(L-R) Zack Goytowski, Nancy Rodriguez, Paul Peden and Natalie Lee attend the Love Is Blind cast celebration of Netflixs First Live Reunion with The Iconic Pods at The Brig on April 15, 2023, in Venice, California. (Photo by Roger Kisby/Getty Images f …
LOS ANGELES - Love isn't patient, love isn't kind — at least if you ask the fans of Netflix's "Love Is Blind." Viewers had to wait more than an hour to watch the Season 4 reunion special set to stream live Sunday — Netflix's second-ever live event on its own platform.
"Love Is Blind: The Live Reunion," hosted by Vanessa and Nick Lachey, was to stream from Los Angeles starting at 5 p.m. Pacific. Netflix subscribers were able to join a waiting room for the show 10 minutes before the start time — and those who did were still there an hour later. The show finally started airing — seemingly live — at around 6:16 p.m. Pacific, although some Netflix users still reported difficulties accessing the content.
"We are sorry we're late," Vanessa Lachey said, the sole acknowledgment of the delay at the top of the broadcast.
"To everyone who stayed up late, woke up early, gave up their Sunday afternoon… we are incredibly sorry that the Love is Blind Live Reunion did not turn out as we had planned," Netflix tweeted at 6:29 p.m. Pacific. "We’re filming it now, and we’ll have it on Netflix as soon as humanly possible. Again, thank you and sorry."
A request for comment from Netflix was not immediately returned. Netflix's first live streaming event, "Chris Rock: Selective Outrage," did not feature any apparent technical difficulties.
On Twitter, Netflix had acknowledged the delay without offering explanation. At two minutes past the initial start time, it promised the special would be in on in 15 minutes. Seven minutes later, the company tweeted: "Promise #LoveIsBlindLIVE will be worth the wait...." along with a picture of one of the season's "villains."
The last activity from the account was a retweet of U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez making a joke about the delay. With the original end time of the special approaching, nothing had been posted since — and it remained that way even once the show started airing for some, until the apology tweet.
This browser does not support the Video element.
From DVDs to Academy Awards: The history of Netflix
Netflix paved the way for countless other entertainment streaming services to follow.
Before the show finally aired, Vanessa Lachey had taken to Instagram — briefly live, perhaps ironically — from the set to try to entice viewers to stay on, indicating the delay was a technical issue in a post thanking fans for being patient and captioned: "Apparently we broke the internet!"
"This is so 2023," she said.
A view of the atmosphere during Netflix’s Love Is Blind: The Live Reunion Official Watch Party at The Vermont Hollywood on April 16, 2023, in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Araya Doheny/Getty Images for Netflix)
Cast members from the Seattle-based season also took to the social media platform to joke about the delay. Marshall Glaze posted a picture of a man studying an array of wires: "I'm trying yall," he tweeted.
Competing streamers and networks also made hay of the drama.
"We would never keep you waiting for a Reunion," BravoTV — home of many a chaotic reunion special — tweeted with a winky face.
"Hmm," read a screencap featuring Kerry Washington tweeted by Hulu.
While the chaos dominated Twitter's trending topics, the end of the hour brought a significant threat to the Netflix's dominance of the discourse: the latest episode of HBO's "Succession" was now streaming.
___
Associated Press journalists Beatrice Dupuy, Alicia Rancilio and Mallika Sen contributed to this report.