Elissa is the first HoH in quite a while to not do what Amanda wanted -- in other words, she's nominated Aaryn and McCrae because she blames them for Helen's eviction. Well, them and Amanda, but even Elissa isn't enough of a loose cannon to nominate Amanda. Yet. Aaryn is filled with self-pity in the Diary Room after doing everyone's dirty work for weeks. McCrae isn't enjoying his first time as a nominee, and says he needs to win the Veto. Amanda DRs that half of her allies in 3AM are nominated, and she has to figure out a way to keep them all safe. GinaMarie DRs that she's going to have to suck up to Elissa, which begins almost immediately. In fact, within earshot of several others, GinaMarie compliments both Elissa's Aaryn-slamming nomination speech and the color of her dress. This pisses off Amanda enough to mutter to McCrae that she wants to punch GinaMarie in the face with brass knuckles, and McCrae mutters right back that she needs to be nice or she'll get them both in trouble. Nothing, however, about how it's inappropriate to talk about punching people in the face with brass knuckles at all.
In the Have-Not room, Aaryn tells GinaMarie that it doesn't make sense that Elissa didn't also nominate GinaMarie to prevent her from Vetoing Aaryn. Everyone keeps thinking Elissa has some sneaky strategy when Elissa is just not that smart. Aaryn goes on to tell GinaMarie that she's never had any reason to mistrust Amanda and McCrae, so GinaMarie says that they're using her to protect them because they can't win anything on their own. And this week, they're extra useless to Aaryn.
Elissa and Amanda are hanging out in the kitchen, and after deploying a metric Pinter of awkward pauses and false conversational starts, Elissa wonders if Amanda will retaliate against her week. Amanda claims to have no such plans, but she's curious about who Elissa would name as a replacement nominee if Aaryn gets vetoed, and suggests GinaMarie. When Elissa isn't all over that idea, Amanda goes right to accusing Elissa of being in an alliance with her, and comments on GinaMarie's obvious ass-kissing since the nominations. Which Elissa hasn't noticed, probably because she thinks GinaMarie was just being honest. Amanda gets to her real point, which is whether Elissa would nominate Amanda. Elissa lies that she wouldn't. Really, really badly. Amanda doesn't buy it for a second, and she's worried. As Aaryn takes Elissa's place in the kitchen, Amanda tells her about the conversation she and Elissa just had, including her suspicions that Elissa is lying. Cut to Elissa smiling dreamily in the DR about the possibility of Amanda leaving. She thinks Judd would go along with it, and seems to be talking herself into evicting Amanda before our eyes.
Elissa goes right to Judd to propose backdooring Amanda. Judd's all over it and Elissa sends him to fetch her Aaryn. When Aaryn nervously arrives in the HoH room, Elissa's all excited about her idea that she and Aaryn can work together to boot Amanda. Aaryn agrees, and promises to keep it quiet. She also agrees to fight hard for the Veto (as if she wouldn't have), and asks for orders on who to pick if she gets Houseguest's Choice (Judd, says Elissa). In the DR, Aaryn seems to be sincere about this plan, saying she's in this game to win. Well, aligning with an unlikeable dingbat who just nominated you for eviction should certainly help accomplish that.
Time for the Veto player selection, which everyone's pretty excited about given that it's one of the four or five things that actually happens in any given week. As nominees Aaryn and McCrae join HoH Elissa at the front of the room to draw names, Aaryn DRs about the one flaw in her plan, which is that if Amanda gets picked to play and wins, she'll save McCrae and the whole plan is down the shitter. Of course Amanda has yet to win a competition, but there's a first time for everything. And Elissa draws Amanda's name right off the bat. McCrae draws GinaMarie, which is bad for him because she'll try to save Aaryn. Who draws Houseguest's Choice and picks Judd, exactly as Elissa instructed. Which immediately sets off alarm bells in Amanda's head, because if nothing's up with her, she would have picked Andy. So, way to tip your hand at the first possible opportunity, Aaryn!
