RECAP: Love Is Blind Season 8, Episode 12 (The Weddings)
As I have established in my previous recaps, Love Is Blind Season 8 has been a total disaster, a season so boring that Netflix should have buried it and taken the tax write-off. After watching Episode 12, the wedding episode, I feel even more confident in that assessment. Not only are these couples boring, most of them also wasted the time fo the viewers and, arguably, the crew of this show.
I’m not saying that every couple had to get married. I have never expected that from this show. But for three-quarters of these couples, decisions were made almost out of nowhere, making this not only dull but also unsatisfying. I don’t know if the couples were not being candid with their true feelings, or if the editing was just so incompetent that they could not create a narrative that made sense. But at altar after altar, I found myself almost suffering whiplash and asking, Wait, how did that happen?
Read on for my takes on the wedding episode of Love is Blind Season 8. SPOILERS AHEAD!
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Ben & Sara
We picked up from the cliffhanger in Episode 11, with Sara and Ben at the altar, and Sara about to deliver her answer: No, she could not marry Ben. She wanted a partner who was on the same page as her on the important things, and he just wasn’t.
Objectively I agree with Sara. You should absolutely want your life partner to be aligned with you on key issues, including ethical and social stances. It’s possible to have opposing political views in a relationship, but it definitely makes things more complicated (especially given the multiple disasters unfolding in our country as I type this). My problem here is, Sara was aware of these issues in the pods. I distinctly remember the moment where they showed her slamming on the brakes when Ben said he didn’t engage with Black Lives Matter, and he seemed ambivalent regarding his church’s stance on LGBTQIA+ people. I was even disappointed when she seemingly just got over that and threw herself fully into their relationship, and assumed she had just accepted that this was something she could work with him on going forward.
But apparently not. I don’t know how anyone else took this, but watching her shut down this man at the altar, all I could think was: she never intended to marry him, she always knew she was going to do this, and this feels really fucked up. She had a meeting with his friends, which at least demonstrated that Ben was surrounded by a diverse group of people and not completely clueless. She attended his church and asked follow-up questions, which maybe did not assuage her concerns — understandably — but her behavior up until that moment at the altar was so overwhelmingly positive that there was a serious narrative disconnect when we got to the no.
It is not uncommon at this point for people to go on this show, and get all the way to the weddings, without any intention of getting married. They just want to be on TV. Ironically, Ben has been (obliquely) accused of exactly that by at least one TikTok account (referenced on earlier episodes, but the allegations were never raised again). My gut tells me Sara never intended to get married. By all means, prove me wrong. But her behavior this episode was really fucking weird. After ditching this guy at the altar, she appeared borderline manic, and left that dude for dead. If a man treated his jilted fiancee that way, the pitchforks and torches would be out. I found her behavior confusing and callous, and I’m not with it at all.
Mind you, the preview for the reunion (coming this weekend) suggested that Sara had additional doubts about Ben, potentially relating to the theories peddled by the aforementioned TikTok-er. It’s possible that Sara was being much more candid about her emotions leading up to the wedding, and the editors chose not to include it for storyline purposes. But even if you omit the scenes where she was expressing serious doubts, there was still plenty of footage — including on her wedding day — where she waxed poetically about how much she loved Ben and how amazing he was. So to go from that to chopping him cold turkey within a few hours? Sus behavior.
Joey & Monica
Going into this episode, I was under the impression that Joey and Monica were our “safe” couple, the ones that were going to cruise to happiness. We usually get one per season. Um, guess not! Monica had at least started making comments that she questioned Joey’s level of commitment/enthusiasm toward the relationship in the episodes leading up to the wedding. And in hindsight you could see that. The two of them were like goofy kids having an extended sleepover, less like adults getting ready for a lifelong commitment.
When it came time for the wedding day, Monica said explicitly that her decision would depend solely on Joey’s behavior. Could he convince her, in that moment, that he was serious about her? And their relationship? If so, she would say yes. But if not, she wouldn’t go through with it.
And spoiler, he did not. It was an ill omen when Joey arrived to the wedding venue with his longboard — basically it’s just a skateboard, but long, so I guess that makes it a separate thing? Oh, straight people…. — and rolled a whopping 20 feet to the venue door. Cringe. He bro’d out with his groomsmen. He again rode his longboard down the aisle. This is a 35-year-old man. I’m all for having a good time, but this felt like the kind of attention-seeking behavior I would expect from a 14-year-old. Monica, meanwhile, was presenting a very traditional bridal fantasy (I took issue with the fit of her bodice, and I thought her make-up really washed her out).
