Is it that time of the week again? We’re back with another recap for the DC season of Love Is Blind. Episodes 10 and 11 cover the run-up to the weddings, including a Gatsby-themed party with the pod squad, dress shopping, and, of course, even more drama. If you need a refresher on this season’s big moments, read our recap of the first six episodes as well as last week’s rewind ⬇️ .
And yes, spoilers galore below. This is a recap, people!
Recap: Episodes 10-11
Sigh. Another streaming session of Love Is Blind: Folie à Deux. Truly, this show is radicalizing me, Joker-style. We started with seven couples getting engaged (including Brittany and Leo), and now we’re down to just three weddings. This makes my job slightly easier, so thanks, I guess?
Ashley and Tyler
Let’s start where we left out: Tyler and Ashley’s conversation about being a sperm donor. Listen, there’s a lot of chatter online about Tyler’s parental status and whether or not he’s actually a donor or a dad. For the sake of this recap and my dwindling sanity, I’m just going to deal with what we see on the show, which is that he’s a allegedly a donor. According to Tyler, he had a close friend with a wife who wanted a baby, but the couple could not afford a sperm donor, hence his gift. Once Ashley and Tyler are on the same page, they’re back on the road to marriage. Huzzah!
The couples are joined by the loveless losers who didn’t get engaged in the pods for a Gatsby-themed party at 14th Street bar the Crown & Crow. At the fête, the women discuss Tyler’s situation, and Ashley shares that—while he left out this glaring omission—he does bring her flowers. At the mere mention of flowers, Monica apparates into the room wearing a gold turban with a sassy “meow.” (Yes, this actually happens.) The couple hits go-karting spot K1 Speedways, and Tyler tells a giddy Ashley she’s like a little kid. It’s certainly an interesting choice of words for someone mired in a child-related scandal. They also goes skydiving, which Ashley mentioned in the pods was a must before her wedding.
Drama forecast: The kids plotline really had the potential to be the biggest drama of the season. However, it appears to be happening online, not on Netflix. Regardless of the truth, Ashley’s dad did say she was “ride or die,” so I believe we can count on a successful wedding either way.
Taylor and Garrett
Catching up with our science-loving couple, Taylor and Garrett are walking the brick-lined streets of Old Town for a calligraphy class with Meant to Be Calligraphy at paper goods shop Penny Post. Taylor brings the love letters from her grandfather that she read before the proposal, and the couple reveals they have been leaving each other love letters around the apartment.
However, Netflix couldn’t let this couple get to the altar without a test. Walking up to the Gatsby party, we discover that Garrett received a message from an ex this morning, and Taylor is not happy. Unfortunately, Garrett makes a critical mistake: He tells Taylor he just “liked” the message, when he actually responded. They’re meeting her parents in San Diego tomorrow, so the timing is a real problem.
Still, they make it out west, nay a camera crew in tow. The entire San Diego montage seems to be shot on iPhones or GoPros—which, her family initially did not want to be on camera, so it makes sense Netflix wouldn’t spring for the crew to go to California. Back in DC, the couple meets Taylor’s mom Fong at now-closed Italian restaurant Quattro Osteria in Shaw.
At wedding dress shopping, Fong and Taylor agree Garrett is not her usual type. Now, much like the Tyler drama, there’s another debate happening online: Is Garrett’s current glow-up the wifey effect or a revenge transformation? Perhaps if Taylor had expounded on her usual type, we’d have a better sense of whether or not that’s her influence on him.
The couple goes to Artechouse for a dinner date in the Beyond the Light exhibit. Taylor and Garrett are sweet, but they don’t deliver a ton of drama, which is why I’m usually looking at their food. They always seem to be eating some good-looking salmon—first at Ciel Social Club, and then at Artechouse. Garrett is a big angler, so I wonder if he has fish-related demands on his rider.
Drama forecast: Despite his family’s hesitation and the ex-text snafu, this couple has been one of our most consistently solid pairings. Not only do I see them making it to the weddings, but I also anticipate a double “I do.”
