Big Brother Season 26 (2024) / Survivor Season 47 (2024)

[Timewalker]

This year's premier is on Wednesday, July 17. Check your own listings for the time and channel/streaming site.

I've found a cast list. I have no strong impressions about any of them at first glance.

The theme is BB AI and apparently the 16 houseguests will have an opportunity to vote in a 17th houseguest to join them. No clue what that's about. As far as I know, all guests will be first-timers, so nobody from previous seasons will be back.

I'm not sure when the fall season of Survivor will premiere. If any of it dovetails with BB, I'll amend the thread title. Since most of us will watch both shows, it makes sense to keep them in the same thread.

 

[Danny99]

I am prepared to be annoyed by Tucker or Matt.

 

[Timewalker]

Any particular reason? I haven't had a chance to read anything about them besides the site I linked to.

 

[Danny99]

They just seem like the typical light headed, light on strategy players. A Reddit thread described them as "douchey bro" and from those videos, I tend to agree.

 

[Timewalker]

Oh, joy. AI.

First off, my TV is fritzing, so I'll likely be watching this online. The local(ish) channel sometimes takes days to get the new episodes up.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

My first impression of most of the cast is negative. But it’s early and they spent the whole first two episodes on their AI gimmick.

I’m not too worried the AI is anything more than a competition announcer but it took up way too much screen time.

The guy who annoys me the most is the guy who keeps referring to himself as a pretty face. But in general 75% of the cast seems more vain and superficial than most recent casts.

 

[Timewalker]

Yeah, he's not pretty, not at all. Hopefully one or two might turn out to not be shallow.

 

[DigificWriter]

I'm not sure when the fall season of Survivor will premiere

Wednesday, Sept. 18th, in case you were still wondering.

I wasn't originally going to watch this season because I already have a lot of older shows that I need to watch on the nights that the show broadcasts, but then I got bored and decided to just go for it and figure out how I can do workarounds with said older shows.

Re: the AI thing, I really wanted the second group of 8 players to give Ainsle a majority 'Yes' vote just to see what would've happened.

On the cast front, the only people I actually like at the moment are Rubina, Angela, Lisa, and Quinn.

As an aside, I'm really starting to heavily question why Rob Cesternino bothers to have coverage of the show on his Podcast network/YouTube channel, because neither he nor the people he brings on/turns to for discussion/recaps about it ever seem to have positive things to say about it.

 

[Timewalker]

I'm actually able to match one of those names to a face. Quinn is the guy with really long hair. First impression is positive, as he doesn't seem nasty or rude.

I'm curious about the woman who crochets. I used to be on the board of directors for a craft co-operative (we had a small consignment store), and there were some people who did exquisite crocheted doilies and other things. One of them was a man who did them to supplement his disability benefit.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Leah should really consider what she’s doing as an attractive lady announcing she likes fat guys on national TV.

Every crazed desperate weirdo in the country will be camping on her front lawn. I genuinely fear for her safety.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I think I'm ready to name Matt the season's official douchebag. He's like the character in romantic comedies who's dating the love interest and not treating her well.

Did they advertise the episode as being 90 minutes? I was confused because even the guide channel said it was supposed to be normal length.

I'm not a fan of the deepfake HoH, it's basically a coup de tat and those just feel unsporting and arbitrary.

Anyone else think Mackensie looks like the actress who plays the first officer in Orville?

 

[Timewalker]

At this point, guys, I'm not going to get mad at all the spoilers because my TV situation is on the fritz and will take at least another week to straighten out. I'm limited to watching this online, and don't get the episodes until 24 hours after they've aired on TV. I don't expect you to sit on everything for that long.

But in future, could you use spoiler tags for twists, who wins comps, and who's voted out until after people in the Mountain/Pacific time zones have had a chance to see the episodes? We're 2-3 hours behind EDT. Some don't get to watch the same night.

Spoiler tags for these things for the first 24 hours would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Guy Gardener]

We all know that the AI is fake right?

It was an actress in a rubber dress.

Have the contestants been asked to pretend that the AI is real, like they already pretended that time travel or Santa was real, or are they dumb?

How hard/expensive would it have been to have actually used AI?

 

[JirinPanthosa]

We all know that the AI is fake right?

It was an actress in a rubber dress.

Have the contestants been asked to pretend that the AI is real, like they already pretended that time travel or Santa was real, or are they dumb?

How hard/expensive would it have been to have actually used AI?

Expensive, not very. I could go to ChatGPT right now and say "Design a competition for the show Big Brother". Give me a little time, a license and some good processor power I could design a pretty good chatbot to run a game.

