'Love Island' USA 2022 recap: Islanders 'getting done dirty,' and who got dumped first
“Love Island" USA is back with new islanders, new drama and a new villa in California.
Season 4, which is streaming on Peacock and films in real time, has around a dozen islanders shacked up in a Santa Barbara villa as they couple up, compete in no-stakes challenges and navigate the drama of living with so many big personalities for six weeks.
During Week 1, five pairs of islanders coupled up, then two of them split when two “bombshells” (Mady McLanahan and Valerie Bragg) were introduced. After the first recoupling, one islander was dumped from the villa.
Here’s a recap of what happened in episodes 1 through 6, which aired July 19-24.
Meet the cast: Here are the first islanders on Season 4 of "Love Island"
Here are the first couples of ‘Love Island’ USA Season 4
It’s not summer 2022 if Lizzo’s “About Damn Time” isn’t playing.
Thus it’s only fitting that Lizzo’s bop accompanies Deb Chubb (a 26-year-old personal assistant from Dallas) and Sereniti Springs (a 28-year-old bartender from Clovis, California) as they make a slow-motion entrance into the villa.
For Deb, “Love Island” is “my last resort.” After four years, she’s ready to settle down with someone who’s just her type. Specifically, “My type is attention.”
Sereniti, who was previously engaged and has a pastor for a father, wants to find someone “that, like, I want to jump his bones mentally, emotionally and physically.”
They’re joined by Sydney Paight, a 22-year-old-operations manager for a tech startup from Houston; Zeta Morrison, a 29-year-old-babysitter and model from Surrey, England; and Courtney Boerner, a 24-year-old-stylist from Winter Park, Florida.
Sydney has found that men “always want to hook up with a redhead,” but “I don’t know if I’m too much for them.” Zeta, “the world’s sexiest babysitter," is here “to find my husband.” Courtney, who reveals to her fellow contestants that she’s bisexual, describes herself with the following: “People tell me all the time that I’m too much, and I’m just like, ‘You just need bigger hands.’”
New host Sarah Hyland shepherds the women — who make sure to do the requisite gushing over each other and the huge mansion they’ll be more or less trapped inside for weeks — through the first coupling ceremony.
Among the men, “Minnesota nice” Andy Voyen, a 23-year-old Realtor from Minneapolis, knows what he’s looking for: “a tan, blond, athletic … and nice legs.” Oh, and “If you call me daddy, it’s game over.” Timmy Pandolfi, a 29-year-old personal trainer and real estate agent from New York City, loves “words, wordplay, metaphors, similes, entendres, all that.”
Isaiah Campbell, a 21-year-old waiter from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, is “usually the person that has their drink up in the air just kind of throwing my hips around.” Jesse Bray, a 27-year-old courier from Springfield, Ohio, declares that, “You’re not going to meet another guy that respects women the way that I respect women.”
The final introduction is Felipe Gomes, a 32-year-old model from Sao Paulo, Brazil, whose type is “the brunette girl, you know, dark hair, skinny.”
The first five couples in the villa are:
Deb and Jesse.
Sereniti and Felipe.
Sydney and Isaiah.
Zeta and Timmy.
Courtney and Andy.
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Red flags start flying early for the islanders
Some couples are off to a better start than others.
Jesse says there is an “instant connection” with Deb, who agrees wholeheartedly to the women: “He’s literally my type to a T. His eyes are gorgeous,” she tells them.
After Andy reveals that he’s business partners and also best friends with his mom, Courtney reports to the women, “He’s, like, so cute. But he’s a momma’s boy.” That’s a “red flag,” she declares.
“We are just so not compatible,” she reveals.
Andy is more optimistic about his connection when the men gossip about their partners.
Ouch.
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Val and Mady enter the villa: Here's what happened
Courtney might want to rethink dismissing Andy, however, because two bombshells enter the villa to break up some couples in Episode 2. Mady, who’s here “to find the love of my life,” and Valerie go on dates with Felipe and Jesse after the men decide among themselves who should do the honors of welcoming the new women.
“Another blond?” Deb wails when the women find out about the new additions.
Jesse comes away from the date feeling that although Mady (Deb’s blond competition) is more his type, he and Valerie would have a better connection. After meeting the rest of the men, meanwhile, Valerie feels a “huge physical attraction” to Isaiah.
Since there’s no better way to get to know a potential romantic partner — and your 11 other roommates — than to learn their “sexiest secrets" and make out with each other, the producers send the islanders to the beach to compete in their first challenge.
We learn who broke a bed during intercourse (Courtney), who’s cheated on their partner on vacation (Jesse) and who got breast augmentation as a graduation present (Sereniti).
