Meet My Folks, June 30, The Dappers (Part 1): Stop, In the Name of Love! Please, Just Stop!

This week, we meet the Dappers, which consist of a fairly youthful Mom and Dad, and their son, Marco. We also meet five young ladies who are competing to go to Greece with Marco. From this group, Mom and Dad will select one as the perfect match for their offspring.

Tonight’s contestants are:

Chauntal, a cheerleading coach and student;
Chelsea, a broadcasting major;
Tarin, an auto company spokesperson (don’t ask; I don’t know either);
Malieah, who spells her name Maleiah; and
Ana, a blonde Public Relations chickie.

I honestly wish I could go more in depth with my descriptions, but I’m only given so much to work with. It’s not like the show’s producers are supplying me with an abundance of material.

Ah ha! As if the producers have read my mind, here comes a fascinating tidbit about the Prize of The Week, Marco. He evidently likes girls that are hard to get, and he wears earrings in both ears. If I had to find out just one thing about a guy in order to get a sense of who he is, the fact that he likes the girls who play coy isn’t without merit.

And I’ll bet the earrings mean something, too. I’m just not sure what.

Back to the show. All the girls are assembled somewhere in the Dapper Living Room, so that can only mean:

• The doorbell is about to ring, and
• Dirty little secrets are about to be delivered.

And this is exactly what happens. Either I’m a genius, or I’ve been watching this show for too long.

The Bad Facts we all learn are:

In college, Ana went through the boys’ dorm rooms with a key “borrowed” from the Dorm R.A. Ana admitted it.

Chelsea makes dates pay for her and her friends, and racks up huge bills. She denied it.

Tarin spends all her money on clothes so she has to live at home. Yawn.

Chauntal has lied to get out of dates. I’m thinking this is a pretty lame secret, when Chauntal actually makes it worse by explaining that no, what she really does is DOUBLE UP on dates, then cancels the one she doesn’t want at the last minute. What a gem.

The Girl with the Mal name: her last boyfriend was older than Dad Dapper. Mallory, or whatever, actually admits this is true. He was 44. Dad Dapper is younger. Everyone freaks out at this news.

I didn’t know dating older men was a crime, if one is of legal age. But evidently in the Dapper Household, this is too icky to even contemplate. Because, you know, if Malady (or whatever) dated one older guy, what’s to stop her FROM GOING AFTER MR. DAPPER? Nothing! Her hormones must be out of control! In the name of everything decent and holy, such a she-devil must be stopped! But how? Remove her ovaries? No, that’s not good enough! Kill her! Kill her now!

At this point, my husband observes: “I think I’m older than Dad Dapper!” This depresses him for a good twenty seconds. Then he gets over it by suggesting that Mr. Dapper is a member of The Hair Club for Men. All hell is breaking loose, both on the screen and in my living room.

We all take deep, cleansing breaths, as the Dappers and their guests move on to dinner. Nothing exciting happens until after the meal, when everyone piles into a limo and goes to a blues club. They’re seated up front, which is a good thing, as Malaprop (whatever) is introduced as the next singing act! (Serves her right for being such a hussy.)

The song of the evening is “Stop in the Name of Love,” but poor Maladroit can’t sing for beans, and humiliates herself. One by one all the girls are called to the stage, but no one can seem to get through even one line of the song. At least Tarin tries to change the words to make fun of her lack of talent. Major bonus points for that.

At last, Chelsea gets her big break. She’s going on stage a nobody, but she’s coming back a star! Well, not a star exactly, but it turns out Chelsea can carry a tune for about 15 seconds without embarrassing herself. Of course, compared to the others, she’s friggin’ Charlotte Church, but that’s another story.

Mom and Dad are instructed to pick a winner, and of course, they pick Chelsea. Because of this, a Good Fact about her is revealed via the Stage Fax Machine: Chelsea volunteers at a nursing home. Aww.

It’s nighttime, out on the street. The Dappers and their guests are sauntering in the evening air when they are accosted by another mail carrier. Dad receives a package, a TV remote. When pressed, the remote activates a Jumbotron.

I’m not kidding. A Jumbotron starts to play, revealing even more secrets about the girls. A crowd gathers ‘round to watch this. Much squealing and groaning and “oh noooo!”ing ensues.

The Further Bad Facts delivered by “friends”:

Ana: Cheats on tests and broke into a teacher’s office to get the test ahead of time. Ana denies this up and down.

Malareee, Malariiiiii: won’t date a guy unless her cats approve of him. She admits it. Insert your own pussycat joke here.

Chelsea: flirts with her professors in order to get higher grades. She denies it.

Chauntal: to get even with girls she doesn’t like, she steals their boyfriends. Chauntal is dumbfounded, but manages to stammer out an explanation. If it was good enough to recall, I’d happily summarize it for you, but it wasn’t, so I won’t.

Tarin: Only dates men with girlfriends because she can’t handle commitment. Tarin hems and haws.

As expected, word comes down from on high that Mom and Dad have just fifteen minutes to eliminate one of the girls. This girl will not be coming back home in the limo with the others, and will be left on the street. Presumably, she will have to spend her life there. (Maybe she can hook up with Fallon, who was left at the bowling alley on the season premiere.)

Mom Dapper is taking this much harder than expected. She is actually crying at having to choose one girl to leave. Usually on this program, the parental tears don’t occur until the final choice, but I guess Mrs. Dapper bonded with the girls early on. For the life of me, I can’t figure out when, as all we’ve seen Mrs. D do so far is roll her eyes in disgust at them.