The Press Box - Ep. 184: 'Bachelor Party' With Reality Steve

Episode Date: September 16, 2016

The Ringer's Juliet Litman brings on Reality Steve to discuss the jam-packed 'Bachelor in Paradise' finale, mull over the many rumors of Nick Viall's upcoming season, and brainstorm ways to improve the 'Bachelor in Paradise' franchise. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to Bachelor Party. I'm Julia Littman. Bachelor Paradise is over, but I couldn't let the season go that one more episode. So I've got a big guest today. On the line, we've got Reality Steve Carbone. Steve, have you considered legally changing your name to Reality, Steve? It's funny, I have been asked that, like, because a lot of people, like, don't know my last name, or some people kind of remember me from my Sports Talk radio days in L.A., and then they read an article about it.

me, they're like, oh, wait a second, you were the guy that worked from Jim Rome, and then I'm really a correlation that reality Steve is Steve Carbone. It is kind of weird, but I think I'll just stick with my regular name for now. Okay, fair enough. If you ever go on The Bachelor, you'll just be Reality Steve. Yeah. That'll be like, your funny name. No, they would never let you on.

Oh, gosh, no. I haven't done a pod yet since the Bachelor in Paradise finale, so I want to talk about that a little bit with you. And then we'll talk a little bit about Nick, probably a lot about Nick. And then let's do a little Ben and Lauren preview because they're in L.A. And they're filming like right now. So let's talk Paradise first. So we ended up with three engaged couples.

We have Josh and Amanda. We have Lacing Grant. Right? Lacing Grant. And the real shocker, Carly and Evan. I can't believe it. First of all, I just didn't know that Evan was like legit. From what your sources are telling you, is that real? I mean, it is to the extent of if we're basing those three couples, and I think one of the biggest things in the Bachelor franchise is when you get to the final couple, if they don't live in the same state, that's a pretty big move for somebody.

And at least Evan and Carly live 10 minutes from each other in Nashville. Right. That's huge. If I'm going to say someone's going to work out, no one has to make a life change. move in that relationship. That's a great point. It makes me think that they at least have a shot, but then again, Andy and Joshua attendants from each other in Atlanta,

and we know what happened to them. Yeah. Evan and Carly are much more genuine people, though. I've come around on Carly. I used to, like, really make fun of her, but now she's, like, the same normal one of the group, and I don't know, I like her. I can't believe it, though.

Yeah, I mean, I don't think anyone saw Evan Come, and especially after all of his antics on Jojo's season, and then just the first few episodes where Carly was repulsed by the guy. Like, usually you don't see that. You come around on a guy or whatever, or you can come around on a girl after a couple dates. But the things that Carly was saying, and I know they addressed it on the After Paradise show, but it had to hurt, Evan, as a guy with an ego, you don't want to hear, you know, yes, we knew the finale.

They knew the finality that they ended up together, but it had to have been a blow to his ego to watch that back. and hear his fiance tell him, tell, say things that she did. That was pretty bad. It's so absurd. They're engaged. Like, okay, just do it for the show and just like, yeah, we're dating. We're not engaged.

I think it seems like Nashville. That's where Nashville is where Sean and Caitlin are living, right? Yeah, they live in Nashville. It seems like Nashville is like a good natural habitat for these bachelor alumni, like, obviously better than L.A. L.A. is like the death now. You got to leave. And Chicago, like, was one.

It just seems like these small, like that's like a good city for them for whatever reason. I don't know. I feel like that's like a – it's like if you were in a zoo and you were trying to like make a habitat for Bachelor alums, you would make it similar to Nashville or something. It's funny because a while there, a while ago was Seattle. Right. Because that's where Desire came from. It's where Catherine came from. It's where Molly came from.

And then like you said, it did move to Chicago. And now Nashville has seemed to be getting a lot of run as the – the it city. That's such a weird phenomenon. Final couples. Yeah, it's very weird. It's weird how, like, it becomes, like, the providence of, like, a certain city that, like, populates these shows and then, like, where they go to, like, be successful.

But I don't know. I'm, like, I'm weirdly happy for Carly and Evan. I'm, like, kind of glad that worked out. So from what I've heard, Evan's, like, a really nice guy. So I guess that's nice. And he drives a Maserati in a Lambo. He does? He does.

