Finally, a Bachelor With a Pulse

By Emma Chance | TV | August 13, 2024 |

By Emma Chance | TV | August 13, 2024 |

Bachelor Nation, lend me your ears. There’s been a lot of criticism of the powers that be behind the country’s leading reality dating show franchise, of late. I too have had some unkind words for the white producers who continue to fumble questioning about diversity in casting and storytelling. Perhaps they’ve heard our cries because last night 30-year-old Grant Ellis, a contestant on Jenn Tran’s season of The Bachelorette, was named as the lead for the 29th season of The Bachelor just minutes after he was eliminated from vying for Tran’s heart.

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Ellis is only the second Black Bachelor after Matt James. So, that’s good … what, did they expect a prize? I maintain that casting a lead of color is one thing and handling their storyline and experience sensitively and intentionally is a whole other kettle of fish (at which they have previously failed).

Chief among my complaints about the leading men of The Bachelor has been that they’re mostly white, yes, but also that they’re mostly boring. These are the kinds of men who confuse Gypsy Rose Blanchard with Ruth Bader Ginsburg. They all tend to mimic each other when they talk about their values, including family and faith, and then do stuff that their faithful families would probably disown them for.

Grant Ellis, from what I can tell, is not that. If anything, he might be too much the opposite. Preliminary research of his Instagram account gives me pause: he’s a day trader, and every woman who’s spent even a few minutes on Hinge knows you swipe left on the day traders because it’s code for “only sometimes employed.” (But we also like a self-made man, so I might be eating crow on that one.) It also appears he’s deleted everything from before he was cast on The Bachelorette, now devoting the entirety of his social media presence to self-promotion. These aren’t red flags…yet. Right now they’re yellow, and his actions on the show will determine their color going forward.

Speaking of actions, it was how he handled himself during the big shocker of Tran’s Bachelorette season—when an ex-boyfriend showed up hoping to be included on the show—that makes me like him. Ellis didn’t even have a rose at this point, and he had to talk a guy who did out of giving up and leaving because he was so shocked and offended by the news.

I didn’t love that the first thing he did when stepping out of the limo to meet Tran was to beatbox, but at least it was sincere.

See also the romance novel fodder of a date he went on with Tran before being eliminated, complete with horseback riding and kissing in the rain.

“Jenn’s a great woman,” was one of the last things he said when he got sent home last night. “I want to give everything to somebody and I want them to give everything to me in return.”

Here’s hoping he means it.