Jenn's Journey: How The Bachelor Franchise Continues to Fail Its POC Leads
Bachelorette Jenn Tran during "After The Final Rose".
Like many, my family and I sat down last week to watch the finale of what we thought had been an incredible season of ABC’s hit Reality TV staple, The Bachelorette. Well, I no longer think that. Instead of the rose-colored naivety that traditionally clouds a season’s ending, what we got was three hours (yes three) of cruelty, as my favorite Bachelorette, The First Asian Bachelorette, Jenn Tran was conned, humiliated, and then forced to watch the whole thing unfold while ABC held the image of her sobbing for all to see. It was by all accounts disturbing, and while I was shocked, enraged even, looking back at the way The Bachelor Franchise has treated POC leads, I guess I can’t be all that surprised.
A bit of backstory and some spoiler warnings for the ending of The Bachelorette Season 21 lie ahead.
Throughout the season Jenn had expressed some clear struggles due to her dad’s abandonment and betrayal earlier on in her life. As you can imagine, this would make falling in love and trusting anyone, let alone at such a rapid pace, pretty difficult. But Jenn continued this season with class, breaking ties with men who displayed traits she would previously fall for like being emotionally unavailable or incredibly toxic. The entire time I had my own front-runner: Devin. He was sweet, all in on Jenn, and totally in love. The obvious choice, but given her previous trauma, I was worried she wouldn’t be able to see it.
Well, now I wish she hadn’t.
In the end, Jenn not only chooses Devin but chooses to propose to him as a way to reassure him of her feelings. And right when we were supposed to see this proposal, the cameras cut to real-life Jenn in a live studio, barely holding back tears. In a disastrous twist, she then fills the audience in on everything that has taken place since. Jenn did propose to Devin. And he said yes. And then all but vanished as soon as filming wrapped. He wouldn’t answer phone calls, texts, or meet with her, and a month before the finale he called her to break their engagement off.
He conned everyone. Now that alone, while frustrating, isn’t necessarily ABC’s fault. After all, how are they supposed to know the intentions of every single contestant (we’ll come back to this later)? Not to mention, he faked it so well that he even won the show. But it’s what took place after that reveal that really put the nail in ABC’s coffin. See, rather than just supporting Jenn, hearing her side, and allowing her to step away from the cameras with this horrific show ending, Host Jesse Palmer then brings Devin out. It’s the first time they’ve spoken in weeks, and the emotions are charged. Devin proves to be a truly horrendous person, essentially laughing through Jenn's tears. You’d think this is where it would end.
Jenn has gotten her feelings out, the audience now knows the kind of man Devin is, we can all move on, right?
Except wrong. Because then the host leans over to Jenn, literally sobbing, and tries to smoothly segue into some form of “Now don’t you want to watch the proposal?” Jenn whips back, sputtering out a cold “Do I have a choice?” Before the show cuts away to the entirety of the proposal. Jenn is now forced to sit next to Devin and see her confess her love for him in the context of everything we know. It’s horrendous, but nothing could be worse than ABC putting her image in the corner throughout the entire scene. All we see is Jenn’s heart breaking again and again in an act of true cruelty.
I should have been surprised, but all that ran through my head was ABC’s mistreatment of the first Black Bachelor. Back in 2021, twenty-five seasons into The Bachelor, we finally got a Bachelor of Color in the form of Matt James, a kind-hearted real-estate broker from North Carolina. While his season was notable for its own reasons, there were two key areas where ABC failed James. During the show, Matt James' family life, similar to Jenn’s, was put on blast in a way that their White counterparts typically didn’t deal with. Rather than showcasing James' family as it was, without much comment, the show made it a big deal that Matt James grew up in a household with an absentee father.
This was his reality, but for many African American citizens, this is a stereotype that follows them. They could have simply acknowledged this, the way it affects him in his relationships, and moved on, but instead towards the finale ABC brought on Matt James’ father and aired a conversation in which James asks for an explanation as to why he was abandoned. I’m not suggesting this isn’t an important conversation to have, but airing it out for a predominantly White audience seems exploitative. Putting Matt James' real-life trauma in some box to ogle at, especially with the way it was framed, felt wrong.
Then came the ending, where Matt James chose front-runner Rachel Kirkconnel, only to discover she had attended an antebellum party just a few years prior. The engagement was effectively over, but it’s a situation James should have never been put in. This is not drama. This is not tea. This is disrespect. You have a Black man looking for love, when vetting contestants they should have pulled Rachel and anyone who had so much as a mildly questionable tweet. In the years since Matt and Rachel have gotten back together, with James even releasing a book, First Impressions, on the weight of being the first Black Bachelor and his relationship with Rachel.
If you haven’t watched The Bachelor in a while, and you’re thinking to yourself when did they change hosts from Chris Harrison to this Jesse Palmer man? Well, it was when Harrison defended Kirkconnel in front of the first Black Bachelorette, Rachel Lindsay. Stating he sympathized with Kirkconnel and the position she was in. While ABC was quick to right that wrong, for many it felt too little too late given the entire fiasco that was Matt James season.
This mistreatment of POC leads is long from over. The ending of Jenn Tran’s journey isn’t even the beginning of ABC’s failures in just this one season. Despite being an outstanding lead, Jenn was third in line to be The Bachelorette, behind fan favorites Maria Georgas and Daisy Kathryn Rae Kent, both of whom have now publicly stated they declined the offer. Though Bachelor Nation is used to the role being passed around, in the days since Jenn’s tragic finale, it was revealed that her top two men were hoping it was one of those two women. Devin wanted it to be Maria and even followed her as soon as he broke their engagement. ABC got a group of men who weren’t even interested in Jenn or going on this journey with the first Asian Bachelorette. Rather than scrapping them, and finding people who applied after Jenn was announced, they continued. They played more than one hand in this humiliating ending, and the only question I have is why?
Unfortunately, I fear I already know the answer. They simply didn’t care enough. For a woman who, like many Asian Americans, has said she always felt second place or that she had to hide her culture and conform, to then be paraded around by ABC as this symbol of diversity, this token of “strength” only to be this mistreated. This devalued. This unconsidered. Is so heartbreaking, and indicative of the reality of many People of Color. She went on a show to find love, and much like Matt James, all she got was embarrassment, while ABC reaped the benefits.
While I hope things change, especially with the looming knowledge of the now-announced Bachelor of Color Grant Ellis, I have a deep fear they won’t. POC stories deserve to be told and they deserve to be respected, but when a network has proven time and time again that they simply can’t do that, maybe it’s time to put a wrap on The Bachelor?
