Al has seen things no little boy ever should. Photo / Channel 9
Racy footage of the Married At First Sight cheaters is aired for their gobsmacked co-stars on Monday night in a finale that covers everything and nothing at all.
It's an evening filled with Greatest Hits and Best Of moments — familiar yet forgettable, like a So Fresh compilation CD. The couples gather one last time with the experts and the producers wheel in a big TV to play footage of everyone trash-talking each other behind closed doors. Shocked facial expressions and half-thought one-liners ensue. It's Gogglebox, but with better couches and less-articulate people.
Settle in as we discover how much more juice can be squeezed from this shrivelled up lemon rind.
Mitch and Ella hit the couch first and everyone is confused. Last week, we watched as he dumped her in a swamp. Then, at last night's dinner party, they arrived as a reunited couple. What gives, Mitchella?
"I'm into this girl. I rate her," he shrugs.
You rate her? Is that what the kids are saying these days? Personally, I don't know why we don't just go back to the Brady Brunch era of romance — where, if Greg liked a girl, he'd go up to her and say, "Hey there, groovy chick". All I ever wanted was for Greg Brady to call me a groovy chick.
Anyway, Mitch and Ella are back together even though he'll never appreciate how much of a groovy chick she is.
Selina's another girl who isn't being treated like the groovy chick she is. Instead, she's being treated like Tracey Jewel — and Cody's blime-fibing her to oblivion.
We watch their Best Of footage — which starts with Cody declaring he's not attracted to his wife because of her ethnicity and ends with both of them deciding to continue the relationship outside the experiment. The producers play heartwarming music over the video clips to confuse the room into thinking they've just watched a love story. All the contestants are left misty-eyed.
"My heart hurts," Olivia places a palm over her chest.
"What heart?" we mutter.
But unlike her co-stars, Selina isn't crying happy tears.
"Um … yeah … I just feel very confused and silly for feeling the way I do," she sniffles.
The experts cock their heads and squint. As far as we all know, everything has been going great for Cody and Selina. We saw them just 24 hours ago at the dinner party and everything was fine.
"We actually … um … you saw I was a bit off my game last night (at the dinner party)," Cody explains slowly. "But Selina and I decided to call things last night."
The camera does a sharp cutaway to everyone's shocked faces.
Cody sighs. "I guess we-"
"Don't say 'we'. It's new to me, too," Selina cuts him off, before breaking down and admitting she thought she had fallen in love with him. "Last night he was a bit more stand-offish than usual. After everyone was gone, I grabbed his hand and he flinched and took it away. And he said, 'I wanna end things'."
Cody lets out a goofy laugh, as if it'll lighten the mood. "I don't even know if I've made the right decision but I really think it is the right one. It sucks."
Mel Schilling steps in to issue the first slap-down of the night. She demands Cody tell Selina point-blank if he does or doesn't see a future with her.
Of course he doesn't. He never did. That's why he has been stringing her along all this time. The worst part? She Veeted his butthole for nothing.
This heartbreaking revelation has really bummed us out. Hey, let's call Tamara up to the couch so we can confront her about the sneaky texts she sent Mitch!
First, we ease into the confrontation by playing her Best Of tape — which includes her rant about people who work full-time in retail — and then segue into the texting scandal.
Since being ambushed with the accusations at last night's dinner party, Tamara has had time to craft an excuse.
"Mitch was really drunk, called me at 2am," she tells the experts.
"And Mitch was like, 'I know I shouldn't be calling you blah, blah, blah'. And I was like, 'Why are you calling me?' And he was like, 'I shouldn't be calling you but I've been thinking about you'. Whatever. And I was like, 'Gotta go' and hung up the phone."
The other contestants break out into a kind of rowdiness you'd usually only see from audiences on Ricki Lake or Studio 10.
"Bullsh**!" Mitch calls out. "I'm sorry, Tamara but that is bullsh**!"
No one believes her. Tamara tries to talk over the jeering but she's drowned out.
"Can I leave? I've had enough," she throws her hands in the air and storms out.
One of the cameras goes handheld and we run after her through the hallway. This is how we manage to hear one of the greatest lines uttered on this year's season of the show.
"I don't want a f***in' person who works in f***in' retail! Why is that not OK?" she sobs.
Are any full-time retail assistants reading this recap? Feel free to print out the below photo and tape it behind your cash registers, like an old-timey WANTED poster.
Next up on the couch, Carolina and Dion! The couple that never was.
"It doesn't even make sense — why would I sit there?" Carolina spits at the experts as she snuggles into Dan, the man she left Dion for.
The experts don't even both putting up a fight. They're just gonna be playing footage of all the times she secretly cheated. It actually works better if she's sitting among the rowdy crowd.
"Receipts, receipts" Dom starts chanting. "I want the receipts! These are the receipts!"
You want the receipts? You got 'em! Roll the tape!
We're served up all the Greatest Hits. The time Carolina and Dan secretly met up at the gym. Their midnight rendezvous at a dark Kings Cross nightclub. And their alleyway romp — complete with passionate butt-grab.
"I'm gettin' horny," Dan says in the footage, a line of dialogue we'd mentally blocked out.
Watching the tape play out on TV, the other contestants are repulsed. They begin heckling.
"Oh my god, gross!" Ella covers her mouth.
"Is anyone else feeling utter disgust," Dom adds. "Turn it off! I feel like I'm gonna have diarrhoea after watching that."
It's only now we realise young Alan hasn't been put to bed and someone's going to have to explain this very inappropriate situation to him.
Dan glares at the hecklers and serves up another of this season's greatest lines.
"Youse are all single, shut up!" he snaps.
John Aiken tries to corner them into giving an apology by shaming them with a rehearsed speech but they sneak out of it like the rats they are.
And it's fine. Carolina will never know what she gave up with Dion. If she played her cards right, she could've doubled her wardrobe.
When it comes time for Olivia and Jackson, the experts just whiz right over their relationship in order to get to what we're actually here to discuss: Olivia's foul rivalry with Dom.
They replay the footage of the smashed glass incident as well as the clip of Olivia falsely telling everyone how Dom stood above her and wielded the jagged shard as a weapon.
Even as her lies are exposed on an HD television, Olivia digs her heels in and refuses to admit her actions were wrong. But, as the experts close in, she grits her teeth and looks over at Dom to offer a fake olive branch.
"Maybe we just are very similar and it just clashes," she says softly.
Any thoughts, Dom?
"No. I don't think we're similar at all," Dom says firmly. "Please don't compare me to you. Because I would never do what you did to me to any other human being."
The experts ask Olivia if she has any regrets. Of course she doesn't. But she wants to get off this couch and away from Dom, so she fake-sobs.
"Of course I do! Of course I do," she pretends to cry.
There's no more juice to squeeze from this lemon. Not even one final acidic spritz in the eye. And with that, we toss the rind into the InSinkErator.
MAFS is available in NZ on Three and ThreeNow
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