It really shows how far we’ve come as a nation. Remember when we were shocked at the first prime time C-word scandal on this show? The year was 2019 and the moment resulted in online petitions calling for this esteemed program to be axed. Ha. We were so innocent.

Now, we don’t even bat an eye. The word is yelled at least six times tonight. It’s just a regular day in the Married At First Sight universe.

JAMES WEIR RECAPS: Read all the recaps here

Welp, it only makes sense to start with the less offensive stuff and build up to the fiery clash. So: the C-word scandal.

All the couples are getting ready for tonight’s cocktail party and a cloud of too-sweet perfume and burnt hair practically wafts through the TV screen. Then, through the walls, we hear shouting. It’s coming from Tamara and Brent’s joint.

Producers don’t wanna send in the TV crew. Not because it would be rude, but because we don’t want the lunatics to stop fighting the second they see the camera. So we make a junior assistant crawl in on her hands and knees to record the action on her iPhone from under the dining table.

We miss the beginning of the argument but quickly piece together that it started because Brent had the TV too loud and then Tamara asked him to turn it down. Then she may or may not have called him a … cantaloupe.

“I didn’t call you a c**t! I used it in a context!” she yells at him.

Well, as long as it was used in a context.

“Oh, wow — that’s convenient,” Brent spits at her. “I’ve never sworn at you!

“You have sworn at me! The other day when we had a fight, you swore at me!”

Brent starts jabbing his finger in the air as he yells back at her. “Don’t you dare lie! Do not lie!”

“You just swore at me before!”

“I said, ‘Shut up’! After you called me a c**t!”

Too bad we didn’t send in the junior assistant earlier. Then we would’ve had footage to confirm all these claims and accusations. Oh well.

Of course, this fight is only going to get worse if alcohol is added to the mix at the cocktail party. So we frantically usher them down to the sponsorship Suzuki Vitara to get them there quicker.

The GoPro on the dashboard catches the rest of the bickering.

“All I asked is if the TV could be turned down!” Tamara yells.

Brent shakes his head with a scoff. “Don’t play the victim! I’m not gonna have someone look at me and say, ‘Turn down the TV, ya c**t.”

This makes Tamara’s voice go really high pitched. “I did not say that! I didn’t say, ‘Turn the TV down, c**t,’ what the f**k!”

Yeah, come on Brent. Tamara’s a polite lady. We’re sure she would’ve said, ‘Turn down the TV, ya c**t — please.”

This fight carries on into the cocktail party and it’s just disgusting. We need to lighten the mood. Oh, thank god — Mitchell’s wearing his ridiculous cashmere turtleneck again.

All the other couples start to filter into the warehouse but the spotlight automatically lands on Tex Wants Sex when he rolls in solo. At first we think Andrew’s gonna be hit with a wave of backlash from the group after two weeks of insulting his wife. It’s usually how these situations go. But Tex is a perceptive guy.

He remembers back to last week, when Selin arrived at the cocktail party alone and proceeded to launch a smear campaign against her estranged husband Anthony. She successfully turned the group against him and, by the time he arrived at the party, he was the villain.

So Tex decides to borrow Selin’s public transport timetable and search for a couple of buses to throw Holly under. Tex Wants Sex. But he always wants revenge.

What unfolds is a gold class demonstration in how to manipulate a group and destroy someone’s reputation. Try it in the workplace or schoolyard!

He shares selective information with the group about his tumultuous relationship with Holly — out of context words, one-sided interactions. Stacking the narrative against her so heavily that it becomes impossible to see it any other way. She’s the crazy one.

He basically gives her the same villain edit that the producers of this show are giving him. Ah, synchronicity!

The MAFS lunatics gather around Andrew and fall for the trick.

“I’m really sorry that throughout the last commitment ceremony I didn’t say anything,” Tamara grabs Tex’s arm, chiding herself for not stepping in to destroy Holly.

Oliva also gets a jab in at Holly, who still hasn’t arrived. “I’m sorry, but there was just such a disrespect — her sitting on the couch and rolling her eyes at you while you took so much accountability.”

Brent stops just shy of pulling out an actual pitchfork. “I think she’s got such a full-on attitude to every single situation in the relationship that is just too much for at least 99 per cent of people to be able to handle,” he slags her off.

