When the former Love Island stars announced their relationship was over after five years, it sent social media into meltdown. Here’s why...
For several million Instagram users, today was the day love died. At approximately 4pm, a statement appeared on the account of the social media influencer Molly-Mae Hague announcing that she had broken up with her fiancé, the boxer Tommy Fury.
“Never in a million years did I think I’d ever have to write this,” the statement – written in blocks of white text on a sombre black background – began. “I am extremely upset to announce that mine and Tommy’s relationship has come to an end.”
Cue full-blown hysteria. Hundreds of thousands of people who had never met either party flooded X, Instagram and every other social media platform with broken-heart emojis, expressions of deep sympathy and concerns for the couple’s one-year-old daughter, Bambi. Devastated YouTubers recorded their heartbreak. TikTokkers wept and gnashed their teeth.
It was Generation Insta’s Charles and Di moment; the equivalent to the news in 1992, announced by then prime minister John Major in the House of Commons, that the Prince and Princess of Wales were to separate – but with extra spray tan and bigger muscles.
The only other difference being that, if you didn’t watch the reality show Love Island and live online, the news and even the names of Molly-Mae and Tommy would have meant absolutely nothing at all. Because, from its earliest days in a Majorcan villa (broadcast on ITV2), to the birth of their daughter, every moment of Hague and Fury’s relationship has been recorded and repackaged for the delectation of their young fans.
Hague, in particular, chronicles her life on social media in minute detail and has documented everything from dealing with endometriosis to being burgled. She has told her followers all about her decision to get fillers, and all about her decision to get her fillers dissolved. The couple had supporting roles in At Home With The Furys, Netflix’s fly-on-the-wall series about Tommy’s more famous (and successful) brother, Tyson. Just three weeks ago, Hague publicly described Fury as the “love of my life”.
The pair, both 25, occupy an unusual place in British culture as they are at once very famous (she has eight million Instagram followers and 1.9 million subscribers on YouTube) and yet unknown to most people.
“My nana struggles to understand my job because it’s something she’d never in her lifetime experienced,” Hague once said. That job, which Hague loves so much she does even when she’s meant to be on “holiday”, mostly involves taking photographs of herself. “I enjoy it so much that even when I’m off work I’ll still be posting bits and bobs. I love keeping people in the loop,” she told one interviewer.
Fans feel they have been taken into the couple’s confidence and have lived every twist and turn of the intense love affair, almost as if it was their own relationship. No wonder they took the break-up so hard.
But, popular as Hague and Fury are, the couple have also been divisive. During Love Island, Hague was nicknamed “Money-Mae” on social media because viewers thought she was “fake” and too desperate for the show’s £50,000 prize (which she didn’t win, despite reaching the final). To be fair to Fury and Hague, they did outlast eventual winners Amber Gill and Greg O’Shea, who split less than five weeks after leaving the villa.
Hague, the daughter of two police officers from Hitchin, Hertfordshire, has become arguably the most successful Love Islander ever and the epitome of a certain kind of no-nonsense, “girlboss” feminism. As well as the dedicated social media output, she is the creative director of fast-fashion label PrettyLittleThing and founder of her own fake-tanning line that is sold in Selfridges.
There was also a sense that she was bulletproof. She was dubbed “Thatcher with a fake tan” when she said in a 2021 podcast that “Beyoncé has the same 24 hours in the day that we do … You’re given one life, and it’s down to you what you do with it”.
However, following the birth of their daughter last year there have been whispers that all was not rosy in the perfectly manicured garden. Fury’s commitment to monogamy has been questioned because of videos that appear to show him with different women in clubs. In her recent YouTube videos, Hague has spoken – and cried – about parenting Bambi on her own while Fury trained for boxing matches or recorded an audiobook.
All of which pales in comparison to the split, which is the first real crisis that the pair have to confront. One thing seems certain, however: after Hague has managed to “navigate the coming days”, she will post an update on social media.
Related Topics
- Love Island,
- Relationships
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