You are listening to their Reality Steve podcast with your host Reality Steve, he's got all the latest info and behind the scenes juice on Matt season of The Bachelor and interviewing some of your favorite reality stars. Now, here's a reality, Steve. What's up, everybody, welcome to podcast number two 15, I am the host reality. Steve, good show for you today. Very interesting. We've got Chad Kolton and Lizzie Paice.

From the Game of Thrones, Game of Thrones, Game, Rose's podcast. And then early yesterday morning, I was contacted by Maryborough's who's Evan Bass's ex-wife. Not for the first time, Marie and I have kept in touch over a couple of years, but she wanted to come on and she wanted to she had something to say.

So since nobody knows anything about Marie and Evan and their marriage, we'll start off with that.

But get into what she wanted to come on in the first place. So not a whole hell of a lot to get started, as you know. We've got The Bachelor starting on Monday, first time in franchise history, where we only had a week in between seasons, that was all due to the pandemic. But now we're back on a regular schedule. The Bachelor will air from January to mid-March. The Bachelorette season will start filming mid-March to the beginning of May.

Maybe a little bit and a little bit earlier, since it's going to be in a bubble again, they don't need the full seven weeks like they normally do. So maybe it even starts a week later or ends a week earlier.

Either way. That's what we're looking at for bachelorette season and then paradise will happen this summer, according to Robert Mills, they're going to do everything they can to make that happen. Where it's being filmed is a different story. I don't know if they're going to do Mexico or not. So that's the situation with that. Um, I should have some notes for you on Matt season.

I'm not going to have the episode by episode spoiler breakdown for his season, but you will get the episode break down. On Monday mornings, when the before the episode airs, you'll get a breakdown of what happens in that episode. But in terms of laying everything out before the season, know on Monday. I will have your episode one break down, but I will also give you everything that I have been told about this season up to this point and you know, kind of where we're at, where I'm at with with spoilers and everything.

So expect that on Monday, along with what what you expect what you can expect to see in Monday's episode of.

The bachelor season number 25, crazy. 16 Bachelorette's and our 25th BATCHELLER, 41 seasons now and still going strong, we talk about a lot of that coming up on this podcast with a Game of Roses, people with Chad and Lizzie and just a lot of stuff. I mean, Chad and Lizzie's podcast itself is an hour and 40 minutes. So get ready. And then the conversation with Maryborough's is about 30 minutes. But yeah, so much stuff to go over.

We talk about what happened on their podcast this week, and then we talk about the Tatia season with Claire and we talk about the contestants. We talk about the game format of the show. We talk about the rumor with Chris Harrison and oh, my gosh, he's moving to Texas. What does this mean? And then we get into a little bit of Dael season, but a lot of talk about the game aspect of it, because that's where they come from.

That's how they view this show. And just so much fun talking to them. I love talking to them. They will be frequent guests on this podcast. I can tell you that right now, probably have them on at the end of the season to go over everything. So and then after that, like I said, Maryborough's Evan Bass's ex-wife is coming on the podcast. As you know, Evan and Carly just recently announced that they're that they split up.

There's there's more to what is being reported, and Marie wants to say a few things, so you'll hear that.

But coming up first, here we are, Game of Roses podcast. With Chad and Lizzie, episode number two 15. All right, let's bring him in right now, they are from the Game of Roses podcast.

It's Chad Cotchin and Lizzie Paice or maybe as you know them better BATCHELLER Close Pace Case. Guys, thanks for joining me again.

Thanks for having a interesting week for you, to say the least.

Earlier this week on Tuesday, you guys released a podcast where Chad. Well, I had to I guess everyone tell everyone he was Chad. The whole podcast is was released on Tuesday. If you want to go listen to it, go ahead. For those that are unaware, I don't want to dive into every aspect of it. But, Chad, in your best words, describe exactly what happened this week and why you felt the need to dedicate a whole podcast to it.

I made a meme earlier last week, I believe, or maybe earlier this week, just about some exact class had posted that meme was then reposted on Reddit and somewhere in that Reddit thread that started a conversation that included a link to some of the books that I have written early in my career and some of the media coverage of those books. And this conversation kind of started to spiral into questioning why I was hiding behind a bachelor whose moniker, because the content of these books certainly is not for everyone.

It was controversial when it came out and remains to be controversial to this day. But I felt like it was necessary to just kind of come out and answer some of these questions because it was never like I was hiding behind a moniker or anything. And we address all of this in our episode on Tuesday, which anyone is free to listen to. We encourage people to do so.

As called, Bachelor is tackled 10.

Yeah. And I felt that there were some important things that need to be said, not only about who I am and the fact that we have never really been attempting to hide who my true identity is. We've mentioned it several times on the podcast. It was just kind of a joke to us that we would call each other by our Instagram handles. But even beyond that, I felt it was important to apologize for some of the marketing that was done around these books early in my career.

And I apologize to Lizzie for, you know, being forced to have this conversation with me. But I just wanted to kind of clear the air, not not for us.

For the record, I volunteered here, but she even put in a position where she felt it was necessary to do. And I appreciate that an immense amount. And we really just wanted to have a conversation about all the things that were being said in not only the Reddit thread, but in our Facebook group. And hopefully, hopefully people feel a little bit better about it all.

I cannot believe a thread on Reddit ended up being a topic. The echo chamber of negativity is what there is, what I refer to them as, because that's what basically they are. Nothing ever gets.

It's its people. And the reactions are valid to this stuff. And I don't want to discount anyone's reaction to anything, really. I mean, that's truly why we did the podcast is because, you know, some people do have certain attitudes about threads or whatever's going on online. But to us, it's like these are people who listen to our show, which means they kind of view the game in the same way we do. And we do care about how they feel and what they think and any reaction they might have to anything that we've done, even in this case 20 years ago, you know.

Yes, he was happy to have the conversation.

Honestly, I listen to your podcast on Tuesday. I listen to that one. And, you know, I. I understand. Why you took the time to say what you did? But my thing is coming from that echo chamber of negativity that they are, it's a very pile on mentality over there where one thing says somebody says something everybody else agrees with, it piles on and that person is now canceled. And that's where I had my issue was the fact that.

They can have their opinions about what you wrote 20 years ago, but to relate it to you today and to basically try and cancel you and call you out for, quote unquote, hiding behind a podcast, which you never did. That was my issue with the whole thing. I'm like, this is this is exactly what they do. That's why they are what they are. They're a they're an echo chamber of negativity because there's so much negativity spread on the things that I have seen written about me, things that I have seen written about the contestants on this show, what I saw you guys address.

It's just but, you know, just me saying that will now spark a whole other thread about reality. Steve just called us the echo chamber of negativity. And everyone will now pile on me because of that, because they have nothing better going on in their lives, apparently, than to go on a message board every day and talk about me. So that's my issue. They tried to cancel you over something you did 20 years ago. It's like, come on now, people.

I don't know.

I mean, to me, there's not really like. I didn't take it as an attempt at being canceled or anything, and I'm not even sure if I agree with the premise that anyone can be canceled. To me, it's just a conversation. People saw these things pop up. They felt like it was some new information, some revelatory bit of info that they found online. And we just wanted to explain that, like, that is not the case.

We've been very open about my identity. And here, yes, I did do some other creative projects in my past before Game of Roses, but now we're doing a Game of Roses and our audience is important to us. And we just wanted to make sure that everybody knew kind of the details of it all and where we stand now and where our creative interests are being focused, which is on this kind of coverage of the bachelor sport.

I think one of the interesting things that you mentioned on Tuesday in the podcast was what you wrote 20 years ago. I just briefly explain the books that people were referring to. The books that I've written are. The average American male, Dilli, the average American marriage, men, women and children, which was turned into a movie directed by an Oscar nominated director, Adam Sandler and Jennifer Garner in it, and most recently Strange Animals was the last book that I published.

And those? Early books were focused on written through the mind of a 25 year old male at the time, correct. So it was a lot of pro male jokes, probably a lot of anti female stuff written in them. I didn't read the books, but I was just judging. Judging from what you talked about on Tuesday, that's the impression I got. But I thought the interesting thing that you said on Tuesday was the fact that that was your life at the time.

You were a 25 year old guy who didn't hang around women at the time. You didn't have a lot of female friends at the time. Your job was, you know, coming home watching TV and playing video games. And so that was your environment. So that's what you wrote about. It doesn't necessarily mean here we are 20 years later, and that's what you still believe. Sure, and all those books are novels, I mean, they're all completely fiction.

Yes, some of them, the average American male. The first book is written from a first person, present tense perspective, similar to American Psycho. So it does kind of put you in the mind of this character. And I can see how on a cursory glance, without reading the book or doing much more research into it, just kind of cherry picking quotes out of it might give you the impression that this is like an autobiography, but it is not.

It is a work of fiction. And the other books after that are. I don't think maybe one or two of them, I can't remember which ones were written in first person present. Some of them are, but some of them are not. Some of them are third person, omniscient, whatever. So they're more kind of what a person might expect a novel to be. But I mean, yeah, they all deal with kind of controversial topics.

Men, women and children was about the effect of the Internet on the incoming generation of 13, 14 year old junior high kids in a small town in Nebraska. And that was written before Instagram, before Facebook really kind of went Tumblr first started becoming a thing. So maybe Facebook was out, but it was kind of about these kids and how their parents don't really understand that generation. We're now millennial are completely affected by the Internet and live entirely on the Internet.

And their parents, who are Gen Xers and baby boomers, will never have that perspective, never be able to understand. So, I mean, I've always been kind of dealing with these things in one way or another, I suppose, but.

Yeah, I mean, it was it's like I said, if you want to go listen to the podcast on Tuesday, check it out on the Game of Roses podcast. You guys cover it all exactly the issues that were brought up. But I guess, like I said, my thing was you guys never did try and hide behind who you were. You just kind of a funny thing where you just started calling each other by your Instagram handles. Even the first time you guys were on with me, I even mentioned we talked about briefly.

Bad judge and or have said the TV show by name, but that you were a writer for television, it was one quick Google search, could easily find your name and your past and what you did kind of like how have you Googled Tatia Adams exhusband? You could easily find Josh Burrell was right and all the stuff that I dealt with with that. So, yeah, I mean, there was never any hiding from you guys. That's what I didn't understand why this became such a thing.

I didn't I didn't get it.

But then again, I don't have a lot of things that happened.

I mean, I think we can't, like, expect to the everyone has has taken in our whole body of work, you know, and listen to every episode. It is I think it is so funny that we call people by their Instagram handles because it is how we measure people's success in the game. We always talk about teeny babies and Balochi and. Stuff like that just definitely meant to be a lighthearted joke. Yeah, yeah, I think it's it's pretty fascinating.

Go listen to it on Tuesday for those that want to know what the first 10 minutes was about. I want to move on to. The seasons at hand, the one we just completed, the one that just starts next week, which is kind of fascinating just in general for me and even I guess as a viewer in the fact that. covid. He's given us something that we've never had before in the history of this franchise, which is a one week break in between seasons.

I mean, this is they've kept the same schedule for BATCHELLER, but everything got pushed back this summer, which is why they crammed everything in right before Matt Season aired. So, yeah, we get a one week break in this franchise with Matt season starting on Monday. However, there is something that happened within the last 24 hours that I got to believe had both of your heart skipping a couple beats.

And that is this report that Dark Lord Harrison might be leaving the show and he's moving to Austin, is going to bring more Encima with him. And they're going to live on a ranch in Austin. Oh, my God. Is he going to host the show anymore? Oh, my God. Tell me, when you saw that story that you did not just freak out.

I mean, I to be I was like, doesn't he already have multiple houses, I feel like it doesn't really matter where he lives and he's just going to come crash the quarantine wherever from wherever. But I know he has always said. You know, he loves Texas and maybe we can shoot there because they know how to do things right, unlike California. So I'm not surprised at this move at all. Yeah, I'm curious.

I'm curious if it is the it is the first warning signal that that he is going to be slowly leaving. The retirement begins. I don't think so. I cannot imagine him leaving the show, especially not now. I don't think he would leave it in this strange, chaotic time where the seasons are back against each other. I heard Rob Mills on another podcast said that they already have their location for the next Bachelorette and it's also going to be above the season.

I don't think he wants to leave while it's like this. I think he wants to leave on a high note, like best season ever back in the mansion if he's going to leave it all in the next 10 years. I can also see him doing this until he's 60. You know, I I was under no possible illusion that he was about to leave the show. When I read that, I was just like, this is bullshit.

Yeah. He came out with an article almost immediately that was like now he said he's not leaving the show, the shows that he's not leaving the show, et cetera, et cetera. Yeah.

And, you know, trust me. What's the. Once the story hit yesterday that he was buying property and whatnot in Austin and thinking of moving out there immediately, a lot of people sent it to me as Chris Harrison quitting and stuff like that. And, you know, I've always said I don't think, you know, people have said, are they grooming wells? Are they grooming Ben Hagans? Old Jojo hosted a couple rose ceremony. Is she going to be the next host?

My thinking has always been as long as this show is on the air. Chris Harrison is the host. I don't think it's a very much a very it's very much like the Jeff Probst situation with Survivor. I just think when this show ends is when he ends. I don't think this show will ever be on the air without him. That's my impression that I've always gotten. I guess it could be wrong. Maybe they will have a face at the end.

I don't I just don't think the show will outlive us. I think.

Do you think he's moving to be closer to that? Well, Hossan isn't really that close for him. I mean, we're in the same state, I guess.

But I think I think the more interesting thing was immediately people jumping to the conclusion, because all the stories he said was Chris Harrison was moving to Austin. It didn't say Chris Anderson is moving to Austin and he's leaving the show. It was reports are he's moving to Austin. It's like, OK, you realize that The Bachelor only films twice a year for about seven weeks at a time, and then Bachelor Paradise films for roughly three weeks. He's allowed to live somewhere that his show doesn't film like.

