Previously: As Julie points out, the Vets have controlled every eviction before now, but once Daniele made her Big Move, followed by winning HoH, followed by her second Big Move, that all changed. And then, if you'll recall, Brendon basically out-Nakomis'd the Nakomis Five-Finger by saying he was going to remove himself from the block, but then not doing it. The cleverest move in Big Brother History.
Tonight there will be an eviction, there will be a new HoH, and there will be some Dick that we're going to pretty much zoom past, because who needs that? Dude looks like the inside of a garbage disposal.
COLOR! DAY 31
But first, let's listen to the aftermath.
Brendon: "This was basically a no-brainer for me."
Daniele: "This was basically a no-brainer, period."
Jeff: "I think Jordan will be safe, unless this is secretly all about me somehow."
Daniele: "Jordan's fine. Brendon is a muscleheaded ball of resentment and gender confusion that hates everyone with a dull-eyed glare, whereas Jordan is delightful."
Jordan: "I'm fairly sure that I'm safe, although Jeff's paranoia is making me feel weird. Mostly I'm just concerned that I won't wear my awesome Eviction Dress. It's a catch-22."
Rachel: "Essentially this game show was a free vacation for me and my boyfriend. Anybody that doesn't help me and Brendon stay in the game together is a floater and they have bad game play. And are mean."
Porsche: (Hilariously pretends to care.)
HAVE-NOT FREAKOUT
Brendon: "Stop crying."
Rachel: "I can't stop crying."
Brendon: "Focus on how amazing I am for doing this for you, and what it says about my masculinity."
Rachel: "I cannot!"
Brendon: "Then let's talk about how amazing it was when I pulled my game-changing move of taking myself off the block!"
Rachel: "Yeah... Um, that was really something."
Brendon & Rachel: "I love you. I love you because we are scientists."
Rachel: "I have no idea how to function in this game without you as my bullying backup, because I have alienated everyone and hate is my only currency."
Brendon: "What's important is that I am physically attracted to you in a heterosexual way."
Rachel: "You make me believe in myself."
Jordan & Jeff: "Shelly, this is all very exciting! Did he fool you too?"
Shelly: "I just want you to know that I will do anything, abase or humiliate myself in any way, to make you like me."
Jeff: "If Brendon goes home, Rachel is going to crank it to 11. She is a monster."
Shelly: "Whatever you want me to say."
Kalia: "Well, I guess we're friends."
Daniele: "Rachel is going to crank it to 11, you realize."
Kalia: "Are you saying I need to win HoH? A competition?"
Daniele: "It sounds really impossible when you say it like that."
Brendon & Daniele: "The swing votes are Porsche, Shelly and Adam. The three people most likely to do whatever they can to avoid getting hit in the face by Brendon. And think that's a game strategy."
Rachel: "Porsche, ever since I convinced myself that we were best friends so my absurd animus toward Cassi wouldn't be simple high school bullshit, I have really come to rely on you. I would like you to keep Brendon in this game. By doing so, you will allow us to win, which is your best move in this game if you would like to lose this game."
Porsche Diary: "Like I'm going to say anything to that girl. She is fucking crazy."
Rachel: "Adam, if you vote Jordan out of the house we will let you win this season of Big Brother."
Adam: "I am unable to discern the unlikely logic of that statement."
Brendon: "And if you don't vote out Jordan, Rachel is going to come after you like a hail of crazy bullets. Threats are my only strategy, because I am a moron."
Shelly: "Okay, is there any way I can go on the block instead of Rachel?"
Rachel & Brendon: "Sadly, no. But thanks for the thought."
Shelly: "That poster on the forums was right. I really do look like Nick Nolte's mugshot."
Shelly & Adam: "I am a mastermind of this game. By kissing their asses openly at all times, we create the illusion somehow of having deals with everybody."
Daniele: "Well, Adam. I guess we have to have a conversation."
Adam: "See, Daniele wants me to vote for Jordan. I see the agenda, I get it. I understand this game on a personal level."
HOH ROOM
Daniele & Kalia: "Let's put on weird sunglasses and eat snacks while everybody loses their minds waiting for the eviction."
