transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:13] Welcome to Game of Roses. This is Pace Case.

Speaker 2:
[00:17] This is Bachelor Clues, and we have a very special guest with us today. One half of 2 Black Girls, 1 Rose, Justine.

Speaker 3:
[00:24] Welcome.

Speaker 2:
[00:25] Hi.

Speaker 3:
[00:26] Hi, everybody.

Speaker 2:
[00:27] Hi, we have a lot to discuss, of course. Yeah. As a fellow podcaster with the word Rose and the title of your podcast.

Speaker 4:
[00:35] Oh my God, I know.

Speaker 3:
[00:38] Yeah, that's a lot going on.

Speaker 2:
[00:40] We're in a kind of Roseless era, as it were, right now. It's been tough on us. I'm sure it's been tough on you as well.

Speaker 4:
[00:47] It's been tough, but we're thriving in a very specific way because we never watched Secret Lives of Mormon Wives and swore we would never do it, and now we're doing it. So we're in a really special spot right now, which is really nice. So if you guys want to hear our recaps come over. It is, we swore of them.

Speaker 1:
[01:02] I can't even imagine watching it now. I can't even imagine.

Speaker 2:
[01:07] I can't either.

Speaker 4:
[01:08] Yeah, this is when we decided, we were like, oh, we're in.

Speaker 1:
[01:13] Wow. How did you come to this decision?

Speaker 4:
[01:15] So we saw that she was an announced Bachelorette. As you guys know, I think I told you guys, we had no idea who she was. We were like, oh, Taylor, Frankie, Paul, who's that? All right. So we did an episode called, Who is Taylor, Frankie, Paul, and we had to watch the first two episodes of season one. And I was like, wait, so they ended it with the body cam footage of the police, then picked the cameras up 11 months later and she's pregnant? Okay. Now we're getting into TLC, Zeus, Teen Mom category here. Like now I'm in it. I thought because they weren't showing the swinging, I was like, oh, it's going to be boring, so whack. No, I didn't know it was like this.

Speaker 1:
[02:00] It's not boring. The first episode right out of the gate. In my mind, that had been like the season one finale. And then we went back and I was like, holy shit, it's at the end of the pilot.

Speaker 2:
[02:13] Yeah, they let you know right up front who the hell she is.

Speaker 4:
[02:17] And their investment in her too, right? With that 11 months later to pick up the cameras. It was interesting.

Speaker 2:
[02:22] Absolutely. Like they had to make some kind of decision on Secret Lives, let alone Bachelor, that yes, she's going to be the anchor of the show, this woman who got arrested for domestic violence. We are going to wait a year to see how this shakes out. Okay.

Speaker 4:
[02:35] Yep.

Speaker 2:
[02:35] She's not going to jail. She has a baby on the way. And let's begin. That, to me, is part of, I guess, the risk in choosing her as a bachelorette. I mean, how did you guys feel about the idea that bachelors, the leads of these shows, bachelors and bachelorettes are usually, or at least traditionally, I should say, not usually, but traditionally, presented as these kind of people on pedestals, better than the normal average person, and you're lucky to be able to date them. But she clearly is outside of that category. Did you have any feelings about that?

Speaker 4:
[03:09] I didn't even think that they thought about it that deeply. They just thought she has a lot of followers and she's really successful for this other franchise that is doing really well in this crossover who knew Disney Warner Brothers' production. And so they got her.

Speaker 1:
[03:23] Crossover event, synergy.

Speaker 4:
[03:24] Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't think they thought like, oh, the past ones are like this, we're gonna make her more relatable. No, they were like, she has nine million followers across all platforms, but sounds good.

Speaker 2:
[03:35] Do you credit, who do you credit for making that choice? Is it Nick Vial?

Speaker 4:
[03:40] No. Well, I don't know. I don't watch him. I don't watch him do anything.

Speaker 2:
[03:45] OK.

Speaker 4:
[03:45] You're one of the only men I watch do anything, Chad.

Speaker 1:
[03:50] That is high praise.

Speaker 2:
[03:51] That is high praise. Well, I'd like to be able to tell you that I don't watch anything Nick Vial does, but I watch almost everything he does.

Speaker 4:
[03:59] Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[04:00] You watch more things he does than anyone I've ever heard of.

Speaker 2:
[04:04] I just think he's one of the greatest reality players of all time, and now he's leveraged that into this massive podcast business where he's making tens of millions of dollars. And he, on Vial Files, when she was selected, very adamantly claimed that it was his idea that he gave the idea to Warner Brothers and ABC, and he deserves credit. So, I was just seeing if...

Speaker 1:
[04:27] You said, you're welcome, Bachelor Nation.

Speaker 4:
[04:29] So, what did he say now?

Speaker 2:
[04:31] Now, he's not... I don't think he's really walked it back, but he has definitely just overlooked that moment in his life and gone on to now criticize them for...

Speaker 1:
[04:40] Yeah, what were they thinking?

Speaker 2:
[04:42] Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[04:43] Listening to me?

Speaker 2:
[04:44] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[04:45] Oh, wow.

Speaker 3:
[04:46] Interesting. Okay.

Speaker 2:
[04:49] We talked a little bit about this when we went on your show as well, but just for our audience, what do you think is the likelihood now that we've got the news she's not going to be charged in any way criminally for violating her parole or for any of these allegations? Do you think they'll air her season?

Speaker 4:
[05:07] How delicious would it be if they did?

Speaker 3:
[05:11] Oh, my God.

Speaker 4:
[05:13] The thing is, we all saw that little girl get hit by that bar stool. You know what I'm saying?

Speaker 3:
[05:17] We can't.

Speaker 2:
[05:18] Exactly.

Speaker 4:
[05:19] We heard the screams.

Speaker 1:
[05:20] We can't unsee it.

Speaker 3:
[05:21] We can't unsee it.

Speaker 1:
[05:23] That video was wild.

Speaker 2:
[05:26] But does that matter to Warner Brothers and ABC? Because at this point, there is a dollar amount that is just a complete loss. And for them, is it about, yeah, we may piss some people off, but how much of that can we recoup? If they can get 50% of their money back, is it worth putting that TV show on? I don't know.

Speaker 4:
[05:46] I don't know either. And, you know, Justine Sylvester on his podcast, Esther Gaze, was there with Rachel Lindsay, and he had heard that it cost $2 million an episode to produce The Bachelor, which sounds expensive. That sounds pr-

Speaker 1:
[06:02] Just her season or any season?

Speaker 4:
[06:06] He didn't specify, but I was like, so they missed out on like tens of millions of dollars? Like, what?

Speaker 2:
[06:14] Yeah, I mean-

Speaker 1:
[06:14] And the like, SponCon, too, that Cinnabon money.

Speaker 4:
[06:18] Oh my God, I can't even.

Speaker 2:
[06:20] Most Bachelor seasons are produced in a way that they- the show doesn't pay for like, the hotels they go to, the boats they go on, the little adventures they go into. Those cities and those places are paying the show to be featured in them. So all of that money, I believe, I'm not positive about this, I think it has to be given back because the thing they paid for was to be shown on television.

Speaker 4:
[06:44] Yeah, and they're not getting that.

Speaker 1:
[06:46] So they have to pay all the hotels?

Speaker 2:
[06:48] I think so.

Speaker 4:
[06:49] And the state of Virginia, Virginia is for lovers, I'll never forget it.

Speaker 3:
[06:52] Oh, I'm sorry.

Speaker 2:
[06:54] That was the one where they had to, Ben Franklin giving them, or no, that was a meme I made of Ben Franklin giving them bags of money. Sorry, I forgot.

Speaker 4:
[07:02] It was bad. That was so bad.

Speaker 2:
[07:05] I remember that. But definitely like with Cinnabon, they had printed out the little Cinnabon boxes with Taylor Frankie Pell's picture on it and stuff. I tried to get one at the Cinnabon at Century City here in Los Angeles. They didn't have them anymore. But-

Speaker 4:
[07:18] What did they do with the collectors items?

Speaker 2:
[07:20] Trash can, I'm assuming. But yeah, it's like when Return of the Jedi came out, originally it was called Revenge of the Jedi and there was some promotional material printed with that title. Just to let you know. Sorry, that's my deep nerddom. But yeah, so Cinnabon is gonna have to be paid back, whatever they paid into that, I assume, because that promotion evaporates. And so it's not just the production cost, it's all of these peripheral costs or monies that they made that I assume have to be paid back. And so for them, it may just boil down to like a business decision.

Speaker 4:
[07:57] Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think now, we've talked about this on 2 Black Girls, 1 Rose last week, all of the fodder was like, wait, a lot of people are gonna watch this. I think we have to do something now, right?