He does. He does. He does. He's very well off. Is he, did he make money on his own? Or is he like family money? I know it's that it's the fact that he owns like three different erectile dysfunction clinics.

Like he owns them outright. Oh, my God. I mean, if you look at his Instagram page, he's not shy about showing off the fact that he owned a Montserratian-Lambo. So with that said, maybe that was an appeal for Carleague. I don't know. Like, I'm not going to jump to conclusion here, but, you know. He has three kids, right?

he's got three kids yes that's a lot that's more than Amanda three boys that are like I want to say like 14 11 and 8 no we're not talking like three little ones he's got like grown ones wow is um is uh is their mother in Nashville too I believe I think I believe so I but yeah she is in the area from what I hear yeah what did you know about Evan before uh Jojo season like was he like on your radar someone who could like become a character I knew he was going to be a character just by his job title and the fact that, and I thought that was the reason he did get cast, because I don't think anybody in a million years ever thought that Jojo Fletcher was going to pick Evan Bass at the end of that thing. There's no way. She just, you know, we knew Jojo's little background of what she likes, and it wasn't Evan Bass.

But the fact that they loved the job title and they made sure to make as many puns as they could during the season of him being erectile dysfunction specialist I think that played a role into why he was even on the show in the first place because, you know,

I mean, let's face it, you know, everybody's got, you know, looks are subjective, but when you look at the type of guys they cast on the show, does Evan jump out at you

as somebody that would be in the upper echelon of the looking guys in the history of his franchise? No, no, no, no, no. But, so that's why I think he got cast as a job. He is just, I don't know. He's had a real world one with Evan.

From him just being like annoying and like the narc of the group on Jojo C's season to having uncontrollable erections on Paradise, I mean, we've just, we've been through so much with him. I know. It's supposed to talk about a journey. I mean, he had quite the arc. I mean, outside of Nick, I can't think of anybody who had a bigger arc changing storyline from Bachelorette to Paradise than Evan. I'm just happy for him. I've just added him all in on Evan. Evan and Carly, I want them to work out.

I just, I don't know why. But after, like, everything she went through last season, now I'm just rooting for them. I think that's cool. Yeah, with Kirk and, you know, she had to watch her best friend get engaged. Yeah. She got to be in her best friend's wedding. And it's almost like it was going to happen for Calder this season, some hell or high water that she was going to be getting engaged at the end.

I'm happy. there. I'm less happy for Josh and Amanda. I'm very concerned about that relationship. Yeah, I mean, the rumors have already started. There's already been reports out there that, you know, they've already had two breakups and Josh is acting basically like he did Andy, like he did.

When Andy said he acted like in his book, in her book, like that he is just up and down in terms of his relationship, but then you see Amanda come out and defend him and they post pictures of of her and him and the kids at Disneyland. It's just like, okay, you know, I guess time to tell with them. But I have heard rumbling behind the scenes that what we see on social media,

and I say this for a lot of the couples, is what they want us to see. It's a facade. Yeah, of course. That's true for all humans. That's true for everyone who has Instagram. Like, that's not just a question. But especially, I take it to the 10th degree with this franchise because these people have fans and they want to appease their fans and they have to let their fans know because the normal

every everyday couple, the average couple that nobody knows can post stuff on social media or whatever. Nobody's going to write about it. But when there's a story in a tabloid about Amanda and Josh have already broken up twice and the very next day, Amanda and Josh are posting pictures of each other, it's like, hey, we're trying to prove a point here. I mean, it's obvious what they're doing. Yeah.

But, you know, I've heard rumbling. So let's see how this plays out. because I don't see it long-term for those two. I just don't. Did you hear what Nick had to say about Josh when he came on this pod? I listened to that interview with a fine-tooth comb. There's a lot of thoughts on what Nick said to you. Okay, we'll get to Nick in a second.

