[Buck]

Hi! I'm new here. I'm a BB fan from Germany who watched most of the German BB series. Beginning with CBB 8 I started watching the UK version for the first time. Reading through this board, I noticed that I obviously missed the better(?) Channel 4 version with Davinia, but I will catch up on that. While watching CBB I noticed some major differences between your UK BB and our German BB, and I thought it might be interesting for some of you to get to know them. So here's what I noticed:

- The daily highlights show seems to be more neutral in the UK. Your commentator generally just announces the time of day and explains the subject the housemates are talking about. In the German version, viewers often complain about too propagandistic comments like "Lazy Lucy is bitching about Tamara". Apart from that, our daily highlights show seems more like a docusoap than a reality show with stupid sound and colour effects, resulting in opinion-forming editing. The German audience is quite unhappy with the way the highlights show has developped in recent years.

- I like the diary room sequences in your show better, as they are shown in more depth, where you can also hear the questions the housemates are asked. In the German version, it's more like a clip show, where short and incomplete comments of various housemates are cut short really fast.

- Nomination: I was surprised to see that in the UK nominations are only part of the highlights show. In Germany, they take place live every two weeks in the weekly live show. We don't have an eviction each week. On a rotating basis, in one week's live show the housemates are nominating, and the week after, the eviction takes place. The German housemates get to know the results of the nomination immediately after it has finished. I also was surprised to see that it is still forbidden in BB UK to discuss nominations in the house. In Germany, this rule has been abolished two years ago and the housemates can talk about who they are going to nominate. In this way, they can make plans and strategies. At first, I was sceptical concerning this decision but it helps to bring up exciting plots and struggles.

- Sometimes even a so-called "open nomination" takes place in the live show where the housemates are prompted to circle, and one after another has to go to the person he wants to nominate and to do it face-to-face.

- What I like on your nomination procedure is that the housemates still have two nominations, whereas in Germany they reduced it to one nomination per housemate years ago. I also like special twists like when evicted Pamela had the opportunity to determine which housemates are next up for eviction.

- Eviction show: Your eviction show only lasts 60 minutes, while our live show lasts 2 hours (launch and final last 3 hours). I was a bit disapppointed that there is not much supplementary content in your eviction show than just the daily highlights being hosted, with the eviction taking place afterwards. In Germany, live matches take place, and ex-housemates as well as family members are interviewed before nomination or eviction. To be honest, our liveshow lost its quality in the last few years, but it is still a big event each week for BB fans.

- The eviction process itself is completely different: In your version, Brian tells the housemates very quickly who has been evicted, and the evicted person has to leave within 30 seconds. In Germany, they extend this process to the max. Before the "Big Brother"-voice tells the housemates who has been evicted, he gives some kind of psychogram for each housemate in which it explains what the HM has done good or bad. After BB has revealed the name of the evicted HM, dramatic or sad music is played, and the saying goodbye can take up to 5 minutes.

- It's a good thing that in the UK the evicted housemate is interviewed immediately after he left the house. This had been the case in Germany, too, but meanwhile the interview takes place only in the following live show one week later. The reason for this is that there had been to many people booing at the evicted housemate in the studio (which is now forbidden). I also get the impression, that the UK audience is even more heated up. I don't like the aggressive atmossphere too much.

- Edits: It seems that you have the same problem with editing than we have. BB is quite sensitive when the audience sees more than it is supposed to see. Criticism of viewers or housemates is not welcome. I noticed this on Friday, when host Brian (who I think is a poofy square) acted quite unprofessionally when Tara wanted to speak out. It's really the same in Germany, and we celebrate each housemate who dares to say his mind, no matter what the host wants.

- Harshness of Big Brother: Your BB seems to be stricter than ours. The line "Big Brother's decisions are final" in fact doesn't exist in Germany. In the worst case, housemates learn that they can get what they want if they moan enough or threaten BB with leaving the house immediately. Even more, in the last few series, some housemates who left the house on a voluntary basis, were given the opportunity to go into the house again as a regular housemate by public vote. The viewers really don't support these wishy-washy rules.

- The good thing is: We still have a live feed channel (which is quite expensive at 25 euros/month, but at least, it exists). Unfortunately, you don't have a live feed anymore.

- The length of a regular BB series in the UK seems to be generally around 3 months, whereas the tendency in Germany has been going to longer series. We had series which lasted 6 months, 8 months or even a whole year.

- Sadly enough, the reputation of BB in Germany in really bad, and most people detest this format as it has been harshly critized by the press for moral reasons from the start. We will never see a German Celebrity BB series, as there wouldn't be enough celebrities who would prostitute themselves to the format. The ratings have become really bad throughout this year's series, and it is questionable whether there will be a new series at all...

