Big Brother: The Final Six

I didn’t see Mohamed’s eviction. I didn’t see anything from about Lisa’s ‘escape’ to the Final, and I haven’t been following the series on Digital Spy either. So I had no idea who the popular housemates were. But if you’d given me the list of the last six housemates and asked me to put them in order of eviction, I might easily have given you the opposite to what actually happened.

So KAT, or so I thought, was the favourite to win. I knew that she was slipping a bit in the ratings, and that Luke (until his eviction), Darnell and Rex were gaining on her, and I wouldn’t have been surprised if one of the latter two had won it. (Or even Luke wouldn’t have been that much of a surprise, as I wouldn’t have put it past Big Brother to throw their Golden Boy back in.)

But as far as I knew, Kat still had a good chance of winning it, and the public were desperate for a girl winner. Kat was funny; usually happy; upsets hit her hard, but she got over them quickly; she always had kind words for others – and she wasn’t the thinnest or the prettiest girl in the house, which is very often an advantage. But something must have happened when I wasn’t looking because Kat only got 4.9% of the vote to win, and finished 6th. Poor girl. Finishing an undeserved 6th really hurts.

DARNELL, of course, was gaining on Kat. Okay, so he was a miserable git sometimes, but even then he could make you smile. Darnell is clever and lots of fun, and he comes out with the most wonderful one-liners. His main fault is insecurity, but that’s usually something so rare as to be applauded in a Big Brother housemate. He’s not afraid to stand up for what he believes is right, and willingly took on most of the house, including Dale, one of his best friends, in order to support Mohamed. He was also the first housemate who saw Luke’s game of going round to each housemate and telling them something different. It’s such a shame Rex was to busy thinking about his restaurants to listen. Darnell talked so much sense.

And any guy who loves horses gets my vote (although not literally because I didn’t vote: bring back the text votes!). The horse he brought out of the house with him is gorgeous. Best-looking guy in the show. I can imagine my little horse Angel looking just like Darnell’s horse when he grows up. (Why Darnell was wearing a skirt was a bit of a mystery, but that was just one more example of the quirkiness in Darnell that I think I’ve always appreciated.)

Given that I was convinced unpopular Mikey had no chance at winning, my support was with Darnell, and I’d have been shocked to see him finishing below 2nd. But he was 5th.

REX won fans early in the series for having the courage to stand up to Alexandra, and his intelligence and humour were also very much appreciated. However, the first came into question when claimed that a year had 366 days (this year does, Rex, yes - but not every year), and, as time went on, Rex seemed not to much witty as childishly winding people up. The fact that Rex would not shut up about all the restaurants he owned (at times, it seemed like Rex had more restaurants than Mario had fans) didn’t help. Especially when the website for one of his restaurants was discovered to have several spelling errors.

Until Kat’s early exit (after which ANYTHING was possible), I didn’t really think Rex could win it, but it’s not unknown for a series villain to find themselves in the top three. Villains are entertaining. Jason (BB5) finished second; Makosi - who, for many fans, was BB6 - managed third, and Richard (BB7) was really quite unlucky to finish fourth considering how much he brought to the series. (If Glyn had been able to cook, Richard’s finishing place could have been higher still.) Rex was in the house with Rachel and Sara, who were boring, and Mikey, whom I thought was disliked. So anything below 3rd would have shocked me. As Rex finished 4th, I was shocked.

I might not really have put SARA fourth if you’d asked me to rate the final six in a likely finishing order, but then she did survive eviction against Lisa – whom I’d initially expected to be fighting it out with Kat, Darnell and Rex for a position in the top three. I never had anything against Sara, and I felt she could be fun on occasion. But I barely saw anything of her. The only thing I read about her doing was teasing Darnell – and given that I quite wanted Darnell to win (I was so sure my other favourite, Mikey, had no chance), this behaviour from Sara didn’t exactly thrill me.

But Sara’s eviction interview showed I had been missing a great housemate. It’s difficult to know quite how to describe her: it wasn’t long before Davina’s exclamation that she’s ‘just so Sara’ made perfect sense. The things Sara says are very sweet and a bit ditzy, but at the same time, she seems like a very strong and intelligent person. There are probably a lot more contradictions in Sara than in the housemates who have been described as fake – like Rachel and Jennifer. But there is something very real about Sara. No-one could make her up. And she’s a housemate I really regret not getting to know this series.

