By M. Giant
Nice cardigan, Julie. She reminds us about how Matt and Joshuah tried to run Ryan, but Sheila came out of left field to fuck things up. She's mostly right, except that Sheila is still in left field. Oh, and apparently y'all have been ignoring me when I asked you not to vote anyone back into the house, because we're going to find out who won the vote.
After a recap of last night's PoV ceremony, Natalie and Matt go out into the yard to gloat about how stupid it was of Joshuah to tell Natalie the plan, because she still thinks Matt's her partner and has totally forgotten that her moron-scorned ass was totally on board with it when she first heard about it.
And it's a time for recriminations in the HoH room, as Chelsia and Joshuah come up to yell at Ryan for going back on his word. Matt comes in to join in the yelling, but Ryan asks for a few minutes alone with Josh. As they leave, Matt tells Chelsia that the two of them are cool with each other. I would say that Chelsia appears to disagree.
In private, Ryan explains that he was going to put up Josh, but they had a deal, and now they can trust each other. Josh seems satisfied that his deal didn't go through, as long as he's still in with Ryan. Well, that was easy.
And downstairs, Sharon frets to Natalie, Matt, and Sheila about how she expects to go home now. But they assure her that James is the one who's going down. Matt DRs that James was going to be in his "crew," but he tried to "overthrow the king," so he's gone. James, in turn, is dealing with the situation by lying on the floor somewhere, looking like a prisoner in solitary confinement.
It's workout time in the yard, as Sheila tells Ryan he did the right thing in nominating James. Ryan agrees, and tells them about what Chelsia said to him earlier. "Bring it, bitch, you're going down," he spits. Charming.
Enter Chelsia and Joshuah, who take up position on either side of Sheila to try to intimidate her. Matt says something about Josh being "the asshole of the house," (a hotly contested position, to be sure) and Joshuah looks like he's going to go off on Matt. Think he'll get in Matt's face the way he did with Allison and Amanda? We'll never know, because Sharon wisely reels him in; she figures that if Joshuah blows up, she's the one who'll suffer. Oh, who are we kidding? Of course we know.
Later, Sheila and Sharon talk about Matt and Natalie's chances of winning the game. Sharon reveals the fact that Matt made out with her when she was HoH, which kind of impresses Sheila.
And it's about to go down, because Sheila goes straight to Natalie and tells her about Matt moving in on Sharon. So now Natalie decides that she doesn't trust Matt. But more to the point, she wants to get rid of Sharon. I would like to think she has reasons for that aside from wanting to prevent Matt from kissing Sharon again, but I can't give Natalie that much credit. She weird thing is that suddenly, Sheila's gunning for Sharon too! What the fuck is going on here? When James happens by, they offer him their votes, and he eagerly takes them up on it in exchange for having their backs later.
Julie then runs a side-by-side highlight reel of Jen and Sheila wearing the unitard. Everyone unanimously agrees that Sheila wears it better. Well, that was pointless.
And now let's visit the folks in sequester. Each couple (or couple-half) has got their own house, apparently, so now we can add the high price of real estate in Los Angeles to Big Brother's list of crimes. Jacob sits in his house alone, praying and planning his possible reunion with Sharon. So, you know, his life is just like it was before he joined the game.
Jen talks about how frustrating it is to not know what's going on in the main house, up to and including whether Ryan is still in the game. She asks Parker if he'd be jealous if she went back to the house and he didn't. Parker acts like that's a trick question or something.
Bueenooo! Alex screeches from the pool of the house he shares with Amanda. She says they don't get along, and Alex is still bitter with Amanda for putting them in jeopardy. And they're still arguing about it too. To be fair, Alex also blames himself for being too honorable and noble regarding his alliance with Matt. What a shame for Alex that his awesomeness and Amanda's suckiness conspired against him.
Allison is also in a house of her own, and she says she deserves to return the most, since she's got some vengeance coming. Bored.
The thing you know, Julie is talking on the viewscreen to the six evictees, who are standing in the front yard. This would appear to be the first time they've seen each other since their respective evictions. Julie asks Jen what her reaction is. Jen is surprised to see Allison but not Ryan. Julie tells Allison about Ryan becoming HoH after Allison's departure, but we don't get to hear Allison's reaction because an audio glitch (or Julie's fat-fingering the control button) results in the broadcast of the audio feed from the main house instead. Julie tells them that America has been voting on which one of them gets to return. But the winner of the vote isn't automatically returning, because the houseguests will then have to vote on whether to keep the returning player or the person they evict tonight. And the houseguests won't know which returning player it's going to be. But we do: It's Alex.
