The 'Love Island' Power Ranking: Week 7

Every relationship has its turning point around the two-month stage. If you've been casually seeing a friend of a friend, or someone from Tinder – or that most rare of creatures, someone who approached you in public and who you actually found to be charming rather than repulsive – chances are that by the seven week mark, you’ll start doing one of two things:

1) Getting misty-eyed in a supermarket queue about something truly awful, like their concentrating face when they're tying their shoelaces, or their impression of Mr Bean (it's not even good), all the while terrifying yourself with this curious ability to feel; OR

2) Telling your mates about how you might have to end it because they wouldn’t stop going on about how into the newest Ricky Gervais Netflix special they were.

By two months, essentially, you know whether you’re in or you’re out. Herein lies the problem. I am not unique in saying that over the last seven weeks, my primary relationship has been with Love Island, a television show into which I have poured my soul, to such an extent that I can barely hold a coherent adult conversation about anything unless it involves the words "loyal" and "New Jack". And the reality is, friends, that by my watch, Love Island is a week away from telling us that it’s not really looking for anything serious and fucking off until next June, when it will re-announce itself, all tanned and oiled, and we'll be in its thrall once more.

For now, however, what we have is the dying wheezes of something we’ve come to know fairly well. So well, in fact, that we’ve picked it apart, like vultures on a carcass, the way you do when you’re pretty certain someone’s about to dump you. Hear ye, hear ye: the penultimate Love Island 2018 Power Ranking.

NEW JACK

New Jack, AKA sentient Bread Lion from Bake Off, has gone from strength to strength. First, he nobly captained his way through the Georgia-Jack-kiss saga that seemed to go on longer than all of my relationships combined. Then he broke it off with Laura in what will surely go down as one of the most reasonable and genuinely apologetic binnings-off in Love Island history. Now, he's thriving as one of the most banter contestants because he has the space to say something that isn't "I was going for the cheek and she moved", is smouldering constantly and spearheading conversations about heartbreak in which he cops to crying over a can of tomato soup in the shop. Relate to me, daddy.

HORNINESS

If you were to run a fluorescent light over The Villa at this point, I estimate it would be roughly 87 percent cum. Cum in the beds, cum on the beanbags, cum on the stems of the glasses they’re contractually obliged to quaff mostly squash out of because if anyone has more than a single alcoholic beverage ITV2 will have to answer to Ofcom for televising an orgy. If Love Island does air next year, I would be very surprised if it’s based in the same location because, much like Glastonbury, the area will need to take a fallow year in order to dry out and repair itself. They’ll have to get an ice resurfacer in there to scrape away the layers of filth, and then an exorcist to banish whatever evil has emerged from the Pandora's box that was Dr Alex lifting up the waistband of his pants like a boy who just discovered his first pube so that Alexandra could “knock” her hand against his curséd "Johnson".

JACK AND DANI

So made for television that honestly, at this point, I would take an hour a night of footage solely of Jack and Dani in a room eating different crisps and saying animal facts (Jack: "Sharks sleep vertical, mate. Standing up." Dani: "I’ve never heard anything like that in my life. These Sensations are lovely. I can’t believe that about the sharks.")

JOSH AND KAZ

Josh and Kaz are in there now to challenge your relationship with the nature of time, a gorgeous two-headed totem of a summer lost. Remember: it’s only been about three weeks since Georgia was blowing steam out of her cheeks at a frantic re-coupling, as Josh walked in, meek and head bowed, with a glowing, silent Kaz. Remember how you hated him? Remember how you supported her? How you thought Josh and Kaz would never last? And now fast-forward three little weeks: they are… basically the second-most established couple on the island? They are… almost certainly on the cusp of love? They are… so rock-solid as a couple that Josh’s main flashes of screen time this past week have been him beatboxing with Wes and New Jack (WHO I DEMAND A ROAD TRIP-THEMED SIX EPISODE ITV2 FRIENDSHIP-BASED SERIES ABOUT, IMMEDIATELY) because he and Kaz are so coupled-up they may as well be married now. What have you done in three weeks? You haven’t even changed your sheets.

