‘The Bachelor’ Season 27 Episode 2: Zach Shallcross Brings a Suitor to Meet His Family and Gets a Surprise Group Date from Latto

SPOILERS WARNING! This post contains details from Monday’s episode of ABC’s Season 27 The old bachelor

It’s week two of Zach Shallcross’s journey to find love on ABC The old bachelor. After his first cocktail and rose ceremony, Zach was ready to explore his relationships with the 20 remaining women in the competition. In the opening moments of Monday night’s episode, Zach said he’s hopeful and has already made some strong connections he didn’t expect.

Because Zach couldn’t talk to everyone at the cocktail party, Zach decided to have two group dates and one on one the first week to make sure he had time with all the women. It’s pretty normal for some women not to go on dates for the first few weeks when the group is this big, but host Jesse Palmer says Zach wants to do things “a little bit differently.”

First up: Brianna, Brooklyn, Katherine, Mercedes, Bailey, Davia, Cat, Genevie and Kylee.

“I’m looking for big, big love,” the date card read, teasing what was to come. The women ride a party bus to a warehouse in Los Angeles and are surprised to see rapper Latto approaching them on a catwalk. She told the women they would prove to Zach that they have “bad bitch energy” all day long, starting with a dance.

And who better to help the new contestants embrace their BBE than some of Bachelor Nation’s most infamous women? Victoria Fuller, Tahzjuan Hawkins and Courtney Robertson come off the stage and announce that they will help judge the women during the group date.

Each of the women took turns walking the runway to Zach to show off her own BBE, and then each had to explain to him when she was, as Latto put it, “a really bad bitch.” They told stories ranging from beauty standards to TKTKTK. And so it was time for the cocktail party.

But wait. Is this some kind of drama brewing? Before the commercial break, Tahzjuan tells the camera during a confessional session that she has a crush on Zach and admits that if he invited her to his season, she wouldn’t hesitate to do it.

During the cocktail party, the women anxiously waited to see who would get the group date rose. Most of the conversations were business as usual, the discussion of the day and possibly a little deeper. Brianna took Zach aside to indicate she wasn’t too comfortable still being there as she received a rose from viewers The Bachelorette: After the Last Rose and not by Zach himself, but he was quick to assure her that she was there for a reason, even sealing the deal with a kiss.

While the group date was taking place, it was time for the other women to figure out who would get the first one-on-one. Credit went to Christina, who said she would love to talk to Zach about motherhood for her 5-year-old daughter.

Back to the first group date… guess who’s back? Yes, Tahzjuan crashed the party to “see if something was up” with Zach. He agreed to consider letting her stay and fighting for his heart, but when the women confront Tahzjuan on the group date, things get a little unpredictable. She tells them that many of them missed the chance to actually connect with Zach and that she wasn’t upset about their attempts to show BBE. In the end, despite his best efforts, Zach wasn’t willing to let her stay.

Katherine received the first group date rose.

Then it was time for Christina’s one-on-one. Before their date, the couple took a helicopter to his childhood home to meet his mom, dad and about 20 of their close friends and family to celebrate his mom’s birthday…no pressure. Christina handled the matter quite well and jumped right into the festivities. When Zach’s mom released his baby album, it brought her back to reality as she realized the conversation she wanted to have with Zach about her own daughter.

She worked up the courage to talk to him over dinner, and while he (of course) had mixed feelings about the news, he gave Christina a rose to show her he wanted to get to know her further and find out if he would be a father stand in the near future.

It was finally time for the second group date, which included Greer, Charity, Jessica, Aly, Kaity, Anastasia, Gabi, Ariel, Victoria J. and Kimberly.

Zach decided to keep it simple for this date and opted for a cocktail instead of something extravagant. It was the first time he had had a real conversation with some of the women in the group, including Ariel, who suggested they both write down their worst fears to pour their hearts out to the world. The old bachelor. Zach told Jessica that as a child she was diagnosed with pyloric stenosis, an uncommon condition in babies that prevents food from entering the small intestine. He explained that this is why he is so close to his mother, who fought for his diagnosis and treatment.

As more women started talking about their conversations with Zach, Gabi said she felt insecure because she hadn’t had a proper conversation with him yet. Fortunately, she was able to talk to him before the end of the group date. While their conversation seemed to be going well enough, he ended up giving Jessica the rose for the group date.

Before handing out the rose, Zach mentioned a few other women he’d like to talk to and he didn’t mention Gabi, which made her quite emotional. She left the appointment in tears and said she felt “worthless”. But at the cocktail party before the rose ceremony, Gabi got a second chance to talk to Zach, and she walked away very confident.

Listen to the second rose ceremony. But first, one last cocktail for the women to convince Zach to keep her. Remember: Christina, Jessica and Katherine already have roses. During his toast, Zach dropped a bomb on the group when he told Christina he enjoyed seeing her meet his family … which she didn’t tell the other women about.

Of course, this caused trouble as the other women questioned their relationship with Zach when they learned that he and Christina had already made such great progress. Specifically, Brianna took Christina aside to talk about how it still bothers her that Christina jokingly told her “I hate you” before she received “America’s First Impression Rose” on the first night. Christina apologized and said she never meant to hurt her. That didn’t stop Brianna from bringing up the conversation she had with Zach from the first night, though she didn’t tell Zach who made the comment. Zach told her he felt like she had too many walls in her conversations and he blamed it on their lack of connection thus far.

Here are the results of the rose ceremony. The women sent home were: Victoria J., Kimberly and Cat.

The women returning next week are: Brooklyn, Genevie, Greer, Aly, Charity, Kaity, Gabi, Ariel, Anastasia, Kylee, Davia, Mercedes, Bailey, Brianna, Jessica, Christina and Katherine.

The old bachelor airs Monday nights at 8pm ET/PT on ABC and is available the next day on Hulu.