As the meeting breaks up, Amanda immediately asks Aaryn why she picked Judd. Aaryn says that neither of the other two choices -- Andy or Spencer -- would save her. Amanda doesn't think Judd will either. Aaryn DRs that it was a pretty risky move. Just figured that out, did you? She follows McCrae and Amanda to the shower, arguing that she has to look out for herself. After that, GinaMarie tells Aaryn that she's been saying all along that Amanda only cares about herself, and "fuck that bitch." Aaryn now bitterly regrets making enemies like this while she's nominated, but GinaMarie assures her that it's all good. Soon they both run into Elissa, who assures them that Amanda's only looking out for herself and will be going home. You know, as long as one specific thing doesn't happen to prevent it.
Later, GinaMarie quietly tells Elissa that she's on her side, but that Amanda is like a female Jeremy. After her shower, Amanda walks through the kitchen, causing them both to fall conspicuously silent. Amanda proceeds to another room where all four of the guys still in the house are hanging out, and reports to them that Elissa and GinaMarie are totally in cahoots. Which, of course, they are. So Amanda, with her usual finesse, charges in and says they're both talking game and being shady. They're all laughing about it, but the claws are out as Amanda loudly accuses GinaMarie of talking shit about Elissa last week (which she was). This quickly turns into a shouting match, in which GinaMarie will always have the advantage. McCrae comes and leads Amanda out of the room by the arm while Elissa tries to pull the plug on GinaMarie's hollering. McCrae all but physically prevents Amanda from going back in there and continuing the fight, DRing that she's going to make them both look bad. Amanda decides to go have a talk with Elissa, promising McCrae that she's not going to fight. But as soon as Amanda and Elissa are up in the HoH room together, Amanda rants angrily about GinaMarie to Elissa. And then she moves on to the question of whether Elissa still holds Helen's exit against her and is planning to backdoor her. Elissa claims to have never thought of it, which doesn't exactly put Amanda's mind at ease. And Elissa's sudden fit of the giggles at the thought of Amanda getting backdoored doesn't either. So then Amanda has another tearful breakdown about how she's no longer in control. She claims to have always had Elissa's back, but all Elissa will commit to is that she has to think. Which is the most terrifying thing possible.
Zingbot's in the house! He comes barging in in the middle of the night, visible in the dark only by the red light on his head and the odd night-vision camera angle. He wakes everyone up and orders them to gather in the kitchen. McCrae's the first one to get roasted, as Zingbot says that he always wears shorts because Amanda wears the pants. McCrae's less bothered by the burn than GinaMarie's over-the-top reaction. GinaMarie gets it , as the Zingbot compares her love story with Nick to Fatal Attraction. No surprise there. Andy gets called a ghost for his pale skin and tendency to float, the latter accusation pissing Andy off. The Zingbot also tells Aaryn he disagrees with those who accuse her of having acted mean and nasty at the beginning of the game. "That wasn't acting! Zing!" He also advises Amanda to visit McCrae in Minnesota by mailing herself with her "giant tramp stamp." And he calls out Elissa for trying to imitate him, saying she's a better cheap imitation of Rachel. No argument there. What, nothing on Judd or Spencer?
They all head out to the back yard, which is decorated like a robot birthday party. Baby Zingbot, who is now a year old, comes stumping out with its own baby zings. For the actual game, there's an unnecessary concept according to which they're supposedly generating power, but the real object is to roll a ball to the top of a covered, two-sided ramp, than run to the other side and catch it, and repeat for as many times in a row as possible. If their ball falls, the count goes back to zero, but the first one to score 250 wins PoV. In other words, we've seen this game before.
The competition begins and they start rolling balls. Everyone is motivated to win for their own reasons, as usual. Judd takes the lead early on, but you know his floppy arms are going to betray him at some point. However, Aaryn is the first one to drop her ball, then McCrae, then GinaMarie, then Elissa, which brings all of their scores back to zero. In fact, this happens to McCrae several times. But Amanda -- whose main strategy appears to have been to avoid dropping the ball -- is eventually in the lead with 101 points, with Judd only ten points behind. Amanda holds onto her lead, while the heat incapacitates Judd to the point that he drops his ball, losing all 164 of the points he accumulated. He ends up sitting on the ground retching. Nice houseguest's choice, Aaryn. And Elissa.
