S26.E15: AI Arena #4, Eviction #4

[Rodney]

The three nominees compete in the fourth AI Arena Competition.  The winner is safe from eviction.  One of the remaining two houseguests becomes the fourth houseguest evicted.

[Lamb18]

Listening to Ainsley describe the competition in the AI Arena. Suddenly I thought the same person is OTEV.

I thought Rubina got her balls off first. Did she forget to hit the buzzer, so Makensy beat her?

[Lamb18]

I didn't realize how ugly Quinn's pants are until he went to the diary room to not vote.

[rachel1496]

With how much time they devoted to the vote flip I assumed there was no way it was happening so that was fun. Equally enjoyable was watching Brooklyn try to keep her rage face in check after she realized everyone else had turned on them.

I need this stupid power explained to me in small words or something because I just don’t get the point.  If the instigator is having people appear in Ainsley’s box to start shit everyone already knows it’s not them.  They already saw it with Angela’s fake noms this week.  

[Rodney]

1 hour ago, Lamb18 said:

I thought Rubina got her balls off first. Did she forget to hit the buzzer, so Makensy beat her?

That's what it looked like.  She only remembered to go for the buzzer just as Makensy was running for it.  And by then, it was too late.

Thank goodness she did, though, because these flip talks would've been for nothing if anyone other than Makensy had won.  If she'd lost, then she was going whether against Cedric or Rubina.

This really was a great hour of BB, though, and I thank Tucker, Kimo, T'kor, Leah, and Makensy for it happening.  I grudgingly thank Joseph for it, too, but not fully, since he was intent on keeping Cedric no matter what.

Edited August 16 by Rodney

[Stats Queen]

4 minutes ago, rachel1496 said:

With how much time they devoted to the vote flip I assumed there was no way it was happening so that was fun. Equally enjoyable was watching Brooklyn try to keep her rage face in check after she realized everyone else had turned on them.

I need this stupid power explained to me in small words or something because I just don’t get the point.  If the instigator is having people appear in Ainsley’s box to start shit everyone already knows it’s not them.  They already saw it with Angela’s fake noms this week.  

I would vote for Tucker to be the AI instigator except he already does a lot of instigating 

[Rodney]

12 minutes ago, rachel1496 said:

I need this stupid power explained to me in small words or something because I just don’t get the point.  If the instigator is having people appear in Ainsley’s box to start shit everyone already knows it’s not them.  They already saw it with Angela’s fake noms this week.  

They won't know who did it, though.

[dizzyd]

13 minutes ago, Rodney said:

They won't know who did it, though.

Theoretically they shouldn’t but most of these people can’t keep their mouth shut. Everyone knew Quinn controlled this week’s HoH. But yeah, they need to dumb down the explanation for me too and not have it evolving based on their whims. How long does this power last? 

[North of Eden]

56 minutes ago, Rodney said:

That's what it looked like.  She only remembered to go for the buzzer just as Makensy was running for it.  And by then, it was too late.

Thank goodness she did, though, because these flip talks would've been for nothing if anyone other than Makensy had won.  If she'd lost, then she was going whether against Cedric or Rubina.

This really was a great hour of BB, though, and I thank Tucker, Kimo, T'kor, Leah, and Makensy for it happening.  I grudgingly thank Joseph for it, too, but not fully, since he was intent on keeping Cedric no matter what.

Ahh so that's what happened! I was cheering on my couch for Rubina winning and I was like Whaaaaa? Seeing how emotional she was at her loss makes more sense now if it was a unforced error on her part. I'm just glad she's safe! I picked her as my favorite on episode one so I'm relieved.

Anyway....that episode was a thing of beauty. Having the whole house against one player is no fun....now that there looks like a clear split into a two-faction house all the better. The best seasons have two halves of the house vying for power exemplified from the classic season of Janelle, Kaysar and Company vs The Friendship. At the very least it blows up and gets rid of all these alliance names you need an AI program to keep up with.

I assume the AI Initiative was introduced in the special episode but I skipped that. I love Taylor but nothing in the world can get me to watch Cody and to a lesser extent Jag again. I simple do not care about anything they have to say.

So to close...absolute best part of the episode was Brooklyn realizing she is going to be outed as the snake in the grass amongst the Five Pointz! Her look was delicious!

