[Kazanne]

Big Brother 2011

When Brian Dowling shut the doors of the Ultimate Big Brother house in 2010, we thought we were waving goodbye to the most famous (and no doubt smelliest) house in Britain for good.

Yet just over a year later, the very same Dowling has beckoned us back through the BB doors.

The show has moved of course (not geographically, but down the schedules from Channel 4 to Channel 5), but has that old BB magic been successfully reignited?

It certainly kicked off in fine fashion.

More than five million viewers tuned in for the launch of Celebrity Big Brother on 18 August, landing Channel 5 the kind of ratings it has seldom ever seen.

The antics of Paddy Doherty, Kerry Katona, Darryn Lyons and the rest held up pretty well too, with nearly three million tuning in for the episodes.


'Normal' Big Brother takes over


However, the big test was always going to be what happened after the celebs departed and the normal housemates moved in for their 13-week occupancy. And this is where the row that never went away was truly magnified; it concerned the absence of the live feed.

"the row that never went away was truly magnified"
This, Big Brother fanatics continue to argue, is what makes Big Brother, Big Brother; giving the watching audience the opportunity to drop in on the housemates any time of the day or night.

I doubt Channel 5 and Endemol were prepared for the strength of feeling around this issue.

So no live feed, but the non-celeb version started with Pamela Anderson waiting behind those doors, meaning we were able to focus on her experiences in the house while we got to know the new inhabitants' and work out who we liked.

Big Brother stands or falls on its casting, and this latest bunch made for a pretty good selection. The fact that they were all of a similar age was disappointing, however the number of truly compelling BB housemates over the age of 40 can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

Yes, we had our usual suspects - Mark was the wacky one, Heaven was the spiritual one and Anton the uselessly villainous one.

But in the best spirit of Big Brother, some of those housemates were able to transcend their rather obvious casting. Harry, who was clearly put in to be the "posh one", became a fully rounded housemate, far outlasting the usual shelf life of a Big Brother hooray Henry.

Runner-up Jay, who seemed to have been picked for his obvious similarities to the male cast of MTV's Geordie Shore, turned out to be quite a sensitive soul (although his propensity to prodigiously pass gas shows that he's not all hearts and flowers).


Big Brother's class of 2011





"The tasks have been pretty fun too"
The tasks have been pretty fun too, with my own favourite taking place just before Halloween when housemates were challenged to resist being scared by BB.

However, not all of the assignments have panned out as planned. The decision to shift Jay and Anton into their own separate little house and have them watch the other housemates was an obvious attempt to provoke confrontation and drama.

This kind of sneaky move was a catalyst for all manner of furore back in Big Brother 5 when housemates Michelle and Emma kicked off what became known in BB legend as "Fight Night".

However the class of 2011 were - by and large - too savvy to have their strings pulled quite so obviously.

In addition, the big twist in which housemates were challenged to unevenly split half of the prize money was completely robbed of all tension. Aaron suggested that, regardless of what BB said, they divvy up the cash equally as soon as they got out of the house.

Still, you can't win them all, and the history of Big Brother is littered with housemates doing entirely the opposite of what was expected of them.


Big Brother's future


So on screen at least, it's been a promising first year on Channel 5. But is it proving to be a decent investment, given the millions that have been spent on it?

"it's been a promising first year on Channel 5"
On the face of it, perhaps not. With this series averaging around 1.4 million viewers, it certainly hasn't broken any records. Channel 5 probably expected something a little more impressive.

What's more, with Celebrity Big Brother due to start in January 2012, there is a danger of overkill. It's more imperative than ever to get the casting for that show right for the sake of the ratings.

Big Brother occupies a massive amount of airtime; we're talking around seven or eight hours week-in, week-out since the middle of August.

As the show captures the kind of ratings a mere handful of Channel 5's shows can attract, the advertising revenue will reflect that. But is it enough, considering the outlay to acquire the series in the first place? The ratings don't suggest a huge engagement with general viewers (as opposed to Big Brother fanatics) and that needs to change.

Take a look at the press coverage over the last couple of months. Time was when every tabloid proudly branded itself "your Big Brother paper", but only the publications of Channel 5 owner Richard Desmond regularly covered Big Brother.

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And of those, the Daily Star - which had been splashing it almost-daily on their front page - stopped a couple of weeks ago.

Last night's final managed an overnight average of over 2 million viewers; Channel 5 will be pleased. But this has by no means been the most high profile year for BB. However, if it can just stick to what it does best, maybe it can capture an audience large enough to justify its continuation.

For me, it's been an entertaining, albeit low key, return but perhaps that's the perfect way to do a comeback.

[waterhog]

it was simple < they say big brothers trys to minpulate you - aaron minipulated us and he beat us and got what he wanted and you all feel for it.


i think he is the most hated guy in the uk ?

[karezza]

C5 should ask BB fans to come up with ideas for tasks.

[starry]

Apart from vote to save I struggle to think of anything good about this series.

[MTVN]

Where's the article from?

[karl100589]

Things channel 5 did right:
1) Vote to save
2) A more relatable and less 'freakish' cast
3) Eviction interviews with family members (it made eviction night feel like an event again)
4) Eviction night unpredictability (helped by vote to save)
5) Not as reliant on twists (for the first 4 weeks at least)
6) Allowing housemates to openly discuss nominations.