I didn't I didn't even understand why people took that leap of logic. I guess it didn't make any sense to me why immediately it was, oh, he must be leaving the show. I never thought that for a second.

I thought that's a testament to how the show is filmed, that most people don't know the production schedule. They don't realize how little of the year it actually takes up.

Yeah, for sure. Or that like he's not living at Nemacolin when they're shooting that Jameses and he doesn't move to Mexico and buy a house there and make that his permanent residence when they do buy VIP.

Yeah, I, I mean, he obviously stated Nemacolin the whole time he was there, but he's not living. Yeah. He's not living in Farmington, Pennsylvania for seven weeks. He's living in the resort where they were. I don't think he was flying out in and out of Nemacolin.

I mean he had to for looking to because he had to move his kid into college. He left once and that's why Jojo came in.

But, yeah, the whole thing when it came up yesterday, just I was like, oh, perfect timing, because the dark, dark Lord Harrison leaving the show would have a Game of Roses podcast up in like I don't even know what you do with yourselves if Dahler left this be a new dark.

But I think, like Lizzie said, the game is going to outlive us. I truly see it as like the NFL and the Dark Lord is kind of like the commissioner of the sport at this point. He's obviously on camera more than the commissioner of the NFL. But to me, that role is the whoever the host is, it is interchangeable and it will be a weird transition for whoever is going to replace him. But someone will in the next 20 years, probably.

Yeah, I guess I guess I've always thought that this show is just going to be like we've had a great run. We're done whether they get to a nice round number season fifty, which is another eight seasons away, another five year, four or five years or I just I think it's so hard to predict who makes that decision to say, like, well, this is a show that makes us one hundred million dollars a year.

All told, in advertising revenue. Let's just get rid of that is at this point, there aren't like it's not like a sitcom where actors are like, well, I've been playing this character for ten years. It's time to hang it up there. Isn't that kind of like person who can be tired of the show. Mike Fleiss would be that person and he's already that person. He doesn't do a lot on the show. It has his name on it and he gets his checks.

But the producers are kind of a rotating cast of people that's always being recycled. So people do come in and move on. It's like the the format of the show is what's going to persevere, I think. And as long as you can have the production entity around it, kind of recycling fresh blood all the time, I think it goes forever.

No, I think my classes is heavily involved. I think he is the one who's responsible for all the scooters is he's grabbing all of them and bringing them in the scooter guy.

Yeah, I've always thought that it was I guess my thinking was more along the lines of. Fleiss and his team of. The higher up production is pretty much the same, and that those people are just like, we've had a great run, we're done. And I understand the money aspect of it because it's very cheap to make everything is pretty much done on trade and it just brings in numerous amounts of money. And the women, 18 to 54 demographic, it winds its winds.

It's two hours every Monday night. So why would you get rid of it other than maybe we just don't know where television is going in the next five to 10 years. And it's just something changes where a show like this isn't necessarily needed on a network schedule anymore. And maybe it becomes an online show. Maybe it's something like that for sure.

Yeah. So it leaves network for sure. What's going to happen next? Five years, I think.

Yeah, if it leaves network, that's where I can see. That's where I can see the dark lord. Maybe leaving once he's off network TV and he's like, I'm not an online guy, I'm dark lord.

I totally agree with that. I could totally see that would make more sense. That's that's how he leaves if once the show gets pushed off network television. OK, I think we're in the same boat there. You know, the other one other thing I want to talk about along those same lines is someone who's become such a major player in this franchise because of what she does and because of who she's dating. And that's Lauren Zema.

I'm just kind of fascinated by her career art right now.

Is it weird to you at all that the number one. Coverage person for this show for Entertainment Tonight is someone that has her own. Online show about it, they put it on E.T., she gets to interview the contestants right away, happens to be the girlfriend of the host of the show. Like there's clearly no way that Lauren Zema can be objective when covering the show, when the guy that she's been dating for two years and probably going to get engaged to, I would think it's happening soon.

That's just a guess on my part. But probably I haven't heard anything, but probably only spoiler alert. No, I just a complete guess.

But is it is it just weird to me? Am I the only one that seeing that this is totally weird and just something off about it? Chad, please back me up.

Well, I mean, I think it's like, you know, Entertainment Tonight extra any of these types of shows, they're not doing like hardcore journalism about any of this stuff. Yeah. They're presenting whatever the networks want them to present. They're essentially just advertisements for that media. And that's literally what she is for The Bachelor. Yes, she has these interviews with people and specifically with Chris Harrison, where she is sometimes asking questions that are like the bigger questions and whatever's going on in the bachelor world about quarantining maybe or is.

I remember when she did an interview with him and she's like, that is The Bachelorette, right? And he's like, I don't know.

Lately I have heard that that interview made me feel crazy.

That's what I mean. It's like she can't cover the show objectively when we know that she she knows way more than she presents but pretends that she doesn't like. That's what I don't get.

I don't want to know. I want to know what's going on with relationships. The podcast that was supposed to be launched and then hasn't. And when when will we see it. Yeah.

So that whole thing came down that Lauren announced. I'm releasing a podcast beginning of December. It's called Relationships, where we drink wine, I guess, and talk about relationships. And then someone called her out on Instagram for stealing the title and the graphics or what exactly was that? You guys covered this in one of your podcasts.

It was a black female black podcast host was like, you stole my whole concept of the show and also the R and the R is very similar. I mean, but it's like it also is a show talking about relationships, a tricky one.

I imagine that's like 50 percent of podcast. But yes, she apparently was scrapping the whole thing, the whole title, doing a rebrand, but haven't heard any update on it.

I thought she was announcing that she had a new. So she hasn't said anything about relationships. Well, she changed it. She did make a brief announcement saying she's changing the title to relations, I believe, and then it was still supposed to come out. If I'm remembering right. This may be inaccurate to some degree, but I think that was supposed to come out on December 4th, that podcast, and it never did so.

And she did a whole she did a whole circuit of going on other podcasts, which presumably was meant to promote her podcast.

But and that's when this lady called her out for so. So OK. So what is your opinion? Do you think that Lauren Zema. Knew that there was another podcast out there called Relationships and didn't care, or do you think that she named her podcast relationships and had no idea? And it was just she should have looked at all of that up before she named it. I just feel like you Google whether there is a podcast by the same title when you make a podcast, but I don't know, we're when we Google gave of roses, you know, nothing came up.

But maybe if you have so much other shit going on, you're just depending on your support staff to fill that kind of stuff out.

I think they came up with the name independently, her and her team. They Googled it. I think they saw there was another relationships. And we're just kind of like, well, fuck it. Are things going to be different for Encima? It's fine. We can run with this, not realizing that they would then be called out for it. Now she has to kind of rethink how she's going to brand it. But I totally agree with you in terms of considering her to be an objective reporter on anything regarding The Bachelor.

You simply cannot, because she really at this point is just a marketing mouthpiece for the show.

Yeah, I mean, and I guess it works for it because it's not like they're hiding the fact that I mean, I don't know. I don't see how many of her reports. I don't know if she openly says my boyfriend Crosshairs. And I doubt she introduces him like that when she interrupts him. But I mean, any interview that she does with Chris, any interview that she does with a contestant, we kind of already know that she knows more than she's letting on in those interviews.

And when she teases something, when she talks about something on her roses and Rosie, I think it isn't it just like, OK, while we can sit here and enjoy what you're saying on Roseanne, Rosie, you're not giving us the full story and you are never going to say anything really negative about the show because how can't she she's dating the host. There's zero objectivity there.

She never will. She really, to me, is just an extension of the show in the same way that the show never tells us the actual truth of what's going on. And in fact, the producers are doing all they can to maintain the lie that these people are they're really just looking for love. And the producers certainly aren't trying to sabotage any of these relationships in the same way that lie holds true for the show. She kind of maintains the same thing, like I'm just a reporter trying to get straight answers from the host of the show.

And so clearly that is not the case. But all of the time of reporting, I mean, that's been a thing forever.

Like Entertainment Tonight has never been in the business of doing hardcore journalism that gets to the deepest, darkest parts of any of our favorite shows and movies. They're just basically doing commercials for those shows and movies. Yeah, yeah.

By the way, I should be clear, like I think she does a really good job at what she is doing for me. I don't want to watch a show where I can't really believe anything they're saying, but it's very popular and I think her podcast will do very well.

Absolutely. And she's good like she's fantastic on camera, whether or not she is getting to the bottom of things. And all that shit to me is kind of a side issue. It's like she found this thing. She carved this niche out for herself. She kind of forced her way into the bachelor world. And she now exists at one of the top echelons of that pyramid. Whatever she's doing, congratulations. It's fucking working, you know. Yeah.

Isn't roses and rosy part of it now? It's not just an online show. Yeah, I think so, yeah, I haven't watched it in a while, so I don't know what she has done with it. Isn't it just a recap of the episode and then maybe an interview with maybe contestant? I don't I don't like what is her what is Rosie Rosie doing now? Has it evolved at all?

Yeah, I've only watched clips but she's very expressive and has comedic timing. OK.

And, you know, the pinnacle of bachelor journalism is that you get to take Christerson and so something we all can aspire to.

Yeah, well, this is the dark.

I mean, just the fact that she gets to be in the presence of the Dark Lord at the end of every night.

I guess it just it's got to be fascinating. Yeah. It's just it's just crazy how her career has taken her from just someone who covered the show for an entertainment site where she got to, you know, show up to one of the early group dates of the season, interview some contestants and get gets to run those interviews to two or three months later to where she is now.

I mean, you know, I guess it's just I guess if you're looking for objectivity, you're just that's the the main thing to take is just you're not going to get it out of out of that. But then again, like you said, Chad. Entertainment shows aren't really all they're doing is cheerleading for the things that they're covering anyway. Yeah.

All right. So, Steve, you're a huge ratings guy. Yeah. What did you think about the ratings for the end of the season?

I was really like I was surprised, but then I wasn't I guess I was more surprised that the finale just didn't have a giant uptick in it, as every finale does from the premiere episode. I mean, looking at it right now, Episode four was the Clair and Dale engagement that drew five point three million and at one point five rating. We got Tatia at the end of that. But that was a Claire Dale episode. Tatia took over, especially episode five, which is five point four million and one point six, which was the highest rated show of the season.

But then you went from that episode five, you went four point four million, four point twenty five, four point one four point one three point eight four point twenty five, four point nine and five point two. So it's like it dipped and then it got back to its original number for the finale.

And it's hard. It's hard because. I'm not going to sit here and say her season was terrible because I didn't think it was terrible, I didn't think she was terrible at all. I think there were a lot of factors involved. I think covid fatigue is one.

I think the fact that it's airing it aired over basically two holidays, even though it ended the week of Christmas, it's just not a time where people are consuming television. And then thirdly, radio ratings are just down across the board on network television. I mean, streaming is is starting to take over now and ratings on network television outside of, you know, NFL football and live sporting events. Every show is down.

I I looked at the ratings last week when I was like, what is the highest rated show on TV? I had no idea what the highest rated show on TV. So I looked for the week of the week before. So it was like the 15th, the week of December 15th. The highest rated show on television was 60 Minutes and it drew 11 million people. Wow.

In the heyday of television before streaming and when it was basically the way to watch your shows was the four major networks. You know, American Idol was drawing 35 million people a week. I mean, it was just there's nothing even close to that. It television's just it's comparing apples to oranges now to talk about network television ratings versus what they were got even ten years ago. I mean, 2005. And it just you can't when American Idol was in its heyday of Carrie Underwood, Taylor Hicks, that four or five seasons, four or five and six, they were drawing 35 million people a week and a rating over, I think three.

I mean, that is unheard of in network television now.

And now you're telling me that 60 Minutes, which has been on the air for 50 fucking years, I guess, is the is the most watched show on network television, really.

I mean, it just shows you people just aren't watching network TV anymore, but. For this for Tatia, even though even though the finale basically drew what her first episode did, 5.2 million for a reality show that's been on for 40 seasons and at one point three rating, that ABC is happy as clams with that. I mean, they're not absolute, but that was winning.

It's like like you said. I would also say, though, that part of the reason I think the ratings were down was because of the fractured narrative structure. Usually when we tune into these shows, we are tuning into a 10 round game where we get to watch these players compete in a Survivor esque game of attrition that got interrupted in Episode four. What clear leads? And it kind of gets reset. So any of the dramatic build that you have for any of these players to see, like who's your favorite?

Who's going to make it to the end? Do you want to see or wind up with that whole thing? All the gas gets taken out of that in Episode four and you've got to restart it. And I think that that had an impact on the viewing audience in terms of their investment in what they were going to watch for the back half of it. Yeah, yeah.

Kluth had like minds going all the way, becoming ground floor off at the knees.

I also think that, like you said, and I think Robert Mills addressed this in the podcast that he was on this week with Julia Lippman. Is is that the podcast you were referring to when you mentioned Mills earlier, John? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So I listen to that as well, because I'm always interested in hearing, what, Miltos I like hearing him speak about the show more so than Chris. Granted, he doesn't give you much, but he'll give you morsels here and there.

I did he did mention the fact that when Tatia took over, if you were to fast forward and know who the final four guys were, none of those final four guys were even remotely shown during Claire's season. You didn't see much of Brendan or Zach. None of them had formed a connection with Claire. Even these guys were all nobody's when taisho over. So they had no one.

The audience didn't have much of an investment into those four, but that was what the producer presented to. Yeah, we have received information that claims and I forget where this came from because we get so much inundated with it. But Zach had a conversation with Keisha on the night he had the entire Claire. Sorry, I was clear Zach had a conversation with Claire the night that she got into the argument with Yoseph, and they only showed Dale showing up to be the shoulder to cry on.

But Zach actually had a very long conversation with her that night as well.

Yeah, that makes sense. And I know that others did come to her defense. I had heard the same stuff as well, that it was a pylon mentality from the guys on Yoseph and they all ended up backing Claire on that. And we're all sticking up for her. But what do they show us? They show us Dayle coming to her rescue, which I get why they did. But there was there was more to it.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think they cut I feel like someone told me this, that they cut her Claire making out with Ben, even though they had shown us they had set up this little mini date where he did this carnival game where one of them was like first kiss, but we didn't see them kiss.

