BBUK: Death, dives and divides

Another update from BBUK (SPOILERS)

So quite alot can happen in 14 days in the Big Brother house - let’s see if I can remember any of it.

WEEK 9

After the Head of House challenge it was time for Rachel to get off the fence and take her place on the throne of power and enforce the law of Rachel Rice upon her subjects. Which involves being fair - in a looking out for your friends without admitting it kind of way.

As Head of House though she couldn’t help out Kat and Mikey in the weeks nominations task, with the housemates from hell having to eat 300 sprouts in order to be permitted to nominated. Despite Mikey’s tactics of chewing them, throwing them up and then re-eating them, they unsurprisingly failed - not that their results would have made much difference. The house hunks Dale and Stuart had made it clear they wanted to be nominated and stated they wanted to go, and the other housemates obliged.

IT’S A PUPPET

Weekly task time and for the three housemates from Hell it’s performing a glove puppet show everytime Big Brother demands it over a period of 24 hours, while for the heavenly housemates it’s a much more interesting interpretation of the form - Bunraku. This involved a table tennis show in which housemates moved objects and each other by blending into the background (no, not like Rachel) - and it’s pretty effective. If it hadn’t been axed, Big Brother Australia would have been stealing this task next year.

AT YOUR PERIL

So with just three housemates in hell responsible for all cooking and washing up - one of them being blind, another being spoiled - Kat had a hard week in Hell. Best friend (or as Nicole would say, “arse licker”) and Head of House Rachel therefore took it upon herself to help out and wash up. Big Brother thought this inappropriate for a Head of House and warned her she washed up “at her peril”, but despite the protests of the Heavenly Housemates (Dale: “You’re not f***ing Gandhi”) she continued to do so - which led to BB sending in a trolley load of crockery for Hell to wash - all marked with the word “PERIL”.

BRAWN vs BRAWN

So with the eighth day of the eighth month of the (two thousandth and) eighth year being the luckiest of the Chinese calendar, the two nominees were given the chance to influence their own eviction and show how much they really wanted to go - by creating bad luck for themselves. That was just an excuse for the producers to get them both in speedos before one left though, as the real business of the day came later when Dale became the eighth evictee - and his fear of being hated proved unfounded as the crowd gave him the best reception in quite sometime, his house crush Jen returned for an on-air reunion and the magazines lined up to milk their “relationship” for all it was worth. Meanwhile Luke and Bex got wed in Vegas.

WEEK 10

So Dale had been in the house longer than the winners of the first four series, yet left behind as many housemates as started out BB1 with 10 still in the running for the prize. First, it’s time for a new Head of House - and the physically demanding and mentally challenging task to determine such an important position - baking a cake!

It’s Heaven, complete with “executive chef” Rex vs Hell - complete with his missus, Kat and the blind man. They had to bake and create London landmarks, but luckily for Hell the outgoing Head of House would choose the winner, with Rachel opting for Hell as Heaven knew she would. They were furious though that she insisted their mess of a cake tasted so good it outperformed their virtually picture perfect creation, and even more furious she wouldn’t admit she chose Hell because Kat and Mikey were her friends.

So Hell move to heaven and elect Mikey as the new HoH, with Heaven demoted to Hell. For one night only as the next day the barrier is removed. So now Rex and Nicole can argue - and make up - with no perspex fence in the way.

MIKEY WIKEY

Mikey’s hearing is hyper sensitive and he hates the alarms Big Brother plays when housemates falls asleep - so he took a tough stand which involved attacking anyone found sleeping with a jug of water. Much to the disgust of Mohamed, Rex and Kat when they became victims of Mikey’s law.

THE BIG BROTHER GAMES

The Olympics are on, so that of course means the return of the Big Brother Games, which begins with an opening ceremony - and BB forcing the “athletes” to parade in the pouring rain for half an hour. The events include the Short Jump, Slow Race and “Floating on Water with a Small Tropical Island Attached to Your Groin” event, with Head of House Mikey betting on the outcome of each event. Turns out he’s quite the gambler and the housemates passed, but the event was marred by tragedy when Heaven the Goldfish - who’d only been in the house just over a week - passed away.

DON’T TRUST THE EVICTION MOB

Rachel pays the price for her role in Cake Gate as six of her housemates use it as the excuse to nominate her, while Stuart’s desire to go makes him an easy nomination for the others.

59% vote to evict Stuart, and despite his own insecurities about getting booed, like Dale the week before him Stuart gets a positive reception upon leaving the house. So positive he decides a stage dive would be a good idea. It wasn’t.

WEEK 11: BB HITS A STANDSTILL! (SPOILERS)

Right up to date and Rex is the new Head of House, and hence immune from eviction, having outperformed his fellow housemates in the Human Statue challenge.

Discuss Big Brother from around the world in our International Forum.