Hello, FOX Network Legal Department. So nice to meet your air quotes.
Let me begin by saying I hope Prince Harry sees this someday, and creates a vast and impossible drinking game for every element that is STUPIDER THAN SHOULD EVER BE ALLOWED. Which is all of them. Which makes it perfect material for a Fugcap in which I take low-rent photographs of my TV set and write it in the wee hours of the morning. Y’ALL. I sat through this. It burned.
There are so many problems with this scorched fecal slapheap. It is not cut with a sense of humor. It is not imaginative. It is, I think, actually mean-spirited. It does not have a charismatic lead whose personality and charm make up for the fact that he makes about as convincing a Prince Harry as I do. It gets Harry’s title wrong. And there’s nothing IN IT for anyone except ridicule. At least on Joe Millionaire, the audience knew there was a carrot for the girl who made it to the end (if I’m remembering right, she found out when she chose him that they’d get to split a million dollars). The total lack of any kind of stakes here — the only prize is, apparently, true love with a guy whose red rinse will wash out in three days — makes this nothing but another poisonous little lens through which to peer and point and laugh and suggest that American women are dumb and desperate, with the added layer of an impersonator who is hoping to add “delusional” to the list of failings of The American Female, to see how thoroughly these women are willing to dupe themselves just to hope they’ll wear a crown someday. It’s a soulless prank on womankind. It is the most cringeworthy thing I have ever seen, and yes, that includes Joe Millionaire, and Average Joe, and For Love Or Money, and early seasons of The Bachelor that I watched before I ran screaming from that ship.
Okay, want to meet Faux Harry? Ladies, this is the Before shot of the man to watch out for, cycling around your England neighborhood:
Unfortunately for Matthew Hicks — who could theoretically be a super nice person who just wanted to hook up with strange women for two weeks in a fancy house — he is going to have to start wearing a bag over his head very soon. Because there may be a lot of pointing and laughing in his future, although when you consider that he was actually listed in a Celebrity Lookalike database already and that’s how they found him, he must at least enjoy the pointing part.
I am only showing you this so that the person who created this show LIVES IN INFAMY.
I am only showing you this because it’s beautiful. Where is this, Fug Nation? I mean, besides Prince Harry’s country home, obviously. The Internet did not tell me, because it is not as smart as you are.
The cold open, which explains the premise, uses MURDER music in a completely unsarcastic way to point out, “This is the fairy tale… that could become a nightmare.” From the MURDER. The show even goes to the trouble of pointing out that this fair prince IS NOT A PRINCE AT ALL. As if we ourselves tuned in thinking it would be so nice to see that young redhead find love again just a few weeks after breaking it off with the lady who wears the scrunchies.
Further, it may shock you to know that Fauxry is JUST A DUDE. He cleans up oil spills ALLEGEDLY:
I am curious how long it will take for Marks & Spencer to put its hand up and be like, “Actually, he bags groceries here..?”
He rides his bike because he doesn’t have a car, and indeed, it’s a borrowed bike. (He also, at one point, rides it in flip-flops, which… listen, that seems like a quick way to get a toe ripped off. But also: While I cannot be hot for a man in flip-flops of any kind — for real, I can’t deal; it’s my thing — if I had to choose between flip-flops or death, I would at LEAST put the dude in Reefs or some other thicker version, and not the super skinny kind that are a tiny bit too small for your foot and have the MOST slender straps. I REALLY JUST CAN’T with the ladyfeet, and I apologize if this is rude or upsetting, but it’s super late at night as I type this and I just needed to get that off my chest. Let us meet with love in the middle and speak no more of it. Bring shoes.)
Fauxry is given a fancy house and a staff and a butler named Kingsley, who is imperious to the extreme and ridiculous to a fault:
Because Kingsley can’t call him “Your Highness,” nor “Harry,” nor, “William’s brother,” he instead has to refer to him as “Sir.” Which is the most mannered and stilted thing in the world, and SO false as any kind of actual speech pattern that it should have been an immediate tip-off, and probably WAS. The man playing Kingsley had better cross “Get On Downton Abbey” off his bucket list. YOU ARE NO KINGSLEY SHACKLEBOLT, SIR.
