Even though we can all agree there’s only one couple who should get married this season, there are currently four pending weddings. Sumit and Jenny, Alina and Steven, Corey and Evelin, and Kenny and Armando are all getting married. Well, only one of those couples actually has a ceremony planned, but overall, it’s rare to see this many couples make it down the aisle. Not that these unions are peaceful; in fact, the drama only seems to get worse as their wedding days approach.
It’s probably easier to get the couples that probably aren’t getting married out of the way. Victor and Ellie have another fight over money this week after a brief détente. Victor is constantly asking Ellie to understand what he has been through, but that empathy isn’t enough to make Ellie feel confident about how they’ll support themselves. Victor feels like it’s over, and Ellie just wants to leave, but she’s stuck spending the night in a house with no electricity. I don’t think we’ve seen these two get along for even a moment, so it really does feel like they should just leave each other. Ellie seemed happier making pizza back home, and Victor needs space to deal with his trauma.
Ari and Bini may not be getting married, but it looks like they might be making a franchise switch if they move to America. In the end, I think this was always Ari’s plan, and it’s why she created all of this drama. She’s been homesick since before her ex-husband came to visit and manipulated this situation to get them out of Ethiopia while making Bini look like the bad guy. Ari’s reasoning doesn’t even really make sense. She says she’ll never live in Ethiopia again because it hurts her pride that people might be laughing at her. Even though Bini told her mom he didn’t cheat, Ari says it doesn’t matter if he didn’t. Basically, Ari thinks her pride is more important than her son’s growing up with his family, aunts, culture, and language.
But really, I think it’s just that she’s always wanted to go back to America. Even her relatives seemed to think her living in Ethiopia was a temporary fantasy. It turns out she actually started the paperwork for Bini to come to America, even though she says she never planned to use it. Bini is willing to do anything to keep his family together, and I imagine if he’s willing to move to Kenya, he’ll also move to America. All of which points to Bini probably not having a secret girlfriend back in Ethiopia, so what is this all really for anyway? In the end, Ari did all of this because she was homesick and wanted to go back to New Jersey.
It turns out I was wrong about Steven and Alina! I assumed Steven would use their paperwork to stall until it was time for him to return home, but no: Steven and Alina are getting married in two days. It’s pretty obvious neither one of them is comfortable with this, however. Steven basically wants to rip his clothes off like he’s having a panic attack when the lawyer reviews their application. Alina is still living in a fantasy, and her friends and family can’t seem to make her wake up. The cheating, the other girls — all of that is still an issue, and Alina is overly optimistic that deleting some apps will change Steven.
I thought the show would tease out Sumit’s secret, but he tells Jenny that he stopped the paperwork on their marriage this week. Jenny tells him she will go back to America, and Sumit says he doesn’t like the threats. Sumit doesn’t like to be rushed or forced, and he’s out of excuses. The truth is, Sumit is just afraid of marriage. The more he talks about it, the clearer it becomes that he doesn’t like the restrictions he thinks having a wife will place on him. Sumit went through this weird exercise with his parents where he said he wanted a traditional Indian wife, and Jenny isn’t going to be that. Jenny already makes the decisions in the relationship, and Sumit seems afraid that marriage will solidify her control. Maybe he should have thought about that before he had her move to India to live with him?
Finally, there’s Kenny and Armando, who are the closest to their actual wedding. Apparently “Don’t Overthink It†opens on their wedding day, but we still don’t get the ceremony or Hannah as the world’s cutest flower girl. The producers are delaying things so we can get into every little fear Armando has. He’s afraid of where to put his hands when they dance. He’s afraid of how they’re going to kiss in front of his dad. He’s afraid of “disgusting†other people on his wedding day, and Kenny is right to call him out for regressing.
90 Day Notes
• No one in Corey’s family wants to go to his wedding because everyone but Corey seems to understand this is just going to end in divorce. Evelin doesn’t even want a religious wedding, because she knows this isn’t a real thing. It’s also funny that Corey can never explain why he loves Evelin. He just says nonsense like, “I’ve been with her because she’s the person I love, and that’s ultimately because I love her because we’re in love.†Also, the friend that Corey said couldn’t come to the wedding is definitely the one Evelin slept with, right? The one who said he’d be with Evelin if he could?
• Ethiopia is, like, an entire country. I don’t understand why Ari and Bini can’t move to another city or area? Ari still can’t let go of “how much†Bini hurt her (even though she still won’t accept she hurt him by going to America in the first place). It’s silly that Ari is afraid to even go to the interview in Ethiopia with Bini. She knows she made herself look stupid, and Bini’s friends and family are going to call her out.
• I wonder if Steven will have an issue with Alina wearing a red wedding dress?
• I have not commented on Victor’s chin braid, but it is so long now it cannot be ignored.