Week 6: Totally over him

Finally. Ashley is totally over Bentley. She's not even thinking about Bentley anymore, except in those moments where she's telling us how over Bentley she is. And those moments come along about every 15 seconds. I lost count of the times Bentley was mentioned and don't have enough ink to go back and keep a running tally. Suffice it to say that Bentley is all but forgotten by our heroine. Yup. Take that to the bank. No more Bentley. Bentley's gone, physically and mentally. Buh-bye Bentley.

I had a comment in last week's post taking me to task for believing Chris Harrison or the producers should have told Ashley about Bentley's true motivations. The commenter suggested that it's not in a documentarian's mandate to meddle; they are there to simply document what really takes place. Fair enough. But I draw a big distinction between documentaries and reality TV. The producers are already meddling in real life by putting everyone in certain situations and recommending certain people get roses. But I think the real reason they should have spilled the beans is because of their own stated purpose of the show: to help people find true love. Yeah, we know that's a load of hooey, but that's what they say. Chris Harrison admits to befriending many of the season stars and wants to help them. The show constantly bends over backwards to bend the rules for the star by keeping more suitors than expected or sending more home. So in the role of friend, you've got to do what a friend would do, don't you? If Ashley was your friend, and you knew a guy was manipulating her like that, you'd do the right thing and tell her.

And here's the thing: I now believe someone from the show did tell her. Because from what we saw of their little tête-a-tête in Hong Kong, there wasn't enough shown for her to react the way she did. Bentley was as slimey as ever, looking her in the eye and saying, "I'm not gonna mess with you," hugging her, kissing her, touching her thigh, etc., and when he finally changed the dot-dot-dot to a period, he did so in the most dishonest way, pinning it on her ("I feel that from where you're at, we should call it a period"). In other words, she bought all that behaviour before. But she left telling us she thought he was a "player", saying, "Bentley, if you're watching this, fuck you. I'm done with you."

Seriously, don't you think someone must have filled her in? Her reaction was a tad strong for what we saw. Or do you think she just clued in? Maybe the fact he left ostensibly to be back with his darling daughter who he missed so much, yet flew all the way back to Hong Kong without her and didn't even mention her when Ashley asked him what he was up to ("I've been working and that's about it.") Granted, I realize we're only seeing what the editors are showing us, but still.

He does make a good villain, though. I can't wait to see his turn on the Men Tell All episode.

So what else happened this week? The usual manic-depressive Ashley stuff. She felt so liberated and ecstatic following the closure with Bentley (who she's completely over, don't forget) she even inexplicably gave the dud Lucas a rose on their one-on-one date. She was clearly just over the moon. Case in point, she saw two Chinese dragons/lions (four guys in two costumes, I should say) and that elicited an, "Oh my God!" Really? She must get positively orgasmic on Halloween. All I ever think when I see them is one guy is stuck smelling the ass of the other the whole time.

Out on the boat with Lucas, Ashley kept fumbling with her hair, desperately trying to keep her bangs down. Then I remembered the weird wrinkles on her forehead from last season. Then I kept noticing her struggling to keep them hidden throughout the show and it suddenly explained her new hairstyle. So much for honesty. Honey, if a guy can't love you for your unique head patterns, he's not worth it.

Actually, honesty played a role in the episode. She came clean first to JP, then to the rest of the fellas, about her past feelings for Bentley (who she's practically forgotten by this point). JP, Ryan and Ames, the good guys of the bunch, were okay with it and appreciated her honesty and what's she's going through. But the other babies didn't like that they'd been wasting their time. They felt she wasn't being honest. One of them, Mickey, felt she lied to them. He said, "If (Bentley)'s what you're looking for please send me home." To which I shouted (in my head), "Then go!" No sooner had I thought that than Ashley called him on it, saying, "Take the initiative and leave." And he did. M-i-c (See you real soon!) k-e-y (Why? Because you're a whiner).

But the mercurial Ashley got the other doubters on side by blubbering and lying. She stood there crying, saying, "The truth is you're not second best." But clearly they were. She admitted it herself time and again, ad nauseum. If Bentley was game, she'd have left them in a second and run off to Utah to be one of his wives.

Oh, and what's with all the Ryan hate? Usually you can at least get a sense of the hated person's other side, but we haven't seen anything about Ryan that suggests a two-faced con man that the guys are suggesting. I get that he's over-exuberant and that some guys might not like that, but they're saying he's one way in front of them and another way in front of her. Anyone out there help me on understanding this?

Lucas, JP and Ryan all received roses. With Mickey leaving on his own, that meant three more would get a rose and one would go home. I was really pulling for Blake to get the boot because he was the one guy I didn't like. Wish granted. Buh-bye Blake. Another B gone. Staying on were the alphabetical Ames, Ben and Constantine.

Next week they go to Taiwan, then in some future episode they'll jet off to Fiji where another person from her past will return. It's not Bentley, by the cut of his suit, so who could it be? I'm not going to go read over my past posts to refresh my memory on who left. Out of sight, out of mind. I'll enjoy watching when the time comes and I encourage you to avoid spoilers, too. It's more fun seeing it when we're supposed to.

Oh, wait. Maybe it's funny whatsisname, the cell phone salesman who wanted to be a comedian. I betcha that's who it is. But I'm not going to check. That's just a wild stab in the dark.