CaptainWacky
I want to smell dark matter
Since we all know this year's Big Brother sucked, I thought I'd look at the possible reasons why while it's still in my mind and I still have something to post about (becasue I have no idea what I'll post about tomorrow!)
All Female Start - Actually, I'd say that this WASN'T a reason why it sucked. In fact, I found the first week very enjoyable. The early Ziggy/Chanelle interaction was intriguing (did she have a gameplan!?), Emily was proving to be a controversial character creating drama and rowing with Zig Zag and Chan, the extremely ego-centric duo of Charley and Shabnam were very amusing in their delusions, the twins were just bouncing aroud in the background and we didn't have to hear them speak, and Lesley was there to provide sardonic commentary on it all. So no, I wouldn't say the all female start was a particularly bad thing, thought it is worth noting that even with all girls on the first night, we still ended up with a male winner yet again. That's six male, one female, one male to female transexual if you're keeping score (I AM.)
Housemates leaving early - This was certainly a problem, I'll admit. Emily had lots of potential to be a central figure but it was cut short by her stupid remark (and BB's stupid over-reaction), Lesley was never going to last long but I wish she'd gutted it out for at least a month, Seany was quite a big loss and even Jonathan could have been an interesting character. But again, I wouldn't say this is a definite reason why it sucked: Big Brother should be bigger than any one housemate. Even if some of the big characters left early the producers could have made things interesting with some good tasks, which they failed spectacularly in...
Crappy tasks - Seriously, what the HELL were they thinking with the tasks this year! When Dermot said on BBLB recently that it was "the best year yet" for tasks I almost punched a kitten in anger, before I reaslied that would be wrong. They were so bad that I can't even REMEMBER any of them except the Catwalk task (becasue Kara Louise looked hot) and the Big Brother Birthday Party (which was quite amsuing and featured Charley arguing while dressed as a clow, always a Big Brother class.) The sleep deprivation task has potential, but they gave up far too quickly. They should have been given more incentive to continue than just the luxury shopping budget, since it's obvious Big Brother was never going to let them starve. There should have been actual decent punishments for failing. They should have been divided into teams and made to compete with the losing team facing eviction. Something! Instead of the crap that was the "man talk" task (remember that? Me neither, I had to look up the wiki for examples of this year's forgettable tasks.) Oh, and the knobbly knees task which resulted in Brian and Charley sleeping in a caravan...and that was it. GENIUS BIG BROTHER, GENIUS!
Nomination meddling - An obvious problem. It started in the first week when only Ziggy was allowed to nom, but got seriously bad in week four. Charley was going to be up for eviction. Charley WOULD HAVE been evicted, there is no doubt about that. So they had to come up with something. That something was "punishing" Charley and Billi for talking about noms by making their nominations invalid, a punishment never carried out before or again. Never mind the fact that the housemates talked about noms all the time without punishment! Liam and Ziggy had a secret code for talking about noms which they used every week. It was spotted by posters on Digital Spy but not the producers. Anyway, the week four meddling was just a BLATANT way to save Charley, even though she'd run her course by that point. They should have let her be evicted instead of giving her special treatment. They then went on to give her MORE special treatment in week six's fake week. Again it was clear Charley would get the most noms, so what do they do? A fake eviction! Let her leave, let her see a crowd of people who could possibily influence her with outside info, and then let her return! Then in week eleven it looked like all the housemates would be up, bar the three gurus. Fine, at least that meant Carole would be up and we could get rid of her...except no, it was the two with the most votes who were up and Gerry instantly asked the gurus to evict him. So despite the face that Carole got twice as many votes, he was evicted. Despite the fact he was the best one in there and Carole had been ruinging the show. WHY did they think this would be a good move!?
Imagine how different the whole thing would have been if they'd just had normal noms every week and had punished people consistently for breaking the rules.
Housemates Too Aware - A problem every year now that mainfested itself in every way. From Ziggy, one of the central figures of the year, not talking in complete sentences for most of his stay so that he'd never risk offending anyone, to Brian the winner dumbing himself down to become more popular, it made the show less "real" than ever before. The best example of all was when Chanelle was allowed back in for a few minutes and she quickly told Ziggy to cut the sex talk and told him "my agent wants to sign you." SAYS IT ALL.
