Bachelor 22 - Arie Luyendyk Jr - Episodes - Feb 12th - *Sleuthing - Spoilers*

that was good.

Paul is a hometown guy. I never used to like him, he was IMO a real jerk. But since he's doing these vids, he's redeeming himself. His twitter vids are quite funny as well.
@BizNasty2point0

I like Sharleen Joynt's blogs - she is IMO intelligent, shows her unique insight in them and articulately explains why she feels the way she does, She writes two blogs, on for Flare and one for All The Pretty Pandas. Those are hotlinks to my sources for these quotes.

First her "handicap" posts on Flare about the Feb 12 episode (she put Lauren in the #1 spot with this reasoning):

Sharleen wrote:
1. Lauren B, 25: I literally rewound the evening portion of this 1-on-1 and rewatched it a few times, trying to make sense of Arie’s abrupt departure when Lauren confessed to falling in love with him. My sister‘s take was that Arie’d been leaning towards sending Lauren home, but when she opened up about falling for him, that put a wrench in previously laid plans and he immediately sought out a producer to say he was keeping her. Meanwhile, my take was that Arie REALLY wants it to be Lauren and that this was such a leap forward for them (made especially powerful by how closed off and hard to read she’s been) that her confession left him verklempt. Either way, what I liked about all this was that it felt earned. For once, her admitting to falling in love with him didn’t feel like a trope that was right on schedule (Week 7 is pretty standard for the “I’m falling in love with you” confession, after all). Rather, it felt like it had been building for awhile and that she finally expressed something that had been bottled up. Lauren is unquestionably the dark horse we thought she had potential to become, however, her airtime earlier in the season still doesn’t add up to a “winner’s” edit. (We didn’t see her limo exit—all we heard him say was “Another Lauren!”—or one second of their Night One 1-on-1 time!) Regardless, Arie’s excitement about Lauren feels palpably stronger than it does (or has) about any of the other women thus far, putting her in this week’s top spot.

To save you the time of looking up her use of the word verklempt (and admit that I didn't know what it meant either) - Google defines verklempt this way: "The definition of verklempt is a Yiddish word that describes a person who is too emotional to speak."

Secondly her post on All The Pretty Pandas (I'm putting it second because it seems she wrote the Flare post first):

Sharleen wrote:In the evening, Lauren confesses to feeling feelings of love for Arie, and this moment was EPIC for me. I actually rewound and rewatched it a few times, trying to make sense of Arie's strange reaction...

As I said over at Flare, my sister thought Arie needed to pow wow with a producer because Lauren's feelings changed the course of things. (She felt Arie was planning on sending Lauren home had she remained on the cold and standoffish side.) My thought was that Arie was actually verklempt and needed a moment. Since posting that, a reader name Christina wrote me about this and put it so perfectly that I figured I'd just copy and paste it here:

"My husband and I both thought the same thing: That he wanted to say "I love you" or some version back, but wanted to check with producers about HOW to word it and what [it was] he was COULD say since there is the "unwritten" rule that the lead needs to play his/her cards close to the vest. I think he was gone for so long because he was getting advice on how to build up and craft his response - both to express his feelings AND to maintain "good TV" in the moment and for the future episodes.

I think he got thrown off by her saying that in that moment, because he is/was insecure in his relationship with her due to her reserved nature. I think he's SO into her that he did not even in his wildest dreams imagine that she had strong feelings for him.

After he said it my husband yelled "IS HE ALLOWED TO SAY THAT??"

Watching it back with that perspective in mind I couldn't agree more. The way he looks down after she says she's falling in love, it looks like he has so much he wants to say but stops himself. He then seems to visibly gulp. Then, the way he looks off to his left, it's like he's looking for a certain producer, not just craving a breath of fresh air and a stroll.

At any rate, Arie leaves Lauren at the table where she proceeds to give THREE fleeting but distinct Direct-Looks-Into-Camera...

The more I see of Lauren the more I like her. She is SO poker-faced, yet you could see in her face in the above clip that she felt unbelievably vulnerable. Watching someone like her try to keep it together (she does a damn good job), while clocking the camera staring at her, is really compelling, far more so to me than the many contestants who just easily and willingly cry, seemingly on command. It's tears like the above that make good reality TV, not an actor's tears.

Arie gives Lauren the rose with easily the most powerful rose speech of the entire season thus far...

This supports Christina's hypothesis. After all, if Arie felt like he was falling in love with Lauren, why wouldn't he have just said it back in the moment? Why would he have needed a time out if it weren't to nail down the semantics of what he was ALLOWED to say?

IMO Sharleen describes the scene so aptly I think it's a worthy read. At least it was for me. As Sharleen says - the scene was EPIC.

for Shar's reviews and it is lovely to read good argumentative thesis on the moments we don't know for sure how they played out, but I could picture it to be close to reality.

Is Christina one of our members? I thought I remembered reading the first part of that quote pretty much verbatim here?

As per Sharleens blog I don't think he left the table to tell producers that he wanted to keep her, i think he left to go ask the producers if he can express his feelings to her and tell her he is falling in love with her too. jmo

I think they changed up the edit from Becca F1 to Lauren.  But I am not convinced there was a clear front runner at this point.   I also think knowing about the change just like any spoiler colors what we see on the screen.

I was talking to an unspoiled co-worker today and she thought he was sending Lauren home and was quite surprised at what he said. I knew what was happening and I would have thought the same thing based on her lack of personality, at least what was shown.

I finally got around to seeing the entire episode, so here are my thoughts:

Becca -- after their date, I would not have picked her for F1. Hometowns, sure, but F2 at best.

Lauren -- Arie continues to be very easy to read for me. When Lauren told him that she was falling in love with him, I watched his face carefully. What I saw was someone who just realized that he had won the romance lottery. Whether he went to talk to a producer or not (I tend not to think so,) I take him at his word that he hadn't felt those feelings in a very long time. I think he was simply coming to terms with the fact that at long last, he had gotten what he wanted. There is no doubt in my mind that Lauren was clearly his F1 at this point. What happened further down the road is a mystery.

Jacqueline -- I like her a lot and was sorry to see her go. If not for her career, she's make a great candidate for the Bachelorette.

Seinne -- One thing I'll say about Arie, he was really good at giving each woman an opportunity to shine. But at a certain point on the evening portion of the date, you could see his walls going up. He does that when he's decided against a woman. He also drags out one or more words. A poker player, he's not. Too many tells.  

Tia -- I hated that she threw Baby Beks under the bus. I realize that this probably came from a place of insecurity, but it was still not a good look for her. My take is that Arie likely already knew at that point that he was sending Bekah home anyway. So IMO it was a lot of wasted energy on Tia's part.

Baby Beks -- I was intrigued by Arie's statement to her that he didn't see their lives fitting together. I would like to know more about what he meant by that. I still feel that his previous chemistry with her was through the roof. But he seemed to put that wall up on the group date. He almost went into fatherly mode with her (the kiss of death.) I'd love to see her on Paradise. Heck, I'd like to see almost all of them on Paradise. I also feel that she might make a very good Bachelorette a few years down the road. She can probably milk this franchise for years, if she's so inclined.

Preview of Monday's show -- it seems that a lot of parents are going into grizzly bear mode about their daughters. Can't say that I blame them. Good luck with that, Arie. Lauren looks a lot like her mom. Down the road, I can't wait to see how Arie explains to Lauren's parents that he initially picked someone else instead. Arie must have a death wish, .