This week we got a rather eventful episode of Age of Love. There were a few surprises to be had and all signs point to continued drama in the weeks to come.
The idea of having the two groups plan out their rivals’ date was a good one. I’m curious as to whether or not the producers imposed some limitations on what the groups could choose. Regardless, neither group managed to come up with a really horrible date. If, as some of the women have said, Mark is looking to start a family, then he’ll be interested in watching the women interact with children. So even though the birthday party date ensured that none of the women got a chance to spend any quality, alone time with Mark, he (and the twenty-somethings) probably were glad to see how their potential partner interacts with hordes of small children.
The date planned by the twenty-somethings seemed like it was just a rip off the forty-somethings’ idea. Like the forty-somethings, they planned a date focusing on the age gap, just going in the opposite direction with it (replacing little kids with seniors). But the twenty-somethings’ idea also had the attractive forty-somethings in bikinis in an environment conducive to horseplay; not the best idea on the part of the twenty-somethings. I think, if they wanted to keep harping on the age theme, a better idea would have been to have them take part in an aquacize class for twenty-somethings. That way Mark would be comparing the forty-somethings to much younger women. Of course, the forty-somethings looked pretty damn good in their swim wear, so it still may not have worked, but a bunch of young women would be more likely to steal Mark’s attention away than the senior citizens.
Even though the hyping it up as an elimination like no other was ridiculous (we’ve only had two previous elimination nights and they weren’t the same. So all three nights have given us an elimination like no other), the elimination sequence was a lot more interesting this week. Even though cutting to commercial just after Mark asked Maria to stay ruined the suspense (general rule of thumb, if a TV show goes to commercial just before a potentially shocking event, said event isn’t going to happen), I was glad that Maria told him she had been planning to leave. Up until this point we hadn’t had any indications that any of the women might be the ones to determine that things aren’t going to work out; this served as a good reminder that not only do the women have to get Mark to like them, Mark has to do the same.
Among the older women, when it came down to Kelli and Lynn, I was kind of expecting Kelli to get eliminated. I figured that her ploy on her date to ensure she was the one to have desert with Mark would come back to hurt her chances. It wasn’t that she merely kept Mark distracted so he didn’t realize that his time was up; he wanted to leave and go back to Amanda before the time ran out, but she kept talking over him anytime he tried to get a word in. While the dessert offered a chance for some additional alone time with Mark, the way Kelli ensured she got that time, even though Mark really wanted to have dessert with Amanda, could have left Mark feeling somewhat bitter. So it was kind of surprising when Lynn (who, to the best of my recollection, was the only remaining forty-something that didn’t really have any time alone with Mark) was the one to go.
The person eliminated for the twenty-somethings was even more surprising. Adelaide was the first twenty-something Mark seemed to bond with in the second episode and after he shared a limo with her and they kissed, Adelaide was looking like she would be around for a long time. So when it came down to Adelaide and Mary, I figured Mary was toast (we only saw one bit of interaction between Mary and Mark this week and it was rather awkward).
It was amusing to hear Mark Consuelos talk about how a rivalry has developed between the twenty-somethings and the forty-somethings as if it were a somewhat unexpected occurrence. The structure of the show practically guarantees the two groups will have a rivalry, and this week they gave each group a chance to plan the others’ date specifically to ensure there was a rivalry there. In any event, it’ll be interesting to see how the two groups interact.
But, even though the previews for this episode made a big point of mentioning it, that’s something for next week’s show (side note: it’s odd how the people putting together the previews seem so anxious for each new twist. The previews always seem to focus on the next thing, rather than what’s happening on the current episode). If the pattern holds, further twists will be in store for us at the end of that episode too.