That's right. That was in the promos. Right. We saw that, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

It was a it was. Yeah.

I think they wanted to keep the men clean for four tatia for Teisha.

Yeah. I mean they just. Well I mean when you think about it, she had two one on one dates that we saw Claire, she had Jason which went rather well and then she had her one and then she went on her one on one with the other, Zac, which ended up being a disaster.

She would show up for the nighttime portion of it.

I've got I've already bought that out. Yeah.

So that was those were her only. Those were her. Only two one on ones. Everything else was a group date set for group dates and two one on ones. And then you had her final quote, one on one with Dale where they, you know, danced to the, you know, the private concert date. But I mean, that wasn't I mean, the outcome was already determined at that point. That was a bonus. Let's give them a date.

But. Because it wasn't like here's a date, Cardale is getting hit today and it was just, you know, out of the normal game form of how Claire and Dale had their day, but, yeah, had two one on one dates.

And on those group dates, there wasn't many people that, I don't know stuck out to me. I can't even remember who got the group date roses.

I think Dale got one and Claire gave one to herself. Or get one. Yeah, one. She gave no gave out to nobody. I can't remember who got group date roses.

So yeah, it was definitely two completely different seasons. So let's we all know Claire and Dale have made it out. They either Claire Claire is either in New York or Dale is in Sacramento on their Instagram. I mean, they've spent tons of time together post show. So it seems like things are going well for them. Your impressions of the finale and how it broke down. If you want to start with Claire and Dale, go ahead. But let me start with you, Claire and Dale, your thoughts and then get to, I guess, the ending of the season and how she broke it down.

We were talking about what the biggest takeaways were for us from this season, and we both agreed that our number one was DOMAs because we are living in this Instagram era of the game and the fact that he did this. Incredibly strong preseason play, his Instagram was absolutely perfect. We predicted he would get the final rose based on his preseason play, basically, and then Claire basically admits, yeah, maybe they weren't cybering, but she was watching his Instagram stories every day.

Yeah.

He said something we talk about a lot on our podcast is about this para social game where you're talking to the camera and people feel like they know you and the fact that she fell in love with him just from Instagram. It's and it's, you know, this very rare circumstance where this could have happened, where production was closed and she already knew who the players were.

But I we've never seen a player do something like they almost did. And it was so fun to watch. I'm still very into their. Their Instagram content, they're making basically hometown dates that never happened on Instagram, and it's just like it is so strong, we think Dale is going to Dale is going to take off that he's going to have a million plus followers at some point, do some hosting, that kind of thing.

She should give him a haircut the other day. You see someone give him a haircut. Oh, he went to this he's he's in Sacramento right now and she posted on that. He went to her salon and she gave Murcutt. She what she does, she's a stylist. And she cut his hair. They talked about it afterwards. Oh, yeah. A whole thing.

So, I mean, just everything he's doing on social media, he's taking these little things where people are making fun of him from the party city costumes and then he posts them. He's like, look, I am wearing Superman costume and I still look hot. And, oh, people are saying, I look like this little girl or like this woman who looks like the girl from Polar Express. What? I'm going to do a tick tock with her.

I'm going to get millions of views on that.

He is so fucking strong and impressive. Chad, your thoughts on Dale? Exactly the same, I mean, still, even after appearing at four episodes of this season, he still is crushing all of the other male players in Instagram account, his seven hundred and sixty k. The next closest is that who I believe is at five forty right now.

And he got up and he got like 300 of those in one day. Yeah, he's at five seventy seven now, so he's climbing the charts. But like you're saying, this is the first time we're ever going to see a bachelorette season, but right up against the bachelor season. So I do feel like a lot of these players are going to be iced wherever they are, because all of our attention collectively is vaccination is about to turn toward this new crop of thirty two players.

But I do think what Gail Moss did this season was transcendental. It does set a new precedent. And like Lizzie said, we don't know if it's ever going to happen again because of the rare circumstance in which she was able to apply this social game and whether they were defending each other or not. We may never know that. But what we do know is certainly they were indirectly communicating through their posts. Claire even mentioned looking at his stuff all the time.

And I think he knew that was happening. And I think she probably did it so they could post something and put something in a caption that's not directly saying, hey, Claire, I'm trying to tell you this, but they could tell each other things about themselves in this kind of indirect social communication that I think we just are not going to see that again unless there is some other catastrophic circumstance that forces production to go on hiatus for five months and all that kind of stuff, which I hopefully won't happen.

Yeah, I mean, it happened because of covid. I mean, this doesn't happen on any normal season. And so which brings me to my next question of I know that Tatia was contacted, you know, late in the process of, hey, we need you to come on and we're thinking we want to bring you on as The Bachelorette.

The bottom line was whenever she was contacted, she had the ability to look at these guys as well. So she has said. I didn't mean I don't believe it for a second, but I'm also not saying she did a deep dive on the, you know, because she didn't know who was left or whatever. But look, if you're about to be The Bachelorette and you have an opportunity to at least look at your guys before showing up that night, of course, she looked.

So that's why I'm saying I don't necessarily believe that she didn't look. But did she do a deep dive and go over all their Instagram accounts and look at every picture? No, but I got to believe that she looked at what guys she was about to enter into.

I mean, it's high stress. It's a high stress situation that she was coming into. It is hard for me to believe that she wouldn't prepare.

Yeah, well, and there's something wrong if she did, because Claire did it for four months, like she was looking at her guys. She was looking at their Instagram story, she admitted it. So I just find it weird that cases like, no, I wanted to go in with a clean slate.

Come on. Do you looked at the guys? Stop it. I mean, and it's not a big deal if you did it just I find it really hard to believe, even if it was like, oh, I barely had any time. Well, I guarantee you did. I think the one thing we heard was she had 48 hours to get to Lakita. Well, that means she had to sleep in her bed before she left for Lockington. You don't think that she laid in her bed and scrolled through her phone before she went to bed and just said, OK, what guys did they throw out there?

Who's I don't know who's left, but at least I know, you know, I'm looking at some of the guys that could still be there and maybe she, you know, looked at some spoilers to be like, oh, this person's not around anymore, whatever.

I just think she looked and I don't think it's a big deal that she did. Look, I just don't know why she's saying she never looked at any of the guys. Come on.

You're about, I think your bachelorette I think it should be something they incorporate into the show. Yeah, well, you should have like a month or something or at least a week to look at each other's Instagram's. I think it helps the show. It heightens their relationships. As soon as they hit the door at that point, as soon as they get out of the limo, they're the pair special bond that they've built with the lead and the lead back to the players.

It heightens their emotional investment. From night one. You're going to see more tears. You're going to see more kisses. This was true of Bob Guiney, who was the first bachelor in season four to be cast from the player pool of a prior season of Bachelorette. And we saw in that season all the players who walk out of the window are already in love with him because they've watched him for a full season on TV. I think giving the players the ability to have some kind of a social relationship with the league before they meet each other and vice versa, that lead to the players actually helps the show.

And we'll have to reflect modern dating because I'm on all the dating apps. People are putting their Instagram bio as like a business card type thing, like stock me and check out, you know, that I'm a real person and I'm not a murderer kind of thing.

And we're going to get that with Matt Season because Matt was announced on June 12th and these women didn't leave for filming until beginning of October. So they had four months to look at every single thing that Matt did and watch him in the quarantine crew. Never wear never wear a mask. You know, they had all that going into their heads.

Yeah, yeah. And and some of their Instagram is the same tailor made to Matt's preferences, you know, very curious about that.

Yeah. I mean, it was it was interesting. So going down to the let's just talk about the final four for for the season and her guys chat.

I'll start with you. Sure. Were you I mean, I don't know where you were spoiler wise with this, if you had known and then things got a little murky at the end or whatever, but the initial, you know, spoiler out there from before the season started was, hey, she picked Zach. But I don't know what's going on.

The relationship. I don't know if you knew that or whatever. Where were you at with spoilers heading into that final couple of weeks of crammed episodes together? I was completely spoiler free, but I did predict Zach would win. OK. I was spoiler free, had predicted Brendon, and pretty disappointed.

That's OK.

Did you think Brendan should have and I say should have, but again, we don't know. I have a feeling that Brendan probably tried to leave earlier than he did or at least expressed some serious doubt about. I don't know if this is for me, because in post show interviews that I've listened to with him, this guy was literally plucked from obscurity on this show. He knew he knew nothing about what game he was about to enter and what and what it meant.

So, Chad, what were your thoughts on that final three, him leaving and then Ben coming back and then her giving Ben a chance only to eliminate him two days later? Like, what was your thoughts on that? I thought the resurrection was completely telegraphed. I don't think that was a surprise to anyone watching the show. As soon as you see him get in the car and drive off into the night. He's like, I fucked up. It's like, no, you didn't do.

There's a producer sitting one foot away from you telling you they're going to bring you back. They're going to drive you around the parking lot of of Lakita, and then they're going to put you back in your room for two days and you're going to be right back in the show. So to me, that was the producers are getting sloppy with those kinds of things, at least in this season. And granted, the season had a lot of things out of their control.

So hopefully they'll be on their A game in the upcoming season. But in terms of Brendan leaving, this is actually Lizzies error of the season. And I agree it was a huge one. You never take yourself out of the game. And I guess what you're saying is true, maybe he did try to leave earlier because he's just not cut out for this. But once you're in it, the possible benefit of getting however many Instagram followers you can get and becoming an influence is so immense, you stay in the game at all costs.

I think he could have made it maybe to the finals if they hadn't have done that thing with Ben. But the thing with Ben kind of belies that. Maybe the producers did know he was going to leave and they had orchestrated all of this. I also think the Iven dismissal was interesting. We talked about that in our episode on Monday, which was kind of a recap of the top 10 things to take away from the season that this was the first time, although clearly the game has gotten more and more overtly Christian.

All the leads and our Christian faith is brought up from time to time, sometimes with Hannah Brown openly, she'll say Jesus still loves me, things of that nature. Luke P was obviously very Christian on her season. And this, to our knowledge, is the first time that religion is used as a reason to dismiss somebody with Ivan. And we found that pretty interesting, obviously something that was out of his control. By the way, sorry, go ahead.

Sorry. By the way, I haven't had my play of the season when he had that one on one date with Tatia, where they talked about Black Lives Matter and George Floyd and police brutality being mixed race in America like that conversation to me was the highlight of this season, like lining it up with the resurgence of Black Lives Matter. Relating that to his family's story and then they showed Gabriel, his brother, in this very humanizing way, like to me, and we had just done this hyper bond where we watched every season of The Bachelor.

There has been no conversation even close to this on the show before. So it made me very excited about the future of Bachelor that. You know, maybe we don't have to be as complicit as I have felt in some of these issues.

No, I agree. I mean, it was a conversation, not only have we never, that it was important at the time, not even close, the show doesn't broach anything that's remotely on the fence, controversial, whatever. It's just such basic. Oh, I love my family. Oh, you do. I do, too. You know, that's the common ground these people usually have, you know, and then to find out post show that basically I haven't told her I'm agnostic and she's wants to marry someone who's Christian that basically did them in again.

Is it a situation where should this have come up earlier? You get to a final three with somebody and you find this out. Seems a little late, but, you know, I don't know because we don't know what they talked about before, maybe even briefly mentioned it, but they never dove into it until they had a lovely romantic night in an Airstream, you know, and stuff like that comes out when you're sitting in an area and you're like, hey, I'm agnostic, by the way.

Yeah.

So it's also a bigger issue of the show. Generally, the premise of this show, the conceit that the producers are putting forward is this is a process by which people are meant to fall in love or the lead is meant to be able to choose from a variety of different people and see who matches with her. The best shouldn't at the very least. The producers asked the lead in the very beginning, do you have any deal breakers? And if one of them is that simple, has to be Christian, shouldn't every guy on the show be Christian?

Well, that's that's that's being that's being too realistic, Chad. I mean, of course. But we know that this is a television show.

They're not casting. Right. The 20 most most perfect men for the lead and vice versa. They're not casting the 32 most eligible women for Matt James that fit him to a t the casting at all.

And they were also cast for Claire. Not so well.

Well, and and here's the other thing that I found totally interesting by something that Brendon said. Brendon, I think, said in one of his interviews. Claire wasn't really for me, Taisha was more my vibe, and he said I was contacted and 10 days later I was flown out to La Quinta. So that tells me yet again, I mean, look, I can say it till I'm blue in the face and people are going to choose to not believe it.

But they knew they were bringing Tatia in at some point before the season even started. And you can't tell me otherwise because I have proof, but I can't show it without outing sources anyway.

But but stuff and stuff that I can talk about because they've talked about it themselves. When when when a guy like Brendan says in an interview he did that Claire wasn't really his type Tatia absolutely vibe with he absolutely vibe with her more. And from the time he was contacted, he was basically recruited by somebody, by a production, by casting. And 10 days later, he was in Laquinta.

Wait a second. Back backup.

Yeah. You had Claire as your bachelorette. Brendon was not part of the initial cast, nor was any of her final four taster's final four, except for Yvonne. He was the only one and only four of her final 12. Wow. We're in the initial casting yet more evidence, but again. However, when I hear players are Basharat, we're filming in March oh, covid head, sorry, we got to recast.

You had four months to recast and you cast Brendan ten days before he left for filming. And you yet you're telling me you're trying to convince me that you cast him for Claire. You didn't you cast him because you knew who was coming on. Like he practically admitted it himself in the interview. Like I buy Patricia. I didn't there wasn't really anything with Claire.

So just more and arguably, arguably, Brendon and Tatia are meant to be together. He is her type as well. This is why I thought Brendan was going to win. This is very gentle, like Taisha and also younger, which is that was her type.

