This week’s Catfish opens with the crew and Nev singing a rousing version of happy birthday to Max, donned with cake pops and candles. Nev hands Max two cake pops side by side and makes a predictable (but still funny) ball joke. Because Nev and Max at heart are really overgrown children, and that’s what they do!
They get right down to business after that and start reading an email from Infiniti, a 19 year old who works retail in New York City as she trains to be a professional dancer. Six months ago she met a 25 year old guy named Dave who, according to her, loves music… and her. Infiniti says he’s outgoing and goofy, but also kind of a mystery because they both live in the same city and still haven’t met.
Red Flag #1!
Dave always says he’s busy or gets called out for work, and promises to make it up to her, but never actually does. Recently, he went to Las Angeles for work and told her he wasn’t coming back until March and now she feels like they wasted the time when they could have met but didn’t.
Max cuts right through the crap and says, “We’ve got a rule. When you live in the same place as a person and they won’t meet up with you – they don’t want to meet you.” Makes perfect sense to me.
They video call Infiniti to learn a little bit more about the situation. Infiniti and Dave started talking when Dave just randomly messaged her one day six months ago, acting like he saw her around the neighborhood, and suggested they meet up and go out for a date. When Nev prompts her for information about why Dave travels for work, Infiniti admits he hasn’t exactly disclosed the details, but he used to be a rapper, and this is Max’s reaction…
My reaction was pretty much the same, to be honest! I can’t blame Max for this at all! Anybody who says they’re a model or a singer/rapper is usually a catfish on this show. So this is Red Flag #2!
Max asks if Dave has any knowledge of New York, and Infiniti explains he’s mentioned a restaurant called Ruth Chris, which Max quickly points out is a chain restaurant. He cracks a joke saying, “There’s this restaurant in New York I’m dying to go to. It’s called Chipotle.”
Infiniti responds incredulously, “Chipotle is great! You’ve never had Chipotle!?”
Nev tries to explain that Max was making a joke, but Max cuts in, saying, “I can see how Dave got so far with you!” because the joke obviously went totally over her head.
Moving on, they find out Infiniti has Dave’s Facebook and phone number, so they text… but they never talk on the phone. Whenever she does call him, she either can’t hear him or he says he’s driving.
Red Flag #3!
We know from past episodes that if somebody won’t talk on the phone, it’s usually because they’re the opposite sex of what they say they are, or they have a voice that would be recognizable to the person they’re trying to catfish.
After Nev and Max make plans to meet up with Infiniti in New York, they end the video call and immediately launch into their predictions.
“This is gonna be a train wreck,” is Max’s prediction.
Nev’s joke is, “Dave Washington? I think there’s a good chance this guy has wooden teeth.”
Ba dum bum, chh!
They arrive at Infiniti’s house after Max makes the joke, “To Infiniti and beyond!” And let’s face it – we all knew it was coming. They ask her if she likes living in New York, and she says she’s lived there her whole life and is ready to leave. In a perfect world, she’d like to move to Miami, which she visited with her best friend, Nelly.
After Nev’s prompting, she tells them more about her relationship with Dave. The first weird thing that comes up is that she says he was texting her from different numbers because he said he travels so much. The number she has now is a California number, which is where he said he would be for a few months. Infiniti confesses her initial feeling is that he’s in another relationship and isn’t being honest about it.
Infiniti tries to show Nev pictures of Dave but his profile has mysteriously disappeared. Weird. She has some pictures saved to her phone though, and while scrolling through them we also see a picture of her friend, Nelly. Max asks what Nelly has to say about Dave, and Infiniti explains she thinks she should dump him. Nev asks to see their text conversations and Infiniti lets them scroll through.
Nev stops on a dirty text that basically asks Infiniti for a picture of her nether-regions, saying that if he likes what he sees he’ll come see her tonight. Nev is having none of that, and I am right there with him. Super sketchy.
“That’s kind of messed up. Like, ‘send me a picture of your vagina and I’ll come see you right now,’ it’s like… a little… gross,” Nev says.
As they keep scrolling they see that Infiniti has told him about emailing Catfish, and not surprisingly, his first response was not to do that. In fact, there’s a long-winded message vehemently asking her not to. Hmmm, I wonder why? And now she’s blocked on his Instagram account? I can’t be the only one connecting the dots, here.
After requesting for Infiniti to send them what information she has on Dave, they take off back to their hotel. Later, they read the email where Infiniti says that Dave’s Instagram is all of the sudden locked. She also says her two friends are coming to visit, Nelly and Nay, and that they can hit them up with any questions they might have.
Max immediately says, “Nay and Nelly I would just throw up there as two possible suspects considering I think this is going to be a girl because she hasn’t talked to him on the phone.”
They decide to call them. Nay goes to voicemail but Nelly picks up and they FaceTime with her. She drops the bomb that her, Infiniti, and Dave were all supposed to meet up at a restaurant in Miami but Dave never showed, and that’s when she started to think he wasn’t who he says he is. It’s also interesting that Infiniti never mentioned this at all to Nev and Max. Nelly also says that Infiniti has told her that she and Dave have spoken on the phone.
