RED herrings are one of the oldest narrative tricks in the book.
Make the viewer/reader think something is heading in one direction (ie. A farmer saying ad nauseam about his concerns over a long distance relationship) then do the old switcheroo at the last minute (ie. Same farmer chooses the girl for the long distance relationship).
The producers essentially brought in a trawler load of red herrings (probably not exactly how the fish is caught commercially) to episode 12 to draw it out and draw in the viewer.
They are, after all, two farmers less than usual so there's more time to fill.
Rural Tinkerbell, Nat, pops onto screen to give a run down on what's going on. She's wearing that go-to golden double belt buckle of hers which much surely have its own Instagram account by now.
This is followed by lots of slow motion footage of the farmers looking over paddocks, leaning on fences and fidgeting with brand-spanking new Akubras.
Before the big decisions - and judging by the copy-and-paste script each farmer uses to leave the viewer in no doubt it is one of the biggest decisions of their life - each one bundles off to meet the friends and families of their final two partners.
So, with lots of good interior and exterior shots of various models of Toyota vehicles, we hit the road.
Bronte's Family
WITH L-plates in place (not really - he's too young for them), Farmer Harry heads to the Sunshine Coast.
While there have been spectacular scenes filmed throughout this thing, perhaps one of the crowning shots comes at this point.
Harry pulls up in his rig and there, clearly visible in the background due to a resplendent holiday blue dress, is a lady, in a strain backwards lean complete with confused expression, having a good old Queensland sticky beak.
Priceless. Quite possibly an innocent holiday maker, there's good chance a comment was barked at the out-of-shot husband: "Hey Lenny, they're filming somethin' here for the television by the looks." She shall now be known as Sticky Blue.
Bronte meets Harry at an icon of Sunshine Coast tourism from yesteryear, The Big Pineapple. They admire the large fibreglass and steel structure but we see no more, largely because the place isn't what it used to be.
Boarded-up restaurants and tourism kiosks are not a good look for the once-thriving testament to the pineapple industry.
It's significant because Bronte's parents got married there. It's off to Bronte's parents house to meet her mum and her two older brothers, who pour on the Queenslandness thick, just short of saying: "Stone the flamin' Wally Lewis mate; grab a Fourex".
There are mugs of beer the size of small rainwater tanks on the table; it's probably about 10:15am.
They laugh loud, talk about traveling and having children. "I think four's a nice number," Bronte's mum says.
Harry goes as red as a Wamuran strawberry.
Kiani's Family
FARMER Ben strolls past the yoga class sign to meet Kiani in her natural setting, Northern Beaches, NSW.
He meets the no-nonsense dad Steve, mum Jen and yet another possibly mute brother with a mullet, as per Harry's family in a previous episode. He has not been given any lines either.
"I know Kiani's a forever girl with the right person," Steve says.
Later Kiani reinforces the fact she is "in the fall" towards love with Ben. With Farmer Benjamin/Costa gone, Kiani has taken it upon herself to come up with creative descriptions.
At this point, it's worth contemplating a contemplation this writer has been contemplating: Ben's face. He often has a stern, hard expression, as if a childhood tragedy has forced him into a double life of superheroic crime fighting.
Then it dawns: Ben could be Batman/Bruce Wayne. His features are ideally suited. Look at that brooding in the pic below.
Maddi's Family
MADDI is from Melbourne, so that's where Will heads, taking the time to adapt his clothing to suit.
While Farmer Ben could done the Batman cowl, it seems Will has embraced Batman's pants, sporting a pair of eye-wateringly tight black slacks.
Over the top of the squeaking pants, he meets Maddi's mum, dad and nan. Scott, Maddi's dad, is a dry as a Sao, asking: "How is your relationship going?"
He leans back at the head of the table, straight faced, with a slight Godfather/Tony Soprano vibe. If Will wants to keep his thumbs, he'd better do things right.
