Big Brother 3, July 13: The Twist!

Tonight we found out what the big new twist is on BB3. Of course, if you were watching the live feeds or had read Kent’s article yesterday, you already knew, but now we have all the details. But we’ll get to that later.

First, we begin with Lisa just after she made the nominations. She says she’s proud of herself and it worked out great. Hmmm. Well, hold that thought until the eviction vote is actually taken, Lisa. Mike Boogie probably thought his first nominations worked out great – until they backfired.

As the next day dawns, Roddy is not happy with the fact that Lori has been nominated. Lori isn’t either, of course. She says she hasn’t really had a chance to get to know people well enough yet, and vice versa. So the nomination is difficult because she isn’t done yet.

Marcellas says he was sad to see Lori nominated because she was so sad. He also considers the nomination to be a stab in the back from Lisa because he had been nice to her before she was Head of Household (HoH). Oh, please. It’s not like you had a deal. Just because you were nice to somebody doesn’t mean they can’t nominate you/vote for you/whatever. There will be enough real backstabbing going on that we don’t have to go looking for it where it doesn’t exist.

Back to Lori, who says she was told (by Josh, at least, in the previous episode – perhaps others as well, though we haven’t seen it) that she was nominated so they could easily get rid of Marcellas for his bad attitude. They figure she can stand the heat and not hold a grudge. But that’s the price you pay to play, she says. Still, payback can be “U-G-L-Y ugly.”

At this point, there are a bunch of different discussions, and I’m just going to run right through ‘em: Marcellas tells Amy to vote with her heart. Amy says privately that she has to vote against Marcellas, even though she doesn’t want to. Jason and Josh agree to work together, though Jason figures Josh will stab him in the back and plans to do nasty dirty things to get him out if he does, and Josh (with his characteristic ego) thinks Jason wants to be like him, so he can use that to his advantage. Gerry tells Lisa and Chiara that they should get Jason out next because he’s the Golden Boy.

Moving on, Lisa says Eric has a great body, and she’s had her eye on him since the beginning (she makes it sound like that was so long ago). Roddy admires what Eric does. Eric, himself, says he has been deemed the Lizard King, and we see a number of clips of him walking around with the lizard on him.

Moving back to strategy, Josh asks Marcellas why he should stick around. Marcellas says the only reason to vote him out is if Josh thinks Marcellas can beat him at the end if they are the final two. A very insightful comment from Marcellas. It is, indeed, the final two that matter the most. Of course, that’s the same tactic that Will used last year (and, indeed, I wrote an article about it at the time which turned out to be rather prescient, if I do say so myself). But you also have to get to the final two, and I rather doubt Marcellas realizes he is talking to the person who formed the Group of Six alliance and prodded them to nominate Marcellas. So logic isn’t going to go very far here.

Meanwhile, Danielle is a bit upset that nobody has approached her about an alliance yet, so that makes her feel like she has a target on her back. Jason tells her that Josh approached him, and both think that Josh has some influence even though Lisa is the HoH. No, ya think? Jason says he has Danielle’s back and vice versa.

OK, now it’s time for a food competition. To begin with, they have to name five foods they crave. Amy names about nine different types of cheese, and people go on and on. Josh describes it as “painful.” These foods, along with others, are written on raw eggs. The Houseguests have to split up, men on one side of a high wall outside and women on the other. The side the men are on has baskets full of the eggs with food item names written on them. The men have to yell what food item they are sending over, and then throw the egg. The women on the other side have to catch the eggs and put them in a basket. Then after a minute, they switch sides. All the whole eggs that are left represent the food items they get that week.

Eric suggests matching up partners by who was in the nests together. Roddy further suggests that the men throw the nonessential items because it’s more likely that the women will drop. While this sounds rather sexist, it also happens to be true, as the results end up showing. After the switch, the men arrive at an egg-strewn side of the wall, but Eric makes up for it with his ability to catch egg after egg safely.

As they go through the food they’ve won, it seems that they have a pretty good variety, and Amy even gets several of her cheeses. But then she cheeses off Josh by throwing an egg at him. He gets revenge by splattering one directly onto the top of her head. Ick. Then, when the food comes in and they have to move it from the storage room to the kitchen, several of them play a trick on Amy and hide her cheese. Her mood really curdles when she doesn’t find her beloved yellow foods and the others have to quickly ‘fess up. Jeez, or should I say, Cheez.

Now that this is done, we’re back to matters of great importance: Marcellas’ sexual leanings. Yes, it’s out in the open – Marcellas is gay. So now they’ve discovered that Jason is a virgin and Marcellas is gay. I tell ya, it’s thrill-a-minute stuff here! They claim they all knew because, for one thing, he has a bathrobe. Huh? I have heard of a lot of ways to supposedly spot a gay man, but a bathrobe? If that’s the case, I’ve been gay for quite a long time now and never knew it.

Anyway, now that his non-secret is out, it’s time for Houseguest Musical Beds. As described in Kent’s “Spoons and Forks” article yesterday, there is a bunch of bed hopping going on, especially in what has been dubbed the “Map Room” (that’s the more private of the rooms, with two single beds and one double bed). Eric decides he wants to sleep in the Map Room because it’s darker and cozier. So he invites himself into the double bed, in between Chiara and Lori. That’s great, except that Lori has kids and she doesn’t want them to see her sleeping in that type of situation (wow, somebody who actually thinks of what their kids will see – Krista could learn a real lesson from that; then again, it’s a bit too late for her). So Lori and Marcellas switch beds (he was in a single), which would put Chiara between Eric and Marcellas. Somebody suggests that, instead, Marcellas sleeps next to Eric, but Marcellas (not Eric) puts the kibosh on that idea.

