‘Love Is Blind’ Has a Toxic Masculinity Problem

By Emma Chance | TV | October 2, 2023 |

By Emma Chance | TV | October 2, 2023 |

Only seven episodes of Love Is Blind season five have aired so far, and it already isn’t going well. A series low of three engaged couples made it out of the pods (every previous season had at least five), and one of those couples broke up on the engagement trip.

Part of the problem is that the pods got messy this time. It’s actually kind of amazing that, in five seasons of casting people from the same city, no one has ever run into an ex before. But it only took Lydia Gonzalez a few moments to recognize the voice of Uche Okoroha, whom she’d previously dated. The news of their past came to light when Gonzalez and Okoroha were separately getting close with other people, Milton Johnson and Aaliyah Cosby, respectively. They both admitted to their new suitors that their ex was in the pods, and it was then that we saw the clip of them realizing they knew each other and agreeing that to continue talking in that setting would defeat the purpose of the experiment. The awkward part was that everyone was living together, and Gonzalez and Cosby had already become fast friends.

Cosby clearly felt uncomfortable about the whole thing and told Okoroha as much. Her conversation with Gonzalez back in the women’s living quarters after hearing the news wasn’t great either, with Gonzalez gushing about Okoroha and giving Cosby way more information about their previous relationship than she wanted, including the fact that she and Okoroha had slept together mere months ago. So she decided she didn’t want to be involved in the mess and left the pods without telling Okoroha. In a confessional interview with producers, Okoroha was incredulous at the news of his almost-fiancée’s departure and confused as to why she didn’t at least warn him, so the producers offered to call Cosby so they could talk. I hesitate to describe the ensuing conversation as a conversation, it was more like Okoroha yelling at Cosby and accusing her of being cowardly for leaving. Cosby was heard on the other end of the line in tears.

Gonzalez and Johnson were able to get past the whole thing and left the pods engaged despite their age difference (she’s 31 and he’s 24), but fans have since been speculating that Gonzalez and Okoroha joined the show with an evil plan to meet and get engaged, lying about their past, as a means of getting on TV. Cosby brought this up to Okoroha at their in-person meeting after the pods, but he laughed it off (suspiciously?). The two broke up officially at that meeting.

But Okoroha wasn’t done. Maybe Cosby mentioning the rumor inspired him because he took it upon himself to show up at a cast party, seemingly with the sole intention of confronting Gonzalez. He reiterated to Gonzalez the story he’d already told Cosby about her, painting her as a crazy ex-girlfriend who stalked him and his friends. She was understandably outraged, told him she never wanted to speak to him again, and stormed off looking for Johnson, who, in a preview of coming episodes, can be seen being told by Okoroha that Gonzalez went on the show with ulterior motives.

BUT THAT’S NOT ALL!

Betwixt and between all the love triangle (square? Circle?) drama, one of the three engaged couples, Taylor Rue and Jared Pierce (aka JP) was falling out. Rue and Pierce were the first couple to get engaged in the pods, but the moment they met each other in person, something was off. Rue tried to talk to Pierce about the awkwardness between them when they got to Mexico, but he was staying mum. Her frustration with his silence mounted until the last night of the trip when he finally admitted that the first time he saw her, she was wearing so much makeup that he thought she looked “fake,” which bothered him. He called her eyelashes “gaudy” and said that his jacket was covered in excess makeup from where she’d pressed her face against it in their embrace.

This, of course, upset Rue and caught her off guard. Pierce was confused by her upset, claiming that most women would be happy to hear that their fiancé prefers them without makeup. She spent the night in another room, and in the morning they met and she told him that he made her feel uncomfortable and, furthermore, she thought the makeup thing was an “excuse” (I agree), and gave him back the ring.

All of this is a very long-winded way of explaining that the way these men talked to these women was toxic and gross. Uche is on a mission to take his ex down, and JP is just a bumbling misogynist. The conversations between Uche, Aaliyah, and Lydia were frightening and dangerous, and the makeup thing was just icky. It looks to me that Lydia really does care for Milton, who is an unfortunate casualty of Uche’s controlling behavior. The producers are milking it for all it’s worth, though, so I guess emotional abuse makes good TV.

The next two episodes of Love Is Blind drop on Netflix this Friday. I’m going to watch them, but I’m not going to like it.