Don’t close the White room yet!

Interesting night of television. First off we found out that TJ is absolutely insane. But in a good way. KEEP HER IN!!! Secondly, we had the boring reveal of the couple and Mr X. I wonder what Billy’s reward is? Probably become a housemate, although I wouldn’t know if thats a good or a bad thing.

The highlight of the night was of course the auction in the White room, and we all now know that Cruz soooooo jumped the gun. OMG, $750, what are you thinking?! I was waiting for Kara to instantly hit it after Cruz hit it, cause she seems like she can’t handle it. Anyway, Wednesday night it’ll all be over anyway, what a waste. Should’ve kept it going for a month. Hopefully the 2 that don’t get into the house will get some decent money. I was about to turn it off when he came into the house, and into the rewards room. I didn’t realise they were simply showing him what he will miss out on. A nice idea, especially so the housemates (proper) could see him for a quick second.

Alright, one last thing. Kate needs to go. Badly. Jamie might also be on the chopping block, but Jamie is one of those underdogs you have to get behind. Should be interesting, I think he’ll become a real favourite in the crowd because of his nerd like qualities.

So who do I hope will be nominated? KATE (she needs to go badly), TJ probably will also be put up, and Jamie. I don’t think Emma will use her new power tomorrow night because Kate will already be on the block. We’ll see I suppose….

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Give me something new!!

I was wondering if anyone else is starting to grow tired of the same old formulas being repeated year after year after Year on Big Brother Australia?

According to the BehindBigBrother website and other reports from the media, last years UK BB intruder Shilpa Shetty will be entering the Australian Big Brother house later in the 2007 series. If this does eventuate, it surely brings up questions of the ability of the BB writers/producers to come up with some new stuff??

I have been an avid fan of Aussie BB since it started back in 2001. My own view on the series is that it was much more fun to watch when it was simple, without the over elaborate twists and turns that we are accustomed to seeing on a dramatic daytime soap opera.

BB Australia was definitely more popular with audiences back in the first few years (but i don’t have stats. here sorry!) i’d say from 2001 – 2003.

In the last few seasons, the producers seem to have tried to jazz everything up and make it more glamourous and spectacular. From what i can see, the majority of the contestants (not all though) of the last few years are lacking an element of ‘variety’ (most of the guys from this year’s BB looked the same/ wore the same clothes, and 6 of the 7 girls have blonde hair).

Thinking back to 2001, we had a Jemma, as well as a Todd, a Johnny, a Chrissy, a Sara Marie, a Ben, a Blair and a Pete.. they were all Different! They reflected different types and characters, from ‘all walks of life’.. isn’t that what the promo’s of 2007 were promising?

In order to bring back the audience.. wheather you’re 16 or 49 (whatever the target audience is these days!) i think that the producers should indeed keep it real. Focus less on the spectacular, the drama and the UK intruders from Last year. Lighten up the storylines, focus more on the Real.. (this is reality TV after all and not Soap?), and maybe get some Brand New Aussie celebrities into the house instead? How funny would that be? I hope BB 07 shaped out to be better than the last 2 seasons..

That’s all folks

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Lets do the time warp again!

I sat down tonight and didn’t really know what I was watching. At some point throughout the show, if you’ve seen BBUSA, you would have thought to yourself “this has been done before”. Back in BB5USA ex girlfriend-boyfriends were bought into the house, in a very similar twist to what happened tonight to Hayley. Anyway, I don’t mind that twist, so I’m willing to let that one go.

When the 4 losers went into the white room, and I saw a button, I knew I was watching “Solitary”. Solitary is a show where each person sits in a pod and the last person to push the button basically wins. It’s exactly the same deal here in the BB house. While they are in the same room, the last one standing gets a wildcard into the main house.

Lets think about these losers for a moment too. They lost the sms vote, yet they haven’t been discared yet. So why have a sms vote? was it simply a money grabbing exercise? You bet!

And news just through in the last couple of hours, Shilpa from Celebrity Big Brother UK edition is coming to the house. Why does BBAU have a fascination with BBUK and stealing their housemates? Seems ridiculous. And to be honest, having watched BBUK, the girl isn’t even an exciting housemate. Very bland to be honest, and only won because of the racial arguments being thrown around in the house.

