Big Brother 12 - Season Thread

Cafe Society
81

Heh, unnecessary blurring makes your content seem edgier. The most blatant example was Erik Estrada on one of those earliy VH1 celebreality cheesefests. He was walking around in a bathing suit, so they blurred out the suit to make it seem like he was walking around naked.

As for who we like/don’t like, yeah, last season was a smorgasborg of hate. This season I’m revolted by Rachel and Brendan, both their interpersonal dynamic and her laugh. I like ogling Britney. That’s pretty much it, though I suppose right now I’m leaning toward the Brigade simply because: (alliance spoilers as of Monday night’s BBAD)[spoiler]The house split in two with Rachel and Brendan leading Kathy, Ragan, Andrew, Kristin and Hayden. They don’t think the other side of the house is organized, but it has been since day one with Hayden, Lane, Enzo, Matt, and now through circumstance Britney and Monet. And for those paying attention, yes, Hayden is a fully trusted member on both sides of the house.

I’d like to say I’m rooting for the Brigade because I like an underdog, but it may just be that I really don’t like Rachel’s laugh or her oogy make-out sessions.[/spoiler]

82

I’m not sure about that move. That’s never a good idea.

83

Yeah, pawns have a pretty shitty survival rate on this show.

84

Maybe it’s the editing, but I’m starting to dislike Britney and Monet. A lot. Yes, Monet, Rachel is jealous of you because you don’t dress like a ho. Every day when she chooses her own clothes she wishes she could be less ho-like, but it just never works out that way.

85

Oddly enough, the past couple of shows have caused me to shift my lists a little. I’m warming to Rachel’s savvy, in spite of being disgusted with her “sense of style” and that hideous laugh. But Brendon is on my shit list along with Andrew and Monet. Brendon is a total phony. And Andrew’s schtick was old by the end of episode one!

At first I thought I was going to like Matt, but now not so much. I had a desire to be shed of Ragan, but I could tolerate a few more weeks of him to be rid of others first. Enzo is growing on me, too, after thinking he was too much with the “Meow-meow” nonsense. That was an impressive performance with the guess-an-hour POV challenge.

Kristen and Kathy have been too far in the background (I just watch the regular broadcasts) for me to judge well. I like them both better than Rachel, but about the same as Britney.

My favorite to win is Lane, simply because he doesn’t grate on my nerves when he’s saying or doing something. Next would be Kristen. And then perhaps Britney because I like her spunk. She should find somebody else to team up with than Monet, though. I guess I’m on the fence about Hayden. Not as dumb as he appeared early on.

Who am I leaving out?

86

Matt and his ‘sick’ wife sob story was hilarious as he was telling it to Andrew. I really hope it comes to bite him in the ass.

Rachel played the POV competition perfectly, dropping the briefcase immediately after Monet. Brendon should have done the same after Britney dropped her case.

87

Seriously. I almost busted a gut (and believe me, on me that would hurt) when Matt said something like “Andrew’s a shoe salesman, not a doctor!”

Apparently the condition does exist, although Matt was hideously mispronouncing it.

88

I kept thinking that if only they’d known the Brigade existed, it would have been delicious for Rachel, Brendan, Britney, and Monet, through their antipathy, to form an alliance and take out Matt or Enzo in a total surprise move. But it wasn’t much of a surprise that none of the women could even think of getting past their dislikes for a week. Though it seemed as if Rachel was trying.

Matt certainly has a way of throwing people off balance. He’s always acting so suspicious that they have trouble trusting him enough to nominate him for eviction. I have no idea why Rachel seemed so dead-set on Andrew as the better choice.\

I can’t decide on a favorite. I tend to dislike the major schemers like Enzo, but that type tends to go pretty far in this game. I’m not crazy about this year’s showmance team. I guess I’m hoping one of the people staying in the background will show themselves to be a clever gamer later in the season.

89

How stupid is Rachel? She has a very temporary semi-secret alliance with Matt because of his volunteering for pawnhood. Matt doesn’t want anyone to know that he volunteered, which Rachel knows and agreed to (though her cover story during the veto ceremony sucked). So what does she expect Matt to do? He wants people to think the nomination was a blindside and not his own idea, so he’s going to bitch about it to everyone else!

Rachel burned her (admittedly temporary) ally…this is not something that inspires confidence in future potential allies. I really can’t believe she called him out in front of the house…not even talking to him in the HOH first. Idiot…how did she manage to get a bachelor’s degree in something as scientific as chemistry?

Oh, and HOH news, spoiled:

Matt’s the new HoH

90

The other choice was Andrew, who is currently in a 3-person alliance with Hayden and Kristen. In other words, losing Andrew means losing a Brigade asset. Better to save Andrew by using Matt.

They’re definitely bitchy, but the editing is playing it up. And apparently the housefrous love Brendan, so he and Rcahel are getting the cush edit. Rachel can be quite bitchy, but we won’t see much of that.

One thing a recapper who hates Britney said that I thought was interesting: “She plays emotional with Rachel, logical with Ragan and honest with Matt. Maybe her social game doesn’t suck as much as I originally thought.”

Yeah, I’m getting a growing respect for Hayden, too. Lane is still my favorite.

The Brigade in particular has impressed the hell out of me. Not only did Hayden do exactly as I predicted – steer the rest of the house toward Britney & Monet, keeping both his alliances intact – but then Matt managed to guarantee Monet went home. But their biggest strength to date has been their independence. The four of them rarely (never?) get together, but instead constantly split off to separate areas so at least one of them is in on virtually every conversation in the house. Plus they’ve managed to pull in close individual allies to help the group:

Matt and Ragan are very close
Hayden and Kristen are very close
Enzo and Britney are very close
Lane and Britney have a weird brother/sister dynamic going

So not only doesn’t the house know they’re in an alliance, they have the ability to bring in three satellite votes as needed, none of whom really know about each other in the context of the Brigade. That’s…impressive as hell to me.

91

I just wanted to chime in and say that I’ve enjoyed your commentary for the past couple of seasons, LSD. Please keep it up!

92

I don’t understand Matt’s nominees. With the players for the Veto competition picked at random from a bag (instead of chosen by the nominees), being able to backdoor someone is not a foregone conclusion. Does he not want Brendon & Rachel to automatically play for the Veto? Because they still can. And even if he put them both up, and one won, they could still vote out the other. With his nominees, he runs a good chance that his nominees stay the same, a player with no real alliances gets voted out, and the power couple get through another week. Stupid move. Matt’s nowhere as savvy as he thinks he is.

93

My thoughts exactly. I also thought he took Kathy’s vote in last week’s eviction a little too personally. I didn’t see the vote so much as being against Matt as it was a sympathy vote for Monet. It was pretty much a foregone conclusion that Monet was going to leave and I assume Kathy figured there was no harm in throwing a little support toward her friend.

94

Matt strikes me as the type of “smart” person who has to do things in a totally random direction because how can anyone find out and marvel at how much of a supergenius he is if he does the same thing that any person of average intelligence would do?

95

I don’t think it serves Matt’s best interest to get rid of Rachel or Brendon this week. I actually think it would have been stupid to nominate them and even stupider to put one of them up post-veto.

As is, he (maybe) has a truce with Rachel/Brendon. If one of them got taken out, the other one would still be left mostly powerless, but probably pretty determined to take revenge (and both are capable of winning HoH). Matt doesn’t want to be the target in the aftermath of taking one of them out. And hey- while the Bridgade is still undercover (something that can’t last forever), taking out the people the whole house is against doesn’t serve his interests either. As long as he takes out people that are neither in the Brigade nor the likely targets of everyone else, the more time that the Brigade won’t get targeted at all.

Believe me, I think Matt is supremely irritating and a bit too eager to try out boneheaded strategies, but taking out the so-called “power players” is a completely overrated strategy. Plus, leaving a known pair around for a while (knowing someone else will eventually take one of them out, and they have no allies anywhere else!) is perfectly viable. They’re not going to survive as a pair forever. Heck, I’d leave them for another month. They’re sure not picking up allies very quickly.

96

I gained some respect for Ragan. Not that I want him to win or anything. Just thought he showed some real moxie.

97

I agree that Matt’s nominations will probably be better for him than nominating Brendan and Rachel would have been. Besides that it will remove someone of unknown or non-existent loyalties and not give any additional power to the couple, it might reveal some things when people start campaigning for or against eviction for either nominee.

However, it doesn’t seem that he’s actually thought it out this way. He probably got lucky that his desire to be unpredictable will work in his favor.

However, his mistake here is that he didn’t seem to explain himself to his Brigade allies. Obviously, he’s ready to screw them over for his own benefit, but it’s a bad idea to allow them to start realizing that fact too early on. If he’d come up with some rationale and passed it on to the Brigade before the nominations, they’d have reason to believe he was working for their benefit. But surprising them with his plan will make them wonder about his loyalty.

I guess it’s hard to say much about it, having never tried such an activity, but it seemed stupid of Brendan and Enzo to keep one leg at the nose of their surfboard the whole time. Clearly, that leg tired out. Why didn’t they switch legs, or adopt the back-to-the-wall stance that Andrew, Ragan, and Matt had such success with?

98

They explained their thinking in that they started off standing in regular surfing position to begin with, thinking it was better than the “back against the wall” strategy at first. After around a half hour they realized they were wrong, but were afraid to try and change strategy halfway through and then fall immediately. So they were basically just stuck with a bad first thought they got locked into. (They also complained A LOT about how it was stacked against the bigger players.)

I think Matt’s nomination strategy was jointly arrived at between him and Ragan, and it basically was a result of Ragan desperately trying to keep his alliance of 4 together. Ragan’s super-tight with Brendan and Rachel, and also super-tight with Matt. So Matt and B&R feuding puts Ragan in an untenable situation.

I saw Matt and Ragan discussing the PoV ceremony on BBAD, with Matt trying to figure out how to toss the competition without being obvious. To that end he was hoping it to be a luck-based physical challenge. The idea is that if forced to switch nominations, I’m assuming Brendan would go up and out. But Matt can’t be the one to take somebody off the block because as soon as he does that he has blood on his hands.

Ragan’s two mantras all season (once he started playing) have been that words are meaningless while actions tell you everything, and also that if you’re not talking game with somebody, even if they’re your best friend they’re against you. If they were with you, why aren’t they talking game with you? Anyway, the idea that Matt doesn’t nominate them will be major damage-control ammo for Ragan to hammer B&R with. As long as Matt doesn’t win PoV, he has a chance to be in two alliances of four: the Brigade, and Ragan, Brendan and Rachel. (Much like Hayden.)

On a personal note, I think the DR went medeival on Matt’s ass with a coupla blowtorches to make sure he didn’t nominate the producers’ dream couple. Who I find every bit as nauseating as Britney does. On the plus side, all that icky make-out footage makes BBAD a breeze to scan through each night.

In the past week, Enzo has been making a specific effort to reach out the Andrew to try and pull him in as another satellite asset for the Brigade. This is funny because (PoV spoiler)[spoiler]Now that Brendan won PoV and the nominations stay the same, Enzo has been agitating to vote out Andrew on the grounds that he’s an actual player. He cracks me up when he says “What the hell, man, the Brigade is supposed to be the strongest alliance in the game, and we’re going to vote out Kathy? What the fuck? We have a rep to uphold.” hehheh.

Note that both Brendan and Rachel were selected to play in the PoV. What are the odds?! FIX![/spoiler]
Houseguest gossip suggests that Brendan & Rachel’s primary targets are pairs. They’ve already broken up Britney & Monet, so that leaves either Ragan & Matt or Hayden & Kristen. Ragan is in full-on damage control to save Matt, so it’s quite possible if they win they’ll put Hayden & Kristen on the block. The Brigade would probably jump at this chance to get rid of Kristen, who as we saw on the network show they’re starting to grow suspicious of. But this seems to have trickled back to Kristen, who has done an understandable 180 from staunch B&R supporter to probably putting them both up if she wins HoH.

Right now the only ones on the side of Brendan and Rachel are Ragan and the producers.

99

Unspoilered live feed (because the timeframe has already been on the network show):

Apparently, the nominations were hammered out between Ragan and Matt when they were alone in the backyard during the HoH competition. Ragan held out for immunity for Brendon and Rachel. Why they didn’t show this, I have no idea.

100

That’s a weird thing not to show. Thanks much for posting that, as it confirms what I was guessing at in the previous post.

I haven’t been to Hamstertime all week; the mods there keep pissing me off with pissy PMs.