So, yeah. And look and I think what I've been saying all season makes me has led people to email me and say, you know, why are you putting this isn't his fault. We're not putting it on her. I'm not even saying Tatia knew that she was going to be called. Like they're making it seem like Taisha knew the whole time, like, oh, yeah, I know. I'm going in. No, I think production sat down when they storyboard their season.

This was there. This was their like, big twist. This season is like, look. We can easily convince Claire because they knew how much she was in denial preshow. I don't think they looked at it as much of a hard job for them to convince her to leave the show with him.

I think if they were just like, no, we'll just go with the whole season and she'll she'll pick Dale. And that'll be our season, I think, because they had their first time ever doing a one location shoot. It was being starting airing in October. And they knew this. Everything was off. They needed some twist, they needed some hook. And their hook was will bring in somebody because we know Claire is going to be fall for Dale.

And even if she doesn't want to leave the show, we can easily make her leave the show and just be like, hey, Claire, it's you and Dale. Like, it's obvious, like you guys need to run with this.

Like, it's very it was clear as day. Now, I'm not saying that Tatia new production was going to do that to Claire. I'm just saying that she got a call. They wanted her. But what I'm saying is they knew they wanted her before it all started. And then hearing these things post show is it things are just adding up way too easily.

And they know what they're doing. Like you said, that that episode had the highest ratings. Yeah, I mean, that was the highest rated episode of the season, was was was his first episode. And Claire and Dale, that episode before Episode four, right before it was. 100000 viewers less, and that was it, those were the two highest rated episodes of the season, Episode four, an episode five. So it worked out for them.

And no, I don't think I don't think you had any clue what was going on with the Clare and Dale situation. She just picked up the phone and said, yeah, I'll do it. But I'm just saying, before the season started, they knew we're going with Tatia as The Bachelorette at some point this season. I don't know if they thought, oh, it's going to be episode four and it's going to go this way. They just knew they were bringing her in and they were going to have a second bachelorette.

That's all it was. And Brendan's interview now and now and then I hear that and I think about it even more. I'm like, wait a second, it's not making any sense. This guy just admitted you called him ten days before he left to go film when you had four months of casting men like what casting meant for Claire.

If you're Claire, if Taisha wasn't even on your radar whatsoever, you had four months of casting men for Claire. And here he is saying, yeah, I got called ten days before I left and I wasn't really into Claire, but Taisha was way more my vibe. It's like, OK, there's a reason she was way more your vibe because you were brought in specifically for her and you lasted and you lasted long. Like, is it four. Is it.

Yeah, four of the 12 four of those final 12 were in the initial cast. So eight men that happened to make this final 12.

We're part of the July cast that was announced three days before they started filming. It's just a lot of evidence out there. They don't ever admit it. I mean, they specifically said, oh, no, we didn't plan this. It's like, OK, well, you did.

You don't have to convince me of any of this. They shot a bentonite one at the mansion. Oh, that's right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's right.

You had people I had people telling me that say, hey, look, you said that there was a first night film.

Are you aware of this and are you aware of what that is saying?

We actually I mean, when that was all going down, there were pictures coming out that I was posting of the guys at the Westlake Village in wherever they stay or that Sheraton like across the street from the mansion. So, yeah, we knew they were all out there and they were all set to go. And that that Friday, that Friday the 13th was the supposed to be the was the limo entrances. But yeah, it got shut down and there was never any.

Did you get some sort of tip that said, yes, there was a first full month?

Where in this country have any actual evidence? Where did this come from?

The evidence was all kind of circumstantial things that I would hear players say in podcast about what you would hear. Like I forget who it was. Was it maybe Kelly Flannigan was flying out to do Pippy's after the final rose.

She was going to be in the audience so that they could have that shot of her waving like everything's fine. And she said that she flew out on a plane with Blake Moines to L.A. and I was like, well, I'd always be in L.A. if they weren't about to start shooting. And so that was probably just before they started shooting or before they planned to start shooting the original season of Clair's. So they were in L.A. They were in that hotel.

And I have to imagine at least some of the guys met each other at that point.

They keep they keep them pretty separate. This is like CIA level shit, like you literally don't see unless I mean, even if you go to the bathroom, like, well, the bathroom is down the hall. This isn't a dorm room. But, yeah, if you want to go down to the gym, you have to request time to go down with the handler and they have to make sure that no other guys from the season are in the gym.

And everything you do outside of your room has to be pre-approved like you literally don't see who is sure who else is on your season until you are in the lobby about to enter the limo to go to the mansion.

Yeah, exactly. And I'm like, is that when they put you in your little pod, five people and yeah, you're going to be okay with it. And no one, whoever it's going to be, or they at that point when they pulled the plug. From what I heard, no, but it was earlier in that day, I mean, I'm sure guys were set to get dressed.

I mean, maybe someone will be the funny thing to find out. How many of you had your suits on on March 13th? Ready, or did you only have the shirt tie on? You were still ironing your pants. Like, when did you find out?

We've gotten a lot of counter evidence as well that say there was no one to be clear. No, that's the funny part. Yeah, that's that's kind of the funny part about it is like when did they find out?

I know it got shut down that day, but was it you know, when guys were standing in the lobby about to get into the limo, maybe it was they found out then like, I don't know.

But I just remember as a country, I'm almost positive as a country around three or four o'clock that day, maybe it was a 2:00 in the afternoon, Central Time. I just remember Trump holding a press conference at the White House saying this is a global pandemic on Friday the 13th. And at that point, I got to believe is when the production team and ABC was just, yeah, we can present just this global pandemic, can't film the show.

So, yeah, it must have been early evening, you know, maybe maybe in the afternoon, maybe between one and three o'clock Pacific time, they realized, OK, we can't shoot tonight. But yeah, that that must have been it. But but yeah. Fascinating. They had four months to cast people and yet Brendan gets called ten days beforehand like that, just something majorly off about that. And the fact that most of his men were not in the initial cast for Claire, you know, the only four were Blake Moines Ivan.

I had it written down and put it in one of my columns, it was Blake BOYENS, Ivan and in the top Domar was in the initial cast of so he finished, what, eighth, seventh? Blake Moines finished fifth. And then there was one other one, four out of 12. So, yeah. Interesting.

All right, let's move on to Matt season, because I know you guys are breaking down the rankings right now. You had a podcast. You had a podcast that came out this week doing a one to 16 rankings of the 32 Women for Matt season. I first need to ask you before we continue, are you are you have you heard of anything in regards to the season spoiler wise? And do you want to hear anything, things otherwise? We have not I would prefer we could not do that.

Well, I that's possible, OK?

I mean, I haven't put it to this. I haven't put out the winner, so it's not like it's out there.

So, OK, so you guys are ranking you did one to 16 and you're doing it by lowest Instagram follower count to highest. That's what you're basically going to do. Yes, OK, who was No one who had the lowest? The lowest was Lauren Maddox. Oh, really had. She had a she has 12, 73. OK, so this is lowest in terms of what date did you. That take their fight to. Twelve twenty seven.

Oh, so you did it as of twelve twenty seven, OK, because obviously I think people are hearing things and following women they think might last long because I have the list of. All the names and Instagram accounts of what their follower count was back on three days before filming began, which I believe it came out, it was either October 6th of October 7th. I wrote down all the follower accounts then, and I have. One, two.

Well, yeah, some of them still hot below a thousand. Yeah, I'm looking I'm just counting the below one thousand four, five, six, six people below a thousand back on October 6th and another. And I guarantee they're all over. They got to be in at least four figures now, some probably in five figures, but yeah.

And and the highest is kicking in at forty five point five K for who was, you know, as we know, kicking in the basics.

I mean, they even hide this when they introduce her on the on the do you have a special name for the show that Chris Harrison does introduce the contestants, this thing that they do online every year now, have you named this?

No, I haven't even watched it. I've seen some clips from it. When players repost their specific things, see it in the stories. But it's just like I feel like whatever they're doing, he's basically just reading the ABC bios and showing you a little video clip of them. Yeah, I have no interest in it. I feel like what Lizzie and I do where we go deep through all their Instagram and really analyze what their playstyle might be and how far we think they'll go.

That, to me is a more interesting introduction to all these players, at least for me. That's how I like to get my information about them.

OK, yeah.

Yeah, we we include some stuff from the ABC bias, but I always tend to be pretty generic. Some of them are, some of them are interesting, but for the most part they're not.

Yeah, I. Do you know who got the first impression, Rosano? Is that something that's not spoiled to you either? No. OK, we remain.

Oh shit. You know, nothing, OK? The only thing that we know is I forget who it was. It was the Abigail Heringer comes out of the limo with a vibrator. No, it's no Katy Thurston Ed. Yeah, it's Katie. Yeah, the vibrator has been spoiled for us.

Yeah. Katie Thurston's got the vibrator, which I like.

I can't wait to see that. I like that is my favorite moment ever.

OK, so, God, I want to say something that it's not like anything about the ending of the show.

But Chris Harrison has said it actually in interviews with Rachel Lindsey.

So I don't know if you've even heard this part or are you aware that there's more than 32 women this season?

Yes. Yes. OK. They don't know who they are, there's two more. No, they're six more. What? Oh, my God. Are you serious? Yeah. Oh, my God. Thirty eight players.

So nice.

You have to do an elimination of what, 15, 16? Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. They come in night one. The 32 that were announced online were part of the show. Those are the 32 he meets tonight. One I see.

But just just like just like an All Stars later. OK, I'll just say this.

I'm nervous. I'm not going to name names. I'll say this at some at some point this season after a rose ceremony Chris Harrison brings in. Five new women, Fermat. But those five but those five women, those five women, all came from this batch of 43 that were released back on the six or seven.

So it's not like you have to go find, oh, they're not all stars. You're saying they are.

Those five are not all stars. Those are people from those are five that they chose from the initial forty three. However, after that, even after that, there is a former contestant who does show up on the season.

Only one former one four. Yeah. Oh, yeah, we've been we've been theorizing so much about who the former contestant is, could you think that might be Kendall? OK, but I'm like I feel like it has to be someone from PPC, from pilot season.

OK, I won't say anything. Colton's season.

I feel like it could be somebody from Coltons season. That seems like the right time frame because sometimes they let two or three seasons love Katie. The. Well, Heather Martin, maybe some for some reason, I'm like, I didn't get all, never been kicked out. Yeah. There's something interesting that I'm like, I don't know, there's something that like we didn't get what we needed out of her. I feel like the producers can bring her back in.

And she is friends with Hannah Brown. Exactly. That is the main thing that is making me think. But I'm like, who's in the kind of sphere of Matt James's world that might have a relationship with him? That's like we were just friends and I had these feelings. And I want to know if you have the same kind and anybody who's in the Hannah Brown sphere, I think is for that reason possible to come back. Yeah, I mean, I think I mean, I don't want to I'm not gonna say anything either way, so but yeah, that's how it breaks down after a rose ceremony.

I think it's I think I believe it's after the second rose ceremony, they bring five new women in who were all part of the 43.

So that basically means of the 43 women that were released before the season, essentially six of them are only six. Never make it on the show at some point.

So. Wow. Well, I mean, we did a show.

I know they're at a they're at a disadvantage, though. I mean, we thought who is was it console's? The season they brought in 15. He went in to mingle with everyone and then they brought in 15. And I think most of the front runners were from the initial. I think there is you have an advantage if you have more time.

Absolutely.

It's like in paradise when they bring in the late players and they're just gone that day because they haven't been there to develop relationships with everybody.

But I think not always true. Not always true, but very Delgado.

I know Mary Delgado is one of the greatest players of all time in a season and then one that whole season. Yeah, but I do also think that because of covid and shooting in these bubbles and all this stuff, we're in this kind of forced experimental era we went through and really broke down like what the different seasons were in The Bachelor and where the different eras are. So there's like classic era is one through three, then season four through 12 is the experimental era where they start inventing things like the first impression.

Rose grouped eight roses, two on ones. He's kind of like big pieces of the game that we take for granted now, but they didn't exist all the time. It took those seasons four, three, twelve to make them and then multiple bachelors shooting in Europe, et cetera.

And then once they start with Jason Mesnick, it goes to the modern era in season 13, this is now when they are going to use a player from The Bachelorette as the lead in every season, with the exception of Brad Womack in season 15. But that was his second season as Bachelor. And then once you get to season 16, it starts. What we're calling the Paradise era, because paradise becomes a thing and players from those seasons start appearing on the first season of paradise and the secondary goal, not just winning the ring or becoming The Bachelorette starts to emerge of making it into the top four, top six so that you're guaranteed a secondary appearance on Paradise.

Which brings me to my next topic that I wanted to talk about in regards to this, which is Matt James is our first lead, who was not on a previous season since bachelor since bachelor Brad Womack Season one. It's first time. So we're talking almost 25 consecutive seasons where the lead that is brought onto our television screens is somebody we've already developed a relationship with. We've seen them usually last until minimum final four. So we've met their family were invested.

Matt James is brought in. He's announced four months before they start filming, conveniently a week after the George Floyd story and the fact that he's best friends with Tyler Cameron. Those are two huge reasons why Matt James is our bachelor this season.

Agree or disagree? I mean, one hundred percent, it seems like a knee jerk reaction to the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement, but I'm not upset about it.

I know you're right. We got it. We got it. So we had to be whatever in order to get it. It wasn't Mike Johnson who would have been my preferred first black bachelor, but whatever. I totally agree.

And I would also argue that while he might not have been a player in a prior season Bachelorette, he has been in the game for a very long time. Yeah, the quarantine crew is a part of their world of bachelor, and especially because during that time period, we had no bachelor media on TV other than listen to your heart, which some would argue is not bachelor media. So people were looking at Tyler Cameron and Hannah Brown's Instagram. And according to every day, they were watching that like The Bachelor, that James is a fixture in it.

