SPOILERS on The Bachelor 2020, aka Bachelor Peter Weber's Season 24.
The Alayah Show is starting this week on The Bachelor 2020 and that will continue into at least one more episode of Peter Weber's season. Sure, Bachelor Peter's season has to continue the Hannah Ann Sluss drama from Kelsey Weier's melodramatic ChampagneGate, but get ready for a lot of talk about Alayah Benavidez -- and then Victoria Fuller and musician Chase Rice.
This week, The Bachelor is spending a lot of time with Alayah, Sydney Hightower, and Victoria Paul -- whom Alayah knew before The Bachelor from the pageant circuit. Whenever we get another rose ceremony, Bachelor Peter will send Alayah home. However, later on -- probably in next week's episode, or teased in it -- Alayah comes back, and that's when Reality Steve's spoilers show her drama will drag in Victoria F. and her musical guest ex-boyfriend Chase Rice.
Yes, both Victorias will get involved before Alayah is gone. (But I don't expect her to stay gone from Bachelor Nation -- pencil her in for Bachelor in Paradise, and maybe even a trip to Stagecoach.)
Chris Harrison warned us about Alayah drama in his pre-season cast assessment. First, he mentioned how she's connected to the pageant world. The Bachelor delved into that drama last year on Bachelor Colton's season with Hannah Brown and Caelynn Miller-Keyes, who had some kind of falling out after they competed in Miss USA.
Apparently Alayah has a similar situation? She was Miss Texas and Victoria P. was Miss Louisiana and they competed in Miss USA 2019. They seemed to actually be friends -- or at least friendly -- in real life. Which is why the spoilers on what happens to Alayah on The Bachelor were a bit surprising.
Anyway, here's what Chris Harrison said about Alayah when revealing The Bachelor 2020 cast:
Maybe the wildest roller coaster ride of the entire season surrounds Alayah. Controversy, emotion, something we've never had happen before on the show, the history of the show, happens to Alayah.
Oh my! According to Reality Steve, Bachelor Peter's next date to be shown in the January 20 episode should be a country line dance one-on-one with Victoria P. (Apparently Peter rode the mechanical bull and fell off, hurting his back. He does seem accident-prone. How he managed to not get struck by that infamous windmill is a mystery.)
Then there was a group date with (deep sigh) Demi Burnett returning from The Bachelor and Bachelor in Paradise for Demi’s Extreme Pillow Fight at Cowboy Palace Saloon. Eight women went on that date -- Tammy Ly, Alayah Benavidez, Sarah Coffin, Kelley Flanagan, Sydney Hightower, Shiann Lewis, Kiarra Norman, and Savannah Mullins. Chris Harrison and Fred Willard -- most recently seen on that sad episode of Modern Family -- were the judges.
That's when we get into Alayah vs. Sydney. Spoilers suggest they fought each other several times and things got very aggressive with hair pulling and pillow swinging. I'm sure that's somebody's fantasy but it sure ain't mine.
The Bachelor has a history of people warning the lead about this or that, and spoilers show this happens multiple times during Bachelor Peter Weber's season. In this case, Sydney is said to tell Peter she feels there's someone in the house who is one way to the cameras and another way to the rest of the women. She didn't name Alayah but she's talking about Alayah.
So The Alayah Show continues with a pool party, instead of a cocktail party, and Peter makes the rounds to ask women what they think of Alayah. It sounds like not many compliments are given, with some women saying they think she is just there for the fame and Instagram followers. (Like they all are, pretty much, no?)
Reality Steve brought up something interesting in that Alayah and Victoria P. seemed to be friends before the show. However, during the pool party, Victoria says she thinks Alayah is a liar and manipulative. So were they never really friends in real life? Were they always more like Hannah B. and Caelynn?
(Speaking of pre-season connections, did you know Sydney and former Bachelorette Hannah Brown went to the same high school and were in the same graduating class?)
Long story short, things don't end well for Alayah. According to Steve, the rose ceremony eliminations include Jasmine Nguyen, Sarah Coffin, Alexa Caves, and Alayah Benavidez herself. However! That's not the end of Alayah's story. She comes back later after Victoria Fuller's date and stirs that very stir-able pot.
Because The Bachelor producers looooove messy drama, they set up a one-on-one date for Victoria F. and Bachelor Peter to go to a Chase Rice concert. Turns out, Chase Rice -- in addition to being a musician and a former Survivor finalist -- is Victoria F.'s ex-boyfriend. So that turns into an awkward thing.
How does Alayah get involved? Fast-forward to a group date after-party when Alayah returns to the show to make her case to Bachelor Peter that she was sent home due to false information he was hearing from other women. Peter ends up giving Alayah the group date rose, which does NOT go over well with anyone else.
Alayah wasn't away from the show for very long, but apparently she was away for enough time to learn about Victoria F.'s past with Chase Rice. Alayah spilled the beans to some women in the house who didn't know about that, since Victoria F. didn't tell anyone. The Chase Rice news got back to Victoria F. and she went off on Alayah that it wasn't Alayah's business to spread that around.
After that, Alayah and Peter talked before the rose ceremony and she ended up leaving -- again. They may not show it as Alayah leaving on her own, but it sounds like she felt like no one was on her side and didn't want to be there anymore.
By the way, here's Chase Rice talking about being just as blindsided by seeing his ex on The Bachelor as Victoria F.:
It's too soon to say how fans are going to react to Alayah vs. Sydney and Victoria P. and Victoria F. (and everyone else?) but I tend to fall on the side of the underdog. If everyone is against someone, I like to balance it out. I'm not sure why Hannah Ann is getting comparisons to Luke P., but it makes me want to defend her. (Hell, I even defended Luke P. for a hot minute.)
Right now, it looks like many fans who don't follow spoilers like Victoria Fuller, but Victoria F. may be the next drama magnet once Alayah is gone. Plus, Chris Harrison did say Hannah Ann gets involved in just about every drama, so we can expect more from her right up to -- and past? -- the finale.
The Bachelor 2020 continues Mondays at 8 p.m. on ABC.
