Published Sep. 3, 2024, 10:23 p.m. ET
Despite The Bachelorette finale seeming like it was headed for a happy ending, Season 21 didn’t end in a happily ever after for Jenn Tran and her reported winner Devin Strader.
Jesse Palmer promised a finale that would keep us on the edge of our seats the entire time, and boy did the three-hour live event deliver. Shortly before we watched a heartwarming engagement between Jenn and Devin, we saw Jenn join host Jesse Palmer during the After The Final Rose ceremony to reveal that they’re no longer together. A genuine Bachelorette bombshell!
Earlier today, Reality Steve shared the following finale spoiler with fans, which prompted pre-finale speculations that Devin broke off the engagement: “In the finale tonight, you will see Jenn get engaged to Devin. That spoiler remains unchanged. However, the rumors that have been circulating for a couple weeks now are true. Devin has ended the engagement and broken up with Jenn. I do not know the circumstances surrounding it in terms of when it happened or the reasoning behind it. Guess we will find that out tonight. Curious to see the reasoning for the breakup since Devin has love bombed Jenn ever since hometowns and now couldn’t even make it to the ATFR with her still in a relationship. Should be an interesting night.”
So what exactly happened? During the finale, Jenn told Jesse that she “felt 100%” about her decision to say goodbye to Marcus, but that she woke up with “a totally different point of view” on her day ahead with Devin. She realized that in order to fulfill herself she had to choose herself, so she wasn’t going to let Devin propose to her — SHE was going to propose to DEVIN.
Before the proposal, however, Jesse cut in from the studio to announce that “because of what transpired” since that day in Hawaii we wouldn’t be seeing the proposal until we heard from Jenn. So what did Jenn have to say?!
The Season 21 lead returned to stage in tears and gathered herself to announce, “It’s been a really hard couple of months. We had left Hawaii engaged very happy. It was the happiest day of my life, I thought I found the person I was going to spend the rest of my life with. And then essentially as soon as we left Hawaii things were just different. It just felt like he was pulling away, all the promises he made of wanting to move together somehwere and see each other all the time — the efforts were inconsistent. I was confused I didnt understand because we left so happy.”
“I felt like I was secondary to everything in his life, he wasn’t introducing me to his family anymore,” she continued. “I didn’t understand why, and we had a happy couple planned some time last month early, and the night before I got a phone call and he basically broke off the engagement. He basically said that he didn’t love me anymore and didn’t feel the same way and felt something was off since the second he proposed, and he regretted getting engaged.”
Jenn wiped away tears to say, “For the past month I’d been trying to empathize with the way he was feeling …how he could switch up like that.” She noted how hard it is to come off the show and said she even told Devin they could take the pressure off the engagement and just date, but he was “checked out” and it wasn’t what he wanted anymore. Jenn said Devin didn’t want to go to couple’s counseling or fight for the relationship anymore and that he’s been ghosting her since they last saw each other in July. As for what happened next, head to our Bachelorette finale recap for the full breakdown.
Stay tuned for more Bachelorette updates and follow along with the rest of Decider’s Season 21 finale and After The Final Rose coverage here.