I think most people were about to tune into the season already know who he is. And again, it's this weird social era. Maybe this this Nemacolin, this looking to era, the COGAT bubble era, whatever you want to call it. To me, it really is starting to show the power of social influence in the game where you have dilemma's wrecking a season in four episodes. Now you've got a lead. Matt James cast basically from his TEQ tocsin Instagram because of his association with the two biggest Instagram players in the history of the game, Tyler Cameron and Hannah Brown.

So I would I think that's not lost on anybody. I mean, there's just there's just no way that if this guy wasn't best friends with the two highest Instagram followers in the history of this franchise, that he'd be the bachelor, not only be The Bachelor, but be announced four months early, be announced with no fanfare whatsoever. I think I think Thursday night GMA said, hey, big announcement tomorrow, didn't even say big announcement. We're announcing the new bachelor just said, hey, Bachelor Nation, tune in tomorrow.

And then it became, oh, by the way, Matt James is our bachelor. It just it's very performative. But I think what Matt said in his first interview on GMA was very important. And I always forget the quote, but I've said it three or four times on this podcast and I always forget it. But it was essentially along the lines of basically what you just said, Lizzy, which was, look, it doesn't matter how we got here.

We're at least here essentially like. It happened finally, if if it if it were 40 seasons of being wrong, at least we're finally right now or whatever, 25 seasons of Bachelor of with no black. Yeah. You know, it is so fucking important like that.

This is happening. And I hope that he gets huge ratings.

I, I do think that. In showing him and making him the bachelor, I just don't think that if they were going to choose a black bachelor and I think I even said this the week before the announcement, the Sunday night before the Friday announcement of Matt, I said it on my live with Ashley. Survivors like Ashley, there's no way they can throw out another milquetoast, privileged white dude as their bachelor with what's going on in the country right now.

They will get destroyed if they do that and then fine. And then five days later, here it is, Matt James gets announced.

And I think Rachel Lindsey had part had a part in this where she was basically saying should boycott the show as the next bachelor wasn't black. And she basically represents diversity on the show, which is. Yeah, that and luckily becoming less true. But, you know, I think she was able to wield that in a powerful way and. I mean, yeah, 25 seasons and you just line up these 25 bachelors and all next to each other, you're just like, wow, I mean, how how did we not why did it take 25 years?

It's like, OK, it did take 25 years. They have made tons of mistakes. But, hey, at least it happened. At least they finally did it, even if it was performative and even if it was like rushed and not given the fanfare that it should have been given as the announcement of our next bachelor. And even if it is somebody who's never been on a show before and we haven't had as an audience the investment that we normally would to a lead coming into accepting this role, at least I mean, you mentioned it.

Chad, that I think a lot of people do know who he is, but I don't think we know a lot about him because. Right shit. Even when they brought him on the goat show, it's like, hey, let's talk to Tyler Cameron and get his thoughts on Hannah Brown season. Oh, let's squeeze in our next as as Matt James just come sliding into the screen. It's like he's your fucking bachelor. Can we just get all the Tyler Cameron?

Much like, yeah, it was like, look, here's Tyler Cameron's Black. That's exactly how I saw that girl out, which, yeah, it was not handled well. And like. I mean, he we also we've had Juan Pablo, he is Latin ex. And Matt James is biracial. He's white and black. I think that that is, you know, people don't want to talk about that, but it is an important part of this conversation.

Yeah. Is are people more. Willing if somebody like we were talking about Rachel Lindsays, Instagram followers not being one million and how Taisha finally hit the one million mark and like how important that was as well.

And somebody brought that up. It was like, that is interesting because she is half black, half white, and Rachel is black and. I don't know, it's. It's definitely these conversations need to continue and people need to keep putting pressure on the franchise because I do believe they might divert to the means. But I'm very I'm very excited, Chad.

I got to say, I'm hopeful about all of this. Not only did they cast Tatia, biracial, African-American, Mexican, they seemed and not only have they cast Matt James, but they seem to also be taking into account the broader kind of presentation of it. Not James's player pool is the most diverse we've ever seen by a huge margin. So it does seem that they're at the very least willing to make an attempt to solve this problem, to make it better in some way.

And like Lizzie was saying, time will tell if they continue on this path or not. But at least for Matt James season, at least for the back half of this fractured bachelorette season, it seems like they are listening. They're listening to the bachelor diversity movement online. They're listening to what's going on culturally in America. And it seems like they are willing to be more reflective of not only what America looks like, but the conversations that we're having.

Like Lizzie said, for me, to the most important moment culturally of this past season, The Bachelorette was that conversation between Ivan Taisha, something we never thought we would see on ABC on The Bachelorette. And it's so reflective of all the conversations that everyone is having in America at this time. And hopefully, like in its best form, all reality television, whether it's bachelor, bachelorette or anything else, should be reflective of what's happening in our culture, even if they're put in these crazy circumstances where it's like a dating reality show or a survivor or a big brother or something like that, you still want those things to be reflective of what's happening in the culture at large.

And it seems like at the very least, they're trying to attempt to do that, which I am sure, and we're breaking records. Delmas is the first black ring winner. You know, we're for a lot of these historical first are happening this year. That's right. He is and along the lines of what you're saying, Chad, hasn't CBS. Installed a new policy in other reality shows where half the cast has to be. BIPAC. Oh, I didn't see anything about that great, though, I've heard I thought I've read that and maybe it's not CBS, maybe it's MTV.

I think it's both. No, I think it's CBS and MTV. Well, they're under there under Viacom. So I believe it's the whole Viacom thing that they have now said that all their reality shows at least 50 percent. So on Survivor, Amazing Race, Big Brother, MTV shows any of those reality shows you are going to see. It has to have a 50 percent non-white cast. Yeah, non-white cast. Great. So I remember listening to your interview with Jazy and talking about, you know, it needs to be behind the scenes as well, and we should make sure to keep putting pressure on them in that regard as well, because white producers are only going to be able to tell certain stories.

You know, you have to have diversity below the line as well.

I'm I wanted to ask you one last thing, Chad, about about Matt in terms of gameplay, the fact that this is our first bachelor who has been on in 25 seasons, who wasn't on a previous season, and Chris Harrison, I believe, in a preseason interview, has said I've had I had to have a few words with Matt and this whole this whole idea of.

He didn't even know what a rose ceremony was, right? How do you think that plays and how do you think that plays into this season? Lucy, I've talked about this a little bit. Was he not cast as a player to be on the season? Yeah, he was. Yeah, he was set to be.

He was on the original cast last season, so he knew he was going into the game. His best friend is Tyler Cameron. He also was hung out with Hannah Brown. They're not coaching him. Of course they are. We're in an era now where you have players like Hannah Godwin coaching. Hannah Flosse becomes a ring winner. I think for sure they have coached him. I think for sure he definitely knows what a rose ceremony is.

That's insane. Every ceremony. That's like saying like he thinks it's called an invitation.

Yeah, exactly.

It's like you don't know what a touchdown is because you don't watch football. He knows what a rose ceremony is.

And I think he's going to potentially be a more interesting lead because he doesn't understand the subtle nuance because he hasn't gone through the process once. I think he might be more likely to kind of break the structure of the game a little bit to suit his needs. And as long as that's on the kind of level of 40 or as long as he's playing well, that's what I need to do to find love for the right reasons, for the right reasons.

The show has to abide by whatever he does. But I think I do think it's going to play a part for sure that he has not been through the game.

Yeah, I think it's going to play a part. I just don't know if it's going to play. Excuse me. I just don't know if it's going to play a good part. I don't know if this is going to be good or bad. I guess I have to watch and see it play out on how he acts and how his lack of knowledge about how this show works, not even just how Rosemann money works, but just, you know, quote unquote, playing the game.

And you as the lead kind of know what you need to do because you've been through it before. You know what to expect when you sit down and film an item where they want you to talk about something. I'm curious to see how that part goes for him, because he hasn't done that until he started filming this season. One thing that I wanted to bring up because I wanted to make sure I got it right and I just brought it up to you.

I pulled up an article on the whole CBS casting thing. And I just want to read to what it says for people that are just like, did you just pull out out of his ass that CBS is. No, this is this is from Deadline. It's an article written in November. CBS is slate of reality shows set to become more diverse after the network introduced a series of representation targets. The network has introduced an edict that fifty percent of its cast for unscripted shows must be black, indigenous or people of color.

And it has committed that at least 25 percent of its annual unscripted development budget must go towards creators and producers that are BIPAC. So it is an official thing. CBS that they are the all the reality shows will be at least 50 percent by BIPAC is how to pronounce it. People say it in the. By park, by black indigenous people of color. Is that how people pronounce, instead of saying it, black, indigenous people of color every time they just say Bayport, BIPAC, whatever?

OK, but I have no idea. I'm not sure.

But that's the thing. And oh, by the way, while I'm also on deadline, unfortunately, some horrible news. Dawn Wells, Gilligan's Island died at the age of 82 today.

Oh, that's terrible. It sucks. She's she's so now Ginger from Ginger from Gilligan's Island is the only remaining living classmate. I used to watch Gilligan's Island all the time growing up, as did I.

Yeah, I know what it is. You don't really care about the death of.

I am so young, you guys. Oh, yeah.

Moment of silence for Dawn Wells, apparently, but not for Lizzie. That's just like who? Dawn Wells, huh? No, that's that's Mary Ann from Gilligan's Island. Lizzie, you didn't watch.

Yeah. So getting back on that, I do think it's going to be interesting with Matt. I really want to see how this plays out and how a guy who has never been in this bubble in more ways than one, so to speak, has how he fared. Chris Harrison saying that. I had to have a few words with him this season, makes me think that maybe it wasn't all smooth sailing. I don't know. We'll be interesting to see how it plays out.

The next topic that I wanted to get to. And this is just for shits and giggles. The battle for baby supremacy in Bachelor Nation, the Lindberg twins versus litter baby is going to be a thing.

So, Chad, we really like the clues to trying to make it a thing. It's not fucking dominated.

OK, so where are we at right now? Where the line twins versus glitter, baby and follower count. Last I looked, the lion twins were at one hundred and something. Jesus Christ, really?

Of course. Oh my God.

There are seven thousand two hundred and seven thousand people are following an Instagram account of twins that haven't been born yet.

Yeah, and it's one post of Lauren with an profile of her baby bump. It's an identical stylistic post to her first post on the other child, Alesi Vandyke's Instagram account. And Alesi has three hundred and sixty five thousand followers.

So do you think this is they've been doing a loop promotion where it's a raffle to win an iPhone, you have to follow every member of their family.

So I think this is I'm going to keep turning over two hundred for one of the first times in my life.

I'm gonna keep my opinions to myself on this one.

But just further, baby, you guys glitter baby is at fifteen point eight. Okay.

I mean, not even on the radar or baby, really.

The fetus game was started, in my opinion, with Jade and Tanner tober. She really was the one who kind of at least imagination kind of made the structural format of like, here's how you promote your pregnancy and then start to do spawn calling with your fetus. And the lions have taken it to the highest possible level with again, their fetuses have two hundred thousand followers. There's one post they have, whatever, eight months or seven and a half months until those children are alive.

And I think those kids could have five hundred thousand followers the day they're born and they're going to be selling. I mean, they're going to be selling spawn before they're born. That's a definite for sure. So I mean, there was a this was called Baby Lindback before, and it was just a twinkle in his eye. It wasn't even a baby yet.

It was just a part to count for the baby they planned to have.

Yeah, Cheesus. Oh, God. I mean, and I think it's interesting, too, that it's like these kids, for the first time really ever, these children are going to be famous from birth in this specific way. It's not like, you know, when Michael Jackson had his kids or Kim and Kanye. It's not like children of super famous people. It's children that are famous children of famous people in this strange little world of the bachelor.

But that kid, at some point, they're going to have to explain to Alesi what having three hundred thousand Instagram followers means. And they've been making money off of Alesi for her entire life and that there are three hundred thousand people in the world who have literally watched every image of her from the first sonogram. That is I don't know how that is going to have to be broached with a lawsuit that some point will have to be and we're now in this era where I feel like Andy Warhol said everybody will be famous for 15 minutes in the future.

Now, it's like everybody's going to be famous for their entire lives from inception. We're through this next kind of era of. Did they do it? Pre birth, did she do it like they were doing or she just shared a bunch of baby pictures in her own feed? Yeah, it was in her own feed, OK, but it was a similar style, like that's what Lauren is mimicking in her baby's Instagram accounts. The having the little board with the what how many weeks pregnant you are and how many months pregnant you are and you get to watch the baby grow so that it's kind of this dramatic narrative of leading up to the time of the birth.

And then obviously, Ari and Lauren have their YouTube channel that's going to be packed with every moment of this as it has been up to this point. They're really, I think, starting kind of a new subgenre of bachelor social media, where they are chronicling every moment of pregnancies, births, childhood, and they're turning all of it into Spungen.

It's a huge market, too. I remember listening to some podcasts about Target and how they were finding people who might give birth soon because you really want them to use you first off the bat, because there just is so much stuff that you need to try to have a kid. And you're telling me? That on this baby lion Dyker twin account that has one picture, they are telling people, follow our baby account and you will be in the running to win an iPhone.

Correct, they posted it on Ari Lauryn's pages and said, these are the handles for Ari, Lauren Alessi and the twins that follow all these and do this, and you will be in the running to get an iPhone. Oh, OK, well, sorry to be the one to break this to you.

I mean I mean, I get people post pictures of their baby, but setting it up pre birth. Making money off something that hasn't been born yet, it's just it's one thing to just post pictures of your kid all the time, instant, because plenty of people do that. This is just a level that. I just find bizarre, I mean, like blind like twins when they are born. Just follow Orien, Lauren, just look at their babies right now.

The real question is going to be who is the dominant twin? Because once they're born, they can't share an Instagram account anymore. Hopefully, hopefully, our children will separate them out and say, here are the two new Instagram accounts. And then which of those twins is going to get the higher number? That's the troubador that I'll be watching.

So basically, basically, you're setting it up where these two are already at each other's throats at the age of three or four to who's got more followers.