Speaker 2:
[08:14] Can they though?

Speaker 4:
[08:15] Yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 2:
[08:17] The line is like, I don't know either.

Speaker 4:
[08:20] Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[08:22] It's like, we can't unsee the video. They said it was because of the video, which even if they dropped these recent charges, the video is still existing. It's not AI. Yeah, I do think they probably get even more eyes on it than they would have already because of this controversy.

Speaker 4:
[08:43] Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[08:44] But then does it take the franchise?

Speaker 4:
[08:47] It's huge.

Speaker 1:
[08:48] That's the question.

Speaker 4:
[08:49] It's already taken the franchise.

Speaker 1:
[08:50] It already has, yeah.

Speaker 4:
[08:51] Horribly, because they realize how bad of decision makers these people are.

Speaker 2:
[08:55] The real, if I'm them, them being ABC, Warner Brothers, the people who stand to lose or make money on this, I would have to, I think, and I don't know that they are doing this, I would argue they probably aren't, I would be looking at the Bachelor franchise as a whole.

Speaker 4:
[09:09] Right.

Speaker 2:
[09:10] The 20 years of it. And I would put that cost across those 20 years and be like, it ain't that bad. You know what I mean? We still made a fuck a little money off this. Let's just move on to the next thing, sweep this one. We had to scuttle it. Let's not go back. Because you're in this, I think, a very precarious situation with the Bachelor franchise. It has been stutter stepping to the grave for the past five years. You know, and now we're in a spot where we're like, we're not going to have Bachelor content maybe for this whole calendar year.

Speaker 4:
[09:43] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[09:43] We're halfway through it almost.

Speaker 4:
[09:44] No, they can't. They got to do this cruise.

Speaker 3:
[09:48] Who is going to go on the cruise? The cruise? If they don't air anything through the cruise?

Speaker 4:
[09:57] Oh, my God.

Speaker 1:
[09:58] Do you think they can still do the cruise if there's no Bachelor product on, Lizzy?

Speaker 4:
[10:03] They have to do the cruise. I'm telling you guys now, as an insider with the cruise, they got to do something with that cruise.

Speaker 1:
[10:09] Wait, what do you mean you're an insider with the cruise?

Speaker 4:
[10:12] I told you guys off air last week about our story with the cruise. Tune in to our Patreon if you want to hear the full tea on the Bachelor Nation cruise.

Speaker 1:
[10:22] Oh, my God. This is the best tea you've ever heard in your life.

Speaker 2:
[10:27] Sign up for that Patreon right now.

Speaker 1:
[10:31] It is absolutely worth it. Yeah, I wasn't sure whether you were going to share that, but it's unbelievable.

Speaker 2:
[10:38] Yeah, it's well worth hearing. But I also think the cruise, I mean, Lizzy and I signed up to go to, this was like three years ago, Bachelor Live on stage. They were going to do it at a resort in Arizona, and it was going to be hosted by Becca Kufrin, I think Ben Higgins. We bought our tickets, we had our rooms booked, and then they canceled that whole thing. Because nobody was buying tickets.

Speaker 1:
[11:00] We were the only seats taken in the venue for the day that we bought them.

Speaker 2:
[11:05] That is not true.

Speaker 4:
[11:06] That's, yeah, that can't be true.

Speaker 2:
[11:07] There were some others, but it was basically that.

Speaker 4:
[11:09] Basically, I feel like if it was only you two, they would definitely put it on.

Speaker 1:
[11:15] A private show?

Speaker 2:
[11:16] Sitting in the Martin Center, like arms crossed, just staring at the stage, next!

Speaker 1:
[11:21] I was so upset because I had missed, due to COVID, the one that they did in LA.

Speaker 4:
[11:27] Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[11:29] That was like half dating show. So I was like, OK, Talking Stick is going to be my redemption tour.

Speaker 4:
[11:36] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[11:36] That one was wild. They had a... Did you ever go to one of those? The Bachelor Love Island stage?

Speaker 4:
[11:42] No, we have rules. Like if they don't pay us, we don't go.

Speaker 2:
[11:46] Oh, interesting.

Speaker 1:
[11:47] I was like, that's smart.

Speaker 3:
[11:48] Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[11:49] You're saying me?

Speaker 3:
[11:51] I'm like, how much is it?

Speaker 1:
[11:52] I paid to go.

Speaker 2:
[11:54] I'll pay $10,000. It was, I think, only like maybe $70 or something, if I remember right, for a ticket to it. It was at a hotel down here.

Speaker 1:
[12:02] That's making money.

Speaker 2:
[12:04] Downtown at the Ace Hotel. It was terribly put together. They had one little merch booth that had like just some shitty white t-shirts with the Bachelor logo on it. They had a couple of little standy things with Bachelor logos that you could take pictures in front of and then the main... Yeah, it was terrible. And then the main event was you go into the theater in the Ace Hotel and on stage, they had James Bonsall, if you remember that player, he was our Bachelor that year. And he basically runs a...

Speaker 1:
[12:35] The guy from the box? Who came in in the box?

Speaker 3:
[12:39] Oh, that guy.

Speaker 5:
[12:41] Was he the guy in the box?

Speaker 2:
[12:42] I think Bonsall was in the box, yeah. He played like Bachelor to a group of women that were selected from the audience, but preselected. You had to in the lobby go up, sign up papers and like apply to be on the stage or whatever. Among those players was a mother and daughter duo. Love it. And the father slash husband was in the audience with his cell phone going, shooting the whole thing. The mom at one point gets a one-on-one date with Bonsall where she has to sit down and reenact the Meg Ryan orgasm scene from when Harry met Sally.

Speaker 4:
[13:22] See, they're like on to something and then they fuck it up like this.

Speaker 2:
[13:26] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[13:27] They're always so close to being like, I know, creatively successful with these things. And then they just f it up by being lazy. Because a lot of this, they could do so much with Bachelorette parties as a thing. Right?

Speaker 1:
[13:44] 100 percent.

Speaker 4:
[13:45] They could do so much with Airbnb, with the state of Arizona, and with the state of Tennessee.

Speaker 3:
[13:58] Okay, y'all wasn't...

Speaker 1:
[14:00] They could do one of those bar bicycle things that's Bachelor themed.

Speaker 3:
[14:07] Yes.

Speaker 4:
[14:07] Very low-lift stuff, low-cost stuff that they could do that is spread around really, really far. Or they could do things that are concentrated like how Bravo does. And I'm really curious to hear what you guys think about the contrast between like a Bravo con and how Bravo treats their independent creators and like a bachelor and how bachelor treats their independent kind of tethers.

Speaker 3:
[14:35] How do you guys feel about it?

Speaker 2:
[14:36] The difference to me is like Bravo understands that the women on their shows are giant social media stars and they get that that is a huge part of why people watch the shows. And that it's basically the same thing. They feed into each other. And so they want to support all of that. And they're like, come take pictures with them, meet them. Here they are. Oh, it's awesome. Bachelor.

Speaker 1:
[14:57] Let them go on every podcast.

Speaker 4:
[14:59] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[14:59] Yeah. For whatever reason, Bachelor still has this. I don't know if it's true of Scott Teddy and the New Regime. And I think it has changed a little bit. But like right up until now, they have still had this old school mentality that social media is the devil and we need to control everything these players do. And as a result, they put no effort into helping promote them as stars. In fact, quite the opposite. And it just, I mean, that Bachelor Live on stage I went to, like you're saying, it's just an afterthought to them. The fact that there's not like seasonal merch that comes out around every season with the Bachelor, Bachelor, it's face on it and all this shit is mind blowing to me.

Speaker 4:
[15:36] Yes, especially because they do so many gimmicks in the show.

Speaker 2:
[15:39] Yeah, totally.

Speaker 4:
[15:40] They could capitalize on all those gimmicks, which cost money with trademarks and stuff like that. But they could do all of this with these rabid fans they have and they just really take advantage of them. And I think they kind of think we're silly. They think their fans are silly and dumb.

Speaker 2:
[15:58] Yes, and that is this old school mentality of reality television that comes from the Jerry Springer era where it's like, we're making salacious shit for idiots in America who are just slack jawed, sitting on their couches, eating Cheetos. And while that is sometimes true of myself, it's not always true. You know what I mean?

Speaker 4:
[16:18] No, I read a brilliant paper, 34 pages on the intersection between the real housewives and the feminist political identity. Somebody wrote their whole thesis on this, and it was brilliantly written, and it's on Google Docs. It's all free. And that is because those girls can do so much promotion, and they have so much evidence of what that says about America. And Bravo doesn't think their fans are dumb.

Speaker 1:
[16:48] The smartest women I know watch Bravo.

