Episode 4 spoiler
Jarrett, why the heck are you doing such obvious flirting with Mallory in front of Iyanna and Sal? Is everyone on this show terrible???
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Episode 4
I want to pull for Jarrett and Iyanna, but really I just want Iyanna to be happy.
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I’m joining in here because this show is one of my favorite train wrecks. The other show I enjoy in the same genre is married at first sight. Which I feel like the people in general are less horrible but still entertaining.
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I enjoy this genre of show partially because I enjoy watching how western modern culture is reinventing matchmaking and arranged marriage. From like, a sociological perspective, this shit fascinates me.
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Oh hell yes. I’ve seen like…all of the married at first sights. So much so that it’s become an inside joke with me and my husband during minor stresses (like losing keys or something) to say, “hey babe, just remember, (then in a robotic voice) the only way out is divorce”.
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Episode 2: (I don’t think these are spoilers)
I’m finding the conversation between Kyle and Shaina so painful. I find him incredibly annoying.
All these people (and in the first season, too) are behaving as if they don’t find love on this show, they’ll never find love again.
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They’re both terrible conversationalists, lol. I mean, most people on the show (and a lot of people in real life) are too, but it’s v hard to watch. Zero content, lol.
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I think the most train wreck thing about these shows is how low the bar is for people. It’s like, “he remembered I have a dog! I’m so touched by that and it must mean he is kind and considerate and and and!” or it’s like “she likes the same sports team as me, I could really see a future there!”
It’s probably especially funny when you’ve been with someone for a decade+ because it’s like…interests change so much and are so relatively unimportant in terms of compatibility, lol. But then on the American one at least they don’t touch on almost anything that has to do with actual compatibility. Granted I’ve seen this a lot IRL too, and I think dating apps work that way also, like it’s mostly based on superficial matching. I can’t look away.
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Yeah. Looks aren’t the only way to be superficial.
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I agree, and I think the other big problem with matchmaking type shows (and online dating), especially western ones like Married at First Sight is that everything is based on self-assessment, which we know humans are terrible at. One of the biggest adventures of marriage IMO is that it’s like a constant self-improvement crash course. You learn you had all sorts of issues you didn’t even know you had and stuff you have to work on that you never even noticed before! But at least if you meet IRL you can feel each other out and draw your own conclusions about how someone is being.
On shows like MAFS or Love is Blind, you have all these people self-reporting how they think they are, and getting matched up on that basis. I mean anyone who has even worked retail fashion will tell you the way people see themselves is often completely at odds with reality, “I’m super wacky and out there in my fashion sense!” says the person wearing what has been on the rack at every major outlet for literally years, or “I’m really conservative and classy, I like to be understated” says the person covered in logos with half their ass hanging out , lol. That’s why in retail you don’t listen, you look, because what one person calls traditional another calls bohemian.
So in addition to the focus on superficial stuff there’s the added layer of self-reporting fucking everything up, lol.
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And this is why traditionally matchmaking and arranged marriages have involved the family’s assessments of people.
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Yep, exactly, often through generations too.
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This is now the unofficial tag line for the show.
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I don’t think it’s a spoiler that I absolutely cannot stand Shaina.
Also that lady with the duck face who kept talking about how she has so many friends. The worst.
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I think Kyle is way worse! I feel like she is much more realistic about how big of an issue him being an atheist and her being a devout Christian is? He keeps kind of bulldozing over that like, “it’s fine because we talked about it once so it’s not an issue!” He’s so disrespectful too! The whole, “well I believe in science,” lmao, ok dude. His brain would probably explode if he ever met a scientist who was religious.
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I think him having formerly been Christian is much more of a negative than that he is not currently Christian. Like, not only does he not share her chosen religion, he specifically rejected it. And, as you said, is still rejecting it with his disrespect towards her!
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He’s just the WORST stereotype of an atheist possible, I swear.
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To me he would seem more terrible if he weren’t next to Shaina, who is objectively the worst human alive.
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Hey, you guys want to hear a hilarious real story?
Summary
My dad married his second wife pretty much sight unseen. He found her on a dating site in China and since he was incredibly book smart but, uh, very emotionally naive (my mom called it “high IQ but low EQ”) he just took her at face value. He lied and told us they’d been talking for two years and had met several times, and that he was bringing her back to Canada and then were getting married after spending more time together, but in reality (which we found out during their very messy divorce), he had been talking to her for only a few months, and I only realized later that legally he would have had to marry her in order to bring her over.
Anyway, when we first met her, he kept saying to be nice, she’s very sensitive, and it turns out that she wasn’t sensitive at all. If my dad had been nicer, or if she had been nicer, it might have worked out, but we had a smart, judgy, stubborn person with a temper living with a stupid, shallow, stubborn person who also had a temper.
One night my dad wanted me to talk to her, because at 39 he felt that she had the chance to pursue a meaningful new career (to her, why should she have to work? She thought she was coming to Canada to live a life of luxury and not end up in a 1-bedroom apartment) but he wasn’t getting through to her. So I talked to her to get an idea of her interests and skills and all she kept saying was “you grew up here, but I’m not from here. Therefore you know the jobs that are here but I don’t, so you should pick something for me.” Finally my dad lost it and sent her to bed, and shook his head sadly and said “unfortunately, she’s not very bright. On a scale of 1-10, she’s 7… max”. I went to my sister and told her this and to this day we’ll be like “7… max” and collapse with laughter 
I always felt really sorry for her (until the ugly divorce) because I knew how hard it was to live with my dad, but she was so stupid! She was like “he has a PhD, how can a person with a PhD be like this”, as if everyone with a PhD must be a gentle, sensitive, worldly, intelligent person (which was what my dad aspired to be and how he probably had represented himself).
But she definitely was smart enough to talk to the folks in her ESL class and get my dad to buy a house, because if you’re married less than 5 years it’s a “marital home” and gets split 50-50 by law. She also got my dad thrown in jail for a night and he was shocked that it wasn’t full of thugs like he’d expected, but a bunch of guys just like him, and he said it was a “very interesting sociological experience”.
A bonus story: my dad then dated a (apparently really hot) woman in a small town that he just couldn’t stay away from, even though she had a fiery temper and was probably the first person he had ever met who scared him. They went on a vacation on Prince Edward Island and she kept throwing tantrums, so he said “if you throw another tantrum I’m putting you on a bus and sending you home”, and she did, so he did. When he came back he thought they’d just pick up their relationship where they left off, and was mystified when she wouldn’t speak to him. It was probably by far the most humiliating experience of her life, but he didn’t understand that at all 
Oh, dad. I think my sister and I got all our EQ from our mom…
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That was a wild ride!
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