Hmmm. Nev comments on how Infiniti isn’t being honest with Nelly, but Max interrupts to say she’s actually not being honest with either of them, and only telling each of them the information she wants to tell them. Nelly quickly comes to her defense, explaining that she’s probably embarrassed, which is at least somewhat understandable.
They end the video call with Nelly and start doing a reverse image search using the pictures Infiniti gave them. All three pictures come up with no information. They find his Instagram next and start messaging some of his followers including Robert and Kabriah, and then they do a search on the phone number which comes back with a hit!
The phone number is registered to somebody named Macksimo, 35, in New York. And that’s all kinds of icky because Infiniti is only 19. Also linked to his phone number is his Facebook page, which they quickly start clicking through.
Warning for ick factor: They find a meme that says, “You call them pigtails, I call them handlebars,” and a Facebook post that says, “Say hi to your little sister for me.” I’m not even exaggerating when I said I was gagging. No freaking thank you, Catfish!
Max says, “He’s a fu**ing pervert!” and again, I agree. Hard.
They’re both convinced that Macksimo is actually Dave and he only does it because he likes young girls. In Nev’s words, he explains, “Maybe this is his thing. Just constantly make new numbers. Find girls in different places, lead them on, get them to send sexy pics of their hoo-has and he’s a total creep.”
Nev quickly points out, though, that in this day and age, they need to proceed with caution before they go and accuse somebody of things he may not have done. They agree to message Macksimo themselves, asking him if they found the right guy.
Fast forward to the next day and they still haven’t gotten a response from Macksimo on Facebook, so Max suggests they text him since they have his number already. The reply they get to their text says, “This is not Macksimo, this is Dave.”
“Dave” says he wants to talk with the about Infiniti but he’s busy right now and it will have to be in a few hours. They decide to call Infiniti and make plans to meet at her dance studio.
On the way there, they get a phone call from Dave… who definitely has a man’s voice. He says he’s just been really busy and he hasn’t had time to meet up with Infiniti, but he will send them an address where they can meet because there’s a few things he wants to clear up.
Max still thinks the voice on the phone belongs to the pictures of Macksimo, going so far as to say he’s 100% sure, but I have to say I disagree. There’s definitely nothing about his voice that sounded like a New York accent to me.
Max and Nev make their way to Infinti’s dance studio, and apparently Nev is ready to dance. Anybody watching knows where this is about to go, and it’s going to be hilarious. We get a glimpse of a very hairy stomach as Nev does some warm up moves in front of the mirror with Infiniti before we’re treated to a little clip of Infiniti doing her hip hop moves. I was expecting more hilarity that ensued, but I digress.
After that, they sit down and talk Infiniti through everything they’ve found out so far. Honestly, I’m a little underwhelmed with how Infiniti doesn’t seem to be reacting to the fact that she’s potentially been talking to a 35 year old for the last six months. I reacted harder than she did and I don’t even know the dude!
With Infiniti’s permission, they text Dave and he gives them a rec center’s address to meet up, so they head there next. They don’t go inside though, they walk around to the back of a building where they see somebody through the trees.
The first thing Infiniti shouts is, “NO! Wait! I’m confused?”
Nev asks who this guy is, and Infiniti says he’s her friend, Ray from Queens. She said they see each other at parties and get-togethers and they’ve known each other for three years.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Infiniti asks him.
He shrugs and says, “You never paid attention to me before.”
Nev asks, “Wait have you asked her out?” Ray says no, so Nev clarifies, “But you’ve liked her?” And Ray says yes.
Max asks Infiniti, “Are you disappointed or excited? I can’t tell.”
She says, “I’m just like…overwhelmed. I don’t know what to feel, what to say. I wouldn’t think it would be him out of all people.”
Ray says, “I just want to tell you… we have to clear everything up. Recently I started talking to somebody seriously. That’s why we have to clear everything up ‘cause I don’t want to keep dragging her on.”
“So you don’t want to be in a relationship?” Infiniti asks.
“Can’t,” he responds.
Nev tries to get him to clarify that he doesn’t have feelings for her, to which he responds it isn’t like that, it’s just that he has somebody else now. Of course, Nev brings up the fact that he recently sent Infiniti text messages asking her for nudes, and Dave says he was trying to do things to make her not want to see him. That’s why he tried to delete social media pages and block her.
Dave shrugs and explains, “I started it but I don’t know how to finish it, you know? I didn’t mean to hurt you in any way.”
Infiniti has had enough though, and says she doesn’t want to be around him anymore right now, so they take a break and decide to meet back up tomorrow. The next day they get a phone call from somebody named Kabriah, one of the people they had messaged who Followed Dave on Instagram.
She says, “I’m calling about Ray. I just want you to know that he’s not the Catfish.”
What the heck!?
She continues, “He took the fall for somebody else and I just want you to know that he’s not the catfish. And I don’t think this is right. Infiniti needs to talk to her friend Joneille.”
