At this point Married At First Sight NZ is feeling more like an episode of Survivor - couples are dropping like flies, allegiances are being made... Even I'm struggling to keep up and I'm literally being paid to watch this.
It's becoming a lonely experience, watching and recapping and shouldering all this angst alone, so tonight I roped in two of my best friends, Vic and Ebonee, to watch with me.
Tonight we bid a surprising farewell to a couple everyone thought would be in for the long haul: Claire and Dom. To be honest, the writing was on the wall from the start of the episode, what with all the dissolving shots of photos of Claire on her wedding day. Guys she's not dead. She's in hospital with a crook gut but she ain't dead.
It's hard to know what the breaking point was for Claire and Dom. It was possibly the stress of cooking up the My Food Bag on the kitchen bench - a gourmet one, no less. Even Nadia Lim's evangelical love for wholefoods couldn't save this marriage.
I've got to be honest guys, I don't know if this is worth the extra $17 a week. I really don't.
Or maybe it was the fact Claire came home to what looked like an episode of Hoarders. I mean, Dom left the f**king Harney & Sons tea selection box open. Are we in prison or something?
To be honest it was probably that little moment when Dom accidentally sent a text about Claire TO Claire. It must be difficult on that Nokia 3310. Classic Dad not upgrading to a smartphone... Why would he, when he only needs it for texts and calls?
In comparison, while Claire and Dom's star fell, it seemed that Ben and Aaron's was really on the up. With lots of moody shots of autumnal trees and a soundtrack that made it feel like a British murder mystery, they strode under the Vic Park underpass like two off-duty cops about to go find who killed Danny Latimer.
But it seems there's a new hurdle in their relationship, which is no longer that Ben really, really doesn't find Aaron attractive (something my friend Ebonee found very confusing as "they look exactly the same attractiveness level"), but instead that Ben would "rather swallow razor blades" than live in Christchurch.
Okay, well that's a bit much. H&M just opened there, so, you know. There are worse things.
They even were getting along really well, but the sexual chemistry between them was still lacking. Or, as Ebonee put it, "watching them kiss makes me so dry". So there's that.
However things seemed to really pick up on their mystery date: Aaron got to choose the activity while Ben had to just go with the flow, which really seems to be a specialty of his. As Aaron cruised the suburban Jeep straight into a 'NO PARKING' zone, the mystery became clear - they were going canyoning! Grounds for divorce in my opinion, but Ben seemed pretty into it.
Several minutes into it, I was still pretty unclear what canyoning actually is, but it actually looked pretty fun, if a bit wet. Friend Vic said she thought she'd like the jumping off rocks part. As with most of our decisions, the three of us spontaneously decided we were actually all going to go canyoning ASAP. We had to pause while Vic tried to see if she could find canyoning on GrabOne. She couldn't. We promptly forgot that we ever wanted to do it.
Ben and Aaron's mystery date seemed to go a lot better than Vicky and Andrew's. Vicky, of the most chronic case of bitchy resting face I've ever seen, perked up a lot at the opportunity to completely change her husband's appearance. It was some real 50 Shades of Grey submissive/dominant shit that a lot of people are into, no judgements here, but Andrew was not one of them.
As she took him to get his hair cut and get made over and pretty like Anne Hathaway in Princess Diaries, he lost his shit and stormed out. His anger lasted all evening, including when he tried to cook and the My Food Bag pushed him over the edge. This episode was not a good advertisement for My Food Bag at all. I don't think the MAFS NZ couples are going to be in one of the stock images of happy white people cooking together any time soon.
It wasn't just Andrew who was angry. Ebonee, Vic and I took the opportunity to also get enraged on his behalf.
"Imagine if a guy did that to a woman? Basically told her she'd be more attractive if she lost weight or cut her hair or changed her clothes?" we all raged. "She's trying to change who he is, and turn him into something she prefers aesthetically rather than working on the deeper issues in their relationship."
After some silence, we did all agree that shit, Andrew's new hair looked really good.
Alas, Ben and Aaron's happy time couldn't last. They ended up getting into a huge fight over Ben staying out with his one true love: Vicky. God, between Hadyn and Ben, Vicky is really enjoying getting cozy with everyone on this show... except, like, her husband. Aaron was pretty justifiably upset that his husband didn't come home until mid-morning, but I personally found it really hard to get angry at Ben when he was wearing this fabulous Ariana Grande Dangerous Woman tour t-shirt.
Vic and Eb didn't agree with me though. "He ain't worth it son, get out of there," Vic told Aaron through the screen, close to tears.
"So true, he's just a pretty face," Ebonee passionately agreed.
I think I've broken my friends.
It remains to be seen whether these two will make it to next week, with the home visits looming. Ben better strengthen his oesophagus as he's gonna be hitting the Chur. Better get practicing asking people which school they went to, Benny! (Some classic Chch humour for all my South Island readers.)
Oh and Brett and Angel were cute as shit as per. Look at them in their matching f**king hats. RIP my heart.
Married At First Sight NZ airs Sunday and Monday nights on Three. Watch the full episode again on ThreeNow.
Newshub.
