A BREAKUP, two pregnancies and a hooded blazer. Just when you think you can’t extract any more delight out of the crumbling relationships of four straight couples, someone walks out in a funny jacket.
In Monday night’s reunion episode of Seven Year Switch, we catch up with all four couples and find out how they’ve fared since the cameras stopped rolling. While they all chose to stay together in last week’s finale episode, a lot has happened since then. And what we see may explain why season two of the show has already received double the amount of applications than the first — with over 1000 Aussie couples putting their hands up.
Catching up with the couples during the reunion, it’s kind of like that final episode ofThe Biggest Loser. The contestants have already put a lot of work in, but it’s amazing the difference a spray tan, a blow wave and a trip to Myer can make.
Ryan and Cassie are wheeled out first. Mainly because they’re the least interesting couple and producers want us to hang around to see if that chick yells about the tattoo again.
Cassie reveals they’re expecting their fourth bub, a girl, and they found out the news a few days before they started filming the show. Given the festering resentment Cassie had for Ryan, it’s hard not to think about the bitter, hostile minutes in which this baby was conceived. Nonetheless, at least we have an explanation for all those layers and baggy chambrays Cassie insisted on wearing.
If she was Blake Lively, I may go through the past nine weeks of footage and pap shots and find the moments she skilfully hid her growing bump behind a couch cushion or a bag of groceries, but she’s not and I don’t care enough, so let’s keep moving forward.
“We’re just happy now,” Cassie reassures us. “Ryan has let go of the business. We have lifestyle, we have balance. I know when Ryan’s going to work and when Ryan’s coming home.” It’s assumed Cassie has some kind of sign-in sheet at the front door to keep track of this information.Michelle and Jason’s ending isn’t as happy. There are no sign-in sheets. They don’t live together anymore, so having a sign-in sheet when there’s no one to sign it would just be silly.
“We went back to our lives. We put all of the things we’d learnt into practice. And we did what we said we were going to do — we tried,” Michelle says, her voice breaking. “But at the end of the day we decided we were going to separate. It got to the stage where we kind of looked at each other and we couldn’t try anymore. We were just suffering under each other’s pressure.”
While Michelle’s aware she came across as a bit of a moll sometimes, she says she didn’t think this would be the outcome. “It mightn’t have looked like that at times. But I love Jason. I love him with all my heart. And I still do. He is my best friend. And I am the luckiest woman in the world because I got to have my babies with my best friend.”
She says she feels closer to Jason since they separated and they now see each other more than ever. I see sign-in sheets in their future.
There’s so much we need to ask Jackie: How does she now feel about Tim’s tattoo with Tallena? Is she still annoyed he got naked in the spa with her? Has she finally cleaned her gross bedroom? Let’s start with the tattoo.
“Ummmm, I’m a pretty dramatic person,” she laughs when host Edwina Bartholomew asks whether she’s still a hysterical wreck about the ink. She brushes it off, acts real chill and tries to convince us she’s less aggressive now.
Fine, you win this time Jackie. But how did you feel when Tim got naked in that spa with Tallena? Bet you were spewing.
“I did find it quite hilarious when he took his pants off in the spa,” she says, because she’s a cool girl now who’s not easily thrown when her man gets naked in a spa with another lady and then goes and gets a tattoo with her.
Bringing Tim into the mix, Edwina asks what he wants to say to Tallena’s partner Brad.
He quotes Oprah: “Brad, lighten the f*ck up. Let’s be honest.”
Now seems like an appropriate time to get Brad and Tallena on stage.
Since filming wrapped, they’ve undergone some dramatic changes as a couple but also as individuals. For example, they went through with the wedding and got married. And Brad’s purchased a weird hooded blazer.I’m not entirely sure if it’s just a Rip Curl hoodie underneath a Roger David blazer or if the hoodie’s built into the blazer like the netted underwear on my running shorts. I don’t know. It seems like the kind of thing you’d have to buy online.
Anyway.
Brad admits he was the main source of their problems. And then we get his take on the whole naked spa incident.
“I was angry. Any man would be. I wanted to knock your head off,” he tells Tim. “You didn’t demoralise Tallena, you demoralised yourself and your family and your partner. But that’s something you’ve got to get through with your partner and obviously you have. So kudos to you guys.”
Going around the circle, they’re all asked if they have any regrets. They all mostly say no. Jackie doesn’t think she’s become a better person. And Brad says he only regrets having to go on the show in the first place.
