‘The Bachelorette’ host Chris Harrison justifies announcing Rachel Lindsay pick early
Earlier this week, the news was made official that Rachel Lindsay was going to be the next star of “The Bachelorette,” and we’d say that there were three separate, but all justified, reactions to the news.
1. People who were very happy with the choice, given that they are such big fans of her and want to see how she does on the season.
2. People are furious over her being chosen over Raven Gates — maybe there’s a few people who wanted to see Corinne in the role, and we’ve got one simple question for those folks: What are you drinking?
3. People are upset over it being announced before Rachel was even eliminated on this season of “The Bachelor.”
When it comes to the latter, we’d like to consider this as further evidence that despite what everyone out there may think, the majority of the people who watch this show don’t know spoilers — also, they don’t care to know spoilers. They do Fantasy Leagues and prediction pools and all other sorts of silly stuff. To most people, it’s lighthearted escapism to get away from the MANY problems in the world right now. It’s not worth getting so invested in that it gets ruined for them in advance.
The show likely knows everything that we’ve just mentioned in regards to spoilers, but as we’ve been saying now for DAYS, there is a pretty specific reason why they made this choice: Casting! You’ve just cast the first ever black Bachelor / Bachelorette in history. However, the majority of the people who come through casting are traditionally white. You want to reach out to other minorities with a minority lead, so announcing it early gives you a chance to do that. Show Chris Harrison confirms some of this (he doesn’t get into the diversity side of it) in a new interview on “Live! with Kelly,” saying that the reaction to spoiling the reveal early has been intense.
Here’s the big thing to remember: In a few weeks’ time, nobody is going to care about finding out early at all. The big thing is that the show will go on and film its new season, and come later this spring, the excitement will be there. With Rachel, you’ve got a chance of getting some viewers who don’t tend to watch the show.
Want to know more about what’s coming in terms of “The Bachelor” and some upcoming hometown dates? We’ve got the hookup for you on that over at the link here! Be sure to take a look and stay tuned to get some other super-good scoop. (Photo: ABC.)