Things channel 5 did wrong:
1) No live feed
2) The 'no housemate over 30' casting policy
3) Blatant bias for/against housemates
4) Marcus' narration being more casual
5) Towie style editing (thankfully toned down during the series)
6) Nametags still being used even by the final week (We know who these people are, stop reminding us)

[starry]

Originally Posted by karl100589

2) A more relatable and less 'freakish' cast

More relatable? Well that is definitely not the case for me. For most of the audience I think they definitely looked at it as a pantomime comedy and that's how it was shown. It was not a cast people were meant to relate to, only to laugh at.

Originally Posted by karl100589

4) Eviction night unpredictability (helped by vote to save)

But every week the audience were told who had received the most votes, that must have made it increasingly predictable.

[thesheriff443]

the problem is big brother has a shelf life,and i think it reached that!,every thing from the kitchen sink has been throw at it! as people want bigger and better!,but i dont think that was the answer!,you can take 14 people from a bus stop que put them in a house and you wuold have a show!,bb as gone from channel 4 to channel 5 but the production team as stayed the same, and that is the problem when people stay in one job for too long they just go thru the motions and lose drive!

[icecakes]

Originally Posted by madJOE

it was simple < they say big brothers trys to minpulate you - aaron minipulated us and he beat us and got what he wanted and you all feel for it.


i think he is the most hated guy in the uk ?

Stop being such a drama queen, he's done nothing wrong!!!!!!!!!! what crime has he committed , who has he murdered fgs

[Tourmaline]

Originally Posted by madJOE

it was simple < they say big brothers trys to minpulate you - aaron minipulated us and he beat us and got what he wanted and you all feel for it.


i think he is the most hated guy in the uk ?

In what way do you think Aaron manipulated us?

[IheartBB]

My biggest qualm with this year is that the housemates knew too much. They were told about voting positions every week, could listen to the eviction crowd cheer or boo for unnecessarily long periods of time and saw people from the outside world almost daily due to tasks. Part of the initial premise of BB is absolutely no contact with the outside world. It is a fundamental that has completely been ignored this year.

[icecakes]

Originally Posted by IheartBB

My biggest qualm with this year is that the housemates knew too much. They were told about voting positions every week, could listen to the eviction crowd cheer or boo for unnecessarily long periods of time and saw people from the outside world almost daily due to tasks. Part of the initial premise of BB is absolutely no contact with the outside world. It is a fundamental that has completely been ignored this year.

C5 havent a clue have they

tasks were rubbish

they always had fags

always had booze

loads of takeaways

no discipline

in fact more like a holiday camp,

[Cherie]

I would like to think that they will return to more the old style BB...give the HMs a harder time, and think up new ways of mixing it up...the splitting the money thing, the crypt all been done before...they really need to come up with some fresh ideas that have not been done before so the HMs are really thrown. Having said that there were some good tasks... Yes/No was a good one though I think it would have been even better the number of Nos had been the same as the number of tasks...ie they could have said no to everything.... the survivor task was good as well... plus there should have been more discipline for rule breaking..ie whole house up which we never had, which would have whittled out Louise and Tom early doors and left us with perhaps Anton and Harry for longer.

[BBFanDan]

Messing with noms, no live feed, blatant bias on BBBOTS, interaction with outside world.

I liked the new editing but nearly every show would have a re-cap what we already know what happened.

[icecakes]

Originally Posted by CherieB

I would like to think that they will return to more the old style BB...give the HMs a harder time, and think up new ways of mixing it up...the splitting the money thing, the crypt all been done before...they really need to come up with some fresh ideas that have not been done before so the HMs are really thrown. Having said that there were some good tasks... Yes/No was a good one though I think it would have been even better the number of Nos had been the same as the number of tasks...ie they could have said no to everything.... the survivor task was good as well... plus there should have been more discipline for rule breaking..ie whole house up which we never had, which would have whittled out Louise and Tom early doors and left us with perhaps Anton and Harry for longer.

when you compare tasks in previous bb's, like having to stay awake all night

sitting in a sardine can of smelly fish, peeling tons of potatoes, cleaning tons of dirty boots and many others very hard ones, there's were easy

[Cherie]

Originally Posted by icecakes

when you compare tasks in previous bb's, like having to stay awake all night

sitting in a sardine can of smelly fish, peeling tons of potatoes, cleaning tons of dirty boots and many others very hard ones, there's were easy

True Id forgotton the stay up all night tasks, this lot had it easy.

[Kazanne]

Originally Posted by MTVN

Where's the article from?

It was on MSN news page MTVN,should have posted the link,I'll have a look for it .

[Kazanne]

Originally Posted by madJOE

it was simple < they say big brothers trys to minpulate you - aaron minipulated us and he beat us and got what he wanted and you all feel for it.


i think he is the most hated guy in the uk ?

IF Aaron is the most hated guy in the UK,I pity us as a nation,what a load of cobblers,we have far more deserving people to 'HATE' in this country,get a grip!!This has to be one of the daftest posts I've read on here.

[Becker]

Originally Posted by madJOE

it was simple < they say big brothers trys to minpulate you - aaron minipulated us and he beat us and got what he wanted and you all feel for it.


i think he is the most hated guy in the uk ?

Ridiculous statement whichever way you do the mathematics. I think you might find Jeremy Kyle has something to say about that also.