"I don't think you have the brain capacity to understand what I'm saying..."

Bianca

By Friday night, I was pretty much over Big Brother 2008 (maybe you noticed?). Over the weekend, I didn’t give a single thought to the show, and I didn’t come anywhere near this website. My life was infinitely more rewarding. But tonight, I had to return for this year’s first live eviction show, proceeded by a catch-up I dearly hoped would not allocate 90% of screentime to BB hotties in swimwear.

The thing is, it seemed many others were in the same boat – and that’s never a good thing for BB producers when The Eye starts reflecting mass public opinion – and forum boards (and my own inbox) were alight with unhappy customers who had finally started to wonder; “When is this season going to actually begin?”  I have discussed, over the past four days or so, that despite the moderate success of the Corey Worthington advertisement, the show had backed itself into a corner, and with ratings falling, something would have to be done. The tension in the Big Brother camp, by Friday, was visible, most of all, by its sudden PR onslaught; sending Brunero out to bat against the anti-Corey sentiment, as it finally dawned upon the men in nice suits that, uh-oh, maybe Corey Worthington was going to benefit a little more than the actual show was (that’s what you get for dealing with Max Markson, quite frankly). Poor little Big Brother – the rather obvious thing to do was to turn up the switch on the propagandametre of anti-Corey sentiment. It’s there, in the house, after all – it’s not a difficult option to take. But it’s stuck in a co-branding deal that depends very much on Corey’s Redemption™ - a deal that it isn’t going to get out of, lightly. And so, what to do, when there are actually people who are not stupid enough to fall in love with Corey Worthington?

Terri is the first to make it to screen with her anti-Corey sentiment. It’s important to remember that aside from Bianca, whilst Terri does not have the same relevance (because Bianca is more relevant to the over all demographic of both Big Brother and Corey Worthington), Terri has proven to be a slight hitch in the proposed Corey advertisement. She was definitely supposed to be the symbol of older Australia, and through her, those mums that Max Markson was so horrendously gloating about winning over, were to be won. Terri was supposed to end up, as Markson put it, “wishing Corey was their son”. Far from it, this weekend, she came out with the line; “I’d be ashamed, if you were my son.”

Ouch. As expected, the other housemates didn’t take to this very kindly, and it goes without saying that we were shown every bit of that reaction – more of it, in fact, than we were given context of the offending line, itself.

What is interesting about this was that the other housemates seemed to feel more for Corey, than Corey actually felt for himself. His response to the situation? “I love giving her some shit!” he snickered. Nice. So, it’s now clear that Big Brother have decided to, at least, let a portion of its audience see the more dubious side of Corey Worthington – so long as there is adequate material around it to buffer the ongoing PR exercise. This way, the anti-Corey viewer can, at this stage, relate; but, ultimately, the crowd who are turning (or didn’t need turning) will feel completely justified in their warm feelings towards Worthington, and – most of all – the show still technically keeps its PR promises (the voice of the actual show – through Sandilands, etc - certainly kept up the bargain, when the eviction show rolled in). I doubt many mothers would love these qualities to be part of their own children. Perhaps, some of them would even be ashamed.

But it’s Bianca where the fireworks really kick off, and where the only real potential trouble was always going to loom. As we’ve discussed, I don’t think it ultimately does; she’s too naïve, easy to rubbish, and far too extreme in where she comes at it from. Ultimately, Bianca is so extreme, she's seemingly difficult for many viewers to relate to (even I don't, particularly), and her opposition to Worthington could, in this light, actually help him. That doesn't mean, however, that it helps the show, as much - even I have been somewhat surprised to see the obvious fanbase Bianca has mustered (I imagine that could wane, after tonight's episode). We were not given the reality of her initial argument at the dinner table, but tonight's clash is clearly difficult to edit into anything too positive. Still, I wish I’d seen the actual moment on feed – I imagine it is no doubt missing many elements, and I am left only to assess an edited presentation. And the show still edited it to plan - this time, using her negativity, instead of hiding it.

I warned that Biacna should tread very carefully, because editing would always be used, in the end, to make sure she didn't step over the lines of what was happening on the outside. What the show is now presenting is a very confusing portrait of a girl who is actually no longer very confused. She’s still wrong about a few things – but not so confused. It can do this, because Bianca is simply too expressive, and has mistakenly responded to the situation by thinking it clever to repress her emotions (which also means that when those emotions do come out, finally, they are delivered with an unbecoming velocity). I spoke, the other night, of that missing context – so vital to this narrative – that revealed Bianca’s admission that she had decided to pretend she liked Corey, as to not play into the collective’s hands and “give them what they want.” The show has decided not to enlighten us on this, which means it can, quite beautifully, cut together a series of responses and scenes that completely contradict each other, and paint Bianca as a confused hypocrite, as opposed to a  girl that struggles between her reality and what she has decided is a "clever" (it isn't) way to take on the situation (we also saw this, later, when we were shown Bianca say "There's still that part of me that thinks yeah, you're a top kid", without showing the other half of this equation and explanation).

Tonight, we saw Bianca “playing” with Corey on the bed – which was really just her response to Corey approaching her; if you looked closely, she did effectively end up “playing dead” (in order to stop it). This then rolled straight into their argument. But one little question - what happened, in between? Where’s the context? What actually happened? Did you catch that? Because I didn’t, and I’d like to know how one thing turned into the next. But we were never going to be given that – we saw a girl willing to be frivolous on a bed, followed by an angry outburst. So, we are given the anti-Corey bone; but it’s clearly made to seem over-the-top, contradicted and unjustified.

“You’ve done a few nice things,” she screams at him (referring to the things that have involved Big Brother), “But in every other situation, you’ve been a jerk, you’ve been a liar… you disrespect older people, you lie to people…” We can only imagine what was left out, here (and remember that the primetime audience were never let in on the moment she caught him blatantly lying to her). But just a reminder of that logic – this kind of heat is boiled. It’s an outcome - and we are denied the boiling. No doubt, because it involved Corey in a way it doesn’t suit to reveal.

And how does the show end, after this?

“Can you imagine what she’ll be like at 35?” asks David. “She’ll be a nazi.”

In so many ways, they're right - and that's the problem of Bianca. I'd like someone who can see through the Corey advertisement, just a bit - and she does - kind of - but that's the least of the dynamic. And would I have thought Bianca was very cool at 18? Certainly, not! I probably would have called her a "nazi". As will many. And in the end, this renders her ineffective. They can show her aggressing Corey, all they like - they don't really have to jeopardise their deal, in doing so.

Still, with all due respect, at 35, she’ll probably be the kind of woman who would never dream of going on Big Brother, I’d imagine! Unfortunately, she’s 18, she’s deluded, and it’s too late.

To be continued tomorrow morning, when we discuss the departure of the UFO lover and the adrenalin-drained disaster of the new eviction format...