This week’s rating, out of 10 anchor emojis: ⚓⚓⚓⚓⚓⚓⚓ by Megan Burbank When The Golden Bachelorette premiered last week, this season’s contestants included Captain Kim Buike, a retired naval officer from Mountlake Terrace, whose bio seems like it was written to evoke The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, with references to sailboat trips, clam cakes (!!!), and whistling. Captain Kim is part of a proud local tradition: Faith Martin, the Benton City horse girl radio host, won hearts and minds during the first season of The Golden Bachelor, although she was tragically eliminated after fantasy suites. A former destroyer captain, Kim showed up in his uniform during limo exits last week and made it through the show’s first cut. We’ll be following his search for love over the next few weeks, as he vies for the attention of Golden Bachelorette Joan Vassos. Let’s watch some grown men cry! It’s week two, and as it did on The Golden Bachelor, this show is forcing people over age 60 to sleep on BUNK BEDS. What could possibly go wrong? The men choose their new sleeping quarters based on relative mobility and proximity to the bathroom. Amid the first day of summer camp hustle and bustle, French stylist Pascal discloses that he hasn’t done his own laundry in 40 years and needs help. I have questions about Pascal’s learned helplessness. (And also his accent. I know he’s really French, but it sounds a little exaggerated to me? Je ne sais pas!) As the men get settled in the mansion, they provide an excitable running commentary, as if they’ve never seen the most overexposed house in Agoura Hills before. “Beautiful pergola!” says one, and you can tell he really means it. At their family meeting, host Jesse Palmer asks Kim if he has any advice for navigating communal sleeping quarters, since Kim was in the Navy. Kim suggests earplugs, which seems obvious but turns out to be an important point later on. Jesse explains the rules of the show, presumably because on The Golden Bachelor, some of the contestants actually had no idea what they were. That makes The Golden installments much more fun to watch than the younger version of this show, where everyone shows up hoping to use their appearance as a stepping stone to Instagram fame, Dancing with the Stars, or—in the case of Madison Prewett, who I consider to be one of the franchise’s biggest villains—becoming a fundamentalist Christian influencer. Aside from Pascal and caterer Jack, who seem very committed to their TV personas, and Gil, who apparently wasn’t appropriately background checked (an ongoing problem for this franchise), the guys on this season all seem boring and nice, with a wardrobe provided by Costco as far as I can tell. At this point, I’m struggling to keep all these vaguely pleasant dads of three daughters and retired financial professionals apart. One of them, Bob, does look kind of like Jay Inslee, though, so that helps. High school dances are so much more fun when you can drink, crown yourself prom queen, and force the hottest man in the room to wear a goofy crown. COURTESY OF ABC On the first group date, the men get sent to a 1980s prom at a high school, because that’s when Joan’s prom was, and it was “the first time I ever wore a long dress,” she says. I know she probably means a formal dress, but just so you know, you can wear a long dress any time, Joan! It’s a free country! Joan does not wear a long dress for this 1980s prom, but a white taffeta tutu, and the men have to dress in pastel tuxes. They’re extremely game for this: “Ruffles have a way of speaking to ya,” says Mark, father of Bachelor season 28 winner Kelsey Anderson. Mark looks like Paul Hollywood if Paul Hollywood were extremely handsome or like Blake Moynes but old. He’s going to go far with that positive attitude. Because this is a 1980s prom, Taylor Dayne (!!!) has been commissioned to perform, and the men have a dance-off to “Tell It to My Heart.” Charles’s dancing is my favorite. After the big opening number, Joan retreats to the school’s library, so the men can come in and talk to her privately. Bob shares that he loves to spend holidays with his daughter, who is gay. It’s “Dr. Bob and 27 lesbians,” which sounds like a wonderful Robert Altman film and a holiday gathering I would like to attend. Also, I don’t want to reward mediocrity, but I like that this show is acknowledging queerness in a casual way, rather than acting like it doesn’t exist, as it so often has in the past. Meanwhile, at the mansion, everyone is struggling because they slept terribly and apparently did not listen to Kim’s advice about earplugs. Pascal bemoans “the snoring of Gregg,” and another date card arrives. Sadly, they did not go on Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, the richest text at Disneyland. COURTESY OF ABC Sixty-year-old insurance executive Chock (yes, it is) is getting the one-on-one, which is a trip to Disneyland! This is the perfect date for the Bachelor