For what feels like the billionth time, 90 Day Fiance is unveiling a new spinoff.
On Strikes Back, stars from this previous season will confront their haters on camera while filming themselves on iPhones and iPads.
A number of stars, like Tom Brooks, Stephanie Motto, and Baby Girl Lisa Hamme, are reportedly already filming for it.
Other stars, like Avery Warner, are said to have declined.
But reports have been strangely quiet about Big Ed Brown — a man who is usually the first to sign up for an interview and speak his mind.
There’s just no way, fans say, that he would turn down the opportunity to speak directly to his haters like this.
Unless, of course, TLC has banned him from the show. And looking at his history, you can see why.
Has Big Ed been blacklisted?
He’s definitely the biggest breakout star from Season 4 of 90 Day Fiance: Before The 90 Days.
And yet …
So far, when 90 Day Fiance Strikes Back was announced — a show in which the stars of this most recent season clap back against their haters — there has been no sign of Ed becoming part of it. That comes as a shock to some fans, since Ed is such a big deal.
The dude is everywhere
People who have never watched 90 Day Fiance a day in their lives share memes featuring or otherwise referring to Big Ed.
It’s not all flattering
Some if it is a nod to his statements. Some of it is ridiculing his appearance, which is not cool.
Ed has a disability
Contrary to his self-selected nickname, the 54-year-old is 4 feet and 11 inches tall, even shorter than Ariana Grande. He has Klippel Feil Syndrome, in which fused vertebrae give him a short neck and limited upper spine mobility.
Still, he took his chance at love
Though people continue to question hsi motives, he and Rosemarie Vega struck up a conversation on social media and devloped a romance.
His family did not approve
Naturally, Ed’s 29-year-old daughter did not love the idea that her dad was flying around the world to bone a 23-year-old single mom, and Tiffany only knew part of the story. She could not have imagined the depths of the generational poverty impacting Rose and her family.
Ed made a fool of himself
Photos of him struggling to feed the pigs on Rose’s father’s pig farm and of course the image of him showering with a ladle were passed around ad nauseum, but Ed got into some real clownery during his visit.
His behavior … was bad
Ed interrogated Rosemarie about her sexual history. He also demanded that she take an STI test … which might have been fine, but he only wanted her to take it. What the eff, dude?
And then ….
We all saw him ridicule Rose for having leg hair and shame her for her breath — which came, by the way, from a stomach ulcer, not from a lack of dental hygiene.
Viewers were getting furious
And that was back when things were “good” between Ed and Rosemarie.
Then came the big revelation
On vacation, Ed finally confessed to Rosemarie that he had lied to her the entire time.
He doesn’t want more kids!
Rose had been upfront the entire time about wanting two children. Ed had not been upfront about his desire for a vasectomy. This is a fundamental point of agreement that couples need to reach, but he had just been leading her on the whole time, using his dishonesty to waste her time and get her into his bed.
Rose was furious
She told Ed that he needs to change his behavior and become a better person.
She doesn’t want him to change for HER
It’s too late for that. No, she’s afraid that he will go on to treat the next woman the same way, and the next one after that.
She told him that he is a bad person
Ed walked away, possibly while crying, while Rose remained seated at the curiously deserted resort.
Rose felt so betrayed
Resolving to pack up her thinks, she reflected upon her emotions.
Now, she knows the truth
Ed’s lie about his height may have been a white lie — albeit a red flag (as it is whenever someone lies about their appearance before meeting up) — but his lie about his future, about Rosemarie’s future, showed her that he did not really care about or value her as a person.
The truth hurts
Rose packed up her belongings as she continued to process the heartache of finding out the man whom you were prepared to marry was a liar the whole time.
She left
Without saying goodbye, Rose caught a ride to the airport to fly home to see her son, Prince.
Ed was deep in his feelings about it
Somehow, he was shocked that Rosemarie reacted exactly as any sensible person might have predicted. What did he expect, that she’d just say “oh bummer, wish you’d told me months ago, let’s get married anyway and I’ll just abandon my life’s goals.” Huh, yeah, that may have been his fantasy.