The problem is that the results wouldn't be reliable. You'd get a few good ideas. A lot of mashups of previous ideas. Some garbage.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Expensive, not very. I could go to ChatGPT right now and say "Design a competition for the show Big Brother". Give me a little time, a license and some good processor power I could design a pretty good chatbot to run a game.

The problem is that the results wouldn't be reliable. You'd get a few good ideas. A lot of mashups of previous ideas. Some garbage.

All they really want is a simulated person, a pretty girl who tells stories and answers simple questions, but they hired an actor instead. Sorry, I meant an AI host would have been easy, not an AI Executive Producer.

The strike last year? Are they even allowed to use simulated actors or writers?

 

[Timewalker]

I've seen Sunday's episode.

First impressions: I really don't like Angela. She reminds me of someone I knew in RL, who said some inappropriate things to some of the younger men, made them very uncomfortable, and kept making excuses for herself. She never did acknowledge that she'd said anything inappropriate.

Chef-lady (can't remember her name). Creepy. Reminds me of a soap character I don't like.

Quinn still gives a good impression, other than being too trusting, too soon.

 

[Guy Gardener]

I've seen Sunday's episode.

First impressions: I really don't like Angela. She reminds me of someone I knew in RL, who said some inappropriate things to some of the younger men, made them very uncomfortable, and kept making excuses for herself. She never did acknowledge that she'd said anything inappropriate.

Chef-lady (can't remember her name). Creepy. Reminds me of a soap character I don't like.

Quinn still gives a good impression, other than being too trusting, too soon.

She's married and old. No Showmance for Angela. Sad.

So, she sees this bloke who happens to be prettier than any one she has met in her life, or seen on TV, and instead of saying "I want to %%%% you" Angela resigns to her village position as crone, and says "Everyone one else her wants to %%%% you, except me because I'm married, maybe there's a closet somewhere with no camera, no, I love my husband, I love my stupid husband... But if the other gals think you're half as hot as I do, you're going to be drowning in poon, all summer, you fantastic bastard."

It's a 51 year old opting not to be a creep and make a run at a 23 year old. How rare.

And then there's him.

Pretty boy.

He's certifiable.

Totally spun out, and everyone in the household knows that he is crazier than he is pretty because he doesn't know how to take a compliment, on day one, before the knives come out.

 

[Timewalker]

Would he have taken it better coming from one of the younger women? The person I'm talking about, who I knew, was at least 20 years older than me. She was flirting with a guy in his 30s - someone young enough to be her son. He was creeped out and didn't know what to say. So I had the job of telling her that her behavior was inappropriate, wasn't taken as friendly or harmless, people witnessing it were creeped out, and she needed to stop.

Of course she decided to blame me, along with offering up her other excuses.

Angela needs to nip this in the bud immediately or she'll be booted as soon as she's no longer safe.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Would he have taken it better coming from one of the younger women? The person I'm talking about, who I knew, was at least 20 years older than me. She was flirting with a guy in his 30s - someone young enough to be her son. He was creeped out and didn't know what to say. So I had the job of telling her that her behavior was inappropriate, wasn't taken as friendly or harmless, people witnessing it were creeped out, and she needed to stop.

Of course she decided to blame me, along with offering up her other excuses.

Angela needs to nip this in the bud immediately or she'll be booted as soon as she's no longer safe.

I'm looking at Angela and thinking, what's the big deal... She doesn't look so horrific for a woman of advanced y... Oh my goodness, we are the same age! If I get divorced tomorrow, that's exactly what all the age appropriate women too good for me will look like!

Married means neutered, and double neutered if there are 80 cameras watching you. Angela was never hitting on Matt, and I don't think he thought that she was. Matt thought that they were going to war, starting a slanderous disinformation campaign, that was going to end in the bloodiest eviction ever. Matt is dumb.

So the nurturing baking cookies PTA matronly mom lady apologizes to the baby with hurt booboo feelings, but he's all chuff, puffed out chest and said "I'm not afraid of you old lady, if you had brought it, I would have circled the wagons and destroyed you. Destroyed you. I am the alpha male who defeats all! Woo! wool! Men are are superior! Make me some eggs woman!"

I do exaggerate, but she apologized for an honest mistake, and he responds by detailing her public vivisection.

What a psycho.

 

[Timewalker]

My point is that in the BB house, it's not enough to apologize to him. She needs to make it clear to the other 14 people that she apologized and didn't mean it the way he took it. Otherwise, they'll tend to believe his spin.

But it would have been best if she'd kept her mouth shut in the first place.