But Nick, Nick does not paint Josh in a good light. No, no. And you know what? I mean, from everything that I've heard, I've never had any association with Josh. but from everything that I have heard, what Nick said was accurate, that he says all the right things for the camera, and he's very, very phony. And people don't buy his act,

and they think that he was just doing and saying the right things and basically went on the show to try and repair his image from Andy's book that pretty much eviscerated him. And I don't think he really did a great job of changing people's opinion that had read the book. if anything, he probably fed into it more, but I see what he was doing. I don't think. But yeah, what Nick said about him, I agree with.

Who's reading this book? Did you read it, Steve? You read it. I read the main parts that I needed to read. I did not read it from beginning to end. I wanted to read the parts about Nick. I wanted to read the parts about Juan Pablo. I wanted to read the parts about Josh.

And that's what I read. Because you're a true professional. You were doing your research. I support that. But I noticed Andy's book, I think, is like, on the New York Times bestseller list. And, like, find me one person who's actually read this book. I don't know how that happened.

Yeah, I mean, I think it's one of these things where that's totally a book. If you're a bachelor fan and you've got 20 or 30 minutes to kill before a movie, you go down to Barnes & Noble and you will skim the parts that you want to read about, Josh, and especially after this, I saw this story, I think it was on us weekly yesterday or the day before, then Andy said her book sales and priests once Paradise started airing and why not? Yeah, of course. every episode. Totally. I know the book is like, the book was like a paradise storyline, basically.

The book. Oh, without a doubt. Yeah. You know, I mean, it's, again, it's her word against his. Her book is her version of the story. Josh has his version. But for him to say the whole thing was lies and the whole thing is false, it's just idiotic on his part.

And if he's not going to follow it up with, it's a lie because this, this, this, and this, and this story is a lie because this, then Josh, be quiet because that doesn't just to say like oh the whole thing is lies is totally false and there were stories that she told in there where there were multiple witnesses so do we need to go to all those people and ask them did this really happen Josh like my guess is a lot of this stuff that Andy said in the book happened um she just might have had a different take on it overall right but okay we're gonna we're gonna come back to the book in a minute we'll talk about nick more but a couple more things about paradise I used to hate hate the twins and now I

I miss the twins. So I think that I need a twins TV show. I don't know what that show is, but like something with them. Like maybe not a TV show, but like a web show, like 10 minutes with the twins every week. Maybe they answer questions. They do some dance routines. I don't know what it is, but I've really come around in the twins. I think almost everyone in Paradise, maybe with the exception of Jared, I like more than I did before they arrived. I think it's about a year ago now from right around the time they started filming Ben's season of the Bachelor when I had released the twins as contestants. I said it then, and I said it throughout Ben's season, and then especially on Paradise,

I'm out of the same opinion that I get a kick out of that. I can watch them do silly blonde stuff forever for an hour a day. And I don't care if it's an act. I think it's funny, and I get a kick out of it, and they don't take themselves too seriously, so I think it's funny. And that's the biggest part of them that I just, I don't think that they take themselves very seriously. Now, if I want to give my professional advice to them about finding men, they probably need to separate a little bit more if they really want to find somebody.

But other than that, doing dual ITMs and doing each other's makeup and wiping each other's tears and stuff like that. That's funny to me. I think they're funny. I think we need to move them over to the VH1. I think VH1 could do a lot for them, but they need to get off of network television and maybe the ABC world. I don't know if free form is really going to be the answer for Ben and Lauren, but who knows, maybe. Yeah. In general, I thought this is a pretty solid Paradise season.

It always kind of just fades for the last week. You're just sort of like, okay, we know who's together. The only surprise, I guess, was, or there could have been surprised with Nick and Jen, but the Nick News broke before the show was over. And let's talk more about that. But for a second, I just need to talk about my sponsor. This episode is brought to you by Casper. Casper is a sleep brand that created one perfect mattress sold directly to consumers, eliminating commission-driven and plated prices.

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and you want me to be happy. You'll get your mattress with $50 off. Okay, let's talk more, Steve. I want to get back into Nick. So let's start with his ending with Jen. So I never assumed that Nick and Jen were going to make it. Like, there was just no way. And it seemed like people were surprised that they broke up.

I mean, it was not a surprise because his Bachelor news was announced before the finale. But, like, it seemed like that there's some controversy over his breakup with Jen, and I don't get that. Like, obviously, Nick Viall is not leaving Paradise engaged. Yeah. You know, and not to mention the spoilers were out two months before all that. That's another reason why we knew Nick and Jen weren't lasting.

