The Moose is Cooked

Sure enough, today's Veto was the How Bad Do You Want It Competition. Andrew and Gary both wanted it, with Andrew getting a mohawk courtesy of Dan, and Gary getting slop for the rest of the game and a prisoner costume:

Gary wanted it more

Dan's influence on the game continued after the feeds came up, with Emmett finally opening up to Dan and deciding that it makes sense to boot Andrew now, and Gary and Talla making a quiet pledge not to nominate each other next week.

Meeting Marge

With the competition over and the backyard opened, Dan took a trip out to see the hot tub with Emmett and Andrew. He was very interested in Marge the Moose, asking if they talked to her, but didn't quite get it when they said no.

A tribute to Peter (RIP)

Back inside, he continued to grill them about who had talked to the other moose in the Diary Room hallway. Talla is the only one who has, for her talk show task the other day - no one else knows the secret of Marsha the Moose, who has only spoken to Talla, Peter and AJ. It took Dan a minute to realize his goof, as Talla played dumb and Jillian grilled Dan about why on earth he would ask about talking mooses.

Jokers reacts

Dan's goof went over the heads of most of the houseguests, but it didn't go unnoticed by the internet, or by Production, who called him into the Diary Room and elicited an apology a couple of minutes later (so as not to arouse suspicion). 

So the secret of the mooses remains (mostly) safe, and Dan is free to continue wreaking havoc on the house and entertaining the internet for the rest of the night. 

Confidential to Peter

Peter finally realized tonight what most of us realized days ago: his game is over, and his goose is cooked.

In a fitting tribute to Ian Terry, he launched into a lengthy monologue on the hammock that was at times astonishing, sad, bittersweet, and freaking depressing.

I'm a little worried for how he's going to fare once he realized that his game was heavily critiqued on the internet, given how much personal stake he seems to put in it, and how high he seems to have valued it himself. It seems like, based on both his Diary Room comments tonight and the hammock monologue, that he's not entirely happy with the current state of his real life, and was counting on success in Big Brother to redeem himself.

Peter:



And you is funny, not that comedy is an easy career, but there's a reason you won the heart of not one but two mooses.

And you should base your self-worth on something more than Big Brother. Seriously. You had a nice spring as the innocuous star/narrator of a relatively popular Canadian TV series, but there's more to life, and it's time to do what others have done before you: enjoy your fifteen minutes of fame, and use it to figure out where you're going next, rather than let it bring you down and spend the next years dwelling on it.

Cause right now, you're sad about the fact that you've come in fifth place on a second reality show, but that's not even true, because you're actually sixth (behind Gary, most likely).

So chin up, pull up those bootstraps, look in the mirror, and remind yourself that it doesn't matter if you win or lose, it's how much money you can pull in off your Youtube channel now.

And if all else fails, there's still a moose somewhere that loves you.

For Pete's Sake

I missed most of this, but for some reason Big Brother decided to pump some disco music and give Talla pom-poms tonight. There seemed to be a task involved, because I did spot her going into the Diary Room at one point.

Wipeout

It was incredibly annoying, and I barely caught any of it, which I'm not too bent out of shape about.

Shimmy

 I'd like to think that this was Marsha the Moose's last, best effort to try to save her Peter this week. It's Tuesday night nearing bedtime, and the boy has yet to put forth any serious effort to campaign. Best guess is that he thinks he's safe because of his previous deals with Jillian and Emmett, because they are so trustworthy.

Peter.

Yep, the magic moose is about his best option at this point.

Oh dear

Speaking of players with terrible game...

The @BigBrotherCA Twitter took a trip up to the undisclosed jury house location this afternoon. 

Our losers (and one soon-to-be returnee) were found munching on tomato soup and grilled cheese with their handlers.

Gary prepares for his inevitable return to the cameras

Interestingly, Alec and Topaz seemed to be a) the subjects of an on-camera interview, and b) still together. I mean... well, what is there left to say about that? Moving on.

Apparently they don't know yet about the twist that will send one of the four of them back into the game. At this point Gary is the most likely to return, despite my best efforts. I'm not entirely against that, I think it will be hard for him to win the game, but he'll liven up the feeds for at least a few days and maybe bring some jury house gossip with him. (Like, seriously, what the hell, Alec and Topaz?)

Still, it would be nice if Peter showed at least some understanding of the fact that he's currently packing his bags for a trip up to this undisclosed winter location. 