Alex and Tim
Tim’s introduction to Alex’s father, Richard, was one of the most touching moments in this cesspool of a series. Do not expect the same in reverse. While meeting Tim’s parents, Alex hugs them with one hand in her vest pocket. Why the hostile body language?
The meeting goes fine on camera, but we later find out it went downhill once the record button was off. This seems to be the standard this season: We return to the aftermath of a big fight, and I have to rewind to figure out if I missed something. I like to imagine there’s one camera guy who just keeps forgetting to take off the lens cap before these big scenes. However, once the cameras stopped filming, Tim says Alex went to sleep “at the first opportunity.” She responds that she was exhausted, and that they spent the time with his parents talking about “the vessel” she would be to him.
To be fair, the entirety of Tim and Alex’s journey has consisted of him trauma dumping on her, and there’s a line between being you partner’s support system and their unpaid therapist. Still, maybe this was a good moment for Alex to just chug a Red Bull. The conversation descends into a fight about responsiveness, communication, mind reading, and more. We reach a point of no return for this couple, and after the effort he made for her family, Tim is not willing to look past this incident.
“There is no scenario where I see myself standing there and saying yes to making you my wife forever,” Tim says. “At least we can both agree that I never want to see you again. This was nice, I wish you the best of luck.”
Drama forecast: Though Tim does actually have to see her again at the Gatsby party, there is no confrontation. But seriously, we might need to stop letting this cast go to sleep because it is clearly their downfall. First we had Stephen’s fateful sleep test, and now Alex’s nap has doomed her relationship. With just three couples left, can someone please make sure Taylor stays awake until the wedding?
Hannah and Nick Dorka
I’m not even having fun with this couple. During a date at Summit Ropes in Sterling, Hannah tells Nick Dorka that she’s starting to find his icks funny. She isn’t sure he’s ready to get married, and she wants him to take more initiative and be more mature. He wants to be treated as her equal. This will happen when he acts as her equal, Hannah responds.
Before the Gatsby party, Nick Dorka mentions that the person he wants closure with is Katie. I’m sorry, WHO?! It turns out this is the Baltimore infiltrator who works for the Ravens, and that our love triangles of Nick Dorka, Hannah, Leo, and Brittany may have actually featured a fifth. When Katie and Nick Dorka sit down to discuss their connection in the pods, she discloses that the reason she decided not to move forward with him was the maturity issue, and that his charm and charisma is a defense mechanism he doesn’t need. Meanwhile, famously mature Hannah lays out her gripes with Nick Dorka’s lack of sexual prowess to the other female cast members.
The Katie and Nick Dorka conversation sparks a feud between Hannah and her betrothed. Multiple times, Hannah notes how Katie is her “best friend in the world,” and yet she kept telling Hannah that Nick Dorka is hot. This feels like someone’s fault…and it’s not Nick Dorka’s. We could probably make a bingo board of just Nick Dorka and Hannah-isms: “I turned you from a boy into a man,” comparing wingspans, the “ick,” and my personal favorite, “bet,” which seems to be Nick Dorka’s go-to word when he’s caught in this conflict.
After hanging with Hannah’s “best friend in the world,” they go to meet some lesser acquaintances. Surrounded by flamingo wallpaper in Clarendon bar Coco B’s, Hannah shares the tale of “icky Nicky” (yes, she says she was going to start calling him that) riding the duck in Cabo. They move on to the current issues the couple is facing, and her friend explains that Hannah asking Nick Dorka to walk the dog or clean up isn’t her asking him to change who he is. This is the best way Hannah’s problem has been laid out yet, but it really does feel like icky Nicky has been stuck in a Mean Girls-style four-way call. When Hannah doesn’t show up to wedding dress shopping, we know this relationship is over. Hannah tells her future former fiancé that half the items on her ick list from Mexico still remain, including her belief that Nick Dorka is delusional. Bet.
Drama forecast: I knew this couple wasn’t making it to marriage before we even left the pods, but I was even more sure last week when Nick Dorka told me his place in Tysons Corner has “enough space for me and my cat.” These are not the words of a married man.
