden (sans earrings), Michael, Sean, Aaron, John, and Caleb went traipsing through the woods for their group date.

I haven’t seen that many cardigans out in the wild since Taylor Swift’s Folklore era.

This group date was typical for this stage in the game. There are only so many activities in western Washington that can accommodate eight men, one woman, and three girls scouts.

So they went on a scavenger hunt through the woods while three pre-pubescent girl scouts yelled at them.

The main theme of the day was that everyone hates Brayden. No like, at one point they were asked who they would eat out of the group and he was unanimously chosen. They really hate him.

In the end, Aaron won the prize of taking Charity to the “kissing tree”. I don’t know what that is either, but he was happy about it.

Brayden’s big mouth

For the past four weeks, Brayden has made it very clear that he does not think he can get engaged at the end of a show like this. His goal would be to keep dating Charity and to “not want anyone else.”

Practical? Yes. In line with the spirit of the show or Charity’s goals? No.

Meanwhile, the other guys are fully brainwashed at this point and think he’s the crazy one. So, at the after-party when they brought it up again things got heated.

Brayden was defensive, the other guys were on the attack, and then Charity walked in wearing a bra with a satin suit like TLC cosplay and finally heard what Brayden was saying.

He doesn’t want to be there anymore.

This was hard for Charity to hear because he got her first impression rose and the woman hates being wrong, but it was time.

She sent him home for good and then went back to the party to make out with everyone who was left.

Joey got the date rose because she likes kissing him the most.

Xavier makes his move

The last date of the week went to Xavier the 27-year-old Biomedical Engineer from North Carolina who knits in his spare time. There has never been a more perfect casting for this show.

Xavier and Charity spent the day at a fruit festival trying the food, bobbing for apples, and riding on a steam train; you know, stuff you’d see in a Hallmark movie. Everything was going well except that Charity is finally starting to pay attention to red flags for once.

I say red flags, but they were more light orange. Xavier is a little smooth. You know, just a little heavy with the compliments and sappy flirting. Charity said it reminded her of her exes which is never a great sign. She is attracted to him, but she needed him to go deeper with her.

So he did.

At dinner that night Xavier told Charity that his biggest fear in relationships is not being loved as much as he loves. Charity ate that ish up. Then he told her that he became a biomedical engineer to try to find a cure for autoimmune diseases because his mom suffers from MS and she was sold.

Xavier got the date rose and Dotun got an official rival.

Cocktail party? More like cockblock party

Ding Dong the witch is dead. Long live peace and harmony. With Brayden gone, Charity’s 9 boyfriends were chilling at the cocktail party.

They weren’t even competing over time with her. They just sat in orderly lines waiting to take turns with her like it was parent/teacher conference week.

Here comes the class clown.

Yup, Brayden showed up uninvited in his flip-flops, skinny jeans, and scarf like a Pinterest girl from 2012 to ruin everyone’s buzz. He stormed through the resort, blasting past the men to find Charity mid-makeout with John.

It turns out that he wanted to apologize for being “emotionally charged” and to let her know it wasn’t her fault. But you can’t gaslight a clinical therapist with therapy talk so she was like, “Oh, I know it wasn’t me. Bye, bitch!”

As quickly as Brayden arrived, he was just as quick to make his escape.

He sped back through the resort with his head down like a rat when someone turns the lights on. Only in this case, the lights were neon and shown from the interior of a party bus.

Before the doors could close, the other men cornered him and yelled at him for ruining yet another night. It was all rather unproductive and then ~~dad~~ Jesse showed up and told them that the rest of the cocktail party was canceled.

I think that’s like the third cocktail party Brayden has ruined and there have only been four episodes this whole season.

And then there were six

As the men arranged themselves on the risers only three roses sat on the dish waiting to determine their fate.

Dotun, Joey, and Xavier already had their date roses. That meant that of the six remaining men, three would be sent home.

The first rose went to Charity’s self-appointed protector, Aaron.

The second went to Tanner, who looks like a tall Tom Holland so I get it.

The third went to ken doll Sean for some reason I’ll never understand.

That meant that Country wrestler Caleb, nice guy John, and yacht daddy Michael were sent home.

You would not believe how many tears there were. Caleb was full-on sobbing. Aaron looked like he was about to fall to his knees in anguish. Charity had salty streams falling down her face.