Cut from 90 Day Fiance Season 9?

Um … where are Ariela Weinberg and Biniyam Shibre?

That’s the question that a lot of 90 Day Fiance viewers are asking, because we’re a couple of episodes into Season 9 with no sign of them.

They’re part of the Season 9 cast unless something very strange — but not unprecedented — has happened.

So when are viewers finally going to see them?

Ariela and Biniyam aren’t fan-favorites, exactly, but they are one of the most discussed and polarizing couples on the franchise.

That notoriety and divisive audience reaction earned them two seasons of 90 Day Fiance: The Other Way before they made the move, in more ways than one.

Now they’re supposed to be on 90 Day Fiance Season 9, with the show hyping things up by showing their drama on the trailer.

Some fans feel weirded out that the show dangled this can’t-miss couple in front of them on trailers, but has now spent two full episodes introducing only new cast members.

Don’t get us wrong, we already have plenty to talk about from Season 9, Episode 1 and Season 9, Episode 2.

But did Ari and Bini get scrubbed like Alina Kasha? If not, how long will viewers have to wait.

At the end of the second episode, however, the preview for Season 9, Episode 3 teased Ariela and Biniyam’s return.

It looks like things are starting out in Ethiopia, at least in part.

That would explain Ari’s messy sit-down with Biniyam’s sisters … the one that ends badly.

Some fans want all new couples, others struggle to care about new faces, and a shocking number of viewers fall in both categories.

It seems likely that the editing team had that in mind, bringing back these two but not inundating viewers with them at first.

It’s also possible that Ari and Bini have less drama and thus less screen time, but given their history … that seems unlikely.

Ariela Weinberg is a free-spirited woman from New Jersey.

Biniyam Shibre is an entertainer from Ethiopia.

Filled with wanderlust, Ariela took an affordable extended vacation in Ethiopia, where she met Bini.

Biniyam impregnated Ariela, which sounds like one of those random events … but this isn’t really new territory for the two of them.

Ariela was married for years to man from Argentina, where she met and lived with him.

And Biniyam was previously married to an American woman after, you guessed it, impregnating her, too.

The specter of Biniyam’s previous marriage ended up dictating the shape of his and Ariela’s love story.

Ariela’s parents are both in medicine — her father a doctor, her mother a nurse — and could have given birth near home.

Instead, she flew back to Ethiopia while very pregnant so that Bini could witness the birth of his child, which he did not get to do the first time around.

There were issues from the start, but initially, Biniyam made a good impression on viewers.

He seemed like a sweetheart, trying to accommodate Ariela, even though he came up short in several instances.

Ariela ended up being the one to cover their housing, so that all of her needs and Bini’s could be met as her due date approached.

Early on, the red flags seemed very small.

Yes, it was weird that Bini had impregnated two different American women.

It also seemed less than ideal that Ariela openly described herself as a "jealous" person, as fans wondered what would come of this.

Ariela’s family had planned to fly to Ethiopia to see their grandbaby born and to help Ariela recover after giving birth.

Things turned out very different.

Ari ended up delivering early via emergency C-section, a terrifying prospect even under the best of circumstances.

Fortunately, Ariela and Avi ended up being healthy, despite some initial concerns similar to those about Biniyam’s first son (who now lives in the US with his mother).

Next, Ari and Bini clashed over circumcision, which is a cultural practice in Ethiopia but which Ari opposed on humanitarian grounds.

Ariela is Jewish, but (like numerous Jewish intactivists) highlighted her infant son’s human rights, and feared that cosmetic surgery on his genitals without his consent might cause him to grow up to hate her.

Viewers were perplexed, to say the least, when the next episode showed Ariela cave to pressure from Bini and from her own relatives.

Even after explaining to the camera why she knew that it was wrong, Ariela brought her son to be circumcised, weeping while listening to his screams of pain.

To say that Ari lost a lot of fans with that move is an understatement. 

What followed of their life in Ethiopia was a lot of the same conflicts, playing out again and again and again.

Biniyam would essentially vanish for hours or even days at a time, leaving his girlfriend (and later, fiancee) wondering where he was.

He would ignore her calls or even put his phone in airplane mode to make himself unreachable, even knowing that his baby was at home.

Ariela also got into conflict with Biniyam’s family, particularly with sisters Mimi and Wish.

Even attending family events and supporting Bini as he pursues his "music career," it seems that she can do no right in their eyes.

And when Ariela reaches out to them to find out where Bini is when he disappears, they accuse her of being controlling.

Even Ari’s toughest critics cannot honestly claim that she didn’t try — in fact, she bent over backwards to meet Bini’s family’s demands.

After moving to Ethiopia to not only give birth but begin to raise their son, Ariela also attended numerous religious rights to please Biniyam.

Numerous viewers have expressed discomfort at seeing a Jewish woman attend so many Orthodox Christian ceremonies and sacred sites, with zero reciprocation.

In fact, for all of Ariela’s whining and tears, it seems that Biniyam is the one who regularly gets his way.

A few times, Ari has put her foot down, like after Biniyam turned their house into party central and allegedly cheated on her.

At the end of their last season of The Other Way, the couple resolved to move to America … assuming that Bini’s K-1 visa could be approved.

It’s no secret that it was approved. Even if we hadn’t reported on Bini being in the U.S. before, he also appeared in person on the Tell All.

Maybe they will have fewer conflicts now that Biniyam is away from bad influences and is less likely to vanish for days at a time.

Or maybe they’ll have brand new problems to overcome now that Bini, not Ari, is the fish out of water. We’ll find out soon.

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