But I think for them, in all the years that the show has been doing their thing, you know, they don't acknowledge spoilers. They don't acknowledge me, which I get. I understand it. They can't. No. They're going to contractually obligated to ignore you. Yeah, pretty much.

And, you know, we, if you followed on social media, once Paradise ended filming, which was end of June, there were plenty of social media pictures of Josh and Amanda together. Evan Carly flipped up a couple times, and Grant Lace weren't very careful. People had seen them together. Like, it was confirmed, and this was after I was supposed to this was. So it was confirmed. But that was the contestants essentially spoiling their own storyline for the show to actually announce Nick as the Bachelor before the finale. Like that is the first time in the history of the show that I can remember where they gave out their own spoiler. Like I had never seen that before.

And that was definitely interesting that they did that. They've never done that before. Like that's the show acknowledging, hey, we haven't aired our finale yet of Paradise, but we're telling you Nick's The Bachelor. So obviously, you know, he and Jen don't make it next week. But they've never done that before. And I thought that was really interesting. So, yeah, let's get into that more. Do you have any information on why they did that and how Nick came to be cast as Bachelor?

You know, I've heard a lot of things. And I honestly don't know what to believe. My thinking is this. Through everything that I've gathered, my thinking was it was going to be Luke. We've seen interviews of Luke saying I had a flight out Monday morning and they called me Sunday night and told me to get it. P.S. Thank God. Oh, they went in another direction. Thank God. It's not Luke. I'm so happy.

It's not Luke. But my thinking is, I think they just, and they haven't really given a good reason as to why they chose Nick. They just keep saying, like, well, we just kept coming back to Nick. And who deserves it more? It's like, Nick doesn't deserve it any more than the next guy does. Like, that's a horrible explanation. But they can say what they want. If they're show, they can choose whoever they want to be the bachelor. I've really got no problem with Nick as the bachelor.

I think he's going to be great. thinking is, they knew that Luke was out there, and they knew that I think a lot of people were convinced it was going to be a loop. And I think they honestly just went for shock value. I really do. I think they just wanted to shock people and wanted people to tune in to After Paradise, which got horrible ratings. It got half the ratings that it did last year.

Now, granted, they heard on Tuesday this year instead of Monday. But I think they went for a shock value. They wanted people to tune in, and obviously, they waited to the very last segment of After Paradise. on that Tuesday to announce Nick. I think it was just a shock value to go after people and get people talking. And obviously, Nick is a very polarizing figure in the franchise. This will now be his fourth show that he's done. He's only one other person in the history of the franchise that's done more shows than him,

and that's Chris McCowski. No one else has done four. Yeah. A ton of done three. Nick has now done four and Chris McCowski has done five. And so he's, and I get, he's got a story. I mean, you know, the bride's made twice. you know, broke up with Jen at the end.

So I get the storyline for him. I think they just decided to go for shock value. I really do. I don't know if I buy that. I don't know because by my calculations, filming, I bet, starts next week for Nick. Yeah, it starts next week. Next Thursday or something?

They usually start on a Thursday. I think it usually gets on Thursday, but I know that some girls fly out Wednesday, So there's no way it starts through the night. So my guess it's Friday or Saturday now. Oh, interesting. Because usually they have the next day's off after. Yeah, it's always the next day.

Next day they're off. Yeah. So they could start Friday, have Saturday off, and date will start next Sunday. Yeah. Interesting. Okay. Well, I just, it's a really tight timeline with like announcing Nick when, like, from a month out. Like, it just seems like putting more work on yourself.

Although I guess that also happened with Jojo, right? Like, they also decided her at the last minute. Yeah. That Jojo was a pretty last second decision. And that's, and Jojo started filming three days after Ben's finale aired. Right. Bachelor, they usually have a little bit more time. Basically, they announced Nick the same time that they announced Ben last season.

