Rachel Lindsay, the new Bachelorette, is a sparkle princess and we are so very excited for her season to begin!
But not as excited as ABC, apparently. During last night's finale, Chris Harrison kept teasing a "surprise" for Rachel, warning us to "hold on to your Spanx!"
The big reveal? That — UNBEKNOWNST TO HER — Rachel's season of The Bachelorette was starting RIGHT NOW ON LIVE TELEVISION.
First, it was a master class in what it looks like when a woman is being pressured to do something she doesn't want to do, but is trying to be nice.
Rewatching the clip, I was shocked by how many times Rachel straight-up verbalizes her unhappiness or shakes her head...with a big smile on her face.
There was a lot of this...
...and this.
Clenched teeth and clenched hands...
...some Wow, I have no words!...
...and some *actual words*.
After meeting the second suitor, Blake (who was so boring/unprepared, it hurt), Rachel said to Chris Harrison, "They're great! I mean, we could stop there..."
And because The Bachelorette wasn't done giving me college frat-party flashbacks, the next thing they did was bring out Dean, who introduced himself by saying, "I'm ready to go black...and I'm never gonna go back."
And then — and I missed this the first time because I was so busy yelling at the television — he licked his lips and made this face:
Even this white woman is like "TF???"
"Did he just????"
My face watching all of this unfold:
The segment ended on a high note, at least, with some genuine chemistry between Rachel and the fourth suitor, Eric:
Rachel handled every cringeworthy moment with total grace, but I'm really hoping that ABC and Chris Harrison will chill out with the "surprises" in Rachel's upcoming ~epic~, ~historic~ season.