James Weir recaps Married At First Sight series 4 episode 8

THE Married At First Sight texting scandal has been blown wide open, with the cheaters publicly outed and interrogated on the show.

WHEN your partner has been sending cheeky text messages to another girl behind your back, there’s only one way to deal with it: by naming and shaming everyone involved at your commitment ceremony in front of a panel of psychologists and a live studio audience of other couples.

Things are always handled appropriately on Married At First Sight, and the dilemma posed on Sunday night’s episode involving Jonathan’s cheating scandal is no different.

Cheryl is distraught with what she’s found out about her husband and she cries to us in rough and ready footage filmed at an unflattering angle in the couple’s spare bedroom on her diary cam.

But who is the girl Jonathan’s been texting? While we have our suspicions, Cheryl’s looking to create peak drama later in the show, so she sits on the information and waits for her moment.

This is the first time weekly commitment ceremonies have been part of the series, so here are the rules: The couples are split up, and all the brides go into a room together and talk about their problems while the grooms hang out in another room. It’s the blind leading the blind, and they each have to decide whether they want to stay, or leave their marriages. Each person writes their decision down on a piece of paper and then, in the commitment ceremony, each couple unveils their piece of paper to each other.

There’s a rather magnificent catch though: in the unfortunate scenario that one person has selected to stay while the other has opted to leave, the couple is made stay together anyway until the following week’s commitment ceremony. Even though one person has said straight up they want to ditch the sucker they’ve been paired with and scram, their wish is ignored and they’re held captive against their will in a relationship they don’t want to be in with someone they hate. I’m pretty sure this goes against some kind of human rights law and Amal Clooney should probably be notified.

Deb and John are up first, and we’re all sure how this is going to go.

But before we hear their decisions, Deb takes one final opportunity to point out that John is not Polynesian as per her request and then goes on to list her perfect and ethereal qualities next to John’s disgusting, nicotine-stained qualities.

It’s clear she wants out.

Decision time, and John flips his card around to reveal what we all expected: “Leave”.

What happens next is more confusing than Deb’s constant surprise that John isn’t Polynesian. She flips her card over: “Stay”.

John actually can’t believe it.

“But I’m not Polynesian...”

Deb is completely miserable and has walked out of the show in frustration several times. She had an easy opportunity to leave and free herself. And instead, she has trapped herself in a non-Polynesian hell of her own making.

As per the rules, it doesn’t matter that John wants to get the F away from Deb. Because Deb has chosen to stay, the two of them will remain awkwardly shackled together for at least another week.

When Anthony and Nadia get called up, they both seem happy and satisfied with each other. Then Anthony gets wildly possessive.

“I’m just trying to drive the ship,” he says. “And as far as I’m concerned, Nadia’s MINE.”

We watch Nadia process what Anthony just said in real time. Her final emotion is a mix of confusion and terror.

When you realise the guy you like may lock you in his basement.

While their cards show they’ve both decided to stay, Nadia is left rethinking her decision while also devising a secret escape plan.

By the time Michael and Scarlett are called up to front the experts, they are both clearly over this whole experiment. Michael says Scarlett has absolutely none of the qualities he’d ever be attracted to in a partner and they have nothing in common.

He then turns on the experts and asks them what the deal is.

According to the experts, opposites do attract and the fact their pairing also makes for explosive reality TV content is merely coincidental.

Scarlett is including this decision card in the list of books she’s written.

Both Michael and Scarlett turn over the cards to reveal they would both like to get the hell out of this mess. Their wish is granted. Michael will return to his life as a naked accountant and Scarlett will continue to pretend to write books.

Speaking of complete messes, Jonathan and Cheryl are next and this is where the evening gets a bit tremendous.

Flipping her card, a fed-up Cheryl has written “leave!” complete with a cute yet definitive exclamation point.

“At least we have something in common,” she says, assuming Jonathan’s response will be the same as hers.

But it’s not what she thinks.

“Stay,” Jonathan’s card reads. He tells the experts what they want to hear — that he feels they’ve been paired for a reason and they should really try make it work.

“I hate disloyal people,” Cheryl mutters. The lack of context around this loaded statement has piqued everyone’s interest and she’s asked to please go into detail.

“So, I actually heard you last night saying you got paired with the wrong person,” Cheryl says, referring to what she overheard Jonathan telling the cameras about his new little texting buddy.

In flashback footage, we see Jonathan shirtless in bed, scrolling through his phone.

“We ended up getting along extremely well,” he told the camera of an unnamed lady. “Ended up getting her number at the end. And we’ve just been talking about our experiences so far and thus far I feel like I have a better connection with her than Cheryl. We should’ve been matched. We would’ve been cute as sh*t. Can we do that? Can we swap? Is that a thing?”

*Eggplant emoji*

Back in the commitment ceremony, Cheryl continues to out her husband’s secret.

“And then you swapped numbers and you’ve been talking to each other. That makes me feel like sh*t. To hear that makes me feel like compete sh*t — you’re just not taking this seriously at all. It’s a dog — it’s a dog move and I’m so betrayed by you. BOTH OF YOU.”

The group gasps as they collectively wonder who the other person is.

Jonathan tries to skim over it by explaining that, at last week’s dinner party he connected with someone else and they traded numbers.

He’s asked who the girl is.

At this moment, one of the other wives begins to panic.

Oh hai.

But before Jonathan can say who, Cheryl beats him to the punch. “Scarlett,” she spits.

Everyone in the group clutches their chests and gasps and we zoom in on Scarlett’s face.

“F*ck,” she whispers in her almost-American accent.

F*ck indeed.

Susan’s facial expression is quite appropriate.

Yeah.

Asked if he’s attracted to Scarlett, Jonathan says he’s “definitely attracted to the conversation” they have and thinks “at some level we might have been a better match”.

“I’m so disgusted,” Cheryl says through tears before storming out of the room.

Scarlett thinks Cheryl, the woman who’s husband she cheated with, is totally overreacting and starts bizarrely throwing her body over the couch.

WHAT.

THE.

WHAT.

Moments later, Cheryl’s made to huff back into the room. Not because she wants to resolve the issue, but because Jonathan’s piece of paper clearly states he wants to stay in the relationship, so she's contractually obligated to remain in the union against her will.

As we watch everyone leave the evening, we’re delivered an important message via voiceover: “Due to irreconcilable differences, Jonathan has reconsidered his decision to continue with the experiment.”

We’re sad and disappointed. Not because Jonathan eventually gave into Cheryl’s hysterical pleads to end the suffering and dissolve their marriage. We’re disappointed because it wasn’t captured on film and aired.

But it’s all fine. Hopefully we can read all about it in Scarlett’s next book.

For more observations on Amal Clooney and imaginary books, follow me on Twitter: @hellojamesweir