The ending of Madea’s Destination Wedding was centered around uncovering the truth about Zavier and whether or not he was cheating on Tiffany. Who is Tiffany? Well, she is Brian and his ex-wife Debrah’s daughter. Brian and Debrah divorced each other a long time ago, primarily due to her history of substance abuse. While Brian got custody of their kids, BJ and Tiffany, and looked after them, Debrah “cleaned up her act,” married a rich man named Dennis, and showered those children with gifts so as to win over their love. That didn’t exactly affect BJ, but Tiffany became Debrah’s puppet, especially when it came to her decision to marry the love of her life, Zavier. There was no doubt about the fact that Tiffany loved Zavier, but Brian thought that there was something wrong about the urgency she was showing regarding tying the knot with him. However, before Brian could convince Tiffany to take her time, he found himself hosting his daughter’s wedding in the Bahamas and dealing with his unruly family members, i.e., Madea, Bam, Brown, Cora, and Joe. Amidst all that chaos, Brian hoped that he’d make some breakthrough in his search for faults in Zavier’s background. What mystery did he unravel? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
Debrah’s Scam
Before the day of the wedding, all the attendees were busy enjoying themselves in different parts of the hotel. Joe and Brown were at the bachelor’s party being thrown by Zavier. Madea, Cora, and Bam were at the casino playing poker. And Brian, who was not welcome anywhere because of his uptight attitude, was floating around the building. Now, while Cora and Bam were hyper-focused on their cards, chips, and drinks, Madea wasn’t, which was why she managed to eavesdrop on a telephonic conversation Dennis was having with Debrah right behind her. Before Madea approached Dennis, he was talking about going forward with the divorce. Since that would send Debrah back to square one, she’d apparently forced Dennis to cough up some money while making it seem like she needed it to support her son and daughter. There was a good chance that Debrah would use that cash to simply relapse.
Hence, Dennis flipped the script a little and promised that he’d give BJ $1 million after he went to college and another $1 million to Tiffany after she got married. That way, Dennis wouldn’t be pouring the money directly into Debrah’s pocket, and it’d rob her of the chance to claim that he had done nothing for her or her children. If you think that BJ’s requirement for getting that money being college and Tiffany’s requirement being marriage are a bit sexist, I think this is your first Madea “adventure,” and you need to do a rundown of the entire franchise; then you’ll see that this is pretty normal for these movies. Anyway, coming back to the “plot,” Madea put two and two together and realized that since BJ wasn’t going to college any time soon, and Tiffany was ready to get married, Debrah had pushed her to speed-run through the process and get hitched with Zavier. That’d compel Dennis to pay up, and then Debrah would probably convince Tiffany to give all or some of that money to her, thereby allowing Debrah to continue living the life of luxury she had become accustomed to. Madea wasn’t okay with that, and she decided to organize a confrontation with Debrah.
Zavier Wasn’t Cheating On Tiffany
While making his way through the lobby, Brian noticed Zavier with a woman and immediately assumed that he was cheating on Tiffany. Instead of making a scene about it all by himself, he called Joe to assist him. Conveniently enough, Tiffany, Debrah, Cora, Madea, Bam, and Dennis arrived there as well, thereby leading to a barrage of information being unloaded on Tiffany. On one hand, she learned about the scam that Debrah was attempting to pull by urging her to get married quickly, and on the other hand, Brian accused Zavier of being an adulterous individual—an accusation that Zavier didn’t even deny. Unable to deal with that mess, Tiffany just decided to call off the wedding and requested everyone to go their separate ways. Now, Brian wasn’t satisfied with that. He had hated Zavier from the very beginning because of his “gangster” persona, complete with a teardrop tattoo on his face, and he wanted to use this opportunity to double down on his dislike of the guy. So, he went all the way to Zavier’s bedroom to give him an earful about almost ruining his daughter’s life.
