Contestants get down on Bachelor in Paradise. (Bahareh Ritter/Disney)After more than a decade on the air, Bachelor in Paradise is known for a few things: young, hot singles hooking up and having it out on a white sand beach, endless swimsuits and humorously edited shots of tropical wildlife.
When the reality dating show returned this summer, after a two-year hiatus, ABC decided to shake up the formula.
Instead of welcoming dozens of twenty and thirtysomething contestants back for another round of cocktails and confessionals, producers decided to cast a wider net. The revamp would include youngins mixing it up with the older, equally attractive contestants from The Golden Bachelor and Golden Bachelorette.
AdvertisementAdvertisement"For the first time ever, Golden men and women will be hitting the beaches of Paradise alongside all of your Bachelor and Bachelorette favorites from seasons past," franchise host Jesse Palmer announced during the Season 29 finale of The Bachelor. "So how is this whole thing going to work? You're going to have to tune in to find out."Naturally, age-gap discourse ensued - and just as predictably, controversy soon followed.
With the format change, both Palmer and longtime Paradise bartender Wells Adams expressed their hopes for age-gap romances among the Bachelor extended universe in the run-up to the July season premiere."This happens all the time in the real world. Look at Bill Belichick right now," Adams told Us Weekly, referencing the 73-year-old UNC football coach's romance with Jordon Hudson, 24.
AdvertisementAdvertisementSome longtime fans and Bachelor alumni reacted negatively, suggesting that the idea was creepy, or at least inappropriate.
Palmer soon adjusted his message, instead saying he "encouraged everyone to stay in their generational lane and just not make it weird." Still, the discourse was curious for a time when so many age-gap relationships seem to be unfolding in the public eye. Is our patience for these May-December romances wearing thin, or is the Bachelor audience specifically primed to reject an age-diverse dating pool?The golden ruleWhen The Golden Bachelor premiered in Sept. 2023 to record ratings, it felt like a potential antidote for the franchise's traditionally narrow outlook on age and dating.
In any given season of The Bachelor, any woman over 30 is liable to worry about being treated like a crone next to her younger peers. During Clayton Echard's Bachelor run, a 33-year-old contestant called herself a "cougar." Although The Golden Bachelor and Bachelorette dig deeper and have earned praise for focusing on participants' emotional depth rather than their age or how they look in a dress or suit, the franchise has kept those shows' participants separate from their younger counterparts, save for a cameo here and there to offer advice. Until now.
AdvertisementAdvertisementBachelor in Paradise's age-gap exploration follows a growing trend in the reality dating space. In addition to ABC's Golden franchise expansion, Netflix launched its own mature dating show, The Later Daters, in 2024. Then there's TLC's MILF Manor, in which mothers and their sons hit the beach together only to find out that they'll all be dating other parents and offspring.
Gerry Turner (center) was ABC's first Golden Bachelor. (John Fleenor/ABC via Getty Images)Up next in 2026, Bachelor star Nick Viall, who is 44, and his wife, Natalie Joy, who is 26, are hosting their own age-gap dating show, Age of Attraction, where "age is thrown out the window when singles search for their soulmates."The flurry of newer shows that subvert age expectations follows a familiar pattern in reality television, Andy Dehnart, editor of Reality Blurred and president of the Television Critics Association.
Whenever a new format finds even moderate success, everyone races to create their own version "and generally falls on their face because they've missed whatever makes that thing interesting," he says.
AdvertisementAdvertisementBut age-gap dating series and those centered around more mature singles could strike the right balance of familiar and novel to viewers, Denhart says. He doesn't foresee age gaps taking over reality TV, though. "I don't expect every single show to suddenly do this, or Big Brother next summer to be a house full of twentysomethings and fiftysomethings," he says.A sign of the timesWhile shows about older singles' experiences in the dating world reflect a growing spirit of inclusivity in reality television, the focus on age gaps, specifically, seems out of step with real-world trends. According to Pew Research, the share of heterosexual relationships in which the husband is older than his wife by three or more years has been steadily declining since 1880. In fact, data shows married couples keep getting closer in age. In 2000, 46% of opposite-sex married couples consisted of spouses who were two years apart in age or less. In 2022, that increased to 51%.
Whereas in the past, supposed "gold diggers" were