TV Eye: Caught in a bad romance

The Bachelor's Brad Womack must be one of the world's luckiest men. Photo / Supplied

If you were single, attractive and tired of dating, would you a) try to find a life partner on a TV show, b) compete for that potential life partner with 29 others, c) aim for a vivid first impression by jumping into their arms, slapping them in the face or wearing fangs, or d) all of the above. If you answered d) then step on up to star on The Bachelor, (Fridays, 8.30pm, TV2) a show as worthy as Keeping Up with the Kardashians, yet so compelling I'm willing to sit through the weekly two-hour cringe-a-thon.

If it wasn't for The Bachelorette, in which the gender tables are turned and 30 men compete for the affections of one woman, you'd think you'd tuned into a polygamist beauty pageant. And yes, there is a contestant from Salt Lake City, although Michelle is too evil to be a Mormon.

The Bachelor craps on social norms. At every turn, in every undignified rose ceremony, the viewer is left asking the same thing: why? Why would you sign up to be emotionally tortured? Most of the contestants wind up giddy with butterflies when Texan millionaire Brad Womack tells them they're special, only to fall into depression when they see him playing tonsil hockey with his blonde girlfriend, or his redhead or the one with the black eye. (Michelle again. Must be an actor.)

Sometimes the questions are more perplexing. Why don't they ever talk about anything? Why am I still watching this when I accidentally on purpose saw who wins on the internet?

The biggest why, and the cornerstone of the show, is, why do all the contestants automatically fall for The Bachelor himself? The last time this master manipulator was on the show four years ago he became America's most hated reality star after rejecting all the contestants. He was supposed to ask at least one to spend eternity with him, or at least the time it takes for the pair to flog a story to a tabloid. Clearly the show's not going to work if even one of the women doesn't find The Bachelor attractive or a prospective mate, and yet most women TimeOut canvassed thought Brad had the personality of a potato. But I bet that if you were put in that situation, where your sole purpose was to gain the attraction of the single male or female in the room, you would find yourself feeling hot and bothered every time he or she looked in your direction. Perhaps it's the competition, the ego that drives these women to fall for this guy, not to mention his tricks to charm them into feeling good about themselves. This is how Brad, who has been in therapy for three years, and who needs the help of his therapist to get a wife when he's got 30 women practically disembowelling themselves to get his attention, got one victim on side: "Please be confident in the fact that I am so wildly attracted to the fact that you are everything I have not been with in my past." Wow.

Perhaps The Bachelor is just an extreme way of seeing where you fit in the social strata. Here's a contrived cross-section of babes with whom to compare yourself. A wise person once said that when you fall in love, essentially you're falling in love with yourself. That's even truer on TV.

-TimeOut

By Rebecca Barry Hill
TheOwl (Auckland City) | 10:10AM Thursday, 24 Nov 2011
Just how many relations that people know of are really mutually benificial,
and that most are somewhat dysfunctional.
The western women has been subject to 100s of years of idealised knight n shining armour fantasy= though what do they need saving from nowdays, their dragons = players bad boys are their bread n butter.
Then need I mention the Hollywood fantasy portral of relationships aka kim Cardashion, the TV world is more so a fantasy land.
Your only going to get what some projects of htemselfs and wants you to see, so its a illusion, few people lok at a persons chaos in their lifes when considering a partner. A TV show just makes it worse.
Do a anaylse of what these female contestants want its the fantasy male.
Men got over the playboy model types A decade ago, just finding one of you with only one cat is a mission too mars. I could be off to the Ukraine just as happy to stay single and enjoy my work income. Relationships are often overated if not needy.
Magnus (New Zealand) | 10:10AM Thursday, 24 Nov 2011
I find this perplexing too. Also the distortion that you have to be impeccably attractive to be on the show and remain so 24/7 during filming. There's that saying that you know you've found your true love when you can comfortably pass gas in their presence and not be embarrassed by it. I can't imagine these people even waking up without make-up (guys included).
It's like a Disney princess story with real people. I keep saying to my daughter don't expect too much when your dating, no-one I've known has ever been whisked away to a tropical island to stay in a 5+ star hotel. Cinemas and nights out at the pub. It's compelling (disturbing) to watch the train wreck as people fall apart during the show.