There would have been much more of an impact when Jed was like, “I’ll handle Ben,” when Rick dismissed his concern for Ben, when Cleo said she knew Jed was worried about Ben, when they faced off in town, and ESPECIALLY when Ben said he was protecting someone he loved.
Jed’s response being something like, “Now’s the time you choose to tell me that?” when, given the minimal interactions we’ve seen, most people would be like, “Um…slow down. We just met.” Because a couple of episodes ago, Jed seemed awkward about getting close to Ben around the fire pit. He went to get more beers to get out of the awkwardness (is the way I took it), but before he got back Ben was kidnapped by Lizzie and Aurora. The next time they are together is this episode when Ben is about to kill Kaleb in town (unless I’m forgetting something).
Telling him he loves him made NO sense as a viewer without more relationship building. And now–they are at odds, and we didn’t get any of the important and sweet moments that we need to see any couple have to really be invested. It started out so good by showing those sweet moments pre-relationship, so I’m pretty disappointed.
