I’ve Not Lick Yer Arse

Rodrigo is going to meet the Queen! But, of course, he isn’t – he is going to meet a lookalike, and sing God Save the Queen to her. ‘BB is genuinely in contact with the palace,’ BB tells the other HMs, ‘but she is yet to confirm a date to meet housemates.’ What utter, utter guff. Bea and Freddie talk in the kitchen. He says, justifiably, that he will stay this Friday, in his opinion. Bea then goes straight out and tells her new best bud, Lisa, what he has said. ‘His head is up his arse,’ Lisa says.

More Bea airtime. Ridiculous, right? ‘He’s not as clever as he think he is… I’d love it if the pubic put him in his place.’ She really needs to watch out when she’s evicted next week, right? I was thinking this morning that it seemed odd last week that we had to vote to save housemates, rather than vote to evict them. If it’d been voting to evict, there’s a good chance Bea might have gone. Because it was to save, well, who’s going to ring up for Hira? Mighty suss, if you ask me, given it was last week that arguments began to restart and Bea and Freddie’s relationship started to go sour. Because if it weren’t for Bea and Freddie at the helm of the arguments, who’d be arguing? Charlie and Rodrigo? Freddie and Lisa? You see, we’ve seen those arguments before – perhaps they’re therefore less interesting? Just a thought, readers.

Anyway, Rodrgio is going to have tea with the Queen. Bea has got a bee in her bonnet about the fact that Freddie thinks there is a remote possibility that the Queen might actually come on BB. It’s all a badly veiled attempt to restart their argument AGAIN. She thinks that lying to Rodrigo about the Queen in the house being a lookalike is ‘dishonest’. Should come naturally to her then, amirite? Luckily, the show moves to Rod in the task room instead. Rod is so excited when the ‘Queen’ walks in, and sings God Save to her. They have a lovely chat. It’s all very sweet. Should we feel sorry for Rodrigo? Well, Bea said she thinks he’s been made a fool of, but I actually think that even that small amount of time when he feels great is enough to make it OK… Isn’t it? The thing is, he doesn’t know that BB is now a nadir of shit programming, shit planning and shit contestants – for him, I guess, it may be entirely plausible that the Queen would appear on BB. When he leaps out of the task room, looking uber happy, Bea seems perfectly content to pander to BB’s request to play along. Hipo, etc.

Anyway, BB decides to tell Rodrigo that he did not, in fact, meet the real Queen. He takes it quite well, and laughs. He seems quite sad at the same time, but he is more embarrassed than anything else. Anyway, they have passed the task, and they have won special prizes. Rodrigo wins a real letter from Buckingham Palace. (We know this is genuine; if you so much as sneeze your address to the Palace, they will write back to you.) He is also given a commemoration mug from the Palace, which is nice. The other prizes are letters from home for all the HMs.

More of Bea being a bitch. Marcus has a good way of dealing with her; he is reasonable, and asks her to rethink what she’s saying. She doesn’t, though. ‘I think Freddie’s a twat,’ she says. ‘I’m sorry Bea, but you will not like what happens when you get out of here,’ Marcus says, perceptively. Say what you like about Marcus: he does really know what’s going on. Then she goes on about being bullied again, and she cries. Charlie hugs her. He fucking would. Freddie then laughs at something Bea says, which he overhears, and Charlie LOVES be able to go in and have a go at him.Bea runs away and sobs.

Do you know what I think? She’s finally clicked – she knows how hated she’s going to be.

Oh! The Solar Plexus Massage!

One of the joys of Big Brother – and they’re few and far between, these days, so we relish them where we can – is seeing people who lie dig graves then claim that they don’t lie. Bea and David are in the kitchen and David is surly with Bea. “Why don’t we talk any more?” Bea asks, and David tells her that he’s angry with her because she accused him of stealing bread and butter. WHICH SHE DID. “I never accused you of anything!” she shouts, but she did, and then gets upset and calls him a bully. “I never accused you of anything!” she repeats over and over, even though she did, and David starts to get upset. David is a lunk, and deals with this in some stupid manner, but Bea is a liar and is being increasingly manipulative. The argument gets dragged into the open in front of the rest of the house, and Bea shouts about what a bully David is, calls him dishonest, and makes out that this is a wider issue than it is. Freddie throws his oar in – after spending time in the bedroom rubbing his chest, acting like he’s high and getting some weird sexual dervish on – and defends Bea. (Freddie is usually very observant, and it’s disappointing that he mis-read Bea. Cock > Brain, eh?) Lisa can smell a fellow manipulator. “She’s going to play this as a martyr,” she says, and try to get David nommed. Bea, on the other hand, goes into the bedroom and cuddles up to new House God Marcus. “Oh Marcus, I hate it,” she says, and then together they bitch about Lisa and David. How the tide turns, eh? In the garden, David cries, and I don’t believe for a second that the tears aren’t real. Bad Bea!

The argument continues with Bea pushing this further and further, accusing David of lying about being upset, and saying that he was shouting, which he wasn’t. “Did he really shout?” asks Marcus, and Bea says that he did, when he didn’t. Rodrigo comes into the bedroom and Bea brings the argument up again for his sake. It’s almost tiresomely obvious what she’s trying to do. Marcus then goes and has a go at David about other stuff, and then Bea throws herself in again in front of everybody. She might have played this absolutely wrong, because Sophie and Rodrigo could nom her for causing aggro alongside Lisa and David. But, you know, when nobody else is around, David tells Bea that he doesn’t want to argue, and then Bea reports to others that she instigated their ‘reconciliation’ entirely. Oh, Bea Bea Bea.

