"The Diamond Power of Veto," Julie pronounces from the studio, herself dressed up like a diamond wearing a black power suit. "Get ready for the biggest night of blindsides the game has ever seen." That better be true, lady.
So as per the previouslies, Head of House Brendon nominated Lane and Ragan, but then Ragan won the Power of Veto, so Brendon replacement-nominated Matt in his place, unaware -- like everyone else in the house -- that Matt has the super-special magical Diamond PoV, which allows him to save any nominee -- including himself -- and name his own replacement as long as it isn't Brendon or Ragan. Brendon thinks this means he'll get to send Matt to the jury house as an "I Love You" gift to Rachel. Worst valentine ever.
The Brigade has pretty much already cut Matt loose, and in fact they don't seem to feel as bad about it as Ragan does. Because he still thinks Matt's wife has a rare bone disease. Right, I forgot about that. Outside, Ragan exhorts Matt to stay, and Matt plays the part of the sad, helpless loser, then tips one of the cameras a conspiratorial wink.
In addition to making Ragan cry, Matt is also using this opportunity to feel out his fellow Brigade members to see if they're still loyal to him. Hayden lets Matt in on Rachel's pretzel message, which they learned about from Kathy. Which of course puts Kathy instantly at the top of Matt's shit list, right under Brendon.
Lane also asks Hayden and Enzo who they plan to vote for, and they assure him that Matt's going home. Lane's also confident of Britney's vote.
Enzo, who really needs to stop wearing his sunglasses in the house when he's talking to people he plans to screw over, visits Matt in the Have-Not dump to ask whether Matt will still want a Brigade member to win even if Matt himself loses. Which makes Matt tell the Diary Room that he's considering nominating Enzo. While using it as an opportunity to be smug some more. You can be a smug as you want, Matt, we're not going to believe you plan to nominate Enzo at this stage.
Ragan's latest saboteur mission is to leave a note somewhere in the house that reads "I know your secret." This is the first act of sabotage he's done that actually requires him to leave the Diary Room. He slips the note under one of the pillows in the red room, on a bed which later turns out to be Enzo's. Enzo finds the note much later that night, and holds it up to the DR camera, annoyed at how this could mess up his game. Because, you know, he does have a secret alliance. Ragan signed it "S," which I assume stands for "saboteur," which is probably unnecessary, since nobody else in the house is allowed paper or writing materials (which is why Rachel had to leave Brendon a message in pretzels). Kathy spots him carrying it out of the room, and says it wasn't there when she made his bed. Jeez, Kathy, why not just jump up and yell, "I'm the saboteur!" Indeed, Enzo shows it around to everyone in the house, and wonders why Kathy is suddenly making beds. And everyone else decides she's the saboteur, which also fits with her sucky performance in competition. For Enzo, the final nail in the coffin is the signature, which he seems to think stands for "Sherriff." And Ragan just sits there listening smugly, aware that he just scored his $20,000 saboteur fee. "Thank you, America," he DRs, "for believing in the evil I always knew was inside of me." It's inspirational, really.
Group Chenterview. Julie asks Britney what she thought when Rachel walked back in, and Britney diplomatically says it didn't seem real at first. Still doesn't. Julie asks Ragan if he has any regrets for throwing down with Rachel. "Being quiet is not worth five hundred thousand dollars," Ragan says, which demonstrates why he's a professor of communications and not economics. Julie asks Lane what he'd want his mother to send, and he requests "muscle milk," which Julie and I both think sounds pretty gross. Then Julie asks who thinks the saboteur is still in the house. Julie says they're right, but then tells them that the saboteur is done, which is stupid. I mean, defuse any paranoia as soon as possible, right? Otherwise, some drama might break out.
We're off to Huntington, AR, to meet Britney's family. Her mom talks about how Britney was a pageant girl (shocking) and speculates about her friendship with Lane. She says Lane probably has a crush on her, but Britney's holding back on account of being engaged. Then it's over to Runaway Bay, TX, Lane's hometown. Lane's mom tells us he fits the stereotype of a country boy, but he's "edgy and so complex." Wow, they really edit out everything on this show. She and Lane's friends fill a whole bar for the viewing party, and Lane's friend Gunter (probably a big spotlighter) says he's surprised Lane hasn't had a hookup with Britney yet. They all agree that Lane may have divided loyalties, and then we get to watch Britney riding Lane's back while he does pushups in the back yard. Which is totally innocent, and I'm sure Lane doesn't want her to slip off and end up underneath him while he continues to raise his entire body up and down.
