Reality television dating shows is experiencing a major boom at the moment. This isn’t to say these type of shows haven’t been around for more than a decade now, but with the influx of streaming networks getting in on the action, there are more series than ever. As a result, there’s a rapidly growing group of everyday people popping up on screens and entering into the spotlight. Many of these people seem genuine, but a few tend to be easy to root against. Like any good television show, having a villain makes for good entertainment. But is this necessary for a show whose objective is to find love? Some shows can get by with having an unlikeable, mischievous personality in them. The Bachelor franchise loves to cast someone who fits this bill. Other shows like Love is Blind typically don’t search for one but can happen to stumble into an antagonist as Season 4 has shown us. Villains allow for sides to be taken, which leads to an increase in conversation among the fan base. Ultimately, though, these characters aren’t necessary for the world of reality dating television, but that doesn’t mean we won’t be seeing them.
Villains Make It Fun, but Take Away From the Show’s Goal
There’s been an increase among recent dating shows in finding these types of people. Love is Blind is in the midst of its fourth season where Irina Solomonova quickly found herself as the mean girl of the group. We see her poking fun at other contestants, making comments about others and stirring up avoidable controversy within the show’s confines. If there’s a blueprint for being a reality television villain, Irina sure followed it. What this has done for the series, though, is take away from the show’s ethos. Controversy is typically reserved for the newly-formed couples as they navigate through the early stages of dating to see if their two lifestyles can be cohesive. With a person like Irina, what happens is that other participants are impacted. This is something that can also be linked back to a person like Francesca Farago from Too Hot To Handle and later Perfect Match.
What both of these women did not only threw their game away, but it also negatively affected others in the house. With Irina, she played an aggressive dating game that eventually forced Bliss Poreetezadi out of the picture. Zack Goytowski wound up falling for Irina before realizing nearly instantly after leaving the pods together that this girl was bad news. Because Irina came into the game with this negative attitude and presumably didn’t take it seriously, she also brought Bliss and Zack down with her. As we have seen at the conclusion of the first part of Love is Blind Season 4 episodes, these two are going to attempt to reconcile their lost relationship, but it ultimately may be too late.
Francesca proved to one of the worst (or best?) villains when Perfect Match entered the picture. She not only affected multiple guys, she also played a ruthless game of strategy in an attempt to ruin other people’s chances at finding love. She made it a point to get people to avoid Dom Gabriel after their brief fling. Then, when he and his eventual match, Georgia Hassarati, began to see if they could work as a couple, Francesca made it her goal to put a wrench into what they were building whenever she had power. In doing this, she also strung along Damian Powers who wound up being blindsided in the end when she didn’t pick him. It was a very messy and personal game played by Francesca that showed just how much of a hindrance a villain can be on a reality dating show.
The Reality Dating Antagonist Isn’t Going Away
Ultimately, these shows will continue to insert antagonists into their cast because of the entertainment it provides. What we can hope for is that for every Francesca and Irina, there are more of the “not-so-aggressive” villains. Love is Blind has done a pretty good job up until Season 4 of having various people fit the bill of an antagonist but not an overly-mean nor intentional villain. Names like Bartise Bowden and Cole Barnett come to mind. Did they cause damage? Yes, but it never felt like they intentionally were going for that. Their actions were more so out of being ill-prepared or not realizing the purpose of the show.
A series like The Bachelor tends to mix in levels of villains. There’s your Christina Mandrell from this past season who didn’t last very long but left damage but also didn’t alter the season. Victoria Larson and Shanae Ankney are the quintessential antagonists as they both lasted long in the competition and caused chaos among their peers the entire time they were on the show. They had varying levels of meanness to them with Shanae being way more aggressive in her comments. This is going to be what we continue seeing with each new dating show. Inserting someone the fans don’t like is an easy way to create dialogue. The longer they last, as in Francesca on Perfect Match, the more that hate grows for them and the more damage they do. That’s the part that would ideally be limited, though there’s really no true way of accomplishing that while allowing them to be cast in the first place.
The boom of reality dating shows is great for the viewer. It seems that every month another new entry has entered the frame. There’s also an assembly line of seasons being produced with these franchises that make the villain discussion seem more harmful than it really is. While someone like Irina or Francesca cause damage on their shows, their time in the spotlight is, for the most part, short-lived. When a new season or show comes around, we turn our eyes to the next cast and seemingly move on from the person we last rooted against in these shows. It’s a cycle that isn’t go away anytime soon, so we can only embrace the villain and call these individuals when it goes from usual confrontation to far-too-personal of an attack.