When the finalists of the sixth season of Love Island USA recently emerged from their cartoonishly retrofitted villa in Fiji, they re-entered a changed world. Their experiences, broadcast daily on Peacock, had made Love Island the number one reality series across all streaming platforms. The islanders, a group of 20somethings vying to find love and win up to $100,000, had become overnight celebrities.
As these contestants participated in raunchy challenges and made bold proclamations of attraction and betrayal during dramatic fire pit conventions, fandoms formed around them. Favorites like Serena Page, JaNa Craig and Leah Kateb (and their partners Kordell Beckham, Kenny Rodriguez and Miguel Harichi) gained millions of followers on Instagram and TikTok. The trio, who endearingly call themselves PPG after the animated superhero sisters on Cartoon Network, displayed a fierce loyalty, protectiveness and humor that came to define this season. Some of their more militant supporters initiated campaigns on their behalf, crusading for these women, who, without access to their phones, were shielded from the turbulence of internet celebrity.
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Within the Love Island universe, the USA version is one of the sleepier franchises. Whereas the original show (which launched in 2005, was cancelled in 2006 and revived in 2015), made up of contestants from the U.K., is near canonical — part guilty pleasure, part anthropological study — the American version barely made a ripple in the culture. But Season 6 upset this dynamic. The show, with its electric cast, hooked and charmed viewers. The islanders delivered on the theatrics of reality television without succumbing to total spectacle. A visceral conviction fueled the drama of their romantic pursuits, social betrayals and petty offenses. The cast, in a refreshing turn for this genre, behaved as if they weren’t surrounded by dozens of cameras or under the watchful gaze of millions of viewers.
The Love Island USA Season 6 reunion, which was filmed in New York last week and premiered on Aug. 19 on Peacock, marked a sobering, if unsurprising, moment for the franchise. It was an uneven affair, defined by the same themes generally plaguing contemporary reality TV (see Bravo): the specter of aggressive fandoms and the realities of cyberbullying. The roughly hour-and-a-half special, presided over by Vanderpump Rules star Ariana Madix, showed the wear of this particular season’s popularity on the emotionally frayed contestants, and seemed edited to mute any kind of frenzied response. Internet vitriol was such a point of focus that halfway through the program, Peacock displayed an intertitle of anti-cyberbullying resources.
The early part of this special was characterized by the routine anxiety of reunions. Some of the contestants hadn’t seen each other since the early summer, which means unreconciled feuds and unaddressed comments hung in the air. Madix opened by asking some of the islanders about how they have fared outside the villa. The winning couples were introduced and offered brief updates on their lives since leaving Fiji. Anticipatory jitters soon led to some minor emotional eruptions and real confrontations. Craig, in a thrilling nod to the Housewives franchise, pulled out physical notes with exact quotes and enumerated transgressions.
The first half of the reunion buzzed with the high tensions and candor that fans of the show are used to, but most of that passion was eventually quelled by the contestants’ conspicuous fear of fan backlash. Early in the reunion, when asked about her post-villa experience, Liv Walker said: “People don’t understand how hard it can be sometimes; the only people that really get it are the people here.” This sentiment became the overarching theme of the reunion, which seemed edited like a public service announcement (and an extended advertisement for Pizza Hut).
Too much time was wasted on rehashing the elimination of Andrea Carmona, although it was interesting to watch unedited footage of the divisive conversation. In airing the full take, the producers, in a not-so-subtle response to fans begging for them to release the tapes, reminded viewers of how the real action happens in the editing room. Other hot topics, like Connor Newsum’s brief coupling with Craig or discussions about the parts of Page and Beckham’s relationship that weren’t aired, were disappointingly left unaddressed.
Instead, conversations always came back to or circled potential fan backlash. The impact of these social media reactions was especially felt when Kateb, breaking the fourth wall (there was, to my knowledge, no live audience), addressed those who supported her. “I don’t want you to say anything negative to anyone on my behalf, I love all these people dearly,” she said. “I don’t want people to think I hate anyone sitting here.”
The moment reflected the impasse reached in many reality television franchises in the social media age: How do you maintain the excitement without reducing participants to characters? (Love Island has a particularly tragic track record with high-profile suicides.)
The thrill of reality TV depends in part on a kind of parasitic mode of relation. I’m far from a Love Island loyalist, but this season gripped me so much that even I caught myself, at various points this summer, talking about the contestants with a striking kind of assurance, as if I knew the texture of their emotional lives. My defense, to myself and to others, was that my favorites — Serena, JaNa and Leah — seemed like people I would encounter in real life. They bucked the recent trend of image artifice, recalling the more authentic personalities of reality stars of the early aughts.
I watched Love Island while scrolling through the accompanying subreddit, devouring the on-screen drama alongside the meta-narrative crafted by fans. Other corners of the internet, notably TikTok and Instagram comments, were more noticeably hostile, with some users leaving disparaging notes of disapproval on certain cast members’ accounts.
The Big Brother-esque approach of Love Island — contestants are filmed nearly 24/7 and one-hour episodes drop every day — falsifies intimacy. Perceived access becomes confused with real knowledge. This reunion was ultimately an exercise in creating some distance. Several of the contestants have, at one point or another, expressed a desire to separate themselves from the show. Page, during the reunion, used the word “disassociate” to describe her current approach. It was a sobering reminder of reality TV’s contradictions — and how the aspects that make Love Island fit for such ravenous consumption can become a nightmare to bear.
