How Married At First Sight ruined The Bachelor

The behaviour is foul and abusive, but with more than a million viewers tuning into each episode of Married At First Sight, what does this say about us, asks Katy Hall.

Once upon a time we were a nation that proudly loved love.

Or more specifically, a nation that loved to watch others find love.

Single dates, ball gowns, red roses and the immaculately coiffured hair of Osher Gunsberg, we wanted — and believed in — all that The Bachelor had to offer us.

There was something feel-good and rather wholesome about dedicating two evenings a week to seeing a person whittle down a bevy of flawless prospective partners until “the one” was realised and a garish diamond commitment ring was presented in a remote holiday destination as a sign of their love.

MORE FROM KATY HALL: When will The Bachelor give us what we need?

The show required not just an investment of time, but a dedication to contestants we’d never met before and watching them have their heart broken or their dream come true, usually in the kind of dresses we’ve all been avoiding since the Year 10 formal, no less.

And while the show’s format has been tweaked in recent times to include a cohort of mean girl contestants planted purely to create tension and increase their Instagram followings, at its core, The Bachelor is still a show about two people trying to find their forever love.

Bring back the wholesome love of Snezana and Sam. Picture: Channel 10/The Bachelor

But somewhere along the way we’ve traded this in for a far more disjointed and dramatic viewing experience. And while it’s hard to pinpoint the exact moment that reality TV lovers decided they preferred the relentless and sometimes brutal drama of Married of First Sight over the slow and steady elimination process of The Bachelor, make no mistake, it’s happened.

Fans of Channel 9’s slow-motion trainwreck are through the roof this season. With an average of 1.2 million Australians tuning in to watch each night, the show is consistently taking out the number one spot in the ratings and starting conversations around the proverbial water cooler in a way that The Bachelor never has before.

MORE FROM KATY HALL: The MAFS storyline that went too far

It seems that in 2019, seeing someone call their husband inbred and likening his past as a male stripper to a drug addict — as MAFS bride Ines Basic has done towards Bronson Norrish — shocking and horrifying as it may be, is what we’re into.

When she referred to another contestant as “a walking problem” we didn’t change the channel, we reached for the popcorn. And now we’re living for her not-so-secret affair with fellow contestant Sam Ball — who reasoned that things wouldn’t work out with his wife Elizabeth Sobinoff, because her body shape was not what he’s used to — and their painfully unsubtle flirting.

The marriage of Elizabeth Sobinoff and Sam Ball has been a disaster from the start and we’ve loved it. Picture: Channel 9

We were gobsmacked when Norrish referred to Basic as a “see you next Tuesday” twice in one breath, and cried emotional abuse when Basic said she feels a desire to punch him in the jaw whenever she has to look at him.

But instead of feeling the kind of second-hand anger and shame we would if these people were our friends in real life, we’re lapping it up, reasoning that our front row tickets to this toxic mess are hard earned because hey, they signed up for this, right?

MORE FROM KATY HALL: How do Married At First Sight ‘experts’ get it so wrong?

Of the two franchises, it’s clear which one is the real deal and which one is just there for the cheap tune ins.

Where The Bachelor franchise has a success rate of 50 per cent of its couples (three of its six couples are still together, two of which are married), Married At First Sight’s strike rate sits at an alarmingly low 2.85 per cent (only one of its previous 35 paired couples are still together).

And while it may all be fun and games now, you have to wonder how low it will go before we finally decide that enough is enough.

@katyhallway