Onto something more exciting. Didn’t BBBA have an awesome weekend!? First with the housemate images, first with the news from the launch (well until….you know what happened!), being linked to a sex scandal….all in a days work round here I suppose. But we’ve got the website name out there on opening weekend this time round than any other year. It’s been a great start. Whats more, the website seems to be holding up to the massive amount of hits we’re receiving as well, so it’s excellent all round.

There is one way of stopping people trying to leak information out of the launch as well – have the balls to do it live. The UK can do it, and they obviously love BBUK, so why not give it another go. It went fine in BB3?! It took them close to, if not more than 3 hours to film the other night. Heck I would’ve been bored out of my mind if I was sitting in the audience. And then to make them wait till Monday night to know the twists?! Thats just harsh.

I’ll be back tomorrow with some comments about the actual housemates; thats if they don’t put another 20 in tomorrow night just to confuse me moreso with the names.

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Housemates Revealed

Girls of BBBA

Being that there are only two females on the moderation staff of BBBA, Realitybites and myself decided to do a joint blog. Although I may write one week and she may write the next, please be aware that we may not always have the same opinion of each other. Anyways, enough talk, let’s start on the blog. 

Housemates revealed. 

I spent a day away from the computer, to come back online to find out that a member had found the images and names of the housemates. I first thought “Great! now we can find out who we will be watching for the next three months and also bitching about”  So I had a quick look at the pictures, read the forum thread about it, and then thought to myself “Why even bother having Big Brother back?” out of all the housemates,  the majority of them look like past housemates.

Kris Nobel, please read this, and I know you wont even consider it ever again when you produce a show simply because you suck at your job, But we have already had a Krystal, Camilla, Jamie, Hotdogs, Ben, Anna, Karen,  Christina, Ashlea or whatever her name was, Trevor, Blair and Mikey. In fact, the only housemate who looks remotely interesting is the one who has no picture who we can only assume is the Starburst winner.

See, the problem with Big Brother, is you can start off writing about one topic, which tangles up with another topic, which of course Nobel has managed to steal from Big Brother from another country. See, the magic word this time was Starburst. Which I find ironic, Channel ten has reality teevee shows, one about obese people, yet to win your way into another reality teevee show, you have to eat candy like Munalita to get into the house. 

So here we go again, housemates are more “worldly” Yeah right! If that is the case, then vibes is also John Howard. Oh wait, I understand it now. They are considered worldlier because they have bought hair products to make them blonde! YES! That must be it. 

Or maybe it’s because they have to pedal to wash their clothes, and in turn that will make them worldlier. But if we go by last year in the case of Jamie, like you know, like they wont like ever like change like their underwear or like you know wash.

So back to the topic of Housemates Revealed early.

A forum member found the pix on 3 mobile. They did not hack as 3 have said they did. Instead 3 screwed up and in the world of corporations they blame anyone but themselves. Was it a publicity stunt on behalf of 3? Or was it just incompetence by the staff that does the website for 3? I mean both 3 and the official big brother website both are suffering because of staff that can not do their job.

 toiletduck

Thoughts from RB:       I feel deceived and pissed off.   Where are the diverse worldly housemates I was promised.    Only last week the media releases promised that every viewer would be able to identify with at least one housemate.   Well I’m sorry but I can’t identify with anyone.      The housemates ages range from 20-32.   Wow, 12 years,  one is married with a child and one is currently separated.  That leaves 10 single twenty something good looking people, many who look like they’ve been sprung from the pages of a ralph magazine competition.  Then we can add the 6 potential housemates, yep you guessed it, more good looking singles.    Even last year had a wider age variance with Karen and Perry.   The only difference is that they have included less 18 and 19 year olds.    To call this mob a diverse group is a joke.

In my view the best BB was BB3, which truly did have a variety of housemates of varying ages, beauty, intellect and life experience.   I can only hope that first impressions are wrong, and that there is more to offer than  what we’ve seen.