Today’s task is some shit where people get dressed up like gnomes or caterpillars, and then the caterpillars get wrapped up in cling film, set to lie down on the ground, and then told to stand up. It looks like what it is: a bunch of twats wrapped in plastic, wriggling around. Afterwards, Lisa, David and Sophie sit around and bitch about Marcus. “I can’t stand to sit next to him!” says Sophie, which is in slight contrast to last week’s protest against his eviction, but there we go. Bea then goes to the diary room and bitches about David. “He’s a bland Yorkshire pudding, and Lisa’s the gravy. They’re still Yorkshire pudding and gravy, which isn’t satisfying. At all.”

Anyway, best part of the episode: Marcus’ sex story. Here it is, I’ll let you judge it. “Once I used a fortune cookie to get sex. This girl had one that said ‘Bluebells are your lucky flower’ and I had one that said ‘Saturday is your lucky night’ and I knew this field where there were bluebells, so I took her there, pointed out that it was saturday and that there were bluebells. Then I took her home and had sex with her.” BEST. (FAKE) SEX. STORY. EVER.

The housemates then have some nice dinner and Charlie winds Rodrigo up about fancying David. “You’d sit on his knee for a can of cider,” he says. Who would fancy David? I mean, really. Rodrigo then bleats on about meeting the Queen – which is HILARIOUS as he’s already met David, right? HA HA HA HA! – and then laughs like a fucking scarecrow as David guzzles cocks sweets. Bea sits in the garden and talks about how well known she is. “I’m well known at festivals, at gigs, on my street, in Ibiza. I’m actually quite a big deal!” she says. And then, Oh! CRINGE! Freddie declares his love for Bea as they lie in bed. “I thought we fancied each other,” he says. “I thought we were friends,” she replies, and then turns away from him and ignores him. “Do you fancy me?” he asks. “No,” she says. He grins that grin the whole time. “That’s a shame,” he says. She turns the situation against him. “I don’t operate on that sort of level, and I haven’t been asked that since I was fourteen.” She turns away and shuns him.

Ouch. Ouch all round, really, where Bea is involved, right?

He Seems Like a Right Noddy

The cries for ‘Noirin Out!’ are almost drowning Davina’s voice – and she has a mic. Oh dear. So, yesterday’s highlights include: Noirin mopping, Siavash moping, and Isaac playing with some toilet roll. This all sounds about right. (is his name Isaac, or did I make that up? I neither know nor care.) Noirin tells Isaac that other people are ‘dramatising’ the situation and making things worse than they are for Siavash. Whatever, love. We all stopped listening to you weeks ago.  You do know, don’t you, that both Isaac and Noirin have been on reality shows before? I am so, so tired of BB doing this – getting semi-famous/known housemates in (think models, wannabe actors, people who may have released one single or had a famous boyfriend, etc). The great irony is that when Celeb BB starts, I rarely know who any of the contestants are – and they are supposed to be famous – therefore both strains of BB amount the the same thing (apart from he Ulrika moment – she must be one of the bigger household names who ever dared darken Celeb BB with her ghastly shadow).

When the cameras come back to Davina, her link for Marcus to be evicted is met with barely a whimper, whilst Noirin’s name is still booed incessantly. Interesting. Back in the house, Noirin wants to talk to Siavash. David runs out of the kitchen so he doesn’t have to bear witness to it. I have some level of empathy for the other HMs this week. The atmosphere there must be awful. ‘I think you’re a good guy.’ ‘I think you’re gorgeous, but this is three times now, Noirin.’ Poor Siavash. Not least because, as we keep stating, he has now lost his chances of winning, which previously I’d though were quite high. Anyway, she witters on about how actually, this is all Isaac’s fault, as she is still ‘head over heels with him.’ He tells her she should leave. ‘You’re not doing yourself any favours.’ She starts being idiotic, despite the fact he is actually telling her something accurate, that she should listen to. She is going to be absolutely hated tonight, when she gets out. (Let’s be honest, it’s not even going to be a close call. She’s a goner.) He tells her he feels he was part of her ’storyline’. Freddie then walks in, and, thankfully, the conversation is over.

Marcus and Siavash are now each other’s bitter buddy. It’s an odd friendship, but I like it. Charlie, however, is an utter fucking idiot, and I hate him. I think he just said ‘This hasn’t made Noirin look that bad though,’ which is the most aggravatingly stupid thing I’ve heard in a long while. Also, he can’t add up when he’s doing the shopping list, and BB has to help him. Noirin is moaning to Noirin about how she doesn’t want to hurt Siavash’s feelings and she should go home. ‘Did I screw him over?’ ‘No,’ says Isaac. ‘So why do I feel guilty?’ ‘Because he’s making you feel guilty,’ he says. Hateful pair.