Porsche: "Hey, I am wearing a hoodie bathing suit for no reason that makes me look like Lady Gaga as a Bene Gesserit swimsuit model. What's going on, girls?"
Daniele & Kalia: "You've been on their side this entire time, what do you think we have to talk about."
Porsche: "I am secretly really smart. Also, those two are monsters. I don't know if you realize that. On the other hand, I am buying into the idea that this season is less of a game show and more of a free vacation for the affianced."
Daniele: "Has there ever been a time that Rachel & Brendon followed through on anything? I don't know if you noticed this, but they have dealmaking ADD that preempts any kind of rational thought or social game."
Rachel: "Hey, are you guys talking? Cool, I'm just going to sit here looking disheveled."
Daniele: "Hey, Rachel. Want to just hang out and act normal for a second?"
Rachel: "...No. I guess I'd better go. As randomly and miserably as I came."
Daniele: "Nice to see you, or at least the shambling mess that you are turning into."
Rachel: (Head hung so low that she smacks into the door on her way out.)
Porsche: "I think she just forgets that this isn't her room sometimes."
Rachel: "Porsche is my best friend and I completely trust her. The fact that she is talking to Daniele proves that I can't trust her and we're not friends. Literally, she should just gut me like a fish because that's what it's like when you talk to other people that aren't me. I'm so glad we're friends and I trust her so much. I don't know what those words mean."
MELTDOWN #1
Porsche watches Rachel stare into space and put out cigarettes on herself for a while.:
Porsche: "Rachel, you're acting like Howard Hughes and it's creeping everybody out. You're like those people in Awakenings. Do you know that you're going to be here week and expected to play this game? That's going to be hard if you make everybody feel like we're in that movie The Others. You have got to stop your drama queen bullshit, right now."
Rachel: "So you're saying you're on Daniele's side."
Porsche: "Christ, no. I'm saying don't add maudlin and macabre to the list of repellent things about your personality."
Rachel: "So you agree. You think I'm really pretty."
Brendon: "Everything is fine. Everything is going to fine. Please don't distract everybody from my immense sacrifice that I can't stop talking about."
Porsche: "Rachel, you have got to pull it together."
Rachel: "Oh yeah? Watch this."
She abruptly hurls herself across the yard toward the hammock, whining incomprehensibly, causing Brendon to lunge into Stop Having Feelings Mode, because you can't be a hero if your damsel is crying in front of you. The cognitive dissonance is too great. Despite one thousand inauthentic pleas to be alone in the hammock, Brendon knows better than to listen, and follows gaily after. Porsche watches all of this and remembers fondly a time when this sort of absurd, grotesque behavior might have shocked her. Rachel attempts to burrow through the hammock into the ground using only her face, while issuing one high-pitched endless screech; things get ugly.
Brendon: "Rachel. I am physically attracted to you. And I am going to get my PhD in Cancer."
Rachel: "Everybody hates us, Brendon! I might as well eat worms!"
Porsche: "This is gross. I'm out."
Brendon: "Stop screaming, Rachel. People can hear you. And nobody knows better than me that your awful personality is a great reason to get rid of you. Without me here to physically threaten women under the illusion that I'm being chivalrous, what future can you have?"
Rachel: "So you're basically saying I have to change my entire gross personality?"
Brendon: "I'm saying that I am physically attracted to you, and I am highly intelligent. And by that I mean that I am in love with you."
Rachel: "I am starting to feel the pressure of being in this house without you to bully everybody into protecting me from the obvious fruits of my constant petty attacks on people. Maybe you made a mistake keeping yourself on the block."
Brendon: "I don't want to hear that kind of talk! It almost makes my meaningless, Pyrrhic gesture seem like the action of an idiot."
Rachel: "You should have never asked me to marry you."
Brendon: "When you confront me with obvious truths it makes me panic! Shut your mouth!"
Rachel, making horrible cry faces: "No, it's true. I am dangerously unstable, mean-minded and vicious, and an embarrassment."
Brendon, pretending to cry in a way that's even more horrible: "I was already an embarrassment to myself, Bukie."