Kingsley supervises an intensive course in all things Harry, that includes COMPLETELY GETTING HIS TITLE WRONG. Kingsley, that officious bonehead, calls him “Henry, Prince of Wales.” THIS IS NEWS TO CHARLES. AND WILLIAM, IN FACT. How does NOBODY giving notes on this thing know that CHARLES is the Prince of Wales, and that in fact Harry will NEVER be unless things go TOTALLY HAYWIRE because only the heir to the throne uses that title? Our theory is that nobody at Fox could make it more than two minutes into the episode to GIVE any notes. “Prince Henry of Wales” is not the same thing as “Henry, Prince of Wales,” and his name is the former, not the latter; Kingsley, you are BRITISH, unless you have a really good fake accent, so the fact that YOU said it incorrectly is EXTREMELY EMBARRASSING and now I’m a bit spitefully glad you never made it into a Harry Potter movie.
What makes it even WORSE is that at the end of the montage, we’re meant to think Fauxry is really LEARNING things when he recites that Harry’s name is “Henry Charles Albert David Windsor,” and Kingsley trills, “CORRECT,” when in fact I am pretty sure that is ALSO not his name: He goes by Harry Wales, and if he were to drop “Wales” before being made a Duke, it’s my understanding that he’d simply be Prince Harry, OR potentially Prince Harry Mountbatten-Windsor, but never just Windsor. (Feel free to knock me off this high horse if I’m wrong, obviously.) It’s not as egregious as an ACTUAL BRITISH PERSON uttering the “Prince of Wales” mistake, but it’s still dumb. WIKIPEDIA WILL TELL YOU ALL OF THE THINGS. THE WORLD’S LAZIEST GOOGLE SEARCHING WILL TOTALLY COVER YOUR ASS ON THIS (which is also how I attempted to cover mine, so I hope I DID get it right), AS WOULD THIS BOOK YOU BOUGHT AS A PROP:
“Cor, this is a CRACKING good read about this Hatsy Windbag chap.”
There is also a really boring-looking Harry wall. No wonder this guy couldn’t remember any of it. But it’s also totally pointless. There is an almost zero percent change ANY of these women who singed up for this show would have walked in there and called him out on whether he’s co-founder of Sentebale, or what his “nightlife” is, or how to spell Von Straubenzee, or even what year he was born. I lived over there when he was born and I still don’t remember and have to stop and do the math.
Also, to convince anyone he’s Harry, and I quote, “He MUST learn to fence.” And we’re not talking watches:
This is important because duels frequently break out in the real Prince Harry’s line of work, and nightlife. It’s also an excuse for them to use this shot:
You’re welcome, Matthew Hicks. RETHINK YOUR LIFE. Also, do we think Harry even KNOWS how to fence? Would he put his crown jewels at risk? They are his most beloved accessory.
Let’s meet the ladies:
There are no air quotes around the number 24, so apparently, FOX’s legal department decided it was okay to make that claim. Maggie looks like a slightly drunk Tinsley Mortimer (if anyone remembers the days of the New York Socialite). She is, in fact, going to be the Drunkface, based on a scene later at the party and the line where she says, “My version of tea is HAPPY HOUR.” Good for you, Maggie. Follow your bliss. I will meet you there and we will order two-for-one potato skins. Oh, Maggie may also be the Cryface, based on the teaser for next week. Maggie’s face will be having a lot of feelings.
By contrast, Karina is 25, and ribbed immediately for being one of the oldest ones, which seems like it has to be an enormous, enormous lie.
The girl on the left here is 24-year old Leah, who shows up in this tank top and elastic-waist pants, which strangely are things Harry’s actual most recent girlfriend probably DOES own.
Meghan here, who is trying to be the hot judgmental camera hog, announces that none of these girls have anything very impressive, and that she is hot and smart and lives the high life and looks bangin’ in a bikini. Because the show apparently decided the only way you could ever POSSIBLY like Fauxry on this show is if the girls around him are wretched, venal creatures, or complete bubbly idiots, and so BY GOD, that’s what they will be.
Fauxry’s lower-third makes me laugh, though. On the one hand, it’s INCREDIBLY STUPID to clarify that he is not Prince Harry when he is a) labeled “Matt,” and b) CLEARLY NOT PRINCE HARRY COME ON. But I did chuckle, so. I guess you can have that one, show.
The girls all go to tea in this truly hideous setting that is not at all wasted on this pungent morass.
