Four seasons in and it’s pretty clear: Love Is Blind is a show about love, but it’s also a show about mistakes. Whether they’re letting their dog drink wine, proposing to a person who doesn’t believe in evolution, or making it known that they don’t find 400-pound women attractive, the hopeless romantics on Love Is Blind are constantly trying to outdo each other when it comes to mistakes. Mistakes are bound to happen when you spend nearly a week going on marathon blind dates in the hopes of proposing to a virtual stranger sight unseen as part of a hit reality TV show.
In Love Is Blind Season 4, the king of mistakes has to be Zack, a 31-year-old criminal defense attorney who uses action movie scenarios as icebreakers and passes off deep-cut alt-rock songs from the early ’00s as his own handiwork. Zack was already in the running to be the most… unique pod person in the show’s history when, in Episode 8, he did something that we’ve never seen on the show before: he proposed to a second person, in-person, halfway through the “experiment.”
Just to rewind a sec, because credit where credit is due: before getting engaged to Iyanna in Season 2, Jarrette actually proposed to Mallory while still in the pods. She turned him down, so Jarrette moved on to True Love #2. We all thought that was awkward, but then two seasons later Zack was like “hold my golden goblet” and outdid Jarrette.
When dropped into a blind love triangle with sweet and nerdy Bliss and mean girl Irina, a woman who consistently responds to the tears of others by stifling laughter, Zack chose Irina. Bliss made him cupcakes while in the pods, becoming possibly the first contestant to discover that those kitchens actually work. Irina forgot Zack’s birthday and then tried to bum a candle off of Bliss.
Zack knew he made the wrong choice, possibly because Irina told Zack to his face that he looked like a “fictional character” within seconds of meeting him (the character was Willy Wonka, we discovered). The two of them then suffered through the most incredibly uncomfortable vacation in Mexico wherein Irina flat-out refused to be touched by or even seen with the man who she theoretically was on track to marry in three weeks. And whenever Zack tried to talk seriously about their relationship, well…
Frustrating for Zack, yes, but Irina covering her head with a throw pillow and reassuring Zack that the pillow is not soundproof is fantastic television.
These two were never going to work out, and they ended their stay in Mexico by ending their relationship. Now comes the do-over, which — for the first time — takes place outside of the pods and face to face.
Production wisely allows Zack to bend the rules until they break by meeting up with Bliss in person, at least twice. Does that make this storyline more like Love Is Blind Until It’s Not So You Get A Do-Over: This Time With More Sight? Yes, but the producers wouldn’t be Emmy nominees if they let a storyline like this just end. Irina was wrong about a lot of things, but she wasn’t wrong about Zack’s constant, unblinking eye contact being unsettling. He makes us uncomfortable, but we can’t look away.
Bliss, it turns out, doesn’t mind Zack’s penetrating stare. She doesn’t even seem to notice! She does, however, keep bringing up the fact that he’s already dumped her and proposed to another person. Both of their IRL dates — or, well, meet-ups — are riddled with justifiably passive-aggressive digs from Bliss about how Zack chose to dump her for the woman that she warned him about. Honestly, good on you, Bliss.
That brings us to the moment we wanted to avoid but knew was coming: the re-proposal.
Love Is Blind is a show about mistakes, owning up to them and making up for them — and, hopefully, moving on from them. Zack has definitely owned up to them and he’s trying to make up for them, and at least Zack and Bliss have moved on to other topics of conversation.
By showing us a conversation wherein these two seamlessly flow from talking about their boat to the movie Gremlins to Furbies and Digipets to ranking their favorite fruits to how Zack doesn’t like jam, the editors make a really convincing case for these two being perfect for each other. Somehow they’re on the same wavelength, and you know this proposal is serious because Zack does what every single straight person does the instant they’re serious about someone…
He calls Bliss his “person,” a term of endearment used so gratingly often on Love Is Blind that I fully expect the production company to try to trademark the word. Bliss says yes — actually she says “yeah” — and the two have the same reaction to their situation as the rest of us.
Should Bliss have said yes to Zack? Let the person who has never made an irrational decision regarding romance cast the first blarney stone. I can’t possibly know what’s in the hearts and minds of singles who voluntarily sign up for a notoriously w i l d and forever life-altering Netflix marriage show. Maybe Zack and Bliss are endgame. Maybe they are really each other’s persons. But whether this relationship results in mistake or marriage, both endings are equally Love Is Blind.