[Rodney]

Cedric leaving under Quinn's HoH power when he could have flushed it last week, but got too scared, is an amazing example of irony and a fantastic act of karmic and poetic justice.

AI could not have written it better, really.

What's also fantastic is that the three outsiders won their respective competitions to ensure their own survival!

Angela won the HoH Competition.  Tucker won the Veto.  And Makensy won the AI Arena.

We love to see it!

Basically, this whole week of BB was *chef's kiss*!

Edited August 16 by Rodney

[Diana Berry]

Cedric only figured out that he was yelling when he was with Julie? Seems like a nice guy but his talking head diary room sessions drove me bonkers.

weird rubina also kept looking over when she was competing.  Was she not clear on the rules or shenanigans?  It would have been something like mentioned if all that lead up had makensy losing.  
 

im assuming the instigator will be between Angela, tucker and Quinn.  Please not Quinn . His talking heads drive me bonkers, too

[Jel]

Aww why did they have to do Cedric like that?

Tucker makes me think Evel Dick, but 45-50 years ago. Hope he's a Suicidal Tendencies fan because there's going to be a lot of those shirts in his future. Grodner really has a type.

[pinkandsparkly13]

48 minutes ago, Diana Berry said:

weird rubina also kept looking over when she was competing.  Was she not clear on the rules or shenanigans?  It would have been something like mentioned if all that lead up had makensy losing

I thought maybe she was trying to see the technique the others were using, if they were getting it right

 

 

[30 Helens]

I think Rubina was looking at the other lanes to see how they were doing, i.e. how many balls had landed. I kept yelling at her to focus and forget about them, because looking only slows you down.

Add me to those who thought Rubina had won and was confused when Julie congratulated Makensey. I didn't even realize Makensey was that close. And this isn't the first live comp to have its action ruined by bad editing. Have these people never heard of an overhead shot?

The Instigator power sounds like more of a curse than anything. So you're going to purposefully piss a bunch of people off, and then what? They won't mind? They'll consider it good fun and not target you afterwards? Because I don't think for a second no one will find out. 

I guess vote for the person who you want the most shit to blow back on?

[Skooma]

3 hours ago, Diana Berry said:

im assuming the instigator will be between Angela, tucker and Quinn.  Please not Quinn . His talking heads drive me bonkers, too

Quinn won't get it.  "America" hates him and put him up for eviction last week remember.

2 hours ago, 30 Helens said:

I guess vote for the person who you want the most shit to blow back on?

Not at all.  It is a great advantage IF played correctly as in keep your mouth shut that you have it. 

My takes:

I think Tucker will be voted it by a wide margin.  And he could possibly keep his lips zipped unless he slips it to Rubina but hopefully nobody. 

I think he would have a great deal of fun with it.  He seems the creative sort.  Maybe try and frame Quinn or some other member of the Square Alliance (they ain't no Pentagon no more no more, hah) as having it.

Either Kimo or T'Kor would probably tell each other but nobody else??  Though they wouldn't be as much fun and probably be scared to death someone would find out and maybe not even use it.

Angela would blab after she tells herself 20 times NOT to tell anyone, hah.  But she won't be voted it. 

Mancanski/Makenski/M-whoever (sp??) and Leah are wild cards but Leah won't get it since nobody watching remembers she even exists.  If M got it -- not likely -- she would be out for revenge on Quinn.

Rubina would tell Tucker but maybe not anyone else and Tucker can keep her secret I think.

Joseph would tell his mustache.  And he probably would cave and tell Quinn and then Quinn would tell half the house, lol.

Chelsea/Brooklyn would share and maybe even tell Cam.  (Yes there is some guy named Cam in the house apparently.  Who knew).  But people don't like The Square (tm: me) so none of them will get it.

And Quinn DEFINITELY won't get it since "America" would never give him a power ever.  "America" wanted him evicted last week.  And he would only blab about it immediately and ruin the whole purpose of having it and make himself even more of a target.  (But again if Tucker gets it I can see him trying to frame Quinn as having it).

Edited August 16 by Skooma

[Nashville]

3 hours ago, 30 Helens said:

I think Rubina was looking at the other lanes to see how they were doing, i.e. how many balls had landed. I kept yelling at her to focus and forget about them, because looking only slows you down.

Yup!  First rule of dragon boats: the boat you’re looking at is the winning boat - point being if your focus during a race is on the other boats, then your technique and synchronization is almost certainly for shit and you’re screwing over your own team.