But then the woman that Brian had assumed was Zavier’s “side chick” re-entered the picture and revealed that she was actually Zavier’s mother, Kaja. Apparently, Zavier wasn’t all that proud of Kaja because of her failures as a mother, and he wanted to keep her away from his wedding, but she came anyway because it was a momentous occasion for her one and only son. As per Kaja, Zavier and Tiffany actually bonded over the fact that they didn’t get the motherly love that they deserved. If Brian had accepted him as his son-in-law, at the very least, Zavier would’ve had a father figure to look up to. However, Brian’s myopic view of life caused him to jump to the conclusion that Zavier was betraying Tiffany right after he saw him with a woman. That’s because Brian wasn’t looking for answers. He had already created an image of Zavier in his head, and he wanted anything that he could use against him. Yes, during that heated altercation in the lobby, Zavier could’ve just blurted out that Kaja was his mother and that Brian’s accusations were baseless. Well, by that logic, Madea’s Destination Wedding could’ve been a short film. Zavier didn’t say anything to pad the runtime, that’s all.
Apology Hour
Debrah approached Tiffany with the intention of apologizing to her for whatever hurt she had caused her. It got a little confusing over here, though. She said that she genuinely wanted Tiffany and BJ to have a share of Dennis’ money because she hadn’t earned enough to give them anything. If she managed to put some money in her children’s accounts by essentially extorting Dennis, she’d feel that she had achieved something. But once Dennis agreed to her terms, I guess the desperation in her kicked in and began governing all her decisions. I suppose Debrah didn’t actually want Tiffany to get married so quickly; maybe she was afraid that if Tiffany took, let’s say, 2-3 more years to say “yes” to Zavier and by that time Dennis walked back on their agreement, then Debrah would go back to feeling like a loser again. She claimed that that was the reason why she forced Tiffany to hurry up, and not because she wanted a share of Dennis’ money. Tiffany didn’t buy that narrative, though, largely because Debrah had a history of duping the people she loved.
Madea advised Tiffany to be a little considerate towards Debrah, because at least she was realizing the error of her ways, but she wasn’t ready yet to look past her mother’s mistakes. Meanwhile, Brian went over to Zavier to apologize for projecting his fears onto the man that his daughter loved so much. Brian admitted that, as a lawyer who was in the business of giving people second chances, he should’ve given Zavier at least one chance to prove his worth. Brian was well aware of the fact that a Black man is judged based on his appearance by racist people. Did he do things any differently? Nope; he let his insecurities and judgmental behavior make his decisions for him and ruined a perfectly good wedding. He said that he was willing to dial his apprehensions down if Zavier proved that he was worthy of his daughter’s love.
Zavier married Tiffany
In Madea’s Destination Wedding’s ending, Zavier realized that Brian’s apology still had a heavy dose of high-handedness to it. Instead of straight-up accepting his mistakes, Brian was making it look like he was in the right for not trusting Zavier because he knew nothing about him. Therefore, Zavier unpacked his whole life story, his bond with BJ, and his love for Tiffany to show that Brian could’ve known all about this if he had just asked the right questions. Zavier underscored the fact that he wasn’t at fault just because Brian was ignorant. That’s what finally opened Brian’s eyes, letting him see that his daughter was in the right hands. The only thing that was left was for Tiffany to welcome Zavier back into her life. Since Tiffany had overheard the whole conversation between Zavier and Brian and found out that Zavier wasn’t cheating on her and that he really loved her a lot, that part was a cakewalk. The following day, the wedding did take place as per the original plan. What came out of syllabus was the hotel bill.
Brian was so focused on catching Zavier red-handed that he had forgotten to keep an eye on Bam, Cora, Brown, Joe, and Madea. And when Brian saw the money that he had to cough up because of his family, he fainted right in front of the hotel’s reception counter. I know that Brian is a rich man, but maybe he’ll look forward to a share of Dennis’ $1 million check to Tiffany to save him from this pickle. That’ll certainly give Debrah the opportunity to say, “Well, well, well, how the turntables…” Now, surprisingly enough, there are quite a few lessons to be learned from this mind-numbing saga. Firstly, be financially independent; then you don’t have to rely on anyone to support your future. Secondly, just because you’re financially independent, don’t go around acting like you have all the answers to the questions that you haven’t even asked yet. And thirdly, but most importantly, don’t insist on a destination wedding, because if your love is true, it doesn’t matter where you are getting married; what matters is that you trust each other enough to weather any kind of storm, be it literal or metaphorical in nature. Anyway, those are just my thoughts on the ending of Madea’s Destination Wedding. If you have any opinions on the same, feel free to share them in the comments section below.