And it is the worst tea imaginable. WHERE ARE THE SANDWICHES. Like, the ONLY B-roll they shot of this table was of the macarons. FOX couldn’t even spring for a FAKE spread for B-roll purposes? On behalf of scone- and sandwich-lovers everywhere, I cast a POX ON ALL THEE JACKWAGONS. Also, fire Kinglsey and the staff, because nobody ironed the tablecloth, and you clearly just took it out of the packaging about ten minutes ago. Mr. Bates would want to MURDER.
Kelley, lover of fairy-tales and headbands, tells us that she’s been described as a Southern Belle, and seems to equate this with being named to People’s Most Beautiful list.
Chelsea describes herself as insane, which is 100 percent how she got on this show; she announces that she wants guys who are “handsome, rich, funny, and rich,” which seems like the most complete put-on when she says it, even if it’s true. Also, kid, you’re 21. What are you even doing here? Don’t give up YET.
Then a helicopter arrives and the girls lose their minds, as if they have never before seen one of those fancy ships with ceiling fans on their heads. Someone screams that she’s going to pass out, presumably from excitement, unless Maggie found the martini truck. And then the girls get their first look at Fauxry:
He lopes out of the copter and is whisked away and inside the house, specifically so that nobody can see him closely enough to bone the entire first episode right from the get-go. And I will grant them that in this shot, in this moment, they have found a FLEETING SECOND in which one might believe that person could possibly be Prince Harry, assuming that person were comatose and unaware that they were on a REALITY DATING SHOW.
And then this girl, Andrea, makes me decide she’s a plant.
She immediately says, ‘That’s Prince Harry,” with all the excitement of a person who might have discovered an expired piece of cheese in the fridge. And, listen. There are a thousand reasons why this would NEVER EVER HAPPEN, but one of them is that Harry is one of the most eligible bachelors in the entire world, and I mean that in the sense that he is having ZERO TROUBLE AT ALL meeting people who might want to have sex with him and/or become one with his soul. He does not need FOX to be his dating service. He has EVERY OPTION AVAILABLE TO HIM. There is NO WAY he was like, “Forget it. I just want some casting people I’ve never met to pick twelve women based on their teetering level of sanity, willingness to drink on camera and provide tongue on-demand, and likeliness to say something shocking, and that’ll be me settled.” Parenthetically, how long will it take, do you think, for these women to give tell-all interviews about the hot second it took them all to realize they were being hoodwinked? I wonder when that gag order wears off.
I suspect Meghan figured it out instantly, because everyone else is gossiping about it — one woman says, off-camera I believe, “I love him already,” which I bet they either stole from an earlier scene when they were arriving at the hous, or was said in jest, or both — and she is just sitting there eating cookies and wondering where to look for a Gutenberg Bible. Chelsea tells us in an interview that she hopes she doesn’t sound ignorant, but she actually doesn’t really know what Prince Harry looks like. Chelsea, that sounds a million times LESS ignorant than any of these people who DO know what he looks like and are speculating that it might be him.
Kimberly, a New Yorker who says she’s 23, points out that the only people she can think of with security like that are the Queen, the President, and Michael Jackson, “and I don’t think he’s any one of those.” That would have been a funny line if this were a parody show. Instead, it’s just… I can’t. MICHAEL JACKSON IS DEAD. And the way you know that this show doesn’t have a sense of humor in the right way is that ALL this nonsense is intercut with bites where Fauxry says he really wants to meet a great girl and hopefully there will be a special connection. You do NOT, kid. I guarantee you the appeal was that the prospect of getting laid for two weeks and then going home with a bunch of free clothes, and if you think I’m kidding, he actually told Vulture that his FIRST QUESTION was whether he could have the wardrobe AND THEN HE HAD IT WRITTEN INTO HIS DEAL. So no, you’re not in it for true love; you’re more likely in it to shop for some pants to get into, on several levels.
Kingsley says something awful here about how the girls must have been gazing upon him in “wonderment,” as we all gaze upon his pit stains with equal curiosity and awe. It is ASTONISHING to me that nobody stopped down and changed his shirt before he shot this scene. Then again, if the show doesn’t have tea sandwiches, it certainly doesn’t have spare shirts. Just chuck it in Fauxry’s suitcase, then, I guess, and he can clean it when he gets home.
Kingsley then assembles everyone in this dining room and tells them there is a masquerade ball that night where they “will all get to know Sir.” You make my blood boil, Kingsley. The girls all scream with glee. Also, one girl will be sent home; conversely, there is a Crown Suite adjacent to Fauxry’s room, and he tells them that Fauxry will choose a lady to “spend some time alone with Sir.” All of these girls should have stood up and said, “Check, please.” Instead, one of them interviews that they’re under so much PRESSURE now because they might all be dating Prince Harry. The only pressure they will be under, sadly, is the pressure to skip work today and for the rest of the airing of this putrid bog.