It was like that second to last after Paradise episode, and Ben's season started filming September 24th, I think. I'll never forget because I was there. Give about a three-and-a-half week leeway there. Sure. But they had picked Luke up. But I'm just saying, like, it was always going to be Ben. If you watched Ben on Caitlin's season, like you knew it was always going to be him, so they had time to plan. I'm not so interested in the announcement so much as, like, why did they ditch Luke when they had, you know, seem like they were pretty, if you believe Luke, they're pretty far down the road of him and then just decided to go with Nick.

Like, that is confusing. Do you want me to act like a tabloid here and tell you what I hear? Yeah. I can't say that this is even true. Yeah. What did you just tell? These are all rumors. Here are the, can't we have some rumors.

Yeah. So the rumor I heard, and I have no idea if it's true or not, is that ABC told Luke, we want access to your music. And Luke said, absolutely not. And they said, okay, see you. We're going with someone else. Really? His music. They want the right.

They want the right to his music. That's fascinating. That's what I heard. Huh. But that doesn't, but when I hear something like that, I was like, okay, that could be it. But then why was Luke telling us weekly? I was set to leave the next morning, and they called me and said no. So obviously he had agreed to something.

Yeah. Or he was fine with something being done regarding his music. So that's why I don't know how much stock to put into that story, because according to Luke, unless Luke is exaggerating or lying, he was set to late Monday. And they called him Sunday 9th that we've gone in a different direction. And maybe they went a different direction because Luke wasn't adhering to their request to have the right.

rides to his music. Like there's so many different angles that could have gone, but honestly, I don't know why they did what they did. It's very confounding. Why they went off Luke, and they've never given us a clear explanation, and they never will. They don't have to. Right. And they're going to do their show and people are going to watch anyway, so I guess that's why they don't care. I'm excited about Nick. I, you know, I've for many years maligned him, but after meeting him, I'm convinced he'll be great. And he was, I don't know, I'm just, I'm looking forward to it. I've talked about this before. I am dying to know what kind of girls they cast for him.

Like, I'm just so curious. First of all, we know he likes brunettes. We also know that he likes kind of petite brunettes. But, like, Nick is not a spring chicken. Like, how old are these girls going to be? Have you gotten any information on the contestants yet? I've got about eight girls. I haven't released any of them yet.

I've got about eight that I know are going to be on the show. And honestly, it's the same exact crop of girls that they cast every season. mid-20s to leg 20 girls. Okay, that's older, though. Ben's girls were young. There is the rumor that I'm, let's say that again. Ben's girls were young. The twins are 23.

Oh, yeah, the twins. I'm trying about them. I think, you know, the last older, quote-unquote, Bachelor we had was Brad's second season. Brad was 38 the second time around. And he ended up picking Emily Maynard, who at the time was 25. Right. I hate Brad.

So they'll never change their face of girls. It won't be a couple girls in their 30s, I'm sure. But it's still going to be a majority of mid-20s girls who are, you know, size zero and size two. Like, that's what they cast. That's never changed in the history of the show. So, but for the girls that I have, I haven't noticed any. It's like, I see this. It's like the same girls of different names every season.

They all kind of look alike. Ashley, Ashley, Lauren. Yeah, it's really just There's one girl that Assuming she makes it and doesn't get I mean, because they still cut people at the very last minute So a couple of these girls might not end up getting on I think they will

One of them's got a really You know, the tragic backstory with A guy from her past And you know, have you seen the This came out like about a month ago But have you seen that The Survivor Co-Rong winner, Michelle, is possibly a contestant to season. Survivor what?

The last Survivor season, Michelle. Oh, really? The bartender. The bartender, Us week broke that. Oh, my God. Just like they posted Jordan, like 11 days before Jojo season. They said that Michelle had attended a casting call in New York City. And I don't think Us Weekly posts that if they don't have.

have information that she's going to be on. Like that wouldn't make any sense for them to post that. And then Michelle might get on. Now, I think she's going to do it based on the things that I'm hearing. I'm still trying to confirm it, but do not be surprised if we see Michelle Fitzgerald, Survivor, Co-Rong winner. That's cool. That's a crossover I care about.

Yeah, exactly. That's awesome. And, you know, Michelle's very pretty. Michelle's an attractive girl. I think she's 20. She's fairly young. I mean, he's 25, so she's, like I said, right in that mid-20s range where most of his girls are probably going to be. Okay.