David is trying to be friendly to Isaac, going on about how much he loves America, and Isaac takes the piss, thinking that David hasn’t noticed. I think he (probably) has, but he’s too excited to care. He’s an idiot too, but in many ways he’s an old-fashioned BB contestant: he wants to be there, and he wants to have fun. Sophie’s quiet today, though, isn’t she? I suppose she only has Rod and Charlie left as her friends. I don’t think she trusts Noirin anymore. Also, what the hell is Hira actually doing in there?

So we all know that Isaac is a tit, but the worst thing is that he actually thinks Noirin might stay tonight. What rot. Bea, on the other hand, doesn’t want to be friends with Noirin, because she borrowed her top and made it smell, and doesn’t like Isaac because it’s like ‘he’s just walked out of Amercian Pie. He is a frat boy… A big lump of Amercianised arrogance.’ Oh, and she thinks Noirin is despicable. Good. I do quite like Bea’s ‘Queen Bee’ put-downs.

Now some of the HMs are going to the diary room in towels to plea for Marcus to stay. They pretend to Noirin it’s just a trick, rather than tell her. ‘Isn’t it too mean?’ asks Hira, stupidly. Even Sophie wants Marcus to stay now. This is how much Noirin is hated. So Freddie, Sophie, Bea and Siavash go and plea. It’s quite sweet, really. Charlie, of course, sits on the fence. I hope he rots on that fence. ‘Leave it up to the public,’ says Hira, having no conception that Noirin must be a horror to live with. Charlie, of course, goes straight to Noirin and tells her about the plea. ‘Didn’t you know?’ he asks, but we’re all aware that he knew she didn’t. Fucking Charlie. See what I mean? Later, Noirin says, on the back of what Charlie has told her, ‘If I stay this week I’m running fucking amok.’ Oh, just do one.

Can we just stop, for a minute? Lisa has just explained how if it wasn’t for her eyebrows, she would be a supermodel. Can we just let it sink in? Thanks. In all seriousness, I am worried that the focus on Noirin has dampened the hatred that should be going to Lisa and Charlie. Let’s keep it alive here on Big Bother.

Isaac then tells Lisa and Charlie, is retarded coded terms, that everyone in the house is an arsehole. Interestingly, he has told the right people that, but a) hasn’t included himself, and b) meant everyone else.

So, Noirin is evicted, and pretty much all the crowd boos. She tells Davina that she expected to be booed, and also that Isaac will leave. I do hope so. Judi James tells her that she has made Marcus a ‘house God.’

Watch the Bubbles

I would never share a bath with Sophie, even if Loaded paid me to and took pictures. Whilst sharing a bath with Rod, she farts deeply. Ew. Wow! Bea is in one stinker of a mood today. ‘You can’t even fart in this house without someone going, oh, what’s that about,’ she presciently states. Moments later, Lisa comes in and judges her egg cooking skills. Lisa seems somehow angry that Bea is making herself a fried egg. ‘You’re looking after yourself,’ she says to Bea, pointedly, then steals the last tea bag. ‘You’ve got to. No one else will,’ Bea replies. She’s in no mood for it, it seems. ‘Bea seems stressed,’ notes Siavash, later. ‘It’s sexual frustration,’ says Freddie. REALLY? SEXUALLY FRUSTRATED? Or is it just that she has to live in a house full of shit stirrers? (By the way, I’m not saying Bea isn’t a shit stirrer herself – in fact, she’s one of the worst – but still, it must be annoying to have to live with Lisa, at best.)

Now, talking of shit stirring, I have had an idea. It seems to me that Bea mostly stirs the shit between Marcus/Noirin/Siavash… And when Freddie was being all ’sexy’ with her yesterday, she immediately complained to Siavash. Does she fancy him, do you think? Let’s ponder on that.

Noirin now wants to be friends with Marcus again, so they go and have cuddles in their little hidey hole by the pool. NOT THAT HIDEY HOLE. Disgusting. Noirin often says she will be hated on the outside world, and she seems anxious about that – so why doesn’t she stop herself? Going back to Marcus and claiming she and Siavash are ‘just friends’ is awful.

Anyway, as the HMs are really bored, they are iven a task – to perform Something Kinda Ooh (one of the best Girls Aloud – no, wait – one of the best songs ever) and Could it Be Magic by Take That as boy and girl groups. Again, BB has not bothered to outdo itself with the tasks – we like watching them do difficult dance routines, right?

By the way, Bea has just told Siavash she ‘wants to be his girlfriend’. We all know, now, that it isn’t a joke. ‘Look at me. I’m perfect for you.’ Siavash then tells Noirin that Marcus, Freddie and Bea are not ‘positive’ about their relationship. Oh dear. Siavash is ruined for me.

As they are practising their dance moves, om nom nominations are announced. Of course, we know that Marcus and Noirin are up. But their reaction? Well, oddly, it’s Siavash who gets stressed, and goes and – cries? Weeps? Grunts? – in the toilet. Ah! He thinks it’s his fault, that’s why.

Bea moans about Freddie to Siavash again. ‘He’s a bit of a drama queen,’ she tells him. Blah blah blah. At least he doesn’t stir. It’s amazing how quickly I’ve gone off her. Then she goes on about how she wants to go to bed, but can’t, because Freddie will talk to her, so she hugs Marcus, kisses Noirin (not like that), and goes out for a fag with Siavash. Never mind: Noirin claims to be ‘happy’ this evening, and is dressed as a giant bee in a yellow hoodie and hotpants, and black tights. Anyway, at the end of it all, Bea goes and lies with Freddie and chat sweetly into his ear. POISON!