RIPPED JEANS

The country is about to be gripped by a never-before-seen epidemic, and that is: lads everywhere getting debilitating sunburn on their kneecaps and their kneecaps only, because of these wretched, deliberately-ripped skinny jeans that every man on Love Island insists on wearing. The knees, the knees. They bulge out like your eyes in a gaff at 6AM. Help them. Missguided’s men’s range could have a class action lawsuit on its hands.

LAURA

Laura’s Love Island journey has been fairly shit: the show can be very tough on contestants’ self-esteem, and she’s been canned twice by two separate dudes in a matter of weeks. Luckily, Cool Paul – a half Swedish carpenter who looks like he’s on an advert for shaving foam – has been chucked in at the last minute to offer Laura a redemption arc, and Laura – understandably, after weeks of knock-backs – is messing it right up. This was best exemplified by her reaction upon being told that her new fella once snogged Britney Spears in a music video (that is: for work). Instead of asking the sensible questions (what does Britney smell like, and also what flavour is her lip balm?), you’ll recall that Laura actually responded to Paul’s attempt at banter by suggesting that Britney is "pushing 40", apparently in an attempt to undermine the globally famous pop star who this man has met exactly once. I predict their break-up one month post-Love Island, unfortunately brought on by Laura spiralling every time Cool Paul talks to a waitress: "Do you fancy her? What's going on. Don't fucking mug me off. Am not having it. Am just fucking not."

GEORGIA AND SAM

Glad they are now off my screen and free to follow the tried-and-tested unpopular Love Island couple fame route: GMB appearance where they announce live on air they are boyfriend and girlfriend, move in to an anonymous Norfolk new build, papped outside STK, sponsored content where they celebrate getting a new sofa, co-adopt tiny yapping dog, OK! weird-hug-from-behind photoshoot about being in love, Georgia solo appearance on Loose Women, weird social media silence, iPhone Note announcement of break-up. All of this will happen in the next 12 days.

THE COLOUR PINK

Poor Pink. Pink has had an awful ride. Pink’s stocks are down; its crops are dying; its family is starving. Pink is really going to take a very, very long time to recover from its association with the Prawn Boi himself, Dr Alex, who has brought shame to Pink’s doorstep via his flagrant refusal to wear sunscreen – despite literally being provided with it for free by kind sponsors Superdrug – and his shitty Nice Guy act. To recap, Alex began this week finally coupled up with Alexandra, a beautiful MUA, with whom he was punching so hard that I was surprised his hand didn’t just come clean off his arm, like the glove on Rayman. His eye, however, soon wandered when New Laura came on the scene, and having had one (1) conversation with her about fuck all, Alex decided that this "more natural" girl (i.e. "wearing less obvious makeup") was His Type, telling Alexandra that their romance was over. New Laura, however, sensed that Sir Pink is the human equivalent of a raw chicken breast festering in the reduced section, and wisely went with New Jack, leaving Alex to wither further in the sun, on his knees at lovely Alexandra’s feet. For health reasons (my own), I am not at this time taking questions about all the chat RE: his penis on Sunday night's episode. A terrible PR week for Pink.

STEPH

Steph's Love Island experience was very much that of a girl who starts at a new school in Year 10, by which point the social infrastructure is writ so deeply in stone it's impossible to penetrate unless you can cultivate an air of ease (New Laura) or confidence (Alexandra) that compels people to gravitate towards you. Which is… not what happened here.

To recap: Steph came in, seemed alright, then had one of the most spectacular emotional breakdowns of the entire series because a man who had expressed precisely no interest in her kissed someone else, and – upon realising that pretty much spelled a dead end for her romantically – tried to establish her identity as confidante-to-Alexandra, who was having none of it and literally got up and walked off in the middle of their only "meaningful" conversation. It's a hard racket, entering The Villa during the final week. You have to be the sort of person who can seamlessly integrate into a group that just erupted into hysterics over a joke you didn't hear. Not the sort of person who enters the group roaring ten times louder than everyone else and doesn't stop until someone gently asks you if anything's the matter.

@hiyalauren / @emmaggarland / @joelgolby