How do you, how do you, like, you're not allowed to contact ABC people, and you don't need to confirm that. I don't want to gain trouble, so I'm just going to say what I know about you and ABC. You're not allowed to, like, be in touch with anyone from the show, contestants, producers, et cetera. So, like, in the early stages, do people reach out to you? Do you just get on Facebook? Do you put out feelers for people? Like how do you get your first piece of information? Yeah, it's honestly a combination of all those things.

I mean, I'm getting emails all the time of people saying like, hey, I think this person might be on the show this season. And then they'll give me their name. And then I look at their social media accounts. And then I can tell sometimes. Sometimes someone gives me a tip. And I need to follow up with it and make a couple emails. or phone calls and just kind of go from there. But it happens, you know, as the season goes on, and once filming starts next week,

usually there's always dates are in public and we'll, you know, we'll see stuff. And if there's, especially if there's a one-on-one date and I haven't released her yet, if there's a one-on-one date and there's clear pictures of Nick with a girl, and we can clearly see her full body and full face, and I don't know who it is. By the next day, usually someone will say, hey, I know that girl. so and so. And then I'm just like, okay, well, thank you. You know, so that usually happens. If it's a group date, it might be a little bit tougher because the picture might be a little bit, but usually any pictures I get, if there's girls on the date that I don't know yet,

usually if I put the picture out there within, I have most of the girls, because someone will say like, oh, and I know that girl. So yeah, that's kind of how it works in the beginning. Have you heard anything yet about, have you heard anything yet about women from previous seasons coming back for who were like interested in Nick because he's got a lot of fans. Like I know people like him. Like Jen seems like an obvious like maybe she'd go on the show, although she says she's not going to. But it just seems like he is ripe for some alumni appearances. Yeah.

And Chris Harrison just in an interview with people over like, I think on Monday or Tuesday, where he said, and Chris is somewhat involved in the casting and he even said himself, I would not be shocked if we saw someone from the past that shows us. up on next season. So he wouldn't say that. There's no way that doesn't happen. Yeah, there's, there's, I'm like really curious to see who it is. If we take the main three girls, you know, his two bachelorette seasons in Paradise,

which would be Andy, Caitlin, or Jen, it's not going to be one of those three. No. I guarantee you that. It's not, obviously, we know that. I would love her to be Kayla. I would love it. It's going to be somebody, like, kind of random, like someone that maybe lasted four or five episodes.

There was like, oh, it was always a fan of you or. I want to be, you. You've met a lot of people, too. Who? I really wanted to be Kayla. Oh, Kayla. Yeah, interesting. She's so weird.

That would just be great. Yeah, I mean, she's almost too big of a name. I honestly think now. I don't know yet. I haven't gotten any confirmation of which former contestant or possible if they do two of them are going to go on. So I can't help out there just yet. Okay. But I don't think it'll be long before I do find.

out who it is. And I guess it might be two of them. I mean, we've never seen more than two show up on a season. So it's not like they're going to, you know, load his season with five or six girls from the past. Like, it's only going to be one or two. And my guess, it's going to be somebody that's not hugely popular, but people will remember.

Right. And, you know, whether they're not they have a pass with Nick is going to be, you know, we'll have to find out, anyone who it is. Right. Have you heard anything about Ben and Lauren's show yet? Other than a lot of cameos by contestants because they're promoting it. No, I mean, I know Nick's going to be on it. I know Chad's making an appearance.

I know Grant and Lace are making an appearance. Jojo and Jordan are on it. Jojo and Jordan making an appearance, yeah. I think that's weird. I just think that is really weird. I'm sorry. Like, I know this is all fake. Yeah, and it looks like they, yeah, and it looks like the Jojo and Jordan thing,

and they literally, like the four of them went to dinner, which is kind of awkward. They go to Katsuya. I'm bummed because it's right by my office, and I didn't know what was happening. I would have crashed it. But I just think that is so strange because it did seem like Jojo was like genuinely hurt by the breakup with Ben. And it seemed like Ben was like really tortured over that. So like if I'm Lauren and if I'm Ben, I'm like, no, we're not doing that. Like, that's awkward.