At least Siavash gets his chance to talk to Marcus. Marcus doesn’t kick off or anything, but nothing really gets said. ‘You could punch me,’ suggests Siavash.

The Most Foregone Conclusion In The World?

Forget today’s Murray/Roddick semi-on, this is the real competition: Freddie Halfwit, the toff with no social skills VS Sree, the rapist stalker pervert pain in the arse from India. Based on the crowd – who cheer Freddie, not even a mix, but a proper cheer, and pantomime boo Sree (as he deserves) – it’s not even going to be close.

Incidentally, I think we’re being fair and unbiased here at BB Towers, but if you disagree, let us know and we’ll tell you to do one.

Words cannot express how much I hate Kris’ pink swimming trunks. They’re so fucking Top Shop, designed by pricks to be worn by pricks who might want to appear to be vaguely metrosexual when on a beach so that they can seduce teenagers who don’t know better. He mounts Sophie Dogface in the early seconds of the show, which is nice. Inside, ignoring this brutal frottage, the housemates do the shopping list. Sree is – surprise surcockingprise – annoying as all heck, which makes Marcus do an impression of Sree. Important: it was an impression of Sree, NOT a racist impression of Indian people. In the garden, Kris and Rodrigo and Karly spur Sree on to make a complaint about Marcus. Oh, whatever.

(Incidentally, I hate these flashmob adverts, and most of all, I hate the twunt that’s singing loudest in the Total Eclipse one. He deserves to be fucking neutered.)

Sree and Marcus argue and both tell each other to shut up. There, that wasn’t hard, was it? Apparently it was, because Channel 4 drag this out for five minutes. FIVE MINUTES. It does end with Marcus threatening Sree a bit more than might have been necessary, and Sree saying that he’ll put Marcus “in a prison, and (you) will eat the dog food for ten years.” Which is brilliant, as Sree apparently thinks that every single prison in the world is the black hole of Calcutta. Noirin then tells Sree to shut up, and everyone stays quiet. Freddie then tells Sree he went too far, and Lisa – who is, honestly, an absolute cunny of a human being – and Kris leap on him and tell him to shut up. Brilliant, thanks guys – you are going to make Freddie win this thing. It’s like they’re playing games and cheating a bit but have forgotten that we can see them cheat. Considering how aware they are of being on TV this year, it’s really very naive.

Then, Marcus gets all threateny to Big Brother. They accuse him of being a bit racist, and he tells them to “step back”. He’s right – Marcus wasn’t being racist, he was being a dickhead, and there is a difference. That’s fucking off by Big Brother. I understand that they’re covering their arses, but he’s right – if it had been Noirin, he would have done an arrogant Irish accent; if it was Karly, a drunken whorish Scottish one. It was Sree, so he did an impression of his irritatingly repetitive voice. Marcus gets very angry, but I think he’s right to – you can’t accuse somebody of being racist and expect them to not get angry if they’re not being.

(These Lucozade sponsor adverts are so dreadfully unfunny I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that Kevin Bishop was behind them.)

Sree and Freddie then have a discussion about the gay gene, and how Siavash is dancing a line of ‘nearly-gay’. Siavash would sex Rodrigo if he had to, and Freddie would sex Siavash. Remember when Freddie said that he was gay? I do. Freddie then claims to be one of the most manly people he knows, and also the most feminine. I wonder how he thinks that he’s manly? Anyway, Marcus is then called into the Diary Room again, and reminded of the BB rules, chastised for his language earlier again. You can see him grit his teeth. Marcus’ slight suggestions of slight and vague threats are apparently enough to give him a proper telling off, or, as they call it, a formal warning. Any more and he’s taken out of the house. “Marcus, is there any more that you would like to say?” Big Brother asks, and Marcus nods. “Yes, you’re talking shit. Think about the words I’m saying. That is absolute bollocks.” I do think, a bit, that Marcus was being slightly threatening, but he didn’t physically touch the guy, and people are FULL of words in life with no intention of acting on it. Anyway, this is dull now, until Marcus claims that he could kill Sree with his eyebrow, and then it gets dull again. And it stays dull as people talk and talk and talk about it.

RIGHT, COME ON BIG BROTHER EDITORS, YOU AND ME, OUTSIDE, NOW, LET’S SORT OUT HOW FUCKING DULL THIS SHOW HAS BECOME!

Or not, because I was only saying.

(That Samsung advert that claims that waiting is dull but impatience is best? What they are really saying is that only twats use that phone, because every single one of the people in the “FUN!” section of the ad looks like an over-privileged and ignorant wanker that I wouldn’t be friends with if you paid. I certainly wouldn’t buy a phone that made me like them, now, would I?)

Sree then chats with Lisa and Karly about respect. AS IF THEY KNOW THE FUCKING MEANING. (Am I swearing more tonight? I don’t care.) And then Freddie calls the argument from earlier as he sees it: “It’s Sree’s massive ego attacking and defending. He doesn’t believe that Marcus was attacking him, he just wants to be right. He starts arguments by attacking people and then plays the victim. It’s awful, he’s awful!”

Freddie, ladies and gentlemen: THAT is why you should keep him in the house.

