Andi Dorfman made her choice Monday and when she told it to toothy Josh Murray, she also said she loved him from the first time she saw him.
So she was either lying then or lying for the entirety of the season of “The Bachelorette,” because as she played it, she was seriously considering 24 other men, whom she eliminated sadly in groups of two and three, as if because of a rose shortage. The ruse with the other fellows continued to the finale, where a Sad Sack named Nick Viall, who still couldn’t tell you why he got the initial First Impression rose, hemmed and hawed and was let go, stunned that a girl would drop him after they’d been in the sack, just like a guy would.
Nick’s embarrassing moment (saved from being more embarrassing when Andi told him right away on finale day he wasn’t the one, rather than have him dress up and go through the pantomime of no rose) was extended even further when at first he wanted to discuss it further, first at the “Men Tell All” event that aired last week (where he wasn’t allowed to tell her the all) to the “After the Final Rose” aftershow, which he clearly dominated despite losing.
When it came down to it, on live television, he paused for an unbearable amount of dead air and finally admitted he didn’t really have that much to say to her. But given the chance, he did say he was especially surprised at her decision since they had gone to bed together. Andi considered that a low blow, but didn’t deny it either.
Men on “The Bachelor” regularly bed their potential candidates, often in the icky Fantasy Suite episode, and it was at that point that Andi woke up from her own Juan Pablo fever dream to realize what a dim clod that guy actually was on “The Bachelor.”
Her rebuke of the soccer player was a breath of fresh air at the last minute, but it didn’t carry through to her own season of “The Bachelorette” where she obviously did her own toying with men until she finally got the one she wanted in the first place.
Toothy Josh, who never misses a chance to tell you he once played pro baseball, was a disappointing choice since he was just like an earlier relationship that had gone badly — another jock — but Andi couldn’t help herself. They laid some weird kisses on one another and pet each other like teens.
Not sure how the attorney is going to maintain a day to day relationship with the jock. He didn’t prove to be much of a conversationalist, choosing to mouth the spoon-fed “Bachelor” platitudes of “amazing” and “journey” throughout. But Andi sort of sunk to his level; maybe she doesn’t want to use big words when she comes back from the district attorney’s office (and does she even still have that job? She’s taken two months off already this year).
In the end, they all chuckled that it was the guy who also lived in her town in Atlanta that won her heart. If they had been half trying, they could have met each other on their own on some local Applebee’s speed dating night without ever involving Chris Harrison’s constant inquiries.
But that likely played into her decision as well. A career girl, she wasn’t up for quitting her job to go where ever her man wanted her to be, but that was pretty much the option she got. The Iowa farm guy wanted her on the farm. Nick talked about their life together in his Chicago.
Location is what sinks most of these made-for-TV relationships after the cameras turn off, so this one has a better chance than most, since they only have to decide whose house to move into, not whose city.
The main feeling for a viewer after three hours of this (more, if you count her required stop on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” ) is relief that it’s all over. As the season went on, Andi got less feisty and less interesting; the drama in the house either seemed manufactured (someone thought they heard a racist remark?) or just exploited (the death of a candidate after he had left).
But as sudsy and insubstantial as the finale seemed, it will all seem Shakespearean with the emptyheadedness that is to follow with whatever “Bachelor in Paradise” will be, next week at this time.