‘MAFS’ RECAP: Tash & Amanda Split, Prepare For Mass Insta Spon Posts In Bid To Remain Relevant

I’ve had a few days to decompress after that dinner party fiasco with the demons and the shouting and the running away crying, and I feel good folks. My MAFS energy is back up. I crave the smack of drama, and I hope these people throw it at me relentlessly this week.

We’re heading into week 3 with a commitment ceremony, of course. Everyone’s prepping and going on about how good their relationship is – especially Stacey, who delusionally thinks that people look up to her and Michael “as a power couple”.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

A power couple of SMUNTS, maybe.

*gazes in smunt*

You know who isn’t having a good time of it? Mikey and Natasha. Quick segue – somehow, I did not realise I KNOW NATASHA. I worked with her back in my retail days! This was a wild revelation. There’s always one degree of separation with reality stars, no?

Anyway – she’s meditating. Mikey is brooding on the balcony. I like to think they have maintained these stances since we left them 3 days ago post-dinner party.

she actually just seized up in this position and will have to be carried to dinner

She says Michael’s played “devil’s advocate” and taken the comment out of context to relay to Mikey. Not the right term beb.

You mean MICHAEL IS THE DEVIL, SOMEONE PASS ME THE HOLY WATER.

Steve’s still stewing on the Michael thing. Michael and Stacey, The Smunts, are still going on about how right they were. Stacey says “it’s not the 50th century, women have power now”. Michael says “and he will forever be a lead balloon on her helium journey.”

Honestly.

Meanwhile Mishel has gotten her Bad Bitch shoes out.

she’s a maneater make you work hard make you spend hard

I extremely back this decision, even if I’m Team Steve.

When she heads to the pre-chatty bit of the commitment ceremony, she tells the ladies that she’s come up with a plan regarding how to approach Steve. Her plan? Write down everything she despises about his personality! Eight pages of that!

hmmmmmmm best rethink this

The first couple who sit on the couch with the experts are David and Hayley. They are LOVED. UP. If I wasn’t aware of Toothbrushgate, I’d be ridiculously happy for them and championing these guys as the MVP’s of MAFS. But I DO KNOW ABOUT TOOTHBRUSHGATE. I can’t be lied to. This has to be short-lived happiness.

Anyway, Hayley does most of the chattering and says David’s learned about who she is as a woman, which means a lot to her. She says they’re being super blunt and honest with each other and it’s working. David says he learned to communicate and he’s gotten his ring re-sized. BLESS.

The experts are positively quivering over this love they’ve created. Wise Master John cannot get over it. Horny Trisha, naturally, asks them if they’ve fucked and David goes on about it not being vanilla again.

you guys can borrow my sex swing if you want

David SPECIFICALLY says “well it’s was strawberry or chocolate because it wasn’t vanilla” and someone on Twitter connected that to this meme of someone putting fingers in the strawb and choc parts of neapolitan ice-cream, and now I’m deeply alarmed that David was actually being hyper-graphic about the specifics of their fun sex. DIDN’T NEED THAT INFO, DAVID.

They both choose to stay, obviously.

Next we had Cathy and Josh, who fell off the love wagon a bit after the dinner party. Basically, Cathy saw Hayley being touchy-feely with Josh and him reciprocating, read it as flirting, and felt triggered because she has a history of being cheated on. Feelings? A hundred percent validated. I also love that she told Josh straight – no denying yourself your needs, 2020!

But the actual situation was probably a bit of a misunderstanding, which is why Josh doesn’t get it. He’s not exactly a sensitive bloke – a lovely one, but a bit of an emotional idiot. So he’s all “it was nothing and you don’t trust me, and I can’t be with someone I don’t trust.” Then Horny Trisha asks Cathy if she trusts Josh, and the most intense war preparation symphony strikes up – in all my years of watching insane reality shows, I’ve never heard anything so ridiculously over-the-top. We go to an ad break and when we return, lol she trusts Josh.

Blah blah be vulnerable, etc etc. Cathy chooses to stay. Josh of course chooses to stay, but I was hoping for a bit of spice with a curve-ball leave to be honest.

only staying bc I want to keep my police costume

Connie and JonEthEn get like 3.2 seconds of commitment ceremony airtime, which is wild because DID WE FORGET THE NUDE DRAWING INCIDENT?? I need to know what the fuck was going on there – Connie’s reaction was intense, there had to be more to it than “wah you’re obsessed with Instagram.” As a conspiracy theory fan, I suspect something bigger went down. I’m watching these two.

Anyway they present as an extremely loved up couple, both choose to stay.

wait I thought you said steak

Another couple who get even LESS airtime? These blow ins:

i thought you were soundies

Both stay, who cares. Aleks and Ivan up next – why do I love these two now? Why is Ivan my favourite dude in this season? I’m fucking obsessed with them. I want them to adopt me.

MVPs, even with the sockless shoes.

To be fair, all these quick visits to the couples doing well (or who barely exist, ahem Chris/Vanessa) was probably because we’ve got three couples absolutely up shit creek without a paddle, and one pair of demons.

First up of this gang is Natasha and Mikey. Natasha starts – explaining all the nice stuff that’s happened between them, and her side of the dinner party fiasco. We cross to The Smunts who are just… I mean. How can anyone like these demons:

Smunt energy ACTIVATED

Mikey then explains how hurt he was hearing the comments from a couple he barely knows, which is also extremely fair. It’s really one of those awkward ones where Natasha wasn’t being a bitch by repeating the joke (come on, the guy said it with cameras up his nostril. He knew it was gonna go public and it was clearly a FUNNY) but Mikey being humiliated and feeling shit was also totally understandable.

