No sooner have Richie and Alex walked off into the Bali sunset, Georgia Loves arrives on our screens.
It starts Wednesday on Channel 10 and the premiere runs from 7.30pm-9.15pm. The following night only goes until 8.40pm.
Will you be watching or was your belief in love dashed after The Bachie editors made us think Nikki was the Chosen One and Alex was a Bunny Boiler? I’m looking forward to seeing someone on screen you knows how to string a sentence together.
Richie has whittled them down to Mysterious Olena, Home State Girl Nikki and Smother Mother Alex. Tonight he kicks one of the trio to the kerb. Tomorrow night is the finale, screening on Ten from 7.30pm to 9pm. Richie takes the final two to Bali (perhaps he’ll catch up with former Big Brother contestant Tully there again?) and will break someone’s heart. Unless it’s Olena he’s rejecting, as she seems made of sterner stuff.
And here’s a post from the Bachie Twitter account, so you gice can discuss the use of the word “fleek” …
We start with Richie recapping the pros and cons of each girl. Pity the girls don’t get to do the same.
He’s doing some deep thinking while he does situps by the bachie pad lake, and even pretends to wipe his brow with a towel because he’s sweating from all the head hurty deep thoughts.
Richie decides to take the girls to his fave place: Indonesia. Alex has never been to Bali before. And she is calling him “Rich” (but Pooky Bear in private as she stabs voodoo dolls of Olena and Nikki).
Alex is wearing a black lace and netting playsuit which flashes her cheeks – and not the up-top kind. The producers make them ride bicycles in what is no doubt sweltering conditions and they must be the only people in Bali wearing safety helmets. Rich is so excited he’s even doing bunny hops on the bike. Time for a chat about how much her family loves him as they perch on a wall – not a couch, for once. Alex questions whether he could ever move to Melbourne (we know Richie is super close to his blonde mum – who raised him alone – and blonde sister). He avoids a straight answer but says he wouldn’t want her son to move schools as much as he did. Enough awkward talk; time for a rice paddy pash. Later on, they do find a cushion-strewn couch and she asks how his family would feel about him dating someone with a child. “They just want me to be happy,” he says. So, no answer, then.
Next up is Nikki, wearing a tropical-look playsuit and she suits the beachy Bali vibe. Straight away she grabs his head and pulls him in for a kiss. Nikki, the fellow West Aussie, has been to Bali a zillion times. They head off on some giant flying lilo thing that’s towed by a speedboat and afterwards have a pash wrapped up in beach towels. They follow up with time on the Bachie couch, surrounded by candles and Nikki again tells him she loves him. He tells her he would slot in easily to her family. Cue 2 minutes of adjectives about how awesome the other person is. “Good times, good times,” he concludes (throwing in a pash for good measure).
Now for Olena, also in a playsuit, but hers has bling. Since the hometown visit she’s started worrying about Richie living in WA while she’s in Sydney. Well, der. Richie throws out a lot of “myterious” and “intrigued” observations. They take a scooter ride to the beach and he loves surfing, so Olena must again pretend to like outdoorsy stuff. “How did your Mum feel about me?” he asks. “Umm …” she replies. Then she tells him her mum “has concerns” but doesn’t elaborate. They spend the next half hour pretending to enjoy surfing while mulling it over. Olena says her folks don’t want her to leave Sydney. Richie says he’s open to living in both cities but she’s still worried.”I see that as a huge mess for me; travelling back and forward for a relationship,” she tells the camera. Uh oh – she’s not making eye contact with him and they are playing the “something bad’s bout to happen music”. Later on, she’s in a leopard print kaftany thing and looking as fabulous as usual. Richie tries to drag some emotion out of her. She tells him her family think she’s living a fairy tale and ignoring “the real shit”. Ooh! He tells her he’s frustrated by her not acting all cray-cray for him from the get-go. “At the end of the day I’m thinking is it too much of a hassle for us to have a relationship,” she tells him. Olena lives in the real world, not Bachie la-la land.
Damn – I was sure she and Nikki would be final two but now he has no choice but to take Alex.