I mean, it's just as weird. Yeah. And this is the first time. I mean, we've never seen this in the history of the show where the couple, final couple, got a spinoff show. Like, we've never, we never seen this. So I have no idea what to expect. Like, the show seems kind of boring.

It just, it just seems like a way to appease Ben and Lauren fans. Because why didn't we get a Sean and Caitlin spin-off? Why didn't we get a Sean and Kaplan spin-off? I've heard that Sean and Caitlin have a bad relationship with the franchise and the show. Yeah, well, that seems to be obvious based on tweets and stuff. But it's like, why did Ben and Lauren? get it over, you know, Sean and Catherine. They love Sean and Catherine.

I know, but Ben is, Sean can't carry a show, but Ben can. Lauren can carry a show either. She's so boring in my opinion. Like, now that the political side is not going to be part of the show, like, what is this show going to be? Ben and Lauren going to dinner with Kentucky. Like, I don't get what we're going to see here. I don't, I don't know either.

And also, I guess they're filming in Denver, so probably it'll be a fair amount of them, like, living together. But even that, they're just both so much such agreeable people. Yeah, they're so agreeable. It's just kind of boring. Can we go back to one thing? I wanted to ask you this.

I want to go back to Paradise real quick. Sure. Like, we see three engagements this year on Paradise. And to me, that's almost like how Bachelor had three ended up where Nick ended up keeping the money by himself and basically ruined that show. Like, you couldn't top that. ending. Do you watch the challenge? What does Bachelor and Paradise go from here?

Guys ask you, do you watch the challenge? Oh, yeah. I was so surprised that when Johnny Bananas took the money from Sarah, people weren't referencing Bachelor Padmore. I was like, yeah, we've seen this before, people. People do this. It happens. Good question about Bachelor in Paradise. Where does it go from here? They need a format change.

What is the better ending? Like, what are we going to get four proposals next season? I think this idea that Chris Harrison, when we get to the final couple, says, you have to break up or you have to get engaged. Like, that's what they're essentially, they're telling these people because they don't want, and this is what I heard behind the scenes. They don't want any sort of ambiguity there. They want a final answer.

That's why Nick broke up with Jen and the other three couples got engaged. And Wells and Ashley, Weld is just like, look, I barely know you. I'm not getting engaged, so we might as well just break up. Right. I think they need to change that somehow. I don't know what the answer is. Yeah, they need a format change. It seems ridiculous.

Yeah. I agree with you. You know, there's a few ways they could do it. Like one we've mentioned before on the show is if you stay together or if you're together for more than like one row ceremony or like two rows ceremonies, you're out. You got to go. Like you need to graduate out basically. And there needs to be more drama other than just like sitting around being drunk and bored. Like there needs to, I think they need to like move around.

Like I would do it kind of like road rule style. Like I don't know if you remember one of the last seasons of road rules that people got voted in and out in real time of the RV. So like if you if the audience didn't like you, they voted you out. And so then someone new would come in and that would really shake things up. I think they need to figure out a way to do it so that the cast is a set number of people, but always are changing like the way they do it now. So they rotate people in and out. And that way, it's almost like forcing people into closed recorders. They need to like be doing more. Like I would I would basically apply like a road rules format to this for like they're on some kind of

road trip and in some country like don't like do Mexico sure it's cheap for their production and they have to like survive challenges because many of these people are not so so bright so there'll be a lot of hijinks and it's like bringing bringing in like a little bit more adversity and I think like if it's sort of a combination like survivor and road rules like someone has to go and then they get replaced basically and who the hell wouldn't want to see the twins in the spelling beat like the challenge like who wouldn't want to see that I would or hey to have challenges like need to do something, have some sort of prize for the final couple. Like, if you want to have your engagement, because they want to center the show around love, okay, fine. But between

those three finalists that got engaged at the end of this past season, can we get like, hey, one of them gets a, at all expense, week-long trip because they did this, or they want to challenge. I mean, like, an element of bachelor pad involved in Paradise other than the voting out part. It just, there's something missing now, and the fact that they just had three proposals, I don't know how they can top that ending. And if you get four or five next season, it'll be even more ridiculous because, as we know, or maybe you don't know, Bachelor Paradise film for 18 days. I know. People knew each other for 18 days and three people got engaged. That's ridiculous. Are you sure it was 18 days? It's not real. And not six weeks. Are you sure about that?

