Flave

The thing I don't understand is how does Grodner get away with this blatant manipulation without a world of hurt crashing down on her? After the game show scandals of the 50s I though networks had become very careful about rigging competitive game shows. Why doesn't someone report her to the FCC (or whoever)?

mwbmis

It's not classified as a game show. They have it classified as a reality program w/ prizes.

Bill Needle

"Expect the unexpected" is them hiding their chicanery in plain sight.

It has made the whole exercise entirely pointless, other than generating the next ridiculous batch of pseudo-celebs out of "social media moguls" and the like, only to have them utterly forgotten even faster than they imagined themselves being created.

Josh-da-man

Yeah, manipulation has been going on for years.

Not letting Eric use the POV to backdoor Dick. Jeff's coup de tat power. Rachel's Pandora's box.

mwbmis

Pretty much Eric's entire journey on BB was ripe with manipulation. Personally, I think him getting expelled if Dick left instead of Dustin was probably the biggest.

JuryDuty

Either way, I think it was impressive that Frankie won that competition all by himself. That said, Caleb kinda came off as a child (again) and would have been MUCH smarter to stay in it and manipulate it.

MoviePage

The accusations of production interference every single year are tiresome. I'm not saying there is never any guidance from production, but the conspiracy theorists always come out when someone who is generally unliked goes farther than people want.

Remember last year how Amanda was supposedly production's favorite and everything that happened in her favor was obviously Grodner paving the way for her inevitable win?

The competition was designed as a tie-in with the beginning of CBS football, along with the "field trip" prize for the winning team. It wasn't rigged.

fujishig

Why does the tie-in mean that the comp wasn't rigged/influenced?

arminius

Because the NFL is just as real as pro wrestling. They would never cheat.

JuryDuty

I don't think they necessarily "rig" any of the competitions. But they definitely influence them. I think Frankie was tipped off, too. Watch the scene and it's odd how he jumps to the conclusion that Beastmode Noshirt is going to throw it.

A few years ago, someone posted an article on here from a reputable source with interviews with Survivor execs and other good reality shows and they essentially admitted to occasionally influencing competitions toward crowd favorites or to tell a greater story. On Survivor, for instance, if a woman with a great story is about to go out, they might make the competition more focused on balance to give her an advantage.

I'm 100% sure they do the same on Big Brother. Probably more so given the CLEAR influence that's been revealed in past seasons (such as contestants coming out of the diary room with revelations and the loudspeaker suddenly tells them they can't talk about diary room sessions).

But don't let that ruin your enjoyment of the show. I figure if you're going to watch reality TV, you have to realize that the producers and editors are essentially part of the game. If you're a good player, you realize that, and you give them good soundbytes and good story so they can feature you more and let the odds ever be stacked in your favor.

Josh-da-man

One difference between Survivor and BB is that Survivor is recorded in advance while BB happens live. Survivor can take all of the footage they film and edit it into a narrative, whereas BB has to do everything on the fly. They don't (necessarily) have advanced knowledge of what will happen week to week so they could play someone up as a fan favorite only to have them evicted the next week.

AaronHernandez

I like most seasons but people are naive if they think this is on the level. The "random" twist always happens to benefit a fan favorite/huge charecter and Pandoras Box and other negative twist always screw over a person with no edit.


I think Juryduty described it best. The best contestants realize they are not just playing against the other players they are also battling Production as well.

xx2000xx

Marcellas BB3/All-stars actually said the same thing almost word for word on twitter. Saying not only are you playing against people but playing against production too. Evil Dick stepped in and said he would make deals late Thursday that way production can't stop it. Others have talked about the Frankie thing being production.

Caleb walked backed in to the challenge but BB said he couldn't enter back in. Also Zach/Donny's platform was all "messed up" and they even had to stop the game to fix it, so their side was probably warped a bit or other issues.

Tonight's ep might be interesting too with rigging.

mwbmis

Of all contestants in Big Brother history, Dick Donato has the least cause to ever complain about production influence.

JuryDuty

This last episode (Sunday) had a game that was interesting because it would be very hard for them to rig it. IMO, Donny truly won that game on his own. I actually think Christine worked against the other team because the bones she handed them were always the incorrect ones, which made them waste time they might not have otherwise wasted.

mwbmis

Yeah but Christine didn't know that. She was actively trying to sabotage Donny. Supposedly she even called out for by production b/c handing the other team bones was against the rules. Donny certainly did know that she did it.

mwbmis

Editing aside, Zach going up was already locked in before the sabateur stuff. Derrick swung it indirectly by having Caleb talk to Frankie about it.

Even Frankie's famous sister didn't want Zach to go up.

The good news is that no matter who wins the jury comp tomorrow Donny finally gains an ally. Let's just hope it's not a shitty ally like Jocasta.

leeta

Previously, I'd hoped that Nicole would come back, but I think Zach would be a better ally for Donny in comps and he knows that Derrick is untrustworthy.

mwbmis

Hayden would be more stable than Zach.

leeta

That's true. I'd completely forgotten about Hayden

xx2000xx

It really depends on how they do the HOH this week. It will be the 4 jurors vs regulars, last jury member standing comes back but after that point I would guess that juror then still stands on to try and win HOH.

Zach (live feeds) has been my favorite HG in many years but at this point I want Derrick to get some massive heat so I'm hoping for a Hayden HOH win and putting up Derrick/Caleb or Derrick/Cody. There is no way Donny or Zach will outlast everybody to become HOH and Frankie would've been a lock but he can't play because their plan backfired.

I just hope they don't target Frankie because if Zach is gone, there is no way they will let him leave especially since they extended the game a week. If Frankie is the target then we will see rigging like no other, to the point where they just give him answers the the POV in the DR with the hold em fold em game or something.

Josh-da-man

If Zach is the returnee, then he'll just go back to being a pawn for the detonators until he's sent back to the jury within two weeks. Jocasta is useless. Nichole will just let Christine lead her around by the nose until she's sent packing.

Hayden is the only one who might shake up the house.

Really hope Donny pulls an HOH tonight.

JuryDuty

So they never really said, but I guess Team America failed their mission since they couldn't make the Neighborhood Watch last a full 24 hours, correct?

mwbmis

Well, hopefully Hayden and Nicole laid out a plan for re-entry. I'm assuming tonight's HOH will be an endurance that favors women.

Also, despite the impression tonight's show gave, in no way did Christine take what Donny said to heart. She broke land speed records ratting him out to Cody and Derrick. Not that it mattered b/c what did Donny have to lose. He was public enemy number one before, and now he's still public enemy number one.

Also, that was the second such conversation Donny tried this week. The first was with Cody. He basically explained Derrick's entire game to Cody hoping he would catch a clue. Cody now thinks Donny is a lying scheming sack of shit. Cody is not the sharpest tool in the shed.

GuessWho

Even though the items were found, they kept up the watch to see if the thief would take more.