Max wasn’t even there when the phone call came through, so Nev goes off to find him and tell him what’s going on. Max says, “Who’s Joneille? NELLY?”
Nev’s reaction is priceless when they put the pieces together. His eyes go wide and he exclaims, “OH MY GOD!” I’m pretty sure my face looked almost exactly the same. Is Infiniti seriously being catfished by her best friend!?
They call Infiniti to explain the situation has changed since the last time they spoke and make plans to meet up again. Nev cooks up a plan to call Nelly and invite her over to Infiniti’s, using the ruse of Infiniti being really upset over what happened with Ray and telling her they think Infiniti could really use her help.
I kind of like this scheming version of Nev and Max we’ve been getting this season, although I did laugh out loud when Max asked, “What are we getting ourselves into?” Nev jokes that he’d almost take Macksimo over what this is turning out to be. For real though, imagine two men trying to navigate this kind of betrayal between two female best friends? Good luck, dudes.
They break everything down that’s happened for Infiniti once they get to her place, and Nev asks if it’s possible for Nelly to be the Catfish this whole time.
Immediately, Infiniti responds, “Nelly would never do that,” as you would expect anybody to say about their best friend. Nev admits that Nelly might not be the catfish and she just knows who is, but she definitely knows something. Nelly shows up to the house and Nev launches into yet another explanation of what’s happened since this morning.
Nelly looks absolutely shocked for a split second before she says, “Kabriah called and said that?” Then she looks over at Infiniti, places her hand on her knee and says, “You can’t be mad at me, okay? Ray… told me that it was him and asked me not to tell you, so I didn’t.”
Yeah, I’m betting that’s still not the whole story.
Even that’s enough to render Infiniti speechless though, and she takes off out of the room after looking like she’s about to burst into tears. Nev follows her while Max stays with Nelly. Max quickly asks if that’s all there is to the story and Nelly admits that it’s not. Color me not surprised. Max tells her that this is going to be like pulling off a band-aid and suggests she doesn’t do it a little bit at a time. He leads her back out to Infiniti and Nev and tells them there’s more.
Nelly confesses, “So… it wasn’t Ray. It’s been me.”
“You have been Dave this whole time?” Nev clarifies.
“Yup,” she answers. Then she says, “Infiniti, you’ve done it to me!”
Infiniti is surprised, asking, “When did I ever do anything like that to you?”
“You gave that boy my number in high school instead of yours and you thought it was so funny.”
Infiniti shakes her head in disbelief, saying that was years ago and not the same thing. Nelly says Infiniti did it first, and now she got her back, seeming completely unapologetic. Nev intervenes, making sure he gets this, and asks if it was all supposed to be a joke. Nelly says yes, at first, but then it just went too far. Then she asked Ray to take the fall because she didn’t want to ruin the friendship she has with Infiniti.
Max asks the question I was thinking, which is, “Do you have any romantic feelings towards Infiniti? Do you want to date her?”
“I wouldn’t want to date, but, I mean… I love her. I don’t love her like Dave loved her. I love her like a friend.”
Okay, but why would you ask your friend for naked pictures? I’m not getting it. Nelly says she did that, plus made plans and didn’t show up, not answering the phone, etc, all trying to get Infiniti to give up.
Then she has the audacity to say, “I think you should laugh about it.”
Sorry, Infiniti, but I think you might need to get a new best friend, because this one isn’t gonna cut it. Max cuts right through the crap again saying how hard it is to even sit here and listen to them talk about this because the whole thing is so juvenile and immature. Nelly flat out exploited her best friend to get a laugh and it’s just mean.
Nev pulls Nelly aside to try to get to the bottom of why this really happened, and it kind of comes out that while it all started as a joke, Infiniti started telling “Dave” things she never told Nelly, and Nelly was kind of jealous. The things she was learning about Infiniti through Dave made it easier for herself to be Infiniti’s friend. Then Infiniti got so attached and she didn’t know what to do.
She also says she got the feeling that Infiniti knew all along that Dave was never going to show up, but she just needed somebody to talk to. Infiniti and Max are listening in from the other room, and she actually nods her head and says, “That’s true.”
Once Nev and Max put the girls back in the same room, Nelly apologizes to Infiniti and asks for a hug. Infiniti denies, and Max explains she might just need some space, which Nelly agrees to with a nod of her head.
We cut to two months later and we see a video call of Infiniti and Nelly back together on vacation in Miami. Infiniti explains Nelly wrote her a long apology letter and then offered to take her on vacation as a way to make it up to her, and that they actually started laughing about it on the plane.
I’m not entirely sure I’d be able to forgive my best friend for catfishing me for six months, but I figure an all expenses paid trip to Miami might soften me up some, too. One thing I didn’t like about the ending of the episode is that they never clarified how Macksimo fit into the whole story. Why was Nelly’s phone number registered to Macksimo and led to that Facebook page? We’ll probably know.
There was no happy ending or romantic connection in this episode, but it was still exciting with a bunch of twists and turns, and I’m already counting down the days until the next one!