Finishing third is an amazing achievement for any latecomer. Yes. Eugene came second in BB6 and Brian won BB9, but Sara probably had more competition. In Eugene’s year, the only really strong character was villain Makosi. He lost to good-looking (???) Anthony, but only just. Brian was up against the twins (who could barely speak); Liam, Ziggy and Carole (who were far from popular) and Jonty (who was absolutely adorable, but probably a bit too old and odd - not to mention he'd only just arrived – to be a possible winner). Sara was up against Kat, Darnell and Rex. The fact it was Mikey and Rachel who finished ahead of her is just one of the mysteries of Big Brother.

So Sara was chosen to finish in 3rd place, and now, I can’t help but feel it was the very least she deserved.

It was an amazing achievement for MIKEY too. Not just that he was able to live and cope in the Big Brother house, although that really is incredible. But, when Mikey went into the Big Brother house, his disability put him at a huge disadvantage. Having seen Touretter Pete win Big Brother 7 by doing pretty much nothing but swearing at every opportunity and breaking at least five housemates’ hearts, we were on our guard. Mikey looked like a hand-picked winner, and we weren’t having any of it. Mikey had to earn his place in the house, and his random spurts of slightly bizarre humour, not to mention his unusual washing practices, didn’t appeal to the public at all. (Well, I liked Mikey from the start, but I was pretty much alone.)

But suddenly something clicked. It must have been quite late on, as I had no idea of Mikey’s popularity when I switched on the TV for the Final. It was no surprise that he was there: as predicted, he’d received few nominations, and never faced the public vote. But whereas the public believed Mikey’s fame-seeking housemates would not dare nominate a blind man, it seems more as though they didn’t nominate him because they liked him. As Rebecca told her surprised and dubious audience during her interview, ‘Mikey is hilarious’. And the public must have finally realised that because Mikey came second with 49% of the vote. He got the best reception of the evening too. And even though I feel as though he was certainly the stronger of the final two, I’m probably more thrilled for him than disappointed.

And it was RACHEL – fake, boring Rachel – who walked out to cheers and fireworks as the winner of Big Brother 9. The heavy boos that had greeted her whilst she was in the house had faded. Either that section of the audience had left in disgust after Mikey’s interview, or they’d decided to follow Mikey’s lead, and congratulate her.

I still don’t understand why she won. She probably isn’t a total fake, as I don’t think even an actress could have kept up an act for thirteen weeks. If she does seem fake at times, I think this is probably how she is naturally in the real world. Yes, she sat on the fence in the house, then had a little bitch in the Diary Room, but that’s probably more tact than fakeness. Rachel said that if she had a problem with someone, she would tell them, but there are some problems there’s no need to mention. Sometimes the problem is more about you than about them, and then what you need is to have a little rant about them – a very polite little rant if you’re Rachel – and then it’s all over. Prize fund or no prize fund.

I’m thrilled we have another female winner at last. Much as I like Sara, I am glad that an original housemate won it. No disrespect to Brian, who was lovely (despite his monumental inanity), but his win did seem to demonstrate that there had been something wrong with the selection of original housemates. (As I could have told you on the first night.)

It’s great that someone really kind and well-spoken has won Big Brother. Last year, the interviews got less and less articulate as the Final progressed. Rachel certainly gave one of the most the most comprehensible interview of anyone. Mikey gave a brilliant and very amusing interview, but Darnell seemed shy; Rex was enjoying keeping people guessing, and Sara has a wonderful habit of rambling on in great, complicated and confusing detail when all she needs is to say yes or no. Rachel does need to find out how many days there are in a year before she’s let loose in a classroom, but she probably can’t start teaching until the next academic year, so she can count the days as she goes. From October, she won’t have much else to do.

Rachel’s ability to keep calm under pressure will certainly be an advantage whatever she ends up doing. She might even be entertaining on I’m a Celebrity. “Would you like to eat a kangaroo testicle? How about you, babe? I really don’t mind, I’m happy to do it, but if someone else really wants to do it, I’m cool with that. Oh gosh, what fun. They look a bit like chickpeas, don’t they?” But I do find her a bit patronising, and it’s a long time since she’s actually entertained me. It’s a long time since it was worth sitting through a whole episode of Big Brother just for a glimpse of Rachel’s peachy bum.

So, should Mikey have won? A lot of people think so. The bookmakers expected it, although they also thought Samanda would win, and the margin was 20% in the end. I would have liked a female to win this year, but I much preferred Mikey to Rachel. Mikey was entertaining. He was basically a nice guy, but, like most people, he sometimes upset people by accident. He did and said things you didn’t expect. He was never afraid to fight his corner. And the fact he managed second place – very nearly first place – shows you just how well he’s done. Not because he’s blind: because he was hated, and he managed to turn it around, and he left the house to wild cheers.