At a later stage as Will and Maddi say a prolonged farewell in Melbourne, a precarious electric scooter rider provides some relief as she very nearly comes a cropper. It's not a good omen for Will and Maddi. Or for Melbourne electric scooter riders.
Tess's Family
THERE is a lot of trekking to Queensland it seems as most of the chosen ladies are there. The impact of La Nina are visible as well with most locations wet and wetter.
Harry heads to the Gold Coast to meet Tess's family. He goes directly to the cafe where she works, flowers in hand.
It's unsure exactly what sort of cafe it is but there are a LOT of tablet bottles on the shelves behind the counter. Tess offers Harry a coffee and he orders a long black, a scene they obviously had to film twice after he ordered a Milo with a marshmallow in the first time.
OTHER FWFWW BLOGS...
- Farmers Watching Farmers Wanting Wives Blog 10: Final dates and it's culling time
- Farmers Watching Farmers Wanting Wives Blog 9: Farmers' families swing by
- Farmers Watching Farmers Wanting Wives Blog 8: Introducing new hens into the hen house
- Farmers Watching Farmers Wanting Wives Blog 7: Paige dumps the boys and takes off
Harry makes a bold move and gives Tess's mum a peck on the cheek followed by a hug upon first meeting. Will that pay off?
Tess's mum and friends Steph and Ellie give Harry a good grilling
"Chemistry is important," Tess's mum says, hopefully not referring to the coffee shop side hustle.
"I think you've got to let love find it's way," she follows up with. There is plenty of discussion and concern about the long distance thing, and not much discussion about fishing or the colour of fish which may be caught, be they herrings or not.
Leish's Family
CONTINUING the Queensland run, Dark Knight Ben meets Leish's two friends Jordan and Ash in her hometown of Brisbane, where it's also raining.
"Welcome to the Sunshine State," Leish says upon Ben's arrival via zipline from a rooftop once he's finished scanning the city skyline (not really).
Both Jordan and Ash speak of the need for, and appeal of, Ben's genuineness.
It's not clear who got the part of the leather-clad Sandy from Greece, but both Leish and Ash are wearing their identical leather jackets from the audition.
Leish shows Ben her city apartment before they say goodbye. She's wearing hugging black pants, either from the before-mentioned audition or borrowed from Farmer Will.
Ben says it would be easy to get married and have children but also that Kiani is obviously the ideal fit at the moment.
He couldn't move to Brisbane, mostly because it would be too hard to find another subterranean cavern to set up a high-tech crime analysis lab.
Again, not sure what the fishing is like in Brisbane but we'll just leave this herring rod here.
Jess' Family
THE small country town of Esk, Queensland, is the hometown of Jess, who belongs to Will.
It is also apparently the home of the Kransky Sisters, for those aware of Australian comedic musical performers.
He's barely sat down when Jess' sister Kim loads up and starts peppering him with questions and comments.
"Don't hurt her Will," she virtually yells across the table. "Do you know who you've picked?"
That line brings a concerned look from Will and a sharp corrective tap from mum, as if Jess is hiding a huge secret. Is she actually Catwoman? Time will tell.
That could be an issue with our Christmas, couldn't it Jess?
- Jess's mum
Clearly of the same stock, Jess' mum responds to the suggestion that Jess would move to the Victorian farm.
"Absolutely not. Why would you do that?" she fires back.
They ask about his previous relationships of which he has had two.
The visit to Awkwardsville continues as the issue of Christmas comes up with Will emphasising the tradition of his family all heading to the farm for the event.
"That could be an issue with our Christmas, couldn't it Jess?" mum declares.
Short of Judge Judy coming in, the lunch concludes and later on Jess and Farmer Will talk about pulling down walls, opening up, unlocking thoughts, etcetera, etcetera.
Decision Time
AS per the format for the show, it's time for the remaining farmers to let the world know who they chose. Away we go.
Farmer Harry's Decision
HAVING polished his boots and touched up his hair, possibly with the same product, Harry then pulls on what appears to be the same jacket that the long forgotten Spiros (an early contender for Farmer Paige) wore back at the start of the series.
