MAFS 2021 Episode 28 recap: Bryce snaps as evidence against him grows, and a dynamite Dinner Party could see more than one couple crumble

9now0– Guys, I’m gonna be real with you: I’m tired. Tired of seeing Melissa cry, tired of watching Rebecca avoiding her feelings for Jake, tired of Jason and Alana’s rollercoaster relationship.

But if tonight’s episode can promise anything, it’s that it’s going to shake us wide awake quicker than you can say “Bryce is storming out of the Dinner Party again”, and I’m READY.

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I certainly can admit to feeling pretty ‘shook’ only a few minutes into the episode when we see Belinda and Patrick getting ready, and the bride strides out in a bright pink, velvet and sequin leotard.

“My sister wore this when she was 13,” Belinda explains to absolutely nobody’s surprise.

But let’s tune into the couple we all want to hear from this morning: Melissa and Bryce. No doubt they’ve had a rocky evening after Melissa received several items of incontrovertible evidence that her husband has been two-timing her…

Aaaand, she hasn’t spoken to Bryce yet. Okay.

But gathering her courage, knowing that she has to set the record straight, Melissa sits down with her husband and asks him point blank about his secret girlfriend, who, for the purposes of this recap, we will name ‘Becky’.

“She’s a friend of a friend,” Bryce responds curtly when asked who ‘Becky’ is. “Why, has she said something?” he adds, his voice tinged with fear.

“Well, Becky’s the girl who’s waiting for you on the outside,” Melissa informs him. “According to Becky, she’s still waiting. Samantha met up with your bestie Jason, and he told Sam all this,” she reveals as Bryce scoffs.

“So you’re going to believe Sam of all people?” Bryce shoots back, clearly on the defensive.

No Bryce, she’s going to believe Samantha, Alana, Rebecca, a number of your closest friends and apparently even Becky herself.

“Right, I’m done with this. You can sort your s–t out, but I’m going home,” Bryce erupts suddenly as Melissa begs him to calm down. “I’m so f–king sick of this s–t,” he growls, leaving Melissa crouching on the floor, crying.

With Bryce finally returning to the apartment some time later, the couple continue their conversation, and the groom insists on going home, but Melissa asks him to stay another day as he begins to break down into sobs.

“I just want to go home,” he wails in between gasps of breath as Melissa holds his head and strokes his hair.

The cocktail party

I honestly never expected that talking about Patrick’s sex life would be a welcome change of pace in this experiment, but as the couples file into the cocktail party and the discussion turns to what Patrick and Belinda got up to after their romantic evening, I almost didn’t cringe.

Nonetheless, let’s move swiftly on.

After some discussion about whether Bryce and Melissa will be joining the other couples and face some very pressing questions, our platinum blonde waiter arrives to announce that dinner is served, and it dawns on the brides and grooms that the pair has decided to ditch the dinner altogether.

The Dinner Party

“Bryce not being here proves that he has something to hide,” Alana says as the couples enter the Dinner Party, and despite being disappointed by the absence of the final couple, all the participants appear to be enjoying the lightness of a drama-free environment.

But it doesn’t take long for the group to return to the rumours surrounding Bryce, and in an attempt to convince Jason, who is still on the fence, of Bryce’s guilt, the brides decide to get Samantha herself on the phone.

Scrounging up a phone from outside the Dinner Party room, Rebecca gives the bride a call, and she soon picks up, shocked to be receiving a call during the Dinner Party.

When asked by Rebecca if she had extra information about Bryce’s situation, she says that all of her and Bryce’s mutual friends had been called by the groom that morning, “telling them to shut up”.

The room erupts into waves of gasps, and even I have to admit I am FULLY AWAKE.

“And that’s coming from Bryce’s best mate Jason, not me,” Samantha adds, before going into detail about her meeting at the bar with the man himself.

“I was with my best mate… he’s sitting right here next to me actually, and he can confirm everything I’m saying,” she says, putting the phone on speaker.

“Yes, this is 100 per cent true,” the male voice confirms before Samantha launches back into her story.

“Bryce’s best friend saw me and said, ‘Hey haven’t you heard about Becky? [Reminder, this is not her real name] And he said that she’s waiting for him to get off the show, and that he told her he needed to go on for publicity for his career. And I’ve heard that from two other people as well.”

As the call ends, Jason — Bryce’s best mate in the experiment (what is it with Bryce and Jasons) — is left looking completely distraught, cringing and squeezing his eyes shut in despair. Johnny also admits that he’s “embarrassed” to have defended the groom.

“I’m heartbroken. F–k, I don’t know… it is pretty damning,” Jason says. “This whole experiment has been me backing up Bryce, and Alana and I almost broke up over it. I feel like a d–khead,” he adds.

“Bryce has been lying to me the whole experiment. I just feel betrayed.”

Determined to put the drama behind them and enjoy their night together, the brides and grooms are finally able to loosen up and enjoy one another’s company, laughing and joking until the night comes to a happy end.

Nah, just kidding.

After a few minutes of happy conversation, experts Mel, Alessandra and John come waltzing into the Dinner Party with a surprise for the remaining participants.

A stack of lacquered wooden boxes are placed on the table, and the collective heart rate of the room spikes…

It’s time for a final round of Honesty Box questions.

Alana and Jason are the first pair to tackle the questions, and they immediately hit home when Alana asks her husband if he trusts that she will always have his back.

“Absolutely not,” the groom responds quickly.

Ouch.

“After last week at the Dinner Party, no I don’t trust that you’ll always have my back,” he says.

As the Honesty Box makes its way around the room, Liam and Georgia have their turn, with the bride asking her husband if his “immediate network” of friends and family would accept her into his life.

“No,” he answers, and clearly we’re all in the mood for BLUNT RESPONSES tonight.

“My friends are my family, if you do not gel with them it has a huge effect in my life, and I trust what they say,” he adds to… soften the blow?

“At the start they will not accept you, hands down. Girls here, you cannot say that when you first met Georgia, you were fans?” he calls out across the table to other brides, who all look baffled by the question.

Jumping to her friend’s aid, Kerry says, “She’s got depth, she’s got intelligence, she’s got a brain, and I would take issue with your friends before I ever took issue with her. I’d f–king fight for her,” she says as Georgia bursts into tears.

Yikes.

For Johnny and Kerry, the questions relate to Kerry’s close relationship with her ex-husband and Johnny’s discomfort with that. For Belinda and Patrick, his free pass question leads to him straight out asking, “Do you love me?” to which his alarmed wife responds she is getting there.

The Honesty Box finally reaches Rebecca and Jake, and we can only hope that things will get better from here.

“Do you see us together in three months’ time?” Jake asks his wife.

“Nup,” she responds quickly and oooooh my God.

“I’m a realist, and I can’t look that far ahead. You never know what’s going to happen,” she says. When Jake presses about how she feels about him in the present moment, she doesn’t mince her words.

“I know you like me more than I like you,” she says. “And that’s a fact.”

Married At First Sight Finale Week continues Monday and Tuesday 7.30pm on Nine and 9Now. Stream every episode of Married At First Sight for free on 9Now.