Host Chris Harrison breaks down Hannah's frustrations to ET.
Things have come to a bit of a halt on The Bachelorette.
Last week's episode of the ABC dating show ended on a cliffhanger, with Hannah Brown telling Luke P. that she couldn't give him a rose on their one-on-one date in Scotland. The controversial contestant has been the focus and cause of much of the drama between the men this season, and when things pick back up on Monday, fans will see how much of a toll it's taken on our Bachelorette.
Instead of moving forward with episode six, ABC has labeled Monday's episode 5B. Viewers will see an emotional sit-down with Brown and host Chris Harrison as she addresses her concerns about the process. Brown had previously admitted to ET that she thought about quitting while filming her season. In a phone interview with ET's Lauren Zima on Friday, Harrison said Brown certainly aired her frustrations.
"I felt like I had a really good rapport with her. We had great chemistry, which led to really emotional, honest conversations, but it’s hard for me to put a finger on how serious she was sometimes when she said she was done or she’d say, 'I don’t know how this works,'" he explained. "She really verbalizes everything, which is great, but I’m really not sure sometimes how real it all is or if she’s just exhaling her feelings out."
According to Harrison, Brown "never walked away, or ran away a la Colton [Underwood]," but she did become discouraged. "Most of her stuff was confiding in us. [It was] less combative, just more confiding and letting us know this is where she stands and things aren’t going well," he shared. "It was never Hannah vs. production, it was Hannah vs. her frustrations with these guys, and sadly it all centered around one guy, Luke P., who was really the fly in the ointment. These frustrations kept bubbling up because she likes the guy, and that was the tough part for us and everyone else because the guys really disliked Luke P. She wanted everyone to respect that, and none of the guys did."
In ET's interview with Brown the morning after her premiere aired, she told Zima that she'd come closing to walking away during filming. "It was ... a conversation of like, 'I don't know if this is going to work for me,'" she said. Brown has told ET that she's happy since filming ended, but has not revealed if she's engaged or in a relationship.
Promos have shown that while Brown didn't give Luke P. a rose, he wasn't kicked off the show then and there. What follows is the beauty queen's "bottoming out" in Latvia, Harrison said. That's why they decided to take a breather and try to work out some of the drama.
"Hannah was going through such a rocky ride. There were several tumultuous weeks from Rhode Island, which wasn’t the smoothest, to Scotland, which was even rougher, and then you see kind of a bottoming out at the beginning of Latvia," he recalled. "The thought was, we sat down in Riga, and things would rebound and she'd be feeling better and let's have a fresh start, but she really kind of hits the skids and bottoms out."
"She was emotional and wasn’t sure this was going to work, so we thought, 'We should have a reset to explain where her head is at.' There’s a lot of Luke P. talk, and even fatigue from our fans, and so we thought, 'Let’s explain this to our fans and where her head’s at, and bring everything together,'" Harrison continued of the special episode. "At the same time, we also filled an hour of television."
And while Brown gets some things off her chest during her meeting with Harrison, the drama continues this season. Viewers have yet to see the Bachelorette's much-teased line, "I have had sex and Jesus still loves me," which the host hinted might be directed at Luke P.
"Ironically enough, faith is what brought them together and his faith and his conservative values might be their biggest sticking point and become the biggest divide between them," he said. "Yes, obviously, we are setting something up down the road that will come to a head, where their faith and their values start to conflict, and how they perceive them."
In an interview in early May, before filming had completed, Harrison told Zima he wasn't sure if the season would end in an engagement. "[Her ending] is already unconventional, heading into it," he said. "I really don't know how it's going to end. I am hopeful and she is hopeful."
The Bachelorette airs Mondays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on ABC. Join ET's Bachelor Nation Facebook group here.
RELATED CONTENT:
