"I cried my eyelashes out"

As usual, the finale is live, and by live, I mean Chris Harrison watches it with us and provides commentary.  As unusual, Rachel is also there to live-watch with us, and she is not too thrilled.  Before we go back to Spain, however, Chris Harrison has some Bachelor Nation news to share with us: Juan Pablo is married!  Chris Harrison informs us that Juan Pablo asked him to inform the viewers, just in case we had forgotten that Juan Pablo is Chris Harrison's least favorite Bachelor.

Anyway, back in Spain, we are still only halfway through Fantasy Suite Week.  Rachel and Peter are at a stand-off: Peter doesn't want to propose and that's literally all Rachel wants.  She offers him the Fantasy Suite card anyway, to you know, "talk" more about this issue.  They "talk," and we get to see them cook eggs and bacon together.  It's cute.

Bryan gets the final fantasy suite date.  They ride horses through vineyards.  They chat and Bryan says the vibe feels off.  It's because Rachel is struggling with Peter's lack of wanting to propose, but she doesn't tell Bryan this.  She instead gives him the Fantasy Suite card, which Bryan barely can read through his eagerness to say yes.  He declares his love for the hundredth time, and then next time we see them, they are eating breakfast in bed after a subtle intro shot of a bee pollinating a flower outside the building.

Now for the Rose Ceremony.  Rachel gives the three remaining suitors a speech about how much she wants a proposal while looking directly at Peter.  She still gives Peter a rose though, after giving one to Bryan.  She says goodbye to Eric, who thanks her for the experience and is clearly bummed, but handles the break up very maturely.  Rachel goes back and toasts to "hard decisions".  We return to the live part of the show, where they bring out Eric to see Rachel for the first time since the scene we just saw.  He looks great and asks how Rachel is and reiterates that it was great to learn how to fall in love and I wouldn't be surprised if that was his audition to be the next Bachelor.

Again, back to Spain, it's time for Bryan's last chance date with Rachel.  They take a hot air balloon and we here lots of voice overs of Bryan idol worshiping Rachel.  He leaves no doubt in her mind where he stands.  In the evening, he gives her "Bryan and Rachel's Spanish Dictionary" which is an actual Spanish dictionary he taped a cover on and inserted a page with "important" words like husband, wife, and forever.

For Peter's last chance date, they go to an old church and get "advice" from a monk.  It's kind of a somber date as they yet again talk about how Peter isn't ready to propose but doesn't want to lose Rachel.  That evening they argue some more until Peter finally says he could compromise to not lose her which  makes Rachel more upset since she wants him to propose because he wants to.  It's really a no win situation since neither really want to compromise.  Peter gets mad and says fine, chose a mediocre life and a proposal over something great and no proposal.  Rachel says she was in a relationship before that seemed to be heading to marriage but it never got there so she just wants a proposal as proof of commitment.  To be fair to Peter, she's comparing him to a guy who took 5 years to get to almost proposing while Peter had barely 3 months.  They are both crying and say goodbye with an "I love you, Rachel" and an "I love you too."  It wasn't really clear what happened until we are back in the live show and bring out Peter.  That was a break-up, I guess.  Peter is still pretty hurt, and Rachel looks uncomfortable.  Peter tries to get closure and Rachel dismisses his feelings and gives a speech basically saying Peter shouldn't be the next Bachelor.

So now we know who wins, but the producers through in a few interviews where Rachel questions if she's rushing into this with Bryan, but no one believes for a minute she might turn down his proposal.  We get the obligatory Neil Lane visit to "sell" Bryan a ring before the final rose ceremony.  Bryan tells Rachel a "chemistry bomb had just exploded" during their first kiss and went on about how she's perfect and he loves her blah blah blah.  Rachel, presumably by Bachelor contract, has a statement prepared that starts out suspenseful before declaring her love.  Bryan proposes; Rachel responds "YES, give it to me;" they kiss and squeal and are engaged.

Back to the live show, Bryan comes out, re-proposes so Rachel can put the ring back on.  Bryan says his mom is thrilled, they say they don't know where they'll live yet, and Chris Harrison offers them another trip to Spain.  We end with a ridiculous teaser for Bachelor in Paradise which looks to be a shit show complete with love triangles, twins, trash-talking, and lots of tears.

The End.

