‘The Bachelor’ Recap: Catty Drama Comes To A Head With Tense 2-On-1 But Joey Can’t Seem To Escape The Issue

Katie Campione
·6-min read

SPOILER ALERT! This post contains details from Monday’s episode of The Bachelor.

It’s a two-night Bachelor event, and Joey is meeting the women in Malta after a tumultuous first few weeks in Los Angeles, to say the least.

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The confrontation at the pool party has everyone on edge and, while they all claim they’d like to move on, it seems to be all anyone can talk about. That’s probably why Joey gives Maria and Sydney a two-on-one to clear the air. But, more on that later.

First, Lexi gets a one-on-one date with Joey. They spend the day walking around Malta, trying plenty of new foods, dancing, and even just taking in the city from a hilltop. They also take in some paintings at a church, and Lexi reminisces about her late grandfather, who was an artist. She says during confessional that she’s hoping to get deeper in her conversations with Joey over dinner. Now is usually about the time the women start craving a deeper connection with the leading man, as roses are becoming more scarce.

Over dinner, Lexi tells Joey that she was previously diagnosed with endometriosis, and she was told she may never be able to bear her own children. She also says this was the reason her last relationship ended. Joey admits this is not something he’s faced in a relationship before, but there are many ways to make a family, and it doesn’t discourage him from pursuing their relationship.

Lexi gets a rose.

Meanwhile, back at the hotel, Sydney is still pissed Joey kept Maria around. She says she can’t focus on anything else because her brain is “completely occupied” by the fact that Maria is still there. It looks like Maria is really not concerned about Sydney and just wants to move forward, but that doesn’t seem like it’ll be happening.

The group date goes to Jenn, Daisy, Edwina, Katelyn, Allison, Rachel, Autumn, Kelsey T., Jess, Madina, Lea, and Kelsey A. This also confirms Sydney and Maria are going on that two-on-one. Yikes.

The group meets Joey at Fort Manoel, where they filmed some scenes from Game of Thrones. Joey says he’s thrilled to be standing where Ned Stark was beheaded (spoilers, Joey!). The women are told they’ll be participating in a series of challenges in order to win some extra time with Joey.

The first is jousting. Then, they are tasked with individually staring into Joey’s eyes to “show him their soul.” This happens in front of everyone else and, admittedly, it’s pretty awkward. It also leads to several make out sessions. Again, this is in front of everyone. Wildly uncomfortable to witness.

The last challenge involves each of the women and Joey standing in a circle around some hanging sausages. As the wheel of sausages spins, they have to catch one using only their mouth. The innuendo is a little too in your face on this one. Also, all of the women are pretty grossed out by the sheer amount of sausages hitting their face. Autumn appears to be the only one to succeed, and she ends up winning extra time with Joey, although it’s unclear how much time she actually got to spend alone with him, because all the episode shows is the pair walking a few feet away and staring at the sunset together. By the next scene, all the women from the group date are together again for a cocktail party.

There’s not much to report from this portion of the group date, other than all the conversations appear to go really well. A few women tell Joey they’re “falling for him,” but there’s no other big moments. Shocking! Also, refreshing! Kelsey T. gets the group date rose.

The calm won’t last long, though, because it’s time for Sydney and Maria to finally clear the air in this two-on-one. The boat ride to meet Joey is super awkward, and things get even weirder when they see they’ll be joining him on an even smaller boat to explore some caves around Malta. Maria is trying to keep things light, but Sydney isn’t having it.

After the boat ride, Joey knows he can’t avoid this any longer. He pulls Sydney aside first to ask her side of the story. She says when he left the pool party, Maria “attacked” her and told Lea to “shut the f*ck up.” She claims Maria is the common denominator for every issue in the house, and, ultimately, Sydney feels she’s just looking out for Joey’s best interest by flagging all this drama with Maria.

Well, Maria says this is all a lie. She wanted to leave the drama in LA, and she doesn’t understand why Sydney can’t move on. She also doesn’t like being accused of being a bad person.

By the time dinner rolls around, literally nothing has been solved. However, Joey has already made it clear (to the cameras, at least) that he has a much stronger connection with Maria, so that seems to be where this is headed. He doesn’t waste much time, though he does ask them both to weigh in on whether they think they have a strong enough connection with him to make it to the end. Sydney says yes, but Maria says she doesn’t know anymore because she thinks he’s questioned her character a little too much for her liking. But, she’s willing to try, if he is.

No surprise here, but Joey gives the rose to Maria. He seems to have appreciated her honest answer, and he says he’s also unsure about her at this point, but he wants to give them a chance to get back on the right foot.

Finally, it’s time for the cocktail party before the rose ceremony. Everyone swears they just want to move on, but it very quickly becomes clear that is still not the case.

During the party, Lea gets upset with Madina for being too nice to Maria, since Sydney is supposedly Madina’s “best friend in the house.” Lea thinks it’s disingenuous, especially because this drama started with Sydney defending Madina. Lea confronts Madina, but she is not having it. She says she doesn’t think she should have to be mean to Maria, just because of her friendship with Sydney, who is not there anymore. Lea says that she has a “higher standard” of friendship than that, and they agree to disagree.

But Lea decides to take the issue back to Joey. Bad idea, girlfriend. As Lea tells Joey her side of the story, Maria has a meltdown when she learns that Lea is mad at Madina for simply being nice to her. She says she feels like she can’t win, and she insists she wants to go home.

Something is telling me Joey will not let that happen, but we won’t find out tonight! This is where the episode ends.

Luckily, there’s not long to wait. Another two-hour episode of The Bachelor airs Tuesday at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC.

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