BB1 - Final Rankings
1. Caroline
2. Anna
3. Nick
4. Melanie
5. Nichola
6. Sada
7. Darren
8. Claire
9. Thomas
10. Craig
11. Andrew
Changes in colour/placing for some of them compared to when they left (ie Nick) because in hindsight I enjoyed them more!
Overall a really solid series for what it is. It's not gonna blow your mind and admittedly I didn't enjoy it as much as the first time I saw it 2 years ago, but it was really breezy to watch and still enjoyable. If you can get past the bumpy presentation of the first week when no one from production really knew what they were doing, and if you can get with the vibe this series has, I'd recommend it.
It's got some FANTASTIC housemates in Caroline and Anna, and of course Nick. What he gets up to seems especially tame by the standards of what followed in the 18 years since this series, and even I didn't buy into it initially, but the presentation is utterly fascinating and peak social experiment.
I dunno if I'm in the minority but this series also has the first awful winner
Craig is so self-righteous and eager to be the top dog in the house that it is nauseating. He was incessantly obsessed with public perception, under some guise of being caring - maybe it was, but it rubbed me the wrong way entirely.
Credit where it's due, he did instigate the Nick confrontation, but his involvement is so overblown by the public. I've said it before and I'll say it again: the only person who got anywhere in that discussion was Anna.
The tasks are very barebones as it truly was a basic social experiment, but for the most part they do their job of forcing the housemates to get to know each other and challenging dynamics and roles. Even something as simple as riding an exercise bike caused division in the house, with Craig accused of being lazy and milking his injury; leading to the first ever BBUK argument between Caroline and Craig.
Of course there's also the assault course task, in which Nick hilariously lies that he was in the army or something and it's exposed moments later when he's the worst in the task
The series has a lot of dated elements - the final week featuring just three housemates, for instance. While I found it fine due to the short episode lengths and Anna existing, it simply would not work in the show today. Indeed, even just a year later they upped the final week number to 4 and it never went below that again. I did love the Monday episodes with the psychologists in between segments - this went on til BB5 or 6 yeah? Imo it kind of encouraged a bit of higher thinking when watching the show and helped me understand certain situations/dynamics a bit more.
BB1 was an iconic piece of television that not only changed the landscape of British television but television worldwide. When Big Brother finally hit here in Australia the year after, it was heavily influenced by the UK version (and continued to be throughout its run), albeit with its own flairs, and the weekly format rather than the fortnightly format became far more popular in international versions. It all started here.
CBB1 is up next for me but being only 8 days it'll be here and gone in a second
From what I remember of it, it's pretty dull but Vanessa is iconic!