P.S.  If you want to know how I feel about this season, I leave you with this:

"Are there any ocular facts that her and I dated?"

Chris Harrison starts this episode with jokes about extra security due to this particular group of men, as if anyone's forgotten Chad.  He then decides to show a montage of "memorable" MTA moments, mostly of Bachelorettes not taking shit from the men, but also Kaitlyn addressing online bullying and the one season where the villains were just two guys who were super close friends and the other guys were upset that they hung out in a hot tub together.  And the most "memorable" MTA moment, according to ABC, wasn't really a MTA moment but a gimmick where they did a live ultrasound to discover the sex of JP and Ashley's baby.  Then they introduce the men and give a little recap of the season and all its drama.

First drama to revisit: the Blake vs Lucas crap, which thankfully they realized no one wanted to talk about (Adam said Lucas should have said wha-boom once and then "wha-bye") , so we quickly pivot to DeMario.  DeMario decides to double down on his barely know Lexi, said she's a side-chick and demanded someone show him an "ocular fact" proving they were a thing.  No one's really buying it, and he tries to make a Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky parallel which made no sense at all.  Jamey pipes up for some reason and DeMario tells him he's irrelevant (which is true) and then Iggy chimes in so I guess we're addressing him now.  Rather than apologizing for stirring shit up, he also doubles down and says he'd do it all again.  Lucas calls Iggy a joke to which everyone else are like, dude, wha-boom, you of all people can't call someone a joke.

But now for the main event: Kenny and Lee.  Dean says that Kenny was probably the most well-liked guy in the house, and Lee, was, well, not very liked, so that should tell you something.  Dean is very good at saying everything but the word "racist" when talking about Lee.  DeMario says Lee was cool to him before he left, and the other guys said, yeah, they all thought he was cool too until he started antagonizing the black guys.  Kenny said it didn't feel like racism in the moment but more like Lee felt out of his league and was getting defensive and lashing out.  At this point, Chris Harrison calls Kenny up to the hotseat.  Kenny says that the Lee situation got in the way of his and Rachel's developing relationship.  After some more back and forth with Lee, Chris Harrison brings out Kenny's daughter who, when asked if she's proud of her dad, replies "yeah I'm proud of you.  You were like number 8."  Kenny gets choked up and Chris Harrison says they're sending them to Disneyland (which is less impressive when you realize Disney owns ABC).

Lee gets a turn in the hot seat next, and it's pretty clear he planned a sort of apology about not being a considerate friend to the guys in the house, but the guys aren't having it.  Chris Harrison brings up some of Lee's tweet, who claims they were bad jokes or something and he's sorry if he hurt someone, but he's hurt too (?).  This goes on for a while, and eventually they get Lee to denounce that one tweet as racist (which is literally the least he could do) and the guys say they appreciate it and that they'd be happy to help him become a better (ie less racist) person.  It's unclear whether any progress was actually made here with Lee, but Chris Harrison seemed pleased with himself, so there's that.

Next, Dean gets a turn at the hot seat and he is wearing an awful camo-print tux jacket and says how he was glad to have opened a door with his dad and that he still wants to know why Rachel said she was falling in love with him just to send him home.  Rachel comes out to the hot seat, so Dean gets to ask her, and she pretty much gave the same response as before: she was falling for him and sorry.  Chris asks Rachel about DeMario and she says "who?" Lee tries to apologize and Rachel sort of accepts- says she'd be happy to give him a lesson in black history and women's rights and that she hopes he's taken advantage of the opportunity to meet a bunch of great guys who are different than him.  Adam asks if she'd do anything differently, and Rachel said spend more time with him and Matt, to which Matt says, nah, you did the right thing.  Fred gives an incredibly rehearsed speech that started out like he was mad at her for not giving him a chance even though he already had feelings for her but ended with I'm glad you're happy, which was a weird 180.  Kenny tells Rachel she has his number if Peter, Eric, or Bryan don't work out.

Then we get bloopers, which they always heavily promote as the best and are mostly lame.  We did get an interview with Dean where he puts his chewing gum behind his ear, and when his interviewer was like wtf, he puts it back in his mouth and swallows it.  It's weird, yet the ladies still love him.

And that's it for these men!  Well, unless they are on Bachelor in Paradise, in which case they have another shot at embarrassing themselves on national television.