Rachel, like it's not 100% true: "Once I leave this house, all of America will continue to hate me. I'm never going to get a job. I'm not even that smart, it's just an illusion created by my circus tits and refusal to let anyone else speak. Marrying me will send you down into a black abyss from which there is no escape. I am mean and crazy."
Brendon, pathetic as ever: "Baby, that's crazy! What's crazy is how crazy I am! About you! Wordplay! 13-letter wordplay!"
Brendon grinds out some meaningless bizarre platitudes -- "You are my heart!" -- and attempts to crawl inside Rachel's clown bra with her, so that two broken gross people can become one whole, sane person. That's how they think it works.
LIVE WITH JULIE
Julie: "Adam, humiliate yourself on television."
Adam: "Done!"
Julie: "Thanks, Adam."
Adam: "You want more? I am capable of being so much more flesh-crawling than that."
Julie: "I do not, Adam."
Julie: "Rachel, seriously. How fucking dumb is your fiancé?"
Rachel: "I feel special and amazing. This is a love story. A once-in-a-lifetime love story, about two warriors and also Excalibur."
Julie: "Well said, Rachel."
Julie: "Jeff, time for you to act like Rachel."
Jeff: "I don't like Jordan enough to act that stupid, but yeah. She's carried me through two seasons of this show, so it could get weird if she leaves."
THE DICK PART
The dumbest people on the show talk about how Dick would play the game completely differently from Daniele, and then Dick explains to us from deep inside his insecurity and erectile dysfunction that his daughter is the stupidest person that ever lived and that attempting to crawl out from under his shadow will be her downfall, because there is no crawling: He simply casts too long a shadow.
We recall the least of his offenses from the past -- mostly various clips of him helpfully explaining that he is the smartest and the best person who has ever played the game -- and he takes credit for her actions in the game and simultaneously for being smarter than her. Then he calls her a whore a few times, and talks a lot about how smart and amazing he is and how good he is at this game, and the whole time he looks like a withered scrotum full of tumors. It is absolutely embarrassing.
Dick: "Look at Brendon and Rachel. They're bullies that isolate female victims at random and lead scapegoating witch hunts against them. That's gameplay, that's what I'm talking about. But my daughter is too fucking stupid to understand that, because she doesn't have what it takes to play the I'm An Asshole Strategy. Because it isn't a strategy, it's a way of life, and the only place it can help you in this entire universe is in that house. I am wearing a diaper."
HOH CHENTERVIEW
Julie: "Turned on the Vets, huh?"
HoH Daniele: "Yeah, it was a little early for that. I was just bored from having the Golden Key, and then Dominic ruined everything and paid for it."
Julie: "What about the stinking sack of pubes that spawned you?"
Daniele: "Julie, do you honestly think there's ever been anything I've done that he approved of? He hates everyone. He hates everything."
Julie: "True enough. Are you worried that Rachel is going to murder you? That bitch is dangerously crazy, you know."
Daniele: "I have no doubts, Julie."
SPEECHES
Julie: "Brendon, make a meandering pussified speech about nothing in particular."
Brendon: "I'm not going to cry, Julie."
(Immediately starts crying, for no reason.)
Brendon: "[Whatever, it's a lot of rambling, but the main thing is that he is the best boyfriend that ever lived, because he stayed on the block, which was also a game-changing move that somehow, he still believes, will result in Daniele's destruction.]"
Julie: "Jordan, save us from this nonsense."
Jordan: "I hope I don't go home this week! Thanks, y'all."
Julie: "Jordan, you are a delight."
VOTE
Jeff and Rachel vote for their respective couplehoods, of course. Jeff does this in a regular way, and Rachel does it in a way that suggests she was stabbed sixty times immediately before entering the Diary Room, causing the studio audience to laugh at her even more than usual. Commercial, and then the votes go: Kalia votes to evict Brendon, pathetic dancing elf Adam votes Brendon, Porsche sticks with Crazy Rachel and votes Jordan, Lawon votes for ice cream and monkeys and Brendon, pointless Shelly votes Brendon and blows a pointless kiss, and we rejoin the Houseguests.