Harry still hasn't managed to find a razor.
There are slow motion shots of Bronte and Tess at separate locations, walking out the house all dolled up. Again, the old slow-mo is a good way to stretch out the lack of two farmers.
A wooden chair with flowers all around is where it's all going to go down.
Cutting through Harry's speech, he tells Tess he loves her. In fact, it sounds very similar to the speech he also gives Bronte.
There's lots of flummoxing around (as Farmer Costa would say) but in the end, he picks Tess and shelves Bronte.
Farmer Ben's Decision
FRESH from fighting the Joker, Ben jazzes himself up and faces the camera, only to walk away for a moment to gather himself after he's asked if he's had his heart broken before. That wretched manipulator Poison Ivy will do that to you, but perhaps that's not who he means.
Kiani has got a new set of heels and sports a golden dress. Leish goes for bright pink, perhaps fuchsia to the fashion-aware.
There's verbose pre-discussion about being nervous, anxiousness, connections, not wanting to hurt anyone, and so forth.
Farmer Ben's shakedown happens at an ornate set of stables, nicely decorated, and quite possibly a secret lair for The Scarecrow.
There are flowers and lights. Ben tears up a lot when talking to both ladies as he repeats his mantra he's had from the start about "following his heart".
A spot of clever editing makes for a huge pregnant pauses prior to an ad break, leaving us all wondering- tea or coffee? Oh, and who will Ben choose?
All said, it's Kiani who gets kicked to the curb.
"My heart's not with you. It's with Leish," Ben says.
"Time wasn't on our side," Kiani replies, along with: "I think the world of you."
With the deal stitched up with Leish, Ben says he genuinely forgot what it was like to be in love.
"I've fallen madly in love with you and want you to run away with me and start this next chapter," the billionaire playboy turned cover-of-night detective says.
At this point it would have been nice to have used the bat signal to project a large love heart onto the night sky, but no luck.
Will's Decision
WILL takes a walk in the paddock while Maddi gives the GHD a workout.
There is slow motion of Jess putting on eyeliner. Or eyelash liner. Or eyelash enhancer. Or some form of make-up. (It may have been better if one of the female writers had tackled this point.)
On an antique red velvet lounge in a glammed-up barn, Farmer Will waits. After a quick live weather cross to Kochie (not really), in comes Maddi.
Will tears up. "I came here looking for something and I think I've found it with someone else," he tells her, adding that she is an "incredible person".
He's very emotional about telling her, like he's apologising for melting her mum's best Tupperware or something.
Maddi takes it hard and just wants to get out of there. She resists pushing over one of the barrels or smashing a vase of flowers on her way out.
"I think it's just hard because I really like him," she concludes.
The drone is given a good workout flying around, delivering shots of Jess making her way towards the barn.
Will obviously lights up a bit more when she walks in.
In his gushing to her, Farmer Will says: "You literally lift everyone up."
The grammar Nazi here will pull you up right there. As spectacular as that would be to see, it's doubtful Jess physically lifts every person she meets up off the floor. Stll, this is an episode brimming with secret superpowers so perhaps she's not letting on about a certain incident involving gamma radiation.
"I really am falling in love with you," Will goes on.
And like she's just won a $50 Baskin and Robbins voucher on a call-in radio show, Jess responds with: "Yay." She says it a few times.
Will's expectations have been blown out of the water apparently. He doesn't produce a diamond ring but gives the vaguely loose non-committal indication that there could be a wedding "a bit down the track".
And that's that - the farmers have chosen.
We now await to see the traditional reunion episode and ensuing drama.
That is, unless the Penguin is in town creating havoc.
A last-ditch effort
STREWTH, they're dropping like flies. Luckily Beno, Willo and Hazzo have found a squeeze. Still, it's a shame Paigeo and...Benjamino... had to depart. There's not much hope old matchmaker Sammo will reappear on the reunion episode with one last suite of contenders for the two farmers who have left. Although it would be the twist no one sees coming. Lay it down.