Anyway, Sree is evicted – 85% of the vote, which is a landslide – and then interviewed by Judy and Kelly Osbourne. Suddenly, Sree wasn’t the most irritating fuckhole in the room, as Kelly’s vacuous mouth spewed shit all over the audience. Incidentally, she clearly hadn’t been watching the show, as she didn’t know who Marcus was and couldn’t pronounce Noirin’s name, which just made her look ever worse. Thank God I don’t have to watch her for the next ten weeks, eh?

The first walk!

Well well, Saffia has WALKED, people. Apparently we will find out why tonight, and the eviction is still going ahead. Marvellous.

The Tao Of Troyer

Sweet Christ.

X-Factor! Bring On The Trumpets!

Voice Over Man – does a lot of work for all channels, like E4, you probably recognise his voice, eh? – shouts over Carmina Burana that lots of people auditioned, and here we are at the live shows. All the contestants have had make-overs, but I’ll deal with those as and when. Anyway, first up in this most exciting of live shows are Girl Band, which is an oddly damp squib: they are one of the acts I am least excited by. But wait a mo! They are singing Venus, off the advert by Bananarama. Voice Over Man shouts insanely at the end of the VT, yelling their name. After the performance – which is pretty good, actually, if not sounding a tiny bit like the original – Simon berates them for going with an “obvious” song. Still, claps all round, nearly. 

Oh! Austin Drage is next! I wonder which un-obvious song Simon has chosen for him? Sting. He chose motherfudging Sting. Every Breath You Take, to be exact. Will he cry? No. Instead he’ll whimper and sound a bit nervous, only opening his voice up towards the end of the performance. It’s pretty meh, all told, unlike his makeover, which is pure Teen-emo, all black fringes and done-up-to-the-collar black shirts and black jeans. But the performance… Well, look, the judges all seemed to like it, and that’s fine. But it really wasn’t much cop, not in the grand scale of things. It’s only a couple of weeks till they’ve got him singing Fall Out Boy, I should imagine, which can only be good for him. Well, Fall Out Boy or Bon Jovi/Bryan Adams. They’re all ROCK in Simon Cowell’s world, right?

The VT for Daniel Evans is surprisingly jolly: they fail to mention his dead wife at all, which is nice for them. I hate that people are made to ’special cases’ on this show when all they want to do is sing. Sad face. Anyway, he’s going to sing I Want To Know What Love Is, which he does really oddly. Faintly.   Slightly tunelessly.  Not very well at all-y. Simon pulls a face. It’s very very very cabaret, old son. When he’s done, Louis says he doesn’t like it, but he does like his “new teeth and earring.” Simon calls it “utterly irrelevant, like somebody singing in a pub.” He’s not wrong. Louis likens him to Ricky Gervais, but he doesn’t pronounce the final syllable of the show: he pronounces it French. Careful, Lou: Cheryl don’t speak French, remember? (Sorry.) When Dermot calls him on it, he pronounces it French again. Hm.

Alexandra Burke sings in restaurants, you know. I hate restaurant singers. I hate any form of restaurant entertainment, actually: I once went to a Greek restaurant for my birthday and was forced to dance with this horrific Greek belly dancer. It was awful. Anyway, she’s singing one of the best songs ever written, Whitney Houston’s I Wanna Dance With Somebody. She sings it really well because she doesn’t copy Whitney, which is the secret when covering that particular crack-fiend diva. She’s superb. Really, it’s a different class to the other acts thus far this evening, just a great performance all round. Surely destined for the finals, even at this early stage. Surely?

JLS appear now and tell us about their normal lives. They leave out the fact that one of them was in a boyband and supported Blue on tour – but then, if I’d been anywhere near Duncan and his syphilis I wouldn’t tell anyone either. According to Simon they have the “hardest song in the world to sing.” And that song is I’ll Make Love To You by Boys To Men. I can think of harder. The theme from Carmina Burana, for one. Good performance, though, if a tiny bit obvious. (I sound like Simon now.) When they finish the song, the crowd erupts in a flood of hormonal lava. Louis claps like he’s their collective Nan. Cheryl loves them (shocker) and says that it’s one of her favourite songs of all time (double shocker). They get good reviews all round, apart from their slightly dodgy tuning. Oh, and their name? Jack the Lad Swing, apparently. That makes even less sense.

Simon introduces Scott Bruton as being a “very very nervous young guy.” You can almost smell how much he didn’t want Scott to get through, eh?  Sinita must be terribly persuasive. Scott Bruton sounds ridiculous when shouted by Voice Over Man. Scott is singing a hyperactive version of… Hang on. I don’t know this song. It’s awful. It features “I say yeh yeh!” as the chorus.  It’s  dreadful. He’s barely singing, more speaking in time, and when he does sing it’s horrendous and weak and pained. Oh, hang on: the song is Yeh Yeh by Georgie Fame. Yeh yeh, my thoughts exactly. Still, nobody can accuse Simon of picking an obvious song, can they? “That’s the most hideous song ever on X-Factor,” Louis says. “Sack your mentor,” shouts Dannii. “That was the biggest Blue-coat song going,” says Cheryl. “I agree with them, Scott: I got this wrong,” says Simon. Scott looks like a kicked puppy. Very noble, Simon. Wait! He’s about to cry! Hang on! HE’S CRYING! Poor Scott. Send him home. 

During the ad break, the X-Factor competition does that thing where you have to ‘guess’ the word that they’ve honked out. They show a clip of Leon – remember him? from last year? he won? (I know, I thought that was Leona too! But that was two years back!) – anyway, they show Leon, and he’s still shocking. What were you playing at, last year’s viewing public? There’s also an advert for Boyzone’s greatest hits, which apparently features a B-Sides cd. I cannot fathom the quality contained therein.

Rachel Hylton is up next. You were told that she was trouble, riiiight? Anyway, she’s now got hair just like Rihanna. I didn’t know that she still had three kids in care. She’s singing a song that she claims is out of her comfort zone: Robyn’s With Every Heartbeat. Great song, AWFUL choice for Rachel. It sounds dreadfully Eurobeat here.  Simon and Louis look utterly mystified.  Cheryl calls Rachel better “than that track”. Simon calls the song “hideous.” Hm. He calls it “a cheap piece of rubbish,” which is a little unfair, although that version was quite shocking. Anyway, onto the most important thing: Rachel looks like a fatter, more-lesbiany Gabrielle in her suit. Bad look.

Diana Vickers next. “She’s like a little doll,” says Cheryl. She’s already looking a bit cleaner than she used to, which is good. Her lips have got some colour in them, making her look less like a 19th Century urchin. She’s singing With Or Without You. It’s acoustic and very quiet and very witchy. She’s being Stevie Nicks! Which is fine. She has a nice singing voice, and it’s a good performance, though I find her hands very distracting as they wave around like she’s on invisible-fire. (Was that a title of a U2 song as well? It might have been. That was unintentional.) She finishes, and it’s good, but a bit over-the-top and affected. Simon calls her the “singing version of marmite,” which is more than fair. He likes that she stands out and takes a risk. Bravo: couldn’t agree more. “You are special,” says Cheryl, and, let’s face it, she certainly looked it at times. She wasn’t wearing shoes, Dermot points out. She’ll get dirty feet like that, if they aren’t filthy already.

Right, time for Bad Lashes. Now, I hope this lot are good: for some reason I quite like them. A lot of it was their song choice last round, but that can only carry them so far. Tonight they are singing It Must Have Been Love. Good song. They perform it pretty well, actually. About the same standards as Girl Band. No, wait: It’s better. They’ve got a really good singer in there, somewhere, who keeps popping up in the mass-sung choruses. It all falls a bit at the end, but it was pretty good. Quietest cheer of the night so far, mind you. Hmmm. Cheryl “wouldn’t have chose that song,” she says, displaying fabulous Northern grammar, “I would have had you be a bit more indie,” which is totally right. Give them an Arctic Monkeys (or similar) song to sing girl-group style, and they’ll be great, I reckon. They could be the new Kenickie! God, I loved Kenickie.

Now it’s time for Ughan Eoghan Quigg. He’s at the stage in school where they choose their career, apparently. I must have missed that lesson. He’s singing Imagine! Did anyone watch American Idol last year? This is Simon trying to give us a British David Archuleta. This is horrific. I HATE this song when it gets turned into shmaltzy love song territory. Lennon wouldn’t hated this, I tells you! This is worse than when it was Idol, actually: it’s weak and slightly bland, as I’ve been arguing that this jobber is for weeks. Reedy, that’s the word. Reedy. All the judges think it was incredible. What’s wrong with them? Seriously? Are they deaf? Of just deafened by the sound of ringing cash registers? Simon says he’s proud of his little protege: I think he will try to adopt him, away from the war-torn third world of Narrrn Ireland.

Here’s Ruth Lorenzo. Will she sing in Spanish? I predict that Dannii will have given her a Gloria Estefan song to sing. Oh no! I’m wrong! She’s singing Take My Breath Away. In Spanish. Oh, for cluck’s sake. I wish she’d just sing in English. Oh! Now she is! She’s singing it quite well, but she’ll never win. Not a chance in hell. Cut to: Simon, perving at her a bit. She walks to the very front of the stage and they turn a wind machine on, blowing her hair back. I don’t know. It’s all a bit weddingy. “You definitely made an impression on me, Rachel,” says Simon, referring to his erection, and getting her name wrong in the process. “Sorry, I can’t even speak,” he says. “Louis doesn’t get you because you’re a real woman,” he says, and Louis protests (too much). “Oh, you fancy her?” asks Louis. “Absolutely!” says Simon. Maybe Terri will let him ‘do’ her? She seems like she would, if he asked nicely. Apparently she’ll be doing rock next week, according to Dannii. “NO NO NO!” yells Simon. Yeh yeh, says I. 

Last but not least, Laura (slightly off) White! She doesn’t look 17, does she? She’s looking less dirty as well. I can only assume that the girls’ stylist has banned that awful pale lipstick. She’s singing Falling, the over-played Alicia Keys song. The first note is horrendous. From there is gets better, just being a bit over-sung instead. It’s good, but over-sung. And she’s not good with high notes. Actually, this is generally quite dreadful, veering from bad R&B to sub-Bee Gees, and then ending very oversung indeed. But who cares what Big Bother thinks? This is all about the judges and the people at home, right? And Louis loves it, loves it (although he does think there’s “three or four amazing girls in your category,” a category of three), as does Dannii, and Simon. “Outstanding,” he calls it. Were they listening to something else? This happens, though, where things sound worse on telly than live. They’ll watch this back and question their judgement, I reckon. Remember Leon? Anyway, who cares, right? She’s never going home today. Not a chance. 