By a vote of 5 to 2, Jordan is safe. Brendon rushes through his goodbyes so that he can hug Rachel and cry and talk about how he is physically and sexually attracted to her, whirls her around in his giant monkey arms, and gets an anemic response from the studio audience. Somehow Rachel remembers not to take a live piss while this is going on, proving that even she is capable of learning.
Julie: "Brendon, we're not even going to talk about how stupid you are."
Brendon: "Good deal. Let's talk about how amazing it is that I feel so strongly about Rachel that I tossed this entire game out just to be a moron."
Julie: "Was it also strategic? Give me something there."
Brendon: "Julie, when you frame the question that way it changes the subject from what a fucking hero I am. Also, it makes me look idiotic."
Julie: "Fair enough."
Brendon: "It's difficult for me to imagine that any woman is capable of independent thought, so I can only assume that Daniele's successes have to do with insecurity about living in her dad's shadow. Also, they told me to say that. Also, don't think that just because she won HoH and got me evicted that she deserves credit for any of this. It is only the sign of a greater hubris. In fact, I have won. I am the victor, because Daniele got me evicted but it doesn't count. In summation, all women are stupid, and I have an imaginary PhD in various kinds of science."
GOODBYES
Kalia: (Fairly classless, but then out of her entire persecution complex the only person who seemed actively gunning for her -- albeit in an unfocused, fire-into-the-crowd way -- was Brendon.)
Jordan: "Please don't hold my win, or Jeff's ten grand, against us at Jury. We'll use it to buy you a wedding gift for your doomed marriage! Finally, to prove that I am working this game in ways you can barely see, I will do a loving impression of your fiancée."
Daniele appears and it is so fucking scary how his smile slides down his face and his eyes go glassy and hateful and gross. It doesn't even matter what she says because his complete change in affect is so terrifying. He honestly thinks she is to blame for things that happen to him as a result of his actions.:
Rachel: "Falling in pretend love with you on TV has been one of the most fulfilling and respectful interactions I've ever had with men. I can't wait to get to know you on a fundamental level. Assuming that you have other ones."
Brendon: "I do not."
AFTERMATH
Julie: "Houseguests, assemble! The evictee -- Daniele, are you listening? -- has a chance to get back into the game. That's all you get."
We get the rest of the story, which is that one of the four Evictees (Keith, Cassi, Dom and now Brendon) will be going up against the Evictee to return to the house, according to America's Vote. And while I guess it's possible that people who think the fake sexless soap opera of Brendon & Rachel might be so profoundly disturbed by their American Tail-style separation that they'd toss him back into the house just to stop the screams, I think it's more likely that Dominic will get back in.
I mean, Dom or Cassi would equally make me happy, and I think Cassi has the greater probability of going full-on Fuck This when she comes back, but I doubt many people saw how smart she actually is. Plus, they're equally nice to look at, and the show has been pressing this agenda that Dominic was unfairly evicted because Daniele is a dumb bitch who's trying to get out from under the shadow of Dick -- when actually, it was Dominic that fucked the plan by telling everybody about it. As far as Cassi, I just mainly watch this show because I believe everybody, every single person, has a Hardcore Alison inside them, a doggedly mercenary superhero with laserlike focus and indefatigable strength, and I wait longingly each summer for this show to activate this, through adversity and persecution and clutch plays and now-or-nevers, even though in practice it rarely does.
And when it does, often it's people like Rachel, who think they're doing a good job anyway so then they just do their stuff even more. And then, too, I guess it depends on who gets evicted this week, because plenty of them -- Rachel, for starters -- could get evicted on social game and then turn right back around and back into the competition. So it becomes a matter of being smart about who gets evicted, on top of the usual PoV-inspired carefulness about who gets nominated the first time around: Just like the Golden Key twist, it takes what was once a double-blind and makes it triple, which is dizzying and intoxicating and exciting.
LIVE HOH
It's a round-robin of sorts in which two Houseguests at a time face off, and ring in with an answer. If you're right, the other one is eliminated and if you're wrong, you're eliminated. Then whoever's left goes back to the bench and says which two have to play the round. All the questions are gameplay-historical, and the answers are either Keith, Dominic or Cassi.