Speaker 4:
[16:50] Watch Bravo.

Speaker 2:
[16:52] There's a thing that's happening that I think some franchises get, some don't, which is essentially the academic study of reality television. It's happening in a very real way now. I spoke at DePaul. They have a whole pop culture conference. There's a bachelor class at a major university. The media is being studied in a way that television and film have started to be studied in roughly the 60s or 70s when you started to see film schools popping up in American universities. Now, you're starting to get that with reality television, but some of these shows aren't on board with that. They still, the producers, the people making it and promoting it, still believe it is trash TV for idiots in some cases. I think it's just so detrimental to the fandoms of those franchises. The bachelor's feeling the hit right now, I think.

Speaker 1:
[17:42] Speaking of Bravo, there was some chit chat in the nation that perhaps because of the Summer House scandal that Ciara Miller getting this huge victimization at it could be the next Bachelorette. However, she is a genius, and her way that she has been responding to the scandal is not through an outright statement. She was first doing pointed SponCon like Sephora, rewards loyalty without saying anything directly, and then getting the cover of Glamour and doing her full interview there with her thoughts. And regarding the Bachelorette, she said, quote, fuck no.

Speaker 4:
[18:31] I think Ciara is so happy being part of an ensemble. She knows that she loves to be part of a crew. And I think we unfortunately saw that on the season, last season of Traitors that she was on. I think she really fell apart when like all the spotlight was on her. And Ciara, obviously, we can tell from watching her from lots of seasons of reality television, but also through like her costumes, through all these other like articles and stuff that she does. She's so smart. She's so creative. She's so funny. She's so vulnerable on television. And I wish that she wanted to be in the spotlight in the way that The Bachelorette puts you on as the star. And she doesn't want to, she just doesn't want to.

Speaker 1:
[19:18] I mean, there was a quote in it that was like, why would we have 22 influencers play in her face? Like she doesn't deserve this. And like for me, I think that's still kind of, I mean, people see the Bachelorette that way as like trying to find this person's spouse. And I'm like, it doesn't have to be that. You know, just don't get emotionally involved. Just be the lead.

Speaker 3:
[19:40] Exactly.

Speaker 1:
[19:41] You don't have to actually want to date these people. But, you know, protect your piece. And, you know, look, the Black women on Bachelor and Bachelor Nation have not been treated well at all. And I completely understand this decision, but I'm a little sad. Because I think it would be great.

Speaker 4:
[20:08] Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[20:10] Chad does not watch Summer House, but do you have any... I caught up. I watched the last week's episode in which Amanda Batula walks away from her best friend's ex saying, look at my butt as I walk away.

Speaker 4:
[20:30] And then almost rips her own current husband's head off in retaliation of West making out with another girl. That really showed it to me just as much as the butt walk off thing. I was like, why are we so mad?

Speaker 1:
[20:44] Where she's like, my husband's a DJ?

Speaker 4:
[20:47] No, where she said, Kyle, if you want to fight with me, then I'll fight with you. I was like, first of all, no, you're not. We've all seen you not fight with Kyle for years.

Speaker 3:
[20:58] Second of all, why are you getting so mad about West?

Speaker 1:
[21:02] I forgot about that.

Speaker 4:
[21:04] That was really telling to me.

Speaker 3:
[21:06] Yeah. Why is she so mad?

Speaker 1:
[21:08] Wait, what? You're really overreacting to this situation.

Speaker 4:
[21:12] Yep. Yep.

Speaker 1:
[21:13] I can't believe this whole thing has made me side with Kyle. It's it's a wild, wild world we're living in.

Speaker 4:
[21:20] I am on the wait list for a Carl's a Mess merch sweatshirt. I'm on the wait list for a Prada from Loverboy. I never thought this day would come.

Speaker 2:
[21:32] Wait, is this the first merch you bought from Reality TV?

Speaker 4:
[21:35] This is the first anything I've bought from anybody, I think, besides Skinny Girl Margarita. I love the Skinny Girl Margarita, but that was it.

Speaker 2:
[21:44] I buy a lot of hats. I got Latia Garza, I got a dad talk hat.

Speaker 3:
[21:49] A dad talk hat?

Speaker 1:
[21:50] I got this. I bought the Challenger's T-shirt.

Speaker 3:
[21:54] If I saw somebody with a dad talk hat, I would laugh.

Speaker 2:
[21:58] I got a shitty, smashed VIP hat that they sold for Bachelor Paradise Season 10.

Speaker 1:
[22:05] That is the ugliest hat I've ever seen in my life.

Speaker 2:
[22:07] It's terrible. It's literally terrible.

Speaker 1:
[22:08] Wait, show your dad talk hat.

Speaker 4:
[22:11] Is it the one they show, like dad talk Utah?

Speaker 2:
[22:14] Yeah. Well, there's a bunch of different ones that they have. I got the one that is the Utah license plate.

Speaker 1:
[22:20] That's a good one.

Speaker 4:
[22:21] That is a good one.

Speaker 2:
[22:22] That was my favorite one, but still my favorite hat that I've ever bought is Latia Gars. Come on now.

Speaker 4:
[22:27] Yeah, that was a good one.

Speaker 2:
[22:29] This is a great hat.

Speaker 4:
[22:30] Yeah, yeah. And I don't know where she is. Is she back working at that financial place doing event planning?

Speaker 2:
[22:35] Well, wait till you get to season four of Secret Lives and Woman Lives.

Speaker 4:
[22:39] Okay, perfect.

Speaker 1:
[22:40] Or season, yeah, season four. I don't think that'll illuminate her job, but yeah.

Speaker 2:
[22:45] Her job is, I think.

Speaker 3:
[22:46] She has potential.

Speaker 2:
[22:47] Yeah, I think she's about to be one of the main characters in season five because they're cutting everybody out of the show.

Speaker 1:
[22:53] I hope so. She brings her 100 person family on.

Speaker 3:
[22:57] Please.

Speaker 2:
[22:58] They should just shoot the show.

Speaker 4:
[23:00] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[23:01] Under the house.

Speaker 1:
[23:02] Wait, sorry. One more Summer House question.

Speaker 2:
[23:04] Sorry.

Speaker 4:
[23:05] Tell me. Yes.

Speaker 1:
[23:06] What are you, how are you thinking that Wes and Amanda are going to handle the reunion?

Speaker 4:
[23:11] Okay, so a lot was writing on this Glamour article, right? For me, for Natasha, I talked to her two days before she gave birth. I was at her house.

Speaker 1:
[23:18] Congratulations to Natasha when you're focused on the right thing.

Speaker 4:
[23:23] Correct.

Speaker 1:
[23:24] It's okay. I was watching Secret Lives of Warb and Wives while I was in labor.

Speaker 2:
[23:29] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[23:30] That's a good one to watch when you're in labor.

Speaker 1:
[23:31] That's fine.

Speaker 2:
[23:32] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[23:33] But we were talking about how the stakes were so big for Ciara's first words, even Mia on Watch What Happens Live, how she was talking about them. And we have seen now two people, two, Ciara and Mia, both say, I didn't expect this out of Amanda, but West, you can't expect much out of a man. And that is what is going to get West a spinoff on Bravo. That is going to get West even more airtime because he is excused. Arianna never excused from.

Speaker 1:
[24:08] Boys will be boys.

Speaker 4:
[24:09] Exactly.

Speaker 3:
[24:10] That's exactly what it gives.

Speaker 4:
[24:12] And I need everybody to come to that reunion, a lot, well, a lot more energy for West. I don't want to see West in this Ozarks spinoff. You heard about that?

Speaker 1:
[24:24] What if, yes. What if Amanda has to do it too? And they have to fake this relationship in the Ozarks.

Speaker 4:
[24:33] They already did it at the Yankees game this weekend.

Speaker 1:
[24:36] Oh, you think I, I watched, I watched people trying to do the, what is it called, lip read?

Speaker 4:
[24:42] What they were saying.

Speaker 3:
[24:43] Oh, yes, yes, yes.

Speaker 4:
[24:45] Yeah, I just think.

Speaker 1:
[24:46] I'm in so deep.

Speaker 4:
[24:47] Yeah, no, same, same.

Speaker 2:
[24:49] You're on the lip reading Reddit threads trying to train yourself how to do it. This lip reader is not reading it correctly.

Speaker 1:
[24:57] I think she's saying, act like you like me. That's my impression.

Speaker 4:
[25:04] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[25:05] Will you watch In the City?

Speaker 4:
[25:08] In the City looked a little boring to me. I, I, if I'm going to watch all homogenous cast, like all straight white people, I need them to be really rich and really...

Speaker 3:
[25:27] And this isn't really fitting the bill for me.

