Bachelor In Paradise - Series Premiere - Recap: Guys' Choice

Naturally, when you have a show like The Bachelor or The Bachelorette, much of the appeal is in watching the journey of one person finding love, watching that love develop to the point where a proposal isn't just inevitable, but right. This show seems far less focused on the actual business of love, despite offering the possibility of watching multiple journeys of love culminate in marriage. If nothing else, it feels a lot less tacky than its parent shows, in that Bachelor in Paradise seems to know what it is, and doesn't try to be anything other than a saucy night of ridiculous television with crazy people in increasingly crazy situations. There's no pretention towards class or destiny or any of that frivolous nonsense you might get with one of its parent shows. And that quality alone made this a pretty fun two hours. If nothing else, I hardly even noticed it was two hours, given how much happened in such a relatively short span. It was almost like the anti-Bachelor in how little time was wasted in getting things moving. That bodes well for the season to come.

So the returning guys and gals for this series premiere are:

Claire, Juan Pablo's season
Marcus, Andi's season
Sarah, Sean's season
Marquel, Andi's season
Daniella, Sean's season
Graham, DeAnna's season
Lacy, Juan Pablo's season
Ben S., Desiree's season
Michelle K., Jake's season
Robert, Desiree's season
Dylan, Andi's season
Elise, Juan Pablo's season
AshLee, Sean's season

Chris Harrison explains the rules, stating that date cards will be given randomly, and a person can choose who they want to take on a date. Currently, there are more women than men, which means that the men will be the ones holding a Rose Ceremony and eliminating women, with each man having one rose to give out to the woman of his choice. However, next week, things will alternate. The women will have the power, and will be eliminating men. This continues until, hopefully, someone finds love, or this thing just ends like a Michael Haneke movie.

Credit: ABC

Right off the bat, the show only lightly depends on viewers to know who these people are. Chyrons at the bottom of the screen helpfully remind us who's who, and the contestants often talk about one another and what they were like on their respective seasons. However, there are the occasional odd moments that don't land unless you know about that person. For example, early on, Claire says she doesn't want to meet any jerks. Then, the editing team because doing monster movie type shots of a guy coming up on the beach, as if to build him up as the mythical jerk Claire wants to avoid. This is Ben S., and apparently, he was a villain in Desiree's season. But we only learn this after the commercial break, long after Ben's introduction was meant to have some sort of dramatic effect. Thankfully, the episode isn't littered with these moments, and even when they are, we can infer how we're supposed to feel from context. "Oh, dramatic music and Claire talking about how she doesn't want to meet jerks. Here comes some guy, he must be a jerk." Yet it's a risky way to build a show if this series intends to hook people who are new to The Bachelor franchise.

Right away, couples start pairing off, and drama pretty much explodes from those first fifteen minutes through the rest of the two hours -- with some issues proving far more interesting than others. For example, Marcus and Claire spy Elise and Dylan getting frisky in the ocean, sealing their attraction with the first kiss of the season. Of course, it's the first kiss of the season, but not for lack of trying on Lacy's part. After being eliminated on the first night of Juan Pablo's season, she makes it a point to make it through the first week here. Naturally, her hardcore flirting -- taking both Marcus and Robert out into the ocean in full view of all the other contestants -- creates a love triangle between herself, Marcus and Robert. This love triangle forms the basis of part of this episode's story, although we'll need to cover one big piece of drama before we can come back to it.

Credit: ABC

So AshLee is described by Daniella as someone who's obsessively possessive, assuming that she and Sean Lowe were going to get married within just seconds of meeting him. That possessiveness has carried over here, as AshLee goes from having a deep connection with Graham -- arguing that they're the only two "normal people" out there -- to completely losing her mind when Claire gets the first date card and chooses Graham to accompany her to some ancient ruins. In one of the most unsettling nervous breakdowns on reality TV in some time, AshLee shuts herself off in the bathroom, crying and rambling to herself about how betrayed she feels, complaining that Graham couldn't even be loyal to her for 24 hours. She says if this were real life, she'd never talk to Graham again. AshLee feels Graham should have said no to Claire, arguing that she isn't even that pretty anyway. Elise tries to comfort AshLee, but only gets a cold shoulder. This gets back to Claire, who suddenly breaks down herself, since she didn't want to create drama. In a scene that ups the awkward quotient, Claire is edited to look like she's talking to a raccoon. Or hey, maybe she was, I can't tell. But Claire rambles on about how drama is the last thing she wanted, and how she has no problem just giving away the date card to AshLee if it bothers her so much.

