’90 Day Fiancé’: Fight or Flight (RECAP)

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Season 8, Episode 2 of 90 Day Fiancé.]

Secrets come out as these couples debate whether they stay and fight or turn around and get back on another flight. This season has only just begun!

From Russia, With Love

Brandon ends his awkward car ride with his parents as they arrive at the airport. His Russian fiancée Julia lands in Washington, D.C. and the young couple intensely make out in front of Brandon’s mom and dad. Julia jokes that she needs Brandon to “pinch her” because he’s too good to be true.

“I’m not believe I’m here,” she smiles in a confessional. “I look at the American people and say ‘oh, hi!’ I take green card and stay here! I joke.”

A producer asks Brandon who the most important woman in his life is: his mother or Julia. He dodges the question by saying in Russian that he doesn’t know.

“I’ve Been With a Lot of Women”

Natalie successfully kicked out Mike’s cousin Bojangles via FaceTime. “He’s not going to be homeless or anything but I feel really bad,” Mike admits. “I feel stuck in the middle.”

Mike promises Bojangles that the move is temporary, and hopefully he can live in the barn in a few weeks. Bojangles is more skeptical, though. “I’ve been with a lot of women myself and they’re unpredictable,” he tells the camera. “Hopefully it’s for the best.”

Cut to Ukraine: Natalie and her mother leave for the airport. Natalie recalls her romance with Mike before their current rocky patch. After two years of a long-term relationship, she hopes her move to the U.S. can be a fresh start for their love. While waiting for her flight, Natalie opens up that leaving her mother scares her.

Finally, Meet Tarik & Hazel

And now the couple we’ve all been waiting for: Tarik and Hazel’s return to the franchise! Their sequence opens with Tarik showing off his rap skills…

“I’m actually an excellent rapper,” he boasts. Anyone else remembers his proposal to Hazel through song? Tarik also flashes his 46-year-old “guns” before explaining his love for the nation of Thailand.

“About eight years ago I went to Thailand and it changed everything about me,” he begins over a montage of him using an actual sword to chop vegetables. Yes, it’s as glorious as it sounds.

After his taste of Thailand, Tarik began using an Asian dating website to find a Thai wife. When that didn’t go as planned, he expanded his search and met Filipino fiancé Hazel online. “She’s beautiful inside and outside. She’s like an Asian version of Angelina Jolie,” he beams. He’s so in love with her that he even created a necklace featuring their couples nickname: Tarzel.

Tarik also has a 7-year-old daughter, Ari. She has high-functioning autism and is Tarik’s number one priority. He hopes that Ari and Hazel get along after meeting in-person. Hazel also has a young son named Harry, but he doesn’t live with her. Hopefully Harry also comes to America “eventually” with Hazel, as Tarik explains.

But there is one other thing missing in their relationship. “A while ago, Hazel dropped a bomb on me,” Tarik states. “She told me that she was bisexual. And I will admit, I was kind of surprised by it. Not long after that, she started talking about having a girlfriend. But there are so many questions that that brings up…Is she really in this for me? I feel cautiously optimistic about it but we’re not even married yet and what you’re thinking about is the girlfriend we need to find?”

Hazel asks Tarik over FaceTime if there are “hot girls” in his area of Virginia Beach. Tarik jokes that Hazel will be like a “kid in a candy store” and he hopes she doesn’t “forget” about pleasuring him too.

A Punch in the Face

Rebecca and her best friend Melanie go to a self-defense class. Rebecca dons a T-shirt with fiancé Zied’s inquisitive pout printed on it, because apparently this couple doesn’t own anything NOT with their faces on it.

Melanie is more cautious about Zied’s impending arrival. As a private investigator, she inherently is suspicious of Zied’s intentions, especially since this is not Rebecca’s first marriage through the K-1 visa.

“Bad Taste”

Yara starts complaining about obese Americans to her love Jovi. They pull up to Jovi’s new apartment, and Yara’s complaints just keep coming. From plastic champagne glasses to the size of the home, she is not having it.

Jovi also made plans to show Yara Bourbon Street, but she understandably is exhausted after her trip from the Ukraine. But to Jovi, this is just another jab. “I don’t think it would have been that hard to go out for one hour, like, come to meet my friends, the people who have been waiting to see you. Now she doesn’t want to go, so it’s pretty frustrating,” he says to the camera.

But of course Jovi’s mind is quickly put to rest after Yara seductively escorts him to the bedroom.

Maroon Melancholy

Back in Washington, Mike drives to pick up Natalie from the airport. He brings purple roses for her, and she has a gripe about their color.

While they are not still technically engaged (Natalie gave her ring back to Mike last season), they are still happy to see one another.

Blocked Brandon

Brandon, his parents, and Julia settle into the hotel. Brandon tries to sneak away with Julia for some private time, but his mom encourages him to join them downstairs for dinner. “My mom is a cockblock,” Brandon jokes.

