Catfish Season 4 Episode 7 Recap: Back In Time

On this week’s episode of MTV’s Catfish, we go back in time to view an unaired episode from Season one. On this vintage episode, Nev gets an e-mail from a girl named Stephanie who was moved by Nev’s movie that revealed his personal catfish story. She’s been talking to a guy named David on Facebook for seven months and he’s been helping her through her parent’s recent divorce. The two live in L.A. but whenever Stephanie tries to plan a meeting with David, he always makes excuses. She’s dealt with being lied to by men in the past and doesn’t want history to repeat itself.

Nev and Max fly out to California to meet with Stephanie and learn more about her story. Stephanie explains to the guys that after her parents divorcing and her father cheating on her mother, she doesn’t believe she could ever fall in love. She was blindsided by her father’s actions and doesn’t want the same thing to happen to her in a relationship. It’s a really emotional journey for Stephanie because if David isn’t who he says he is, that’s just another chance at love that has crushed her heart. Either way, I feel like Stephanie is a tough girl and can handle whatever is ahead.

We get our first look at the inside of Nev’s house since they were filming in L.A. for the first time. He brings Max and the crew inside to film their detective work on David. They first do an image search and find a lot of pages made by girls saying how attractive they think this guy in the photos is. They follow one of the website’s links to another the Twitter page of a guy from the East Coast. The next step is for Nev to call David. Luckily David answers and Nev lets him know about Stephanie wanting the Catfish crew’s help. David tells Nev that he and Stephanie haven’t met because she lives so far from him.

This may be by far the easiest phone call to set up a meeting, because David immeidately gives them a day he’s free to meet. Of course, that only lasted about a minute. Nev gets a text from David shortly after hanging up with him, letting Nev know that he actually might be too busy to meet. After letting a day go by for David to think about his decision, Nev calls him again. Nev lets him know that Stephanie needs to meet with him soon — otherwise she’s ready to move on from him. David agrees once again that he’ll meet because he wants to see Stephanie but who knows how long that feeling will last.

After visiting the salon, the guys show Stephanie all the information they’ve found on David. They let her know that it’s more likely that she’s not talking to this version of David and that he’s using someone else’s photos. Now she feels like she’s been talking to a stranger so she’s a bit hesitant about meeting him. Eventually she says she wants to go through with meeting whomever David is, ending all the lies.

The next day, the gang heads out to meet up with David. Nev knocks on the door as a man named Dawuan answers, confessing he’s David. Stephanie confronts Dawuan about all his lies only to be told that those weren’t his intentions. He wanted to make sure that he was the perfect guy for her, but I guess he missed the whole part about Stephanie hating liars. Dawuan asks Stephanie for a second chance, but she’s beyond crushed and tells him that she’s now disgusted by him. I’m not taking his side but it does seem like Dawuan is genuinely sorry for his actions and upset that Stephanie doesn’t want to continue their relationship. They respectfully part ways in hopes of letting everything sink in and make more sense.

The next day, Nev and Max try to convince Stephanie to meet with Dawuan once again to get his side of the story. She’s ready to rid her life of him and start fresh, but the guys don’t think it’d be fair to Dawuan, who has been there for her for seven months. She ends up understanding what the guys were trying to tell her and goes to talk with Dawuan.

Dawuan tells Nev he created the David profile because he still had feelings for his ex-girlfriend. He wanted to continue talking with her but couldn’t on his own account since she blocked him. Dawuan also mentions how ashamed he feels for what he did to Stephanie. Dawuan says he still has feelings for Stephanie, which is great since she also came along to hear his side of the story. He apologizes for his actions and tells Stephanie that he doesn’t want to force a friendship with her. Stephanie realizes that Dawuan is a good guy and thanks him for being there for her during her rough patch over seven months.

The two peacefully part ways but Stephanie ended up cutting off communication with Dawuan after filming. She’s in a new relationship that makes her happy but says she continues to struggle with trust issues.

What were your thoughts on this hidden episode of Catfish from Season one? I feel like this episode was a lot calmer than the more outrageously dramatic ones in the more recent seasons. While I love watching all sorts of chaotic drama unfold, I also love seeing a peaceful goodbye between the two people involved. Do you think more people are trying to get on the show with crazy stories versus the more real ones like in this episode? What were your thoughts on Dawuan? I think he was genuine with his apology and truly did feel foolish for making those mistakes. I’m glad that Stephanie gave him a chance to speak to her so she could see that he was there to support her the entire time. While he lied about some things, the support was all true. Leave your thoughts in the comments.

New episodes of Catfish premiere Wednesday nights at 10/9CT on MTV.

Photos: MTV