Remember how Jesse introduced himself by claiming to have the utmost respect for women? Deb understandably doesn’t find Jesse’s infidelity very sexy.
Later, Sydney earns the honor of shedding the first tears of the season when she and Isaiah hit choppy waters.
“There’s something I’m just missing from you that I don’t know about yet,” Isaiah tells her.
“I have yet to find a king who can deal with a queen,” Sydney later tells Zeta.
Two couples are broken up
After 24 hours in the villa, it’s time for Mady and Valerie to make the all-important decision of which men they want to share beds with.
In Episode 3, they break up Deb and Jesse and Andy and Courtney: Mady chooses Andy, and Valerie picks Jesse. Though Deb and Courtney are left single, Courtney’s relief is apparent. She tells Andy that she’s happy he’s found someone who his “type to a T.”
Things are also looking good for Timmy and Zeta, who have their first kiss outside of a challenge. The outlook isn’t so bright for Sereniti and Felipe, however.
“Felipe and I are definitely a friendship couple,” Sereniti says. “I don’t think I have the personality to be his little boo thing.”
This opens the doors to the newly single Courtney to approach Felipe, and the pair have their first real conversation hours after they shared spit in the challenge earlier that day.
Jesse, Val and Deb form a love triangle
Season 4’s first love triangle emerges when, after being dared to kiss every woman and asserting Deb as the best kisser, Jesse tells Zeta that he is more attracted to Deb than Valerie.
But soon Jesse is turning around and reassuring Valerie that he enjoys being coupled up with her.
“I don’t really feel any way about anyone else more than I feel about you,” he tells her.
In Episode 4, Valerie pulls an all-eggs-in-one-basket on Jesse, and he reciprocates, insisting he’d rather be coupled up with her than Deb.
Meanwhile, Deb makes it clear to Jesse that she is still gunning for him. He tells her that he “barely even knows” Valerie and would like the chance to get to know her.
“This is the most I’ve talked about my feelings in, like, my whole life,” Deb tells Jesse. “Like, this sucks.”
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Bombshell Tyler enters ‘Love Island’
The next morning, the women find none other than a 23-year-old Ph.D student from Cleveland floating in their pool.
The long-haired man’s name is Tyler Radziszewski, and he claims in his intro package: “I have the confidence. I have the hair. I have the looks, and I am a Ph.D student. What more could you want?”
In order to help Tyler get comfortable in the villa, the producers introduce the next challenge, in which the men and women vote for the best kisser of the opposite sex while blindfolded and wearing noise-canceling headphones.
After they all watch their friends making out with their partners, Valerie is declared the winner among the women, and Timmy is crowned the best kisser among the men.
The drama heats up later in the evening, when Deb and Valerie finally compare notes on how their love triangle is faring. Turns out, Jesse had been leading both of them to think they were his first choice.
“If he’s telling you the same thing he’s telling me, it’s like, OK, how do we know which one is true?” Valerie says.
Jesse fesses up when Valerie confronts him and apologizes: “If I led you on I’m truly sorry,” he says before admitting that he’d rather be with Deb.
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Valerie is ready to move on — “On to bigger and better things, I’ll tell you that,” she says in a one-on-one interview — and Tyler becomes her second chance at staying in the villa.
After receiving a text that he can invite two women on dates in Episode 6, Tyler spends time with Valerie and Sereniti on the beach. But as new possibilities start to bloom there, the door seems to be closing between Andy and Mady. Claiming that things with Mady are not going beyond the surface level, Andy strikes up a conversation with Sydney.
“I feel a lot better when I’m with you,” he tells her.
Sydney says that while she’s happy with Isaiah, she is open to getting to know Andy as well. Soon, the men are forced to make up their minds when the next recoupling is announced.
Here’s who coupled up in Episode 6:
Timmy and Zeta.
Jesse and Deb.
Felipe and Courtney.
Andy and Sydney.
Tyler and Sereniti.
Andy choosing to recouple with Sydney prompts Isaiah to assert that, “The good people are always been getting done dirty” before he chooses Mady.
This makes Valerie the first islander to be dumped in Season 4. Jesse apologizes to his former partner, feeling partially responsible for her early departure.
Where to watch 'Love Island' USA
New episodes of "Love Island" USA Season 4 stream starting at 6 p.m. MST Tuesdays-Sundays on Peacock. Saturday episodes are recaps.
Reach Entertainment Reporter KiMi Robinson at kimi.robinson@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter @kimirobin and Instagram @ReporterKiMi.
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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: 'Love Island' USA Season 4 premiere: Who went home first