And absolutely, as soon as they can understand numbers, they're going to be looking at that number on Instagram. But like, I have more followers, and unless he's going to be in the EU, it's going to be a very interesting sibling rivalry developed around their Instagram accounts. Wow. All right, all right, Abel, Birbal, and they will delete their accounts. Yeah, or that.

I hope so. Just to wrap it up here with you guys with Game of Roses podcast where I mean, start with you, Lizzy. Where do you see this going? What's your ultimate goal out of this? And where do you see your game of Rose's podcast going in the next few years?

I would say that we we see it very much being that people are already watching it as a game, but they don't kind of realize that. And so I would say, what Game of Roses kind of. What our intent with it is that we're creating this ESPN style coverage of it and it's a different way to watch the game. And like I said, I think The Bachelor will outlive us. And, you know, I'm very young. I didn't even know about Gilligan's Island.

So, you know, I have a very long life ahead of me. I don't think The Bachelor will will outlive me.

But, yeah, I mean, that's what we're trying to do.

We we've come up with all these terms to describe these things that we have seen in the game over and over again and. You know, I loved your interview with BATCHELLER data, because when you can just look at the numbers, it's like you don't even the numbers speak for themselves and show you, you know, sometimes not very positive things about the show, such as like racial representation and that kind of thing. But there are, you know, plays and strategies where people can do well.

And even if you are in it to find love, you do have to play this game and you do have to be prepared. Yeah, I, I second what Lizzie said, I mean, ultimately, I see a version of what we're doing, the kind of final version is a daily show. I think eventually we go to some kind of a video format, maybe YouTube channel, maybe it even gets on streaming somewhere. But I think that there is enough information about everything happening in the bachelor world at this point, everything from what these players are doing on Instagram, maybe with their fetuses or not all the way to his cross hairs that are retiring all the way to like who gets cast and what's happening in the actual game itself.

There's enough of that stuff that I think there is an amount of information that can fulfill a daily version of a show of some kind. Maybe it's only half an hour, maybe it's an hour. But I see kind of a support center of this, the ultimate evolution of what we're doing at Game of Roses, that we'll have a podcast component still, certainly. But I see that video component as being bigger. But yeah, exactly what Lizzie said.

We're really developing at this point the language to talk about this thing as a sport in the same way that sports writers developed the language in the early nineteen hundred for baseball and things like Eora and Arbie didn't yet exist. It took sports writers to identify these statistical categories, start writing about them, and then they became absorbed by the game and even changed the way teams were made and lineups were made, all that kind of stuff. I think we're identifying similar important statistical categories in The Bachelor writing about them.

We're working on a book and we're certainly talking about them in a podcast in the hopes that our analysis of the game will change how it's played.

And it might already we are starting to have players so that they listen to our podcast. And I'm curious as to whether we will see some of these strategies play out in game.

Yeah, I mean, you think about it, there certainly is, especially one, especially in season, I don't know, out of season if there's going to be a ton where you could fill a daily show. I mean, I guess it all depends on how much effort and research you put into following every single thing that every single one of these contestants is putting out on Instagram for sure. Then if you were to take all of 32 of Matt's women and then plus the other five plus the one and.

Yeah. Thirty eight women that you want to cover from that season, if you were following them every single day and watched every single one of their Instagram stories or their feeds.

Yeah, that would be wild. You could. Yeah. I don't know what that's like.

I mean I'm following a few Fermat season, but I guess I just don't pay attention enough to what they're doing now because a lot of them are being very, very quiet.

And, you know, this show has absolutely cracked down on social media with these contestants because in the past, just two, three seasons ago, yeah, the second somebody got eliminated, they were hopping back on their Instagram and you can tell when they were eliminated.

Now, every single one of these contestants is basically told go private while you're filming and you can not turn on. You can't go from private to public or from deactivated to private until filming is done. And then you can all do it in one day, like we all got that dump on November 18th where everyone came back online. So now they've really started to crack down on their own contestants and not allowing them to do that.

But I don't think, like even in season, it doesn't really matter. Like what for me, I've really learned out of doing this podcast and like, hammering the format of it until we got into what we want. We do a show at the end of the week called This Week in Bachelor Nation that contains bachelor nation news items. And we also do a thing called the Social Play of the Week, where we go through all the biggest posts on Instagram, YouTube, whatever, from the kind of top players and talk about what was the most important one or what got the biggest engagement.

And for me, really, not only are we breaking down, what's happening in the show is a game, but I've become acutely aware of the fact that the social media arena is a game unto itself and that one never ends.

Yeah, and it's getting more competitive. Yeah, people are making better and better content and it's fun to break it down.

Yeah, it'll be interesting to see once, you know, because these these women, as far as I know and again, I'm not following is as as keen as you are, Chad.

But I see these women, as far as I know, aren't even commenting on each other's posts just yet. I don't think that's going to be able to start till Monday because they're not even acknowledging the other women. They're just saying, hey, I did this thing. You're going to find out on Monday. And but they're not even. But in seasons past, there were girls I remember it was next season there was like six or seven women that went down to Miami and watched the premier all together down there.

They're not even allowing that to happen anymore. And if they and if they're doing it, they have to do it privately and not put anything out on Instagram where producers will see that a group of women are hanging out together, which is totally different, like, yeah, they are cracking down on it.

Now, I don't understand why I don't if it is that because that's a spoiler that like, oh, this one's our friend. Is that it far? Yeah, I mean, it could be, but. I think they're just knee jerk reaction, scared that because of what they lost, they're like, we have to really control the social media. But in the social game, it's like it's not just the people in the contemporary season that stretches all the way back to really like you're looking at Andy Dorfman, some of the old school, not old school players, but like some of the prior era players who are in the million clubs or Kaitlynn Bristo, for example, had an incredible social year and she wasn't even on any show.

She was a guest judge on Listen to Your Heart for one episode. But what she was doing socially was mind blowing. And she's now scratching at the door of the two million club. So.

Well, Dancing with the Stars. Yeah, that was part of it. Absolutely. But, you know, we can cover at this point all these other players who are still extremely relevant in the social world, even if they're not on the contemporary season. That game is like bigger and broader and deeper and stretches back. You're talking about like actually I comédie we're looking at Deani babies, Kayla Miller keys. And of course, we're looking at all the contemporary players from the last season of Bachelorette.

But there's just so many other players to talk about. And the field gets so big that like the people who are kind of cutting through that clutter are really doing impressive stuff. Geopark has been doing incredible care. So it's a place where you're talking about the covid vaccine.

He's getting the Copan vaccine on video through what side effects may or may not be.

It's incredible to watch some of this stuff. So Park is carving out this niche for himself where I believe is the Doctor Foushee of Bachelor Nation, like he is giving Bachelor Nation all of their vaccine.

You mentioned the big pool, Chad, which brings us to paradise. I mean, Robert Mills has said it. Chris Harrison has said in his interviews when they come to paradise this summer, they have four seasons to choose from. You've got Pieter's women you've got and men you've got Mat's women and then whoever the next bachelorette is, her men. You know, four seasons to choose from. This is going to be an all star season. If I ever if we've ever seen one, depending on who is single, by the time June rolls around, we don't know who will be down there.

But you got to think who is willing to be single.

Yeah. Who is willing to be single because we know what names they will like on that show. They would love to have a Hannah and a Maddie, a Victoria full. I don't know if the show's really made for Maddie. And I think she's still with Michael Porter Junior. But you know, Victoria Fuller, Kelsey, where I mean, if those women are single, they're doing the show, there's no way they wouldn't. And then you get to take his top three guys.

I don't Brendon has said he's kind of iffy on it because he's not really sure that's how he wants to meet someone. But I mean, Ben Smith might as well just make his reservation for paradise right now. I agree. Ivan is definitely down there, Bennett. I mean, these guys are in it, there's no doubt about. Yes.

Hey, Bennett says he won't do it. Oh, please.

He's playing hard to get. Yeah, he wants to hire.

Can only do it if I can show up in the first five players.

I mean, and then I mean, going through I was going to say Peter's winning, but I already said, like Victoria Fuller, Kelsey, we're in Hannah and are single by June. They're going I don't see any of them, any of those three turning it down. I agree.

Matty is the only one that I just don't know if this show is for her.

And she has. And obviously she may not need it. She may not like it would be beneficial to her and any kind of material way. Don't forget, also, we listen to your heart. Good. Showing us why. Thank you.

I think they might get I think they might get squeezed just because of we've got four seasons of our main show. Like I think yeah. I think if I think if Paradise filmed last summer, they absolutely would have included some of the people from listen to your heart. But now I think those people might get squeezed because there's just not going to be enough. Like, is this person really worth putting on?

There is are we do we really need to waste a spot on someone like Trevor who's just going to go on here, has zero interest in actually finding somebody when we have four seasons to choose from?

I don't know. Maybe maybe they will.

Yeah, but and the listen to your heart ratings were not good, so. No, then people won't even really know who they are. Yeah.

And you've just got bigger, better names out there, you know, from this season. I guess we'll have to see who lasts long is who makes an impression all this talent.

Yeah. I mean, I honestly, I don't I don't have a ton from this season. I know certain storylines here and there. That'll I'll probably release next week. I've got a few things, but I have not put out the winner. I mean, I have not put out the final four I. I think I know things, but it's not as solid as in the past. I mean, the boats we have made Final Four predictions I want to hear.

I don't want to have to hear them. I won't say anything, but go ahead. Yeah, don't say anything. I have Casandra Suarez. I have Chelsea von. I have. Sarah Trought. And I have Mary or Mary, Pepín Cruz has different ones, OK, who do you have?

I have I have Piper James, also Sarah Traw, also Mary Peppin and Katie Thurston, who I also think might be our next bachelorette.

We thought Abigail Harinder and Katie Thurston had the Instagram of possibly our next crowd.

Hmm. Interesting. Katie Thorson's the ticktock girl, right?

Yeah. She's got a God. That doesn't sound promising.

She's the she's the one that's got to like a lot of followers and views on ticktock, right? Mm hmm. Okay. Interesting. Will, when I listen to this back, I'll write those down and we'll revisit it at the house. Oh, have you at the end of the season and we'll revisit it to see how close you may or may not have been there all.

But yeah, God, the fact that he doesn't even know who Katie Thurston is the top priority.

Oh, I knew. I knew. I know she was. I just the one that mixing up because I knew that there was one girl that goes into the season with a giant. Like when I found out who she was, the things that were told to me about her was she's got a big tick tock following and that's what I had. Yeah, but I haven't watched any of her tick tock because I think when she left it was on private or something.

Maybe it was.

I remember but yeah.

I mean, yeah, I don't want to, I don't want to say anything tough not to.

Two hundred and forty, just two hundred and forty thousand followers on tick tock. Tick tock. I think she's going to be huge.

What are her. I haven't looked at it. What are her videos like. What kind of content is she putting out. Is she dancing or is she doing like.

No SilverLink of other like the Kardashian stuff.

It's more face to camera, kind of like relatable life stuff like her fucking around in quarantine.

She's very funny and she's very charismatic. And I feel like relatable is like the main way I would describe her.

She's kind of got a I feel like she's kind of got a Caitlyn Bristo vibe, especially with the vibrator limo.

And Caitlyn told a dirty joke on her limo entrance, right?

Yeah. She said, you can clown, you can plow my field any day. Iconic.

Yeah. Yeah. The vibrator is probably going to top that. But yeah, I know it's 20/20 vision.

Thurston could be could be a player, could be a player, could feel like she's probably at night, watch it and she's not in my top four.

And then would you say do you know. Well you know from the just the bio for Abigail Heron to her story. Right.

Yeah. OK, I think, I think people are going to love her story and she has this like, very good girl. Look to her. She doesn't have direct camera videos. So I don't it's hard to say when they don't interact with camera.

But she also she also had crown qualities. In my opinion. She could potentially be a bachelor.

Is that what you call it? Crown qualities? Yeah.

We refer to The Bachelor about the crown who wins the season is the ring ring.

So. I I mean, I'm fascinated going into Monday, these last two seasons, well, with clear intention and now Matt season, I just don't have the episode by episode breakdown anymore. Just because there's one location shoots make it a lot tougher because.

Non covid years, all the public dates. It just it helps me just by process of elimination, you know, you see who's on a group date, you're like, OK, well, these were the group dates and these were the two people that got one on one dates.

Well, then no one else is, because once Tropica, once travel starts, they don't have people.

Every everybody's accounted for on dates. So you're like, OK, well, when they're in this city, I know who's left. And then they move on to this city and I don't see this person there. So I know he's gone and he got eliminated at the episode before. So, yeah.

I mean, are you frustrated by the lack of spoiler?

I mean, or is it a life? It's it's less work for me to do so. In that case it is. But in terms of the response and people. Oh yeah. You got me. Hello. Hello. You can.

Yeah. Can you hear me. Can you hear me? I need it, we can hear you now, you got me. Yeah, yeah. Oh, that's weird. With the amount of people that hit me up with, hey, what happens this season that is astronomical, like where are the spoilers?

Why haven't we heard this? What about this? That gets annoying. But so just to let just to answer those people, I would yeah. I'd love to have the episode by episode breakdown, but now I just don't put it out until the you know, until I can find out, which is usually the day of the episode. And I just say, OK, here's where you're going to see tonight. But to lay it out all before the season.

Yeah, it's been a lot tougher with these with these bubble seasons. And like like Chad mentioned earlier, looks like The Bachelorette is going to be filmed in a bubble, which is not surprising. March is not a time where you're just going be able to travel all around domestically and even internationally.

So but I'd say by next September, when the next bachelor starts filming, I think that will at least get domestic travel would be my guess.

That's my guess.

Yeah, I think so, too. They haven't said anything. Fingers crossed. Yeah, they haven't said anything specifically.

But just knowing the way the country is going and vaccines and coming and all this stuff, I would think by September of twenty, twenty one they can at least do some domestic travel, you know. But we'll see. We'll see what, we'll see what comes of it anyway. Guys, thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it. It was a good talk, a good wrap up of Tatia and clear season, a good start to Matt season.

