You could say we all saw it coming. And yet, it’s such an offensively boring pick, color me surprised by the predictability—Colton Underwood, a real person (seen above) and not the love interest of a YA novel set in some future dystopia—is your next Bachelor.
You might remember the 26-year-old retired football athlete as “the virgin” on Becca Kufrin’s season of the Bachelorette. (If you don’t: he was eliminated when another former Bachelor contestant, Tia Booth of Weiner, Arkansas, showed up to tell Kufrin she still loved the guy. Kufrin immediately dumped him.) Or perhaps you’re newly familiar with Underwood’s role on the current Bachelor in Paradise season, where he strings Tia Booth for, like, five episodes before breaking it off in an episode that aired on Monday.
Some words from Colton (via The Hollywood Reporter):
“That’s one thing that I took pride in on both seasons: just being true to who I am. I think it took all of that to get to where I am at now, and know who I am as a person and know what I want in a life partner.”
When asked if he’s open to marriage (the show is literally predicated on the promise of engagement), he responded:
“Absolutely. That’s what I’m looking forward to the most, is being engaged and getting married shortly after that.”
Great, Colton. I cannot wait for an entire season of virgin jokes. The fantasy suites… so awk!!
For what it’s worth, Underwood isn’t even the first “Virgin Bachelor.” That title goes to the “born-again” virgin Sean Lowe, the 17th Bachelor who, back in 2013, didn’t lose his v-card until he moved to Dallas, TX at 24. He also waited to have sex with his then-fiancé Catherine Giudici until their wedding night (and he was also the first in the franchise to actually marry the woman to whom he proposed).
I imagine this wack pick of Colton Underwood is the result of a post-Rachel Lindsay Bachelor universe, where ideal mates still look and behave exactly as they did as high school jocks. And, of course, it’s all very, very white again.