Dear Nick,

It’s about time we have a serious chat about your season of The Bachelor. We’re just a couple weeks away from the big proposal and we have so many frustrations bottled up that we *need* to get off our chest before we legit go crazy.

We should start off by saying that we take The Bachelor VERY seriously here at FLARE. We would even go as far as to say that we treat it like a religious experience. We hand over two hours of our lives every week to live-tweet the show and then devote more time thinking about it, writing about it, reading about it, and talking about it. We even created an all-Bachelor, all-the-time hub on our site. So we feel confident in our reasoning for writing this letter—and we’re doing it for our own sanity, for the sanity of all the other superfans experiencing the same pent-up rage, and most importantly, for YOU.

But, before we get started, let’s take a quick look at the rocky ’ship we’ve had with you over the years. Flashback to the year 2014, when a baby-faced 33-year-old software salesman made his Bachelor Nation debut on Andi’s season of The Bachelorette. You were branded as the villain v. quickly and like most, we were NOT members of #TeamNick at first. Your horrific appearance on AFR (you know the one—where you outed Andi *on live television* by saying “If you weren’t in love with me, I’m just not sure why you made love with me”) didn’t help grow your fanbase either. But let’s fast-forward to when you spontaneously showed up on Kaitlyn’s season. Sure, you might have been portrayed as the villain yet again, but we were instantly captivated by your intense chemistry with Kaitlyn (best Bachelorette ever!) and your very sincere feelings for her. And just like that, all of your shortcomings and major f-ck ups from Andi’s season didn’t seem to matter as much. We found ourselves defending you to all the Nick haters and even though we were rooting for Shawn B (because, duh, Shawn B) we genuinely started to care about you. And that takes us to last summer, when you went on Bachelor in Paradise—a.k.a your redemption tour—and made us all fall truly, madly, deeply in love with you (like, actually). You came to Paradise as a new and improved Nick with more maturity, more facial hair, and WAY more abs *insert 200 heart eye emojis* and that’s when we became full-blown, proud-ass members of #TeamNick. So to sum it up we’ve invested, like, A LOT of time in you.

Related: A Farewell to Corinne, in GIFs

For the past four years you’ve been one of the most exciting Bachelor Nation members to watch. Because of your v. real relationships (and hey, also because you’ve gradually been getting hotter and hotter). So obviously when it was announced that you were going to be the next Bachelor, we freaked the hell out. They couldn’t have chosen anyone better.

Boy were we wrong.

It’s unfortch because The Bachelor franchise reeeealllyy put a lot of pressure on your season to do well, we’re not oblivious to that fact. The network promoted it at every corner until it became tiresome (that “Ladies Get Some Nick” promo was a bit much). And they’ve dramatized it in a way that has somewhat killed the magic of the show—like weekly cliffhangers and even bringing Andi onto tonight’s ep. But we were promised the best The Bachelor season of our lives! And what we actually got is a season as exciting as watching paint dry.

Like, even Ben’s season was significantly better than yours and we called him “Boring Ben.” Yes, we’ve been given a ton of house drama (and the gift of Corinne), which has been great. But you might be surprised to hear that we don’t watch The Bachelor for that. The real reason we watch the show is for the love story—as lame as that might sound. We watch it to get butterflies in our stomachs when something cute happens (like when Luke made that cheesy-but-adorable heart of candles for JoJo). We watch it to feel all the emotion and the fireworks with you from our couches at home. Remember that couldn’t-keep-your-hands-off-each other date you and Kaitlyn had in Ireland? That’s the stuff we’re talking about. We watch it for the fairytale. And we’ve been robbed of that this season.

We realize it’s totally possible that you might just have zero chemistry with all of these women—you’re clearly not getting butterflies either—buuuut we don’t think that’s the full story. So we want to take a quick sec to openly chat about why we think your relationships are the most vanilla we’ve ever seen on the show, resulting in your season being so. damn. boring.