Speaker 1:
[25:30] Wait, Whitney Fran Suez not doing it for you?

Speaker 4:
[25:33] Yeah, like, I don't know, like, Lindsay for sure, right?

Speaker 1:
[25:36] Yeah, she's the star.

Speaker 4:
[25:38] Star quality, star power there. But like, Amanda and Kyle with this divorce and fighting over this failing company that now, you know, obviously now he's going month to month, but he's doing something now if I'm on the wait list. So now we'll see what happens. But yeah, I don't know, Andrea, I'm like, he's really handsome, but...

Speaker 3:
[26:03] What else?

Speaker 4:
[26:04] He's a wife now, so that's boring. Like, you know?

Speaker 1:
[26:07] Yeah, we'll see. Jerry's still out. I'm obviously gonna watch anything Lindsay ever does for the rest of her whole life.

Speaker 4:
[26:14] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[26:15] But... And I'm curious about the Amanda Kyle. I mean, I guess we've been watching that relationship devolve for 10 years, but... Anyway, sorry, Chad.

Speaker 2:
[26:27] No, please.

Speaker 1:
[26:28] This is what I'm feeling the Bachelorette-sized hole in my heart with right now.

Speaker 2:
[26:33] Mine's 90 Day. Did we talk about that? Do you watch 90 Day?

Speaker 4:
[26:36] No, I don't watch 90 Day. It's too big of a universe for me, but I'm so happy for you all who are in it. I love this for you.

Speaker 2:
[26:42] The reunion of Before the 90 Day is happening this coming week. It is going to be the best reunion of any TV show you've ever seen. If you want to dip your toe in, you don't even need to watch the season. Although, you'll want to after this reunion. Watch this reunion that's coming out.

Speaker 1:
[26:57] Why do you think it's going to be so good?

Speaker 2:
[26:59] The players of this season, the cast, I've never seen anything like it. Usually, there's one or two couples that are duds and whatever. This shit is like everybody's operating at an 11.

Speaker 3:
[27:11] Every couple, you're just like, wait, what, what, oh my god, what, oh shit, fuck, oh.

Speaker 2:
[27:17] Every scene, it was one of the craziest seasons I've ever seen. If you want to dip in, this reunion would be a good one to dip into. For what it's worth. I will ask you this question though, back to Bachelor. What do you think is going to happen to the men of Taylor Franklin's first season within the franchise?

Speaker 4:
[27:34] Oh my god, and they were all influencers. Every last one of them. I think one of them set up a cameo preemptively.

Speaker 2:
[27:43] Smart. No.

Speaker 3:
[27:44] Yeah, he was ready.

Speaker 2:
[27:46] We went through their Instagrams and the thing that stuck out to me the most was like, 50% of them were legit, 100% gigantic bodybuilders. Like just huge, incredible Hulk type guys. And I was like, they're gonna have a tackle football game. Someone's dying in this season. That seemed certain to me based on their muscularity. But yeah, I'm sad for them a little bit. I don't know what's gonna happen to them. I'm curious. Do you think they're gonna do a Paradise and put them on it? And who's gonna watch that?

Speaker 4:
[28:17] That's what I'm so curious about. Cause our next move would have been Paradise, right? And then they wanted the Bachelor after Paradise. So I don't know what the next move is. The next move of Bachelor. And then they pick like, you got to pick somebody who's like X. What is it when you're studying to be a priest and then you quit, whatever that is. You're in seminary school and then you're like, nevermind, I'm gonna just do charity. You have to pick that guy, right? To do that for now.

Speaker 1:
[28:43] Wait, because they're so innocent?

Speaker 4:
[28:45] Because they're so innocent. Because honestly, like, I can't stand Colton. I can't stand him. But he gave us one of the best seasons. Like that, him jumping over the fence was worth watching the whole season for.

Speaker 1:
[28:58] I mean, we were talking about that moment this morning. It lives on in infamy.

Speaker 2:
[29:05] To me, it was the culmination of kind of the producers' malevolent attitude toward leads that had started really in Bachelor season 18 with Juan Pablo as the first villain bachelor. Every bachelor after that seemed to be cast specifically to be the target of like producer manipulation at a hardcore level. The next one was Chris Soules, who was basically presented as an idiot, who lived in a shit old town that nobody wants to go to.

Speaker 1:
[29:32] He made fun of his town.

Speaker 2:
[29:34] Yeah. Ben Higgins was next and although he was a beloved bachelor, he was presented as unlovable, that he was like this broken person who doesn't deserve love. Then we've got Vial as a villain bachelor, Ari Leyendijk, who was like pulled from the past and then Colton Underwood and that fence jump moment. Yeah, the kissing bandit. And Colton Underwood was, a lot of people believe, cast that the producers knew he was closeted and they were hoping that would explode in the course of the season. What?

Speaker 1:
[30:04] It exploded. It for sure exploded.

Speaker 4:
[30:07] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[30:08] Okay. So the other rumors I have seen for next lead have been Laura Higgins' bachelor at season from Love Island and Traders. The other one I've just seen was the astronaut from Artemis being the next bachelor read something. Have you read this? No.

Speaker 2:
[30:28] I'm totally down for that.

Speaker 1:
[30:30] It was just thrown out there. I have no idea. I didn't do any follow up journalism, but I was like, interesting.

Speaker 2:
[30:38] Can you imagine that the first one on one date? Oh my God. So you saw the dark side of the moon. What did you see? There were alien bases there. There were aliens and they're planning an invasion soon. So if you want to get married, we should do it very quickly.

Speaker 1:
[30:51] The disclosure comes through bachelor. That would make sense in this timeline.

Speaker 2:
[30:56] Can you imagine that? It would. Yeah. I mean, that would be incredible. I just don't know, like we're in a time crunch. We're at the end of April. So like best case scenario, if they have somebody locked in today, sign the contract today, announce today, start shooting tomorrow. That's a two month shooting cycle, generally speaking. They usually take at least a month to edit and then they're airing over the next two months. That's getting us into October, November.

Speaker 4:
[31:25] That is the best case scenario that they have. I think they got to wait until after Love Island. Y'all cannot even touch June and July. And August is even a maybe. Like they tried it with Bachelor in Paradise, and it was so wiggity whack.

Speaker 2:
[31:41] But that season, Bachelor in Paradise Season 10 was just bad too though. Like if the season would have been better, it might have been more forgivable that they were trying to counter program against the biggest dating reality format in the world.

Speaker 1:
[31:52] That's so embarrassing.

Speaker 2:
[31:53] But it's just getting to a point where it's like, we used to have Bachelor in January, Bachelorette three months later.

Speaker 4:
[32:03] May-ish, yeah, whatever.

Speaker 2:
[32:04] VIP and a Golden. We used to have four Bachelor products. And in some cases, there was that season that was back-to-back Michelle Young and Katie Thurston Bachelorettes where we had two Bachelorette products in the same year.

Speaker 4:
[32:19] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[32:19] Now we're getting none.

Speaker 4:
[32:21] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[32:22] Maybe one and maybe it's going to be a Golden at the end of this year.

Speaker 4:
[32:26] Oh, please.

Speaker 1:
[32:26] No, they can't come back with Golden.

Speaker 4:
[32:29] With Golden. Yeah, that'd be unless it's a Golden Cruise, Bachelor in Paradise, which we've been begging for.

Speaker 1:
[32:35] A Housewife as the Golden Bachelor.

Speaker 4:
[32:38] Or a Housewife.

Speaker 1:
[32:40] Or a Housewife. I hope they don't give up on casting famous people personally, but...

Speaker 4:
[32:44] Me too.

Speaker 1:
[32:47] I could see them not wanting to touch it after what has just happened.

Speaker 4:
[32:50] Oh, please. That's on their own doing. I just feel like all their mistakes, they have to look at with really clear eyes and know that it's them.

Speaker 2:
[33:02] It's not everybody else, it's them. But that's like, there's no way.

Speaker 5:
[33:06] There's no way.

Speaker 2:
[33:07] Because the people who are... Rob Mills is the primary person who's in charge of ABC Reality, that executive, he's been in that spot for a minute. He gave an interview where he was basically just like, we're not putting our heads in the sand about this, but anyway, moving on.

Speaker 5:
[33:21] It's like, you are though.

Speaker 2:
[33:23] They're gonna deny, ignore, sweep under the rug as much as they can, and I think they'll announce somebody as the next lead and just be like, that's it. All systems go. Look in this direction.

Speaker 4:
[33:35] Crazy. That's a crazy move. They need to go on whatever with Gail, interview with Gail one on one, answer the hard questions, look her in the face. They have to do that whole thing. Otherwise, they have no trust behind their brand and trust is everything and we don't trust them to make good decisions. Honestly, after Katie.

