Monsters and Critics columnist Liz Long recaps Married at First Sight, Season 12, Episode 8, Face to Face, with a little help from a glass of pinot (or two) …
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! All rise, all rise. For our girl Paige has seen the light!!
That’s right, that’s right. While Chris was the one who asked for a divorce last week, Paige has managed to come out on top.
How did she do it?
Let’s recap.
Chris doesn’t get the advice he wants from Pastor Dwight
So before we get into it, tonight’s episode was the one where they meet each other’s friends. And the friends were great as they talked the most sense we’ve seen all season long!
But because this is a Paige appreciation recap, we should focus on the little visit Chris had with his friends– or rather, Pastor Dwight and this big ol’ dude.
Chris took them step-by-step through his plan to win the title of “Worst MAFS Husband Ever” including how he slept with Paige the first night of their wedding and his reasons for doing so.
Plain and simple: they were not swallowing the B.S. Chris tried to feed them. They encouraged him to stay with Paige, a diamond as Dwight called her. BUT, Chris being the child he is, looked at his watch the whole time and decided he had to go because the time had come when he wasn’t getting his way.
Chris asks Paige to meet Mercedes to “clear the air”
Chris then calls Paige on the phone (you know, because she’s just chilling in that “mutual” apartment alone with not a friends visit of her own), and he asks Paige to meet his “ex-fiancee, mother of my child” (aka, Mercedes). (He just always refers to her as that other title.)
And Paige, being the girl who we’ve been wanting to either shake or give up on in our frustrations, said “I’ll have to pray on it.”
Oh Lord here we go, I said, rolling my eyes. She’s going to pray on it, and she is going to come in and allow Chris to run the show and mind-warp her again, I said.
But, after what I presume could have only been a divine intervention from the Big Guy upstairs, Paige tells us, I decided I WILL meet up with Chris after all. “He has been playing middleman this whole time. Now it’s time I took control.” Okay, so those might not have been her EXACT words – but that’s the way I picture it in my head (and they’re pretty darn close to her words).
Paige meets Chris and his ex, Mercedes
Okay, so this meeting was a whole bunch of weird. First, we had Chris and Mercedes on the same couch with Paige sitting there as if she’s their shrink.
Then we had Mercedes giving looks to Paige, looks to Chris, and being shocked at Paige’s “well there’s a chance I could have been pregnant too …” And, yes, Mercedes, she means “by Chris” as well.
I kept fearing a moment where Mercedes and Chris would gang up on Paige. Maybe because I went into this meeting with the thought that Chris and Mercedes are in cahoots.
But Mercedes made it clear: “For any doubts about whether it is my intention to be with him, it is not.” (Okay, so I’m aware of the rumor of Mercedes and Chris being in Cancun recently and people saying Mercedes was not pregnant. But dangit I’m going to revel in this moment of joy that the last five minutes of this episode brought me, be damned!)
If nothing else, let us take a moment for the way Paige handled the situation with class!
Paige calmly said, “This relationship is not serving me anymore.”
Those are the words I’ve been longing to hear. The words all of us have been longing to hear. And I believe she meant them.
Paige then even told Mercedes, “You are beautiful by the way,” (which, Mercedes reciprocated as if they were two girls who just met in the bathroom). As these two grew a little tighter, Chris grew a little squirmier.
Not “having the conversation go the way he wanted it to go” because Paige came out “pistols blazing” (finally!), Chris had no choice but to resort to his childlike ways (again) and bolt from the room before anyone else could ruin his “Last word!” “I win!” game.
Whatever B.S. he spewed as he made that exit doesn’t matter. Paige won. She can honestly say she gave the whole thing a fighting chance. (Yes, a little too much. But we give her grace.)
Paige is at peace with it all, and it is well with my soul. Let Chris go watch his game and eat his dinner.
And even if Mercedes is with Chris in Mexico, I am happy for Paige. That was a class-act way to go out.
What will be next for Paige’s journey? Well, as I understand it, they are both contractually obligated to keep filming until the season ends (as former MAFS-wife Mindy Shiben mentioned in the comments section of an Instagram post from the mafsfan page).
So even if Paige and Chris have to keep filming the rest of the season, at least it won’t be with each other. Right? Please Lord say that I am right on this one.
Well this has been sufficient fun for the night. And if you are wanting a little recap on “the rest” of our crew, head on over to our new Reality Instagram page where I will be rounding up the best tweets of the night!
Til next week, “MAFS-Lovers.” I’m calling you that again because, I don’t know about you, but tonight gave me a little pep in my step that I was really needing.
Married at First Sight airs on Wednesdays at 8/7c on Lifetime.