Married at First Sight NZ: What does this obsession say about us?

Married at First Sight New Zealand fosters a sense of collective culture, and Kiwis are tuning in.

OPINION

Why are so many Kiwis caught up in the communal viewing experience that is Married at First Sight New Zealand? How do these shows foster a sense of community and why do we turn to media for this? What does that say about our culture now? And what do the experts have to say about it all? I’ve never watched the show or shared its appeal, but I need to understand it.

The fourth instalment of Married at First Sight New Zealand – or MAFS for the uninitiated – is in full swing.

And it feels like everyone I know is watching – colleagues, friends and family are tuning in, contributing to a season that has reportedly generated over a million streams so far.

My NZ Herald colleagues have covered the show, and our readers are invested.

What’s the appeal? Why is this resonating, and why now?

Dating shows are an enduring TV format

MAFS NZ isn’t a new property (the inaugural season aired in 2017) and dating shows are a timeworn reality television device, even in New Zealand; the 1980s saw Blind Date beamed across Kiwi screens, and later we had The Bachelor and The Bachelorette.

All featured regular people – at least, regular people who wanted to be filmed – looking for love, tweaked and twisted for each new show or season.

With MAFS, the premise is in the name; strangers are matched by the show’s experts – season four leans on John Aiken and Jo Robertson – and the couples meet at the aisle, after which they have a month to decide on the future of their fated union.

Nate and Maddy were all smiles at their wedding. Photo / Warner Bros. Discovery

There’s a mystery to each pairing, and this element seems central to the show’s appeal – and its marketing approach. Is this fascination reflective of our contemporary dating landscape?

Much of it is shaped by the algorithmically driven mechanism of dating apps, combining randomness and surprise with insight and expertise we’re not privy to, but have to trust.

It’s much the same for the couples on MAFS NZ.

It’s a fascinating theory agrees Rebecca Trelease, senior lecturer at AUT. “But I don’t think it’s that,” she says. “The show tells us it’s a social experiment.”

The mystery inherent to the show, experienced by both its participants and viewers at home, is why the couples have been paired in the first place, she explains, akin to“old-style matchmaking” and we get to watch the contestants trying to work it out.

“The idea of how the prize is marriage and that’s the ultimate goal, is really interesting,” and it’s tied to the format.

That format is familiar, and the visual conventions of MAFS NZ support the premise (and satisfy our brains).

Watching my first episode, shut in a room in the NZ Herald office, what struck me was the amount of slow-motion footage. Is this part of the growing trend for ‘ambient television’?

The kind of shows we can drift in and out of as we scroll on our phones, or turn to for unchallenging viewing that soothes us during periods of stress; easy-to-digest media has audience appeal for reasons that don’t need explaining.

The show's stars glide through each episode as they consider their lives and loves, with the help of frequent slow motion, a device that serves that plot. Photo / Warner Bros. Discovery

Slow-mo is often used alongside MAFS contestants’ narration, and the footage represents their “inner mind” Trelease explains.

“The second screen thing is absolutely in play during MAFS,” she says.

“But I do believe we’re at a stage where we don’t need content to be slow in order to do both.”

We’re all guilty of it, streaming a show on one screen, while scrolling on another.

It’s mind-numbing, which is sometimes what we need. There are a lot of awful things going on in the world, and anxiety rates and general mental health data isn’t great.

There’s a salve in easy-to-digest media. It’s why we rewatch shows like The Office.

And though reality shows have, traditionally, been considered a low-brow form of entertainment – they’re not quite a Ken Burns documentary or an avant-garde piece of cinema – they have cross-cultural appeal for a reason.

Even people with “elite” taste in culture confess to watching reality shows and other “trash”; a savvy social signal, so confident in their status that admitting to low-brow habits doesn’t render judgment. Omnivoric media consumption is worn with pride now.

The MAFS phenomenon is global, and the New Zealand series has even garnered mentions on forums dedicated to the Australian and British versions of the show.

But, beyond the easy-to-digest romances (and drama) of reality television, is there something more to the MAFS obsession?

MAFS is bringing people together

There’s a communal nature to its release schedule; MAFS NZ is rolled out episode by episode on a fixed day and time - contrary to the now-standard streaming practice of releasing a whole season at a time.

“Staggering it instead of one big, massive drop is quite crafty; it’s guiding us back to it,” explains Trelease.

The way we consume content has changed dramatically in recent years with on-demand streaming. Nor are we all limited to linear television, or limited to a single household screen. With the right device and connectivity, we can watch whatever, wherever, whenever, exciting in our own bubble of taste.

But you can’t binge MAFS NZ if you want to be up to date. There’s a communal viewing element to the show; we’re more or less watching the same show at the same time, and the ecosystem of content around the series – social media, forums and articles like this one – creates a collective conversation.