Speaker 1:
[33:55] All of the decisions we were just going through since Pilot Pete have been pretty terrible. Except for Joey and Charity, like, yeah, all of the major decisions have been bad.

Speaker 4:
[34:08] Bad.

Speaker 1:
[34:09] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[34:10] Dang, man. And I met Pilot Pete in person. He's like tall and not not cute. You know what I mean? Never likable. But like he's he's very tall in person, like, you know, and he's like a weird friend and they got their podcast canceled. I remember that.

Speaker 2:
[34:26] D-Man 43.

Speaker 4:
[34:27] Oh my gosh. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[34:28] Are you saying you want Pilot Pete round two for next Bachelor?

Speaker 4:
[34:33] He wasn't, I think his mom was a really great accessory.

Speaker 2:
[34:38] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[34:38] Uh-huh. Sweet Nums.

Speaker 4:
[34:40] Sweet Nums, yep. I think he wasn't like, I don't think he was a bad choice. I don't think he was a bad choice. I think like to me, Katie was the beginning of the end.

Speaker 1:
[34:54] Interesting. Because she was 11th place. No, I'm serious. Like why? Because we didn't know her.

Speaker 3:
[35:04] I forgot all about that.

Speaker 4:
[35:06] But yeah, she was 11th place. We didn't know anything about her and she didn't really take it serious at all.

Speaker 1:
[35:13] What do you mean? What about her breakdown with Greg Grippo? Whatever.

Speaker 4:
[35:17] That felt real. But she still wore the Old Navy t-shirts that she was wearing when she was up there. She looked like a Coles mannequin up there on television because she just thought nobody's watching. She didn't care.

Speaker 1:
[35:29] I thought it was a COVID season.

Speaker 2:
[35:32] Yeah, those bubble seasons all, in my opinion, Katie Thurston specifically, but also included in this, they all gave something to the franchise that we'd never seen before. And it was specifically because they were shooting them in these closed locations because of COVID and all that. And it started, of course, with Claire Crawley's season. And maybe like that fracture moment in whatever it was, episode four, I believe, where they did the Indiana Jones switch with that Bachelor, it's out and here's Tasia emerging from the pool like Phoebe Cates in Fast Times at Ridgemont High.

Speaker 1:
[36:07] That shot was incredible. It was.

Speaker 2:
[36:09] There was so much revealed in that season to me about how the people who make the show promote the show think about it. I remember the Claire Crawley poster for it was a, it's a parody of The Graduate, a movie from 1967 or something. And I was just like, what? And then Tasia's emergence from the pool was from a movie that was made in 1984. And it's just like, who are the people making the show? Who are they making it for? They don't get it at all. And granted, they had a lot of things stacked against them with COVID and how that hinders production and everything, but it just was like, it felt like a different show in that era. And I didn't begrudge anybody for doing what they did because it was like, who could make a bachelor season where you can't travel? You know, they were doing shit with like Ed Wastbrot was going to have late night talks with Chris Harrison at that resort. Do you remember that? And it's like, that's a five minute scene. You just gave some weird thing of it was just bad all around.

Speaker 1:
[37:07] And I think they did like split the Michelle and Katie announcement. Yeah, something they've done for women more than men, except for obviously Byron Velvick, Jay Overby season four. Other than that, they split Gabby and Rachel season. They split Tayshia and Kaitlyn hosting Katie's season. Oh yeah, they've just done all this weird shit with the splits.

Speaker 4:
[37:37] Yeah, that was another bad move. They should have kept at least Kaitlyn on as a host. She was an incredible host.

Speaker 1:
[37:43] And so Kaitlyn is so good. Tayshia is co-hosting, did you watch Bachelor Mansion Takeover?

Speaker 4:
[37:51] No, probably not.

Speaker 1:
[37:53] She's an amazing host.

Speaker 4:
[37:55] Yeah, she's great. They're both amazing.

Speaker 2:
[37:58] She's in many scenes, I think in all of her scenes. She has to kind of co-host the little things they're doing with Tyler Cameron. And it's just like that guy shouldn't be on TV, no offense, unless he's silent and just standing there.

Speaker 4:
[38:11] He needs to be seen and not heard, right? I watched his Amazon Prime show. I think it was on 2x speed because it was just so wack. It was so bad.

Speaker 2:
[38:24] Yeah, he's not good.

Speaker 4:
[38:25] Oh no. Yeah, he's just not good on camera. He might be great in person. I don't know.

Speaker 2:
[38:29] He's good on camera if he's dating.

Speaker 4:
[38:31] Yeah, he's dating. Right.

Speaker 2:
[38:32] But he can't like read a script. He can't. Hosts have to have like, in my opinion, the good ones have kind of like both an air of authority and nonchalance simultaneously. Like they're just showing up and doing this. But controlling the situation. Tayshia can do that. Kaitlyn Bristow can do that. Tyler Cameron can do that. If you watched, Kaitlyn Bristow also co-hosted a show called Are You My First? Or Are You My One? Are You The One or whatever it was? It was The Virgin Show on Hulu with Colton Underwood. If you want to see a crystal clear example of, here's somebody who can host a TV show and somebody who should never be on television again, like side by side, it's unreal.

Speaker 3:
[39:15] It's unbelievable. You want to talk about somebody out of the control of the situation? It's always Colton, it's always out of control of the situation.

Speaker 2:
[39:23] That ain't no shit. From like what he's wearing, that shit on Traders when he showed up in that one outfit with the gold, the pearls.

Speaker 4:
[39:29] I know exactly what you're talking about. Oh my God, it was so, he tried so hard. He was trying so hard.

Speaker 1:
[39:36] That outfit was someone like messing with him.

Speaker 4:
[39:40] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[39:40] It felt like that way to me too.

Speaker 1:
[39:42] Being like, this is good, this is good. I know that was a plot on Housewives once where their stylist put them in a dress someone else had already worn. I don't remember which one it was, but trying to mess with them.

Speaker 2:
[39:57] They did that on-

Speaker 1:
[39:57] I want to say Potomac. Potomac.

Speaker 2:
[40:01] Potomac. The producers purposely had, I believe it was 13 women, Rachel Lindsay included, showing up in very similar red dresses. Do you remember that? Oh, yeah. That's a tactic for sure that producers use to like, fluster players, get them all pissed off. Oh my God, they're wearing the same thing I am. It's like, the producers told us all what we were wearing. So it's like, they did this to us. Speaking of producer manipulation, let's move on if we may. Love is Blind, season 10, concluded earlier this year. We talked a little bit about this on your show, but I want to get your take here on the political kind of stuff that creeped into that show. We saw Alex and Ashley have a pro-Trump conversation with her family. We then learned on podcasts.

Speaker 1:
[40:49] As you called Megan Kelly.

Speaker 2:
[40:54] The love is blind, Megan Kelly. We also heard then on podcasts from Jessica and Kia, both of them, on the official in-argue podcast, by the way, hosted by AD, said they had anti-Trump conversations in the pods, and that was like a deciding factor for them in terms of which guys they were going to date. But none of that footage is aired in the show. What is your take on that?

Speaker 4:
[41:18] You know what, after we had that talk on 2 Black Girls when Rose last week, somebody commented something really interesting. They said that Alex still looked bad. Even though they showed all of that pro-Trump stuff, he still looked bad, and they still tried to make Ashley aka Megan Kelly, they attempted to make her look good throughout that whole thing. That to me shows the parallel journey they're having between being pro-Trump and MAGA, as you guys have concluded with Love is Blind, and also being in the same line as their audience.

Speaker 2:
[42:06] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[42:06] Because you wouldn't have AD hosting your show if you didn't have, no, you had an all-female audience who was probably on the more liberal side.

Speaker 2:
[42:16] For sure. But Ashley is pro-Trump too. They made her the hero of that couple, but her and her family are pro-Trump. He even says it, Alex says it in their real line politically. So they're letting you see like she's the hero, she's going to kick him in the nuts in the end, she's also pro-Trump, and we are not airing any of the anti-Trump footage that multiple characters have now said they induced. So to me, it's like, I don't know that Netflix or Love is Blind is like actively, politically MAGA. I think they are nothing. They don't give a fuck.

Speaker 4:
[42:47] They're nothing.

Speaker 2:
[42:47] They're just like money. We don't care about politics. We don't care what you think or what they think. We're going to air this because we believe it will convey like, this is just America. But they're not conveying both sides. So that is a choice. To me, it's like, well, why though? Why didn't you show the anti-Trump shit?

Speaker 4:
[43:08] Do you think they are, because they're showing a lot of like anti-menosphere stuff with who is it? We call them the munchkin. Oh, God.