Rose time
They get straight into it – no cocktail party chat. The girls are all in shiny dresses and poor Osh and Rich have to swelter in suits. Nikki gets the first rose. The music builds to a crescendo and he picks Alex. Olena looks a bit nervy, like she’s trying to breathe calmly. She and Richie exchange pleasantries about how they want each other to be happy and it’s like two strangers making polite conversation at a dinner party.
Tomorrow night
Alex and Nikki get to meet his Mum, who asks questions like: “So, you’re not a basket case?” We hear Nikki tell the camera she’s confident it’s her. The finale screens tomorrow on Ten, from 7.30-9pm.
Tonight White Rose wielder Alex finally gets a date and the girls get a fake baby challenge. Luckily they are already used to tanties of the grown-up variety.
Presumably the ones who didn’t get airtime last night are the sane ones. Here’s a name refresher for you (but of course Natalie and Aimee are goneski and Vintaea bailed). So we didn’t really see Sophie, Mia, Tolyna, Faith and just glimpses of Kiki and Laura.
There’s a bit on Swear Bear Vintaea who obviously never watched the show before here
Again, Rosie from Mamamia does the best Bachelor recaps – they are usually posted soon after the show ends at mamamia
It’s day 2 (more like day 5) and the girls are hanging around the house in their casual resort gear and most look so much better without all the spack filler and sequins.
Osher drops off the date cards and it’s WA girl Nikki of the white hair (whom we met first in the premiere had the super high split). The others are totes jelly, especially when Richie turns up in a helicopter to pick her up – Channel 10 are blowing the budget early. How are they going to offered to pay their candle bill?
As they fly near the Sydney Harbour Bridge Nikki professes a fear of heights, so that will be exploited later in the show. The chopper drops them off at a secluded beach and then it’s into a row boat for a getting-to-know you convo. And just to remind us Richie is a true blue Aussie, he utters “crikey!” at one point.
Back at the mansion the girls are chilling outside when Kiki appears with a date card, revealing the names Sasha, (Snickers Faux Villain Keira: “She’ll be hilarious on a group date. Really loud – she’ll annoy the other girls. Heh, heh.”) Tolyna, Faith (wow – she is still wearing a lot of makeup and favours the American cheerleader look), artist Georgia, talentless singer Eliza, white rose holder Alex, another white haired girl called Laura, Kiki, former athlete Mia and Keira. Upon this, Keira utters what looks to be an “urgh” and looks like she just ate a dirty street pie. “I don’t like it,” she says at the thought of having to share the limelight. The dateless ones aren’t pleased with her reaction.
Under-the-radar villain Rachael aka Regina George tells the camera: “We’re here to date him – we’re not here to sit back and just chill out and get a tan in the backyard. I suppose she did really want a one-on-one date but we can’t always get what we want in life.”
On the first date, Richie and Nikki are having a dip in the ocean and pretending to splash each other. Nikki looks so much better with her white blonde hair all wet and tousled. The producers make poor Richie open up an already de-husked coconut with a machete for reasons I don’t understand. Real estate agent Nikki spills she was engaged to a guy she was with for 12 years. So, she’s 28 and they broke up a year ago, so she must have been 15 when they got together. She tells Richie she’s never been on a real date before. He seems to really like her, so out comes the rose and … First pash to Nikki.
Back at the mansion the girls have been gathered to await Nikki’s return. Rachael thinks they won’t have kissed. Poor, deluded Rachael. Nikki says she just gave him a peck.
Nine girls arrive for the group date and it looks like they stopped at the tanning salon on the way because everyone but Eliza has Oompa Loompa-coloured legs. There’s a lot of cut-off denim and biker jackets. The girls are split into smaller groups for a retro-style photo shoot and Alex is the only one who doesn’t have to share her shoot with another girl. Keira and Russian Sasha are teamed up for a milkshake shoot.
We keep hearing about what a big character Kiki is but we haven’t seen it until now, when she walks out rocking her her 1950s leopard print swimsuit like a Playboy bunny.