Much of the dislike for Mikey was probably really aimed at the Big Brother producers, who’d put in yet another disabled person who seemed born to win. The fact it takes everyone a while to understand Mikey’s humour, housemates included, was another disadvantage. I do respect the people who refused to allow Endemol to manipulate them into giving a blind man the prize, although I do wonder if Mikey would have done better if so many people weren’t against the idea of letting the perceived Chosen One win. (They disliked Luke for being a Chosen One as well, although this was compounded by the fact Luke had more faces than Aisleyne*.) Maybe some of the votes for Mikey were sympathy votes, but I think the fact that he had so little sympathy to begin with shows that he won most of the votes for being Mikey - an amusing and entertaining housemate, who probably should have won.

But well done to Rachel. 51% of the public have spoken, and we have another female winner at last.



*I do love Aisleyne, but ‘more faces than Big Ben’ has been done to death, and Big Ben doesn’t even have faces because it’s a bell.

Big Brother 9: The Build-Up to the Final

I know I haven’t written for ages, but I hadn’t watched Big Brother for ages either, so I didn’t know what I could write really. While Big Brother 9 was a much better series than Big Brother 8 in that there were some very interesting characters, I think the fact that I lost interest was mostly because the tasks that became monotonous. Although Rachel didn’t help.

So I stopped watching for a few weeks, and, when I tuned in for the Final, I was in for a shock. The housemates were all the same, but it was as though I’d entered an alternate universe. Mikey popular? Darnell unpopular? What the f*** happened????

Going back to where I left off, following Mario’s eviction, Belinda-Belinda-Belinda was the next housemate to go. I don’t really understand why everyone disliked her. She was loud and dramatic, but, unlike most loud and dramatic housemates, she often had something quite interesting to say, and you have to admire her perseverance in the cycling task. She might not have got far, but, as Lisa was quick to point out, it was a great achievement for someone who’d never cycled. Belinda probably worked harder than anyone considering the state she got into.

I also think she’s quite a good singer. If only Belinda had been there at the start, the hymns at Mario and Stephanie’s fake wedding might have been almost bearable.

Rebecca was the next housemate to leave. It’s true I’ve spent quite a lot of time hating Rebecca, but she was one of the funniest housemates this year, and perhaps her clearest demonstration of this was in her eviction interview. Much as I love Mohamed, Rebecca’s declaration that living with him was like watching a slug crawling across the floor was hysterical. There’s definitely a touch of the Nikki Grahame about Rebecca, but Rebecca might have been at a disadvantage not being a petite blonde. Nikki was sweet no matter what she did. Rebecca was only sweet when she was quiet.

Maysoon then left via the back door, but I’d watched at least one complete episode without her before I’d even noticed she was gone. Her exit seemed sudden, not only to someone who wasn’t paying attention, but to her housemates as well. Maysoon was a perfectly nice girl, as far as I can see, but this highlights the danger of putting glamour models into the house. I know plenty of glamour models with great personalities, including Lucy James, whose non-appearance in Big Brother 8 was just one of that series’ many disappointments. She’d have won BB8 by miles. But, apart from their deceptively glamorous lifestyle, glamour models are no different from any other contestants. There are people who make good housemates, and people who don’t. Maysoon did not. But the fact that (at least in my opinion), Rachel, Nicole, Sara, Jennifer, Dale, Stuart and maybe even my lovely Mohamed did not always make brilliant TV shows that the problem is with the selection procedure.

The eviction of Luke against almost all his fellow housemates was far from a surprise, even though, within the space of a few days, he’d gone from second favourite to win to polling almost half the eviction votes against about 10 of his fellow housemates. Even Luke wasn’t that surprised to go, as he’d been miserable all week about losing Rebecca – not to mention his catchphrase, ‘No, Rebecca, no’, which couldn’t really be applied to anyone else - and the fact the wannabe politician had fallen for someone who thought Gordon Ramsay was the prime minister didn’t make him feel any better.

But Luke felt a lot more cheerful when he got out of the house, and was reunited with the girl of his dreams. The fact that Rebecca had claimed not to fancy him when she was evicted was soon forgotten as she realised the potential of the union. Soon, the pair were posing in provocative positions for numerous newspapers and magazines. (If you’re an evicted Big Brother housemate, there’s nothing in the world better than a magazine deal or two.)

The housemates were then given a surprise when Rex’s girlfriend Nicole entered the house as one of his special prizes. (Am I the only person in the universe who agrees with Rex that Nicole is gorgeous?) She didn’t make a particularly good impression on the house, crying because she didn’t have any makeup (imagine if she’d been in Week One of BB7! Well, at least Bonnie wouldn’t have been evicted) and arguing almost constantly with Rex.

