Big Brother 11: The Finals Begin!
Written by EJ Feddes   
Thursday, 10 September 2009 21:00
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Previously on Big Brother:  An awesome season went pear-shaped in a big damn hurry.  Jeff was evicted, and a nation wept.  Then, against all odds, Natalie won her first competition ever (in an almost entirely luck-based game) and became the most self-aggrandizing HoH in history.  Bad luck but Michele out and left Jordan in the house with Natalie and Kevin, and leaving our hopes for a happy ending slim at best.
 
When last we saw our final three, they were standing on a spinning log, holding onto their keys.  Let’s see how this shakes out, if you can bear it.  Remember, the fewer people in the house, the more you have to hear Natalie talk. 
 
We’re live tonight, and Julie Chen is wearing a lot of brown.  I think she also has glitter on her face, because she’s heading out to see Bon Jovi after the show.  She explains that all three will make it to finale night, which means we don’t get any resolution tonight.
 
Going to the tape, our three hamsters are standing in fake rain, trying not to fall.  Kevin says in the Diary Room that he’d rather take Jordan to the Final Two.  Natalie talks about how great she is, and all I hear now is white noise.  Then we go back to Michele’s eviction, and Natalie talks about how evil Michele was.  I seriously don’t get that, and I think Natalie is awful.  Back on the log, she talks about how Michele will be happy to spend some alone time with Jeff.  Now, we all sort of have a crush on Jeff, but I doubt that Michele is making a play for the guy, you know?  Natalie says weird things that she things will help her game, but they won’t because she is stupid.
 
Because Jordan is cool, she sees through that ploy and just laughs at Natalie.  Shortly thereafter, the log stops spinning, and the fake rain starts to pour down again.  At one point, Natalie almost falls.  Since it would be silly to waste a perfectly good Natalie fall when crocodiles and a pit are not involved, the universe keeps her up.  The seasons change, and the houseguests get hid with wind, then snow.  The log changes the direction of its spin several times, and everybody is still holding on.
 
At the three-hour mark, Natalie tries to talk everybody else into quitting.  At this point, Kevin is tired of her too.  Jordan suggests a game of rock-paper-scissors to see who wins the endurance competition.  (Why, I bet Jordan would love to check out my serialized novel about competitive rock-paper-scissors!  I bet when she’s out of the house, she’ll definitely check out the first chapter of Lique at A Nickel for the Swear Jar and then wait anxiously for future installments!)  They’re all looking cold and tired and miserable.  And then, at the three-and-a-half hour mark, Jordan falls.  Noooo!  It looks like she really slipped too – I don’t think for one second she gave up.
 
Natalie tells Kevin that “we’re almost there”, unaware that Kevin is not exactly on board with her as an ally.  We see a flashback where Natalie agrees to throw the first round to Kevin, since she’s more likely to beat Jordan in the second round.  Never mind that they don’t have any inkling as to what Round Two will be.  I mean, you know the first round is going to be endurance, but they’ve had some weird-ass second rounds before.  Kevin emphasizes in the Diary Room that his strategy is to get rid of Natalie.  While I’m not forgiving him for the Jeff betrayal, I may be able to get on board with him at some point.
 
Natalie whines about having to throw the competition, which she really doesn’t have to do.  And then, she jumps off the log.  Kevin revels in his win for a few moments before he jumps down, too.  Now, I don’t want to dissuade Kevin from booting Natalie, but I don’t think he can beat either one of them at Final Two.  Jordan is pretty much guaranteed votes from Jeff, Michele, and America, and probably Natalie if Kevin boots her.  Meanwhile, Natalie would have votes from Jessie, Michele, Jordan (if Kevin boots her), and probably Jeff and Russell.  I don’t see how Kevin can win, but I’m just going to remain on Team Anybody But Natalie.
 
Back in real time, Julie tells us we’re going to catch up on Jeff and hear from four past BB favorites.  Oh, why don’t you let me decide if they’re really favorites?  She checks it in with the Final Three and lets them know that nobody’s leaving tonight.  “Then why did we pack, Julie?” says Kevin, which makes me laugh.  Natalie then repeats his joke, to diminishing returns.  The Houseguests are confused by the new schedule.  Man, that’s going to be a long stretch between competitions for them. 
 
Time to check in with Jeff at the Jury House.  Russell is wearing a crown, which makes two crowns this week.  Russell really hopes that it’s Jeff walking through the door, and when Jeff does enter, he yells out “Hey!” in, well, kind of a gay voice.  I think it’s alright to say that, because everybody assumes that it’s Kevin.  Hee.  Everybody gloats when they see Jeff, but it seems to be mostly in good humor.  Everybody’s grinning, including Jeff.  They’re all impressed that Kevin lied to him, and Russell takes this as proof that he is awesome.  Once again, Jessie drops the knowledge that Natalie is actually 24 years old, and his reaction is one of mild surprise and slight disinterest.  Jeff is pleased that everybody seems to hate Natalie now.  Now?  They watch the video of the HoH that eventually got Jeff evicted, and Jessie is disgusted that Natalie didn’t even try. 
 