Ed didn’t stay quiet
After the season filmed, he didn’t (quite) spoil how things ended with him and Rose, but he did no shortage of interviews — in person, over social media, and through remote video chatting resources during the COVID-19 pandemic.
It reached a point where Rose couldn’t stay silent anymore
Taking to Instagram, she called out Ed as a liar who never cared about her — she said that he had used him to get famous.
You can understand why she spoke out
Ed had been cultivating this lovable, off-brand Danny DeVito image for himself through giving friendly interviews and fan interactions. Rose couldn’t stand seeing him control the narrative when she knows him so much better than any fan could.
Meanwhile
On the finale of Season 4, Ed spoke to his daughter, Tiffany, whom he had basically ghosted to go bone a desperate 23-year-old. He gave her his side of the story and told her that she was right.
They made up
That said, fans are wondering what Tiffany really thinks of her father now that she has seen his season play out and seen him memed all across social media.
That wasn’t the end
After Big Ed declared himself “the most authentic 90 Day Fiance star” in the history of the franchise, he got an earful from … basically everyone. When Loren Brovarnik and Larissa Lima, two stars whom most fans would describe as near-opposites, are both telling you to simmer down, you need to simmer TF down.
Big Ed Brown Expects the Worst
90 Day Fiance: Before The 90 Days star Big Ed Brown had insulted his fiancee the night before and so he lowers his expectations the next day.
Then came this
Ed Brown had a chat with Daddy Long Neck, a social media personality and a pornstar notable for his own distinct shape — we can understand the intended humor of these two men chatting.
However
Ed allegedly went live almost immediately after that chat — in which he discussed the man’s porn career — talking to a girl who frankly seemed to be too young to even be on Instagram, possibly between the ages of 10-12. The rumor was that Ed got banned from Instagram Live.
That has never been confirmed
But Ed did abruptly get suspiciously quiet on Instagram, which means that either someone talked some sense into him or someone at Instagram disabled that feature. As you can see here, 90 Day Fiance blogger John Yates discusses the rumor.
It seemed to be part of a pattern
This was not the only time that Big Ed was seen to be having inappropriate conversations with minors. Even if he didn’t mean anything sinister by it, he shoudl have stopped.
That wasn’t all
Fellow 90 Day Fiance star Michael Jessen accused Big Ed of sliding into Juliana Custodio’s DMs. Michael and Juliana were married, and Ed very likely saw their wedding on his TV. Fans were creeped out that Rosemarie wasn’t an isolated incident — that Ed apparently feels entitled to exclusively pursue young, college-aged women.
THIS is the worst part
A TikTok user going by the name lordakeet accused Big Ed of grooming followed by sexual assault. She says that she ended up in the hospital after the alleged assault, and also says that she signed an NDA at one point and fears being penalized for speaking about what happened, but wanted to warn people regardless — because Ed was such a popular, seemingly harmless meme at the time.
Why do people think that he’s banned
Because they can’t imagine a guy who loves giving interviews like this, who seems to revel in fame, turning down TLC’s offer to be on Strikes Back.
Was his bad behavior too much for the network?
Being a creep is one thing, and TLC is clearly okay with that in their stars. Sexual assault accusations are another … though for some reason TLC still allowed Geoffrey Paschel to film for this same season despite being accused of horrific domestic violence and sexual assault by his exes.
There is another possibility
What if they made the offer, but Big Ed’s inflated ego made him turn down the meager salary that they offered? Maybe he thinks that his next move is Dancing With The Stars or something like that, and isn’t willing to record himself for $1000 per episode.
Or …
It’s also possible that Ed will be invited, or even has already agreed to the gig (a gig whose existence was confirmed by 90 Day Fiance alum Leida Margaretha, who heard it from Avery Warner) but that his participation hasn’t leaked yet.
We don’t yet know
But before long, we at least expect to know if Big Ed will be doing Strikes Back. If he doesn’t, however, it could be some time before an explanation for his absence bubbles to the surface.