[SummerDreams]

I'm excited to see the pentagon losing their power but I'm sad to see Cedric leave plus Rubina staying. I consider her stupid and immature plus she gives nothing to the game plus she is in a showmance plus I hate her and her childish behavior.

T'kor and Kimo seem to have taken the power for now. Let's see how it goes.

[Gregg247]

This may have been the first episode in many, many years that actually featured meaningful scenes of ALL the contestants as they struggled to make a decision of what to do, rather than just have someone recap it all LOUDLY in the Diary Room afterwards.

Cedric telling Julie that he "saw it coming" regarding his eviction was about as believable as his "It's all good.  It's all love." as he walked out the door.  He was dumbfounded (as was I!).  I was convinced that, despite all the maneuvering to flip the vote, it was going to end up being 8-1 for Rubina to go.  I was on the edge of my seat during the vote this time!

As far as I can tell, Makenseyyy and Leah have no alliances, and everyone else in the House has at least 2, 3, or 4 alliances.  How often have the 2 traditional "hot chicks" in the House been so ignored in BB gameplay?  I've always felt that the producers cast the typical beautiful people first, like these 2 plus the young muscular dudes (Matt & Cam) who could all appear on a magazine cover, just to show CBS that, "yes, of course, we've got the eye-candy covered this year." 

This year, that seems to have backfired a bit, as Matt is gone and the other 3 barely register as personalities on the show so far. (NOTE: "Beauty" is subjective, of course; I'm basing this on how BB has typically cast for looks over the past 26 seasons.  They seem to stick to the archetypes from "Revenge of the Nerds" for casting; the jocks and cheerleaders vs. everyone else.)

[North of Eden]

7 minutes ago, Gregg247 said:

 

As far as I can tell, Makenseyyy and Leah have no alliances, and everyone else in the House has at least 2, 3, or 4 alliances.  How often have the 2 traditional "hot chicks" in the House been so ignored in BB gameplay?  I've always felt that the producers cast the typical beautiful people first, like these 2 plus the young muscular dudes (Matt & Cam) who could all appear on a magazine cover, just to show CBS that, "yes, of course, we've got the eye-candy covered this year." 

This year, that seems to have backfired a bit, as Matt is gone and the other 3 barely register as personalities on the show so far. (NOTE: "Beauty" is subjective, of course; I'm basing this on how BB has typically cast for looks over the past 26 seasons.  They seem to stick to the archetypes from "Revenge of the Nerds" for casting; the jocks and cheerleaders vs. everyone else.)

Hot chicks are usually embroiled in some form of showmance but its been a failure to launch with M losing her one possibility and apparenlty no one grossly overweight to get Leah's true attention nothing is going to spark. To be fair T'Kor and Rubina are quite attractive but they don't fit archetypes as you mentioned.

[Rodney]

3 hours ago, Gregg247 said:

Cedric telling Julie that he "saw it coming" regarding his eviction was about as believable as his "It's all good.  It's all love." as he walked out the door.  He was dumbfounded (as was I!).

He actually did think that it was possible that he'd be evicted.  He started getting an inkling on Wednesday that something was shifting, and it was a lot stronger when he woke up yesterday morning.  So he honestly did see it coming.  You could tell by his desperate strategizing before the vote, too, that he knew that something was wrong.

[Diana Berry]

Just watched Julie’s extended interview with Cedric.  Wow it really got to me.  What are those wet thingies in my eyes.  As noted , his talking heads drove me bonkers, but I do hope he gets to play again or go on another reality show.

Did he say why he left the service? He’s so young. 

[Skooma]

22 hours ago, Diana Berry said:

Just watched Julie’s extended interview with Cedric.  Wow it really got to me.  What are those wet thingies in my eyes.  As noted , his talking heads drove me bonkers, but I do hope he gets to play again or go on another reality show.

Did he say why he left the service? He’s so young. 

I seriously doubt a pre-jury boot will live the lazy life of an endless reality show leech.  Nothing really interesting about him.  He was a complete wus on the show and should go and get himself a real life now.

I assume he left the service cause his hitch was up.  Most people do.

Edited August 18 by Skooma

[SummerDreams]

18 hours ago, North of Eden said:

apparenlty no one grossly overweight to get Leah's true attention

Leah has said she likes chubby dudes but she very much has a crush on Tucker. I guess she used this line just to get cast. I don't believe she really likes chubby guys but she chose Tucker of all people to have a crush on.