So, there’s your twelve. Who would you put your money on? Here at Big Bother we don’t really care. We only watch it for Simon, Louis, Dermot and Cheryl.

One More Day to Go, One More Day of Sorrow

Can you believe it? Just one day left. And god, it’s been a slog. Do you think this series has been the worst ever? Most people I have spoken to think so, although some have said they’ve still enjoyed watching it, even though they don’t like the housemates. These latter people clearly have no idea about the purpose of Big Brother. Rachel is crying in the bedroom because Kat has gone. It is sad, I know – Kat was very upset, which was upsetting in itself – but still. Get on with it, like. Well, Rex hasn’t enjoyed being a housemate. Oh dear! Pity you’re in the final, then! Rex tells Mikey and Rachel his hair is strawberry blond, which I think it is. “Strawberry blond my dick!” says Darnell.

Then BB plays crowd noise into the house “on a whim”, according to Marcus. “If I go, don’t pack shit,” says Darnell. “I didn’t even took a shower yet, you pricks!” says Darnell, like a true American. Then BB speaks. “Darnell, please stand up. Michael, please stand up. Rachel, please stand up. Rex, please stand up. Sara, please stand up… You are the remaining five housemates. BB would like to congratulate you and wish you luck for the final.” Hm. There was great wit in that, right? Sara screams a lot. “That was cruel!”

Now they have a task. They have to perform a rap about their time in the house. If they pass, they will be allowed to watch one full episode of this year’s series. They’ll probably be bored to sleep, but maybe that’s the idea. “Try to get into the groove of it,” Mikey advises Rachel, unhelpfully. Then he starts going on about “Mr Fishy”, though I have idea why. Sara’s rap practice is hirarious, and better than her singing by quite some way. (I always remember Rex asking her what put men off most about her. “Is it the voice?” he said. I laughed for about an hour.) Anyway, Darnell’s rap is really good, of course. Rex is really getting into it. “House full of cookie love, house full of baddy Bs” is the refrain (what is a baddy B?). Oh god, Rachel’s rap makes me want to cry. “As I walked into the Big Brother house I felt as lucky as a mouse.” Hm. Mikey’s is weird: he just shouts and goes on about “someone trying to murder me”. I am looking forward to Sara’s. It is so funny. She is off beat, her voice like a terrible, horrific foghorn. “I was not a happy camper!” she shouts, several times. Rex starts off really well, sounding like he’s doing a hirarious Will Smith impression, but then loses it in the middle.

Later, Sara asks Rex what happens at the final. She clearly, out of all of them, has not watched much or any Big Brother before. “It was hard today, this morning, waking up,” says Rachel in the diary room, still going on about missing Kat. Anyway, they pass the rap task, which means that they are allowed to watch an episode of BB. They pick from three episodes: when they enter the house, when they do the shock task, or when they do the cops and robbers task. Cops and robbers wins. I remember that episode. Oh yes. With Dale sneaking about with the token. Anyway, they are given fizzy  drinks and the episode comes on. Stu and Luke are being mean about Rachel. She looks confused, but laughs. Then the line-up with Nicole comes on. “So beautiful,” says Rex, as she appears. Rex nearly cries as he watches himself go on about Nicole in the diary room. “That’s amazing,” says Rex, as the episode comes to a close. Was it? Well, it wasn’t that interesting, watching them watch it. “That was the bomb!” yells Darnell.

“I don’t look very good on camera,” says Rex. “I don’t think I do, either,” says Sara. “I can’t wait to fix myself up.” I don’t know what she’s referring to – maybe Darnell’s comments about her having “small titties” have been playing on her mind. Rex opens his vintage champagne outside, while Mikey eats a Flake in bed. “I’m so glad to have made it to the end,” says Rachel. YES, I BET. She don’t deserve it, no doubt. Darnell rolls about under a blanket with Sara while singing The Automatic but changing the words to “is it a swallow”, which I think is dubious. “You should feel very good, leaving here,” says Darnell. “You’re clumsy as fuck, you can’t sing at all…” but Rex cuts him up by flapping the blanket. “There is spooning going on!” shouts Rex. Later, Darnell tries to do an impression of Geordie Marcus, but fails. Then Darnell examines Sara’s nails. “Can you guys stop being weird?” says Rex. THEN DARNELL SINGS DEM GIRLS. You remember Dem Girls, right? It’s amazing. Sara seems happy. “Ooh. I’m going to bed,” she says, which sounds dodgy. Then they hug. Darnell looks very happy. “You  two are weird,” Rex says. “Any time you have a drink you’re all over each other,” he says.

In the diary room, Mikey says “Next week, I won’t be on TV.” He seems to think every episode is full of “excitement”, which is clearly a joke. Darnell and Rex are talking about Sara. “I’ve been with Sara so long now that I’m comfortable,” says Darnell, as if they were married. “Keep it as friends,” advises Rex, master of relationships. (This is a joke, too.)  HO! SO ONLY ONE DAY TO GO! WHO WINS? Please not Mikey. For all our sakes.