Marsha should really throw her boy a clue.

Psst... Peter... campaign or something!

Peter, Out.

I don't even want to talk about it.

Andrew-won-POV-Peter-would-have-been-golden-to-get-Emmett-out-but-he-did-the-stupid-thing-last-night.

The Sheyld (sic) is officially toast.

You know, I'm reminded of when the Brigade on Big Brother US got really bored near the end of the game when there was nothing better to do, and decided that they would spell their alliance "Bra-gade". There was a running joke on some forums that the Brigade and the Bra-gade were two different alliances: the Brigade was the four-man alliance with Matt, while the Bra-gade was what was left after Matt was evicted and no one knew how to spell correctly.

In that case, let's differentiate for a moment between The Shield (a pair of harmless but entertaining game-loving players) and The Sheyld, who had NO CLUE HOW TO PLAY BIG BROTHER despite maintaining their superiority in the game - basically, The Shield for the last week and a half or so.

Sorry, Peter. I'm with Marsha the Moose - you're still the cute one - but that doesn't mean you have game. Sigh.

I'll just take a little while to mourn, and then get back to figuring out which Nova Scotian looks most likely to take this game in the home stretch.

Marge the Moose

Jan the Moose Marge the Moose

The new moose in town has a name.

She also has a Twitter account.

@MargetheMoose 

Werk

It's been a day of work in the Big Brother house. 

About halfway through the day, feeds went down for a few hours for the POV ceremony and preparation for the dinner, which the house earned as a result of Peter's task from Marsha the Moose.

Putting on the moves during bedroom lockdown

Alec woke up after sleeping off last night's fight with Emmett and Jillian and immediately went to work entertaining the house and trying to get firmly on everyone's good side. He's not actively campaigning against Topaz, but... he's not exactly not campaigning, either. It's a fine line. He'll sell himself without selling her out. 

His Hail Mary, as he outlined last night, is to promise Emmett and Jillian that he would actively sit out the next Head of Household competition, a promise he's privately told Peter that he intends to stick to. 

For one week, anyway. After that, he's going after Jillian and Emmett with a vengeance.

Trying to get a word in edgewise with Talla on speed

Somehow in all the chaos of the last few days, it seems like Topaz didn't truly believe she was going on the block until it happened, so she's been much grumpier tonight, hanging by herself while Alec works the house. 

She vented to Talla - naturally, she's angry that she could have won the competition and trusted Jillian, who's now broken all three promises that she made. (Jillian disputes this, saying she only broke two of the three, and that putting up Topaz as a replacement pawn doesn't actually violate what she promised her. Sure, Jillian, whatever helps you sleep at night, especially as you contemplate sending Topaz to jury.)

I'm all out of faith, this is how I feel

Emmett, meanwhile, is torn - he seems to switch from Topaz to Alec and back again depending on who he's talking to. As angry as he was after the conversation with Alec last night, something about it resonated, and he wondered all day today if he's better off keeping Alec instead of Topaz. 

He's also trying to pressure Jillian into going for a 2-2 split vote in which she would break the tie, because... well, he's not giving a great reason for it, though it would be super for his game... in a final two against her.

Good thing that invitation to her sister's wedding is in pencil.

A head scratcher

Jillian at this point is changing with the wind too, though her wind smells suspiciously like milk and tattoos. She's worried about being a target next week, so Alec's sit-down promise is tempting, especially since Topaz isn't offering anything like that.

In the meantime, she and Talla are going after Topaz for the dregs of a mostly fake girls' alliance later tonight, and Topaz's reaction to that may well determine whether Jillian supports keeping her in the house, or decides that Emmett's split-vote and Alec's sit-down HOH are more tempting to her game.

Talk to the hand

Andrew is not budging at all - Emmett tried to float the idea of keeping Alec and he unleashed a torrent of reasons why that was a bad idea. There's no doubt in Andrew's mind that Topaz needs to stay, so if a house flip happens, don't expect him to be a part of it.

Shielding

Peter is locked and loaded to do the campaigning against Topaz that Alec refuses to do, already starting to sell her vengeance to Emmett to try to preserve the Shield.

Alec said to Peter tonight that his life is in Peter's hands. It seems like they may have worked out that Peter will have to do the campaigning against Topaz, since wherever Alec is in his torrid soap opera of a relationship at this point, he just can't bring himself to do it.