Marissa and Ramses
We return to a couple in crisis. Marissa is feeling run down while dealing with a vitamin D deficiency, PMS, and the commute between DC and Baltimore. I need someone to get this girl a MARC train ticket, STAT. At the same time, Ramses is dealing with the trials and tribulations of possibly having to have sex with a condom. Marissa tells him that sometimes, she just doesn’t want to be touched. “I still want to marry you,” Ramses says. How brave!
Bohdan, the other point on the love triangle with Ramses and Marissa, makes an appearance at the Gatsby party, but we don’t get the fireworks I was hoping for. If anything, I think Bohdan could be a solution for Ramses and Marissa: They seem much happier when he’s around discussing the ways in which they all align, and I think they should consider this dynamic.
Back in the apartment, Ramses doesn’t want to eat batter with raw egg. However, he’s willing to do something else ra—I’ll stop. Mom, I’m sorry for that one! They’re filling out the marriage license, and he doesn’t know her date of birth. The tipping point for Ramses in the pods is that he’s a Cancer/Leo/Leo, so not knowing Marissa’s birthday is pretty sacrilege for the astrologically inclined.
We also get the return of mommy dearest, Vanessa. You may remember some of her greatest hits: calling her daughter a bitch, threatening to cut off Ramses’s balls, and saying the couple looks like siblings. But something incredible happens while the women are picking their dresses, and it’s the first time this season I believe in the transformative power of matrimony. Marissa steps out in a dress the other cast members deem “too girly,” but the cameras cut to Vanessa, and she gets emotional seeing her daughter in the gown—the same little girl who wore princess dresses. Vanessa even starts talking about how Ramses seems really genuine, though she’s still probably going to cut off his testicles. But at least they are genuine testicles!
The marriage license has been filed, the dress has been chosen, so there’s only one thing left to do: Take a cruise on the Hot Tub Boat. What is sexier than role-playing a sous-vide chicken thigh? Also, whoever thought to put a massive banner with the company’s URL on the side of the boat is the brightest mind on this show. Because we have two newly engaged lovers in a hot tub, it’s inevitable the conversation would get a little sultry: Marissa wishes Ramses had gotten Vanessa a gift as she did for his mother. They didn’t even bring her mom flowers, she says. Suddenly, Monica ascends from the Potomac River, activated by the mere mention of flowers gone ungifted. (No, this doesn’t actually happen, sorry.) It seems like the tub isn’t the only hot water Ramses finds himself in.
Drama forecast: Though Marissa and Ramses are slated to have a “boho glam” wedding, I don’t think it’ll be more “boho sham.” This is probably going to be our only dramatic “no” at the altar, and I need the cameraman to make sure the lens cap is off for Vanessa’s reaction.
Top 3 DC moments
- Finally, someone complains about the traffic in This Town. Thank you to Taylor’s mom Fong for delivering us the most DC dialogue of the entire series: “So is traffic usually this crappy on a Saturday,” Fong says. “It’s DC, it’s always bad.” responds Garrett. “My God. It never shuts down,” says Fong. Randy Clarke, this is your moment!
- The crew gets decked out to party like it’s 1920, strutting their way to the Crown & Crow. Wearing a really stupid outfit on 14th Street is a canon event! Yours truly has walked the strip dressed as everyone from Anne Boleyn to Larry David’s father in Curb Your Enthusiasm (don’t ask).
- Washington Monument count: 18. That’s more than last week’s drop, which featured an extra episode. With the couples breaking up left and right, it’s possible they just need to use more B-roll to fill the episode.
Best break up line
It’s hard to top Monica’s Venmo power move, but Nick Dorka delivered a truly inspirational message after the demise of his relationship. Reaching into the recesses of his soul, he attributes the line to Kim Kardashian as sampled in a Drake song: “I didn’t come this far just to come this far.” Quoting Kim K. through a Drizzy song? Feels like the correct way for Nick Dorka to end his tenure on the show.
One final question
I honestly forgot Nick and Vanessa Lachey hosted the show until they appeared in the dress and tuxedo shopping scenes. It made me wonder: What if each season had a local host, and who would that be for DC? I fear the answer is Tony P.
Daniella Byck joined Washingtonian in 2022. She was previously with Outside Magazine and lives in Northeast DC.
