The 'Bachelor' 2-On-1 Is Back, After Years On Bed Rest

- The Bachelor -
The 'Bachelor' 2-On-1 Is Back, After Years On Bed Rest

While there's a few ways to get a Bachelor villain out of the house, one of the most effective is the two-on-one date. ABC is promoting Clayton's Bachelor two-on-one date with Shanae and Genevieve as a comeback. But is that true? When was the last Bachelor two-on-one date?

The last few seasons of the franchise have been funky with a global pandemic, a lead abandoning the show after a couple of weeks, and a host digging himself into a racist hole. Things were so bad, they just upped and skipped a whole season of The Bachelor. But with Clayton's season, the show has (for better or worse) seemingly returned to form. A boring white ex-football player is the lead! A boring white man is hosting! They're back at the mansion! They can travel for dates again, so boring American cities can be featured! There's a very clear villain! And with all that, comes the two-on-one date between said villain and Genevieve.

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In honor of Shanae and Gen's face-off on the Maid of the Mist in Niagara Falls, ABC shared some of the more memorable two-on-one dates. There was Kelsey and Ashley I. on Farmer Chris's season. There was Chad and Alex on JoJo's season. There was Olivia and Emily on Ben's season. And there was Kasey and Justin on Ali's season. Most of these featured the eliminated person getting abandoned in treacherous weather situations, leading me to think that Shanae is going to end up being left to swim herself out of Niagara Falls (fingers crossed).

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But when it comes to this "classic" date format in recent years, it hasn't been making much of an appearance. If you don't count Chris crashing Michelle and Nayte's one-on-one date (which you shouldn't), the last proper two-on-one was in Arie Luyendyk Jr.'s season in February 2018! That's ancient history in Bachelor time! Don't believe me? Working from the latest season back, here's the proof:

  • Michelle: None
  • Katie: None
  • Matt: A pseudo one with MJ and Jessenia ahead of a rose ceremony cocktail party where MJ got sent home
  • Tayshia: A pseudo one with Bennett and Noah ahead of a rose ceremony cocktail party where Bennet got sent home
  • Peter: A pseudo one with Mykenna and Tammy mid-cocktail party that resulted in Tammy being sent home... and Mykenna not getting a rose at the following rose ceremony
  • Hannah: None
  • Colton: None
  • Arie: A true one with Kendall and Krystal where Krystal got sent home
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It seems like without a clear-cut villain in the past few seasons, the two-on-one date has been pushed aside... until now. Ahead of Shanae and Genevieve's date, it's good to remember that, with most two-on-ones, the "villain" gets cut. There's always exceptions, like in Nick Viall's season when he kept Corinne over Taylor. But when you've got a lead who's too smitten with their season's villain, the two-on-one is engineered to make them realize the villain's not worth destroying the rest of their season over. (Let's just conveniently forget that producers surely wanted that villain around in the first few weeks. But around Week 5 or 6, there's no time for such distractions! It's time to get serious in their journey to find everlasting love, obvi.)

If any villain has been begging for a two-on-one date, it's Shanae. So even though Genevieve may not have done much to deserve being the other participant (clearly, this should have been between Elizabeth and Shanae), she's forced to take on this role in Clayton's season of The Bachelor. And with the franchise returning to its state of normalcy, this date better end with Shanae battling her way out of a waterfall all alone while Genevieve rides off into the sunset in a helicopter with Clayton.

Image: ABC

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