[Halting Hex]

On 8/15/2024 at 8:35 PM, Lamb18 said:

I thought Rubina got her balls off first. Did she forget to hit the buzzer, so Makensy beat her?

Spoiler

Certain sentences look really different out of context, if you have a sufficiently dirty mind.  Just saying…

Oh, joy.  Another week with Quinn, Tucker and Angela all still in the House.

To quote Xander Harris, "mix in a little rectal surgery and it's my Best Day Ever!"  Why can't the Producer Puppies just fucking leave??  They're all so annoying.

(And, given that they are production's favorites, quite possibly being coached to be so.  Lovely.)

On 8/16/2024 at 1:54 AM, Skooma said:

the Square Alliance (they ain't no Pentagon no more no more, hah)

Technically, cutting off one point of a pentagon should make them The Quadrilateral.  But the odds against anybody coming up with that one are about as long as Quinn shaving his head to win Veto.

[Ivana Tinkle]

I think this is the saddest I've been over an eviction since Donny in BB16 (and Derek X, to a lesser extent). I don't watch the feeds but read the forums pretty religiously; Cedric didn't seem too popular over there - was there something he did or said that wasn't shown on the show? 

All of the houseguests seemed pretty torn up over evicting him and from what I saw he seemed like an earnest, genuine guy. I wish there was a buyback this year because it genuinely bummed me out to see Cedric go so early. 

[Rodney]

3 hours ago, Ivana Tinkle said:

I don't watch the feeds but read the forums pretty religiously; Cedric didn't seem too popular over there - was there something he did or said that wasn't shown on the show?

Cedric lost a lot of respect from feed watchers for backing out of the attempt to flush Quinn's power and not owning the reason why he did.  Many even agreed with Tucker's sentiments of him being a pussy and a coward.  Many others called him a wuss.  So lots of fans, like myself, were glad for karma to hit him this week.

He's probably a sweet, decent guy outside of the house.  But gameplay like his just needed to be punished.  Which it was, in swift, short order.

Edited August 18 by Rodney

[Gemma Violet]

I'm not a fan of Cedric's simply because his loud DRs annoyed the heck out of me.  I agree he seems like a nice person though.

Edited August 18 by Gemma Violet

[Skooma]

10 hours ago, Rodney said:

Cedric lost a lot of respect from feed watchers for backing out of the attempt to flush Quinn's power and not owning the reason why he did.  Many even agreed with Tucker's sentiments of him being a pussy and a coward.  Many others called him a wuss.  So lots of fans, like myself, were glad for karma to hit him this week.

He's probably a sweet, decent guy outside of the house.  But gameplay like his just needed to be punished.  Which it was, in swift, short order.

Also the whole Pentagon -- Cedric included -- were strutting around like they owned the game and everybody else should just basically line up to be eliminated.  I didn't like the smug everyone of them including Cedric gave off.

Edited August 18 by Skooma

[Diana Berry]

On 8/17/2024 at 3:29 AM, Skooma said:

I seriously doubt a pre-jury boot will live the lazy life of an endless reality show leech.  Nothing really interesting about him.  He was a complete wus on the show and should go and get himself a real life now.

I assume he left the service cause his hitch was up.  Most people do.

I guess with him being twenty one just figured he would give it five years to at least get the pension 

[Halting Hex]

19 hours ago, Rodney said:

Cedric lost a lot of respect from feed watchers for backing out of the attempt to flush Quinn's power and not owning the reason why he did. 

Can Quinn only deploy his power at the start of a HoH week?  Because if there was a chance that Quinn could respond to being backdoored by using the Deep Cake (yeah, I'm not letting go of that one) to save himself and put one of Cedric's allies on the block, then IMO any feedwatcher who blamed Cedric for not nomming Quinn is a blithering idiot prioritizing "drama" over strategy, which is their problem, not Cedric's.

I think nominating Makensy (which put the power in "America's" hands, rather than Quinn's) was a far better choice, especially if Cedric (rightly) suspected that "America" hated Quinn and was likely to nom him anyhow.  That way you obtain Tucker's objective (Quinn on the block) without having The Collective [and The Pentagon within] lose trust in you for nominating your own (nominal) ally, and you decrease the chance that, if Quinn can use his power at that point, that he would use it to nominate Cam or Chelsie out of revenge.  (After all, if Tucker is screaming for Quinn to be nominated and Quinn can save himself, he'd be more likely to throw Tucker's pal Rubina or someone like that up instead.)

