'The Bachelor' Finale Part Two Recap: Peter Ends Up with Madison & Mom Barbara Loses Her Mind
We’re on Part Two of the (supposedly) explosive Bachelor finale, after last night’s admittedly dramatic Part One. Madison walked out on Peter after a disastrous home date, delivering a genuinely mature breakup speech. Heartbroken, Peter now has to decide whether his feelings for Hannah Ann are strong enough for him to propose, or whether he’ll be leaving the show. And as Chris Harrison teased, Madison will be coming back tonight with a change of heart. It’s all capped off with a live show — and both Kelley (???) and Neil Lane (AKA engagement rings) are both in the audience. Let’s do this.
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We’re back in Australia, and Peter is striding through empty plains with renewed confidence. He meets with Neil Lane, the Diamond Man, and chooses a pear-shaped diamond. He calls up Hannah Ann’s father and asks for his blessing to propose. It’s all happening. Hannah is anxious in her hotel room and says she’s thinking about walking out. Fair, since Peter’s spent the last week only thinking about Madison.
Peter’s getting ready to propose when Chris walks up: “I have some news that I just found out about Hannah Ann,” he says. (All this time! All the teasers we’ve been waiting for have been about Hannah Ann!) He tells Peter that Hannah might not be coming. Peter starts to panic….and minutes later, Chris comes back in to tell him that Hannah is, in fact, coming. So, we just put him through all that for nothing? Are you kidding me?
They drag a teary-eyed Peter (handcuffed, I imagine) back to his proposal site. Hannah walks down a shockingly long dirt path in a long white dress and talks about how scared she is that he won’t propose. Can someone please tell her that Madison is gone? This is all so messed up!
Peter’s heart is rattling out of his chest when Hannah gets to him. He delivers a largely sincere proposal, and even tells her that Madison left. He tells her he loves her, and she seems genuinely surprised: “You love me?” He proposes, and she accepts.
“I can’t believe you’re all mine!” she yells “I get to love you forever!” But there’s an hour and a half left in this finale. The odds are not in Hannah’s favor.
Peter’s back in California and on his way to tell his family. We know they’ll be thrilled with the decision, but when we cut away to the live audience, Peter’s mom Barb is there too — and she’s pissed. This is all more evidence that his and Hannah’s relationship won’t make it, but it’ll be nice to see the family happy for now.
Peter draws it out as much as possible to punish his mom for her tantrum, and she predictably has a total meltdown (a happy one) at the news. They FaceTime in Hannah Ann. “How’s our daughter?” Barb screams, upon seeing Hannah’s face for the second time in her life.
The family group hugs: “And they lived happily ever after,” Barb says. We cut back to the live audience and cut to Barb: her face is stony. Finally, Peter comes out on the stage with Chris and the real show begins.
Chris gets right into it and asks Peter how he’s been dealing with the breakup. He says it was hard to shut off his feelings, and once again, we cut to Barb looking unhappy. Chris shows us footage of Hannah’s first (on-camera) visit to Peter in California after the show, about a month after the engagement.
You can immediately tell it’s not great. “We both know it’s been rough,” she says. “You’ve been my rock,” he tells Hannah. “I’m so thankful for you.” He tells her he’s totally sure that he’s in love with her, but he’s still struggling. “It kills me to put you through this,” he says, which is not a great sign. But Hannah honestly looks hopeful at the prospect of him breaking it off.
She asks him if he’s able to really love her back, and he basically says no. “I’ve told you everything,” he says. Sure, but that doesn’t make it any easier for her to repeatedly hear that you’re still not over Madison. Barb’s face appears in a pop-up as Hannah tells Peter he ruined her “first engagement.” Barb is despondent, possibly more than Hannah.
“Why didn’t you just let me go?” Hannah demands. Peter swears up and down that he “never envisioned this,” which of course doesn’t make anything better. “I don’t need anything more from you,” she tells him. “You’ve done enough damage.” Ouch!
