Love Island USA Recap: Me Sowing, Me Reaping

Love Island
Episodes 27-29
Season 8 Episodes 27 - 28
Editor’s Rating ★★★★
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Each season of Love Island USA contains approximately 1 million episodes, and we are recapping all of them. Check back for morning-after recaps of weekday episodes and a Monday roundup of the weekend’s shenanigans. 

So that’s seven Islanders gone in just two episodes. Trinity thinks “that’s too many heads,” but, frankly, the villa needed a bloodbath. The last true dumping was so long ago I barely remember it, and we had gotten to the point where there were too many couples to care about. Case in point: Why is Caleb and Jaiden’s “Say Less” shouting match the first conversation I’ve seen them actually have? More importantly, why do I have zero investment in this argument? I simply do not have it in me to care about all of these bombshell couplings when the OGs are dealing with their own interpersonal dramas. This is why, historically, bombshells rarely couple up with each other, by the way, and it is why Carl, Dylan, and Titi were never in any serious danger. 

There is an obvious way for the first dumping — in which four Islanders (plus Jen) are booted — to go, and that is the way that it does. However, it also opens up some new animosities in the villa … or at least it reveals some old wounds. The second dumping is, if possible, even more a fait accompli, but it gives Zach an opportunity to ponder his own unpopularity with the American public — and it left me to wonder who is voting for KC. I’m not saying this out of malice. KC is as confused as I am. The one person who truly got hosed here was Jen. She has to first suffer being rejected and thereby dumped by Gal, the Casa guy she brought into the villa, only for Gal and his new pick, Amora, to be dumped by the other Islanders that very night. But Jen’s fate was sealed the moment Gabe was dumped by the girls (oh, yeah, that was the last dumping!), and none of the other OG boys were willing to give her the time of day.

Getting rid of Islanders on 1.5x speed

We spend very little time in the daylight over these two days. On Friday’s episode, we spend just enough time lounging around the villa to remind us of the Jen-Gal-Amora triangle, the fact that Jaiden and Caleb are still here, and that Melanie is incapable of dropping Sincere. It doesn’t help that Aniya is loudly Team Sincere, a position I cannot in good conscience support. I second Kayda, who says, “What about Team Melanie’s feelings?” After Caleb gets the recoupling text (boys get to pick this time), we can spare one moment to allow Amora and Jen to simultaneously regret the fact that their fates are in the hands of a man, but not a moment more, because we’ve got a lot of Islanders to cull and we’re wasting daylight. 

Once at the firepit, things continue to zip along. Each boy is allowed to say exactly one sweet thing about the girl they want to couple up with, but keep it snappy. At the end of the line, Gal picks Amora mostly because he kind of hates Jen, and Jen is hereby dumped. But wait, Ariana says, there’s more. They can say good-bye to Jen, but then it’s back to the firepit because they have four more people to dump. At this point, I start to wonder how long, exactly, the Islanders are going to be filming tonight. A recoupling is always going to require a long evening, but a recoupling with an elaborate dumping ceremony tacked on top? There is not enough grilled cheese in the world that would keep me upright for all of that. Maybe that is why some of the Islanders are testier than they needed to be when ranking one another by compatibility, which is how the next dumping will be decided. 

There was only one way this was ever going to go, really. Gal and Amora barely know each other, and Jaiden and Caleb have been complaining about one another for the past three days. Sure enough, they are the two couples to ultimately follow Jen to the airport. But while every couple voted for Gal and Amora, Jaiden and Caleb almost escaped thanks to a few surprising wildcard votes. 

Kenzie and Dylan vote for Parmida and Corbin because, Kenzie says, every time Corbin talks about his connection to Parmida, he just talks about himself and how hot they are. Parmida, who counters, hilariously, that “they are both very good-looking,” is not going to let this go for an entire day. Corbin and Parmida vote for Sincere and Melanie because Corbin felt backstabbed by Sincere after Movie Night, and Sincere and Melanie vote for Dylan and Kenzie because, Melanie says, she doesn’t think Kenzie was really done exploring when she locked it down with Dylan. Which is a super-harsh way for Kenzie to discover that Melanie does not consider Kenzie one of her best friends in the villa.

While it is not technically “Friendship Island,” in many ways, it actually is, so Kenzie and Mela’s debrief the next day is really the weekend’s biggest gut punch. It turns out Melanie has been distancing herself from Kenzie since the days of Sol. What I am gleaning is that Kenzie felt bad for Sol and tried to befriend her, which hurt Melanie because she felt like Kenzie wasn’t having her back. Now Kenzie is crying, and Melanie has to wipe her tears because, on top of all of that, Parmida has spent her entire morning telling Kenzie how “petty” she is. It’s a lot. If only Kenzie knew how soon the tables were going to turn in her favor. 

The Karaoke Night competition is a big success

I don’t know who came up with making the Islanders do a Karaoke Night competition, but give that person a raise. Not only is there no food transfer and actual stakes, but nothing is more endearing than watching hot people sing badly to uproarious applause. (You’ve seen My Best Friend’s Wedding, right?) Parmida, who practices all day by doing a sort of high-pitched bird call, and Corbin are particularly bad, but none of their fellow Islanders were much better, and I love that. Nothing ruins a good karaoke night like that one friend who wants to show off their Mariah Carey–level pipes. Kenzie and Dylan win because they were the least off-key, and this turns out to be more beneficial than they thought.

America has also been voting for the couple they find least compatible, which turns out to be Corbin and Parmida, Zach and Kayda, and Kenzie and Dylan. No one is more shocked by this turn of events than KC, who takes his place among the safe Islanders with his mouth hanging open. Since Kenzie and Dylan won karaoke, they are also saved from elimination, and now the Islanders have to choose to stand behind either Corbin and Parmida or Zach and Kayda. I have so many questions about this setup. What were producers going to do if one of the safe couples had won karaoke? Why not just have two bottom couples instead of three? In any case, the big twist is not that all but KC and Titi chose to stand behind Kayda and Zach, thereby dumping Corbin and Parmida. The twist is that, while packing up his stuff, Corbin actually breaks down in tears. Bryce exclaims, “I didn’t know AI could cry!” And now, just when he’s leaving, I find I kinda like Corbin again. 

Quotes of the week

“I’m a good boy.” — Dylan 

“Abs on fleek.” — Dylan 

“You’re like a natural beauty.” — Carl 

“You gotta chop that wood down.” — Carl 

“I just hate men.” — Jen 

“Grandmama is coming.” — Aniya 

“What does French fry mean? Y’all know?” — Caleb 

“Bitch, it’s your family cat.” — Kayda