Sean Lowe The Bachelor: Season 17 is Sean's Second Chance at Love

On January 7, ABC will premiere the seventeenth season of The Bachelor, starring Sean Lowe and 26 female contestants, each eager to find their one true love on national television. You might remember Sean from Season 8 of The Bachelorette, which aired last spring, but if you don’t, it’s not your fault.

In the vast menagerie of Bachelor/ette contestants, Sean is a little on the vanilla side, even for the cast that was trotted out during Emily Maynard’s quest for love. Sean, 28, from Dallas, Texas, was one of the final three suitors - not the hip entrepreneur or the dynamic race car driver but the other guy. His key moments include tossing a log during a date/promotional event for Pixar's Brave, giving an impromptu speech about “searching for that great love” in England, and taking off his shirt.

For all of that, Sean was entertaining and endearing, especially when he seemed to get sincerely caught up in the romance of it all. One night in Prague, he ran through the streets to find Emily and he cried when she eventually sent him home. But Sean Lowe is no Kalon McMahon, or “The Mask,” or anyone else that has stolen the spotlight while on The Bachelor/ette. 

This could be a problem for his upcoming season. Every Bachelor/ette has been presented to us with an easily digestible narrative, something that plays off their previous appearances on the show — for instance, Ali’s season hinged on her choosing love over work and Brad’s constantly pined about “letting his walls down” after rejecting all contestants on his original season. Unfortunately for Sean, he doesn’t have much of a personality or story to hang a show on, and his abs, however spectacular, can’t carry an entire season on their own. 

Maybe the producers of the show realize that they have to kick things up a notch. Since last season of The Bachelorette, the public has been treated to a Bachelorette wedding, another just ridiculous season of Bachelor Pad, some inter-season drama as Bachelor contestant Courtney Robertson ditched fiance Ben Flajnik for Sean’s costar Arie Luyendyk, Jr., and Shayne Llamas’, an additional Bachelor winner, star performance in VH1’s Couples Therapy. That’s a lot of Bachelor noise clogging up the airways before All-American Sean takes the stage.

So, expect to see a few more gimmicks than the usual seasons. Of course, there will still be fantastic dates scattered across exotic destinations. And there will still be numerous beautiful women with perfect hair and makeup to swoon over shirtless Sean. But one of those women will be a “SuperFan” from Bachelor Pad and another will be a “mystery guest” that hopes to rattle the premiere cocktail party. Also, the show’s website promises even more “Red Hot Drama” while providing a “Cheat Sheet” to help keep track of the action.

America’s newest sweetheart, Sean Lowe, will be at the center of it all, looking for a wife. He will need all the luck he can get.