snarkmachine
Resident Bitch
watching 2020 bb has made me so insanely nostalgic for the old channel 10 seasons of the show (which are now all up on youtube for convenient viewing!). it's so funny to watch those old seasons through a new lens, because i remember talking a lot of shit back then and i find looking back that i am much more sympathetic to the housemates and the show now than i was then. gretel never got enough credit for being as pithy and funny and quick on her feet as she was, and even things that seemed silly like friday night games seem sort of charming and winsome now. watching the 2020 version of the show makes me realize just how much i missed the petty dramas and interpersonal conflicts and the real fly-on-the-wall nature of the show back then.
anyway, has anyone else been watching old seasons of the show? i've been rewatching series 7 which originally aired back when i was in high school and it's interesting how my opinions have shifted with over ten years of perspective. i remember thinking emma was a huge bitch back in 2007 (which she still is), but now i regard her with a degree of fascination i didn't have back then. she was just such a singular figure - someone who almost nobody liked but everyone respected, an introvert in a house full of extroverts, and someone who evolved into the natural leader of the group despite all that because of her natural competence. she could be so cutting and witty, i just find her endlessly fascinating to watch and the sort of personality 2020 bb robs us of by not letting us spend enough time with.
watching aleisha's journey to winner from a bird's eye view was eye-opening too. you could tell from the first week that she was the producers' favourite - she doesn't get her own storylines for a while because she rarely stirred any drama, but almost every episode includes something funny or charming she did, as opposed to someone like joel who the housemates assure us every week is hilarious but who almost never made the daily show. production clearly had her picked from the very beginning as someone they wanted to win....perhaps as an antidote to jamie 06 and the logans 05? which sort of made it ironic when she started her own romance in the house, although with the benefit of hindsight, i feel like her romance with billy was leagues more genuine than jamie or greg's. in fact, it's sort of striking in retrospect how understated and restrained those two tried to be on a show like this - you got the feeling both of them would rather keel over and die of embarrassment than stage a fake wedding like jamie and katie. i remember being very cynical about that romance at the time because of jamkat the year before and how he dropped her like a hot potato two weeks after he cashed his winner's check, but knowing billy and aleisha dated for a few years after the show was over makes their relationship in this series just really sort of endearing and charming to watch.
anyway, has anyone else been watching old seasons of the show? i've been rewatching series 7 which originally aired back when i was in high school and it's interesting how my opinions have shifted with over ten years of perspective. i remember thinking emma was a huge bitch back in 2007 (which she still is), but now i regard her with a degree of fascination i didn't have back then. she was just such a singular figure - someone who almost nobody liked but everyone respected, an introvert in a house full of extroverts, and someone who evolved into the natural leader of the group despite all that because of her natural competence. she could be so cutting and witty, i just find her endlessly fascinating to watch and the sort of personality 2020 bb robs us of by not letting us spend enough time with.
watching aleisha's journey to winner from a bird's eye view was eye-opening too. you could tell from the first week that she was the producers' favourite - she doesn't get her own storylines for a while because she rarely stirred any drama, but almost every episode includes something funny or charming she did, as opposed to someone like joel who the housemates assure us every week is hilarious but who almost never made the daily show. production clearly had her picked from the very beginning as someone they wanted to win....perhaps as an antidote to jamie 06 and the logans 05? which sort of made it ironic when she started her own romance in the house, although with the benefit of hindsight, i feel like her romance with billy was leagues more genuine than jamie or greg's. in fact, it's sort of striking in retrospect how understated and restrained those two tried to be on a show like this - you got the feeling both of them would rather keel over and die of embarrassment than stage a fake wedding like jamie and katie. i remember being very cynical about that romance at the time because of jamkat the year before and how he dropped her like a hot potato two weeks after he cashed his winner's check, but knowing billy and aleisha dated for a few years after the show was over makes their relationship in this series just really sort of endearing and charming to watch.
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