(Not) Everybody Loves Darnell. And Rex. And Sara. And…

Gosh, Mikey’s blanket is lovely and brown, isn’t it? It looks ever so comfy. Darnell is fascinated by what people – specifically, blind Mikey, who is untouchable due to his “milking” (Darnell’s word) of his blindness – can get away with saying to other people. Well, aren’t we all, Darnell? I have to question how Mikey is still here, how he’s the odds-on favourite with every single bookies in the land to win. 

So, Rex reads out a Big Brother missive saying that they will all be dressing up as each other and, essentially, engaging in one gigantic mocking session for the rest of the day. The Darnell Piss-Take hour is up first, and the housemates all get shirts with DON’T LABEL ME on them, and short blonde afro wigs. This can only end really well, right? (We know how it ends: it ends with a surprise eviction, and floods of tears. Oh, boo hoo hoo.) So, in imitating Darnell, everyone shouts and rants and sings Cookie Love – I haven’t heard Dem Girlz yet, but I live in hope – and Kat’s impression is littered with wonderfully evocative swearing. Darnell runs around and acts weird, like a psychiatrist talking to himself, watching himself out of his body. “I learned that I have a big bad potty mouth,” Darnell says. No shit.

Impersonations of Mikey include goggles to make them blind, leopard-print jackets and blind sticks. During the impersonations, Mikey rolls around on the floor, and Rex mocks Mikey for fancying Rachel, which he clearly does. Everyone shouts “For fuck’s sake!” and bumps into things on purpose, and then Mikey goes into the garden and seems to have a fit, collapsing with laughter. Don’t know how he can see then to find them so funny: he’s blind, remember? 

Next up: Katreya impressions. Everyone sings “Happy House” over and over, and Darnell does a very witty impression that makes her sound crack addled. It’s a pretty single-levelled impression, but she’s an easy character. As is Rex. Everyone wears lovely white tracksuits and ginger wigs and blind and talks about how much money they have and how many restaurants they own. Oh, and Nicole. And cigarettes. And the cost of trousers. Rex is surprised that he always puts a price to things. “I suppose I am quite materialistic,” he says. “What sparkles makes me happy.” Which doesn’t explain Nicole. He’s annoyed at the ginger wigs. Huh. 

Oh, Rachel. The Sun described her, today, as WELSH BEAUTY. Really? Really?? To impersonate her everyone talks softly and sits quietly and doesn’t do anything. Mikey throws chickpeas everywhere, which is  just idiotic, and isn’t something that Rachel has ever done. As Rex says, it isn’t like he has to clean it up. Anyway, whilst impersonating Mo Mohammed the housemates get to listen to and sing along to Meatloaf. Now, we viewers know this is the moment that the eviction happens. It’s lovely to see them having such a good time. Their faces when the eviction is revealed is priceless! So, we’ve seen this: Bye Mo! I’ll forget about you pretty quickly! Darnell cries and apologises for nothing and then swats at a chair. And then he has to run to the loo to dry his face with toilet paper! Bless him. I like him again today. How will he react when Kat is booted? We’re about to see.

“Enough Big Brother enough, please,” says Kat, and then her names gets announced. “Please, no Big Brother, no,” weeps Rachel, like Kat is being sent off to be hanged. We should hang the contestants, actually. The winner gets some money, the losers a brutal form of corporal punishment. Darnell, for his part, sits on the floor and weeps. This is how they were at Auschwitz, you know? It’s very similar, and utterly comparable in terms of emotional resonance. Years from now people will visit this studio, stand in the middle, listen to the silence and the sounds of the ghosts and just thank God that they never had to go through anything like this for themselves. “I swear on my mother’s life I love you, Kat,” Darnell says, which is quaintly touching, actually. Everything else about this has been utterly pathetic. It isn’t until she goes that we see what they are really worried about: “Even Kat gets fucking boos!” says Rex, and that’s the crux of their real emotions: how far this goes for themselves.

“Who would have thought this combination, guys?” asks Mikey, about the final 5, and I have to agree with him. Never would have called this week 1. “I’m shocked Rachel out-did Katreya,” says Rex. So are the rest of us, Rex. Suddenly the housemates all realise that they could win this, and the talk turns to money. “Some people didn’t come in to win,” says MIkey, suggesting that he didn’t, but he’s lying. You do only go on BB to win, whether you say that or not. It’s a gameshow, lest we forget. Oh, it’s time for the Sara impersonation task… But we don’t get to see any of it. Not a jot, apart from the remnants of the costume – a black dress. Instead, we see them eating doughnuts which look delicious.

Darnell has a heart to heart with Sara, feels bad for hyping her to thinking she might win, and manages to get a hug out of it. Good one, D. Rachel, who is suffering PTSD apparently, sits in the Diary Room and talks about Kat leaving. “Why am I still here when she’s gone?” Apparently, she’s a mother who lost her child too soon in a made-for-TV movie. Well done Rachel. Rex has decided he’s going to entertain to win this, as he “owes it to the public.” You don’t have to owe me anything, Rex: Feel free to kill yourself now, and we’ll call it quits. Darnell is the happiest he’s ever been in the house due to this: “I don’t need no money, dude,” he says to Rex, “people like me.” 

Two days to go. Two more days. Two more days.