I think we can all agree the real evil presence here is MiStacey.

Anyway, in wild news Mikey says leave! Natasha looks like she wants to smother him with a couch pillow.

how dare you not want to stay with me after I publicly humiliated you

This is because she wrote stay (!!!) and man, that’s gotta bruise. Mikey softens up when she says that and is all ohhh let’s make it work etc etc. But she looks like he’s dead to her. We’ll see.

On to The Smunts! Classic timing following their dirty work with literally them crowing about how good their relationship is. Sadly we don’t see them grilled by the experts about their shit behaviour at the dinner party, but I guess this isn’t Fun Pals Who Aren’t Shit Humans At First Sight, right? Seems like a fun show though. Anyway they both say stay.

Then it’s Steve and Mishel. I just soooo back Steve in this whole mess! I don’t think he should have raised his voice and he could have let Mishel join the conversation, absolutely. But I also didn’t think he was being insanely rude to her considering, as he explains to the experts, that they’d agreed he would handle the Michael convo. He was frustrated that she had interjected after they’d agreed on that – he didn’t handle it well, but he also had a reason to be upset and wasn’t just being a disrespectful sexist pig.

The Smunts interrupt from 4000 metres away just to fuel the fire, and it really grated on me that Wise Master John didn’t tell them to shut the fuck up. You’re on that couch on the other side of the warehouse! Pipe down! Put a sock in it! But I guess that’s the entire point of this show – let the shit fly as it may, and hope it lands on someone’s head for rating’s sake.

Mishel is ROPEABLE. She pulls out her list of Everything That Sucks About Steve By Me, Mishel.

In this essay I….

Thankfully it’s more about his behaviour toward her than “your hair sucks and I hate your stupid accent”. She wants to leave – literally has a baby tantrum and throws her ring on the settee.

Steve – because he believes not enough people work at relationships – wants to stay. Mishel is furious and honestly? Being a giant baby about it. Eye-rolling, huffing, the works. I know she’s upset but come on. You JUST said “I’m a 48 year old woman not a child” beb.

The experts tell them they’re gridlocked and need to something something. Who knows! Whatever! I will be shocked if Mishel bothers to try at this point, which is sad because I actually think Steve is pretty great and wants to be a better dude.

On to Tash and Amanda, how the fuck are they still here. WHY the fuck are they still here. Stop flogging this dead horse, guys! The horse is basically one of those wight horses from Game Of Thrones at this point!

Tash is all “I can’t belieeeeeve Amanda wanted to go to the dinner party alone. I thought things were good.” Reading between the lines I see “please Australia consider me to be the angel in this relationship, so when I leave I retain my influencer following.”

Amanda claps back with “you can’t live apart and grow a relationship.” But she’s just dirty Tash doesn’t like her. The whole thing is a mess. My god. Cut your losses, everyone!

Old mate Hayley/Esther Perel cuts in to share her relationship wisdom, and is told to shut the fuck up by Amanda is absolutely STUNNING areas. Honestly? Hayley a) has NFI what she’s talking about, she’s been in a healthy relationship for 24 hours and b) is not part of this couple and needs to butt the hell out.

it is me, award winning counsellor Esther Perel

Amanda and Tash blow up after that and are just yelling random words, I think. In THIS argument, I’m on Amanda’s side – everything about Tash stinks of “I’m just trying to come out of this the good guy”. She clearly never had attraction to Amanda and instead of trying to forge an attraction, she just tapped out as best as she could on a show where cameras follow you.

Make no mistake – she didn’t HAVE to force an interest in Amanda, and Amanda had no right expecting that from her. No one should be pressured into intimacy.

But… if you don’t like your wife, fucking write leave? I feel like Tash has been tapped out since the honeymoon, and that’s fair enough but what’s NOT fair is pretending you’re going to give things a shot if you’re not. I just didn’t feel like she tried – maybe I’m wrong! But that’s my vibe.

Anyway, in chilling areas Mel interrupts them to say she can sense the issue is Amanda feels Tash isn’t trying, but Tash feels she HAS tried. So she asks Tash “how have you tried?” – is it just me or does Mel look like she fucking knows Tash hasn’t tried.

please tell us how you locked yourself in your room 24/7

Tash goes into a big spiel about trying, while not really saying anything, and then reads out a letter to Amanda that basically says “you’re a good person but you’re dumped lol”.

They both say leave. OH SWEET BABY CHEESES THANK YOU. I could not handle one more second of their depressing dead horse relationship, hooo boy.

Hilariously, Amanda says “we’ll cross paths again one day, and there will be no angst” and Tash is like:

lol hope not see ya never

Then Amanda, after being asked by absolutely no one, says “I’ll leave with these parting words” and at first I was like OHNONONONO NO ONE ASKED AMANDA GO WITH DIGNITY, but then she had me bawling like a baby because she says unfortunately this isn’t a good representation of what gay relationships are like, and there are so many good/functioning ones in Australia, and it’s like the nicest speech this show has ever had. Tash agrees, it’s a real Moment.

But I still won’t miss these two.

Tomorrow the families return! Mishel’s kids hate Steve because of course they do! Connie’s mum hates JonEthEn for god knows what reason! Fuck yeah. Hook this MAFS drama to my veins, bitch.

Melissa Mason is the Managing Editor (Sydney) at Pedestrian. She’s also the co-host of the All Aussie Mystery Hour podcast, and posts shit content on Instagram.

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