I love reunion episodes because I exclusively watch reality television to analyze the toxic relationships. Naturally, there is no better place to watch people argue than in a manufactured setting in which they are forced to relive the worst moments of their year on national television and discuss them in detail. Episodes like this are my Super Bow … which is why it is with a heavy heart that I must share that I am disappointed with this 90 Day Fiancé “Tell-All†special. I am disappointed that Larissa and Colt didn’t show up until the last 20 minutes, when that’s all we really wanted to see. Don’t get me wrong, there were some highlights, but overall this bait and switch insulted my intelligence as a viewer. Not okay!
Let’s just skip to the part when Colt and Larissa arrive, because that’s all we really care about anyway. Larissa and Coltee are late and all their castmates hate them for it. Apparently the love-gremlins (like lovebirds, but more monstrous) lost their luggage flying from Nevada to New York. This is something we can all relate to. What makes matters worse is that Larissa lost her makeup bag and the “formal†garments she was planning on wearing to the reunion. I won’t question this woman for checking her bags in the first place because that would be blaming the victim. Instead, I will empathize with her as a woman who doesn’t want to be caught without her lewks on national television.
Listening to Colt and Larissa conspire against their enemies in that limo reminded me of House of Cards … and not in a good way. Never did I understand why these two were together until I saw the way Colt backed up Larissa in her violent paranoia. This power couple totally deserves each other. And I used the the term “power couple†loosely — Colt and Larissa are a power couple like antibacterial soap and the superbug; together they wreak more havoc then they ever could alone.
Once Larissa and Coltee finally get to the reunion, they threaten to leave if the producers can’t find Larissa the perfect outfit. I love walking into a room and immediately threatening to go home. It’s the reality show equivalent of finding the biggest guy in prison and punching him in the throat to establish dominance. This prompts several PAs to scour New York to find Larissa her perfect “Kardashian-style†dress. Imagine going $120,000 into debt to attend film school only to find yourself at a Rainbows in midtown texting pictures of bandage dresses to an emotionally unhinged reality star who refuses to face her enemies without looking super hot. Everything about the production of this is bleak and exactly what I’m looking for in my reality programming. I need more of this and less of Leida crying about bullying Eric’s daughter with the rattail. Finally, Larissa gets her dress and makeup ready, but I don’t even notice what she’s wearing because I’m distracted by her unsightly bangs.
Onstage, Coltee and Larissa’s entrance immediately alters the vibe of the room. The couples direct all the energy they’d been channeling into hating their significant others into hating Colt and Larissa. I think in psychology this is called projection, but WebMD isn’t always right … (One time I had an eye infection and WebMD’s cure was for me to cry … as if I hadn’t already been crying every day of my entire life … what I’m saying is that health care is a human right.)
The tension is so thick you couldn’t cut it with a vibranium chainsaw. All is quiet, all is still, until Fernanda makes the first jab. She says it was more comfortable when Colt and Larissa weren’t there. Of course that’s true, but thinking the tell-all special is supposed to be comfortable was her first mistake. If Fernanda is feeling good during a tell-all, it means she didn’t tell it all, and that is a disservice to herself as a reality TV star and to us as viewers.
Larissa takes this little opening to unleash a tirade of profanity and insults culminating in her calling Fernanda ugly, jealous, and thin (which apparently is an insult?). This prompts Jonathan to get involved and call Larissa pathetic, which prompts Colt to call Jonathan pathetic, which means we have a Pathetic-Off™, folks. Let’s keep it real, everyone on this show is at least a little bit pathetic. The whole premise is that Americans who couldn’t find anyone to love them here go abroad to find someone who’s willing to sleep with them in exchange for American citizenship. At it’s best, 90 Day Fiancé is a story about how love knows no language, but at its literally-everything-else, it’s about desperate people taking desperate measures to not feel alone. To weigh one couple’s pathetic-ness against the others is to split the hairs that Paul collected. Which is worse: living with your mom or having a child bride? Because of Colt’s counteraccusation, I realized that if Jonathan has been trying to get Fernanda a visa for 1.5 years, and she’s 18 now, he started dating her when she was 16 … And in my book, dating an underage girl is the most pathetic thing you can do. (Game point, Colt!)
God bless the wonderful Shaun Robinson for getting to the root of the problem between Larissa and the 90 Day Fiancé cast. Apparently, Fernanda (and her minions) are mad at Larissa for taking an ass selfie on a cop car and worrying her fans. This is the stupidest sentence I have written, and truly insignificant in the grand scheme of problems. However, for Fernanda, this speaks to Larissa’s great desperation for fame. This is a hot take, but ultimately, I think the rest of the cast doesn’t like Colt and Larissa because they see a reflection of themselves. They accuse Larissa and Colt of being fame-whores, but so are they. They accuse Larissa of not letting Fernanda get a word out, while each of them has been guilty of an interruption or two. They think Larissa and Colt are acting crazy, well they all just had televised weddings after having known each other for less than 90 days. Pot, meet Kettle! Kettle, meet ya ugly-ass face! Ultimately this episode ends with every single one of the cast members storming off stage because they are frustrated with Larissa. But this is not before Asuelu has a slight rage blackout, which is like watching a panda take steroids … And that’s exactly what I want in a reality reunion.
Otherwise, the evening is pretty uneventful. The tension between Ashley and Jay is palpable, but somehow they are still living together. My question is: … Why? There is no scenario in which Ashley could ever forgive Jay for his wrongdoings, so she needs to stop wasting her time, cut her losses, and move on. Ashley has shared that she hasn’t applied to adjust Jay’s status as a citizen, so right now he’s living in a red, white, and blue purgatory in which he is surrounded by the unlimited breadsticks of the American Dream with no hope of ever getting to eat them. Ashley thinks that he should just be thankful that he had 90 days to get married because it took him 93 to screw up. This is a great, piercing line that emphasizes what we already know: these two are not going to make it! Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but I have no faith. Sometimes I wonder if the people in charge of K1 visas fervently watch this show and make adjustments to the castmates’ immigration statuses based on the constantly shifting narrative. I would love to watch the Lifetime show about judge-y government bureaucrats with soft spots for love — they could call it The Great Immigration Bake Off™.
There are some things about Jay and Ashley’s interaction that I appreciated. I loved that everyone stood by Ashley and defended her at every turn. There is truly no logic Jay could use to defend his actions, although he tries. At one point he says he was just using Tinder to make friends, which couldn’t be more of a stretch if it was a pilates instructor. Jay claims that this is all one big misunderstanding, a goof, if you will. I realize now that Jay is the walking incarnation of the Shaggy song “It Wasn’t Me.†Ashley could literally catch Jay butt-naked, banging on the bathroom floor, and he’d literally be like, “I didn’t mean it that way.†What I’m saying is that Jay plays dumb. Like when Shaun Robinson asks him if he would be in a monogamous relationship, and Jay says no, which startles everyone until Jonathan helps him find the excuse that he doesn’t know what monogamous means. Now, part of me wants to give him the benefit of the doubt, but I have been to Jamaica; I know that this man has grown up speaking English his entire life. I don’t know if he knows the dictionary definition or the word, but clearly he doesn’t know the true meaning of monogamy because he stepped out on his wife three days after the wedding. (Boom, roasted!)
Other things happen with the other couples, but it doesn’t really matter. Asuelu cries about missing his parents, which reminded me that he’s barely legal. Leida says she regrets the way she treated Eric’s kids, but we all know that’s untrue. Steven admits no wrongdoing in his treatment of Olga, which gives me an aneurysm. And Jonathan and Fernanda started dating when she was 16, which is the only thing I can think about. Until next week!