Speaker 2:
[43:17] Chris.

Speaker 4:
[43:18] Chris. They showed like a lot of just airing him out and even making Alex look bad, like making him look like a real loser, like just awful all around. And that's not hard to do with somebody, with those people. But I just think it's interesting that the values that they're saying are like not okay, that they are disparaging in these edits, also align with the pro-Trump conversations that they're airing. I think that's interesting because we haven't heard Kamala at all, right? We haven't heard Harry.

Speaker 1:
[43:59] Exactly. And they try to act like they're politically neutral and they're like, oh, well, it's Ohio and we're like documentarians essentially, but it's like we've seen Portland. You're not talking about Kamala. You're not talking about Hillary Clinton. Right, right. I do think there is an argument that it's like Alex is getting a severe villain at it. He's the only one who's overtly saying Trump. We don't really hear Megyn Kelly say, oh, yeah, I love Trump.

Speaker 2:
[44:28] Her dad says it. Her dad says, did you vote for Trump?

Speaker 4:
[44:31] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[44:32] And I do think they give the dad a good at it as well. They're like, look at the dad standing up for his daughter. I saw people calling for him to host a reunion. I was like, no, the man who says, I'm the patriarch? No, thank you.

Speaker 4:
[44:47] No, no, no, no, no. And that just shows you how terrible. I think before this, they did a good job. Well, Nick did a good job on this reunion. Nick Lachey, I thought. He wrangled them. I thought he did well. It just shows how bad they were at asking questions.

Speaker 2:
[45:03] Yeah. But there's a component of Love is Blind that none of these other shows have, which is they do allow talking about social issues, political issues, whatever. That is sometimes part of the document. We've seen other conversations about abortion and stuff.

Speaker 4:
[45:19] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[45:21] Bachelor never does that. Love Island's never gonna do that. None of these other shows are ever gonna do that.

Speaker 4:
[45:24] No.

Speaker 2:
[45:25] But they are very selective about what they're showing, and they don't give you both sides of it. And that is a thing to me that's like, I don't quite understand why, especially if they are talking about these people are getting married and they're really conveying the idea that these are real relationships, not like other reality shows. Your political leanings, your social ideologies, those are huge parts of what make you align with somebody to a point that you might want to marry them.

Speaker 1:
[45:51] Religion.

Speaker 2:
[45:52] And they're just not including the liberal shit. I don't get why.

Speaker 1:
[45:56] I think it would be so funny, you know how they were accused of not feeding the people and now they do these huge feats on camera? It'd be funny if next season, it's like all pro-AOC or something.

Speaker 3:
[46:09] Oh my god.

Speaker 1:
[46:11] That would be hilarious. Shouldn't you be the next president?

Speaker 2:
[46:16] Do you know what the next city is?

Speaker 4:
[46:18] I want to say it's Boston and then Philly.

Speaker 2:
[46:21] Okay.

Speaker 4:
[46:22] Which is interesting because I think with the other shows that you spoke about and the other shows that we love watching, Bachelor, Love Island, so many of those contestants are from Texas and Florida.

Speaker 1:
[46:37] Yes. It's like California, Texas, Florida. I feel like they're probably the three biggest, maybe New York.

Speaker 2:
[46:44] That doesn't necessarily mean anything. You know what I mean?

Speaker 3:
[46:48] Not necessarily. I think it does. You got a warning that doesn't mean anything.

Speaker 2:
[46:54] My sister, for example, lives in a crazy conservative suburb of Dallas, but is the most liberal person I know. Actively, very vocally, puts it into her business, like everything, you know? So it's not necessarily the case that if you're from one of these places, you're hardcore Maggot or anything.

Speaker 4:
[47:13] Right.

Speaker 2:
[47:13] But I agree, statistically, if you're looking at large number laws, you know what I mean? Like, likelihood goes up.

Speaker 4:
[47:21] It goes up. We say this on our show all the time. They're like, how could you say that about Austin? He was a lifeguard, man. He's just a lifeguard who doesn't want to pay rent. Of course, he's Maggot.

Speaker 3:
[47:35] What did you think was going to happen?

Speaker 4:
[47:36] He's from Florida. Like, it's just and he won, right? Trump won. So you're going to get somebody in these cats. Oh, well, I can't get on that on air.

Speaker 3:
[47:48] Lizzy. I'm fine.

Speaker 1:
[47:53] I haven't I haven't gone down any rabbit holes.

Speaker 4:
[47:58] But you're going to get people, you know what I mean? So it'll be interesting to explore those conversations. And some people have them in a real roundabout way.

Speaker 3:
[48:06] Uh, Sierra.

Speaker 4:
[48:08] Was that her name? I even forget her name. I don't even care. I'm such a Nicolandria fan, but Sierra on Love Island. She kind of had those conversations really subtly with the contestants. She I remember she asked, like, what did you think about evolution or something like that? She asked questions like that. And I'm like, oh, that's smart. That's a really good way to do it. Serena asked Cordell, do you listen to any podcasts?

Speaker 2:
[48:31] Smart. Right. That's interesting.

Speaker 3:
[48:34] They do it. They do it.

Speaker 4:
[48:35] But it's just whether they aired or not.

Speaker 2:
[48:37] Yeah. I feel, too, though, that the especially Love Island, that's a certain type of player that's usually younger.

Speaker 4:
[48:44] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[48:44] That's usually a little more Love Island-y, if you will. You know, yeah. There's not like, there may not be a lot going on in the mind other than...

Speaker 3:
[48:55] No, no, that's not true...

Speaker 2:
[48:56] .think about Instagram and TikTok and stuff.

Speaker 1:
[48:58] No. It varies.

Speaker 4:
[49:00] Yeah, it varies, for sure.

Speaker 1:
[49:01] There was, I'm watching the last Love Island Australia season right now, and there's a player who's like, where is Europe? Like, does not know where the continents are.

Speaker 3:
[49:13] Where is Europe?

Speaker 4:
[49:14] That's a large...

Speaker 1:
[49:16] I'm like, you're in Europe right now.

Speaker 3:
[49:18] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[49:19] Oh, yeah. Right.

Speaker 3:
[49:21] Did you watch All Stars?

Speaker 1:
[49:24] No.

Speaker 4:
[49:25] Oh my God. Love Island All Stars season three. It is everything.

Speaker 3:
[49:28] It's so good. Okay, fine.

Speaker 1:
[49:30] I'll watch it. I only need a tiny little push. Oh, God. What was I going to say? Oh, they made me look up the voting record of Ohio because of how this season went. And I was like, because they're like, oh, well, it's Ohio. So I look and I'm like, the big cities are still blue circles. So it's like, what do you mean? Okay. Whatever.

Speaker 2:
[49:56] I think they're actively casting MAGA people. I think they're actively doing it to be able to present that side of it.

Speaker 1:
[50:04] I don't know. I do think they actively cast villains. They're like, oh, there's no way you interview Alex and you're like, this is going to be a fan favorite.

Speaker 2:
[50:17] Of course, but they are, when the Netflix guy comes on or the Chris Colen did an interview, and they're just like, yeah, whatever, it's just Ohio, that's how it is. It's like, oh, you mean you just go around with a truck and a net and just scoop up a random selection of people and be like, you're on Love is Blind now? No, that's not how it works. They interview all these f**kers.

Speaker 1:
[50:41] A net.

Speaker 2:
[50:42] They all have to go through hardcore psychological evaluations and FBI background checks and sh**. They know their political leanings, 100% when they cast them. So they are actively making a choice to put MAGA people in these shows. I'm not saying that necessarily means the personal political affiliations of the people making these shows and promoting them are MAGA or anything, but those people are at least okay with it. You know what I mean? If I'm show running a show that's a dating show, for me personally, MAGA people ain't in it.

Speaker 4:
[51:15] They're not in it, exactly, because I'm not looking back at history and seeing what I have produced and knowing that I had anything to do with promoting a MAGA agenda. That doesn't even make sense. Because we're going to look back and know.

Speaker 1:
[51:29] There weren't enough Nazis in this season.

Speaker 3:
[51:31] Exactly, exactly.

Speaker 1:
[51:34] Speaking of other shows, a little lighter fare. Did you watch Age of Attraction or Love Overboard?

Speaker 4:
[51:43] I haven't checked out Love Overboard, but I love Gabby from afar and Robbie from afar and I attempted to watch about half an episode of Age of Attraction at Natasha's house with her. And it was a rough watch. That's a really, that's a really lazily produced show. Like exceptionally lazily produced.

Speaker 1:
[52:07] What made you step?