Theory #1: You’re not trying hard enough

For a guy who’s on his FOURTH shot at this show, we honestly don’t think you’re trying hard enough. Right before you sent her home, you told Danielle L (or D-Lo) that you’re looking for an adventurous and “raw” relationship, something you didn’t feel with her (or any of the other girls for that matter). And that’s fine, you know what you want and you’re not going to settle for any less. BUT it’s like you just expect it to fall right into your lap. That might have happened with Andi and Kaitlyn but NEWS FLASH sometimes you have to work at it and actually put some real effort in. But instead of doing that you just send every girl home that doesn’t scream “adventure” or “raw relationship” (whatever that actually means) right off the bat. Ummmm if we all did that, we’d legit be single forever. It’s true that sometimes a rom com-style connection can hit you in the face without even looking for it, but more often than not relationships like that take time and work. Something you def haven’t given these women enough of. Some people have been saying you’re the most emotional Bachelor we’ve ever had and that you cry waaay too much (like on your first date with Vanessa, or when confronting the girls about your mid-season breakdown, or while talking to Vanessa’s sister—just to name a few. But those are like the only moments we get to see any real emotion from you. For the rest of the time you just sit there with a bored look on your face, mumbling (stop mumbling!!) about shit that doesn’t really matter. You expect these women to open up to you and let you in and share important facets of their lives with you. But guess what Nick, to achieve this “raw relationship” you speak of, YOU have to do the same. And maybe that’s why your relationships have been *so* insignificant this season—because you’re giving them (and us!!) nothing.

Theory #2: You’re not taking it seriously (case in point: Corinne)

We’re not going to lie; we’ve really come to love Corinne (yah, we were shocked too). She’s funny, she’s unforgivably herself and contrary to what some may believe, we don’t think she *technically* does things to be malicious; she’s just staying true to who she is. But, with that being said it’s obvious to literally everyone (but you) that she’s def not ready for the MAJOR commitment that is marriage, no matter how much she says she is. And if you were *actually* taking this process seriously you wouldn’t have kept her around for this long. You’ve jeopardized your relationships with other women to play into Corinne’s sexual games (re: the topless photoshoot, the bouncy castle, the trench coat). And it *really* makes us—and clearly the other women—think that you aren’t taking this seriously, which could be another possible explanation for your relationships amounting to nothing.

Theory #3: You never really changed

It’s no secret that we’re not fans of the old Nick. And as we’ve already mentioned, after watching you on Paradise last summer we really thought you changed. But this season has made us wonder whether you’ve *actually* not changed at all? Was your entire stint on Paradise just a façade to better your image? We really hope not. The Nick we’ve been watching for the past eight weeks is eerily similar to the Nick we all knew and hated from Andi’s season. You make up your own rules as you go, completely screwing up the carefully crafted formula of the show—something the old Nick defs would’ve done (must we bring up the time you lied about being Andi’s husband to get access to her hotel room?). Like, come on Nick. In these uncertain times, it would be nice if at the very least, we could rely on a predictable, end-of-the-episode rose ceremony. But you’ve taken that away from us, and now we’re left thinking maybe that’s why your season has been such garbage. Because you never actually changed and you’re still the worst.

Theory #4: You did all of this to further your “career”

We *really* hope we’re wrong on this one, but we can’t help but consider it. You’ve been so checked out of the entire process it forces us to ask: do you even care about finding a wife? From our POV you don’t seem to care about these women in the way past Bachelors have and at this point we’re not ruling out the possibility that you just did this to further your career (whatever that even is now…). And if we weren’t questioning your intentions before—the recent news that you’re probs signed up for the next season of Dancing With The Stars just looks way too sketchy (Fun fact: Kaitlyn thought so too). So maybe, just maybe, the reasoning behind your shitty season and your non-existent relationships is because you literally don’t even care about any of this. But we’re begging you to prove us wrong.

TBH, whatever the reason for your lacking relationships and boring-ass season may be, it doesn’t even matter. Watching you on The Bachelor is like waiting for the boy who will never call. Every week we’re hoping something will happen but nothing ever does. We continue to be disappointed but for some reason, we can’t give up on you. (We aren’t the only ones: viewership for last Monday’s episode was the highest this season.) So we just keep waiting and waiting and waiting for anything to happen that will make all of the time we invested in you worth something. Here’s hoping, from the bottom of our freaking hearts, that the fourth time *is* the charm.

xoxo,

FLARE

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