The dry humping begins. Photo / Channel 9
Playing the victim during his vow renewal ceremony, a resentful Troy has dumped his wife Ashley on Married At First Sight with the breakup creating the perfect opportunity to pursue another wife on the series.
But it seems Troy may have dry humped too soon. And on someone's kitchen counter. Don't you hate when that happens?
"You are not the woman I've been searching for. And I know, somewhere out there, there is a woman who will realise my value and love me for all that I am," Troy tells Ashley while standing in the middle of a forest glade on Monday night's episode.
And soon after, he does find a woman who realises his value: Carly. That chick who was married to the guy who works at a Wendy's. They were snapped earlier this year rubbing their bodies against each other on the grass in a park.
Troy thinks tonight's break up will be a clean break. He thinks no one would ever find out. But as one of the only people who still reads magazines [because I steal them from our office], I've unearthed damning evidence that suggests Troy may have began his tryst with Carly just moments after his marriage ended. The salacious claim includes the phrase "dry humping on a kitchen counter". Truly sensational. Keep reading, you know you want to.
It's episode 30 and about one million years have passed since we started this adventure. Jesus.
To mark the occasion, I take a selfie of myself recapping tonight's instalment.
All the couples separate and return to their sad lives, spending the week alone in their poorly decorated apartments around Australia.
In perhaps the most raw and honest scene we've seen all series, John orders both a pizza and Thai for dinner. It depicts both the glorious and pathetic sides of single life.
This is the kind of liberation one only achieves after years of being alone. For some of us, this behaviour comes easily. But for others, they struggle to break free of the shackles placed on them by society and their mother.
I remember how shocked a former boyfriend was when, one February, he witnessed me enter a Woolworths where I proceeded to buy only a large chocolate Easter bunny to consume that night for dinner. He was stunned. And a little embarrassed to be seen with me as I spent too long inspecting the bunnies to find a pristine one that hadn't been damaged by children. 'How is this allowed?' he wondered.
The act went against everything he had been taught in life. But when you've been single for an extended period of time and you don't leave your house much, the inherited rules of a structured society fall away. They no longer apply. And that means Easter eggs for dinner in February. Or, if you're John, purchasing both Thai food and a pizza.
Across town, Sarah's catching up with her gal pals. She's concerned Telv doesn't want to move over from Perth within 24 hours of the experiment concluding and her friends only encourage her psychotic expectations.
"I can really see genuine concern in your face, Sarah," one friend says. I've also got genuine concern in my face that Sarah's boob harness is going to spring open and unleash fury on everyone in the restaurant.
Ashley returns to Brisbane and seeks counsel from her older sister. When talk turns to sexual connection with Troy, her terrified little face says it all.
On the morning of the vow renewal ceremony, Troy wakes up in an odd mood. Particularly odd. More odd than usual. He's very cocky and quite resentful.
"I feel like I wasn't treated as well as I treated her," he snips to us.
This resentment stays with him on the journey into the remote forest where the vow renewal is taking place.
When his Uber reaches a clearing, he gets out and comes face-to-face with his wife. He tells her there were moments throughout their marriage where he thought she was the one. But then his vows take a turn and he launches a blistering monologue about Ashley's downfalls.
"It was hard to ever ascertain your true feelings for me. I was constantly having to act out of blind faith because there was little to no reciprocation," he says.
He takes a swipe at her foul mood and describes the little progress they made over the eight weeks as "painstaking".
"Ashley, I said 'I love you' on several occasions. Because I thought I did. But now I realise it was me wanting to believe that we had something more than we did," he says.
"I gave this relationship absolutely everything I had. But unfortunately it wasn't enough to win your heart over. You are not the woman I've been searching for. And I know, somewhere out there, there is a woman who will realise my value and love me for all that I am."
And there is. Troy already knows this woman. And so does Ashley. It's their Married At First Sight co-star Carly.
Right after Troy dumps Ashley, Carly is photographed "realising Troy's value" in a Melbourne park. And if you look closely, Troy also takes a moment to "realise her value".
But there's a twist. Flipping through the latest NW magazine while in a coffee shop far away from my office today, I came across a terrific story that involves Troy and Carly dry humping on a kitchen counter just days after his marriage ended.
The magazine reports the dry humping is shown in secret footage to air at Wednesday night's reunion dinner party.
"Troy attempts to dry hump Carly on a kitchen counter," a source says of the captivating moment. My gosh that's a terrific sentence. And, given the dry humping that's going on in that paparazzi photo, I totally believe Troy and Carly humped on a kitchen cabinet too.
The question is, which unlucky person has had their kitchen counter tainted with Troy and Carly's dry humping?
Anyway, back in the forest, Ashley's eyes well up and she can't believe she's just been dumped. So she amends her vows and dumps Troy too.
The humidity of this rainforest is just unbearable and I start to develop unfortunate-looking sweat marks in my chinos, so I steal Ashley's Uber and head back to the city.
Pulling up at some kind of industrial warehouse, we find Sarah and Telv standing under a bunch of hanging fluorescent lights. Despite all the drama Sarah has been inventing, we know they're going to stay together.
Telv structures his vows as directed by the producers: compliment, heartwarming memory, blah, blah, HOWEVER, criticism, doubts, blah, blah, BUT, I love you! Blah.
Sarah does the same. Producers really need to find a new way to format these final vows because they're becoming very tedious.
When it comes to John and Mel, they stay together. Yes, they have their doubts. And true, they don't live in the same town. But their fears of dying alone outweigh the practicalities of this relationship.
So they make a pact. If, in one year, they're still alive, they'll move into the same retirement village. And hey, they might even dry hump on a kitchen counter, too.
Film distributor A24 used this to promote Celine Song's 'Materialists'.