Perhaps Quinn could not have used his power at that point; it was never specified, AFAIK.  But Quinn might well have implied he could, anyhow, so I don't blame Cedric for considering that possibility.

And I don't know what "feed watchers" mean by Cedric "not owning his reasons".  First, he's the HoH, he doesn't need to "own" anything.  He won the power to make the damn noms; if Tucker doesn't like said Ced-noms, too damn bad.

Secondly, it seems that people perceived Cedric as somehow weak because Tucker was shouting him down.  While I assume that Cedric (having been in the Marines) can kill Tucker in about half a second, I understand his not wanting to do that.  And I don't know why a 30-year-old loudmouth lout bullying a 21-year-old should be considered "heroic" or "impressive" or "strong" or whatever.

In conclusion, Tucker can go Tuck himself, pretty much full time.  JMO.

ETA: 

Spoiler

Also, IMO, the OP ("Cedric lost a lot of respect from feed watchers") comes perilously close to breaking the rule against claiming people's opinions aren't valid because they're not watching the live feeds.  AFAIK, it's supposed to be a hard wall between the feeds and the episode threads, with the feeds (theoretically) not existing in these threads.

I can't seem to find a Rules thread, or any information as to who is moderating this forum, or I would raise that issue directly.  Apologies if anybody who doesn't want to hear my semi-complaint sees it here, but this is the best way I could think to raise the issue discretely.

 

Edited August 18 by Halting Hex
Discrete discussion of a question about keeping the feeds separate from the ep threads.

[Gemma Violet]

8 minutes ago, Halting Hex said:

And I don't know why a 30-year-old loudmouth lout bullying a 21-year-old should be considered "heroic" or "impressive" or "strong" or whatever.

I wouldn't classify someone in BB saying "You double-crossed me.  I'm coming after you.  You're going up next." as bullying.

[Halting Hex]

Bullying isn't only in the words, it's how they're said.  If Tucker had shut up at some point, that would be different.  But he constantly berated Cedric all through the remainder of the Veto Ceremony and in the aftermath, loudly and with an aggressive, heated demeanor.

I consider that bullying.  JMO.

[Rodney]

39 minutes ago, Halting Hex said:

Can Quinn only deploy his power at the start of a HoH week?  Because if there was a chance that Quinn could respond to being backdoored by using the Deep Cake (yeah, I'm not letting go of that one) to save himself and put one of Cedric's allies on the block, then IMO any feedwatcher who blamed Cedric for not nomming Quinn is a blithering idiot prioritizing "drama" over strategy, which is their problem, not Cedric's.

Quinn could use it only at the beginning of the week, at which point he could then choose the replacement nominee after the Veto was used.  So that particular week, he couldn't use it.  Knowing that, Tucker thought about getting him out, because Quinn had one more week to use it after that week.  The idea of getting out such a big power before it could be used was sound.  Tucker got that.  Cedric seemed to get that.

But then, he got cold feet and couldn't go through with it.  So in the end, Quinn was left in the game to use his power, after all.  And what do you know?  Cedric ended up as a victim of it who was knocked right ouf of the game when he could've gotten it out of the game a week sooner.

[Halting Hex]

Had Quinn specified this to the other HG's, though?  I never saw him say "I can only use it before initial noms are made, so after that, I'm dead meat all week" or anything like that.

If he had, the editors should have shown it.  Because were I the HoH, that would be a legitimate concern when somebody pitched Quinn as a renom.

(Also, clearly Cedric couldn't "own his reasons" for not putting up Quinn because, generally "I'm in two alliances with the guy" is not something you want to announce to the House.)

[Rodney]

On 8/18/2024 at 6:50 PM, Halting Hex said:

Had Quinn specified this to the other HG's, though?  I never saw him say "I can only use it before initial noms are made, so after that, I'm dead meat all week" or anything like that.

He told it to Angela and Kimo early on in the game, specifying that it could only be used before initial nominations.  After using it, he had full control of nominations till after the Veto meeting ended.  So yes, he did specify it.

Edited August 24 by Rodney