Once upon a time, Astor recapped an insane Christian book that claimed the devil created football as a tool to destroy humanity. The article’s popularity made him turn his recaps into a weekly series named “So You Don’t Have To“, where he finds batshit crazy pieces of media (books, movies, etc) and recaps them for your pleasure.

Hey! My name is Steffi, and I’ll be captaining the So You Don’t Have To ship this week because the gorgeous, gorgeous Astor is taking a well-deserved break. To shake things up, I’ve decided to serve some American pop culture content sprinkled with Nigerian madness for flavour. This week, I will be recapping the super chaotic TLC reality show, 90 Day Fiancé.

Specifically, a recap of the Nigerian storylines on show. Because everyone knows those are the wildest.

For those who don’t know, 90 Day Fiancé and its spin-off shows follow the lives of Americans with nothing better to do with their time and money than to chase love in strange places. They throw caution and their ATM cards to the wind for a chance at love. Here’s a breakdown of the Nigerian-flavoured mess on the show so far. 

In 2018, Michael Ilesanmi joined the second season as the first Nigerian, with his American sweetheart, Angela Deem. The show chronicled their love story and engagement through the third and seventh seasons. After getting married in 2020, the producers cast them on the fifth and sixth season of the spin-off shows, 90 Days Fiance: Happily Ever After?   

The second Nigerian to come on was Usman Umar. Usman came in on the fourth season, but his love with his American sweetheart, Lisa Hamme, didn’t last long enough for them to be a part of the spin-off like Michael and Angela did.

So what happened within this chaotic timeline for Michael and Usman? 

Let’s begin with Michael Ilesanmi, a 30-year-old car dealer living in Lagos, who manages to get a 52 year old American woman named Angela Deem to fall in love with him on Facebook. A few months after being wooed by her “sexy Nigerian man,” (as she called him at the time), Angela packs her bags and heads to Lagos. Why? To put a ring on the man she likes. Beyoncè be praised.

                 A match made in heaven, wouldn’t you say?

As soon as Angela arrives at the Lagos airport in episode one, she runs into Michael’s arms and does something that’s supposed to be a kiss but looks more like her vacuuming his tonsils with her tongue. Many Nigerians aren’t used to PDA so the innocent bystanders that have to witness this face-sucking are visibly shook and disgusted. Between the airport and checking in at the hotel, Angela sucks her “sexy Nigerian man’s” face about twenty times. 

I saw it and you have to see it too.

The clerk at the hotel knew exactly what was playing out in front of him. 

The best (and most jarring) part of the episode is hearing Angela talk about how hard she’s going to “trump” (bump genitals with) Michael that night. It makes me want to gag, but I’m impressed by how she uses Trump as a sexy verb. The next morning, Angela wakes up a satisfied granny. Michael, on the other hand, not so much. 

I wonder if Nigerians can start using Bubu’s name as an euphemism for knacks. 

Michael spends the rest of the season trying to turn Angela into an African queen. There’s a hilarious episode where he takes her to the market to price goat meat, which leads to her almost passing out on the market floor after seeing a severed goat head chilling on a table. 

Later on, Michael’s mother and aunt pay a visit to discuss grandchildren, which is funny as hell because Angela is 52 years old. Things take an even crazier turn when they start talking about Angela being a submissive wife. Let’s just say that Angela isn’t too thrilled by this idea.

Angela’s response: “Just because you have to be submissive to your husband doesn’t mean I should. I’m an American.” 

The sex must’ve been spectacular sha because even after all the madness with Micheal’s family, Angela still proposes to him at the end of the season, making her Mrs Angela Ilesanmi. 

This purple suit is giving Willy Wonka.

It looks like Michael’s village people are working overtime, though, because his K-1 visa gets denied. There’s no confirmation on why he hasn’t been able to get the visa throughout the show. All we know is that Michael is on an agenda to fertilize Angela’s eggs by all means. When she’s back to the States, he offers to ship his sperm to her for an IVF procedure, but Angela is not having it because she doesn’t want him wanking into a tube in front of some doctor without her being present. 

Without her sexy Nigerian man close, Angela starts feeling insecure about being old and wants to lose some weight. She uses the money she’d saved up for the IVF procedure on a gastric bypass for weight loss. Angela returns in the spin-off show, Happily Ever After, as the hottest grandma you’ve ever seen. Michael, however, doesn’t  approve of her smaller boobs but doesn’t have the balls to tell her during their steamy, phone sex session in episode 12.

By the end of the season, it’s revealed that Angela might’ve had a fling with the gorgeous doctor who performed her surgery. Michael loses his shit and things get pretty heated between he and Angela at the reunion episode (90 Days Reunion: Couples Tell All) and she storms off the set, but not before flashing her new boobs at the camera.

I’m not sure where their relationship stands but I feel so sorry for Michael. Three years of this insane rollercoaster and our guy still hasn’t fulfilled his mission that we’re hinting at right now but won’t explicitly state to avoid wahala. Sorry, Mikey.

Up next is, Usman Umar; a Kano-based Nigerian rapper popularly known as Sojaboy. Sojaboy is introduced in the fourth season, along with his American sugar mama, Lisa Hamme. He even made a song for her titled,  I love you. It’s truly the worst thing I’ve ever heard, and you need to listen to it.  

When the show starts, Lisa seems like a calmer version of Angela. The only thing they have in common is that they both like a good genital meet & greet.

Usman tries to ride the wave of being a popular artist and takes Lisa for a performance at a nightclub. The club girls scream and flock around the self-proclaimed superstar as he walks in, and Lisa is obviously pissed. She spends most of the season being jealous and trying to frustrate Usman’s music career, but he doesn’t falter and remains focused on his goal that we’re hinting at right now but won’t explicitly state to avoid wahala.   

His family initially doesn’t support his relationship with Lisa but they come around after he assures them, in Hausa of course, about the certainty of moving to America. Usman marries Lisa but things don’t end well for them. The couple didn’t spill the full tea in the reunion episode  (90 Days Fiance: Tell All) but in interviews, Usman hinted at him feeling controlled in the marriage. In 2020, he filed for divorce.

Don’t worry about Usman, sha. He’s back on the show with another American milf on the current season.

There’s clearly some kind of epidemic in America that needs to be studied

Usman the Sojaboy is onto the next mission-filled adevnture with his new catch, Kimberly Menzies. After Kimberly slidesinto his DM as a super fan of the show, Usman takes the opportunity to get closer to her, and thus begins their relationship. So far, she’s flown to Tanzania to support him with a music video, bought him a Play Station 5, and a Macbook.

Usman seems to have hit the jackpot this time, but he’s been friendzonning Kimberly. He refuses to have sex with her, but she’s adamant about getting him in bed. We’ll keep watching and see how it goes for Usman and his horny horny mamaon the season of the show currently airing.

OUR MISSION

Zikoko amplifies African youth culture by curating and creating smart and joyful content for young Africans and the world.