Love is Blind is a reality dating show in which a group of men and women date each other through a wall while sitting in separate rooms called “pods.” Eventually, pairs emerge, and contestants either get engaged or go home, never having seen what the other looks like. Once they are engaged, the couples reveal themselves, the entire group of couples jets off on vacation, and the season ends with the remaining couples’ weddings, where we find out whether they will get married or leave their partner at the altar.
I love trashy TV, and historically, I have loved Love is Blind. I love it when petty drama is blown out of proportion with dramatic music and skewed perceptions about what is normal. However, I’m finding Season 8 to be terrible. It is somehow boring, confusing and exhausting at the same time. So far, only six episodes have been released, but every one of them takes place in the pods. Typically, the couples have made it out of the pods and to a luxurious vacation by episode four or five. Even though the conversations dragged on, each episode lasting an hour or more, the conversations lacked substance. I felt like I was watching hours of small talk, with real discussion sprinkled in. I was counting down the minutes for each episode to be over and wondering when, if ever, the couples would emerge from the pods and reveal themselves.
Usually, there are one or two outlandish contestants — like Leo or Hannah from Season 7 — which keeps things interesting, or at least entertaining. The contestants this season, however, were generally unremarkable and mildly dislikeable. There was neither an endearing love story to root for nor a figurative car crash that I couldn’t look away from. I was just bored.
While I didn’t find any of the contestants particularly interesting, I was still frustrated that so many red flags were being overlooked. One contestant, Ben, revealed to his date that he didn’t vote in the last election and that he likes to stay out of politics, including the Black Lives Matter movement, which his partner, Sara, is particularly passionate about. Sara tells him that she “needs reassurance about the social causes.” Instead of having a real discussion about whether this will be a problem in their relationship, Ben says: “I don’t want you to have any burden … thinking that you have to teach me. Because I do have that motivation to, you know, grow into that and that internal feeling that we do have the same beliefs in these things. And, yes, we will, you know, be on the same side with these things.” Personally, that wouldn’t cut it for me, but within a minute of the episode, following this conversation, the two are engaged.
Similar scenarios happened with several couples. Contestants presented their red flags plainly for all Netflix subscription holders to see; the pair has a fake conversation about it, and in the next scene, they are making a lifelong commitment to one another.
Honestly this seemed mostly the result of poor editing. It felt like they wanted to trick me into finding this “drama” dramatic. The most exciting thing that happened was one man had allegedly followed his match on Instagram before going on the show, so he knew what she looked like the whole time. While that’s mildly interesting, it happened in the final minutes of what has been released so far and made out to be the climax of the whole season. Boring!
The first season of Love is Blind aired on Netflix in February 2020 and was alluring because it aimed to counteract the shallowness of other dating shows through its blind concept. The creator, Chris Coelen, noticed “how difficult it is for couples to form a real connection in modern society” and wanted to try something new. Initially, this gimmick was enough for the show to be interesting, but as the seasons went on, the concept alone was no longer enough to make the show worth watching. Instead, as with so many reality shows, the series became reliant on drama and eccentric personalities to entertain. This is why, I believe, Season 8 is so dull. There was no gripping drama and no one eccentric enough to motivate me to keep watching.
The reason people like myself watch reality shows is to see something you wouldn’t normally see in your actual reality. I watch Love is Blind expecting to meet a bizarre character or witness an overly romanticized love story. Instead, this season gave me boring people and couples that probably shouldn’t be together, both of which I encounter often enough in real life.
I don’t think this is necessarily the end of the Love is Blind glory days. My guess is that after the poor casting choices, the editors tried to piece the footage together into something entertaining. These six episodes, though, could have been three. I sincerely hope the rest of the season is better and, if not, that Season 9 redeems this one.
Rachel Cannata is a senior in the Hotel School. She can be reached at [email protected].
