Big Brother 15: Week 8 Review
Firstly
I want to start off this week’s assessment by apologising for my failure to post
a review of week 7, I had a lot on my plate over the course of the week and
unfortunately didn’t have the time to publish my feelings about the week’s
proceedings. To be fair though if there was a week to miss writing about
however then that was the perfect choice, as the premise of having to write
positively about Steven Goode is one to scare off even the most passionate
blogger. One of the things is highlighted to me though is the way in which the
opinions of those that watch the show can change so quickly over the course of
the week, and this week’s proceedings helped t highlight two very notable
examples of that, both of which I have plenty of grievances about.
I
will begin by speaking about one of those changes of opinion, that being our
most recent evictee Zoe, of all of the three intruders that entered during week
6 Zoe was the one who I had as a lock to make it the furthest, even possibly to
the final, she was a bubbly character whose presence would make a welcome
change in a house defined by negativity and she had a pre-show fan base that
put her in a good standing, as demonstrated by being saved first in both a vote
to save and vote to evict scenario in her first two weeks, then of course came
the Tesco comment, and the opening of the floodgates towards what would
ultimately orchestrate her departure. I do understand the grievances that a lot
of people had with Zoe’s Tesco comments, as somebody who had worked in a
supermarket for a short time I can tell you that it is an incredibly strenuous
and highly demanding role which doesn’t give the payment to it’s employees that
they ultimately deserve, employees which are more often then not in that
position through necessity rather then through an indication of their skill
abilities, and it does annoy me that there are people like Zoe who look down on
those types of people and considers them as lesser standard of human because of
their profession. At the same time however I do feel slightly aggrieved that
this comment was blown up in the way that it was by the audience, and that in
the eyes of the audience Zoe was targeted and subsequently evicted on the back
of one throwaway comment, in my opinion though I think the comment was more
then anything the key to unlock the door as it were to targeting Zoe, prior to
the comment there had been murmurings surrounding Zoe’s behaviour and the
feeling from some in the fanbase that she was getting annoying with her overly
peppy Vera Lynn-meets-Sonia routine, and what the Tesco comment did more then
anything was allow those which had issues with Sonia to justify venting them in
a public forum, in the same way that I feel that I feel people were scared to
speak up about Chris until the label of creepy Chris was assigned to him by
production.
And
speaking of which we come to Chris and his downfall both within the house
dynamics and with the audience itself, going from someone with a realistic
chance of winning the game to all but certainly being evicted before the finale,
Chris has by a long way had a terrible week within the show, but at the same
time I do feel that a lot of his behaviour has been exaggerated by production
and made to be a lot worse for the sake of attempting to create the next
chapter of their show’s story-arc. Firstly there was the grievances that Chris
had with Pav, and I will wholeheartedly agree with the majority that Chris has
not looked good in his treatment of the Sikh housemate, but at the same time I
feel that there is something in the show that we as an audience are not seeing
so that they can push the Chris and Pav feud as the lead storyline of this
week. Firstly as we know from the previous weeks Chris has been very accurate
in his readings of the housemates and that his diary room commentaries about
those housemates have been some of the best elements of a weak series, and I
find it difficult at times to think that someone who has had such a good read
on house proceedings can get this one suddenly so wrong, and the other aspect
of this is the fact that Chris’ grievances with Pav feels as if it is shared by
the rest of the house, some of the tweets designed to try and substitute for a
live feed (yeah right!) have point to the housemates having problems with him,
added to that is the fact that all the housemates aside from Zoe voted for him
this week, and yet within the confines of the highlights show this has been portrayed
as solely being Chris’ problem when I don’t feel this is the case. On a side
note I have found the sympathy vote that Pav has generated this week slightly
annoying as well, I understand based on past experiences that the British
public do love to support an underdog, and I admit that I have been a victim of
that as well, but this is the same person that people were clamouring to be
evicted last week due to being dull, and the fact that he on some forums the
second favourite doesn’t sit right with me. I do like Pav as a person and he
seems pleasant enough, but he has up until now not been exciting television.
Getting
back to Chris however the other big attack that has been thrown at him this
week is the question of his behaviour around Ashleigh being creepy, and this is
one that really annoys me in regards to the producers of the show. Up until
this week I have never seen anything about Chris and Ashleigh’s friendship that
has been interpreted as being uncomfortable, just two friends that appear to be
on the same wavelength as each other and need each other to get through the
process, and yet thanks to the mechanisms of the production team and the awful
labelling of Chris through Bit on the Side this friendship has had so many
awful connotations and innuendos thrown towards it which are hurtful and
unjustified, and a guy like Chris who has in my opinion been perfectly pleasant
throughout the series has been painted by the show and his detractors as, for
all extensive purposes, a sick pervert. The sad thing is though is that part of
me feels that a lot of the catalyst for these accusations to be thrown at Chris
stems from his appearance, being someone who is older and not particularly
attractive he attracts negativity from an increasingly shallow audience for
behaviour which may be interpreted as romantically motivated, yet I have the
feeling that had someone like Ash and Winston behaved in the way that Chris has
this week non of these accusations would have been thrown in my opinion. I know
that the show needs to thrive on painting villains of the week for
entertainment purposes and that I can’t imagine Chris being somebody who
production had lined up as being part of their endgame, but no man deserves to
have those kind of accusations thrown at him, especially from a supposedly
credible production company as Channel 5, and whilst I was happy that Zoe went
this week it was more down to wanting to have Chris stay and send a message to
production that their behaviour was uncalled for, even if I do admit Chris
would have filled the ‘big character in week 8 boot’ rather well.
Two
weeks to go now before the inevitable Winston win, lets just hope these are a
lot more enjoyable then the past eight.
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