Big Brother Boo-Boo
April 18
While you can make the case that game
shows and reality shows are entirely different, nearly the same or
somewhere down the middle, they do share one element: the challenges
that make it a game (otherwise Survivor and Big Brother would be
entirely political games with no meat, and The Amazing Race would be
nothing more than a point-to-point road rally.) It's also expected that
the games are run fairly, with the same equipment for each contestant,
or properly researched questions if it's a mental challenge.
On this week's Head of Household challenge on Big Brother 9, the three
remaining eligible contestants (the outgoing Head of Household cannot
compete until the final one) were asked to say whether a series of seven
statements were 'fact' or 'fiction'. Right answers were worth a point,
wrong answers weren't, and the top scorer would claim the powerful
position. All fine and good except that one of the questions asked "Is
there still a pre-existing relationship in the house?" (One of the
twists this year was players competing early on as teams, and four
contestants each knew one of the other four.) The question as written
had the answer "fact". The contestants were not told anything other than
the correct answer, leaving them to guess what the other pre-existing
relationship was. Seconds after the question was judged, an onscreen
graphic revealed that the answer related to the pair of guinea pigs
living in a cage.
This question never should have gone to air. It's a deliberate swerve
that rewards nothing more than a lucky guess, and Ryan won the ultimate
power on nothing more than a fluke. Sharon lost by one point, and was
cheated out of a legitimate chance to contend for the power.
Game shows (and reality shows) have their own ways to deal with issues
like these. Most will bring back a "disadvantaged contestant" to play
again, with a note to the audience acknowledging the error. Survivor:
Africa had a similar event occur, and two such contestants were given an
additional $100,000 (equivalent to the second place prize) because
there's no way to know how the game would have turned out. Different
people making up the final group in the game and on the jury would have
different outcomes.
The problem becomes there's no way to fix this other than to run the
contest again. You can't have Sharon back next year; because the new
cast will know about her game from go. It would be hugely unfair to give
her a "final four" spot in that contest, too.
There's not much for the viewing audience to do at this point. The show
has been a summer fixture for so long that nothing short of a total
boycott would remove the show from the air, and I don't want that. Big
Brother is an interesting spin on the vote-out concept, but it's only
interesting when everything is on the up-and-up, and the producers
dropped the ball.
Travis Eberle can be nominated at
traviseberle@gmail.com. |