There’s fashionably late and then there’s Carolina Santos, who showed up to her wedding three hours late on Married At First Sight Australia. Not that her groom, Dion Giannarelli, seemed to mind all that much. Despite his accommodating nature, the relationship didn’t exactly improve after that.
WATCH: Carolina keeps Dion waiting at the altar
While their wedding day was off to a slow start, Dion appeared to be smitten with Carolina.
“She’s absolutely stunning,” the groom confessed to the cameras after meeting his bride. “I was so nervous but I turned around, looked her in the eyes, and I felt a sense of calm. I felt there was a connection there.”
Spoiler alert: there wasn’t. At least not in the eyes of Carolina, who has pretty much rejected her groom from the beginning.
So much so that, during an interview with Nova’s Fitzy & Wippa, the 33-year-old bride hung up on the radio hosts when they pointed out she had done nothing to work on her relationship. How awkward and deliciously scandalous.
At the very first dinner party she attended, Carolina flirted with another groom, Daniel Holmes, who was struggling in his relationship with Jessica Seracino.
Following the Commitment Ceremony in the next episode, both couples moved into their apartments. But Jess promptly left Daniel, leading him to contact Carolina for a wine and a long discussion about how much they enjoy being at the gym.
“I feel bad for Daniel that Jess has decided to leave. I had a lovely chat with him at the dinner party. I hope he’s okay,” she told producers.
The following episode, Carolina and Daniel went to their favourite place for a catch-up: the gym. Because apparently the fact that they go to the gym is the basis for a perfect, happy relationship and to that we say an emphatic “lol.”
Meanwhile, Dion was setting up their apartment for an evening of romance complete with flowers, a cheese platter and a heartfelt letter. She did not enjoy the letter. When tensions bubbled up to the surface later, things turned ugly.
“Okay, so I’ll tell you how I’m feeling. With the letter, it was so surface,” Carolina told Dion, when he expressed disappointment that she wasn’t even trying to get to know him or work on the relationship.
“To be quite honest with you, I would have loved nothing more than walking down that aisle and meeting the man of my dreams. And that didn’t happen. And I’m like okay I’ll be positive and I’ll give this a chance,” she continued.
“I honestly feel like we are mismatched,” Carolina told him, after also saying she wasn’t attracted to his personality. Which is interesting because it’s hard to get to know someone’s actual personality when you do not speak to them.
Her reasons for not clicking with Dion was all about their interests, not personality, and included the fact that breakfast is her favourite meal of the day but he doesn’t eat breakfast, she loves the gym and he doesn’t, and she likes rap while he prefers 80s music. Literally what were we even watching?
Oh yes, we were watching someone absolutely obliterate another person’s self esteem for no reason. Great.
When Dion told Carolina he was trying, she responded to say he was “delusional” – leading him to declare he was finished with the experiment.
Dion repeated over that he had tried his hardest as he went to leave the apartment, while Carolina shot back a cruel retort that he could try all he wanted because he is “empty.”
“You have nothing, that’s why. You can try all you want, you have nothing, you’re empty,” she said, while he replied: “I have got something, I’ve got a heart.”
We have no words for that one. So, to summarise MAFS expert Alessandra Rampolla, being mean under the pretense of being honest is not okay. There’s a nice way to say “I don’t think we work because I have a crush on someone else” other than telling the person they are EMPTY.
“It’s like she’s upset she got stuck with me, it’s hurtful,” Dion told the cameras after the fight. “It’s… it’s just really hard because I’ve given up everything to be here. I’ve tried, tried, and tried. I really did come here to find love and it’s just been thrown in my face that I don’t have it.”
READ NEXT: All the proof that Daniel Holmes and Carolina Santos are still together
At the Dinner Party and Commitment Ceremony following, the tension was so clear even their co-stars got involved. Despite Carolina writing “leave” and Dion asking to change his to “leave” the experts made them stay in the experiment for another week.
The next week, Dion showed up solo unaware of what happened to Carolina. She showed up halfway through the evening with Daniel, leading to a mass walk-out of the contestants.
It’s no surprise the pair have hit this rough patch, with the signs pointing to a split all along.
Ahead of their first episode airing, Carolina and Dion were not following each other on Instagram despite following some of their co-stars. It’s a major red flag, since other couples like Jackson Lonie and Olivia Frazer or Domenica Calarco and Jack Millar were following each other from the get-go.
There’s also another classic spoiler in the form of paparazzi photos. Dion was filmed showing up to the MAFS reunion alone, while couples like Jackson and Olivia were snapped showing up together.
Married At First Sight Australia airs Monday to Wednesday, 7:30pm, and Sunday, 7pm, on Nine Network and 9Now.
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