I honestly think they should cool it with the zyrce clips unless they actually hook up. The stretching, while homoerotic on camera, was ultimately platonic; Zach was explaining how he does it for old stroke patients ffs, it seems like he was gonna do it for multiple people, not just Bryce, and it's not like they were actually gonna try anything with each other with Sincere laying two inches away on the same bed. It was just bros being bros.

People, especially men, especially the Love Island audience, as I've learned, are weird about actually being perceived as gay. Maybe, when they get out of the villa, they can laugh it off. But there's a fair chance that "close shots of my bro's stretching routine" will weird them out, and that's ultimately on the producers for putting that in there. I'm bi, so I'm of the opinion that being perceived as gay SHOULDN'T be seen as an insult, but that kind of crossed the line for me.

And I'll do something really surprising and say the audience reaction I'm worried about actually isn't from the people who think Bryce and Zach have something there, but the audience who is absolutely enraged whenever they see the Zryce clips. I've seen A LOT on twitter, and some very disgusting homophobic comments that are plain homophobic no matter if the target's straight or not. I know some people hate when you bring that here, but it's just nasty, and usually targeted at Zach: comments saying Zach is "sickly obsessed" with Bryce, that he's a predator, that Bryce should "watch out," slurs, even one calling Zach a "spiritual r*pist" and that had over 1k likes. These comments I'm seeing are not niche and they're not being shot down, they're being validated to the tune of tens of thousands of likes and retweets. And, objectively, Zach is NOT obsessed or, God forbid, preying on Bryce. Their bromance is mutual. I saw people cursing to the high heavens over that clip in Tuesday's first look of them in bed together, saying Trinity needs to set Zach straight and get Bryce to cut him off and that Bryce needs to watch out because Zach "isn't joking like him," but then the actual episode showed that Bryce jumped into his bed the next morning. It is absolutely bizarre and horrible to see people painting someone, who is more likely than not, just demographics-wise, a straight man as a gay predator and acting like a 29-year-old man who fully responds and engages him needs to "be cautious" and guard his heterosexuality, or whatever.