At the hotel restaurant, the foursome cheers to the “complete family” and Julia’s arrival to America. His mother quickly spills the news about Julia having to stay in a separate bedroom once they get back to the farm. Brandon’s father scolds him for “not being honest” in telling Julia their living arrangements. However, Julia wishes that Brandon stood up for her more.

And then comes part two of Brandon’s mother’s meddling: she tells Julia that she needs to “take proper steps” to make sure they don’t have kids yet. Julia refuses to take medicine (a.k.a birth control) and says she has never had “an accident” since being sexually active. Brandon stays silent.

Love Actually Really Is All Around

Rebecca goes shopping for a present to celebrate Zied’s arrival. Even though his visa hasn’t been approved yet, she is eager to get him something special. She shops for a videogame system, similar to the one she has given her son…who is around the same age as Zied. As she goes to pay for the Playstation, Rebecca flashes her credit card which (shocker) has a picture of Zied on it. “Most people can’t understand the special bond that we share,” she says to the camera.

Later that night, Rebecca wakes up to speak with Zied after his visa interview to see how it went. She sits on a blanket that also has their faces printed on it. Talk about home decor.

Three’s Company

Tarik meets with his friend Kia to chat about how to prepare for Hazel’s arrival. Then we learn a little more about what Tarik and Hazel have been up to since we last saw them on 90 Day Fiancé.

“In two and a half years, everybody’s going to go through it,” Tarik opens up. “Hazel and I had been engaged for almost a year but then we had a big misunderstanding. What happened was, we thought she was pregnant. She takes a couple pregnancy tests: one positive, two negative. But the two negative were after like a week. So I’m thinking that she terminated the pregnancy, so I flipped out and I’m thinking, ‘I can’t be with anybody who’s going to do some s**t like this!'”

Tarik clarifies that he believes a woman should be able to do whatever she wants with her body, but he believed it was a trust issue between him and Hazel. To Tarik, it seemed like Hazel had the procedure without discussing it with him first.

Tarik apparently called it off with Hazel, and three weeks later, he began talking to Minty, a Thai woman, online. “I wouldn’t say that I was falling in love, but I was falling in like,” he smiles. But at the time, he started to feel guilty about breaking it off so suddenly with Hazel.

He reached back out to Hazel, and she told him that she had gone to the clinic and learned that she was never pregnant, just late on her period. Tarik believed that and asked for Hazel’s forgiveness. He admitted to chatting with Minty, and Hazel asked to see all her photos and text messages. Hazel then asked if all three of them could be in a polyamorous relationship.

The trio vacationed together, and after a “beautiful” two days, Hazel ended the dynamic. She was paranoid that Minty was more into Tarik than herself, and Tarik admits that he was more “fascinated” by Minty. “There was this jealousy that came over Hazel immediately and it ended right there. And Hazel told me to never contact Minty ever again,” Tarik concludes.

But there’s of course another piece to this story. Tarik recently texted Minty to check in to see if she was doing well during the coronavirus spike in Thailand. He has not told Hazel yet that he’s been in communication again with Minty.

“A woman is not going to want you to be checking up on another woman that you were entertaining while y’all broke up because of a pregnancy scare,” Kia gives Tarik a reality check. Now he’s worried about Hazel’s reaction to the news about Minty.

Yara’s Complaints

Yara tries to unpack while insulting Jovi’s dirty clothes before the couple sets out to finally explore their surrounding neighborhood. Of course Yara also finds this underwhelming. She complains about the smell, the lack of charm, and dirty streets. “Ukraine may be poor but it looks better,” she sniffs.

Jovi asks Yara if she would be OK meeting Jovi’s family tomorrow and staying at his mother’s house. Yara has qualms about sleeping over there for one night since it won’t be comfortable for her. She propositions Jovi to go alone and threatens to go back to the Ukraine. Well this is a great start for them.

A New Life

Even though he’s in debt, Mike books a fancy hotel for him and Natalie to stay at in Seattle before heading back to Sequim. She is touched by the sentiment, and the couple promise one another to try to forget the past and move forward together.

“I’ll start a new life,” Natalie says to the camera.

Sleep No More

Zied tells Rebecca that after the visa interview, his passport was taken but he thinks it went well overall. She explains in a confessional that she is worried that immigration may deny his visa because her ex-husband was also foreign. “I want Zied here. I want to be able to sleep for the rest of the week so I don’t have to worry about it,” Rebecca moans.

Fight or Flight

Julia and Brandon return to their hotel room, where she proceeds to question why he didn’t stand up to his parents. She explains that in separate rooms, she won’t get to spend much time with him when he’s not at work. Brandon condescendingly laughs at Julia saying sleeping together would be “bonding time.”

Brandon tries to stress the fact that he needs to obey his mother because she paid for Julia’s flight and is helping the couple save money for their own place. Julia is worried that she will fight with Brandon’s parents if they’re all living in the same house.

Previews

Hazel lands in America, Brandon and Julia still argue over the sleeping arrangements, and another couple is introduced. Plus, Jovi’s mom meets Yara, and Natalie wants her engagement ring back from Mike.

Talk next week, 90 Day fans!

90 Day Fiancé, Sundays, 8/7c, TLC