Nicole was put in a horribly difficult position, apparently without much preparation or thought, and this was very unfair not only on her and Rex but also all the auditionees who nearly made it, many of whom would have been on standby. Putting Lisa and Mario into the house together was different: both had strong personalities, and made a good team, and they’d appeared on a number of TV shows together in the past. They were ready for the challenge of the house, and the audition process (despite having its flaws) had probably showed this. It was obvious from very early on that Nicole was not ready.

Dale and Stuart, meanwhile, had been begging to leave for weeks. Stuart, who was missing his daughter, meant it; Dale just wanted the kudos of having survived eviction – and, no, losing to Luke against a million other housemates just wasn’t enough.

So neither of them got what they wanted, as Stuart was kept in the house, and Dale was evicted to boos. As Dale did occasionally say something interesting (usually related to the male genitalia), whereas Stuart only occasionally said something on any subject, it was a disappointing move from the public yet again. To make matters worse, Dale was nauseatingly reunited with Jennifer. If I’d believed for a moment that Jennifer might actually care about anyone besides herself and her Picasso masterpiece pizza painting, I might not have minded. But as it was, I’d hoped never see that girl again. And there she was, leading Dale astray. Like a little lost sheep and a… dog.

Dale, to put it in your language, the girl’s a cock tease. Stay away. (Note: Dale has obeyed my commands and is now with Chantelle.)

Stuart’s eviction wish was granted the following week – as he was up against Rachel, I ironically would have liked him to stay. Stuart is sweet when he cries over his daughter (his eyeliner must be very waterproof), but what else has he done besides that? He’s so wet, I’m surprised he didn’t catch pneumonia. (Why didn’t I fancy him?)

But at least he’s never patronised anyone. Well, to be fair, Rachel has probably never patronised anyone either. She’s too nice to do something like that. But sometimes it sounds as though she is. I especially don’t like the way she speaks to Mikey – although, he seems happy with it, it has to be said. But the only real shock was that Nicole didn’t face the public vote that week.

But poor Nicole was next to go. ‘Rex’s girlfriend’ – a rather unkind nickname that nevertheless accurately represented her position in the house - was so woefully inadequate as a housemate, I don’t see how anyone could hate her. If she’d auditioned, she’d have been lucky to get through the first round. She was just so pathetic, voting her out seemed like an act of kindness, and the boos were just cruel, like kicking a puppy. (I would have said kicking a horse to be more original, but that’s just too cruel.) Nicole was not prepared to go into the house, and the fact that her boyfriend Rex was there wasn’t a good enough reason for letting her go in. But I’ll always love Nicole for beating Sezer’s record. She was at least a bad housemate. Even the people who dislike Sezer mostly seem to feel he was an effective villain.

Lisa and Sara faced eviction in the week before the Final. It was a week of mixed fortunes for Lisa. Accepting Mario’s proposal might have made her and Mario happy, but the viewers were probably left questioning her taste. Lisa’s sanity has been an issue for quite a while – one of the few episodes I saw showed Lisa attempting to smash her way out of the house, Leo Sayer-style (if there was an issue with Lisa’s underpants, I fortunately remain in ignorance of it). I loved Lisa’s escape (an overreaction to the presence of Nicole, despite the fact that Lisa had just seen her at her best), but it was a little bit odd. Not that I’m saying I wouldn’t do it. But the public nomination process that resulted in Lisa’s and Sara’s nomination probably wasn’t a lot of fun either. Lisa and Sara were then given the chance to win £50,000, but the two opted to share the money. It was a sweet moment, but Lisa did spoil it somewhat by pointing out what a generous person she is.

However, winning money before the Final can put you at a bit of a disadvantage as people tend not to want you to win the prize money as well. Previous winners Eugene (BB6) and Liam (BB8) had to settle for second and third place respectively, and the survivor out of Lisa and Sara would probably be lucky to get that far even without the money.

And Lisa was the unlucky one, losing to latecomer Sara in a close vote. But if she’d been given the choice between a place in the Final and a proposal from Mario, I think she’d have chosen the proposal.

It was probably only Mohamed’s position as Head of House that prevented him from leaving in the final eviction of the series, and it was no surprise that he was one of two housemates who left halfway through the final week. It’s a shame, as he’s a lovely guy. But he was very quiet, and never really at the centre of things, and I think he knew that.

So Mohamed unsurprisingly left the house in 7th place – although he certainly deserved a higher percentage of votes – and, as another housemate followed him, things went a little bit crazy.