The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives is the most recent reality-TV sensation, with thousands and thousands of followers who cannot get sufficient of the Hulu sequence. So naturally, after its record-breaking first season, SLOMW started airing reunion specials. But anybody who’s tuned into one of these episodes is aware of that the particular occasions might be…underwhelming, to say the least.
The post-season reunion is a time-honored custom of actuality docusoaps. Some time after manufacturing concludes, forged members collect to react to the season’s lingering dramas, after everybody has watched all of the episodes and seen what their “friends” and co-stars have been saying behind one another’s backs. Ideally, the reunion ends by giving the forged a clear slate heading into a brand new season of filming, however SLOMW‘s manufacturing schedule implies that these specials can go away followers with the similar unanswered questions they’d earlier than watching.
Below, we break down how The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives‘ season 3 reunion match into the present’s filming timeline, and why the particular episodes have left followers unimpressed.
The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives forged, from left: Taylor Frankie Paul, Jessi Ngatikaura, Jen Affleck, Mayci Neeley, and Mikayla Matthews.
(Image credit score: Disney/Fred Hayes)
When are the ‘Secret Lives of Mormon Wives’ reunion specials filmed?
Ever since season 1 turned a pop-culture phenomenon, it is appeared like the crew behind The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives by no means places their cameras down. Seasons 2 and three of the fact sequence had been greenlit collectively and basically filmed back-to-back, with season 2 spanning October to December 2024 and season 3 going from round March 2025 to that May. Meanwhile, SLOMW‘s season 2 reunion was filmed round April 2025—when cameras had already been rolling on season 3 for at the very least a month.
While season 2 did have some buzzy moments—most notably Demi Engemann skipping the reunion, and Jen Affleck revealing a recording of Demi telling her what to say in entrance of cameras—fan consensus was that the particular was basically a chronic teaser for season 3. Developments had already occurred within the forged’s many feuds, however since what occurred off-screen would have been seen as a spoiler, a number of discussions ended with some type of “you’ll have to wait for season 3.” Off-camera social-media drama is normally fodder for reality-TV reunions, so delaying these conversations for later episodes is understandably irritating for viewers.
Demi Engemann and Whitney Leavitt on the season 3 reunion.
(Image credit score: Disney/Fred Hayes)
Unfortunately, season 3’s reunion follows an analogous sample with fewer actually buzzy moments. Though the filming date hasn’t been confirmed, web sleuths consider the particular was filmed someday between August and November 2025. On October 21, 2025, for instance, Jen revealed to PEOPLE that she was filming SLOMW whereas she was on Dancing with the Stars. So the season 3 reunion was both filmed proper earlier than cameras began rolling on season 4 or, extra possible, within the center as soon as once more.
Jacob Neeley, Mayci Neeley, and Taylor Frankie Paul in the course of the season 3 reunion.
(Image credit score: Disney/Fred Hayes)
Why do followers criticize ‘The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives’ reunions?
If an SLOMW fan skips the season 3 reunion, odds are they’d enter season 4 with the identical quantity of data they’d on the finish of season 3’s finale. Where do the #MomTok ladies stand with Demi and Whitney? Pretty a lot the identical place (unstated resentment). Have Mikayla Matthews and her husband, Jace, resolved their intimacy points? No, it has been a pair of months, and she or he simply had a child. Where does Taylor Frankie Paul stand with Chase McWhorter? We have to attend for season 4. (However, it does not matter as a result of she’s presently filming The Bachelorette because the reunion airs.) As for that renewed Fruity Pebbles drama that everybody was speaking a few week in the past? Better tune in for season 4, as a result of that hadn’t even occurred when the particular was filmed.
The largest growth within the reunion is that #DadTok went on Vanderpump Villa season 2. (Except, I may stand for them to cease attempting to make #DadTok occur, and I additionally by no means want to listen to any of these individuals utter the phrases Vanderpump Villa ever once more.)
These further episodes are basically pointless if the forged cannot share new data or resolve something, as a result of these objectives are your entire level of filming a reunion. Without that, viewers are left with awkward segments, like this particular’s prolonged product placement. SLOMW already releases two seasons a yr at this level—a breakneck velocity, even for a style that already has a streamlined manufacturing course of. #MomTok has develop into recognized for rewriting the foundations of actuality TV, and the present can as soon as once more do issues otherwise than different reveals. If the scores from a reunion are too good to move up, producers have to let the present’s drama breathe. Eventually, followers who’re drained of listening to “wait til next season” could just do that.