Claire approaches AshLee and tries to smooth things over, but AshLee plays it off as though nothing is wrong. She refuses the date card from Claire and continues on without paying anyone any mind. She even blows off Graham when he tries to talk to her, since Claire breaks off the date with him over this whole AshLee mess. It's such a complete quagmire of a scenario, and the show never pretends for a moment that we shouldn't consider AshLee borderline insane. But it's also kind of annoying that Claire caved so easily to AshLee's hysterical freakout. Nobody owns anyone else on this show, especially less than 24 hours in. And the idea that she'd penalize Graham for something beyond his control is kind of silly. Yet that's exactly what she does, choosing instead to rescind her date offer and go with Robert (whom she alludes to sharing a past back home with, saying they traveled in many of the same circles).

It's a sweet enough date, I suppose, with the couple climbing ruins, and Robert comforting Claire over her fear of heights. They even bond over being attacked by fire ants, before taking a dip in the ocean. All in all, it's kind of toothless, but at least it passes by quickly. Ditto the second date, as Sarah chooses Marcus to go spelunking in an underground water cave with her, resulting in a pleasant little date with an incredibly awkward first kiss that Sarah just sort of goes for. It's clear that the attraction is mostly going in one direction, but Marcus is hesitant to lower the boom, arguing that Sarah deserves to be there even though he admits he has an attraction to Lacy. This leads to one of the more interesting aspects of the show: Rose strategy.

Credit: ABC

You see, because Marcus assumes that Robert will give Lacy a rose, Marcus all but promises Sarah he's going to give her his rose, since he knows the person he might have given a rose to before (Lacy) won't be going anywhere. But Marcus doesn't know about the connection Robert has apparently made with Claire, and for all we know, Robert could also assume the same thing about Marcus, that he'll give Lacy a rose. And ignoring all this, let's assume one guy decides to change his mind and offer his rose to someone else, someone whom another guy had planned to give his rose to. Who does that guy now give his rose to? It creates a weird domino effect that could lead to some broken hearts when unexpected, unplanned eliminations start to pile up. But more on that later...

Lacy is still struggling with making an impression, since the two guys she's focused the most attention on were both taken out on dates. However, once Robert gets back from his date with Claire, he assures a worried Lacy that he's still very much interested. In essence, they reaffirm their connection -- and not a moment too soon, as the cast receives a late arrival in the form of Michelle Money from Brad's season. Thus, now two ladies will be going home this week. And, because he's apparently the man of the hour, Michelle M. pulls Graham aside to talk, since they established a connection with each other on Season 2 of The Bachelor Pad, yet things don't exactly pan out between the two. Graham has already had it rough between getting rejected by Claire and getting ignored by AshLee (leading to him telling her off on the beach in a wonderful moment, as he explains how little her behavior with him). But Michelle doesn't really linger on it for too long before asking Marquel to go horseback riding with her. Like all dates on this show so far, it's virtually a non-entity. Hell, this show would be perfectly fine just leaving everyone back at the resort to hang out, letting the alcohol flow and the drama fly.

This all culminates in a Rose Ceremony that proves to be surprising before any roses are even handed out. Michelle K. interrupts Marquel before the first rose is handed out, announcing her decision to quit the show due to having felt no connection with any of the guys in the house. She leaves, prompting Marquel to remark (in a confessional), that "the coconut doesn't fall far from the crazy tree," since Michelle K. never really came across to him as the sanest of individuals. However, on the van ride home, Michelle refuses to go into detail on her reasons for leaving. When asked by the cameraman, Michelle says that maybe she'll find love somewhere down the line, or maybe "it's already happened." She does not elaborate on this, although there's clearly more to this statement than meets the eye, as evidenced by the preview for next week, which teases we'll find out Michelle K.'s dramatic reasons for leaving (and their "tragic" consequences, whatever those are).

Credit: ABC

As for the rest of the Rose Ceremony...

Marquel offers his rose to Michelle Money
Graham offers his rose to AshLee (surprisingly)
Dylan offers his rose to Elise (unsurprisingly)
Marcus offers his rose to Lacy (completely throwing off Robert and Sarah)
Robert offers his rose to Claire (for lack of anyone else to give it to)
Ben offers his rose to Sarah

This means...

DANIELLA is eliminated from BACHELOR IN PARADISE!

For his part, Robert is furious with Lacy since he feels this means her connection with Marcus is stronger, although I'm not sure why he's blaming her for getting offered a rose and accepting it. I'm sure there's no guarantee, in her mind, that Robert wouldn't still be thinking about giving Claire his rose, so it's better to have a sure thing than to take a risk and end up going home the first week all over again. I did find it funny, though, that Ben S. -- the guy who is supposedly a jerk -- is the one that saved sweet little Sarah. I like her a lot, and was kind of angry with Marcus for not offering her his rose, but I guess the heart wants what it wants. Or the hormones. It's too early to tell.

What did you think of the series premiere of Bachelor In Paradise? And what do you think about the show's potential, going forward? Sound off in the comments! Until next week, thanks for reading!