The final vows for MAFS 2026 have been spoken (or not spoken) and we’re honestly tearing up with joy…and awkwardness.
While Stella and Filip had the happiest ending imaginable for a reality TV show of this calibre, and Rachel and Steven took their relationship status from MAFS to real-life official, other couples like Bec and Danny and David and Alissa had a different end to their “love” story.
After Danny rejected Bec, he expected to be “abused” by his bride. Instead, Bec apparently made his anti-vow “harder” than he thought as he had to watch her walk away and cry.
I mean what did he expect? She’s been professing her love for him the entire show…?
However, the final vows moment that has people divided is David’s decision to simply not hear Alissa out when both contestants decided to walk away.
Speaking to WHO, David said that if it wasn’t for the structure of the MAFS experiment, he would’ve walked away from Alissa much sooner than anyone watching would’ve expected.
Questionable behaviour or not, did Alissa at least deserve a final word?
‘Shut down, controlled, and unheard’: Should David have walked away sooner?
David and Alissa’s final vows didn’t go as one would expect marriage vows to go. That is, David said his piece and then walked away before Alissa could reject him in return.
Despite opening with a lovely reflection on how “effortless” their relationship was at first and how much he admired Alissa for being “unapologetically” herself, the drama after Homestays was evidently too much for their relationship to handle.
In the end, Alissa’s behaviour at the end of the season caused the groom too much “pain” and left him “heartbroken, fighting for a relationship that only he wanted to fight for.”
Not even a second after his final word was spoken, David turned for the door and sped down the aisle, surprising Alissa by not even hearing her final words and decision.
After an awkward pause – and possibly some pushing from the MAFS producers – Alissa read out her final vows to an empty church as David’s footsteps trailed on in the distance.
In the end, Alissa ended her vows with a simple, “I love you David for who you are, but not for me.”
Does David still have more to learn about himself and relationships?
Even though he knew they would both be walking away from each other after the final vows, he could’ve at least heard Alissa out…right?
He justified his bold move by saying that he “had to look out for [himself]” as he’d done all the “listening” in their relationship and was done. So done that he couldn’t listen to her just one last time.
David told WHO about the “pain” he felt from Alissa’s behaviour through the MAFS season, saying that he felt “blindsided” and “gaslit” by the “red flags” he saw from the start – that is, the “get down on one knee” drama from episode one.
“I did so much work to change and then I get on MAFS and the first thing that happens is the same thing I told the experts I wouldn’t want again because it happened to me in the past,” he admitted. “Get down on a knee. Boom, straight away hit in the gut.”
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In David’s mind, MAFS was the opposite of a learning experience.
“I wish MAFS had been a great learning experience,” he said. “But at the same time, the lessons I’ve learned, I already learned.”
“So when I went on MAFS and was so calm and non-reactive, it’s because I spent a year listening to podcasts. Teaching myself how to be not toxic because I had toxic relationships in the past.”
Shout out to podcasts, I guess!
David also told WHO that Alissa’s behaviour, as well as the behaviour of other brides, was inexcusable.
“I won’t make an excuse for [women who’ve been through trauma] because I’ve been through trauma,” he said. “I’ve been treated s–t repeatedly and still not treated someone else like s–t.”
“Why I’ve never had a long-term relationship is because I would see a red flag and I would know this was no good and leave. [On MAFS] I did something different, which was I stayed on, passed all the red flags and it still bit me in the butt. So it’s one of those things like, did I learn something or did I just like go on national television to be hit in the gut again for the same thing, you know?”
It seems David’s move to not hear Alissa out was his chance to finally do what he wanted to do from day one…walk away.
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