Speaker 4:
[52:09] When everybody said they were from different places, I was like, this is just this is Nick and Mrs. Thing trying to prove that their relationship is real.

Speaker 2:
[52:19] Interesting.

Speaker 1:
[52:20] Like, Nick and Natalie.

Speaker 4:
[52:21] Natalie, Natalie. This is them trying to prove that like that it's totally okay that he met her when he was 19. She was 19 and he was 38, like, or however old he was. And it's just, it's, if I have three kids, 15, 13, and seven, and I meet somebody who lives in California and I live in Vermont, he's not moving to Vermont and I can't pull my, all three of these kids out of school. So what's the point of this reality show?

Speaker 3:
[52:51] I don't. Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[52:53] And then finding love, it's a huge gaping thing for me. And then when they all moved to British Columbia, I was like, oh, so we're really avoiding the location thing. Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[53:04] Wow.

Speaker 2:
[53:05] This is your new home for five years.

Speaker 1:
[53:08] That is something I love about Love is Blind is the regional thing. You're like, okay, well, maybe these relationships can actually work.

Speaker 4:
[53:15] That is what makes the political conversation so good. That's what made that conversation with Bartice and, oh my gosh, Nancy so good in Dallas. Because this is a real concern for her.

Speaker 2:
[53:29] Totally.

Speaker 1:
[53:31] That was one of the best scenes I think they've had on the show.

Speaker 2:
[53:35] That's one of the things I think they should do for Bachelor honestly is city by city it. Be like, here's our Dallas Bachelorette and here's all the Dallas guys she's dating. That would be it and set the whole before they do international travel, the first two or three episodes, all the dates are around Dallas. That'd be fantastic. I love that. I think it also solves that problem that they have in Bachelor, which is like almost none of the couples last. Because they come out of the show, one of them moves to LA, oh, you got to come to LA with me too. You know, we're not or whatever. And it just, there's something about doing it regionally that makes it very interesting because you get a flavor for that place too. The attitudes, the looks, the whatever. It's great.

Speaker 1:
[54:18] I can't wait for Los Angeles Love is Blind. Why haven't they done it yet?

Speaker 4:
[54:23] Why haven't they done it in LA or New York?

Speaker 1:
[54:25] Yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 4:
[54:27] Or Miami.

Speaker 2:
[54:29] God, there's a player on 90 Day right now for Miami. She's insane.

Speaker 4:
[54:33] Of course there is.

Speaker 2:
[54:34] Oh my gosh, amazing. Amazing. She did an IFI, Injury, Fear, Ear Loss Play. Her and her guy are in Australia. That's where her guy's from. She's rappelling down this waterfall, gets tangled up in the cord, screaming, water sitting on her face. She's a star. Oh my God. And yeah, I saw her and I was like, why haven't they done Love is Blind Miami? I need like 20 of these players sitting in pods. That would be mind blowing.

Speaker 3:
[55:02] Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[55:03] Oh my God. Miami's so look focused, so aesthetic focused. It would be so good. But that's probably why I can't get people. Oh my God. Oh, dang. Yeah, we'll see what Love is Blind in the big cities.

Speaker 2:
[55:16] We will see. Love Island's coming up in about a month. We get our next season.

Speaker 1:
[55:22] I can't wait. I know.

Speaker 2:
[55:25] What were you like? Yeah, it's unreal. I hadn't watched it until season six, I think, was my first one.

Speaker 4:
[55:33] You say season six was my first season as well.

Speaker 2:
[55:35] That shit was like heroin straight to the goddamn vein. I've never experienced anything like it.

Speaker 4:
[55:43] I could not wait until nine o'clock Wednesday. I regretted I hated Wednesdays. I had resentment against Wednesdays.

Speaker 3:
[55:52] Because it was every day of my host day.

Speaker 4:
[55:54] I hated Wednesdays.

Speaker 2:
[55:56] I totally agree. And when we first started doing it, we were like, okay, we're gonna do this season. And I was like, fuck, it's on every night? This is gonna be brutal. I can't wait. And then by episode two or three, I was just like, so is it time for the next episode yet?

Speaker 3:
[56:10] I need it. It was crazy.

Speaker 2:
[56:13] It is visually just this eye candy. The players are all incredible. The fact that they, I think, the fact that they do it five nights a week and they have that quick production turnaround, shooting 24 hours to air, and they have to edit it and all that shit, like the technical stuff is impeccable. But I think it also allows them a little bit of time to be able to present these scenes where they're talking about innocuous dumb shit and you get to know the people better. So it's not like Love is Blind and Bachelor, all the conversations are like, are you, do you like me? Are you starting to fall in love with me? Are you falling in love or are you in love? Every conversation is that. Or playing a PTC.

Speaker 4:
[56:55] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[56:55] And that's it. But Love Island gives you those extra little moments where like Rob Roush is letting a spider crawl across his face while he's talking to somebody about snakes. And you're just like, this is fucking gold. It's unreal.

Speaker 4:
[57:08] Yeah, it's so good. It is so hard to go on. I really commend all of the players, the contestants that go on there because it is a very difficult show to do. The audience is ruthless, especially this past year. It was bad. I think it's still bad now with them. And we're about to go into season eight.

Speaker 3:
[57:31] Like it's bad.

Speaker 1:
[57:32] I think it's like there's the good of getting to know the players a lot. And there's the bad where it's like the parasocial relationships are even stronger. So people are like way more defensive of their faves, way more hating of their enemies.

Speaker 3:
[57:47] Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[57:49] Yeah. But I can't wait.

Speaker 2:
[57:51] Do you think there could be a scandal like as big as Taylor, Frankie, Paul, that would take that franchise off the air, take it down in some way?

Speaker 3:
[57:58] Oh, you know what?

Speaker 4:
[58:01] That would have been Huda.

Speaker 2:
[58:02] Right. And it didn't do anything.

Speaker 4:
[58:05] No, it's like, yeah, like we're sitting here talking like, I can't wait for the next season. Yeah. But I think that's because Huda's fans are very young, naive and silly. And we all know that as adults. Right. So I'm watching her and I could have told you. And it's ensemble and it's ensemble and it's ensemble.

Speaker 1:
[58:27] They removed Sierra from the game.

Speaker 3:
[58:29] I know.

Speaker 4:
[58:30] For a story that she deleted, that her friend, like that somebody leaked and the whole thing. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[58:36] Well, there was also what was her name? Yulisa. They removed her before the season even started. Basically, she was in like one episode or something and then she just disappeared.

Speaker 4:
[58:47] She vanished. She provided some of the best edits on TikTok ever. And people still joke about Yulisa. It's crazy. But yeah, I think for Love Island, they have that protection because it's an ensemble cast and because they remove people in this very squid games like way. All of a sudden, they're just gone.

Speaker 3:
[59:10] There's just no evidence that it ever happened. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[59:14] Oh my God.

Speaker 1:
[59:15] Yulisa. No, Sierra has left the game for a personal reason.

Speaker 2:
[59:20] The way the players can talk about it. Are you cheered for her exit?

Speaker 3:
[59:24] I was like, yes. My husband was next to me.

Speaker 4:
[59:27] I was seven months pregnant, six months pregnant. I was so crazy to her. And I was like, yes, she's gone.

Speaker 3:
[59:32] And my husband was like, what the?

Speaker 4:
[59:34] I was like, this is if you got a touchdown in overtime. Like this is how serious this is.

Speaker 1:
[59:40] How serious? Also, I'm like, this is dark, but like Love Island UK did have a host die by suicide.

Speaker 4:
[59:49] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[59:49] And if that doesn't kill the franchise.

Speaker 4:
[59:55] Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1:
[59:57] There's been a lot of darkness that has happened.

Speaker 4:
[60:00] What I'm hoping is that they really get savvy with, even more savvy than they already have with the casting and the editing. Because you could tell Huda, Shelly and Ilandria, they were trying to make them a PPG version. Yeah. Like, great value version PPG, which was very annoying because those three people obviously didn't have any chemistry as friends in the same way that like you can't force a PPG. You can't. And then for them to scout Ilandria for three years in a row, and very obviously attempt to make her look dumb on television, and for her to come out looking so amazing, they have to learn from that mistake because they really tried to make her look dumb with Taylor.

Speaker 2:
[60:45] Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[60:45] We all were like, why?

Speaker 2:
[60:48] That's some of what I was talking about, like the old school producing. So like for Bachelor, again, I don't know if Scott Teddy's crew is doing this, but this was like a tried and true practice that Bachelor producers would do every season. They go through casting and they literally on Polaroids of all the guys or women that were going to come into the seasons, right down, villain, girl next door, whatever. That's who you are before you even show up to shoot. They're making you that. And if you do something that diverts from their kind of like pre-planned identity for you, you're off the show. Fuck it.