Julie tells us we’ll be hearing from “the best players in Big Brother history”, only two of whom actually one, and one of those took two tries.  It’s Season Eight winner Dick, Season Two failure and Season Seven winner Mike Boogie, Season Six and Seven’s Janelle (the Veto record holder), and Season Three’s runner-up Danielle.  (By the way, I refuse to call him “Evel Dick”.  If he spelled it correctly, I’d consider it, but I’m not buying in to his network-mandated nick name.)
 
Dick, as usual, is making Keith Richards look healthy.  Mike Boogie is still a douche, but he has a present for Julie.  Danielle, who has somehow not aged a day since the Summer of 2001, thinks that Natalie has played the best game.  Janelle, who is still walking that fine line between “hot” and “busted”, thinks the worst move of the year was Jeff evicting Russell.  In hindsight, yeah, but I do think Jeff was going to be the target that week if Russell had won the Veto.  It didn’t work out, but I don’t think it was a bad move in and of itself.  Boogie thinks Jeff’s use of the Coup D’etat was the best move of the game.  He also seems to indicate some bad blood between himself and Jessie.  Man, do all the BB contestants hang out together forever?  Somewhere, Marcellas, Jason, and Marvin are playing air hockey or something. 
 
Julie brings up Chima, who I honestly believed would never be mentioned on this show again.  Mike says she should have been kicked out, but her behavior was understandable.  Spoken like a guy who bragged that he was going to pee in the water bottle of the woman he was sleeping with.  Dick says she was stupid and lost sight of the game.  Danielle flat out calls her a brat, and they all make fun of her.  Mike thinks Kevin’s going to win it all, as does Janelle.  Dick also thinks Kevin will win, and Danielle thinks the only way a woman can win Big Brother is if she’s seated next to another woman.  Well, that’s… actually completely supported by history.  Huh.  I have to think about that.
 
Time to begin the second round of competition!  They’re competing one at a time, and first up is Natalie.  There’s a giant ramp with holes numbered 1-10, and different colored balls representing everybody who was Head of Household.  The goal is to place the HOH balls in order, but you have to roll them up, so there’s skill as well as memory.  You get two minutes, and the one with the most balls wins.  Julie says that in the event of a tie, the one with the most time remaining will win, but it seems like that only works if they tie at 10.  If they don’t complete the board, the round ends when time runs out so they have no time remaining.  These rules were not well thought out.
 
Natalie puts the first four balls in order, and manages to get a Jessie ball in the wrong hole.  That’s probably not the first time that’s happened.  She gets Michele wrong too – she’s not very good at rolling the balls.  Time runs out, and she’s still trying to count off HoH’s in her head.  Julie reveals that Natalie got five right.  That shouldn’t be impossible to beat, right?  Come on, Jordan!
 
A nation’s hopes ride with Jordan as she steps up to the ramp.  She has trouble with a Ronnie ball, but then she skips around through the board, earning audience applause.  Other than accidentally rolling Ronnie into Week Four, she does a darn good job.  In fact, she gets 9 out of 10!  Hot damn!  See, unlike Natalie, she remembered that Natalie has once been HoH…  Way to go Jordan!  This looks so much brighter now.  You know what?  I’m proud of that kid.  I like Jordan, and it makes he happy just how hard she rocked this one. 
 
Julie now reveals to us that America gets Chima’s jury vote, though that was pretty widely reported already.  And now, since the Final Two won’t be revealed until the finale, this is going to get confusing.  Although, Bravo manages to take instant polls during all of their reality shows and that seems to work out.  Of course, it helps when the answer is always “Tim Gunn”.  Anyway, you’re presented with the three possible Final Two pairings and you choose who you’d pick in each case.  Though it does seem like you could, say, only vote for a Kevin/Jordan finale, and then your vote wouldn’t count if Natalie is in the Finals.  Basically, to have your vote count no matter the pairing, you have to pay for three text messages.  Pretty sneaky, CBS…
 
Time to reveal the results!  Jordan’s totally got her game face on and doesn’t even crack a smile until the studio audience freaks out.  She looks forward to facing Kevin on finale night.  Natalie says it sucks that she lost and that she put a ball in the wrong hole.  Yeah, Jordan did that too.  You know what she did next?  She got the other ones right! 
 
Sunday is going to be a clip show, so I don’t believe we’ll be recapping that one.  Myndi and I will be back here Tuesday night as we recap that finale into submission.  Come on, Jordan!

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