Villain or victim of bad edit? 'MAFS' Season 15 star Morgan Bell defends herself against audience backlash
SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA: Binh Trinh and Morgan Bell of 'Married at First Sight' may have split up before 'Decision Day' on the reality program, but there's more to the narrative than what fans witnessed. Morgan recently spoke with ET on how the former couple's relationship panned out on TV and her thoughts on fan backlash.
For 'Married at First Sight' stars Binh and Morgan, marital happiness seemed a distant dream. Fans couldn't help but root for Binh as their relationship unraveled in the September 14 episode of the hit Lifetime series. Morgan claimed to have lost faith in Binh after realizing that he had been complaining about their problems to fellow co-star Justin after only one month of marriage. When Morgan told their friends that they were breaking up in the September episode, they both talked to their friends about how they felt. Binh kept saying sorry and saying he was going to therapy, while the women rushed into the guys' chat to settle their fight.
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Fans raced to Twitter to condemn Morgan's hypocrisy for confiding in her own pals about their troubles and for how she treats her marriage.
"You know, it's a little frustrating because so much more happened, of course, behind the scenes that maybe the viewers didn't get to sees," Morgan said of the season's drama. "There's a much more dynamic relationship between Binh and I that no one really got to see. So, of course, I wish people could've seen it. But with the show, they had to break it down into only a couple of hours a week so there was hours of filming that no one got to see, but I understand. I get it. They're trying to highlight certain things so it's understandable."
Morgan went on to state that she is aware that she has been vilified by certain people, but that this is due to the fact that not everything was captured. "[Fans] didn't see that so much more happened between Binh and I leading up to that point," she explained to ET. "People only saw certain things that we kind of argued about, but there was a lot more that happened behind the scenes. People only saw, you know, me give him the first chance then this last chance when in reality we were on chance like three, four, five."
Morgan revealed that Binh was saying things behind her back and discussing their relationship troubles with other cast members, especially Justin Hall. "Unfortunately, Justin wasn’t the best influence when it came to helping him make those decisions," she explained. "I wish I can say more on that, but I don't think I can. I just wish that he had gone to someone who knew him much better instead of someone who knew him for only a couple of months."
Morgan also explained how the pair gave their marriage numerous chances before calling it quits, which fans blame on her, claiming she only gave Binh one chance before leaving.
"That is completely not the case," she stated. "Binh had multiple chances -- three, four chances at that point -- and I really did try to make it work behind the scenes with Binh. Off camera, a lot of different things happened that the viewers just did not see. I understand where they’re coming from, though. They only saw certain things, and that’s just because everything had to be condensed down into a couple of hours of an episode every week. However, more did happen behind the scenes that no one got to see."
Are Morgan and Binh still in touch?
While their relationship did not end happily ever after, Morgan told ET that they are both in counseling and still interact. "I've been in therapy, I'm working on so many different things. I have really stepped away and said, 'OK, my priority now is mental health. That's what I need to focus on within myself.' I've like noticed so much growth since being in therapy."
"Binh is in therapy as well," she noted. "We're both working on each other as individuals, and it's just such a wonderful thing to kind of look back and see where we were at. At some points, we kind of talk, we kind of laugh, we're like, 'Oh my god, I cannot believe that all happened, I cannot believe we went through that.' Because now we're just completely different people at the end of the day, and it's it's honestly wonderful."
Season 15 of 'Married at First Sight' premieres Wednesdays at 8/7c on Lifetime.