Catfish Season 4 Episode 14 Recap: Grammy-Nominated Catfish

Whenever Nev and Max encounter a celebrity on their show it usually involves someone trying to catfish them. The tables have turned this week on Catfish as the celebrity is the one looking to see if he’s being catfished by a “regular” girl. Ryan “R. Prophet,” formerly a part of the Grammy-nominated group Nappy Roots, recently started using social media. (I know, it’s crazy that he’s just starting to figure out how to use Facebook.) Prophet got to know a girl named Trinity and the two instantly connected. They started messaging each other almost every day but they still have yet to meet. What’s really strange is that the two both live in Kentucky, so you would think it’d be easy for them to meet up.

Since Prophet is so new to the whole social media thing, Nev calls him instead of video chatting with him. Nothing wrong with a little old-school throwback. Prophet lets the guys know that with Trinity, the two hit it off instantly because she was so different than everyone else he’s met in the business. She is true and genuine, which is what Prophet needs at this point in his life. Prophet knows that he could be getting catfished, though, so he’s tried to prove that theory wrong when asking for photos from Trinity: He’ll ask for her to turn to the right or left when sending a photo and so far she’s been following his directions. He’s also heard her voice and invited her to meet, but it’s never happened. Now he needs Nev and Max’s help to make sure this “genuine” girl is really telling the truth.

The guys head out to Kentucky to meet with Prophet at the studio where Nev throws down a sick verse or two. After playing around, they get serious and ask Prophet for some more information on why he’s looking for love on the internet. He says that it was his team that told him he had to get onto social media in order to promote the music. By replying to fans and roaming around online, Prophet found Trinity and thought it wouldn’t hurt to send her a message. Now Trinity has helped Prophet with a police brutality case that he’s been going through. He thinks that this could be the girl for him because of how different she is.

Catfish-Season4-EP14-nevSince Trinity has telling Prophet that she’s a model, the guys do an image search on the photos they find off her Facebook. Sure enough — they find multiple hits, including an Instagram page for a Jasmine Sanders that has close to one million followers. They find all the other photos that Trinity has been using and also find out that the real girl in the photos is Chris Brown’s ex-girlfriend. Nev and Max send Jasmine a video message in the hopes of connecting with her to see if she knows about Trinity using her photos.

They decide to search the phone number, since this seems to be a catfish and find the number associated with a girl named Crystal. The search also provides an address, which shows the guys that Trinity has been lying about what city she lives in. They search for Crystal on Facebook and find a bunch of accounts that match. That’s kind of creepy that there are a lot of Crystals in Kentucky that Prophet could be talking to. Then again, my name is so common that whenever I hear someone yell my name I ignore them because I think they’re talking to someone else.

Catfish-Season4-EP14-trinityThe next morning, Nev gets a reply from Jasmine who tells him to video chat with her so they can talk. Jasmine looks just like the girl in the photos that Trinity had. Nev lets Jasmine know Prophet’s situation but she’s certain that they haven’t even crossed paths. She doesn’t have any clue as to who could be using her information because a lot of people do it daily. Who knew the model life could be so rough?

After the guys show Prophet everything they’ve found on Trinity, he’s upset but still wants to know who he’s been talking to this entire time. Since all they have is her phone number, Nev tries to call her and set up a time to meet. He gets her voicemail and leaves her a message letting her know that they are making an episode of Catfish and wanted to ask her a few questions.

Nev gets a message from Crystal the next day letting him know that she’d be willing to talk with him. He calls her and explains the situation of how they’re there to try and help Prophet meet her. When Nev tells her that Prophet already knows that she’s not the girl in the photos, she immediately gets embarrassed and starts stumbling over her words. She hesitates to tell the truth yet again, but Nev got her to confirm that her name is Crystal. She tells Nev that she’s willing to meet up with them since they live so close. The guys call Prophet to let him in on the news and go to pick him up and head out to meet her. Let’s see how revealing Crystal is going to be when they meet up.

Catfish-Season4-EP14-rprohpetThe gang nervously wait for Crystal at the park and think every girl walking by could be her. The one girl that Prophet didn’t think could possibly be Crystal ended up being Crystal. Max notices that Crystal seems a bit upset while she’s talking and trying to defend herself, but she says she’s not angry. If I were her, I’d try to be as nice as I possibly can because she’s been lying to Prophet this entire time. If she thinks there’s still a relationship that the two could share she better be on her best behavior.

Prophet questions how she was able to send so many photos — especially the ones where he was directing her on which way to turn. Crystal tells him that she had multiple photos on her phone of Jasmine so she was just lucky enough to have the one he requested. That’s cold and creepy at the same time. Crystal lets them know that she created the Trinity page because the boyfriend she was with at the time seemed to be blocking information from her on Facebook. So she knows what it feels like to be lied to and yet she continued to do the same thing to Prophet. Does that make any sense?

Catfish-Season4-EP14-crystalNow Crystal thinks she was helping out Prophet by keeping the Trinity account open. She says she felt the need to keep the lies going because she was the only one able to keep him motivated for his career, through the Trinity page. No, you weren’t doing any community service by keeping that page open, lady. Crystal does admit that she developed romantic feelings towards Prophet over time. Because of the overwhelming emotions that Prophet was feeling, he decided to end the conversation with Crystal and left.

Nev and Max have Prophet and Crystal meet one last time to hopefully resolve their issues before leaving. Prophet lets Crystal know that through their conversations she was able to help him get through some tough things in his life. She hopes to continue their relationship the same way it has been but Prophet lets her know it’s not going to stay the same. He lets her know that he forgives her and that they could still talk in the future but things will be different.

One month later, Prophet lets the guys know that he’ll be dropping a single in August and an album to soon follow. He still stays in contact with Crystal as she’s continuing to help him with his non-profit fundraiser. Crystal lets the guys know that she’s not online looking for love and hasn’t logged into the Trinity account for a long time. Looks like Prophet and Crystal were able to make this bad situation work out into being a nice friendship. I’m happy for them.

What were your thoughts on this episode of Catfish? Did you think Trinity was fake from the beginning or real? Since this is a different situation where the person asking for help is actually famous, I thought it could play out a different way. I thought that maybe Trinity thought she was being catfished by Prophet because he’s famous. Let’s face it, how many people make fake accounts claiming to be celebrities? Do you think Crystal was genuine with her feelings towards Prophet? I’m glad that the two were able to keep a friendship relationship after they went through all of this. Prophet is a good man, I give him a lot of credit. I’m not sure if I’d be able to do the same if I were to get catfished. Would you? Leave your thoughts in the comment section below.

New episodes of Catfish premiere Wednesday nights at 10/9CT on MTV.

Photos: MTV