Speaker 4:
[61:21] What is that? What is that made? Like how do they make that identity up? Instagram? Like they do a little background?

Speaker 2:
[61:29] Through casting, when they're interviewing them and stuff.

Speaker 4:
[61:30] Through casting interviews?

Speaker 3:
[61:31] Okay.

Speaker 2:
[61:33] They get to know their personality. They're like, oh, here's our villain. Here's this, here's this. And then if you come into the game and you play in a way that's outside of that box, they literally just cut you. And that's it.

Speaker 4:
[61:44] If you don't do what they want.

Speaker 2:
[61:45] And I think that that style of producing is just like in a modern world where you're asking these players to come in and give you dynamic performances in these bizarre situations you're setting up, especially Love Island. Like live in this weird fantasy neon palace that we built.

Speaker 4:
[62:01] The Sims. It's the Sims.

Speaker 1:
[62:03] The Sims. Yes.

Speaker 4:
[62:05] Crazy.

Speaker 2:
[62:06] Yeah. It's like you have to let them play. And your job as a producer is to highlight the good play and certainly try to kick things in certain directions. But if a player is like, no, no, no, I want to take it in this direction, support that and see what they can do.

Speaker 4:
[62:18] Yeah, I agree, especially because these people come out and they go on live for three, four hours at a time.

Speaker 2:
[62:24] Yes, exactly.

Speaker 3:
[62:25] We see them fully, all the way.

Speaker 1:
[62:28] Yeah, let me ask you this. One half of Game of Roses believes that this relationship is real and one half thinks it's not. What do you think about Nicolandria?

Speaker 4:
[62:40] So I love them. I'm obsessed.

Speaker 1:
[62:42] OK, yes, love is real.

Speaker 2:
[62:45] I'm not saying I'm not obsessed. They're both fantastic players. I'm not taking anything away from them.

Speaker 4:
[62:50] Yeah, I think if it wasn't real, they'd be better actors and they would do more together.

Speaker 2:
[63:00] OK.

Speaker 4:
[63:00] They don't do a whole ton of stuff together.

Speaker 2:
[63:04] Right.

Speaker 4:
[63:05] And while that could be like an opportunity for a scarcity play, like they only give their couple stuff to, you know, like certain, when the deal is good.

Speaker 1:
[63:20] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[63:21] Right.

Speaker 3:
[63:21] It could be, you know what I mean?

Speaker 1:
[63:22] You think that it's for the right reasons that they are not doing that much together.

Speaker 4:
[63:27] Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[63:27] Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[63:28] Like, I just think there's so much more money on the table that they're leaving. So I would say that they're real for that reason.

Speaker 1:
[63:36] Like, just for the live, that's a really good point. I love that.

Speaker 3:
[63:39] Just alive. Like, the amount of money they make, like, please.

Speaker 2:
[63:44] I think the opposite is true. I think the scarcity technique you bring to mind is due to the fact that they both know there's gonna have to be the amicable breakup post. And if they taper us off, if they wean us from this drug of Nicolandria, then it will be easier to submit that post to the public and not blow up their entire careers. Because they right now are-

Speaker 1:
[64:08] How do fake relationships last this long?

Speaker 2:
[64:10] But they're locked into it. They have a name. You know what I mean? Nicolandria. They can't be that.

Speaker 1:
[64:16] But the scarcity, they're not making- Yeah. I'm so proud of her, by the way. When I saw that Barbie at Coachella thing, I was like, she's mainstream.

Speaker 2:
[64:31] She's fantastic. One of the best reality players that I've seen in the past decade, maybe.

Speaker 4:
[64:36] Yeah. For her to bounce back from how they tried to make her look is so impressive. I agree.

Speaker 1:
[64:45] And she's commented on it being like, they make me look like a fool, but Taylor was giving me all this attention and validation.

Speaker 2:
[64:54] But to their credit too, they did do a pivot in the middle of that season when she is kicked off the show and they're like, actually, what?

Speaker 5:
[65:03] When Sierra went home.

Speaker 1:
[65:06] You don't think they wanted to make Sarah a neck-upper?

Speaker 4:
[65:09] Even before that, when she got eliminated and her and Nick went in that candlelit forest for a date. I was like, oh, production knows what they're doing with these two. Like, this is incredible. And Sierra was still there.

Speaker 2:
[65:28] Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[65:29] She was dating that Nick Doop.

Speaker 4:
[65:31] Yeah. Remember the Nick Doop?

Speaker 1:
[65:33] Yeah. Elon?

Speaker 4:
[65:36] Elon. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[65:39] Is that the guy who was in that hot tub podcast? No.

Speaker 2:
[65:42] No.

Speaker 1:
[65:43] No, that was Eyal.

Speaker 2:
[65:45] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[65:46] From UK.

Speaker 4:
[65:47] Oh, from UK, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[65:48] But then they gave her a whole ass car to pull up and like rescue him from being eliminated.

Speaker 4:
[65:54] Yeah, rescue him from being eliminated.

Speaker 1:
[65:55] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[65:56] So we can either be in a relationship and get back on the show or go our separate ways. And they're both like, huh, I guess we're in a relationship now. That's why like it was created out of the lie of the TV show.

Speaker 1:
[66:08] No, it was created out of people seeing True Love and True Sparks.

Speaker 4:
[66:12] And Sierra leaving.

Speaker 1:
[66:14] And Sierra leaving.

Speaker 4:
[66:15] Sierra leaving was a good one.

Speaker 1:
[66:17] Sierra and Nick, they were propping up as like the A couple of the season. So I'm like, if Sierra doesn't leave, do they do all this? I don't know.

Speaker 4:
[66:24] I don't know. And they were, they gave friend those two. Nick and I later, they give like sexy those two, you know what I mean, Nick and I later.

Speaker 1:
[66:30] They give us full mates.

Speaker 4:
[66:31] Yeah, full mates, exactly.

Speaker 1:
[66:32] Together forever.

Speaker 4:
[66:34] Yep, forever.

Speaker 1:
[66:36] Thank you. Thank you for coming to the... Oh my God.

Speaker 2:
[66:40] Because time doesn't exist, we all know that.

Speaker 1:
[66:43] Thank you so much for joining us this week. Congrats to both you and Natasha.

Speaker 4:
[66:51] Thank you.

Speaker 1:
[66:52] On your babies. It's so cute and so sweet. And I love when friends have babies together. So cute.

Speaker 4:
[67:01] Yeah, it's fun. Yeah. And me, you, Emma and Claire, all of us.

Speaker 1:
[67:05] Oh yeah. And Emma. Oh, soon.

Speaker 4:
[67:07] Am I the only one?

Speaker 1:
[67:08] Soon.

Speaker 4:
[67:09] You're the only one.

Speaker 3:
[67:10] You need the pregnancy packs.

Speaker 4:
[67:12] You didn't get it into the pregnancy packs, Clues. Hello.

Speaker 2:
[67:14] I'm not gonna sire a child that won't do it. Sorry. No.

Speaker 1:
[67:20] Do it for the pod.

Speaker 2:
[67:21] I have a cat. I'll submit Scobie, my cat, as my child.

Speaker 1:
[67:25] Yeah, you do. That's fine. You give him a lot of attention.

Speaker 2:
[67:29] I do. I treat him like a human child.

Speaker 4:
[67:31] No. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[67:34] But yes, thank you for joining us. Thank you for everybody for joining us as well. Where can everybody check out your stuff?

Speaker 4:
[67:41] Yeah. If you want to hear more, and there's more of me and Natasha on the mic, despite that she is on maternity leave, you can follow us at 2BlackGirlsMedia everywhere, and we are at 2BlackGirls1Rose on Instagram. We are at 2BlackGirlsMedia on Patreon. Join us on Patreon for all the good yummy stuff, but all of our episodes go out on all the platforms, YouTube, Spotify, Apple, Google, all of it. So check us out.

Speaker 2:
[68:07] Definitely hit up that Patreon too.

Speaker 1:
[68:08] That hot cruise tea.

Speaker 2:
[68:10] Yeah, the cruise tea is worth the Patreon in my opinion. That shit blew my mind.

Speaker 4:
[68:14] Thank you.

Speaker 1:
[68:15] Thank you.

Speaker 2:
[68:17] Thanks everybody.

Speaker 1:
[68:18] Bye. Praise be Dark Lord Palmer.

Speaker 5:
[68:22] Please rate this podcast. Please review this podcast. Please get a friend to listen to us. And then please rate this podcast. Please review this podcast. Please get a friend to listen to us. And then please rate this podcast. Please review this podcast. Please get a friend to listen to us and them.