Boring Ben Flajnik is this year's Bachelor. But before Ben had his choice of twenty-five women oh-so hungry for love, the former Bachelorette-reject was just a simple winemaker who happened to create the non-phenomenon dating move for shy guys everywhere, The Mental Kiss. Last night, the premiere episode of his televised pursuit of love premiered on ABC and boy, were there some interesting daters among the group.
There were women who were already planning their wedding to Ben and imagining what their babies would look like. There was a scorned lover whose last relationship had ended with a text containing the words, "Welcome to Dumpsville. Population: YOU." (Sounds like that dude is available and could make for a very interesting next season of The Bachelor, by the way.) There was a wacky blogger from New York City who spent most of the episode crying in back room. And, of course, there was Sheryl, the retired 72-year-old. Let's meet the players, shall we?
"If everything works out, Ben will definitely be coming back to Nebraska to eat some deer cake and beef nuts."
And then there was Emily, the PhD student who won over Ben by letting out her "gangsta" side:
It actually somehow worked?
And just in case you forgot, ABC thought it'd be nice to have poor Ben talk us through the embarrassing moment when he got down on one knee and proposed to last year's Bachelorette, Ashley Hebert. She turned him down for the world to see:
Okay, this brutal rejection is not really as excruciating to watch now that we all know that Ben went on to get his own reality show, but still: way harsh, Tai.
Now that you've met them, do you think any of these women will actually finish off this season of fake-love with a real engagement ring?