Maggie believes that it MUST be Prince Harry because Kingsley is calling him “Sir.” Maggie, I could start calling you Pope Francis right now if I wanted; wouldn’t make it true. This is yet more absurd logic that suggests to me they all saw through this IMMEDIATELY and were just playing along because, well, too late now, and also maybe they all still thought he was someone well-to-do.
Oh, and “Sir has arranged some presents.”
It’s a rack of the most hideous clothes known to man, which should have been the OTHER tip-off that it’s not Harry. If it were, these would all be racks of Kate Middleton castoffs, and the girls would go downstairs looking really good, not like rejects from a Burlington Coat Factory ad. Kimberly, up there on the left, breathes, “I’ve never had a boy buy me drive-thru, much less a dress.” Well, get used to disappointment, because not only did Fauxry not buy these, but he may not be able to buy you drive-thru on a bike.
Just in case you were wondering, he has not turned into Prince Harry in the last five minutes. He says he’s uneasy about the party, because it’s crucial not to let slip any details that might tip off that he’s not Prince Harry. Here’s a tip: Don’t let slip YOUR FACE.
This woman announces that her job is Miss Los Angeles. I live here and had no idea such a thing existed. She also makes an unintelligible comment in-scene to the other girls, which SOUNDS like she’s saying that she and her girlfriends tell people they are totally cool and awesome, and then turn around and whisper about how butt ugly they are. So I’m basically going to continue about my life as if Miss Los Angeles is not a real thing, because ew.
Meghan, who has busted this bullshit stand, pretends she’s excited to be there for the true love, and says, “I don’t care if he’s Prince Harry or Harry Potter.” Of course you don’t. One of them knows magic and defeated Ultimate Evil, and the other is Prince effing Harry. That’s called a win-win.
Poor Leah gets her dress stuck on her head and stands there for a while before anyone helps her. Leah explains that she doesn’t understand things like like bronzer and makeup and neck holes — also, apparently girls here are bronzing their cleav to make it look bigger, so Fug Nation, never say I didn’t give you anything — and Meghan interviews that Leah is a total “anomaly” to her, which does not mean what she thinks it means. Leah has no business being on this show. She later talks about how she usually dates musicians, and the guys she goes out with mostly prefer to get her drunk and make out with her in the back of bars rather than kiss her on the cheek, and basically I am concerned someone told Leah this show was called I Wanna Marry Harry Dean Stanton. And also about her life choices in general.
Rose, 22, has put on a black dress through which you can see her panties. It’s hard to tell in this shot, but it’s true, and there is an entire scene — including a close-up OF her panties — of her pulling up her dress and displaying them for everyone and saying, “Ha ha, at least I’m wearing panties,” while also noting that she is a teacher. She is the worst kind of cliche of all these reality dating shows, and it hurts my core being that we have to watch it here. Also, who the hell shopped for this thing? There are sundresses, cocktail dresses, satin gowns… it’s all over the place, and all over the spectrum from “bad” to “NOOOOOOO.” I really think some 18-year old male production assistant went over to a department store and was like, “Whatever, just give me some things, and stuff.”
Oh, but poor Fauxry, he’s having deep thoughts as he gazes into the eyes of his mask — the literal mask representing the figurative one he has placed over his SOUL in order to find true love the totally fake way. He says that if the girl he picks decides to have a go at a relationship with him, all this will have been worth it. Yes. FOR YOU. And even that is debatable. Son, your Facebook page is about to get hella unbearable.
Kingsley tells the women it’s time to “present yourself to Sir,” because, as it says repeatedly in my notes, Kingsley is the WORST. And so are these clothes. One of these women actually looks like she’s wearing a championship belt she won in the World Series of Chastity.
Carley here says she’s studying cell and moluecular biology, and recites her GPA, with the smugness of a person who doesn’t care if she actually KNOWS anything so long as there are numbers and words she can rattle off. She then notes that her intelligence sets her apart, which is always the wrong thing to say on a show that requires you to park said intelligence at the gates and hope the valet doesn’t lose it, or worse, take it on a joyride around Chicago while you’re skipping school.
The sequel to this show: I Wanna Borrow Zorro.