In the other single bed, Chiara and Roddy are “spooning.” We also find out that Chiara is most attracted to him and calls him “Hotty” (how cute) while he flirts with her a lot. They even share some oh-so-cute talk at night. Awwww.

Enough with the lovebirds, this is a serious game. Jason notes that chess, another serious game, has become a bit of a metaphor for Big Brother. You have pawns, you guard important pieces, and you sacrifice others (Marcellas’ picture was shown as he was discussing sacrificing). Jason is still making plans with Josh, but he knows that people are going to be eliminated as part of the strategy of others – they all knew that when they signed up. They are all a bunch of pawns.

Gerry, though, is more of a Bishop as he doles out advice (yeah, yeah, I’m stretching that whole chess metaphor too thin), especially to Marcellas. He doesn’t give him specifics, like, “You should talk to these people,” but rather advises him to find five people and work them to get their votes. He says he has to also be very Machiavellian and think about the order he’d like to see people voted out as he works different angles.

As some of them talk, we find out that Eric trusts Lori more than he trusts Danielle. Gerry turns around and tells Danielle that she needs to work her charm on Eric because he feels threatened by her. Gerry says he has her back (and he’s being straight with her), he likes being around her. Besides, she is a more useful ally than Josh is. In fact, the more earnest Mr. Paranoid gets, the less Gerry trusts him. I can’t imagine why. Gerry also tells Lori that if he has anything to do with it, this won’t be her last week in the house. After all of this, Gerry says he is a negotiator, but he can’t get entangled in too many webs. Sounds like it may be too late for that already…

Getting back to Marcellas, we find that he is still mad that Lisa (who he calls, “the bitch”) played him. Get over it, Marcellas, you never had a deal. Anyway, he realizes that he needs to give the others a reason not to get rid of him. He has to open up. That night, we see him doing just that in the Map Room, where he has everybody in stitches. He talks about how Lisa put him up against the divorced mother – and the right one, the real mother – not the one with big tits, not the stripper masquerading as a mother. Ouch.

But now it’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for: We find out about the big twist. Lisa describes the “Big Brother Veto.” It is the power to take a nominee off the chopping block. They even have a necklace for the holder of the Veto, much like the Survivor immunity necklace. Anyway, all players will compete for it each week. The winner can remove one of the nominees and the HoH has to replace him or her with a new one (it cannot be the same person or the veto holder). If a nominee wins, s/he cannot remove her/himself from contention, but can remove the other person. If the HoH wins, s/he can replace one of the people already nominated, or keep it the same.

This makes things very interesting indeed. If you are a nominee and think you may be in danger of eviction, your best bet is to completely throw the competition and, if it is a competition where you can eliminate others (as this week’s is), you should try to make sure a close ally wins. The other option is to try to win and then replace the person you’re up against, hoping the HoH will put somebody even worse there – that’s a pretty unsafe bet in most cases.

Gerry says this will make things interesting in a good way. Poor Josh looks virtually paralyzed and says he was shocked – all the work that was done all week can be thrown off in a heartbeat. Aw, poor guy. Gerry again repeats that anybody can go – no permanent friends and no permanent enemies.

This makes some of the others in the Group of Six question his reliability. Eric asks why they feel allegiance to a guy who is already going back on the alliance. Somebody else notes that it is actually good because that way they know when they get down to the final six of them (presuming everything goes their way), they know it’s really only five plus Gerry.

In another discussion, Gerry says the reason Marcellas and Lori were nominated is antiquated by now. Amy tells him that she will be voting with the others (against Marcellas) because she doesn’t want to be the person who backs out. She is not voting with her heart but for the sake of the group. Gerry says he doesn’t know if that group even exists anymore. Little does Amy know that it never really existed for her, as the Group had already discussed how they would lead her along and then get rid of her.

Now it’s time for the challenge. The stage is set outside with each person’s headshot picture placed atop a tube with a wider opening on top. There is a ball machine (like the ones used to practice tennis) and each player will fire the ball launcher at the Houseguest they don’t want to win. They each get to shoot four balls per round, and there will be as many rounds as necessary. Whenever a person has three balls in his/her tube, they are out of contention for the veto power, but can still take their usual turn firing at others.

Danielle says that people began shooting at her because they knew she didn’t want it. Eric feels the same way. They are the first two out. As others start dropping, Gerry notes that a lot of people took themselves out of the running because they had no guts. For his part, Marcellas wanted Amy to win – nope, she’s out. Jason tries to eliminate Gerry but misses. This leaves Marcellas and Gerry. Lori takes aim at Marcellas and knocks him out because she knew he didn’t want to make that decision. Gerry is the first veto holder, and the first to hug him in congratulations is Marcellas.

Lori says Gerry might just be controlling enough to throw everybody for a loop. Lisa says he’d be screwing himself if he does, though. For his part, Gerry sees it as a chance to throw this thing wide open.

For my part, I’m betting he makes no change whatsoever. But we won’t really know until Wednesday (or sooner if you watch the live feed).

David Bloomberg is the Editor of RealityNewsOnline, and can be reached at rno@pobox.com.

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