Big Brother: All-Stars – Why Diane Lost

At the beginning of the week, Diane seemed to have saved herself by kissing up to Janelle. But somewhere along the line, after Mike Boogie won the veto, Janelle decided to go back to her anti-Diane ways. What happened to change her mind? Did Diane do something wrong, or did Janelle? Or both? Why did Diane lose?

So far, Big Brother: All-Stars has been marked by clearly-defined groups. There is season 6, Chill Town, and the floaters. Of course, within and between each group, there are sub-alliances, and these have been moving to the front in terms of importance. Indeed, as we go through What All-Star Houseguests Should Have Learned this time around, we’re going to see that perhaps this had something to do with Diane’s departure. But we don’t want to get ahead of ourselves.

The first rule tells players they need to scheme and plot. Diane was one of the players known as floaters this time around, but that doesn’t mean she ignored this rule. Quite the contrary, the floaters may be scheming more than ever because they need to in order to survive.

Diane appeared to have a number of relationships with people, though it’s hard to define whether any of them rose to the level of an alliance. She and Marcellas got along, but he wouldn’t change his vote to keep her. Same with Danielle, though perhaps Danielle would have switched if the majority had been on her side. And there was certainly some sort of sub-alliance with James, who is so pissed about her being gone that he appears to be planning to turn on his alliance.

But Diane never seemed to lock solidly into anything. Janelle thought the floaters had power, but the problem is that the floaters themselves never realized they could have power! They all appeared to be determined to hang out and wait for the big blow-up so they could choose sides, and thus didn’t realize they were a side unto themselves.

This may change now, depending on the outcome of the HOH competition. However, it’s too late for Diane. Her eviction may spur them to action, but Diane needed to be spurred sooner.

The second rule tells players not to scheme and plot too much, and to keep your scheming secret. Somehow, Janelle got the idea that Diane was out to get her. Maybe she was, maybe she wasn’t – frankly, I didn’t really see it. Nor, for that matter, did I see that it was a big deal if she was. But the thought got out into the open, and that was enough to help cook Diane’s goose.

Third is to pretend to be nice. Diane did an excellent job of this before Janelle made her original nominations this time around. Janelle was planning to nominate Diane, but Diane countered with some friendly girl talk. They were best buds!

But then it all changed. While Janelle seems to think she’s pretending to be nice to Will and pulling the wool over his eyes, in fact, he’s doing that exact thing to her. And he out-niced Diane, thus convincing Janelle to turn on Diane once again.

In a somewhat surprising move, Diane also did well on the fourth rule, not letting emotions control her. She was upset when she first heard Janelle would be nominating her, but she put that aside and convinced Janelle to go in a different direction. Once Janelle came back like a pendulum, Diane was upset again, but she took it like an adult. Nobody turned on Diane because of her behavior.

But the fifth rule was another matter entirely. It says not to be too much of a threat, and if you ask Diane, I’m sure she’d say she wasn’t. Unfortunately, perception can be everything in Big Brother, and that was the case for Diane. Janelle perceived her as a threat. What kind of threat? I honestly don’t really know. But Janelle decided that Diane didn’t like her due to things that happened outside the game. Then, even though they aired their differences and became best friends forever, Janelle still came to believe she was a threat.

In one way, Diane was a bit of a threat. Because James was linked to Diane in a sub-alliance of sorts, Janelle might have felt that James could jump ship and have a ready-made flunky to help break up the alliance. Ironically, though, Janelle’s actions may cause James to jump ship even earlier!

Overall, there wasn’t much Diane could have done to undo the perception that she was a threat to Janelle – that’s because it was in Janelle’s mind more than in reality.

The sixth rule tells players to be flexible. I would say that most of the floaters have been doing this fairly well, as they talk to the different alliances and sub-alliances and try to maneuver a good place for themselves. Diane was no different, and by hooking up with a member of the season 6 alliance, she probably figured she was safe. Unfortunately for her, the alliance they all wanted to break up started breaking up, but Diane was left holding the bag.

Diane already knew that trust is in short supply within the Big Brother house. But Janelle made sure everybody knows it now. She told Diane she’d be safe – and she was, at first. I don’t know if Diane every truly trusted Janelle, but I’m sure she didn’t expect a rebound quite so quickly. Still, Diane wasn’t nominated or evicted because of a mistaken trust, so it really didn’t affect anything.

Speaking of not affecting anything, we come to the eighth rule. It says not to be lazy or show bad habits. Diane did neither, so we’ll skip right on past it.

Where does that leave us? Well, we’re in a situation where Diane was not the best player of the house, but nor was leaving entirely her fault. Janelle perceived Diane as a threat. Part of this was in her own mind, part was aided by Will planting the seed. Janelle thought that going after the floaters was more important than getting rid of the smartest player in the house. Again, Will was using his magic.

But Diane is not blameless. Just as Will could work on other people, Diane could have also. As Will noted, Janelle is the type of person who goes with the last ideas that were planted in her head. Diane needed to be pushing the best friends forever thing more and should have been “helping” Janelle make the right decision rather than allowing Janelle to be swayed by Will.

So on the one hand, Will has been playing an excellent game, and is certainly playing Janelle. On the other, Diane didn’t play a bad game, but just not a good enough one. To steal a phrase from Survivor, Will outwitted and outplayed Janelle, and he outlasted Diane. That is why Diane lost.

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