Housemate selction - There's always some housemates who just shouldn't be in there. Tracey sticks out this year, what were they thinking she'd do? She said nothing in twelve weeks. Laura was supposed to be fat and jolly I suppose, but she just lay in bed bitching all day. And Carole, the fun-sucker, rejected for the last eight years, finally gets on Big Brother. WHY!?
The Halfway House - I'm not completely opposed to housemates coming in late, but this just came TOO late. They came in at week eight out of a thirteen week show. That's not HALFway! They SHOULD have come in at the end of week six at the latest. In fact, that's what should have happened: Charley's eviction should have been real and the Halfway Housemates brought in then. They might have had a chance to be accepted and build a following, but as it was it was obvious they were just there to fill up a few Friday's worth of evictions because the show was so long. They were never treated like "real" housemates by the "originals" or by the producers! Witness the poor treatment of Kara-Louise by the gurnmaster Davina and her ridiculous two minute interview. Even the name "halfway" housemates makes them look somehow inferior. EVERYONE SHOULD BE EQUALS!
The twins - Look, they're nice enough. But the point of big brother is that you're in there with total strangers, but they had each other all the way though to lean on. Of course they were happy all the time, they each had the person they were closest too in the whole world in the house! They should have AT LEAST been split up into seperate houses at some point or one of them should have been made to face eviction to see how the other could get by without her. Instead they were united into one housemate late in the show, after being counted as two the whole way! Pathetic.
Bad editing - Always a problem. Lots of big events were left off the highlights. Richard Madely's "cunt" remark, the arguement between Charley and Jonathan that left him crying and sleeping in the Living Room, so much of Liam's bitchiness and nomination manipulation, and including EVERY Amanda and Brian conversation on the hilighlights one week because it looked like they might possibly kiss again (they didn't) at the expense of leaving all the other housemates off the show (Kara suffered most from this, she DID say stuff on the live feed!)
Housemates' characters decided from the start - Brian was picked as the winner almost as soon as he went in and promoted as such on BBLB and BBBM every day and any disenting opinion was met with boos. No debate, Brian's going to win...and he did! Liam came third by default just because he's "northen", didn't matter how much nasty shit he did, he was labelled a "canny lad" so that's what he was all the way through. YOU decide? Not anymore.
I was going to write more but you know what, it sucked so much that it's not worth hurting my fingers over.
All Female Start - Actually, I'd say that this WASN'T a reason why it sucked. In fact, I found the first week very enjoyable. The early Ziggy/Chanelle interaction was intriguing (did she have a gameplan!?), Emily was proving to be a controversial character creating drama and rowing with Zig Zag and Chan, the extremely ego-centric duo of Charley and Shabnam were very amusing in their delusions, the twins were just bouncing aroud in the background and we didn't have to hear them speak, and Lesley was there to provide sardonic commentary on it all. So no, I wouldn't say the all female start was a particularly bad thing, thought it is worth noting that even with all girls on the first night, we still ended up with a male winner yet again. That's six male, one female, one male to female transexual if you're keeping score (I AM.)
Housemates leaving early - This was certainly a problem, I'll admit. Emily had lots of potential to be a central figure but it was cut short by her stupid remark (and BB's stupid over-reaction), Lesley was never going to last long but I wish she'd gutted it out for at least a month, Seany was quite a big loss and even Jonathan could have been an interesting character. But again, I wouldn't say this is a definite reason why it sucked: Big Brother should be bigger than any one housemate. Even if some of the big characters left early the producers could have made things interesting with some good tasks, which they failed spectacularly in...
Crappy tasks - Seriously, what the HELL were they thinking with the tasks this year! When Dermot said on BBLB recently that it was "the best year yet" for tasks I almost punched a kitten in anger, before I reaslied that would be wrong. They were so bad that I can't even REMEMBER any of them except the Catwalk task (becasue Kara Louise looked hot) and the Big Brother Birthday Party (which was quite amsuing and featured Charley arguing while dressed as a clow, always a Big Brother class.) The sleep deprivation task has potential, but they gave up far too quickly. They should have been given more incentive to continue than just the luxury shopping budget, since it's obvious Big Brother was never going to let them starve. There should have been actual decent punishments for failing. They should have been divided into teams and made to compete with the losing team facing eviction. Something! Instead of the crap that was the "man talk" task (remember that? Me neither, I had to look up the wiki for examples of this year's forgettable tasks.) Oh, and the knobbly knees task which resulted in Brian and Charley sleeping in a caravan...and that was it. GENIUS BIG BROTHER, GENIUS!