Poor Kimberly describes the party and its random acrobat and two flame-breathers as having “fire-breathing dragons.” I don’t even know what to do with that. I WISH. Oh, PLEASE, universe, make all these people disappear and then reappear inside Game of Thrones. They’d be fine! Fauxry learned to FENCE!
No one cares about Infornation-Planting Andrea, but if you must know, she’s from East Texas, where her dates all want to take her to a casino, which she does not think is especially romantic. That really depends on whether your date wagers you to any high rollers, though. Don’t be so closed-minded, Andrea.
The scenes where Fauxry has to waltz with the women are MERCIFULLY short because it’s AWFUL and this was a TERRIBLE IDEA for a segment because he is about as comfortable with a box step as he is with neurosurgery.
And of course, he then sit down with all twelve girls, after charmlessly extracting their names via small talk and instantly forgetting them. This. Is. A problem. To be a workable Fauxry, he has to be EXTREMELY smooth and impossible to stay mad at, much like the real thing, yet this guy is a goober of the highest order. He’s got no game at all. The girls ask him what to call him if he can’t share his name, and his answer is the unoroginal equivalent of Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman purring, “Whatever you want it to be.” One unfortunate soul babbles that they call him Prince Charming — these people will be SO GLAD they are masked right now — and another agonizingly shrieks, in a way where you know she thinks it’s secretly clever and winning, “WE NICKNAMED YOU ‘BOYFRIEND.'” He jerkishly replies, “That’s very premature.” Oh, I want to scream. Fauxry interviews that all the girls are loud and energetic, and, “Engaging twelve girls and trying to make them all like you is damn near impossible.” To which Prince Harry is currently saying, “NOT FOR ME!”
There is also a montage that’s meant to look like they all sat him down and bombarded him with questions and made him panic, and also, is intended, I believe, to make them appear grasping and awful and him look sympathetic, so that he can later make sweeping generalizations about American women. Nice try.
Then he takes Rose aside for some one-on-one time — which is NEVER explained; the show makes no effort to clarify this forma, or how and why these decisions were made, and I suspect it’s because doing so violates The Bachelor’s sanctity or something — and gets a healthy dose of Crazy Eyes from her, as well as a lot of high-volume exuberance. This leads to the first of a series of SUPER charming observations about how Americans are loud and braying. And Fauxry’s first move with her is to ask her, I kid you not, “How’s your dating career, to date?” Kingsley, you forgot to teach him how to interact with human females. Big oversight. And when she gives a bubbly answer, he actually says to her, “That’s another thing about American girls. Volume. They probably heard you in the next town.” She says she works with deaf and hard of hearing and so she has to yell a lot — I am sure her deaf students really appreciate that her solution is to yell near them? — and then he goes on AGAIN about how American girls don’t have “inside voices” and are brash and forward. Of course, then we cut to Rose suggesting that she’ll jump his bones behind closed doors, and his only response is, “Madam!” And THEN he talks about how English girls are more reserved and conservative. I CANNOT imagine that is any truer than the notion that all American girls are loud. Basically, Fauxry is just tarring entire groups of people with the largest brush he can find, and ensuring that girls in NEITHER country are going to want to sleep with him after this.
He and Leah try to dance, and stomp on each other’s feet a ton, which makes her self-conscious, so she sadly hands him off to someone else. Bye Leah.
“Maggie drinks a lot, and THAT’S not royal,” says awful Anna Lisa, who obviously hadn’t read any British history, nor heard of mead, nor read any of the Us Weekly articles about that time Harry raced Ryan Lochte in Vegas and then dropped trou. Oh, and by the way, y’all? Drunkface Maggie gave an interview bite that said she’s seen a LOT of pictures of Prince Harry and she’s REALLY pretty sure this is not him. So all you folks with the cocktail judgments can STAY SEATED PLEASE, because her blurry eyes were clearer than yours in a big way.
I also need to know why there are Christmas trees here, and why they strung an actual tree with the world’s cheapest fairy lights. They dressed this set with one bar, some couches, a purple felt dance floor, and this stuff, and let me tell you, it is an ACHEVEMENT to make that setting look cheap AND YET HERE WE GO. It may be the only impressive feat of this entire show. The dude hasn’t even taken off his mask and there are a BAJILLION CLUES that there is NO WAY IN HELL this is Prince Harry. Ladies, if it were Harry, the show would have an actual REAL BUDGET. I guarantee you some of them sipped those cocktails and went, “Yup, that’s well vodka. Not Harry.”
