Loveday Writing

Ainsley confides in Ben about Simmo’s habits and her struggling to get used to them. Ben points out that they’ve only just moved in together and there’s bound to be a few crinkles to iron out. When her and Simmo are lying in bed together, he tells her that he’ll be going to Kerang for a few days to help Bourkie out with his home renovations.

The next day, Ainsley comes home from work and finds she quite enjoys having the self-contained room to herself. While she’s spending the night in bed, eating ice-cream and enjoying some rom-coms, she gets a call from her father, Des, who tells her that Simmo is loitering outside his house. Meanwhile, Simmo goes to see Des and asks for his permission to propose to Ainsley. After Des gives his approval, Simmo conference calls Ben and Heather to let them know and ask for their help in planning a romantic proposal. Ainsley calls him and he accidentally conferences her in, which results in Ben almost breaking their cover.

Later, Ainsley talks to Heather about the fact that if Simmo was in Tasmania to see her father, she thought it might be to get his permission to propose, but Heather tells her she watches too many rom coms, trying not to spill the beans.

The next day, Harry, Heather, Liz and Ben meet with Simmo to discuss his proposal plans. He owns land at Diamond Creek that he plans to build his dream home on one day. He tells them it will be a four step process, each with its own station, representing four key memories of their relationship. Ben, Harry and Liz will be at a station, and he will be at the last one where he will propose. They all come up with an idea to get Ainsley to the land by saying they are staging an intervention to deal with Heather’s “break-up depression”.

Later when Harry and Liz tell Ainsley about the intervention, Ainsley tries to talk them out of it, to the point where they have to put their foot down and tell her to just get Heather there. Heather organises the Uber for her and Ainsley to take them to the land.

When they get there and start walking the path Simmo has cleared, the first station they arrive at has Ben making drinks, reading off a card Simmo prepared. Ben talks about Simmo’s memory of meeting her for the first time and falling in love at first sight. The next station has Harry, surrounded by Diwali decorations, Harry talks about Simmo’s memories of them decorating the house and dancing together at the Diwali celebrations they held in the previous season. The third station has Liz with the tent he lived in during the self-contained room renovations, which leads to him bringing up the memory of the loss of Evie, when he talks about her warmth. Heather, seeing Ainsley become overwhelmed with emotion, tells her she doesn’t have to go through with the proposal if she’s not ready. Ainsley tells her that she loves Simmo and he is wonderful, but she is still putting herself back together after Evie’s loss.

We then seeing Heather walking towards Simmo alone, while Ainsley is in the tent, with her as well as the others unsure of what to do. Ainsley suddenly gets out of the tent, without saying a word and goes to Simmo. The last station has the crates they sat on, on the site where he was when she came to see him and told him she was ready to give a relationship a go. He proposes and she says yes.

The episode ends with Simmo calling his mother, Pam, to give her the good news, and she starts making wedding suggestions to Ainsley.

Harry and Liz – There wasn’t much of a focus on them, however there was progression in their story arc, with Harry telling Liz that Geri’s back in Melbourne as she and Sam have broken up. Harry also tells her that Geri’s put the family plans on hold for the foreseeable future. Harry tells Liz he’s relieved as he now knows he’s not the reason they were pulling away. After he leaves, Heather comments on Liz’s recent, excessive online shopping, and asks her what’s wrong, but Liz denies anything being wrong.

Liz calls Geri and asks if she wants to meet up, Geri says it’s best if they forget anything ever happened. Later, Harry goes to see Geri at her house after she invites him over, she tells him that she has feelings for Liz, Liz knows, and she begged Liz not to tell him about it as she wanted to tell him herself. She also tells him that they kissed.

When Harry and Liz arrive at Simmo’s land to prepare for the proposal, they briefly argue before Harry tells her that they’ll talk about it later.

Ben and Heather – There wasn’t much of a focus on their relationship, or lack of, as they were busy helping Simmo with his proposal.

Overall I felt that this was the best episode of the season so far. It was nice to see Simmo get the spotlight with his proposal to Ainsley. His way of planning and preparing the proposal gave us a great insight into his character and his love for Ainsley. I was worried that Ainsley was going to say no, and based on the reasons why she provided to Heather, it would be understandable, but I’m glad she said yes. Hopefully the doubts she felt won’t come back to haunt her. The emotion and performances by all the actors were absolutely incredible. I’m looking forward to (hopefully) seeing Ainsley and Simmo get married. In regards to the Liz-Harry-Geri story arc, it will be interesting to see where they go from here now that Harry knows about Liz and Geri’s kiss, and now that Sam and Geri are no longer together.

Stray Observations:

Running gag – Ben and Simmo’s mutual couple friends, Bourkie and Leesha, constantly breaking up and getting back together again.

-According to Ben, Simmo teared up when he showed him how to ‘reply all’ to a group email. He said it was too impersonal.

-Reliability is a trait in Simmo that Ainsley has always admired.

-According to Ben, Simmo has a system for pillows.

-At the start of the episode we see Ben pickling vegetables in jars, although we never find out what he planned on using them for or when.

-Simmo tried to swipe right on Ainsley’s photo on Instagram, only to end up liking and unliking her photo multiple times.

Best one liners and interactions:

• “I’ve waited over half my life for this, I wasn’t gonna let a general lack of neck support get between me and happily ever after.” (Ainsley)
• “Moose, that slow moving apprentice bloke, not Benny, the other one, Boof or Biff?” “Simmo?” “Ah, tip of my tongue.” “What about him?” “He’s here, he’s loitering between the front fence and the gum tree.” “That’s impossible.” “You haven’t told him I did well with my super have you? Or the bitcoin.” (Des and Ainsley on the phone)
• “Are you financially independent?” “Yes sir. I run my own business and I firmly believe in the power of compound interest.” “Who do you barrack for?” “I’d prefer not to say, sir.” “Why’s that?” “I’m afraid you might not like the answer, sir.” (Des and Simmo going back-and-forth)
• “He’s looking at this asbestos removal as metaphoric or something. He reckons if he can’t resolve the toxicity in his home, he’s not gonna be able to resolve it in his relationship.” (Simmo to Ainsley on the phone, trying to lie about where he is)
• “What’s the dress code?” “Just…nice.” (Ben-Simmo on his proposal plans)
• “Did you need me to act morose just to sell it?” “No I think we’re OK on that front.” (Heather then Harry on the plan to tell Ainsley that they’re giving Heather an intervention on her depression)