Mr. and Mrs. Jones

Talla, meanwhile, has been on crack today. She spent some time after the task reveal dancing around the house jabbering to Tom's monkey Mr. Jones, until Big Brother broke down and confiscated it. They instead gave her a card that said "Do you love it?", her catchphrase, which she's been alternately wearing, talking to, and promising to marry.

In the middle of all of this, she's working as Jill's lackey in this arrangement with Topaz. It seems like she wants the guys out of the way one way or another, and Alec is simply another means to this end.

So right now, the votes are looking like this:

Andrew: Voting out Alec

Talla: Voting out Alec

Peter: Voting out Topaz

Emmett: Could vote out Topaz or Alec 

Jillian: Could cast the swing vote either way if Emmett votes out Topaz.

Alec is probably still going home, but things aren't looking quite as dismal as they did twenty-four hours ago.

And, hey - what ever happened to that "mundo power"? No one is acting like they have it, especially not Jillian, so we might be looking at a Wednesday night public vote, in which case, it really will be anyone's game.

Moose on the Loose: Twist on the Way?

Marsha's not the only moose in town any more.

Over at Survivor Sucks, there's a suggestion for a name for the new moose:

Meanwhile, there's also a bird flitting about the indoor backyard today. The official Big Brother Canada account tweeted the following:

Something is afoot. 

No, not that foot.

Are these things connected? More importantly, are they related to the "mundo power" Arisa hinted at last week? Will the new moose (Jan?) be dealing out tasks like our friend Marsha? 

I don't think anyone besides Peter in the house right now even knows about Marsha, since she's been swearing them all to secrecy, but I heard she had a nice long cameo on the feeds this morning.

Here's hoping this twist isn't a failure like some of the production team's more recent efforts. 

(Confidential to the Sixteenth Houseguest: Talla can go, we won't miss her!)

Mount Gary Erupts (Video & Audio!)

As predicted, there was indeed a task tonight. When feeds returned, the houseguests were enjoying a backyard barbecue along with some much-needed booze. Apparently, AJ successfully got a certain number of houseguests to play a game at the request of Marsha the Moose. These kids are starting to get smarter about dutifully cooperating with the obvious tasks in order to earn rewards for the house.

Gary has been complaining of malaise for a couple of days. At first it seemed like something he ate, and then later like a cold. Could have also been the loss of power, quite honestly. Whatever the cause, he's been withdrawn and unhappy for days.

It didn't take long for Gary to wander back inside from the party tonight, where he and Topaz engaged in an epic bitchfest that started in the Head of Household room and moved downstairs.

Thanks to intrepid Big Brother blogger/podcaster Ash, we have video and audio of everything that you could possibly think of that's bothering Gary. Pretty much every houseguest gets a cameo.

Follow Ash on Twitter at @Ashes2Ashes13!

Video:



Audio:


Once the venting was complete, Gary and Topaz returned to the pool party... where she noticeably blew off Alec.

Big Brother then decided that now would be an excellent time to bring out more booze.

Stay tuned... Mount Gary may have more steam to blow.

Sunday Evening Feed Outage: A Clue?

Feeds have been down for a few hours this afternoon and evening, for unknown reasons. The POV ceremony probably isn't until tomorrow, but Sunday afternoons have been used for twists, like Andrew's carbonara disaster the other week.

This could be related to Canada's vote (for a pool table or air hockey table - obviously, it will be the air hockey table). Two other possible clues went out over Twitter early in the blackout, and were retweeted by the official Big Brother Canada account:

Hold up - mooses don't quack. 

Could the moose be bringing a visitor into the house? The latest tweets from Big Brother 14 winner Ian Terry placed him in New Orleans last night, but a flight from New Orleans to Toronto isn't that long, and the Big Brother Canada house is right by the airport. 

I'll be happy if this indicates the return of the moose and her sass. I just hope feeds come back before Alec and Topaz's scheduled HOH date tonight.

Topaz was planning to make mashed potatoes and eggs for some bizarre reason, and I was looking forward to seeing how that would go over with Alec.

Stir Crazy

The still-green Big Brother Canada production team up in Toronto got the fans' message tonight, and switched the feeds back on for a few fun-filled hours between the nomination ceremony and Power of Veto competition. That's more like it, BB!