In the audience, Barb is clapping furiously, which must be fun for Peter. It’s not quite the emotional breakup of Arie and Becca, in that both of them seem to have seen this coming from the beginning. Also, Hannah’s struggling to squeeze out any tears. Peter half-heartedly tries to track her down, but she tells him she’s fine. Now, we’ll see them talk on stage for the first time since the breakup.
Peter and Hannah Ann have their confrontation, and it’s awkward as expected. Hannah yells at him for downplaying his emotions about Madison and keeping her around when he wasn’t in it. Peter insists that he loved her and she’s the greatest person in the world. But he couldn’t get over Madison.
“The first red flag that you gave to me was when you wanted to reach out to Hannah Brown,” Hannah caps it off. “If you want to be with a real woman, you need to become a real man.”
Next up, we’re seeing footage of Chris’s trip to Auburn, Alabama to visit Madison. “You seem surprised to see me,” he tells her. Why did she think the cameras were setting up? Madison talks about how heartbroken she is, and Barb literally rolls her eyes in the studio audience.
“So you regret what you did?” Chris says. “Yeah, I do.”
Chris tells Madison that Peter and Hannah got engaged, and really lets her stew in her misery but revealing that he is now single. “Is he okay?” Madison asks, which is genuinely sweet. “He ended his engagement because of his feelings for you,” Chris tells her. “I guess we’re going to LA,” she says. Slowly (finally), Peter starts to smile back in the live audience.
Madison flies to LA and drives up to meet Peter at a shockingly nice house (is this his?). Peter is full-on beaming in the audience now. “I haven’t fallen out of love with you,” he tells her, like that was ever up for debate. “So, what do we do?” he asks. They smile and hug.
Back on stage, Peter reveals that he hasn’t seen Madison since that day a couple weeks ago (reason unknown). He says he’s in love with Madison, and the audience (sans Barb) starts clapping furiously. Madison comes out on stage and they hug and smile some more.
“Where’s your head right now?” Chris asks her. “I love Peter,” she says. And that’s that, right? Chris asks them how this story is going to end, while Barb actively fumes in the audience. Finally, Chris asks Barb how she’s feeling.
“The show last night, it didn’t show everything,” Barb says. “When I went for Hannah Ann, it was because she was the one who embraced me with love…The next day, we met Madison, and it started on a rocky road because she had us wait three hours for her to come in.” Oh shit! So that panic attack was happening in real time?
Barb goes on to say that Madison never apologized, and that the family was exhausted and jetlagged. Honestly, relatable. She also says Madison told her she wouldn’t accept a proposal in four days, and that she really just clicked with Hannah Ann. Madison tries to keep it together on stage.
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“It is what it is,” Madison says as a comeback, and honestly, it’s appropriately flippant. “I have love and respect for Peter so I have love and respect for Peter’s family and I’ll never say a negative word about anyone or anything.” Barb whispers something in her husband’s ear.
Peter says he knows his parents are emotional, but he hopes they’ll get over it. “Being a dad twice over, I totally understand your position,” Chris Harrison tells Barb, who then reiterates how much she preferred Hannah. Finally, Madison’s had enough.
“I disagree,” she says. “I think this isn’t just Peter’s journey, when you sign up to come on a show like this, you’re looking for love too…This isn’t just Peter choosing me, this is me choosing Peter.”
The audience cheers wildly, but Barb still isn’t giving up. She says everyone in Peter’s life knows that his relationship with Madison won’t work: “He’s going to have to fail to succeed, that’s it.” Peter all but begs his mom to stop talking as the audience boos her.
Madison makes the point that perhaps Peter’s mom shouldn’t be a part of this conversation anymore, and…that’s it. Chris says she and Peter will have plenty of time to do that going forward, Neil Lane’s rings remain in his briefcase, and Kelley is never seen again. It’s been a long season of fake-outs — but I can honestly say that this Barb drama was the most dramatic thing I’ve ever seen on The Bachelor. Congratulations, Chris Harrison! You kept your word.
Think Peter and Madison will make it? Click here to see all the Bachelor and Bachelorette couples who are still together.
Launch Gallery: 18 <em>Bachelor</em> & <em>Bachelorette</em> Couples Who Are Still Together
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