Michelle1
Anne Michelle
Professor Corbally
English 101
8 February, 2012
Fairy Tale or Reality: An Analysis of The Bachelor
“Once upon a time” is a phrase that brings to mind all of those folk and fairy tales that make up so much of childhood bedtime stories. The past few years these fanciful stories have been reinvented for adults. A recent, violent re-make of the classic Little Red Riding Hood story appeared in movie theatres. This season the television shows Once Upon a Time and Grimm directly portray fairytale characters living in reality, and Charlize Theron will soon be in an edgy screen version of Snow White and the Huntsman. These stories get told over and over, often re-invented for more modern audiences and reflecting new values while tossing away old stereotypes of submissive princesses who must be saved by handsome princes. But one television show still relies on this old thinking that fairy tale romances are real, and women can depend on rich, hunky guys to sweep them away to some castle (perhaps a beach home in Malibu or a villa in the Sonoma wine country); the show is The Bachelor.
The Bachelor, a show aired on ABC, is about a man who is given many young, attractive women to date as he looks for his one true love, and at the end of the season, after he has sent women home each week, he chooses one and typically proposes to her. Some of the women see themselves just as contestants in a dating game, but soon most of them get carried along in a dream of luxurious dates, adventurous experiences, and exotic locations and are convinced that they are truly on the path to finding their own Prince Charming. Some of the women, dazzled by the limousine that drops them off in front of a fabulous mansion where they see the bachelor dressed smartly and standing in front of a romantically-lit fountain, make the statement that they are in love with this man on the first night they meet him. They are caught up in the fairy tale. Many peopledismiss the show as junk, but it has an enormous fan following, and the internet is packed with blogs and websites that feed the audience’s need to follow the lucky couples even long after the season is over. Near the end of each season a special episode has the bachelor and the women he has sent home in a question and answer session with a studio audience filled almost entirely with women who spend a lot of time sighing at the romantic memories from different episodes. For many viewers, the show works because it persuades viewers, predominantly women, that the fairy-tale romance is possible.
The show is structured to carefully blend moments of high drama and soft romance, to showcase thrilling, once-in-a-lifetime dates with quiet, cozy snuggling. This is a reality show, yes, but situations are planned, and the results of days of shooting are carefully edited down to show length to create maximum impact on audiences. Just like fairy tales there are heroes and villains. Some of the women are portrayed as caring and patient and being there entirely for the bachelor and the love that is soon to come. This season Kacie B, an administrative assistant from Clarksville, Tennessee, generally acts concerned about everyone’s feelings. Her blurb on the ABC website quotes her ideal way to impress a man: “I would make a dinner and give them something sentimental - like a basket full of things that are ‘us.’ I feel like thought shows how much you care.” On the show she is given flattering lighting and soft focus. Other women, such as Courtney, a model from Santa Monica, California, are shot in with stark lighting and a sharp focus that exaggerates her piercing stare. She wants to win and chuckles cruelly as other women are sent home. She is two-faced (being sweet and coy with the bachelor but cold and venomous to the other women), seductive and aggressive, and she even looks like Maleficent from the Disney film version of Snow White. Most often the wicked women are on the show long enough to make the season interesting, but eventually the wise prince catches on and sends them home, leaving the quiet, self-sacrificing, virtuous women still in the running for his eventual hand in marriage.
The writers/producers, who suggest that quiet, virtuous self-denial will win the prince, do not spend much time appealing to logic (logos). Now in its sixteenth season, the main evidence that this marriage game actually works is the success (meaning they are still together) of Trista and Ryan, winners of the very first season of The Bachelor. ABC even paid for their million-dollar fairy-tale wedding. The host, the contestants, the fans come back to that one success story to show that it really does work. Fifteen seasons later, however, nearly every proposal (and all but a few were accepted) were followed by broken relationships. Brad Womack, on the last episode of a recent season of the show, proposed to Emily Maynard, and she accepted. Before the final show even aired, the couple had broken up. Maynard cited Brad’s jealousy and unpredictable temper as contributing factors in her decision. The current bachelor, Ben Flajnik, a winemaker from Sonoma, California, has earnestly told the women on the show that he knows this works; he knows love is possible on the show, and he is confident he will find his future wife before the season ends. The reason he knows, he says, is because last season he fell in love with Ashley on a female-centered variation of the show, The Bachelorette. He was truly in love with Ashley, and on the final episode he dropped to his knee and proposed to her. She abruptly sent him home and chose another contestant (the two of them are now separated). If that was true love, then true love is certainly not eternal. Ben is ready to dump that memory and shop around from twenty-five new women to find another endless love.
Ethos does figure fairly largely in the presentation of the show’s message, and it often comes through the mouth of the soulful, calm, reasonable host, Chris Harrison. He is the rock of the show, always there like a supportive older brother, always listening like a close friend, always sharing quiet wisdom like a parent. He is so concerned that the bachelors have time to reflect before deciding who stays and who goes. He protects the process convincing viewers that this is serious stuff, not just some game show. This season, for example, he took Casey S, a trading clerk from Leawood, Kansas, aside because he was concerned that she might not be on the show for “the right reasons.” It had come to his attention that she still had feelings for her ex-boyfriend, Michael. She confessed to Ben and was asked to leave the show. Chris Harrison helps viewers believe the show and its ability to create the fairy-tale couple is legitimate.
The major tug of the show is emotional (pathos). A perfect marriage seems not only possible but likely when the sensitive bachelor takes his women (sometimes on solo dates, sometimes in group) to four-star hotels with breathtaking views in Tahiti, Panama, Japan, Italy, Australia. Local concert halls are cleared so that the bachelor can slow dance with his date as Coldplay performs for them solely. Six Flags empties as the couple enjoys a private fireworks show. Candle-lit beach dinners, snowboarding weekends, zip line adventures, helicopter tours, even a date where the women got to participate in a Cirque du Soleil performance. The audience sees all of these perfectly romantic dates and a sense of pathos overcomes them. Many people want to have interesting dates that they cannot afford or do not have time for, so to see someone actually living out their dreams gives them a sense of hope. These dates fuel a hard-working person’s fantasies of relaxation and love. These are such exotic, dreamy, romantic events that they certainly have to lead to true romance.
The problem is that after the starlit carriage rides through Central Park and the yachting excursions in the Bahamas, only one woman is picked. The other women who knew they were right for the bachelor, knew they had found love, are sent home, and only one man and one woman are left. And the final couple has to exist in the real world. They go home to Peoria, Boston, and Portland. They have jobs and responsibilities and personality quirks. In an interview after his final show aired, Brad Womack, whose engagement crumbled almost immediately after Emily accepted his proposal, had this to say about the experience: “It hasn’t been a fairy tale,” (Marikar 1).
Works Cited
"Episode 6." Callahan, Ryan. The Bachelor. American Broadcasting Company. ABC, New York
City, New York. 6 Feb. 2012. Television.
Lee, Ji Hyun. "'Bachelor' and 'Bachelorette' Couples: Who's Still Together?." TV Recaps, TV
Reviews, Breaking TV News, and Exclusive TV Clips -- HuffPost TV. Huffington Post, 3
Dec. 2009. Web. 12 Feb. 2012. <
Marikar, Sheila. "'Bachelor' Brad Womack on Emily Maynard: 'It Hasn't Been a Fairy Tale' –
ABC News." ABCNews.com - Breaking News, Latest News & Top Video News - ABC
News. ABC News Internet Ventures, 16 Mar. 2011. Web. 12 Feb. 2012. <