This should be interesting. I'll have you on at the end of that season. We can go over your final four possessions.

I can't wait. I feel very nervous about it. I have never missed you so much for having us on. It's always so fun to talk to you about this stuff.

No, no problem. I'm loving your stuff. Keep it coming. You guys, I think, are going to be able to do some good work with what you do. And combining with BATCHELLER data I think is right up your alley with her because she's got so many good numbers for you guys to pull from. I know I'm going to reference it a lot this season, so. Absolutely. Yeah. So we'll be in touch and enjoy.

Matt James, bachelor number 26, right, he's 20, 25 or 20. Oh, that's right, because because Claire Leticia were 16.

Unless you count Byron Belbek and Jay Overbey a joke for no one.

Very, very few people remember Jay Overbey. Anyway, thanks a lot, guys.

I appreciate it. And we'll be in touch.

All right. Have a good New Year. You too. Thanks so much to Chad and Lizzie for that. I really appreciate it. So much fun talking to them. Almost two hours, I felt like I could have gone another two hours with them because they've got a lot of great insight. They're very funny. And you know, what happened with Chad earlier this week I thought was pretty uncalled for. But it's been addressed and we move on and they move on and we go from there.

But I really think that they are they have such a unique perspective on this show that I really I really love having them on. And like I said at the beginning of the podcast, they're going to be on again probably at the end of this season. So we could one go over their final four. And to just talk about Matt season in general and if it lived up to any certain expectations, it is kind of weird that this is the first time and I think around twenty five seasons where the lead is not from a previous season.

But it's not like he was picked out of obscurity either, there are people that it's like we know who Matt James is as a person, like we can identify him. But going into the season, we don't know anything about him. We've never met his family on a previous season. We've never seen how he talks on a date, how he acts on a date. That's all the new stuff. And that's what's going to be interesting to see if it failed miserably by the production team to choose somebody who's never been on a previous season or if it kind of is refreshing, we won't know until it starts airing.

So that'll be interesting to watch out for this season. I know. I'm certainly looking at that, but thanks to Chad and Lizzie again for coming on now. Coming up next, Maryborough's Evan Bass's ex-wife, which contacted me yesterday morning and said, Steve, I'm really not thrilled with what I'm seeing online right now in regards to Evan and Carly's breakup. I'd like to say a few things had her on. So here we go. Here is Maryborough's.

OK, let's bring her in. Her name is Marie Bass. She is the ex-wife of Evan Bass.

Marie, thanks for joining me. Yeah, thanks for having me. I know that you had reached out to me. You and I have been in contact for the last couple of years on and off, you know each other up, talk about stuff going on in Bachelor Nation or whatnot.

And, yes, you know, you have reached out. You reached out to me and said, look, I really want to kind of come on and talk about things that are going on, because as we know, this week, Evan and Carly had decided to split. There's more to it. And I know that you want to get that out, but before we just jump into stuff like that. I need to just kind of give people a background of you and Evan out, how many people know anything?

So talk about your relationship with them and how long were you guys together? How long were you married? How do you mean? When did you get divorced? All that stuff.

We actually met on a blind date, OK? And we met in March and got married in August.

So it was very, very quick, OK?

Yes. And and that was 2004.

A long ago. I said sounds so long ago. And so it really 16 years ago. OK, so you married in 2004. You have three boys with Evan. What are their ages and names?

Our oldest is Nate and he is 19 and a half. And Evan adopted Nathan.

We when we met Nate was two years old and I was a single mom and Evan adopted him as soon as we got married, which was amazing.

And then two weeks after our honeymoon, I got pregnant with our second, which was crazy.

So I was pregnant for our whole first year of marriage. And and then we waited a couple actually, we waited three years and had our third one.

So the second one is probably then he's 16 then roughly. Right. So. So Liam is 15 and a half. 15. Right. Right there. All summer babies. So OK. Yeah, yeah.

So you guys and then you guys were married for how long.

Nine years. OK, so you got divorced in 2015, probably. Well 13. Sorry to in 2013. Probably wasn't easy becoming a single mom with three boys. Exactly. You don't need to go into details, but when the divorce happened, was it an easy breakup to where it was able to. You know, divvy up the kids in terms of visitation and stuff like that custody, or was there something there that was it was tough and now, you know, it really was smooth.

I am so grateful for that because I have a lot of friends that, you know, are going through it or went through it. And theirs was not the case.

Evan and I, it was a very mutual decision to get the divorce. And and really, once we were divorced, we actually got along so much better. And I feel like we really coped parented well. So, you know, obviously nobody wants to get divorced. It is the worst thing. And I hate divorce. So sad for everybody. And our kids have been affected and we do our best to really love them well and make them feel as secure as they can in a, you know, divorced household.

But so it was as smooth as it could be, probably OK.

Yeah.

And then how it went from the time it the divorce happened till now, has has custody roughly been the same? How has it been? Is it every other weekend as he goes week. How does it.

We have 50/50. We do week on. Week off. So it's a total even time share, which is really great. I always love being with their dad and I love being with me. And it's just it's perfect. And we only live five minutes from each other.

So that's a really wonderful thing. And of course, our oldest drives. So he helps out and it's. Yeah, but it works.

So when you found out Evan was going on a show called The Bachelorette, what did he tell you? I'm assuming he had to give you a heads up because obviously you take care of the kids.

But had you watch the show, what were your thoughts on this?

I have to be honest with you. I have never seen that. OK, I could not watch it. It was that was that would have been a little bit too hard for me. And so I chose not to. And, you know, that's that's OK.

That's what was best for me. I did have a few things sent to me by friends that said, you really need to see this. You know, when she went off on him and called him all of those names and was just really, really nasty about him, I saw that and sadly, my children did as well.

Oh, but now you're jumping into Bachelor in Paradise. I was actually just talking about that. Oh, sorry. I skipped ahead. Sorry. Yeah, OK. The first one. Jojo, your. Yeah. Jojo, yes.

No, I actually have not seen any of that one at all. But yeah when he told me he was going on I kind of laughed. I was like that's hilarious. And he's like No, no, I really am. And I was like, what you really are. And at first it was kind of like, Oh, this is funny. And then I was kind of like, Yeah, I don't know about this.

You know, this this could be bad. And I worried about it. And I did ask him I did end up asking him not to do it before, before he left.

But he he really wanted to do it and he really felt like it was just what do you need to do?

And those were really his words. He was like, Marie, I really need to do this. Like for myself. I just I need to do it. And so off he went.

Did he ever tell you how he got cast? Like, some people are like, oh, I shut up to a I filled out an application online. I just can't imagine usually. Yeah, man. It's like someone nominates him.

They did. Yeah. He had some friends from our church that nominated him.

OK, and yeah.

So after Bachelorette he ends up going on Bachelor in Paradise. Right, right. Right.

And then that's where he had met Kali and everybody that watched it saw how their relationship started. It wasn't like this was hidden. It was well known out there that Kali. Was not love at first sight with Evan, it was. That's right. Yeah, in fact, it was the opposite. She was saying the opposite. Some some mean things about him. But then according to her, you know, he grew on her.

She was she had gone to the hospital and she felt sad. And she realized when he went, God had gone to the hospital during paradise that she really felt something for him, whatever the case. But there's still all the quotes out there that you could easily pull up on YouTube. That show she was almost making fun of him and was creeped out by him.

Yeah, yeah. When you've seen those clips and your kids have seen those clips, what is the reaction?

My first I was just so mad. I mean, I was I was livid.

I just couldn't believe because at this point when I saw that, I already knew that they were together.

So so I, I said I called him immediately and I was like, you are not going to marry this girl. Really. You're going to I mean, tell me, after what she said about you on national television, you're going to marry this girl.

And so I was very upset. I just and I was very, very disappointed that he allowed our boys to watch. Of course, he didn't know that she said all of that about him until he watched it. So my boys, he had these, like parties every week where he would have friends over and they would watch the show and my boys would go because he wanted them to see it. And it's his choice. So he wanted them to see it and they had to watch that.

And it was just so when he does this, that makes me mad.

So when he watched it and you saw the clips and, you know, clearly they were watching it, but we already knew what the results were that they had right there together.

Yeah. They had got together and they had gotten engaged at the end of filming. But they're watching back the first episodes together and usually in a one on one interview saying these things about him.

So what did he say when you said, Evan? What?

What was his reaction to seeing that, you know, he was really upset. I could tell, but he didn't want to talk about his upset ness. I mean, he he just he kind of just said, I didn't marry. I don't want to talk about it. I need to get through this and deal with this on my own side. And I just don't want to talk about it. So I dropped it. I mean, that was you know, he didn't need me going off on him when the whole world was kind of like, well, you know, I didn't need to add add to that.

So, I mean, I remember back I mean, I think you and I first came in contact post Bachelorette before even Paradise took place, because, yeah, if I'm not mistaken, I'd have to go back and look at our text conversations, but I'm almost positive.

I was the one who told you, hey, by the way, having got engaged at the end of this, you were.

You were. Yeah, yeah. I remember giving you a heads up and you were like, yeah, you did. And I'm grateful. I know. Right.

And you you had to watch the show. You certainly hadn't seen all season you had so you had no idea who Carly was or anything about her.

No, no idea. And I just kind of thought at that point, wow. Like I guess she found love, you know, like I had no feelings either way at that point. My my negative feelings didn't come until I saw how she spoke about him. And then, you know, I was very open minded before that.

So I just just to throw it out there. When you talk about your relationship with Evan, like when he went on the show, went on Jojo season and then found love on Paradise.

Are you jealous at this point, are you mad? Were you still in love with Evan? Where was your relationship with Evan when he went to do these shows?

I'm. I don't know that I would say jealous or mad, I was concerned that he was making the wrong decision because it was so fast, because we got married so fast and it was not a good decision. I mean, we were married. What is that?

Four months after meeting and we rushed it and we went through a lot as a couple because we didn't know each other.

And that was married and with kids already. And it just was just so much. And I thought, oh, no, he's going to do this again. And that and that was. I was just I was just concerned our relationship before he met Kali was the probably the best, in my opinion, co parenting relationship you could have. We went on vacations together. I mean, we had just gone to Florida together with the kids before he went on the show for a week and we did holidays together.

I babysat for him while he would go on dates and he would do the same for me. We were just I don't know, I felt like that was probably the best that we have been OK. And then all of that went away very quickly when he when he was with her.

OK, so after bachelor paradise, he comes home and it has to be it has to er he obviously can't publicly say that he's with her, but so the finale airs and they are now an official couple together, even though everyone knew everyone was new.

So how did your relationship. Things change because now he was now living with Carly, I'm assuming they were living together right after paradise because they were engaged.

How do you think how did that dynamic work with you and the kids and him and Carly now that he has a fiance?

It was really strange. It was not what I expected.

I genuinely expected to kind of blend her into the family and have a mature adult co parenting type relationship with her. But I think what ruined that was after she said those mean things about him. I kind of popped off multiple times. I got very defensive of Evan, even though we weren't married. He is the father of my children. Yes, we have had a lot of crap that we've been through and, you know, but still, he was the father of my children.

I was like, she is not going to get away with speaking like that about him publicly. That just disgusting. And so I was very much. I was very verbal about my feelings about that, and I think it I don't know if it I think it just kind of made Evan. Push me at arm's length away from from where he got he has to side with his fiancee in that right?

He does exactly. And even though I'm technically standing up for him, she is or was still his fiance, exactly like you're saying. And he had to kind of draw like. Yeah, he had to put a boundary up. Yes. What he had to do. And that's totally understandable. And so, you know, things changed. I wonder, looking back, if I hadn't have gone so hardcore in his defense, if things would have been different, I wonder when you say, I don't know when I say you popped off, was this publicly or is this to her?

Yes. Yes. Was publicly known never to her. What did you.

Well, I guess I should pull it up of what you said publicly about the time I said I think I said that she was had no class and no character because of what she said on national television and that he shouldn't marry her. I said that publicly on social media, I think, and. I I had some anger moments where I just was like, this is absolutely crazy, this can't happen. She is a train wreck, is what I thought she was.

And so, you know, I am a redhead. And so I definitely have my red head moments where I get just I don't know, you know.

Well, I think it was also during I mean, you also popped off on Evan, too. I did. I did. I did. Called him. I called him a deadbeat dad.

I did. I did. Because. I think I was so pissed off that he left for so long and then came back and wanted and wanted. It felt like he really wanted the boys to be integrated into his new life with no respect for me as their mother. He just started making decisions without me, and that really upset me because we for so long had been making decisions together as their parents. So right or wrong in that it is what it is.

And I've apologized to Evan. Yeah. Many times, actually, for that. And it's all good now. But yeah, I had my moment of just being like, this is bullshit. Just I mean, just, you know. So, yeah, I do I do somewhat remember that, and I also remember you apologizing on an Instagram story as well to.

I can't remember if you apologized.

I think you apologize to Carly, I'm pretty sure you apologize to Carly or was maybe it was just having overall.

So I think you probably have an overall. OK, so we're at a point now where. They're now a couple, like you said, he kind of had to draw the line, that's his fiancee, he's not going to sit with his ex-wife and about his fiancee.

So, yeah, when he does this, how did it change? How often did you see Carly? Did you ever did you guys ever talk, hang out, have a Y night together? Oh, good Lord, no.

OK, no, no, no. We never did. I don't think she could ever get over me calling her out on the way she behaved on national television. And, you know, but we would I would see her at school functions and soccer games. All three of our boys are athletes. And so we have a lot of sports stuff. And and in the very beginning, she would come to those. And so, you know, we have been around her plenty of times.

But no, it was never, never like a a step mom, mom, co parenting or anything like that.

So they their first their daughter was Isabella, two and a half years old. And so once Bella was born, obviously did the amount of time the boys spent with him increased, decreased or stayed the same. It was still one week on, one week off. Stay the same.

