MAFS Australia 2026
Episode 1
hustler, grinder, man of faith - the aestheticism of late capitalist "success"
all of the men are dressed the same
immediately we have the right wing contrarian
what it means to stand out - what it means to be different within this very rigid set of gendered expectations - according to Gia, the hyper-femininity and consumption - clothes, plastic surgery - the cultivation of status that it read by others in the group as vulgar. Vulgarity is such an interesting concept actually. What do we refer to as vulgar? Categorise as such - it is a word for the brazen, there are classist attachments to it - it is associated with "lowness"
she is being contrasted by the show with Rachel, who is presented as bubbly, authentic - so authenticity is perhaps something we constrast with vulgarity - vulgarity as an exagerration, a performance.
What does authentic vulgarity look like then?
The mafsperts are pontificating about "The Dating World" as if they exist outsside that ecosystem - as if they are not themselves influencers of what is expected
Alissa and authenticity - nurse and social media manager
David - the religiousness.
what is being framed around faith in this - not just religious faith, but the performance of faith in the experts, the experiment - oh interesting framing of age and "need" to have children.
It's a structure that camps and exaggerates the expectations of heterosexuality and monogamy
"the perfect husband/wife" perfection as contained within these categories - what is the expectation for a partner outside of that role? What is a wife or husband in the mind of the expecter?
racism on mafs as well - there are these negotiations of power around and across intersections - Alissa insisting David kneel to her and propose when he is clearly uncomfortable, insisting after destabilizing him with the "I can't marry you" thing - I was braced against thinly veiled racism and it seems like so was he - then his relief and the immediate demand - i feel like there is going to be room for discussion/ exploration of how men can be abused and the kinds of power dynamics black men have to navigate -especially around dating white women given the history of lynchings and accusations. Tropes.
Vows as a list of things and accomplishments - house, holidays, children. Being denied those things as a genuine shock. Legacy - what a concept, what a stricture - the idea that after we die we must pass some property on to others, along through blood and heteromonogamous reproduction
Rachel and Steven
romantic partnership as a necessity - wonder if isolation and lack of third spaces, driving this marketisation of romance/ dating
competition - both have felt pushed out of hypercompetitive dating market - it's a kind of? etherealistion of the traditional heteromonogamy of the wealthy - where everyone envisions themselves as nobility, seeking to make a socially appropriate match by which to consolidate wealth and power
Christian as an identity category. perhaps go back to that Religion, Emotion, Sensation - Affect Theories and Theologies
What is Alissa's obsession with the Daddy thing.
There's a difference in what is being asked for between these couples - A&D looking to be served by the relationship - a list of achievements or occomplishments to pursue together, R&S to be accepted within the relationship - transactional vs. interactual?
Episode 2
"skip all that dating process and get to the good part"
"i am just a pink girlie looking to find my blue"
oh there is a rigid gender thing happening here. attraction to a rigid performance of "blueness" and "pinkness"
girl just find a stone butch
prescriptive view of relationships and roles - this idealization of the nuclear family
that which is threatened by queerness, transness
he was late and she feels the experience has been ruined but will "give it a chance"
I guess people have their own values but the expectations feel abit rigid.
what is a pink feeling? gender euphoria? does she want to feel gender euphoria?
GIRL "i don't feel like meg ryan in you've got mail"
2nd couple
again there's this continuance of legacy - where legacy is defined as passing along the wealth and security of previous generations
can you buy your way to being yourself? Consumption as identity
swearing in women as an "ick" insteresting
"they'll make beautiful babies"
three businesses
it's interesting how shame creeps in with these things - Gia's insistence that she be the one to tell him she has a daughter, the pressure she has attached to that secret. The way the self is mediated within the generic conventions - what has happened on previous seasons, rom-coms - intertextuality.
sn the ai lady on the ionos ad - is "ai generated" an aesthetic that will be reproduced with digital/analog/ human intelligence art?
might be interesting to redraw ai generated art and add something organic to it?
Final vows.
the whole Alissa David thing smacks of Alissa being scared and blaming David for it. Instagram reels vibes.
the shutting down, the fixating, the thought terminating cliche's - "taking your ring off is a red flag"
what if Opposites Attract was more of a like. what?
if there were some elements of The Circle to it.