ET spoke to controversial '90 Day Fiancé' star Big Ed and his fiancée, Liz, and they addressed all the backlash they've received.
Big Ed isn't immune to criticism. ET sat down with Ed and his on-again, off-again fiancée Liz, and they reacted to their fellow 90 Day Fiancé castmate, Loren, openly admitting she despises him.
Loren and her husband, Alexei, recently appeared on Vanderpump Rules alums Jax Taylor and Brittany Cartwright's podcast, When Reality Hits With Jax and Brittany, and were asked who their least favorite 90 Day Fiancé couples are. Loren didn't hesitate to call out Ed. "I loathe, loathe him," she tells ET's Melicia Johnson. "He's so insecure, but not at the same time. Just not a fan and I think everybody's well aware of it."
Ed told ET that her comments definitely affected him and insisted that Loren doesn't actually know him.
"You know, when I first read it and Liz and I talked about it, it kind of hurt my feelings," he says. "And here's why. We're on the other side together. Like, there's a reality. I don't like to call myself a star. But we're on TV and we get enough hate from people that don't know who we are. So, I was offended because she doesn't know me. And for her to say that and not know me, it put her in a lower class, like a bottom feeder online that goes and creates a fake account to tell you to go eff yourself."
"So, I'm just disappointed in her and she talked about her, you know, Tourette's as, you know, being a disease and somebody made fun of her ... which was hateful, and I wish her luck. I wouldn't. I've never ever gone online and made a negative comment about anyone. Whether it's a fan or somebody that's on the show, because I don't know who they are," he adds. "If Loren had my phone number, then she would know who I was. So yeah, it hurt. And I talked to Liz about that. And I go, 'That kind of sucks.'"
As for Liz, she said she doesn't care about what other people think about Ed.
"I know Ed's heart," she says. "And he really does have a huge, huge heart. I don't really care what people think. I don't like reading. I don't read the comments. You know, people come back and watch us for a reason. ... Ed's right when it comes to the Loren comment. She doesn't know him. She should know better. She, you know, she gets backlash too. Like, we all do."
"And we know how it feels, like, Loren knows how that feels," Ed adds. "So for her to do it was kind of sad."
Ed and Liz are one of five couples appearing on 90 Day: The Last Resort, the latest spinoff of the 90 Day Fiancé franchise. 90 Day: The Last Resort features 90 Day Fiancé couples who have reached breaking points undergoing a couples retreat to determine if they want to continue on with their relationships. Ed and Liz addressed the backlash they received from fans who no longer want to see them in the franchise due to their multiple breakups.
"If you feel my skin, it's like leather," Ed says of all the criticism. "So, I've been beaten up since day one being on Before the 90 Days and I didn't deal with it then very well, actually. Ended up in counseling, but my brother would always tell me, 'Look, if you want to live with your head in the gutter, that becomes your life,' which means don't read your comments."
Liz reiterated that the two didn't care about anyone's opinions if they didn't know them personally.
"Basically doesn't matter," she says bluntly. "If you don't have our number, we don't care about your opinion."
"I'm kind of Teflon," Ed jokes. "I just let it bounce off and I let her take all the heat."
Still, Ed did acknowledge some fault when it comes to the tell-all that aired in January, when he fought with his fellow castmates and Liz claimed she was done with him after he lied about communicating with Rose, his ex-fiancée from the Philippines.
"On my end, I I acted like a total idiot because everybody I felt was attacking me, like everybody came at me at once and they didn't read the entire text if you read at the bottom," he says about his communication with Rose. "Regardless, I should have been more honest with Liz. But I told [Rose] I'm in a relationship and I was reaching out to her for other more business reasons than anything else. But I did forget, and I didn't tell Liz and I wasn't honest. So that was on me. But the reason why I acted like an idiot was I felt like I was drowning and everybody, including Liz, they were stepping on my head."
For her part, Liz owned up to what she felt she could have done differently.
"So in therapy I learned, you know, Ed did get himself in trouble. But I also learned that I need to have his back more often," she says. "I've grown a lot with that too. So, I don't care what people think about us. I don't like the bullying. I think it's very hurtful, you know, but I have his back. And we learned to become friends again and better partners for each other, so you can just take all your negative comments and keep it to yourself."
The couple went through intense therapy on 90 Day: The Last Resort, which obviously led to a lot of self-reflecting.
"A big takeaway in general that I got out of therapy is that the way that I behaved at the tell-all for example is, it's wrong, right? But it doesn't have to define who you are," Ed notes. "You can always improve, but a lot of people, they think they're bad because of the way they act. You know, you can always change -- you can always not choose to behave like that."
"It's been tough," he says about feeling ashamed due to his behavior at the tell-all. "You know, just my friends, you know ... when I saw my sister, she's like, 'God, Ed. Everybody goes, you’re really, you know, that big of a d**k.' And she's like, 'No, he's not. He's loving, he's wonderful.' So, number one, you have to own your behavior. OK, I acted terribly, and I apologized as much as I can, but I'm also learning that you can be a better person. You can always become a better version of yourself through therapy."
90 Day: The Last Resort premieres Aug. 14 on TLC.
RELATED CONTENT:
