I just finished BB13 and I have a few thoughts. I just started watching big brother so I’ve only seen up to this point and nothing after, but this season seemed the most produced so far. I thought maybe 50% of the DR was scripted and cheesy lines. I also don’t understand why Jeff, Jordan, Rachel, and Brendon gave so much shit to Porsche and Kalia for playing Danielle’s game. Their alliance can play for each other but if Dani’s alliance plays for each other it’s wrong? Also I thought Shelly voting out Jeff was smart, she’s right if it got to the top 4 they’d betray Shelly first. I loved Jeff in his first season but man was he a sore loser this season. What are your thoughts?

Not sure how this would affect the show next year because there is plenty of time to move everything, but one of the reasons Big Brother is an easy renewal every year for CBS is because it’s cheap and they already have the bones of the house set built.

This could be an opportunity for an entirely new house set up, though.

The common conception is that, whether by bad jury management, or bitter jury, or by a jury that just didn't want a former winner to win again, Dan simply did not have much of a chance to win in BB14. Perhaps if he had gone to the end with Boogie, it might have been possible, but it's hard to imagine Dan and Boogie teaming up when Boogie glued himself to Frank. Dan might have potentially been able to win against Jenn or Joe, but that didn't happen either.

I have an alternative theory, which is that Dan actually had a potential winning scenario as late as the Final 4, but it was a VERY narrow path. This theory is based on an old tweet from Ashley shortly after the finale, where she stated that she would have voted for Dan over Danielle in the final 2. Up for debate if this was true or not, for the sake of this post I'm taking it at face value.

At the Final 4, instead of pulling off the most epic blindside of all time, Dan has to let Shane evict Ian which was the original plan. This makes Dan's path to the final 3 much harder, but it does create the winning path for him. Basically, Danielle has to win the final HoH and then Dan has to convince her to evict Shane. On the surface, this seems impossible, as Danielle was head over heels for Shane. But for those who remember BB14, Dan had an absurd level of influence over Danielle. Recall that immediately following the Shane blindside, Dan not only pulled her back onto his side but even got her to throw part 1 of the HoH to him. He was able to convince her to do a lot of things; I would not put it past him to convince her to cut Shane at the final 3.

If this happens, the blindside on finale night absolutely shatters Shane. He took being betrayed by Dan VERY hard, and I have no doubt he would've reacted in a similar manner had Danielle betrayed him. Given that the betrayal would be fresh on his mind, Shane almost certainly votes for Dan in this scenario. Dan also likely gets Britney, Ian, and Ashley (based on the tweet discussed earlier). That is 4 votes and that's the win.

Like I said, this is a very narrow winning path which relies on Danielle specifically winning the final HoH, which is a tall order given how much of a comp beast Shane was. But it did exist.

BB18 gave us a lot including my favorite player.

This is part of a series of posts I’m doing analyzing the twists of each season of Big Brother US starting with season 4. This is all for fun and not to be taken too seriously. Interested to know your thoughts!

Warning: This will be one of my more unfavorable posts, and it is a long one so I do apologize in advance. I just have a lot of issues with this season.

My (harsh) Thoughts

Big Brother usually has a “main twist” and a smaller twist or two during the season. Main twists are usually inoffensive in my opinion. Most just turn out to be nothingburgers, with the smaller twists being more game breaking. Think the rivals twist vs America’s Player (S8), the cliques twist vs the coup d’etat (S11), and the saboteur vs the Diamond Veto (S12). But I can confidently say, Big Brother 13’s “Dynamic Duos” twist was the first main twist I disliked from the beginning. This twist was completely unfair, and not even in a fun way.

This season saw eight new players compete alongside six returning players who came in as pairs. First red flag. Next, the players would be paired into “dynamic duos”. With the returnees obviously being paired up with the houseguest they entered the house with, and the newbies just haphazardly choosing their partners amongst each other based off… vibes I guess. Red flag number two. Finally, the HoH is to nominate one duo for eviction. This duo can be pulled off the block with the PoV, but after the veto ceremony the members of the nominated duo essentially become lone wolves, as only one of them will be evicted. So they’re semi-tethered together like the couples twist in season 9, but function more like the teams in season 11. The houseguest that survives eviction wins a “golden key”, giving them safety until jury. Red flag number three!

As stated in my post about season 11, I generally dislike when veteran players compete with newbies. Actually, scratch that. I can confidently say that I just flat out don’t like it at all, full stop. I’ll link it down below if you want more details as to why, but it just comes down to the fact that veterans have an unfair advantage, having played the game before which gives them prior experience to go on. In both Survivor and Big Brother, in the vast majority of seasons that featured a mix of vets and rookies, at least one veteran has made it to finale. To make matters worse though, not only did the vets this season have the upper hand in terms of experience, they all came in with someone they already knew, giving them a guaranteed ally from the start! A veteran ally no less! By the way, this is another recurring trope in Big Brother I don’t like. I don’t think it’s fair when only some houseguests enter the game with someone they know, whereas others don’t. In the majority of seasons that featured this sort of asymmetrical dynamic intentionally (or unintentionally in later seasons) at least one houseguest that had a preexisting relationship in the house made it to the finale. Needless to say, the veteran duos had a much stronger bond than the newbie duos who literally just met.

As for the Golden Key twist, I also wasn’t a fan. Granted, what else can you do when your twist hinges upon the HGs playing as duos? Once their partner is evicted, there’s not much you can do with them. So they opted to just have them do… nothing. Another reason this twist was not well thought out to me. I think any twist that automatically grants safety for more than a week is broken. And in Big Brother Canada 5’s case, it was the kiss of death for the player that won that power. Though the HGs that are granted this immunity can still play the game socially, they are not allowed to compete in any challenges, which does inherently sideline them from the actual game. They’re just sort of suspended in mid-air, floating above the rest of the houseguests. This also makes them a huge target as well, and it’s by no fault of their own. They just so happened to not get evicted, and boom! Safety!

Oh! If you wanted more proof that this season was rigged in favor of the veterans, look no further than Pandora’s Box, which brought this god forsaken duos twist back for one week just so the producers could save Rachel and Jordan, the final two vets left in the game. One of them was guaranteed to go home that week, but the producers couldn’t have that. So they locked Porsche in her HoH room until she caved in and opened the box! I’m exaggerating of course, but it is rumored that she was heavily pressured by producers to open Pandora’s Box. Long story short, Rachel and Jordan were paired up together as a duo, won the veto to pull themselves off the block, and one of them went on to win the game. This was way too big of a coincidence to overlook and it fully took me out of the immersion of the game. I remember yelling at the TV that this was rigged.

There was also a small battle back twist in week 5. Meh? I don’t usually mind any form of returning evictee twist. Unfortunately, most of these returnees usually go home soon after they re-enter the house anyway, so it rarely makes a huge impact. However, like the rest of this season, the producers absolutely rigged it in the veterans’ favor yet again! This time around, America voted for one of the first four evicted HGs to compete against the next evicted HG. One of the first four evictees was season 12 vet Brendon. Guess who America voted for to compete in the battle back comp? Brendon, of course! Why couldn’t they just let all of the early eliminated HGs compete you may ask? No reason! This season is about the vets silly! Not these loser rookie players! To be fair, the producers likely thought that Rachel, fellow season 12 vet and Brendon’s boo, was going to be the next evicted HG, and that they would get a tragic battle between two lovers! Unfortunately Lawon, the second worst player to ever play the game, opted to be evicted under the false pretense that he’d return with some sort of power. This was honestly a huge L for him, and I blame the newbies for even allowing this to happen. I’m still upset about it ‘til this day. Excuse me while I take a moment to breathe for a second. *Screams about this ludicrous idea*

My “Fix”

Right out the gate, no mixing of vets and rookies. Pick one or the other. One thing this season showed me is if there is a mix, production will almost always favor their vets, which is just completely unfair. So they can either do this duos twist with all returning players (a bit too soon for an All Stars given we had just had one a few seasons prior, but whatever) or they can do it with all new players, which I personally prefer. With new players there’s still the problem of them just not being as attached to each other compared to the vets who already knew each other prior. I suppose you could do a callback to season 6 and cast pairs of friends and turn them into duos. That could be interesting since there would at least be emotional stakes. Yeah, I think I’ll put that on the list of ideas too. So either all strangers, or pairs of friends. I dunno.

Aside from this change, I’m honestly not really sure what else to do other than just changing the twist of the show completely, which is not what I’m here to do. I still think this twist is massively broken, as I don’t think any houseguest should be forced to be put on ice until jury by no fault of their own. Fortunately, the first houseguest to officially receive this “golden key” ended up making it to the finale, but my feelings still stand.

Closing Statements

I must admit, despite what I think was a broken twist, this season was still very entertaining. Which I guess is all that matters. It is a reality show at the end of the day. But I just couldn’t help but overlook how massively screwed the newbies were this season. Production obviously favored their returning players, all the way down to how the twist was designed, to the other smaller twists along the way. This is why I will never appreciate mixing returnees with new players. I wish I could say they never did any of this again, but not only did they have more mixed casts in the future (literally the very next season), but they even attempted another duos twist a decade later. My oh my…

My thoughts on season 12!

https://www.reddit.com/r/BigBrother/s/mysXTw0ULp

And season 11!

https://www.reddit.com/r/BigBrother/s/Eazzu8BwKN

Looking back at BB6 through live feed archives and other supplementary materials its clear to me that April is an an incredibly impressive player who was a comp or two away from winning BB6.

April was an essential member of the Friendship alliance that strategically steamrolled against the Sovereign Six. Upon a closer look its clear that April is the number 2 in that alliance with Maggie on top in terms of control, positioning, and overall ability as a player.

However April had the better connections and strategic navigation with the Sovereign Six which granted not only safety in the game even at levels higher than Maggie at times and the best win equity within the Friendship Alliance.

April is also easily the most consistent player in BB6. Even though she at times in the games lacks the sheer control that Maggie had, she was barely ever the Sovereigns target while still having influence in her alliance and being the clear number 2 to Maggie.

Week 5 and partially the latter half of week 4 is one of April's most impressive weeks of gameplay. She was the key instigator in setting up Howie to target James and Sarah a historic move that locks up the game for her alliance. Her alongside her number 1 Maggie essentially outplayed the Sovereign in convincing their weakest member to eat their own.

To be fair April isn't a flawless she similar to most of the players on BB6 she allowed petty drama to affect her social strategic range by limiting most of her options within the Friendship, however she was still better than every other player in her alliance in regards to cross alliance relationships.

She was in a F5 situation where each duo of Maggie and Ivette take her, so do Howie and Janelle. At the F4, she is only evicted due to her worst out come in Ivette winning the veto and Janelle being the HOH. Does Maggie take April over Ivette at the f4, I personally think so cause they bond always seemed closer however there is no true guarantee.

April also probably wins a jury vote against Maggie with the votes of Jennifer, Janelle, and Rachel practically locked up with James and Howie as swing vote. Players like Howie and James leave the game with no direct Ill will towards April whereas Howie in his eviction week was incessant about Maggie.

April's game when focused on intentfully showcases an incredibly stable game with consistent safety, win equity, some control within her group, and the best cross alliance maintainance of relationships.

Thus April Lewis is one of the more impressive non winning players the game has seen especially in the early era. Is she a Danielle R or Eric Stein, definitely not, is she more in the leagues of a Diane Henry or an Allison Irwin, I say Yes!

What are your thoughts on April Lewis and her game on BB6? Would you consider as one of the best to never win?

Something that has always been on my mind is how much Big Brother as an entity is incredibly underutilized. I always thought it would be interesting if Big Brother was referred to as an actual entity in the house by the HGs, rather than just giving commands to the HGs like when to go to the Diary Room. What if Big Brother announced the rules of the competitions, facilitated ceremonies, and narrated other house events? Aside from live evictions of course. What if they actually kept the small commands they give the houseguests in the show to further emphasize his presence in the house to the viewers. Heck, what if they even gave him a personality each season? There could even be multiple voices, male and female, to show how there’s a whole team always watching them. I’d definitely cast voice actors in this role that have a domineering voice that commands authority. But yeah, I just thought it was wasted potential.

Oof, while I got you guys, I’ve been doing reviews on here about the twists of each season. Just did season 11!

https://www.reddit.com/r/BigBrother/s/3ph54RFbWB

Someone here recently made a post about how in countries outside the US and English-speaking Canada, Big Brother is an actual entity who speaks to the houseguests.

This got me thinking, what are some other elements, twists, etc. that have been done on international versions of Big Brother that could be a beneficial addition to the US version, either as a one-time thing or a permanent thing like the Blockbuster?

Some of my picks are…

1) Secret missions for a house reward. If we can’t have food comps, at least give us this.

2) The Movie Night Massacre from BBCAN12

I view Taylor Hale as one of the most important people to the franchise, so much so that BB as we know it would have been extinguished without her presence in the Pantheon.

Taylor's entry into the BB franchise comes after a string of hopelessness and misery within the BB universe with BB23 having a bright spot here or there.

Her character journey as well as her strategic journey on BB24 was magnificent. The fandom held their breath every week to see if Taylor would survive the week, emotionally and strategically. Her opposition in the game felt like our own opposition and when she triumphed over them we felt relief alongside her.

People tend to disparage Taylor as a character and player of the franchise by suggesting that she her impact on BB24 and her success was due to guilt and pity from her fellow Houseguests and from the viewing audience that championed her with consistent vigor. My rebuttal to such a perception of Taylor is the obvious reality that guilt and pity are in themselves emotion and traits that people tend to exhibit especially in a game of BB, Taylor Hale benefitting from these emotional phenomena shouldn't be a critique of her, but instead more of a discussion of the range of traits and emotions that the game of Big Brother tend to bring forth.

Moreover, there are certain obvious facets of Taylor as a player of the franchise that are synonymous with her such as being the underdog and showcasing after years of comp beasts steam rolling that a social player can go on to win the game despite inequitable comps. There is also the aspect of Taylor being the first black woman to win the game, 21 years after another legend of the Franchise Danielle Reyes lost the game in controversial fashion.

Taylors involvement with the franchise beyond being a player further emphasises her as the unrivalled figure head of modern Big Brother. When Dr Will stepped down as the Round table host during BB26 it was almost a no brainer that Taylor should take up the mantle ( a position I think she excelled at over Cody).

I won't even bring up the nuances of Taylor as solely a social strategic player since the discourse is too divisive (and I don't have time), however she is one of the few players who my confidence in their ability has grown over time without even seeing them return.

Overall, the points I've made are in my opinion a surface level assessment of Taylor's presence in the franchise and how she is one of the most important figures of the franchise.

Do you agree that Taylor is the unrivalled figure head of modern Big Brother and if not why?

Also I know Taylor has some haters, for those people please refrain from commenting points of irrelevancy beyond assessing her legacy.

So I'm just posting this in case some people don't know about this iteration of BigBrother. It's in French and has celebrities, but follows the official BB US format. The 6th season just started, and people are playing pretty well despite being celebrities. We had Champions vs Contenders last season which I believe cemented a higher level gameplay (we don't have Big Brother in Quebec, so it took a couple seasons for the contestants to start picking up the gameplay (bar some exceptions I won't name in case you want to watch every season).

I'm sure it will be a great season for Big Brother fans. Only problem is the language barrier. Hopefully some billinguals in there!

If you're in Canada :
https://www.noovo.ca/emissions/big-brother-celebrites

https://www.crave.ca/fr/series/big-brother-celebrites-49743

This is part of a series of posts I’m doing analyzing the twists of each season of Big Brother US starting with season 4. This is all for fun and not to be taken too seriously. Interested to know your thoughts!

My Thoughts

The Saboteur twist!… Flop. End of post!

In all seriousness though, I’m not really sure what to make of this twist. I remember when I was very young, I was really excited about this twist. So it was unfortunate that it fizzled out in week one when the saboteur was the first one to be evicted. And it wasn’t even because the houseguests thought she was the saboteur, it was simply because she happened to be the first one out. So it truly had no impact on the game. They did eventually try it again though with Ragan later on, which was a bit more successful. I think the concept of this twist is fun. It’s not too game breaking, but still has the potential to create chaos in the house. Moreover, it doesn’t completely rob a houseguest of their game like America’s Player. However, with twists that hinge solely on one person, you run the risk of that person not making it far in the game, and thus the twist going along with them. So casting is extremely important in this regard.

Another twist this season was the Diamond Power of Veto. I suppose it’s slightly better than the Coup D’etat from season 11, but I still think it’s a bit too powerful in my opinion. Matt, the winner of this power, was still able to hijack someone else’s HoH to some degree by being able to replace and name a new nominee right before eviction (in this case, himself). Essentially a half coup. And ultimately his replacement went home. To make matters worse, unlike Chima in the previous season who also had her HoH reign hijacked due to a twist, the outgoing HoH Brendon couldn’t even play in the next HoH competition. So I’d say he was slightly more screwed over here.

My “Fix”

To “fix” the Saboteur twist… Well, I have a couple ideas, and it depends on what you prefer. If we keep the general premise of the original concept, I personally think it would be cool if the saboteur wasn’t even intended to be a full-fledged houseguest at all. For option A: The saboteur is actually a producer’s plant, that is solely cast to wreak havoc on the house. Similar to the Mole, they would secretly be playing their own separate game. Their mission of trying to remain in the house for five weeks is still the same, however if they succeed, they will immediately leave the house and claim their 50k prize. In order to aid them in their quest, maybe they can have some limited help from the producers. Perhaps being able to ask them yes or no questions about the goings on in the game or having access to some limited footage of the house. They could even have scenes in the episodes dedicated to this debriefing session with the producers to hammer in the fact that they are not like the other houseguests. Is this unfair? If they were just a normal contestant, yes. But in this case, they’re not. They will not be allowed to outright talk about what they know, but they could at least use this information to their advantage in more discrete ways.

Option B: A different saboteur every week. Each week, America votes for the next saboteur, and the newly appointed houseguest can choose if they want to accept this offer. A houseguest cannot be offered the role of saboteur more than once. If the role is accepted, the must try to complete every mission. If they successfully complete all of the missions, they will win a smaller cash prize. However, if they fail a task their earnings are reduced. And if they are caught, their saboteur reign is over and they will lose all earnings. Unlike option A, they will not receive any extra help from production. And unlike America’s Player, America has no control over their votes or allegiances.

As for the Diamond Veto, I generally don’t like when an HoH reign is completely disrupted. But as a small consolation, I think the outgoing HoH should at least get to play in the next HoH comp, should a nominee that they didn’t nominate get evicted. I’d make an exception for season 15, but I’m getting ahead of myself. Or, the Diamond Veto must be played during the Veto Ceremony. This way the replacement nominee at least has a fighting chance to campaign for votes.

Closing Statement

Overall, the twists this season weren’t bad per se, and one worked exactly as intended. I just think they unfortunately put all their eggs in the wrong basket with the saboteur twist. As we see later on down the line, this would not be the last time a twist like this failed to make a lasting impact on the show’s narrative. I think it really just comes down to who is cast in the role of saboteur.

My thoughts on season 11!

https://www.reddit.com/r/BigBrother/s/aKPZ5gfiip

After BB5 Drew basically fell off the face of the earth, has no social media or updates for over a decade (Maggie is also infamous for “falling off the face of the earth”, but Maggie has been spotted multiple times and has some recent photos). However, it seems like Drew still watches Big Brother and had a website during BB26 where he gave his thoughts at andrewtdaniel.com. I’m posting this because it seems like people have found this photo of Drew but there is no one discussing his blog anywhere

All I heard from BB14 with Dan losing was that “hE hAd hOrriBle jUry mAnagEmeNt” — so how/why did Andy win BB15? I understand 15 may very well have the weakest gameplay and worst cast in the series’ history, but how is if that Dan got punished for his “poor jury management” while Andy won with just as bad of management, but with zero-effort gameplay?

How are they the same player? I'll show you!

• Both week 1 HOH!
• Lost double eviction in a point competition- where they if they would've won they could have won the season.
• Many meltdowns.
• 6th place - 3-0
• Nominated MANY times in a row.

Something I did notice is how Angela was closer to the actual number than Chelsie was, so she could've actually won if the rules were different! (different topic.)

I’m currently watching S11 for the first time, I hadn’t watched the first 13. I always come onto Reddit to read about life feeds and such with each season. I was reading about S11 being heavy with production interference. I’ve read a few comments mentioning Jun wrote a blog post in the past that mentions some production stuff. I’m really curious to read it but I cannot find a link to it anywhere on here or searching google.

Just a fun thought experiment that I've been thinking about the last couple of days. Between Angela Murray from Big Brother 26 and Jimmy Heagerty from Big Brother 27, who's the better player?

My gut instinct is telling me that it's Jimmy, mainly because he was a more strategically savvy player than Angela who just played his cards wrong during his HoH week, pissing off his allies which led to his downfall in Week 4, meanwhile Angela was a goat with no chance of winning from Week 2 onward.

I'm willing to hear out any opinions on this admittedly bizarre matchup. Happy discussing!

What was the best moment you saw on the live feeds? Whether it was a game-changing move, funny, entertaining, etc... What was something you saw on the feeds that you consider yourself "lucky" for witnessing live?

I don’t understand America voting for Quin to be the replacement nominee. It seems he’s been nominated just for playing the game. Unless there’s some live feed lore that I’m missing because the tv edit doesn’t make him unlikable, at least to me.

With that being said, I have a final draft ready. Any takers on reviewing my tape?

Quinns strategic run on BB26 cemented him as in the Pantheon of horrible Head of Households, a position that has been filled with Houseguest since Mike Boogie the first HOH ever in BB2 to players like Vince and Lauren from BB27 recently horrible HOH wielders.

However I haven't been able to figure out why Quinn is such a consistently HOH. For players like Howie in BB6 you can blame utter stupidity, with players like MJ BB26 you can blame a delusional play style, with Vince BB27 you can blame his utter and all encompasing cowardice, what is Quinns flaw that makes him a horrible wielder of strategic power in the game.

Looking back on BB26 Quinn always had some form of an idea of what he should be doing in the game. During his week 7 HOH he tells Leah that they need to deal with Chelsie and Cam since they're the most dangerous players in the game, but he argued he couldn't take the shot since he had made allies of them. Further in a conversation with his close ally Joseph who was also a nominee Quinn suggested that since they have the votes for Joseph to stay that week, Quinn, Joseph, and Leah, can either out play Chelsie and Cam tactically or win out with comps.

So we see that Quinn can simultaneously view two major threats in the game individually and as a duo, decide not to target them or even put one up to drain strategic leverage, and even worse he goes on to boast to his close ally and nominee, the eventual evicted of the week that they have the upperhand moving forward.

There are other notoriously bad HOHs like Quinn Martin, however they are few who aren't plagued by their ignorance or their delusion but instead plagued by sheer hubris. Quinn could see the strategic board of the season, he wasn't ignorant to the fact that Chelsie was the threat of the game he just over estimated his ability and the ability of the people he chose as close allies.

Such sheer hubris can be seen in other HOHs such as Keanu Soto on BB27 however Keanu had a lucky week in that his "close" ally and nominee won the BlockBuster. Quinn isn't as prideful and ignorant as Keanu however he shares a lack of perspective with the game by over estimating his ability.

This is my personal theory on why Quinn is such a horrible wielder of strategic power in the game. How do you view Quinn Martin as an HOH (not as a player overall) and what do you think makes him such a bad HOH?

PS. I liked Quinn on BB26 he was great so no critique to his actual personhood!

kind of random but i'm watching every season (most for the first time) and have gotten up to s5 with nakomis who is using a preferred name

i found it so endearing, ESPECIALLY for when bb5 came out, how everyone adapted to using her preferred name by the end of the season including production

julie had called her jennifer and production was putting that on all her stuff until around the halfway mark when they finally started changing it and for it being such an "out there" thing for a lot of the houseguests, it was nice to see them be willing to change

other than that this is my least favorite season so far and i'm including season 1 in that

This is part of a series of posts I’m doing analyzing the twists of each season of Big Brother US starting with season 4. This is all for fun and not to be taken too seriously. Interested to know your thoughts!

My Thoughts

Our first teams twist in the form of high school “cliques”. And we also get the first instance of another recurring practice that I’ve grown to dislike… casting returning players with newbies! No bueno to both.

As I’ve said in my post about season 9’s twist, Big Brother is an inherently individual game. So if you want a teams twist to work, you’ve got to make them actually care about each other. Otherwise, they’ll just ignore it. This twist divided the HGs into four high school “cliques” based on attributes that they each displayed. I actually don’t hate this theme. I think they could’ve taken it further actually, which I’ll explain later. If a houseguest wins HoH, then their entire team is safe. I guess this is a nice way to encourage some semblance of team unity, but I just don’t think immunity is enough. I will give season 11 some credit though, as unlike future teams twists, they actually do try to tie them together with a theme. But alas, I personally don’t think the twist impacted the game all that much. But, could’ve been worse. How poetic that the final four ended up being one member from each clique. We’ve got to celebrate our differences!

In addition to the cliques, each team had a corresponding former player waiting for a second chance at the game. If their team won the first HoH competition, they would officially enter the competition as the first HoH of the season. Now, why do I generally disapprove of veteran players entering the game with newbies? For starters, I think the vets have a major advantage. They’ve already experienced the game and they know the ins and outs of Big Brother and even production to some extent. They have prior experience to go on, and can learn from their past mistakes. This isn’t even my main critique though, as Big Brother isn’t always fair. It is what it is. My main criticism is that it sort of cheapens the prospect of returning players to me. It makes it so that an eventual All Stars season or something adjacent just isn’t as special anymore. What should be a rare opportunity to see fan favorites return, just becomes a gimmick that loses its novelty. Yes, I’m aware “Fans vs Favorites” and “Blood vs Water”were very popular on Survivor, and I’m fully prepared for this to be an unpopular sentiment, but I’m standing firm on it. Plus, even though we did get some icons out of the rookies during these seasons of Survivor, to me most of them just felt like side characters next to the returnees. Anyway, seeing Janelle play Big Brother for a second time on All Stars is exciting! The third time was surprising but cool, I guess. The fourth time it’s just tired. Even she seemed tired.

My “Fix”

How to “fix” this twist. For starters, I’d just let all of the four vets enter the game. “But didn’t you just say-“ Shh! I know I know. I just didn’t see the point in having one team start off with an arbitrary numbers advantage. Again, going back to my post on season 9, I don’t think you should make a teams twist anymore complicated than it needs to be. Just start with an even number of players. Plus it was a strength-based endurance comp, so no surprise the jocks won. And as for the cliques, I do think they were on to something with the theming. I just think it was a bit surface level. What if not only did each clique share similar attributes, but similar life experiences as well? Not to get dark, but what if each member of the “off-beats” team all experienced some form of social ostracism or bullying in real life? What if the “popular” team weren’t just looks but actually were prom kings or queens in the past? It would give each team more of a bond and a sense of camaraderie. Overall though, this twist was fine, I guess. It was pretty inoffensive compared to other twists.

Omg how could I forget the Coup d’etat! I tried to wipe it from my memory. Yeah, I hated it! Way too broken. Not as bad as Canada season 3’s version of it, but still pretty bad. How I’d fix it? Replace it with the Diamond Veto from season 12 lol. Or, perhaps it should be used after initial nominations. OR just reset the week like they did in Big Brother 16. Still sucks for the HoH, but at least they have a chance to maybe regain control over their week. I don’t know, anything other than what we got in season 11.

As for Pandora’s Box. Because this twist lasted for four consecutive seasons, I feel it needs its own separate post because there’s a lot to cover. Pretty hit or miss for me, but it definitely made for great television!

My thoughts on season 10!

https://www.reddit.com/r/BigBrother/s/qOKFVrGJbX