As the competition continues, GinaMarie is closing in on Amanda, with 210 and 218 points respectively. Elissa drops her ball and her 138 points disappear. Amanda thinks she's in good shape until she checks the scoreboard and sees that GinaMarie might win this, which is Amanda's worst-case scenario. GinaMarie narrows the gap, but she's unable to close it -- and Amanda wins her first competition of the summer, scoring the PoV and knocking Elissa's half-baked plan right out the window. Now Amanda gets to save McCrae and is out of danger herself for the week. With the competition over, Andy DRs about how this is the least safe he's felt all summer, and Elissa says it's her worst case scenario. Yeah, when you come at Amanda, you best not miss.
Back in the house, Amanda and McCrae both congratulate Amanda on winning a physical competition. Andy joins them and they speculate on whether Elissa will nominate GinaMarie now, but he's actually worried about being nominated himself. Elissa said she would last week, after all.
Upstairs, Judd and Elissa are soaking in their defeat, and Elissa gets all weepy, saying that everyone who goes against Amanda goes home and now she's . Well, not the very . And doesn't she still have plausible deniability? She could just nominate Spencer and nobody would be the wiser. Elissa makes some personal comments about Amanda and Andy, and Aaryn joins them, asking what Elissa's going to do. Elissa doesn't know yet, but in the DR she says she's determined to make a replacement nomination guaranteed to mess up Amanda and McCrae.
When Elissa comes downstairs, she's all fake smiles about how that was so much fun and everyone was trying to help Amanda. Who doesn't believe it for a second, having seen everyone's near-suicidal efforts to win and their reactions when they didn't. Amanda starts going off on Elissa, saying she's got nobody and wasted her HoH. She keeps going, comparing Zingbot to Elissa: "They're both made of plastic. Zing!" Where the hell is McCrae now?
Later, Amanda and Andy are talking about the replacement nomination. Amanda promises Andy that he's not leaving, "but I want Poopy to stay too." "Poopy" being Aaryn? I bet she loves that. They figure the only way to pull this off is to engineer GinaMarie's nomination, which Amanda suggests accomplishing by volunteering to torment Elissa and then have Andy be the one to console her. That doesn't really seem like a solid long-term plan to me. But Amanda throws herself into the part, pacing around in the living room and blowing on a noisemaker from the party, yelling up for Elissa to come down. "We all want to see Elissa and her plumped-up, collagen-injected lips, her botox-intense forehead, her fake-ass extension hair!" Judd's buying the entire act, saying in the DR that Amanda's proving she's a disgusting, vile person. Everyone figures Amanda's just self-destructing as she hammers on Elissa's door. I'd say Amanda's making a big sacrifice, making herself look like this much of an asshole just to save Andy, but that doesn't bother her under normal circumstances so why should it now?
Amanda comes out to the back yard and says she's done. That's Andy's cue to head up and act all concerned about Elissa's feelings. He lays it on a little thick, saying he's embarrassed to have been allied with Amanda. "At least I've got one friend," he fishes, and then glances around all shifty. I think Amanda played her role better. Probably because she actually believed hers.
Amanda calls the Veto meeting and before getting to it, she zings Elissa, saying she should know better than anyone that "no one comes between me and my man." Show's over, Amanda; skip the curtain call. She vetoes McCrae as expected, and calls Elissa up to make her replacement nomination. Elissa says the Rachel's probably very "insulted and disappointed" that Amanda used her line, but her replacement nominee is Andy. Going back to the front of the room, Amanda tells Elissa, "Sit down, trash," and adjourns the meeting.
In the DR, Elissa says she isn't getting mad, she's getting even. She knows that Aaryn and Andy have both been working with Amanda, so this means Amanda is going to lose one of her allies either way. Amanda DRs that 3AM is done, but there will still be a 2AM. Andy says he needs Amanda and McCrae's loyalty this week, but after that he's done with that alliance entirely: "I'm not playing this game for third place and it's time to get rid of them." Aaryn says it's either her or Andy, and it's going to be him, "because I'm not walking out that door after all I've done." Jeez. Aaryn, how many racist comments have you been keeping to yourself, anyway?
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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