Franchise, which loves to pretend everything is a heteronormative fairy tale. Chock and Joan wear Mickey and Minnie ears and ride on Thunder Mountain Railroad, and then discuss their personal traumas over a dinner they don’t eat. Joan wears a light blue dress that makes her look like a fairy princess. Normally, the styling on this show looks deeply incongruent with its locations, but they’re in Disneyland, so it all makes sense. Joan says Chock makes her feel safe. Speaking of feeling safe: Back at the mansion, Kim fixes the garbage disposal, because instead of picking fights about who’s being fake, the men on this season are filling their free time away from Joan with chores and naps. But Kim’s moment to impress Joan finally arrives: For the second group date, the men have to compete in a talent show, with Loni Love as a guest judge, even though she is too funny to be on this show. The men have to do this because the Bachelor franchise loves a forced-fun competition, and also because Joan’s claim to fame on The Golden Bachelor was at a similar talent show, where she read a bad poem she wrote about meeting Golden Bachelor Gerry (pronounced like Gary) for the first time. To be clear: The poem was bad in a literary sense (it rhymed) but it was earnest and charming and allowed her to express her feelings, so it got the job done. This is Gregg, a retired university vice president. COURTESY OF ABC As if inspired by Joan’s poetry workshop, Kim sings a little song he wrote about love, rainbows, magic, and maybe falling in love with Joan—or just being friends if that makes more sense. Goofy but respectful! He’s somewhat overshadowed, however, by Dan, a father of three daughters/private investor who employs his essential hand tremor in a poignant ribbon dancing performance, because sometimes the Bachelor Franchise is true cinema. Dan is rewarded for his vulnerability and rhythmic gymnastics with a special dinner with Joan, against a backdrop Joan says is London Bridge (it’s not), where neither one eats anything. Kim admits that despite being “rough and tough and tumble dry,” he is disappointed not to win more time with Joan. If that “tumble dry” line isn’t a little dig at laundry-challenged Pascal, it should be! Sidebar: Watching this show live is really eye-opening. Every single commercial between segments is either for joint pain medication, a retirement community, Metamucil, Ancestry dot com, or the Ryan Murphy cruise ship show starring Joshua Jackson, an actor who was on Dawson’s Creek more than 20 years ago. We are all Golden Bachelors now! Instead of having a normal cocktail party before the rose ceremony, the many grill dads of the mansion (or the producers—who can say?) decide to have a barbecue, and get into a lengthy discussion about their personal best practices for grilling, and I have never been so bored in my life. When Joan arrives, everyone wants a tête-à-tête, but some of the attempts to charm Joan seem to work better than others. Kim tells her a touching family story about how his wife wrote a letter to their granddaughter before she died. But some of these other guys just wanna talk about sports, and Mark is lucky he’s very handsome because his idea of fun is forcing Joan to translate German phrases even though she speaks no German at all and I’m not sure why Mark does. Amazingly, Joan is patient and charmed by this. She is great at feigning interest, as all Bachelorettes must be. While everyone else treats the barbecue as a Solemn Opportunity for More Time with Joan, Jack decides it’s time to do cannonballs into the pool, and honestly, I get it! Why go to a party adjacent to a pool if you’re not gonna swim? Unlike some of the other men, Jack understands he’s here for a good time and not a long time, and he seems like he’s enjoying every minute. Good for him! But now it’s time for the rose ceremony, and everyone is anxious. “Joan is in charge. Charles is not in charge,” says Charles. I love Charles! As the tense rose ceremony instrumentals begin, Mark gets the first rose (predictable) and Kim makes the cut, but Christopher, Michael, Jack, and Jay Inslee look-alike Bob get sent home. Michael says it’s hard to be an introvert on reality TV, which it really must be, but also, has he seen this show before? Meanwhile, Jack and Christopher take it in stride, singing “My Way” in a little impromptu duet outside the mansion during their getting-kicked-off in-the-moment interviews, because The Golden Bachelorette is much more charming than its younger counterpart with so many 23-year-olds shuddering with sobs and gently dabbing their eyes as they sniffle into the camera about how they HAVE to GET MARRIED because TIME IS RUNNING OUT. Meanwhile, 68-year-old Jack exhibits no such distress. “I did my cannonballs in the pool today,” he says in his exit interview. “I had a couple of cocktails. It’s all good!” Did Captain Kim survive this episode? Yes. This week’s rating, out of 10 anchor emojis: ⚓⚓⚓⚓⚓⚓⚓