MAFS NZ is a communal experience both on and off screen. Photo / Warner Bros. Discovery

Whether it’s a private Whatsapp group, Reddit threads or Facebook comment sections, these add to the immediacy; you need to watch the show as it comes out if you want to be part of the conversation, Trelease explains.

“The algorithm is showing you the latest thing, if you’re not keeping up to date, it’s going to have spoilers, or you’re not going to know what people are talking about.”

The conversations happen offline too. The Herald office isn’t immune to MAFS chat, nor are many workplaces around the country.

Families and friends weigh in on what’s happened. It’s familiar, those local accents and clothes and decor, a representation of New Zealand on screen.

Amidst the increasingly globalised media landscape now, where a sense of sameness permeates, is there something appealing about the Kiwi-ness of MAFS NZ?

“It’s so much more accessible,” says Trelease.

Watching it feels personal

There’s a sense of recognition with the personalities, and a projection of self onto the contestants.

“We watch it because we can find elements of ourselves in the people we watch on screen,” she explains.

“We see their behaviours and consider how we’d respond in that situation. And if we identify with them, and they behave differently, we process that.”

As much as it gives us a chance to relate, it also allows us to position the ‘other’, Trelease says.

“We can identify ourselves, and we can identify what we are not.”

Contestants talk through their relationships. Photo / Warner Bros. Discovery

This is critical to MAFS’ appeal.

Social judgement is as old as human time. There’s a village kind of mentality to it all.

We assess behaviour within the current framework of acceptability, establish hierarchies and place ourselves within them, competing for the social currency that comes with conventions around beauty, desirability, wealth.

“It’s not nice, it’s actually kind of yucky,” says Trelease. “But that’s what we do, so it’s kind of telling of us as a society.”

With its combination of judgement and discussion, MAFS NZ creates opportunities for shared morality judgements and the shaping of our collective values and social rules.

“We decide what our social rules are in New Zealand by how we talk about what people do wrong. If we see on TV that someone has cheated on their MAFS partner, we’ll talk about it to each other, the media talks about it.”

Trelease cites the infamous ‘muzzle’ comment on the Australian programme as an example of this.

During a dinner party, when the couples get together, a groom told a bride to “shut your mouth” and then said to her husband: “Can you muzzle your woman”.

“Everyone was talking about it, whether it was right, or the correct thing to do,” she says.

“By discussing whether he stepped over the line, we’re actually deciding as a society what that line is.”

Engaging with shows like these gives us the chance to partake in those decisions.

“If I wasn’t a part of that, I wouldn’t be a part of deciding what’s right or wrong in society.”

MAFS NZ covers some heavy topics. This season alone has seen plot points and confessions around infidelity and self-esteem – things we don’t usually always have space to discuss as a society. It helps normalise terminology like ‘gaslit’ and ‘toxic’.

The show also records shifting gender behaviour. Three of the men have cried, including Piripi Clarke, who confessed to cheating in the past.

“We’re feeling sorry for him, but actually what he’s upset about is behaviour he did himself, so there’s a really ethical debate as to what’s happened.”

MAFS NZ groom Piripi Clarke made an emotional confession on the show this week. Photo / Warner Bros. Discovery

These are the grey areas of human behaviour that make for engrossing television, and real-life discourse, as we watch the drama unfold.

Of all our current media, reality television remains the most explicit example of commodifying the self, not to mention surveillance culture – things we all experience, normalised online and on screen.

“Every few years we’ve had people freaking out about surveillance,” says Trelease.

She agrees it’s increasing in our everyday lives.

“I don’t think it’s going back, unless we actively fight it and opt out.”

There’s an agency to how we engage with media, and shows like MAFS NZ, and the content ecosystem and attention economy encourage polarisation and overfamiliarity.

Comment sections can be harsh. The UK’s Love Island has a dark legacy with mental health. Can we consume these shows in an ethical way? Or are we inherently complicit?

“In general people need to stop being trolls,” Trelease says.

“Humans need to be kind to other humans, and I think productions need to be kind to their contestants and set them up for success, not as consumable props.”

Everyone involved in these shows, which Trelease describes as an art form, needs to be aware of the meaning they’re creating and how it will be received by the audience.

But it’s not necessarily the production’s fault. “We as a society have less of an understanding of what is media literacy, and taking apart what we consume.”

Will we ever get tired of voyeurism; surely we have enough of it by now – or does more beget more?

“We’re always going to think ‘at what point does this have to stop?’ but it hasn’t stopped yet.”

Emma Gleason is the NZ Herald’s lifestyle and entertainment deputy editor. Based in Auckland, she covers culture, entertainment and media.

For more from Rebecca Trelease on the appeal of reality TV and Married at First Sight NZ, listen to today’s episode of The Front Page below. You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.