Who Left Michael At the Altar? The MAFS Runaway Bride Conspiracy Theories
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It’s the show’s first runaway bride in 17 seasons and audiences were left scrambling to find out who left Michael at the altar on Married at First Sight. The Lifetime TV show was created in July 2014 on FYI. The premise derives from the Danish TV show Gift Ved Første Blik. The first season took place in New York City and New Jersey and showed off three couples, who like the show describes, are married when they first meet each other.
One of the matchmakers on the show, Pastor Cal, told E! News about his views on marriage on the show. “I’ve learned and tell couples now that marriage doesn’t work—people work. And quite often, we want the marriage to work,” he said. “Sometimes we want to blame the marriage and say the marriage is not working, but it’s you. You’re not working. You’re not doing the things that are necessary. You’re not communicating and not being vulnerable. You got to be kind. You got to be honest. And you’re gonna have to put in the time and don’t give up too quickly.”
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Out of 64 couples that have walked down the aisle, only 11 are still together, meaning the success rate of the show is 17 percent—only 6 percent in the past three seasons—and who left Michael at the altar only adds to the list of failed relationships. Now the fans are becoming suspicious.
Season 17 of Married at First Sight premieres Wednesday, Oct. 18 at 8 p.m. ET on Lifetime. Here’s how to watch it for free.
Who left Michael at the altar?
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The identity of who left Michael at the altar remains a mystery, though some sites have incorrectly reported her name is Chloe Brown. Fans on social media, including Instagram and Reddit however, have pointed out that Chloe is Michael’s replacement bride after the first mystery woman backed out of their marriage.
“Yeah, my understanding from what’s been posted in this sub is that he marries Chloe 2 months later in March which is why the season is late in airing. There’s a marriage license application for the two of them in March floating around. The others were all in January,” one fan speculated on Reddit. This was seemingly confirmed by a show fan account, @mafsfan, which clarified: “NOTE: Chloe is not the “runaway bride”. They get married Approx 6 weeks after the initial weddings,” in the comments section.
During the October 2023 premiere of season 17, fans watched as Michael stood at the altar as he prepared to meet his future wife for the first time. “My biggest hope for this marriage is that we truly are a great match together,” he told cameras before his nuptials to a stranger, hoping it was going to be “fireworks” when he met her. “That it’ll be evident to us as we grow together.” He watched as she made her way down the aisle—the audience didn’t see her face, but Michael said she was “beautiful”—until she said: “I don’t think I can do this,” before the ceremony abruptly ends in everyone’s shock. “That hurt,” the disappointed groom is heard saying.
Fans aren’t buying it, though, and the /MarriedAtFirst Sight subreddit is filled with conspiracy theories that the whole thing was staged. In the thread “Is anyone else not buying this weird faceless rejection at the alter?” fans discussed what they thought of the unidentified bride. “The voice seemed fake. U can’t see her face but u can tell the sound doesn’t seem to match the way her head is bobbing,” one wrote. “Another possibility is that it’s one where they knew each other and the wedding scene is a complete reenactment to keep people interested in him while they scramble to find him another bride and it’s going to be some great redemption story. I hope it’s the latter personally. There’s not too often where I feel bad for someone on TV but I genuinely felt bad for this dude.”
Another speculated: “Something definitely feels fishy (they kept her reveal a surprise) but I think there is an untalked about angle. If she had signed the paperwork and backed out then the Producers still wouldn’t want to show her face or talk to her. Doing so would encourage others I future seasons to just goof around to be in tv for a hot minute. In my humble opinion.”
Fans also had theories on why the runaway bride’s face didn’t appear on-screen. “I don’t think that the person who didn’t go through with the wedding ever appeared on screen and I don’t think they changed their mind right before the ceremony. It’s obvious that this was reenacted, even if it was just a few minutes after the real ceremony,” they said. “There was nobody on the brides side, just empty seats. The person in the wedding dress that walked down the isle alone was never shown. So, maybe we heard her voice (from backstage or another time. They didn’t even show a match for him on the matchmaking episode. They had to regroup and come back to that? Come on. It’s like when they tell their friends they are ‘engaged’ and they seem so surprised. Why else would there be a camera crew there?”
Multiple sites have reported there’s a $50,000 fine for any cast member who leaves production early for a non-excusable reason, but forced marriage (via force, fraud, or coercion) is illegal in the United States and it’s considered a human rights violation. In the supposed Married at First Sight leaked contracts, however, there is no word on whether this alleged fine applies to cast members who decide to get divorced before Decision Day.
Who does Michael marry?
As we said, it’s all a bit of a mystery of who Michael marries, but all signs point to a woman named Chloe Brown, who’s been identified as a senior director at the American Heart Association.
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