An FBoy just got seriously effed.
HBO Max's wild new reality dating series FBoy Island came to a dramatic conclusion on Thursday, Aug. 12, with its trio of leads—CJ Franco, Nakia Renee and Sarah Emig—making their final choice between their remaining self-proclaimed FBoys and Nice Guys. If they chose the first option, the couple would leave the Cayman Islands together, each winning $50,000. But if an FBoy was picked, he had the power and could either split the money or keep $100,000 check for himself.
So, did they play it safe or risk their hearts (and bank accounts)? Spoiler alert! Do not continue reading if you have yet to watch FBoy Island's finale. In the, um, word of host Nikki Glaser: F-Bye!
In the end, CJ surprised everyone when she chose New Jared over her frontrunner Casey, who revealed himself to be a Reformed FBoy because he would've actually split the money if she chose him. Aw! Nakia took a chance on OG Jared, who proved his love for her was real when he split the cash.
And then there's Sarah. Oh, Sarah.
Despite having a safe and secure relationship with Josh, Sarah decided to pick Garrett, the self-anointed "king of FBoy Island," who proved he was playing a game all along when he chose to keep the money for himself and end their relationship.
"This has been a marathon," Garrett said. "I can't wait to get out of here with $100,000, no strings attached."
But, in a final twist, Nikki informed him that his prize money would instead be going to a charity of Sarah's choosing.
"Our hope was you would reform your FBoy ways, but you didn't," the host said. "You are leaving here the same person you came in as. I don't really believe FBoys should be rewarded in the end at all."
FBoy eff off, indeed!
While that moment was seriously satisfying, it also begs the question of whether or not it was fair, considering Garrett did actually, you know, win.
And that moral conundrum is exactly what FBoy Island creator Elan Gale was hoping viewers would be facing when he crafted the show.
"That's the thing with any show that has human dramatic conflict that there is no ending to anything that everyone's going to like," Elane told E! News in a recent phone interview. "I see both sides. There's a reason to reward someone for winning the game and there's also a reason not to reward someone for playing it to their worst virtues. It's an interesting problem."
But from the show's inception, "it was always part of the plan" to pull a fast one on any FBoy who chose the check over one of the leads, he insisted.
"It was based not in the moment itself, but in a concern that was raised, kind of universally, which I thought was appropriate, which is it's really interesting to do an expose and a deep-dive into 'FBoy' culture. But you don't necessarily want to turn it into a celebration."
Ultimately, he continued, their job was to walk the fine line of discussing the phenomenon without holding it up. "I think that's the key for us," he said. "We wanted to make sure that we allowed it to be and we treated it kind of non-judgmentally, as much as we could because obviously people have reasons for being who they are. And that's what makes people interesting. No one is 100 percent anything, especially when you're choosing a hyper-reductive dichotomy like nice guy and FBoy, which most people aren't really either."
And it's worth noting that the Nice Guys were never given the opportunity to make that choice, so we don't know if they would've actually picked love in the end. Which begs the ultimate question: What is the show's definition of an FBoy?
"I think the simplest way of reducing an FBoy down to its most concentrated form is it's someone who says a lot of things they don't mean for sexual or social gratification," Elan explained. "I think it's somebody who is actively dishonest about their intentions. That's what the men on the show have at the starting point."
Of course, it's not that simple.
"Simultaneously, there are a lot people who are ''Nice Guys' who do that also, but aren't maybe aware of it," noted Elan, who previously spent a decade as one of the most well-known producers on The Bachelor franchise. "It makes you wonder if the awareness is part of the issue. Does intent change outcome? And that's another really interesting question we can get into in different seasons."
That quandary, he shared, is also why the producers "had a lot of heated debates" about what to call the men who came on the show claiming they were there for love.
"In some early iterations we were talking about 'Good Guys' because the alliteration is there," Gale said. "'Good Guy Grotto' sounds better than 'Nice Guy Grotto.' But we didn't place a moral value on goodness because people that are good aren't necessarily good and people who are FBoys aren't necessarily bad. Those things change."
Does your head hurt a little bit right now? Well, that's modern dating in a nutshell.
"All of this s--t is really confusing," Elan stated. "My thesis generally when it comes to dating—whether it's on this show or any show—is that it's all confusing, it's all weird, it's all kind of made up by whatever society is telling you in any decade, period. But there are no right answers, it's all ridiculous."
F-Yeah it is.
FBoy Island is streaming on HBO Max.