There Was One Brief Moment of Reality on Last Night's Episode of The Bachelorette

By Kate Dries | July 26, 2016 | 2:25pm

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Monday night’s episode of The Bachelorette—the first of two this week, oof—featured some hard-to-watch rejection. But it also, for a few fleeting moments, showed an actual conversation you might have in a relationship—big!

Though Luke and Chase were sent home in dramatic fashions—Luke immediately after a producer told him to tell JoJo he loved her, Chase right before he thought he’d be having sex with JoJo—the real highlight of the episode was a conversation had between JoJo and Jordan on their date, before they went off to presumably Do It in the Fantasy Suite.

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“In your mind, what does the next year look like for you?” JoJo asked Jordan, to kick off a rare televised discussion on this show that featured two people actually discussing things people discuss in life, like logistics or the feasibility of a relationship between them working out when they live in different states.

“Um, that’s a tough question to answer. It kind of depends, I don’t know what the next year looks like 100 percent,” Jordan responded. (By this he meant that at this point in time, he wasn’t yet sure whether being on The Bachelorette was going to bring him the career in sports broadcasting he desired. Don’t worry—things worked out for Jordan.)

“I think that makes me nervous,” JoJo immediately said. “I feel like with lifestyle, there’s a lot of movement, there’s a lot of being gone…”

Jordan countered that that was a good thing, because it means he doesn’t have, “nor do I need, a home base right now,” i.e., he could very easily be in Dallas where JoJo lives.

This was not enough for JoJo. “I know but when you say ‘right now’ it makes me feel like in six months if you get a phone call you’ll be like, ‘Peace, I’m out,’” she replied. Fair!

It was at this point that she brought up, however vaguely, the biggest issue with dating shows of this type: that they do not work the way real life works, and when that’s addressed, those moments are not shown. “It’s not like we’re just dating and we can figure it out as we go; the worst thing that could happen is ending up with somebody and not realizing how different your lifestyles are and how that could possibly ruin things.”

Ding ding ding! We have some reality folks!

Jordan quickly tried to soothe her by saying, “I wanna spend the rest of my life with you.” But JoJo countered immediately with, “Ehhh, that’s what Ben said.” Cold-blooded but real!

Most of JoJo’s storyline/fears this season has centered on her wanting to pick a guy who won’t surprise her in the end by not proposing, that she doesn’t want to be “heartbroken” again. She’s asked all the men to explain their feelings to her, to try to get the most positive outcome possible. But she admitted the conundrum here herself—with so little time, there’s no way you can properly acquaint yourself with the person you’re dating on a reality television show. And as we’ve seen from the reveals about her final two men and their past history with relationships since the show started airing, she is learning that no number of platitudes erase what you don’t know.