Yeah. Evan did a great job juggling that. Yeah. And the boys absolutely adore Bella. She is the cutest, sweetest little thing in the whole world. And the more she could be around, the better for them. They really, really love her.

So when Carlene having worked together, it was the boys would go over and spend the weekend at Kaleen Evan's place with obviously Bella that would. Yeah. So they have a week with them and then. Things changed, I know, and, you know, look, you know, you and I like I said, we've spoken for a couple of years now and. You were the one that told me last November, you're like. You came to me and had mentioned things are going great with Evan and Carly, I'm like, well, what do you mean?

She's like, you told me, Steve, Steve, they haven't been together. They haven't lived together since at the least that summer. That's right.

And I really think, yeah, it was early and had to it was earlier than that. I think it was spring. But yes, when she she left him when she wasn't even showing with Charlie yet.

OK, so that's early on. Yeah.

And I found this out. I even have the text conversation. It was on November 5th of twenty nineteen that you told me this and I'm like, well I can't put this out there because she's a week from being do with their son.

Yeah. Luckily she doesn't need this time. But in my head I was thinking, OK, well if. If Carly has moved out while she was pregnant, there obviously is, you know, some pretty serious warning if you're going to wait. If you if not, I'm going to wait till after you are deliver your during the middle of a pregnancy, going to leave your husband and, you know, move out, move into separate places. It's got to be fairly serious that things aren't working out.

But, yeah, you told me a week before I didn't put it out there. I said I've heard some things and vaccination. I know that other people in Bachelor Nation knew because I reached out at that time and just kind of poked around and said, hey, have you heard anything? And people are like, oh, yeah, I know they have been together for a while.

Yeah. Yeah. And so I was like, wow, I'm just surprised that nobody reported this. But, you know, my thinking was she'll deliver the baby next week and within a month or two they'll probably announce, OK, we're done. You know that she had moved out. Little did I know it would last another year. I know.

So they so basically. They just announced last week that they are separated, but they haven't lived together since at least June of nineteen, at least June.

But I want to say it was February of 19 that she left and moved to Peagram. Yeah.

So she moved to Peagram. And he lives in Brooklyn. Yep. So. I don't I don't follow either of them on Instagram, but but over the years, people have over the last year or so, people have always said, oh, what's going on with Evan and Carly? They don't seem to post a lot together every time they do. But he's over here and I never see him at her play.

And so what exactly was I don't I don't know what was going on that you know.

You know, I don't know. And I don't want to speak for, you know, with, like, intimate details or anything because I don't know. What I know is that. That Evan was really sad when she left and really didn't didn't want the relationship to end. I mean, he. As far as I know, he adored her, he told me when they met or when he got back from the show that she was one of the coolest people he's ever met in his life.

He pretty much worshipped the ground she walked on.

And I think that he really tried to save it. It seemed that way, just as close as I am to the situation. It seemed that way. He was very protective over. Their privacy of the situation and and it just seemed like he was really heartbroken and really, really, really didn't want to end, and that is why I believe that it did. That they have been separated for almost two years, but because he didn't want it to end.

So as far as you know, they've been working on things for the last year and a half. Where was he?

Where did so they never moved back in together. But clearly they had they had Bella. And then last November, Charlie comes along and they have Bella and Charlie. But they're so ever since they've had Charlie, they've never lived together. Correct.

Correct. Has this been what they've been promoting on Instagram or no, I don't you know, I don't I don't follow them on Instagram either.

I'm not a huge social media. I really try to just not. But but my friends and my my kids will have said things, you know, like, man, I can't believe they're trying to portray that they're together. It's just mind blowing. And I didn't have an answer for it. I really just didn't have an answer for it. I. The only thing that I can believe is that, you know, they just didn't want it to end and he was going to do anything he could to try to make it work.

So then do we know why last week just happened to be, I guess, the final straw where they publicly, like they haven't been together for a year and a half. So why are they announcing now? We're separate?

I don't know. I don't know. I really I can't speak to that. I'm not sure on that. And I think that that's probably private to them anyway. No, I'm not I'm really not sure why they picked this time. I think it just. They knew that it was just the end, and for however, they knew that they knew it and that was it.

So what's the biggest thing, I guess, to take out of all of this for you? What I know that you wanted to come on and say, like, hey, is it this isn't what it seems or like.

Why? Why?

Because I could go to like I would I'd love to talk to Evan about this, but I don't think that he's going. To talk to me about this, I'm guessing because this is like because I know people will ask me, Steve, why why did why did you have Maryan? Why don't you just go to heaven?

But he you know, I was really heartbroken, like, really, really heartbroken. And he he's probably not going to talk about it publicly for a really long time. He's a he's an internal processor. And just I don't see him blasting it or anything. He's just not that way. And that is one thing I appreciate about him. But he he is. He's really heartbroken and I hope that, you know, people aren't, you know, nasty and mean to them during this process because people don't understand the full story.

They don't know both sides. There she is, very vocal on social media. So they hear her side and they hear how, you know, whatever they're hearing.

But I saw an Instagram post on Christmas Day where she talked about being lonely. All right.

Well, she's been alone for two years. And so I just thought that kind of stuff just kind of turns my stomach a little bit because she's she chose to be lonely because she left him. And that is her choice. So, yeah, it is lonely.

And you know what? She can feel lonely. We all, you know, she can feel lonely and she can voice it that she's lonely and that's great. And she needs to work through that. And I hope she heals and I hope you know, but she did choose this. And I know for a fact Evan didn't want it.

So I don't think it's fair to I don't think it's fair for her to broadcast that, oh, woe is me, because she's been pretty happy for the past two years and they haven't been together.

So and he hasn't been he's been sad.

He's been sad. He is not OK with this. And it has broken his heart.

Is he getting through? I haven't looked at the social media response. I know I've gotten a plenty of emails about asking me why. And I think I said I don't know. And I don't think it's we don't need to it's their place to tell people and they probably even won't. You know, why did a divorce happen? I mean, look, if you're a public company, you if you choose to go on the show and you choose to get engaged regardless and then you choose to put your life out there and promote product on Instagram.

Yeah. And then that relationship ends. I'm sorry. You're going to have people asking, you don't necessarily have to respond and you don't owe them anything, but you can't get mad at them for asking. Exactly because they followed your journey this whole time.

And I know people feel invested, you know, and they want they feel like they're part of the relationship. And I get that. I mean, they want to know details. And I don't know, Evan's a very private person. I don't oddly enough, I know he went on a reality show, but he really is a private person in general. And I don't see him I don't see him talking about this any time soon. I really don't.

I, I would that would surprise me.

So you're so you're just. Kind of sticking up for the father of your children, I guess. Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely.

In what in what way would you say is the biggest thing that you're trying to stick up for him against? Like it's people that are are people blaming Evan or something?

You know, I I've heard that people might be maybe verbally attacking him a little bit on social media because she's so lonely. And it just I don't know, maybe it seems like he just dropped, you know, his wife and the mother of his children. But that's just not the case. This man adored her. And I know that he tried really, really hard and it wasn't good enough. Yeah.

I said I don't know anything about the relationship other than what you've told me, which was last November, you told me they had been together for living together for six months, so. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. And that obviously continued through. The the birth of of Charlie last November and right finally came to a. I had, for whatever reason, this this past couple of weeks, this past this last week when the announcement was officially made that they were separated but.

Right, right.

In your mind, is there any I don't know. Is there any chance for reconciliation between these two or. You don't know?

I don't know. I mean, hey, crazier things have happened, so I don't want to say no. But I don't know. I really I'm not and I'm not in there. I don't know enough about the details of what they go through. And I don't want to know. And that's something that we've been pretty good about. Keeping boundry up is we don't talk about that kind of stuff with each other. Don't talk about my relationship. You don't talk about his, but.

You never know. I don't know, it's just being a young mom is really hard. I know that. And there's a lot of hormonal changes that happens when you have babies and there's just a lot of change.

And it's hard. It is hard and it affects the relationship. I don't know that that did affect the relationship, but I know it affected me and and and mine hasn't mine.

Yeah. So who knows in a couple of years. I don't know. I don't know.

I just I know that I want to see him happy and I want to see him peaceful and that's it. So whatever, whatever that takes because he, he puts his life into. Being a dad for all five of those kids, and it's been hard being pulled back and forth, and I think now he can really focus on the the kids and really just love them, love on the kids. And and he'll yeah.

I mean, obviously, this is not a fun time for anybody. You know, I don't know how your boys took to Cali. They're obviously going to be seeing her a lot less. I don't know if that's, you know, something that's going to disappoint them or whatever the case may be. It's just hard for everybody involved because there's there's children involved. Bella and Charlie, I think, are young enough to where obviously they're going to grow up in a in a split parent household.

But they're young enough now to where they won't as. I guess what am I looking for here? It'll be all they know it'll be it'll be all they know. It's not like they're fully formed, developed yet as seven or eight year olds. It's like, oh, mommy and daddy are splitting up.

Like, it'll be like. Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

I think so at this point. Yeah. It's it's tough for everybody involved. I thank you for at least coming on and explaining a couple of things that maybe were a little bit confusing to the audience.

And if and if Evan's getting shit for this, for people giving him shit for, oh, why are you making Karlee lonely? Like, again, you kind of need the full scope.

You do. You're really do. You really do.

And and trust me, I could have easily said this myself and said everyone is blaming Evan. They've been separated for 18 months minimum. They're right. They live together for 18 months. But just coming from me and oh, you're just a bachelor gossip guy and you want to spread. No, I figured, you know, when you contacted me, I'm like, you know what? Why don't you come on?

And Yeah, yeah, I'm glad I could. Yeah, yeah.

And I appreciate you coming on. And I hope you don't get shit for this because it's more or less I mean, there's always going to be people out there that are.

I know. They're always there always is. I don't read any of it. So it's OK. I turn I can't look at the comments. It's all right. I don't I don't care. I can handle it. OK, fine.

So I appreciate I appreciate you at least coming on and kind of explaining this, breaking it down and talking. I don't think anybody knew anything about Evan's relationship with you and his sons and how it all worked. And I'm glad you just laid it all out there for everybody. And Anne Murray, thanks again for doing so.

Welcome. Thank you. You got it. And we'll be in touch, OK?

Sounds good bye. Thank you to Marie for coming on sharing that I know that, you know, putting X's on is always a dicey situation because there is just always going to be this side of well.

There's two sides to every story and, yeah, there is, but I feel like the first side and Karlee side has already been expressed by her social media activity post breakup. And as you heard, I mean, I'd love to have Evan on. It just doesn't sound like he wants to talk about this at all. And I think Carly Carly I think Marie is, you know, sticking up for the father of her children. And she has every right to.

And I really appreciate her coming on and and giving her thoughts. And, you know, when I said that thing. Last November and said, I heard something that I'm surprised hasn't gotten out in Bachelor Nation, this is what I was talking about, that they had Karley had moved out at least six months before they were due with with Charlie.

And I knew other people in Bachelor Nation knew. I spoke to spoken to a few of them. Who knew? And I just thought it was going to get out and then when it did and I was like, OK, well, clearly I'm not going to say anything a week before she's due with her second child, I just need that headache to deal with that. I just assumed that a couple of months, you know, passed by after they have the baby, they're settled in that they would announce it and they never did.

And they just, you know, didn't announce until this past week. So, I mean, that's I don't know why, but, you know, I think if I would have just come out and said that I think he needed to hear it from somebody else.

And it's why I never reported it. I just didn't I didn't feel it was I didn't need to at that time. And I was just shocked that just months and months passed that. It just never got out, I think I think people don't follow, like I said, I don't follow Evan and Cali online. But I've had people throughout the last year to 18 months say, hey, what's the deal with everything? Carly's relationship, it seems kind of weird.

I don't seem to spend a lot of time. I've had it.

It's all been sent to me and I've just never responded to it.

I've just never said and maybe I have responded, but I was just like, I don't know, I just played dumb. But, um. You know, I think the people that did follow it closely could see something was up and. Yeah, so it just wanted to clear the air about what is where Evan stands on all this. Sounds like he's really broken up about it.

And, you know, it's not easy for anyone. Obviously, this wasn't news. We're not breaking news that it's like the kids are finding out for the first time. They're very well aware that. When they've gone to see their dad for the last X amount of times, it's not like he was living with Carly, so.

I think, you know, Mary wanted to come on, and I figured I'd let her tell her side, so I hope you enjoy that. I hope you enjoyed Game of Roses, Chad and Lizzie before that. So I appreciate that last podcast of 2020. It's great. You know, look, we all want to get out of 2020, I get it, but let's just also keep in mind that when the clock strikes midnight tonight, wherever time zone you may be in, it doesn't mean all of a sudden things are going to be great on January 1st, 2021, and trying to be a Debbie Downer here.

But let's let's be realistic as a country and understand it's going to still take some time. The first six months of twenty twenty one are probably going to be similar. Slowly but surely, though, there is light at the end of the tunnel. If you listen to the Emily O'Brien podcast last week, yeah. There is light at the end of the tunnel and that's good. We didn't have a lot of light in twenty twenty. Now we do and all we can do is do our best and adhere to protocols put out by the CDC and just do our best, because it's not all of a sudden at the at the flip at the stroke of midnight tonight, all of a sudden everything is going to change because it's not we're still in a very bad place with infection rates being up and just setting records daily.

So I just hope people understand and can be realistic about it and just there's hope, but be a realist that it's not all just going to change at the stroke of midnight tonight. So everyone enjoy.

Your New Year's and like they all say in the office when they leave on New Year's Eve, see you next year. Everybody, thank you all for tuning in and really appreciate it.

Please write, subscribe and review an Apple podcast. It's much appreciated as we head into year five of this podcast. So for Lizzie Pace, for Chad Kolton, Murray Bass, inreality. Steve, thank you for another great year of podcasts and look forward to twenty, twenty one and another great year of podcasts as well. So thank you all everybody. I really appreciate it. We'll talk to you next week. Tim.