In the wake of Jeremy’s eviction of Big Brother 15, I became despondent that the season would become dull and predictable. The course of action over the next several weeks seemed incredibly obvious to me. However, I failed to realize that this year the house is full of insanely paranoid and petty people.
SPOILER WARNING: This article contains Big Brother 15 spoilers.
With Judd as HoH, the Goof Troop (his alliance with Andy, Amanda and McCrae) is already fighting about what to do. Depending on who you ask, Kaitlin, Howard or Aaryn seem to be the primary targets this week, and that’s causing tension in the alliance. Let’s look at each one.
Kaitlin: HoH Judd wants her out because she won last week’s Power of Veto by a large margin and has made it to the tie-breakers in the past two HoH competitions. It doesn’t help that Jessie is suddenly trying to be the Amanda to Judd’s McCrae, sleeping in his HoH bed and influencing his decisions. She actually said that she views Kaitlin as a younger, funnier version of herself and that there’s only room for one hot brunette in the house. Congratulations, women, this is how you’re being represented in the house, as petty, bitter, jealous shrews who want to evict anyone prettier than they are.
It brings me back to week 1, when Jessie was angry that Jeremy snuggled with her for the first few days, then he dropped her for Kaitlin. It truly is like my Game of Thrones prediction, where Jessie is Roslin Frey, hurt that her betrothed (Jeremy) married another woman. If you saw “The Rains of Castamere,” then you know how this story ends.
The problem for them is that Amanda and McCrae feel comfortable with Kaitlin and, last week, Helen cozied up to her and promised her safety for using the Power of Veto and helping them get rid of Jeremy. If Kaitlin gets evicted after everyone said how great her game would be after Jeremy left and how much farther she’d go because of it, that would just be depressing.
Howard: For Amanda, Howard is still the prime target, and I suspect her hatred stems from the fact that the Moving Company wanted to get rid of her. She ranks Howard and Spencer as her top two targets and is pushing very hard to backdoor Howard this week. She’s become incredibly demanding and controlling, trying to run her alliance despite claiming she’s not trying to make it a dictatorship.
Jessie, however, is already trying to poison Judd against Amanda, pointing out that she’s running the entire house. I honestly didn’t see Jessie stepping up her game this much, but that’s a side effect of Judd winning HoH, something he didn’t want to do so early in the game.
Aaryn: The third and most obvious target is Aaryn. Everyone agrees that she’s a compulsive liar, mean-spirited and can’t be trusted. But they also think she’s all alone, which means it might be safer to keep her. Amanda and McCrae have tried to keep her close, so they want to protect her, and Judd feels bad that he lied to her face so many times the first two weeks. Elissa, however, seems to want Aaryn out more than anyone, and the others think it’s because she’s playing a purely personal game.
This is one of those quirky and unfortunate facts about this game. You can be a truly awful person who lies and alienates everyone, and that will actually keep you safer than trying to be nice or daring to actually try to win competitions. The reason there will NEVER be a “no-floater summer” is that floaters get rewarded by making it to the jury.
Elissa: This isn’t very likely, but Judd has told Amanda and McCrae that backdooring Elissa might be an option this week if she doesn’t work with them on her MVP nomination. This could prove tricky since we know she won’t be the MVP this week. Will they believe her that she doesn’t have it? Will that hurt Elissa’s game? It’s possible, because the others are already worried about the fact that Elissa seems to refuse to consider putting up Howard.
GinaMarie: Everybody hates her and thinks she’s absolutely insane for still obsessing over Nick. However, nobody wants to waste their HoH reign getting rid of her because it’s a complete waste as she’s easy to get rid of at any point. This is another quirk of the show. Everyone agrees GinaMarie doesn’t deserve to be there and shouldn’t be allowed to make the jury, but no one wants to bother evicting her.
Unlike my original assessment, this week might turn out interesting if only because power corrupts and it might drive a wedge between the Goof Troop. Heck, just look at last week. Beforehand, everyone loved Helen. Now, a lot of people in her own alliance don’t trust her because she talks too much. Winning HoH really is a bad thing.
Judd is hellbent on getting rid of a woman, mostly because evicting four guys in a row would essentially guarantee that a girl will win. But will the others fall in line with his plot against Kaitlin, despite the fact that Helen and Elissa promised to protect her and Andy is her new BFF?
Objectively, it shouldn’t matter. If Amanda, McCrae, Judd and Andy would simply stick to their alliance, keeping Helen, Elissa and Jessie close to them, then I believe they can evict the six other HGs in any order. Sure, Kaitlin won a competition, but almost everyone she beat was from the other side of the house. I don’t think she’s any match for Andy, Judd or McCrae. And even though Howard is allegedly throwing all the competitions, I don’t know why people think he’s going to be this huge threat. Sure, he has big muscles, but there are almost never competitions that rely purely on brute strength.
The reason I thought this season would be boring is that I gave the Goof Troop more credit than they probably deserve. I thought they’d stick with each other and pick off the other side one by one at random. If Howard goes this week or two weeks from now, I don’t think it makes any difference. I failed to realize that, to them, the order matters. They’ve all made so many side deals to keep themselves safe under any circumstances, and they’re unwilling to part with them. This is one aspect where the Moving Company was superior, because Nick had no problem telling everyone in his group that he’d drop GinaMarie whenever they wanted.
It’s the cardinal rule of a real alliance: Don’t get too attached to a side alliance. As close as Matt was to Ragan, or Lane was to Britney in season 12, they never turned on the Brigade. This week could test the Goof Troop’s commitment to each other over their separate side alliances.
Will everyone follow Judd’s plan to evict Kaitlin, even though many of them promised to protect her? Will people think Elissa is lying about being the MVP this week, or will the show totally blow the twist and tell them all about it? Is Jessie a manipulative genius, or just a dumb girl who’s jealous that Kaitlin landed the boy she liked?
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Senior Writer, BuddyTV
John watches nearly every show on TV, but he specializes in sci-fi/fantasy like The Vampire Diaries, Supernatural and True Blood. However, he can also be found writing about everything from Survivor and Glee to One Tree Hill and Smallville.