Andrew sighs and shrugs his shoulders like a man who has given his all. “We’re all perfectly imperfect. I have a heart.”

Placing the wax seal on the envelope, he breaks down and cries.

All the other contestants jump to their feet and rush to wrap their arms around him in a comforting group hug.

The producers have been working tirelessly tonight to ensure Holly is the last one to arrive. When she finally enters the warehouse, she assumes all the other couples will be on her side. So she bursts through the doors triumphantly, waiting for the crowd to hoist her on their shoulders.

Silence instantly falls over the room and everyone just stares. I swear, at one point, someone yells, ‘Get ‘er!’

To ensure tension remains high, the producers shuffle everyone to the dining table because they know Holly won’t want to obey the seating cards they’ve carefully put out — placing her next to Andrew.

And they’re right. She takes one look at her seat and drags it down the other end of the table. This behaviour by itself is quite bratty. And layered on top of the villain edit she’s been given by Andrew, it makes the group look at her with mouths agape, like she’s a monster.

Tamara and Domenica walk over and stand above her, issuing a sorta-warning to behave.

Holly closes her eyes and shakes her head, trying to figure out why no one is on her side. “He made me feel lower than dirt,” she rushes to tell them.

They don’t want a bar of it. Andrew CRIED, they inform her before demanding examples of how he was mean to her.

Holly strains her face. “He won’t even let me finish a sentence and-”

“Holly, I just wanna see you be the bigger person” Olivia interrupts Holly’s sentence to scold her. “It’s not how a grown woman acts.”

Holly rushes to describe how he insulted and hurt her but, the more she talks, the more senseless she sounds. She’s trying desperately to get her fellow wives to see the light but, to them, she just seems like a crazy lady who hasn’t left her home for decades and is now trying to convince her neighbours that the aliens are coming.

While the girls force Holly into a straitjacket, we head down the other end of the table to see if anyone wants to chat about the And Just Like That finale. But Ella decides to take over the conversation and ask her husband Mitchell if he has thought about how their relationship will work in the future.

“We’re two weeks in, who f**kin’ knows,” he scoffs at her. “Who f**kin’ cares, to be honest. Who gives a sh*t? We’re less than a month in.”

We try to change the subject to Miranda moving to LA, but Ella interrupts again.

“When you say, ‘I don’t wanna be here’, and ‘I’d rather be doing this and that’, I can’t help but think it has something to do with me,” she furrows her brow.

Mitch sits back in his chair defiantly — chest puffed out, as if he’s gearing up to hurl some truth bombs. In five, four, three, two ...

“Well that’s your own f**kin’ problem for being insecure,” the first bomb explodes. “How am I supposed to reassure you? I’m hugging you, I’m touching you. I’m trying my goddam best. I’ve already had sex with ya. That’s it, done. You’re on my f**kin’ board, done. And I dunno what you want from me. It’s stupid, stupid that you’re even bringing that sh*t up. ‘Cause it just doesn’t make any f**kin’ sense.”

Look, Mitchell, we have no idea where this outburst is coming from or what the hell it means — and we’d like to explore it further but we have a gaslighting emergency on our hands! Holly is literally seconds away from being locked inside a padded room. Also, seriously — what’s with the turtleneck?

Back down the other end of the table, things are worse than we thought: Al’s giving Holly relationship advice.

The last person who should be helping Holly is Al.

… Wait.

… Oh no.

… Selin, you sit down this instant!

“Holly and Andrew, I feel like they really need a professional to intervene in their relationship,” she tells us as she walks towards the troubled couple.

Selin and her once-estranged husband Anthony stage an intervention by trapping Holly and Andrew in a room together and forcing them to sort out their differences.

It goes … great?

Andrew sticks to his plan: remain calm and let Holly cut sick. It works. The more quiet he remains, the more riled up she gets.

“You made me feel lesser than dirt!” she lashes out. “Stop trying to pretend like you’re something you’re not!”

Then she hits him where it hurts and mocks his attempts at motivational speaking. Ooft. That’ll do it.

Within seconds, they’re both yelling over one another. We look desperately around the room for Tamara. Now’s probably a good time for her to demand they turn the volume down before calling them both C-words.

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