Turns out a big part of the reason for the long blackouts may be long prep with the competition hosts. Peter, this week's POV host, was called to the Diary Room for two hour-long sessions. The first time he was called, a number of houseguests promptly went to start napping. They were soon placed on a long lockdown in the back bedroom area as well. When Peter finally emerged, he was not allowed to discuss the reason for the delay.

The houseguests still managed to entertain themselves throughout their boredom, much to the delight of feed-watchers. Big Brother may finally be getting it - just let us watch, it's not like there's that much to hide between comps.

Whatever happens next, tonight we were able to watch all of the following, in addition to the glory of Emmett doing Gary's makeup (which was already capped everywhere else):

Talla chasing AJ around the house for a pot of coffee

Talla is not a regular caffeine-drinker, and AJ thought it would be best if she didn't have the two cups she wanted. I don't think the screencaps could keep up with a caffeinated Talla, she's blurred out in most of the caps I get already.

Suzette in tears over her future in the game (look at Jillian being supportive)

Suzette is depressed and depressing most of the house, to the point that even Gary was complaining about it. Seems she did this last time she thought she was going home, too.

Talla apparently levitating via the bookshelf

Alec being inappropriate with a pool noodle

Alec rubbing Emmett's hair

Alec wouldn't touch Talla's hair, he was afraid once he started, he wouldn't be able to stop. Seems it's just as soft as it looks, which explains why Andrew is always trying to touch it.

Eagle-eared Emmett listening to POV comp prep

Emmett: "Lots of buckets of water, guys."

Big Brother: "Please stop talking about Production." (Canadian Big Brother is so polite.)

Alec and Topaz being horrified by AJ 

Alec and Topaz playing matchmaker with AJ and Talla

Alec and Topaz were pushing hard for a showmance between AJ and Talla. Trying to get the target off their backs? Neither was opposed to the idea, but it sounds like Talla isn't interested in long-distance relationships. She also accidentally offended AJ by suggesting her friends would think he was "nice".

Girl talk!

The girl talk was mostly about unfortunate boyfriend stories and violent incidents. It was a little traumatic for Topaz, who broke down in tears telling the story of a neighbor who was stabbed and died in front of her.

Emmett tickling Alec with Jillian's hair

Gary wrestling with Topaz

AJ and Talla debating how much of Alec and Topaz's makeout session they could stand to watch

Talla directing a porno with AJ and Topaz. "Why is this a KKK-directed porno?" -AJ, when Talla went for the sheet.

Finally, feeds went down, presumably for the Power of Veto competition, which will be a late one tonight.

Congrats to Production for starting to get it together. Now can we please get some more Marsha the Moose?

First, a Welcome

Welcome to Big Brother Play By Play!

Now that we've got two seasons of North American Big Brother to look forward to each year - and yes, this is going to be a thing now, Big Brother Canada is a Canadian hit - it's time to put some of my constant over-analysis of Big Brother to good use - yours.

Here, you'll find summaries of what's happening around the net, tidbits from the live feeds, thoughts on episodes, rumors, debunking of rumors, gossip, old wives' tales, and urban legends. You'll get stanning, opinions and judgments, strategic analysis and wit - everything that makes Big Brother worth enjoying.

Week Four: Still Bright and Cheery

At the moment, Big Brother Canada is in full swing in its third week (fourth eviction). The Canadian production team... well, let's just say that they're still working the kinks out. (One gets the impression that they had no idea what they were getting themselves in to.) Luckily for them and for the Slice network, they've been blessed with an interesting, scheming group of characters to launch the northern series, and their unique mix of American-style gaming with British-style tasks has created nonstop excitement. 

Maybe their twists have come a little hard and fast, maybe they haven't quite realized how to turn the feeds on in between competitions, maybe they're just now realizing that their live games need a referee (whoops!), but it's not a bad thing that when the feeds do go down for hours, they've got fans screaming for more.

Showmance or Nomance? Two gamers, one game.

Will Alec and Topaz be the first North American BB showmance to betray each other in the house? Will Gary's social pizzazz keep him on the upside of the house once he's no longer in power? Will Tom be blindsided at the eviction? Will anything come of the Quattro alliance? Will Talla ever figure out how to use a teapot? Most importantly, when will we see Marsha the Moose again?

Welcome to Big Brother Play By Play, and I'm looking forward to finding out just as much as you are. 

-Karen Elise