I'm not saying I'm grieving anything when I make this reference, but when I was thinking about how I feel about Big Brother's elimination twist this season, especially by comparison to last year, I realized that I've moved past the denial and anger after last season's Hamster Wheel of Death twist, and on to the bargaining stage of whatever this is. Big Brother seems to want to keep the elimination twist around, and if that's the case, there are a couple of ways they could improve it for die-hard fans like myself.
For the second season in a row, Big Brother has done a twist that resulted in a houseguest being eliminated from the game without going through the usual process of nomination, Veto competition, Blockbuster and vote. This time around, as the Medieval-themed twist played out, Haley was eliminated after Yash, the winner of the final competition in a series of games, voted her out over La Trice (Lala).
I'm still not a fan of mid-season eliminations like this (or any twist where a houseguest is eliminated without a proper vote), but if this twist is here to stay for the foreseeable future, here are two things I'd like to see changed:
Make The Actual Vote To Evict A House Vote
The fact that there was at least some kind of vote involved in Season 28's elimination twist is an improvement over Season 27, as was the fact that the elimination happened pre-jury this time. Still, I think it'd be better -- also closer to the core of the game -- if the twist ended with a house vote to determine which houseguest leaves.
To elaborate, using the format of this season's twist -- a series of competitions to earn safety and determine who competes next -- instead of ending the process with the winner of the final competition casting the sole vote among the two remaining houseguests, let all of the houseguests vote on which of the two remaining houseguests should go.
Last season, Rachel was eliminated after failing a competition. This season's twist was an improvement, in that there was an actual vote to determine someone's exit -- it's just that only one Houseguest got to vote. The impact any houseguest's exit has on the trajectory of the season is too great to be left in the hands of one person, in my opinion.
Put The Feeds On Inside The House During The Twist
The Big Brother live feeds went dark during the twist in Season 27 and were out even longer for Season 28 (they did end up coming back a day earlier than expected, but still...). I assume that Big Brother wanted to save the surprise of who was eliminated for the episode, but is that really absolutely necessary?
In the case of this season's twist, the Sunday episode left us on a cliffhanger anyway, which might be why the feeds came back early to begin with. However, even if they had gotten everything into Sunday's episode, shutting the feeds off for such a long time in the middle of the season really messes with the show's momentum, from my perspective as a feed-watcher.
It's one thing to turn the feeds off for a few hours while a competition or meeting/ceremony takes place (this happens weekly), but it's another to have such a major event take place and then keep the feeds off for days until the episode airs. Not only is it frustrating as a viewer, but it also seems like a wasted opportunity.
If the feeds were on inside the house, feed-watchers could stay up to see who returns after each round and watch the strategizing that takes place. With no feeds on in the yard, we'd still need to see the episode in order to know exactly how things played out in the contests, but in the meantime, this would allow us to participate in the twist the way we do endurance competitions. As it is right now, Big Brother is shutting us out of what could be the best part of the experience by turning the feeds off, and it's part of why I'm already dreading the twist's possible return next year.
Two seasons in a row isn't quite a pattern yet, but it is an indication that Big Brother may be trying to make this type of mid-season twist stick. If that's the case, I really hope they continue to make adjustments to improve it and make it something that feels true to the game that's being played and allows the dedicated viewers to watch at least part of it play out in real time.
The Big Brother live feeds are available to watch with a Paramount+ subscription.
