reality tv

Mamamia recaps Wife Swap: Dear God. There are quadruplets who eat ice-cream for breakfast.

Welcome to another episode of a show we’re pretty sure is banned in multiple countries.

Straight away children are screaming and we’re regretting our life choices. They are piled up like a traumatising halloumi stack and throwing stools around the room.

Do you SEE IT?! 

Meet, the Andrew family, who is made up of mum Alise, dad Todd and… *checks notes*... QUADRUPLETS. 

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Oh s**t.

Why. Are. There. Four. Of. You. 

Rather than reviewing them for myself, let’s take one of the quadruplets own review of his family: “My mum is a b*tch and my brothers are idiots. And b*tches.”

Righto. 

Quick chop change to the next new lady-wife-lady who is currently pointing at a minor who is hoovering in a semi-professional manner. Either this is her well-trained son, or she’s running a cleaning business built off the backs of child labour. Let’s hope it’s the first.

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This is the Lister family, who are described as ‘highly disciplined’ (read: fun sponges).

Their youngest child can be found on this punishment stool most of the time, questioning his life choices and regretting ‘acting like a baby’ despite the fact his is a… baby.

Blink if you're safe. 

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It’s time for the lady-wife-ladies to do the old switcheroo, and the first hurdle for Alise is… the bins.

To clarify, the Fun Sponges have approximately 562 wheelie bins, and we’re pretty sure this is where they store their joy.

A true crime doco waiting to happen. 

Across town, Mrs Funsponge rocks up at the house of the halloumi stacked children and makes a stunning observation: “I think I’ve won the lottery here. It’s not a farm.”

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...You can count your lucky stars you weren’t on last week’s episode, mate.

Mrs Funsponge has a snoop at the family photos in her new house and realises that there are four little boys heading her way. The colour drains from her face.

“I know what my boy is like, and there’s only one of him. So I’m imagining him times four.”

Need a visual for that? Course you do.

HALP. 

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It’s officially time for Mrs Funsponge to meet the halloumi stack kids, and this is bound to be chaotic. 

They scream each other's names as a hectic way of introduction and then hit up Mrs Funsponge with their first question. Which, of course, was:

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but are you a lesbian?”

ME SCUZE?!

via GIPHY

Back at the Funsponge’s house, the lady-wife-lady is strangely stressing at how organised things are. She’s met the kids, they were polite and calm, and she cried. Actual tears.

She wipes her tears and gets ready for dinner, and as they all sit down to enjoy a plate full of what looks to be twigs.

Twigertarian. 

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Man-spouse-man whacks out a timer and plonks it in front of the son. “He has a timer, because he takes too long to eat,” the daughter explains.

We’re suspicious that this is simply his allotted 20 minute dinner break from his shift at the child labour cleaning corp.

But alas, employee #808 fails to eat his twigs in time and is banished to the punishment stool.

Surprisingly joyous to be banished. 

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It’s day two for the lady-wife-ladies and we’re pretty sure Mrs Funsponge is on the brink of putting the entire halloumi stack in the bin.

Breakfast time with the quadruplets involves them deciding what they want and eating it. For one, it’s pancakes, for another it’s ice cream, for the third it’s prawn crackers and for one creative little soul, it’s ketchup in a milkshake. 

God help us all. 

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On the flip side, Alise is having to make a group protein shake for the Funsponges and she describes it as the “most grossest thing ever. Yuck”. 

Cleary her palette has adjusted to the ketchup-milk-unami flavour. 

Is this from one of the 562 wheelie bins? 

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Skipping forward to the Halloumi Stack household and they have decided to throw a pool party.

There are noodles, there are millions of nine-year-olds and every single one of them is chanting “chug, chug, chug” as a boy downs what we really hope is not a double black.

Do not try this at home. 

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The Funsponges, comparatively, have thrown a party of their own. Where they are counting portions of vegetables.

It is with this greatest respect that I reject the RSVP to this shocker of a shindig.

One asparagus for you, one asparagus for me. Nah thanks mate. 

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RULE TIME. The lady-wife-ladies are about to deploy their way of lives on their respective families. AKA the moment everyone has a complete and utter meltdown.

Alise chucks out the protein shakes and brings in pancakes and playtime.

And Mrs Funsponge puts approximately every non-raw-vegetable food item directly into the bin. Oh, and she cuts down tech time from five hours a day to just 30 minutes.

Funnily enough, this goes down like a lead balloon with the Halloumi Stack.

 

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In fact, it goes down so badly that one of the individual halloumi sticks packs up his things (read: a pair of socks) and walks straight out of the door. WE HAVE A RUNAWAY, FOLKS.

At some point off screen, the child returns home. Probably dragged in by a producer promising him that the ketchup milkshakes will return.

The next morning, as their first mass punishment, one half of the stack are served up the food they failed to eat last night at dinner, for breakfast.

Yup. Peas, tomatoes and a cold slab of chicken at 7am. Just the way you like it.

The very definition of gourmet. 

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Across town Alise has decided to redecorate the punishment stool. She asks the small child slave to rip the rules sign off the wall and throw it into the bin, and he looks at her like she has freed Dobby the house-elf. 

Now the lady-wife-ladies have done their duties and stirred the pot of the opposite household. But now it’s time for them to meet each other face to face and tell their fellow lady-wife-lady that they are a rubbish mum. Aww.

As different as these two are, they actually aren’t as horrific to each other as we anticipated. Dang.

The lady-wife-ladies return home and Alise fills the cupboards with snacks and tech-time still happens on the weekend, which is progress. Kinda. 

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Mrs Funsponge reinstates her punishment stool, and we say a little prayer for Dobby.

UNTIL NEXT WEEK.

Feature Image: Channel 7 + Mamamia.

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