‘Love Is Blind’ Season 7 Reunion: Everyone’s a Villain, Especially Vanessa Lachey

The Love Is Blind season seven reunion dropped last night, and with it came the answers to our burning questions. Kinda.

First, Tyler Francis, to whom I think the internet owes an apology, myself included (kinda). Tyler was the guy who got in trouble for waiting until after he was engaged to tell his fiancé he’d donated sperm to former friends so they could start a family. Then, one of the mothers in question went on Instagram and accused him of lying about how involved he was with the children’s lives. I got the sense that it was a complicated, emotional situation that wouldn’t look good on television and that perhaps we didn’t know the whole story.

Turns out that was true. Tyler and his fiancé, Ashley Adisoner, are still very much married, and he explained that he did tell her about the situation with his former friends and their progeny before they got engaged, off camera, because he wanted to protect their privacy. This I very much respect. What bothered me was that Ashley was the one who felt they should have some version of the conversation on camera because to do otherwise would be, she felt, inauthentic. So, the conversation we saw made it look like she was just hearing this information for the first time and essentially forced him into a lie about whether the kids knew what he looked like or not because he didn’t want to talk about them on camera. So, yeah, super authentic!!

I think the takeaway here was that Tyler got in a little too deep with a situation he didn’t know how to handle, and that has resulted in some uncomfortable conversations. But it’s interesting that the crux of the issue for the show hinges on what has been an ongoing issue for reality TV across the genre: what participants are hiding from cameras.

Exhibit B: Steven Smith, the sleep test guy. Steven was on the defensive from the jump when co-host Vanessa Lachey made a joke about stuff that happened off-camera and slung a lazy “Hi, Steven,” at his couch in the corner, promising to get to him later. Such began a pitiful display of a broken-down man essentially throwing up his hands and saying, “I was tempted, it was a year ago, it was a huge mistake, I regret it and I’m sorry—what the hell else do you want me to do?” Also, turns out he has sleep apnea, so, you know, cut him some slack? I don’t even feel the need to spend more time on him, he’s already pathetic enough.

Vanessa’s other victim was Ramses Prashad, who had to endure several “wrap it up” jokes from the host because he’s the guy who didn’t want to have condom sex. There’s one on every season, unfortunately.

Ramses earned the ire of the internet for dumping his fiancé Marissa George the week of the wedding because he didn’t like her “energy.” Marissa’s on-camera breakdown was hard to watch, and she didn’t seem much better at the reunion a year later. I get it—it was whiplash. He seemed to like her energy before, except for when she wanted him to wear a condom during sex, of course. He didn’t have much to say for himself at the reunion to clarify his statements, and his wardrobe hasn’t improved much either. So, sucks to be Ramses right now.

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Speaking of wardrobe, the one win of the season was Garrett Josemans and Taylor Krause, the STEM couple, and their glow ups. Well, Taylor already looked great, but clearly her influence has brought Garrett out of his shell. The man walked at fashion week!

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These two are one of the best couples to ever come out of the show, and I think that’s because they’ve both said they went into it with no expectations. At the very least they knew it would be an interesting experience and they’d learn about themselves—neither of them thought they’d meet their future spouse. That, compared to the desperation for love and/or fame of their co-stars, creates an authentic connection.

But Garrett wasn’t the only one with a glow up: Hannah Jiles, who apologized to her former fiancé Nick Dorka for being “cruel” to him, looks great.

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I didn’t love the narrative taking shape about her appearance, though, and how that was the problem in her relationship with Nick. The main disagreement was whether or not he referred to her as a “grenade” behind her back after seeing her for the first time, and how he allegedly told their costars he wasn’t attracted to her. Since none of that made it to camera, their whole relationship looked one-sided: Hannah was the mean, loud lady, and he was the cute boy just trying to live. Mrs. Lachey was sure to force an apology out of Hannah for her harsh words, but Nick’s feet were not held to the fire in the same way.

This is a common Love Is Blind theme: the men are womanizing galavanters and the women are too much to handle. No one ends up looking good in that scenario; everyone’s a villain.

Except Garrett and Taylor.