18 days. 18 days for Paris. June 8th to June 26. Now Bachelor films for eight weeks and Bachelor films for eight weeks, Paradise films for 18 days. They were home by June 29. And so started filming on 8th. I have another idea. How about this? How about this? They start out, people couple up, and then they get separated and they have to like do challenges to like get back to each other. It has like win time with each other basically.

And then sort of like who's more committed? I don't know. I just think they need to make more of a competition happening here. Oh, yeah. No, I mean, I don't know what it is, but they can't keep it. And it's been the same thing for three seasons. We see it all the time. And especially when you get in episodes five and six,

and it's like, great, you're bringing in Tiara, the chicken enthusiast, and Shoshana, and five couples are already coupled up and have been a couple of weeks. It's like these people have no chance. Why are we even bringing them on? We know they're not going to last. Another problem with the show is when you rely on having so many people in the rotation, you like dilute your crop, basically. So, you know, they need like almost, they go for like more people opposed to, like,

the bigger stars. Like, they would have been better if they had like Nick and Josh, and Evan and Jared and like that was it. And then like the twins, Kayla and like Ashley or something like that. They just need to like focus on quality, not quantity, with the people they get involved and then come up with a better like a better, like a better conceit basically. Or like something similar to like dating naked where do you watch dating naked?

Yeah. So there's like the one central couple and each week they kind of like try on new people and decide if they want the new people or whoever they already have. Like that kind of thing would be good too. Like actually dating naked is a very good idea for them because what would happen would be like Ashley and Jared are like the couple and it's like then they have other people thrown at them and they have to keep repeatedly deciding each week,

do I want to be with Jared or do I want to be at this new guy? And then it sort of is very similar, but you're subjected to less filler that way. Yeah, I mean, I know Brett got involved and that, you know, caused the hisy breakup. But if Brett, Carl and, you know, Ryan Beckett never showed up on this show, I think we would have been fine. Like, I don't, it wasn't a big deal, because nobody remembered them anyway from their season.

And the other thing is, like you said, with Josh and Amanda, like, okay, once Josh and Amanda were together, obviously they were together every day and their mouths were stuck to each other. But at some point, I think the show needs to incorporate, look, Josh or Amanda, you have to go out on a date with somebody else. Like, because when we knew Josh and Amanda were a couple, there's no, you bring somebody new in, if you don't force Josh and Amanda to go see other. people, then, okay, great, what's their story? There's nothing. You know, it's almost like, yeah, they should be forced to go out with somebody, even though Josh and Amanda are this tight couple,

or Lays and Grant are this tight couple. No, you need to go out with somebody else, and we're forcing you to. And, but when they have the option, and everyone's like, they come in and they're like, well, who's a coupled up? All right, well, Lath and Lath and Ratton are coupled up. I'm not going to touch them. Well, then it's no fun. Like, how about you do touch them? And you do try and pull Grant away from Lays or vice versa. Like, that's what we need. And I think that's where I just, I don't know how they can incorporate it, because it seems like they're pretty stuck on this format. You know?

Yeah, I've got to move them off of it. Yeah. Well, I'm, you know, I'm looking forward to next season. And I think we have a lot of Bachelor goodness ahead of us. I'm happy Paradise is over. It was a slog by the end. Steve, thank you so much for calling in. I'm sure I'll talk to you in January when next season is back.

and we'll be, uh, if you're interested in spoilers, everyone should go to reality, Steve.com to follow along next taping in real time. Yep. Thank you. I appreciate it. Yeah, always going to talk to you, Steve. We'll talk to you soon. All right.

Thank you so much for listening to Bachelor Party. Next season won't be back until January, but don't worry. You won't have to wait that long. For more of me, I got some lip-in-free styles planned. I'll be back. And of course, listen to Jam Session every other Wednesday for me and Amanda Dobbins talking about Celebrity News and much more. This coming Wednesday will be.

diving deep into Bridget Jones's baby. See the movie, listen to the pod, and I will be back soon.