Wow, that was quite a lot, but I hope that you got some impressions of the German BB. All in all, both versions are not perfect, but a mixture would be good. What do you think?

[Niamh.]

Welcome to TiBB. I'm going to read all that properly tomorrow, too tired now! You should watch some of the normal BBs BB2, BB3 and BB5 are ones I'd recommend

[CharlieO]

If you liked this one you would love the back catalogue.

[Jarrod]

I Recommend Big Brother 2004, Big Brother 2006, Big Brother 2010 and Ultimate Big Brother 2010

[Chuck]

Welcome
I recommend BB5, 6, 7 and 10 + CBB3, 4, 6 and 7.

[CharlieO]

Ok well you should watch Big Brother 3, 5, 6, 7, and 10. And Celebrity Big Brother 3, 4, and 5. You will love them so much.

[Buck]

Thanks for the warm welcome and your recommendations!

[Ryan.]

Excellent first post and welcome to TiBB!

[Buck]

Another thing I noticed is that they don't show you the percentages of the eviction in BB UK, right? In Germany, we get to see the figures, plus sometimes intermediate states. Beginning with this year's series, there even is a notarial act concerning the eviction, because of growing suspicion of fraud.

By the way, you can see an example of an "open nomination" here:
http://www.clipfish.de/special/bigbr...ig-brother-11/

[Doogle]

A literate member that posted this in the correct place. Welcome!

But on-topic, it's interesting how you say our narrator just states the time and what they're doing and say it's not that bad compared to Germany. It must be very bad then because this narration is very different from previous series' where it was literally just "[insert housemate here] is in the kitchen".

And it's interesting you saying about the strictness of BB when all of it is so soft compared to the older series'.

[Joelle.]

What an excellent post and welcome to the forum.
I would recommend BB3, 5, 6, 7 and 10.

[Conor]

Whatever you do watch BB5, BB6, CBB3 & CBB4. They are just incredible. Oh, and welcome!!

[reece(:]

welcome, i'd recommend depending what you're interested in

gameplay, huge fights, good twists - bb5
great twists, diverse cast, lots of fights and arguments, good tasks - bb6
brilliant tasks and twists, good cast, lots of arguments and controversy - bb7
lots of fights, good female cast, decent twists - bb8
diverse cast, interesting twists, many arguments near the start - bb9
probably most interesting cast, stand out housemates - bb10
decent cast but rubbish series overall - bb11

[BBGermany]

I like the music & effects. 10 was a good year for the Prodigy
The UK HMs cant grasp the concept of Not taking 10 years to nom one person.
The thing I dont like about Germanys live show (evictions) is the 10min babbling. I sometimes go for a smoke, come back & still havent missed anything.
Was disgusted that during the Noms of (I cant remember which days) it was Klaus, Uwe & Picco were up but for whatever reason (I dont speak German) Picco was dropped from the list.
Was also disgusted with the fact that Piggy #1 (That would be Meike) got kicked out which left Lilly & Alexs up for eviction. IMO noms should have been null & void & redone.
Also showing the graphics the way they did that night didnt help Alexs much.
I was glad they let allowed the public to vote if Sexy Cora could go back in or not.
--------------I just spoiled myself Oo well. I thought Cora left the 1st time due to her mother but the wiki says she left due to work problems -shrugs-


Ill take Germany any time over the "new" US Fun House out in the UK any day

[Flamingjoe]

That was such a great read, thank you so much for writing that! I love hearing about international Big Brothers.

[BBfanUSA]

I like the fact (I have only seen the BB8 finale) that The public knows the results first and then BB reveals the results to the house. I think Big Brother talked to the winner before he sent her on her way out of the house.

[lostalex]

Very interesting comments. Thanks for taking the time to write it.

I'm so jealous you havn't seen the other series yet. You'll have a lot of fun when you watch i think.

BBUK is great. I hope you also get involved in BBUS. I wish there was some way for me to watch German BB with translation. I'd find it very interesting.

[MTVN]

That was an interesting read, thanks. It seems that in some ways our show is becoming increasingly more like yours; the editing has increased, along with the cheesy music and effects, and the narrator used to actually be a lot more neutral and just stated the very basics of what was happening. I quite like the idea of making eviction nights more of an event and a spectacle but it also sounds like it's a bit too dragged out as well, although I do think our eviction shows should be longer than an hour, and they did use to be, because it just means we get shortened highlights and a hurried eviction and interview

I'm not sure if you'll have seen this or not but in BB11 our housemates played a penalty shoot-out against the BB Germany ones, was that aired over there? And I also seem to remember thinking the garden in your show was a lot smaller than the one here but I dunno if that's just the way it seemed from the camera