I’m curious what would have happened if Joey was asked for an answer first. If he said Yes, would Monica have agreed as well? We’ll never know, because Monica told him no. But instead of pulling a Sara, and just leaving her fiancee for dead, Monica and Joey at least showed kindness toward one another, and to the gathered audience as they announced their gratitude to one another and to their guests. I appreciated that.
I ended the episode hopeful that maybe the two of them could move past this and continue to date. In many ways they seemed compatible (interestingly, Monica said they never had sex), but Joey’s communication was an issue that he acknowledged he needed to work on. The preview for the reunion seems to suggest that is not the case, but it could be a fake out. We’ll see.
Devin & Virginia
When I saw the runtime for this episode — nearly two hours — I was confused. There were only 3.5 weddings to cover (the build up for Ben and Sara took place in the previous episode). Surely something explosive must happen. No, the bulk of the airtime went to the Devin and Virginia wedding, and it was painfully boring. PAINFULLY boring. Never have we had such a dull group of people focused on for so long. There was no reason for this segment to be as interminable as it was, especially given how it turned out.
Much of the time was spent with Virginia and her family. Listen, they all seem lovely. Truly. But there was nothing happening here that justified the amount of time spent following banal conversations with largely dull human beings. A lot of cliched well wishes and noncommittal comments from Virginia — but nothing that indicated that she was having some kind of crisis of conscience in marrying Devin.
But again: surprise. Because she said no. Similar to Ben and Sara, Virginia did not feel that she and Devin were aligned on several major philosophical and ethical questions. Again: I agree with her. That was clear in the previous episodes. She kept trying, desperately, to get him to engage with her on political and moral questions, and he gave her basically nothing. But 1) these were convos that absolutely should have happened in the pods, and have on previous seasons; and 2) you knew this was a concern for weeks leading up to the wedding. Did you not raise this with him specifically? Why wait until this moment to drop this bomb? Because Devin genuinely looked stunned and deeply hurt when she shot him down.
I don’t think anyone should feel obligated to marry someone if they’re not feeling secure in it. And in Virginia’s defense, I think she showed significantly more empathy to Devin — or at least expressed it to her family — after the cancelled nuptials. You could see that she was distraught at hurting Devin. I don’t deny that she cared for that man deeply, she simply could not get past her very real concerns about long-term compatibility. I can accept that far more than what I saw from Sara, whose behaviors post-altar did not reflect someone who cared about another human being the way she claimed to care about Ben. For that reason, I’m actually glad three out of the four weddings ended in splits. You could get a better sense of who was genuine in their emotions and who sure seemed to be faking it all along.
Daniel & Taylor
That left us with only Daniel and Taylor, the couple that looked the shakiest coming out of the pods. After that dramatic moment where Taylor accused Daniel of manipulating the experiment just to meet her (still a worrying level of paranoia), it has been easy street for these two. In fact, when they recapped their story leading up to their wedding, they didn’t mention the post-pod confrontation at all.
Both Taylor and Daniel seemed to have thoughtful preparations for their ceremony, and the ceremony itself was lovely. I thought it was such a nice touch to have Daniel’s sister sing — beautifully, I might add — and their vows were charming. Daniel got a bit overwhelmed and tried ad libbing, while Taylor delivered one of the most well-written and moving vows I’ve ever seen on this show. I was happy for both of them when they both said yes. I think they’re a well matched couple who genuinely seem to love each other. I wish them only success and happiness.
With a success rate of 25 percent — even lower if you count the couple that imploded before they got it to the altar — I think we can all agree that this season of Love Is Blind was a complete dud. One marriage, precious little drama, unsatisfying narratives. I really do wonder if this franchise has run its course, or if the format needs tweaking. I can’t help feeling that at least one of the couples that made it to the altar were never going to get married, they were just there for camera time. I know that external factors impacting the relationship is a huge component of the post-pod episodes, but it’s unsatisfying when numerous unseen parties exert intense pressures on these relationships (still waiting to meet David’s apparent dragon-lady sister). I’ll watch the reunion on Sunday, but at this point, they’re going to have to bring me something genuinely major to excite me into watching another season of this sucker.
What did you think of Love Is Blind Season 8? Who do you think will make it to the altar? Drop your thoughts in the comments.