And then they make a tedious huge deal out of each girl removing her mask…
… which leads to the amazingness of Rose having MASSIVE pressure-marks on her face from hers. How did they not think of that?!? HE IS SEEING THEM FOR THE FIRST TIME (except for the casting binders they probably spotted him) AND THEY HAVE FACE DENTS.
And so does Fauxry, although the don’t show as well — you can see the curved line right on the apple of his cheek. They all look absurd. It’s SO TERRIBLE. When he unmasks himself, Kimberly turns to a girl and says something that the producers want us to believe is, “It is him,” but the movement of her lips seems just a little bit off and it REALLY smells like fudged audio over close-enough lip movements. Because:
I mean, does anyone think these two haven’t just sussed out that they’re being played?
These two, though, have me concerned. Although Rose’s mask was apparently tied tight enough to have dented her brain, so maybe I should give her a pass.
Headband up there just wants a leg of mutton and a palm reading, if anyone can help a sister out.
Fauxry now has to decide which girl he is sending home: It’s Leah. “Nothing seemed to excite her, and that’s not the sort of girl I find exciting,” Fauxry says inelegantly. This is no surprise, not even to her really; she seems more sad that she has to go back to bar hookups than anything else, although she closes with, “There is a Prince Charming out there for me, but it’s not Prince Harry.” No kidding, hon, nor would it have been if you’d stayed, and seriously, I think her perfunctory tears are mostly for the end of her vacation.
As for which girl he’s giving the key to the Crown Suite: Unsurprisingly, Meghan, who flirted with him like mad and is the best-looking of the bunch, is at the top of the list. But he doesn’t pick her even though he tells Kingsley she gave him great “come-to-bed eyes.” I usually give some producers the benefit of the doubt when it comes to rigging things, because in the field things can be so crazy. But I honestly feel like she must have been too obvious a front-runner for them to let him pick her, because otherwise it made no sense that he DIDN’T, given what he says to the girl he DID pick — which is, he insults her.
For real, he picks Rose, but before he does, he tells her that she was super loud and brazen with him, and it’s totally a criticism. He also told Kingsley he wasn’t sure they had chemistry. Why aren’t they trying to sell this? It’s insane. Oh wait: Because it’s meaningless. If the show doesn’t actually care, and Fauxry can’t muster up a twinge of lust, then zzz.
What is this LIGHTING? Did their footage get damaged? You think that’s going to turn out to be a flaw in my TV, but it’s not. It’s the actual shot. And Rose is calling Fauxry “my boyfriend” and swearing about how awesome it feels to be on the same page with him, when meanwhile, it appears that she’s actually on the page that’s about an eclipse and he’s on the page that talks about narcolepsy.
And the Crown Suite is hideous, to the surprise of no one, because they spent five dollars on this show and her attempts to luxuriate in it consist of her kneeling on the bed and bobbling slightly.
And when she goes to tell the other women that she’s in the Crown Suite, Rose acts all sheepish about her success, which is CLEARLY a bad cover for gloating, and elicits this from Meghan:
And Rose, for her part, gives more Crazyface:
Because she knows the other girls are jealous and thinks they all want to kill her in her sleep. Well, they DID use MUUUURUDER music. I’m just saying.
The other laugh of the episode came right here, when See-Through Panties walks out of the room again and one of her competitors shouts, “Keep your panties on! Or not.” It’s so bitchy, but seriously, now that I think about it, there really is no way this idiot wasn’t going to default to picking the girl who flashed him her knickers. OF COURSE that’s where he went.
And there we are. The show bends over backwards to try and make it seem like a sweet thing that Fauxry is willingly playing all these women. Like pretending to be Prince Harry is an adorable quirk of a hopeless romantic. They make him spout all this pseudo-sincere nonsense about how at the heart of it he really just wants to meet a nice girl and give it a go, and that somehow makes it all worse. Because it tries to make him the hero, and the women, the beasts he’s fending off with a stick while they dance on the graves of their competitors and speak in voices above a whisper. When really, he’s acting like a douche, the show is rotten to the core, and they’re being played; I almost think the show admitting that would be LESS skeezy because the ONLY way to make this enjoyable is to root for these women to band together and trip him up; instead, it wants us to care, as if we’re to believe this is potentially a test of whether true love transcends truth itself. In other words, SHUT UP, SHOW. I can’t believe I watched it. Do I have to watch it next week?
