SPOILER ALERT! This story contains details from Monday night’s episode of The Bachelor.
When tonight’s episode of The Bachelor opens, we find Joey and Maria in a car, on a date, speaking French to one another as best they can. Are they in France? Or perhaps Switzerland or Belgium? Non, non, non.
Of course, as promised at the end of last week’s Tuesday episode, we’re now in Montreal, Canada, where we learn, unfortunately, that our Bachelor Joey really isn’t feeling all that great amidst a crisis of confidence. He’s now down to 10 women, and while his feelings are most definitely getting stronger, that’s actually the problem, as it scares him to recognize that he’s falling for multiple women. He has to admit that he’s at times found himself holding back in some ways, even if he doesn’t want to, his great fear being that his whole romantic experiment as The Bachelor‘s leading man simply won’t work out. He feels imperfect, he says, and has always felt others expect him to be the opposite.
Later, we see Jesse greet the group, speaking perfect French as he reveals that Joey will start off the week with a group date, before moving on to two one-on-ones. Contestants set for the group date include Daisy, Katelyn, Kelsey A., Jen, Rachel, Lexi, Lea and Jess. This leaves Kelsey T. and the Canadian Maria as those who will get some much desired one-on-one time with Joey.
Over the course of the group date, which is a scavenger hunt through Montreal, we see the women visit Jesse’s favorite restaurant in the city, dance to the music of an accordion player and play street hockey. A shared sentiment amongst the women is just how much harder it’s getting to see the connections Joey is forming with other women. Amongst those expressing this is Kelsey A., who reveals this is her least favorite date so far, given a weird energy in the air, and her own feeling of being stuck in the shadows.
When Joey rejoins the group later in the evening, he can sense an awkwardness and a sadness amongst the women, and so chooses to open up to them about his own insecurities in this process. While we see in one-on-one interactions thereafter that Joey’s relationship with both Kelsey A. and Jen is deepening, we’re not sure what to think when Lexi realizes in conversation with Joey that his thoughts on the length of a potential engagement and the amount of time he’d want to take before having kids are much different than hers. Later, when Joey talks with Jess, he confesses that he hasn’t been able to get there with her, emotionally, and walks her out.
On his one-on-one with Kelsey T., Joey joins her to learn some of the fundamentals of circus acrobatics alongside the team at Cirque du Soleil. Kelsey later confides that she’s had challenged relationships with her family — and her father, in particular — given his desire for her to focus on her religion, rather than going to college. She ended up going anyway, seeing her trust with all men affected by her issues with her father, with whom she’s just started to mend her relationship.
Kelsey leaves the date with a rose, and we then transition to Maria, who’s picked up in a limo and taken to a luxury clothing store, where she gets to pick out a dress. After a romantic helicopter ride, she reveals at dinner that she’s falling for Joey, securing a rose of her own. The pair slow dances to the music of the artist Spice, and Joey reveals that he’s now begun letting go of his worries, feeling that he will find his wife.
Later, with a pit in her stomach, Lexi tells Joey that she’s leaving the show because she needs to be able to try for children sooner rather than later, given her struggles with endometriosis. Joey feels crushed, and at the rose ceremony, goes on to cut two more women: Lea and Katelyn.
Next week, Joey reveals, we’ll be continuing on in Canada, heading to the alpine town of Jasper. Offering glimpses of motorcycling, a polar plunge and horseback riding, the teaser sees Kelsey T. reveal that she’s all in at this point, as Maria again doubts whether she can continue on. Joey, meanwhile, knows that this week will crush him — it’s not a matter of if, but when. Find out how that plays out next Monday at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC.