By Leah Burdick
Big Brother (BB) is a reality TV show in its 25th season. BB usually starts towards the middle of summer, typically July. This year it started at the end of August due to the writer’s strike, but it will be the longest season yet.
Julie Chen Moonves has been the only host for this show making her the iconic face of BB. At the beginning of each season, 16 random houseguests enter an enclosed house for months straight with no outside communications. The winner of the show wins around $750,000.
Throughout the months locked away, they have to compete to not get evicted. On Sunday nights, at 8 p.m., the houseguest competes for Head of House Hold (HOH). This gives the winner not only safety for the week but they get to pick two nominees that will be on the block to eventually get voted out.
On Wednesday, at 8 p.m., is the Veto competition where teh HOH, the two nominees on the block, and three randomly chosen houseguet compete for The Power of Veto (POV). Whoever wins is safe for elimination. They can either use the veto to take down a nominee so that HOH will have to pick a new person to replace that spot. Or the winner can leave the nominations the same.
Thursday night is the live eviction where houseguests go into the diary room one by one and pick who they want to evict out of the house/game. HOH only gets to vote in the event of a tie, which is not common.
Sounds easy enough right? Well not exactly. Julie Chen’s Moonves catchphrase is “expect the unexpected”. Even though a lot of the competitions are similar and the idea of the game never changes, to keep the show entertaining Moonves adds a bunch of twists to make the show more difficult. Each season also follows its own theme. For example, this season is called the multiverse because the house is designed into four past season themes.
I have been watching this show since I was born. It’s like a holiday for my family when it’s the premier night for BB. I do not like reality TV shows, so it’s weird for me how obsessed I am with this series.
This season has already been filled with twists and turns. Currently, two house guests who have been evicted are “zombies” who are competing against each other to get back into the house. This is a very big deal because the people who evicted them become their number one targets if they win and get sent back into the house. This twist has been seen a few years back when it was called The Battle Back.
This season has legendary Survivor player Cirie Feilds is playing alongside her son, but no one in the house knows they are related. Cirie and Jared are both from CT. which is where I am from, so It’s great to see a more overlooked state have someone in there. I personally do not like Jared and am glad he is out of the house because he focuses too much on what his mother says than what he should do for himself. Cirie on the other hand, has done an amazing job at manipulating the whole house until recently exposed for it.
My favorite players that I want to win are either Corey Wurtenberger, who is only 21, or Jag Bains, who is 25, or Matt Koltz, who is 27. I like Cory because he has broken out of his shell and stopped being a floater. He is starting to really get involved in the game which is great to see. Jag has always been a favorite of mine, but he went from being a strong threat to the house to just having luck on his side. He sat on the block and got eliminated, but Matt won a secret competition that lets him remove Jag off the block anonymously.
Matt Koltz is very unique. He is a deaf man who can speak fluent English. This is so extraordinary and rare to see and having him on the show is breathtaking. I am more impressed by how he is a Deaflympics gold medalist and the fact he can speak fluently. He is a strong competitor in the house and is really standing his ground even if he can be seen as not having an upper hand in the show.
My favorite season is season 16. The players they had were incredible and the twists were mind-blowing. It was in my opinion the craziest and best-produced show yet. I actually got to meet one of the final five in the house, Frankie Grande.
Now I know, a lot of reality TV is scripted and overly dramatic which is why I am personally not a fan of them. BB though, is not like this. Yes, there is drama. One year a fistfight even broke out and security had to go into the house and take both players out. Nothing in this show is scripted. Sunday and Wednesday episodes are prerecorded to fit the screen time of an hour that it gets, but there are cameras on the houseguests 24/7. The live feed can be found on Paramount+.
What is unique about the live feeds is that you can watch what the houseguests are doing and saying off CBS airtime. This keeps everything real and you will even catch some parts of their conversations aired on the next episodes. I sometimes go on the live feeds to watch the arguments and competitions before they are on. I know that there is too much happening that can’t fit into one hour of air time, so I like to see the extra information and insight into what led to specific events.
If you have never watched BB I highly recommend this show. Since this season is still going on I would recommend watching it from the start before tuning into the next episode to have a better understanding of what’s happening and how the game works. If you want to wait for the season to be over, season 16 is a great season to binge.