As confusing as that is, it's eventually clear what is going on. Although I don't think Lawon or Shelly ever really understand what is happening.
The first, random pair is Jordan/Kalia. "During an eviction, who referred to the other Houseguests as [jellyfish]..." Kalia rings in because obviously it's Dominic she's talking about; Jordan's eliminated and Kalia brings up Rachel and Lawon.
Question Two: "Who didn't play in the 'March of the Ants' Have & Have..." Rachel rings in with Keith, because he was gone before that even happened. Lawon is eliminated, for reasons beyond his comprehension, and Rachel brings up Kalia and Adam, because Kalia is Daniele's only ally and needs to go up as often as possible.
Question Three: "Who was nominated for eviction twice?" Well, Adam, I'm thinking that was your partner she's talking about, which you might recall from having also been nominated each time he was nominated. The elf is evicted, and Kalia brings up Rachel and Porsche.
Question Four: "In the HoH Competition with golfing, who putted their ball..." Rachel rings in for no reason with Dominic, then loudly screams FUCK, which pisses Julie off so amazingly hard that even Rachel is chastened. I don't know what the question was, probably play order, but whatever. Rachel is eliminated, and Porsche (brilliantly) goes, "Shelly and Jeff, you guys haven't done it yet!" like they're missing out on all the fun, when in fact she just has no other options so she has to choose people from her loose alliance of collaborators and meatheads.
Question Five: "Who said, 'There are some friendships I'll carry outside of..." Shelly rings in with Cassi, of course, because that was the single greatest moment of her entire life when Cassi said that. Jeff is eliminated, leaving only Kalia and Porsche, the winner of whom will then go up against Shelly (and win, obviously).
Question Six: "Who fell off their banana third?" Maybe they think about it, maybe not, but Kalia rings in with Keith, and you can see her get terrified about possibly winning as Porsche steps down and Shelly steps up, one of them to become HoH. I like Kalia and I want her to continue the work of dismantling the Vets, but then you think about how dumb old Shelly would be about everything and it's kind of exciting to think about, because her self-delusion about "playing both sides of the house" could suddenly become very, very real if she won HoH at this time, and she'd just start playing as though this were always her intention, and then maybe crazy shit would start happening.
Question Seven FTW: "Who spelled the word STANDINGS in the scary hair one?" Kalia rings in with Dominic and nearly starts crying as she realizes that she's the new Head of Household. Which is so exciting because of the twist, of course, meaning that the Newbies (i.e., people who exist only to make Rachel cry) might actually get a full majority and run the table, which would be nice.
I love Jordan and all, but honestly Jordan would be just as happy with a new puppy as she would with a half-million dollars and she already won a half-million dollars. And once the Newbies get control, the Daniele/Newbie thing will fall apart anyway, because without Brendon & Rachel selling the illusion of their alliance nobody will believe in it anymore, and without the Vets to scare everybody into playing as a team, there's no real reason to do so.
So while the Big Moves of Dominic and Daniele -- not to mention the proletarian revolutionary aspirations of Cassi -- seemed to go nowhere at the time, you can see how they led now to this spot, this particular situation where only Kalia getting HoH this week would create the possibility of their dreams coming true, and that is nice. And if Cassi or Dom come back, they'll run with that all the way to the end. (Or at least as close to the end as possible before Adam's eventual win of Season 13, because the Finale is always incredibly disappointing.)
All I know is, Kalia's nominations couldn't matter less, and that's exciting in a whole other way. I feel like just her name being said must, on some level, have activated the tiny beeping craziness inside Rachel's mind. Can't you see it? That sinister dull flashing pinprick of red light at the back of her hairline, slooooowly speeding up and blinking faster and faster and faster and soon you'll be able to hear it beeping and soon it will be a klaxon and then it will take over and her eyes will start flashing and her monkey arms will start windmilling and then it'll just be blood, blood, blood.
JACOB CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps True Blood, Gossip Girl, Pretty Little Liars, and Desperate Housewives for TWoP. Jacob can be found online at jacobclifton.com, on Twitter, and on Facebook. IRL work appears in BenBella's SmartPop series of anthologies, most recently A Friday Night Lights Companion.