More DR talking: Natalie wants Sharon out for being sneaky, but recognizes that James and Chelsia are a threat. And Sheila says that they need women in the house, so she's leaning towards keeping Sharon. Josh says that as much as he trusts Sharon, he thinks she's easily intimidated and manipulated. Is that not a good thing? Oh, I guess he means she's easily intimidated and manipulated by people who are not Joshuah.
Back to the viewscreen, as Julie gets ready to announce the person who lost tonight's eviction vote. And it's James, 5-1. Chelsia hugs him goodbye, and is the only one to walk him to the door or even stand up, while everyone else sits around on the couch like Ed Harris at the Oscars that one year.
Afterwards, everyone assures Chelsia that they're not mad at her for not going with the group. Mighty big of them. She goes to the kitchen for a drink, while Natalie tries to comfort her.
Outside, Julie asks James about nobody getting up to say goodbye, and he says that was his choice, since he didn't want any goodbyes from people who didn't keep their word. Oh, grow up, you baby. Speaking of which, Julie asks James about suggesting Chelsia for nomination, and how Chelsia is going to react when she finds out. James says that he already told her. And thank God we didn't have to sit through that boring scene, right? God, what is the matter with this show? James now he gets to watch her goodbye message to him.
She cries as she talks about how awesome he is, and how she used to laugh at people who felt a connection with another person on reality TV, but now she's in that position. After she's done, Julie asks a very detached James what he would think if he found out he had another chance. "I might crap my pants," James quips. Julie explains the dealio to him, and now he's going to get to watch the viewscreen as she breaks the news to the other houseguests.
Inside the house, the siren goes off again, and everyone rushes into the living room in a panic. And then sit there wondering what's going to happen . Commercials, is what.
When we come back, Julie informs the remaining eight houseguests that there's a big box outside that contains one of the previously evicted houseguests. So now they have to vote live to bring back either James or the mystery houseguest. She has to shush them a few times while they try to speculate on what this all means, because they're each going to have to make this decision on their own.
Ryan goes to the DR first, and votes for the return of the mystery houseguest. Chelsia of course votes for James. Matt goes with the mystery houseguest, claiming that it’s because he's all about taking chances. Sheila? Mystery houseguest. Joshuah can't get into the DR fast enough, and votes for James. Where will Natalie come down? She votes for James, too. So does Adam, jubilantly. Sharon also votes for James, rather than take a chance on ending up with Jacob again. I would be very interested to see what Sharon wouldn't do to avoid ending up with Jacob again. Anyway, that's 5-3 in favor of James's return. Sorry, Alex. Also, sorry, James.
When the ads are over, the houseguests are all sitting on the big curved sofa, which wraps around a giant gift box containing a human being. They're about to find out who it is (I don't see any airholes, so it might be moot). Julie tells them to lift the lid, and James is officially back. Everyone seems really happy. So with that out of the way, it's time for the HoH competition.
There's an awkward moment while everyone waits for leave to exit the house and we sit there staring at tonight's HoH playing field for a good long time. It seems to involve disco balls sitting on a big black mattress. There's also a circular scaffold suspended over the platform, with eight chains hanging to foot level with a small metal disk at the bottom. Julie has everyone save outgoing HoH Ryan step onto a disk, which they do, hanging on to the chains with their hands for balance. Julie forbids sitting, kneeling, or crouching, at least for now. She says they're playing "Big Brother Disco," and the scaffold lifts everyone into the air with the disco balls dangling below them. In case it isn't apparent by now, the person who hangs on the longest will be the new HoH. The machinery slowly rotates and goes up and down, making am earsplitting squealing noise that would have me dropping out long before sore muscles did. Oh, and there's a random guinea pig shot in there again, which seems a little odd. Having that happen in one HoH competition seems like mere incompetence. Having it happen twice in a row strikes me as rank incompetence.
After the ads, Julie asks James how he feels to be back. "It feels great to be around all the people that voted me out," James says. Jeez, you didn't have to come back, you big whiner. After learning that the vote was 5-3, James's mood doesn't seem to improve much. And it's time to complicate the competition, as a cannon appears and starts squirting out champagne foam at everyone in orgasmic white spurts. Everyone hangs in sullen silence, with blobs of white goo spattered on them. Looks like we won't be finding out who wins HoH tonight, but I'm thinking that if getting spooged is the curveball that everyone has to deal with, James has a definite advantage.