Time for the final plea speeches. Matt goes right after Brendon, referring to his "convoluted veto speech" and "your girlfriend who's not even here any more wanting me out...But that's neither here nor there, because here I sit on the block like a chump, ready to go home. I'm sure you're beaming with delight, as you well should be." Matt congratulates Brendon, but then clumsily pulls out the Diamond PoV from his back pocket saying, "Better luck time, you big dummy, because I'm gonna use the Diamond Power of Veto to save myself from the block." The medallion falls off the ribbon, so he has to hold it up, commenting that it's "not a very well-made" Diamond Power of Veto. And in case anyone (like Brendon) might be in denial about any of this, Julie breaks in to tell the houseguests that Matt got the Diamond PoV when he opened Pandora's Box two weeks ago, and explains to them what it lets Matt do. All the houseguests are shocked, and Ragan is nearly in tears of joy. Julie tells Matt to pick a new nominee, and he takes his time picking Kathy. We knew you were going to do it, Matt, so don't take a lot of time explaining it.
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Lane's speech is pretty standard, saying hi to his family at home and calling the houseguests his second family, and refusing to say anything bad about Kathy. Like he needs to. Kathy says she's had an awesome time, and tells Matt it's okay, and boasts about her integrity and morals and values some more before sitting down. What I love about people with integrity and morals and values is listening to them talk about their integrity and morals and values.
The voting begins, and as soon as Hayden gets up to head to the DR, everyone in the living room starts freaking out to each other, resulting in the censors cutting out the audio like they usually don't do until after an eviction. Hayden and Enzo obviously vote to evict Kathy, and when Ragan takes his turn in the DR, he has a giant smile on his face like the male enhancement commercial guy as he votes to evict Kathy. Matt and Britney (the latter doing a happy-dance in the hall before returning poker-faced to the living room) also vote to evict Kathy, so that makes it unanimous. But Kathy's gong to have to wait until after the ads to find out. As if she didn't already know.
Julie breaks the news to Kathy about the 5-0 vote to evict her, and she hugs everyone goodbye on her way out, telling them to be good to each other. She walks out without any luggage, because why would she have packed? When she reaches the studio, even Julie gets a hug. Back in the house, it's the happiest post-eviction ever (except for Brendon, who's really taken it in the junk from Pandora's Box this week) while they wait for Kathy's picture to go black and white and Lane accuses Matt of messing up his speech.
Out in the studio, Kathy says she feels like she didn't have a chance to fight, and barely stops herself from saying live on the air that Big Brother skull-fucked her with her glasses on. It's not the unanimous vote that hurts her (since she has a history of being one of the few dissenting votes anyway), but the fact that she didn't get a chance to say goodbye to everyone. Julie asks Kathy if she threw the PoV this week, and she says she honestly fell off. Julie does not ask Kathy about the other 16 competitions at which Kathy spectacularly sucked wind. No pre-taped farewell messages for Kathy, obviously. Couldn't they at least show her what everyone said to Lane and Matt before sending her off to spend a week in the jury house with only Rachel for company?
Yesterday, the houseguests (including Kathy, because she was still there) were forced to play "Big Brother Says," a version of Simon Says where they were ordered to howl at the moon, TP the HoH room, do jumping jacks in the kitchen, have a two-minute group hug, and attempt handstands in the back yard, among other things. Can we move on to the HoH competition now?
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It's a game-show thing, and outgoing HoH Brendon sits off to the side pouting while the other six -- with Britney as the only remaining woman in the house -- stand in their little cubicles. Julie starts asking them true-false questions about what the exact words of Big Brother were during the "Big Brother Says" game Really, all they have to do is catch misquotes, but Hayden and Ragan are out in the first round. Matt is out in the second round, making sure to give us a secret little thumbs-up to let us know he meant to do that. It's down to Enzo, Britney, and Lane, none of whom has been HoH yet. After a three-way tie, Lane is knocked out in the round. Julie has to keep rushing Enzo for his answers. He and Britney both get the few correct, until finally Enzo's gives an answer that is both slow and wrong, which makes Britney the new HoH.
For the first time in a while, Julie has a post-HoH group Chenterview with the houseguests. She makes some small talk with Britney before asking Matt how hard it was to keep his secret. Matt says it was horrible, being "no good with secrets." Of course that's what he wants us to think. And Julie tells us that Thursday is going to be a double eviction. Ooh, I love those more than anything! Two fewer idiots!
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M. Giant is a Minneapolis-based writer with a wife, a son, and a number of cats that seems to have settled at around two. Learn waaaay too much about him at Velcrometer, follow him on Twitter, or just e-mail him at m.giant[at]gmail.com.
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