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Actually, it might not be that bad

We are just hours away from the housemates moving in now – 10 we believe, with a further 2 selected from 8 candidates moving in on Monday – and actually since my last blog, Big Brother has begun to win me over.

The whole environmental thing has been a selling point from the start of BB07 – and that’s a good place to start.  Any responsible organisation – or household for that matter – should now be taking their environmental impact seriously, so it’s good to see the show making the effort into doing something more positive – and perhaps influencing a few viewers along the way.

The best thing about it is it’s nothing more than going back to the shows’ roots.  Limited water supply, vegetable gardens and a back to basics existence were all core to the Big Brother format when it launched across the world – but as each series passes elements of this have been lost along the way, so perhaps taking a step back is exactly what the show needs.

A few on the forums have been concerned that being environmentally friendly won’t be entertaining – but in reality, it’s not really going to feature much in the show.   With Adults Only gone, so are the shower scenes – while they’ll be no more footage of housemates recycling than there was of them throwing out the rubbish.  It’ll just be a part of their daily routine.

The other thing we’ve heard this week which I’m liking is the news they’ll be “launching” with no prizes and that they’ll be no cars for the evictees.  It’s widely expected that as “winning is everything”, Friday Night Live will be used to build up a jackpot for the eventual winner – something we’d assumed was the reason for it’s existence when it launched back in 2005.  

There is also a suggestion that though the eviction prizes are being cut, they may instead be available to be won by the housemates while they are in the house.  Again, this is something I’ve been suggesting for a couple of seasons (it never made sense you get prizes for being evicted!) – but I do hope their green promises aren’t forgotten – cars and flights aren’t exactly known for being environmentally friendly.

The other main rumour is Mr X – and this is the one that concerns me, though perhaps judgement should be reserved until we actually know what it is!

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Here we go again…

Ouch! It’s that time of year again where our television screens are set to be raped by another year of extreme personalities, C-grade celebrities (being generous) and fun packed drama that we all famously call Big Brother.

I’m new this year to the Behind Big Brother team but definitely not new to Big Brother. I’m Ryharn and a new addition to the blog side of this now not so little online community: Behind Big Brother Aus.

It seems I have turned a little skeptical to the whole format of this show. Despite the continuous promises of new surprises, different housemates and different rules, nothing to me seems to change and I do believe despite the pitiful efforts in lame marketing techniques (simple and no doubt cheap tv advertisements) that this year will bring (in essence) nothing new.

There have been countless times where producers, Gretel or the likes have come back the basic bare ass of Big Brother; to study how ‘we’ as a society function in a controlled environment. In Famous magazine this week Gretel also mentioned that the only control the contestants have (contesting for hrm NOTHING seeing there is ‘apparently’ no prize money, car etc.. … maybe a phone?) is on themselves, “so remember that“. To this I disagree. So many times in previous years we have seen housemates not only control themselves (or perhaps lack of control like David’s [BB06] hissy fit…. PAAAA HAHA) but control each other and even big brother (through threats of leaving, disrupting the shows plans yadda yadda). Even in the house peer pressure and emotional manipulation alone has stimulated so many rants, tantrums, bitch fests, segregation, etc… So Gretel, I know you’re an ‘established author’ but damn… think before you speak!

What brings me back every year to this seemingly ADDICTIVE trash TV is the hope that SOMEWHOW it will be as good as the first year it was launched in Australia. I remember coming home in 2000 sitting in the passenger seat of the car seeing a bunch of ass-crack wielding workers putting up a Big Brother billboard displaying those unmistakable eyes. Heck, I even have the official Big Brother CD! Despite many of the housemates fading away to Neighbours (Blair), failing in FHM standup competitions (Christina ballerina), charity volunteering or some ‘hot’ photo shoot I still look back to the previous seasons with warm nostalgia.

So surprise and entertain me Big Brother, wear you horrible glitter clad outfits Gretel (maybe thorw in some more ill thought comments on editing) and send in another bunch of over excited, enthusiastic housemates because my remote is handy, television and internet on and I’m ready for hours of mind numbing television. How I do really love this show!

Ryharn

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