Temptation Island: Why we hate to love Netflix's dating show revival

Temptation Island isn't a new show for OG reality TV fans. It originally premiered in 2001 and was rebooted in 2019.

After a brief break, the show is back with a bang, or several, for Netflix users to gasp at worldwide. Let me tell you, you could not waterboard out of me the things the cast is willing to admit to the world on camera.

Let's break it down.

The Temptation Island host

This may not be the Mark Walberg I signed up for, but it's definitely the one these islanders need. Frankly, all reality dating shows desperately need a Mark L. Walberg. His combination of advice, holding the daters accountable, and genuine caring is a refreshing change from some other hosts and experts who can barely remember the cast member's names.

Walberg, who looks suspiciously like a male version of Ellen DeGeneres, doesn't just pop in to read some cue cards and head home. He sits the men and women down for regular bonfires to reflect on their actions and behavior and why maybe, possibly, perhaps, these 20-somethings need to look within if they can't keep their pants on for three minutes without cheating.

The couples

From the moment these four troublesome couples stepped into their cargo vans to head to Temptation Island, I knew we were headed for trouble. There may only be two passengers in the van, but there's enough emotional baggage for an entire nation.

Like the Love is Blind season 8 cast, I found it hard to tell two of the men apart and even two of the women who happened to be paired with them. Ashley and Grant? Tayler and Tyler? These duos are your typical gym bros and blonde bombshells. Nothing new there.

Ashley and Grant have been together for a year and a half, and he knows he wants to marry her. However, he cheats a month into their relationship, follows her to Greece to apologize, and convinces her to show up to this train wreck to "prove he can avoid temptation." I'll let you guess how that goes, but if you can't, I have serious concerns about your well-being.

Tayler and Tyler are equally up the creek without a paddle. Tayler described this as their Hail Mary. Why she wants this man is beyond me. She is supporting him while he seems to make excuses for not holding a real job to focus on his modeling "career," she pays the bills, he cheats on her, and they genuinely seem miserable together.

We also have Shante and Brion, who, despite only having been together for a year, want to commit to each other (allegedly) despite having the compatibility of a stiletto and a marshmallow. Their whole challenge, however, is Brion, a religious and spiritual mentor that he is, wants to be polyamorous and isn't satisfied with Shante's sexual appetite. This should go swimmingly.

Next, there are the only couple I'm holding a sliver of hope for, Alexa and Lino. Netflix really needs to do a better job of putting title cards on screen. I called this man-boy Leon for three episodes before I realized his name was, in fact, Lino. Lino cannot get over Alexa having chosen someone else initially having cheated, or their constant fighting.

They have somehow, some way, made it 3.5 years and through three major moves and want to get engaged even though Leon/Lino has never been in another relationship, and from the descriptions they individually give, they'd both be better off with potatoes than each other.

The singles

In parade somewhere between 12 and 200 single men and women in their Handmaiden's Tale: Sexy Beach edition finest to try to lure the couples to the dark side of Temptation Island. They do their little dance and give some cheesy lines to forget them by, including confessions that I hope their families never see.

I'm not a prude, but aren't there censors for this kind of thing? We're just going to talk about how down and how dirty we get for the whole ever-loving world to hear. I must be getting old.

Speaking of old, the age ranges of these daters is wild. The youngest is 22 and the oldest is somewhere in his mid to late 30s. And yet, with the exception of one or two, they all have the emotional intelligence of a thumb. Their job, after all, is to break up these couples, not to provide psychoanalysis.

It's also initially pretty difficult to tell the single apart. There are only so many ways to separate one six-pack from another. I'm not 100 percent sure I have them all sorted, except for the ones that initially cling to their new perspective partners like peanut butter to jelly.

Kay, for example, immediately marks her territory and claims Tyler as her own. They go on more dates on their ten days on the island than Tyler has ever gone on in the two and a half years he has been with Tayler. Have any one of these people considered just maybe going to therapy and staying single awhile?

Brion is determined to make every woman in America hate him, playing games with every single woman on that island and having a threesome less than a week in with two of his potential "connections," Alex and Courtney. Apparently, they/that wasn't what he was looking for, though, because he spends all of two seconds debating only to invite April on a date.

Grant, king F boy of the island, gets naked with Natalie, hoping turning off the lights will cover up his dirty deed. Netflix 1, Grant -1000. The cameras have night vision, and despite acting crushed, he cheats on Ashley, icing out Natalie, which lasts all of 10 hours before he is back to breaking the rules.

The bonfires

These sit-downs with the men and women separately are supposed to be a chance to self-reflect and grow. If you're like these men, though, who have the self-awareness of a spoon, the majority of the night is spent figuring out why the women say such awful things about you, instead of acknowledging that while the comments are pretty harsh, they are also 100 percent accurate and a reflection of their own actions.

Watching reality TV frequently makes me want to throw my TV in the ocean, and the feeling has never been stronger than listening to Brion admitting that while the threesome he had felt empty, he knows Shante will take him back, and he can continue to walk all over her. I'm not buying he wasn't into it. I am, sadly, buying that Shante doesn't realize her worth and where this man belongs. Not her bed. W

The men continue to live out their fantasies, while the women have mental breakdowns over their dumpster-fire boyfriends. It only gets worse when Mark L. Walberg, who I will only refer to by his full name, introduces temptation tents. Or zones. Camps? Whatever. The place everyone cheats in.

It takes all of five minutes for Grant, who was so heartbroken minutes earlier, to go back to giving Natalie his undivided attention and unbuckled pants. When Mark L. Walberg mentioned a light went on at the opposite gender's house to let the others know someone was getting it on in the tents, I was NOT expecting Defcon 1 apocalypse alerts. The producers are diabolical for using flashing emergency lights and sirens to wake these women and men out of dead sleep to let them know that someone on the other side of the island is getting it on.

I hate that I love it. I truly hope, for their own sakes, all of these couples are make-believe and just in it for influencer fame. While it usually drives me nuts that the fame-hungry are cast on more "serious" dating shows, Temptation Island is a train wreck from day one and never pretends to be anything more. Sign me up through 2090.

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