The Bachelor Recap: A Heartbreaking Exit, An Unexpected Ring, and the Rise & Possible Fall of Olivia

Will Ben take back Olivia's rose? Another dramatic cliffhanger plagued The Bachelor tonight

By Lauren Piester Feb 02, 2016 4:19 AMTags
The Bachelor, Ben HigginsABC

Let's be honest: this season of The Bachelor has become The Olivia Show.

And to be a little more honest, she deserves it. At this point, while she's not the only one who's trying, she's definitely the one who's trying her hardest to achieve what she thinks is the pinnacle of life, aka winning the heart of the current bachelor. She wants to be his partner both in life, and in cooking, and in adding crickets to perfectly non-cricket sandwiches.

She's also kind of unbelievable as a real, live, breathing human being, because we've just never experienced someone so delusional. She managed to fill these past two hours with so much smiling and so much complete insanity that there wasn't even time for her to bring up that "secret language" she shares with Ben.

We're actually getting to the point where we're sick of her, and we're ready to see her go, even if she takes all of the GIF-worthy moments with her.

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ABC

The girls and Ben headed to Mexico City tonight for fun with food and language barriers. Olivia was very excited about the bidet in the hotel room, but not so excited when Amanda, and not Olivia, was named for the first one-on one.

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She pretended to be happy on the outside, but on the inside, she was furious, and thinks Amanda is totally not the girl for Ben. 

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For Amanda's date, we returned to that classic Bachelor tradition of waking up all of the women at 5am to find out just how ugly they get when they sleep, in their "natural element." Lauren H wears a retainer! Despicable!

Of course, Amanda looks gorgeous, just like Britt did when Chris woke her up last season, but at least Amanda doesn't sleep with a full face of makeup. They took a nice hot air balloon ride filled with fun facts about Mexican pyramids, which Amanda totally loved.

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ABC

Her voice says this is amazing, her face says "oh dear god." 

They later had a nice chat about Amanda's family and the fact that she's divorced, and as usual, it was a nice, productive date that was completely uninteresting from an entertainment perspective.

 

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Up next, for the group date that did involve Olivia, Ben decided to make the women learn Spanish and then cook using recipes in Spanish, because he likes disasters, apparently. He and nine of his girlfriends learned to say things like "I love you" and "I'm falling in love with you" and "I want to kiss you." Jubilee wasn't having it, because "you just said that to four other girls."

After the Spanish lesson, Olivia scooped up Ben to be on her team for a very casual cooking competition. The chefs said that Ben and Olivia's cricket, duck, cheese, and mole sandwich looked like dog food, and tasted pretty much the same, probably mostly thanks to the crickets that Olivia added for no reason other than the fact that she thinks people in Mexico really like to eat crickets.

While Ben criticized Lauren B and Jubilee's quiet team that seemed to not be getting along, they won, even though Jojo tried really hard to say as many suggestive things about tacos as she could.

At the post-date cocktail party, Olivia snatched Ben away before he even had a chance to finish his "thank you for being here, what a great day" speech.

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Olivia, however, did not take home the prize for Most Dramatic at the Cocktail Party. That award goes to Jubilee, who has continued her shtick of pretending she's not into Ben, even when she's really, super duper into Ben. She refused to take his hand and literally pushed him away after complaining all day that he didn't seem to notice her or care about her. This time, he could not support it.

They had a long talk about her issues before he explained that at this point, he was just not feeling it. Jubilee went home, and it sucked.

We've never felt it more appropriate to call on a classic Tyra Banks quote: "I was rooting for you! We were all rooting for you! How dare you?!"

Good night and good luck, Jubilee.

As hard as Jojo tried to comfort Ben, and even after he stole Lauren B away from a romantic stroll, he only had eyes for Olivia after they "reconnected," and he gave her the date rose.

While the other women held a moment of silence, Olivia was all:

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The next day, Olivia was not worried about the fact that Lauren H had a one on one.

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Lauren H, meanwhile, could not have been more excited.

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The date involved walking in a Mexico City fashion show. It was fine. Lauren was very nervous, and Ben looked very natural. 

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During dinner, they talked about—what else?—Jubilee! Lauren H totally understands how hard it was to break up with her, but also knows it was probably a good decision, especially since Lauren H always believed that Jubilee would never get along with the other soccer moms. 

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ABC

Lauren H got a rose, obviously, and then it was time for the big pre-rose cocktail party. 

That's when Olivia busted out that line from last week's preview and compared Amanda's life to Teen Mom, and apparently hit the last nerve in the process. 

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Emily had had enough, and she went to Ben to reveal to him that Olivia is the worst. He was shocked and confused, but didn't have much time to process this information before Olivia came waltzing down the stairs to steal just a bit more time with him (and to "squash" any truth-telling that was about to go down courtesy of Emily). 

She rattled off a bunch of crap about something or other, and gave him a ring, for some reason. Did the ring represent anything? She didn't say. It was apparently just a ring. She couldn't even make up a cheesy reason to give it to him, and his reaction consisted of a perfect, "...oh." 

She then said this: 

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Stop her from what?! It's unclear, but what is clear is that Ben is starting to see the light. We're also starting to fall in love with Emily. She may be slightly ditzy with the palate of a child, but she's got a good heart. 

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While Ben went around to all of the girls to ask about their feelings towards Olivia, Olivia did this: 

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ABC

Of course, the episode ended with Ben going to talk to Olivia before giving out any roses, which was rude, but at least the preview for next week ended with this glorious display of drama: 

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We guess we can forgive your cliffhanger in exchange for dramatic shots of Ben standing in a suit on a cliff. We guess. 

But please, Ben, have some mercy and get rid of Olivia. We want to find out if the other girls have personalities or not!