Nomination meddling - An obvious problem. It started in the first week when only Ziggy was allowed to nom, but got seriously bad in week four. Charley was going to be up for eviction. Charley WOULD HAVE been evicted, there is no doubt about that. So they had to come up with something. That something was "punishing" Charley and Billi for talking about noms by making their nominations invalid, a punishment never carried out before or again. Never mind the fact that the housemates talked about noms all the time without punishment! Liam and Ziggy had a secret code for talking about noms which they used every week. It was spotted by posters on Digital Spy but not the producers. Anyway, the week four meddling was just a BLATANT way to save Charley, even though she'd run her course by that point. They should have let her be evicted instead of giving her special treatment. They then went on to give her MORE special treatment in week six's fake week. Again it was clear Charley would get the most noms, so what do they do? A fake eviction! Let her leave, let her see a crowd of people who could possibily influence her with outside info, and then let her return! Then in week eleven it looked like all the housemates would be up, bar the three gurus. Fine, at least that meant Carole would be up and we could get rid of her...except no, it was the two with the most votes who were up and Gerry instantly asked the gurus to evict him. So despite the face that Carole got twice as many votes, he was evicted. Despite the fact he was the best one in there and Carole had been ruinging the show. WHY did they think this would be a good move!?
Imagine how different the whole thing would have been if they'd just had normal noms every week and had punished people consistently for breaking the rules.
Housemates Too Aware - A problem every year now that mainfested itself in every way. From Ziggy, one of the central figures of the year, not talking in complete sentences for most of his stay so that he'd never risk offending anyone, to Brian the winner dumbing himself down to become more popular, it made the show less "real" than ever before. The best example of all was when Chanelle was allowed back in for a few minutes and she quickly told Ziggy to cut the sex talk and told him "my agent wants to sign you." SAYS IT ALL.
Housemate selction - There's always some housemates who just shouldn't be in there. Tracey sticks out this year, what were they thinking she'd do? She said nothing in twelve weeks. Laura was supposed to be fat and jolly I suppose, but she just lay in bed bitching all day. And Carole, the fun-sucker, rejected for the last eight years, finally gets on Big Brother. WHY!?
The Halfway House - I'm not completely opposed to housemates coming in late, but this just came TOO late. They came in at week eight out of a thirteen week show. That's not HALFway! They SHOULD have come in at the end of week six at the latest. In fact, that's what should have happened: Charley's eviction should have been real and the Halfway Housemates brought in then. They might have had a chance to be accepted and build a following, but as it was it was obvious they were just there to fill up a few Friday's worth of evictions because the show was so long. They were never treated like "real" housemates by the "originals" or by the producers! Witness the poor treatment of Kara-Louise by the gurnmaster Davina and her ridiculous two minute interview. Even the name "halfway" housemates makes them look somehow inferior. EVERYONE SHOULD BE EQUALS!
The twins - Look, they're nice enough. But the point of big brother is that you're in there with total strangers, but they had each other all the way though to lean on. Of course they were happy all the time, they each had the person they were closest too in the whole world in the house! They should have AT LEAST been split up into seperate houses at some point or one of them should have been made to face eviction to see how the other could get by without her. Instead they were united into one housemate late in the show, after being counted as two the whole way! Pathetic.
Bad editing - Always a problem. Lots of big events were left off the highlights. Richard Madely's "cunt" remark, the arguement between Charley and Jonathan that left him crying and sleeping in the Living Room, so much of Liam's bitchiness and nomination manipulation, and including EVERY Amanda and Brian conversation on the hilighlights one week because it looked like they might possibly kiss again (they didn't) at the expense of leaving all the other housemates off the show (Kara suffered most from this, she DID say stuff on the live feed!)
Housemates' characters decided from the start - Brian was picked as the winner almost as soon as he went in and promoted as such on BBLB and BBBM every day and any disenting opinion was met with boos. No debate, Brian's going to win...and he did! Liam came third by default just because he's "northen", didn't matter how much nasty shit he did, he was labelled a "canny lad" so that's what he was all the way through. YOU decide? Not anymore.
I was going to write more but you know what, it sucked so much that it's not worth hurting my fingers over.