Richie looks like he got a bit sunburnt on the beach date and Faith proves to be gormless yet flirtatious, comparing her modelling style to that of a potato.
Sasha works hard to ruin Keira’s photoshoot and Keira is rather meek about it – and obviously rattled.
On the next shoot Eliza is loving the dance shoot, pulling out all her dance moves. The other girls on the shoot are dying to get some time with Richie but no one wants to tackle Eliza to the grand to do it.
For the final shoot Richie is dressed like a T-bird and he and Alex get to sit in a gorgeous red Cadillac. Afterwards Richie says he got a few butterflies: “I was like: Be smooth, Richie, be smooth.”
The other girls come out to watch them giggling at each other. Sasha drily says: “Imagine how pretty their babies will be.”
The photographer makes them pretend to kiss while Keira provides sarcastic commentary just metres away.
Here we go again, showing how cool Richie is by having him rock up on a motorbike for another date. “Oh my god he’s so bad boy,” purrs Georgia. He’s there to pick up Olena the mysterious Ukrainian. She’s a 23-year-old make-up artist who has had a string of disastrous dates. “We have nothing to talk about or he sets my hair on fire … that’s another story,” she tells the camera.
They go for a ride and she asks him some not-so-superficial questions about his family and future kids, fearful she won’t get another chance. He gives the usual “kids, eventually” answer.
Richie takes her back to his bachie pad.
“That’s my sleeping quarters – wait to you see that,” he tells her. Cue both of them cracking up. They go for a swim in one of his many pools even though it looks like they are freezing. She’s luring him in with her mysterious eyes again. He says he has another surprise for her but it’s not a rose: it’s a figure-hugging red dress that she puts on and rocks – the other girls are going to die.
“I feel like you challenge me a little but, which is great,” he tells her, and hands her a rose.
Back at the mansion the girls have started drinking already and there are dress splits galore. Nikki from the first date has a full-one J-Lo plunging neckline green dress on but it’s too short.
Richie takes Nikki off for a chat but then Alex appears clutching the white rose, looking mischievous. Some of the girls are confused as to the white rose’s power. “It’s like an unlimited packet of Tim Tams – it never stops,” Kiki succinctly explains to Georgia, who may be too young to get the reference to the genie ad.
At least Alex waits til he finishes his chat before revealing the rose, and he whisks her off to his dungeon, which is stuffed full of cushions, candles and Moroccan lamps. They share a passion for dirt bikes and realises their relationship will never work because he barracks for West Coast and she’s a Collingwood girl (carn the Pies!).
Keira is super cranky about the white rose, whereas Megan the diving chick sensibly says they would all have done the same.
Alex finally gets to have an in-depth talk with Richie about her son. “I feel just on CLoud Nine and nothing could dampen that feeling,” she says after their chat. And then she sits on a couch near Keira.
“You disappointed me personally,” Keira tells her. “I’ve said it behind your back and I’m telling it to your face.”
Alex doesn’t seem rattled: “I’m going to go to sleep tonight knowing that I’m a good person.” By this point a few of the girls have snuck away, over all the drama. And it just escalates from there.
Finally, one of the other girls encourages Alex to walk away, depriving us of the chance for a glass of wine to be thrown of someone. Can we hurry up already with the rose ceremony>
The rose ceremony
Oh god, Nikki’s green dress is just so wrong. Either cover up the chest or the legs – don’t flash both. God, Tiffany aka plank girl looks totally different to last night, as does Sophie the Mary Louise Parker lookalike, who gets her first bit of airtime, so she’s a goner. Oh – actually, she’s safe, so it’s white hair Laura and former athlete Mia who are goneski, off to watch Osher’s Australian Idol clips.
Later in the season
We get a lengthy montage of clips from upcoming episodes and it looks like Keira is around for a while as we see her in various outfits. And it looks like Richie does lots of pashing. I didn’t want to watch it too closely as it seemed to give a lot away.
And here’s a still from early in the episode. Megan would rather eat Nutella from a jar than get in a chopper with Richie.
