Big Brother is 100 days, making it the longest season ever. Here’s why the reality series should stick to a shorter timeline in the future.
Big Brother 25 is the longest season in the show’s history at 100 days, but this timeline might’ve been a mistake. In order to celebrate the reality competition series’ milestone season, Big Brother made the game more challenging than ever, including stretching the game out for 100 days. Big Brother premiered in 2000, and lasted 88 days. Since then, the game has varied in length. The shortest seasons were Big Brother: Over the Top, which aired on CBS All Access and lasted 65 days, and Big Brother 10, which ran for 71 days. Big Brother began to supersize its seasons in 2013 with Big Brother 15, which lasted 90 days.
This was followed by Big Brother 16 (97 days), Big Brother 17 (98 days), Big Brother 19 (92 days), and Big Brother 18, 20, and 21 (99 days). Big Brother 22: All-Stars had an 85-day time frame, followed by Big Brother 23 with the same amount of days. Big Brother 24 was 82 days, making it about two and a half weeks shorter than Big Brother 25. Although viewers love Big Brother, the seasons that last 99 days or more are way too long for many reasons. Big Brother 25 in particular is proving why shorter seasons are better.
The Big Brother 25 Houseguests Seem Burnt Out
The Big Brother 25 houseguests began the game on August 2, excited, fresh, and ready to play the game. However, as the weeks have dragged on, they seem burnt out. They’ve spent a lot of their downtime sitting around in their robes. In particular, Survivor legend Cirie Fields seems increasingly checked out of the game ever since her two closest allies, Izzy Gleicher and son Jared Fields, were evicted. Cirie was unhappy to receive a punishment in which she had to change into a superhero costume in a phone booth, and perform various tasks around the house.
Although many previous houseguests have been enthusiastic and excited about receiving punishments because they’re a Big Brother rite of passage, Cirie couldn’t wait to get her latest one over with. Cirie had much more fun with the punishment she shared earlier in the game with Felicia Cannon, when they had to move around the house in a kayak for 48 hours together. However, this late in the game, Cirie seems to just want to be left alone, and who could blame her? It has to be very taxing to be in the game for this many days.
Powers & Twists Are Falling Flat
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Big Brother 25 has tried to spice up the game by introducing twists and powers. However, this late in the game, they’ve become more frustrating than exciting for both the houseguests and the viewers. In week 11, the Power of Invisibility and the Power of Multiplicity were unleashed into the game by the BB Comic-Verse. The Power of Invisibility shielded the Head of Household (HOH) Jag Bains’ identity, and therefore gave him the privilege of playing in the next HOH competition as well. The Power of Multiplicity doubled the Power of Veto, so both Blue Kim and Jag won them.
Since Blue was Jag’s original target, her Power of Veto win set Jag’s plan in motion to finally blindside showmance Cory Wurtenberger and America Lopez. However, before that, his nominees, Blue and Felicia, were very safe choices. Felicia even pointed out to him, when she suspected that he was the invisible HOH, that he didn’t need the Power of Invisibility to make that move. The twist fell a bit flat, especially since Jag told everyone that he was the invisible HOH in the end.
These powers were introduced so late in the game to keep things interesting, but they would’ve had a bigger impact earlier in the game when there were more people, and Jag had more of an incentive to keep his secret. However, because the game is so long, new powers and twists have to be introduced in order to keep it interesting. The problem is that they’re preventing the houseguests from strategizing the way they should be at the end of the game.
It’s interesting that the shortest Big Brother season, Big Brother 10, is also considered one of its greatest. Declared a “back to basics” season, it didn’t feature any major houseguest twists, such as exes, secret partners, or family members. It was pure Big Brother, with 13 complete strangers competing for the grand prize. Winner Dan Gheesling was able to work his magic with his own strategy, unaffected by random twists that would throw a wrench in his game, although he was America’s Player for a week. The shorter length of the season made for a tight, exciting game without any superfluous distractions.
Big Brother 25 Is Running Out Of Ideas
Big Brother 25 feels about two weeks too long, with twists being added to fill the time. A great example of this was Scary Week, when evicted houseguests-turned-Zombies, Cameron Hardin and Jared, had the chance to resurrect their games after being eliminated during the double eviction. Rather than have a single, quick Battle Back competition and send one of them right back into the house, Big Brother had them compete for a whole week in the Resurrection Rumble, a three-round competition that determined which of them would get to choose if he wanted to play in the Do or Die competition.
Although it was exciting to watch this play out between Cameron and Jared, the game was essentially put on pause for the other houseguests. There were no HOH or Power of Veto competitions that week, which meant that the houseguests spent most of their time listening to Cameron and Jared try to rebuild their relationships with them, rather than strategizing for their own games. It was a drawn-out and rather anticlimactic week, as competition beast Cameron easily won his way back into the house. It felt like filler to have the competition last a whole week, rather than have a traditional Battle Back competition and keep the game moving along.
Big Brother 25 Is Dragging
Big Brother 25 is so long that the major events and moves from the beginning of the game feel like the distant past. From Felicia’s week 3 blindside and backdoor of Hisam Goueli during her HOH reign to Matt Klotz saving Jag from his unanimous eviction with the Power of Invincibility in week 4, there are major game moves that have been all but forgotten at this point. The game is slowly dragging on, leaving viewers hungry for its conclusion.
In Big Brother 25, the jury started in week 11 because there are seven houseguests on it instead of nine. This means that, including Luke Valentine, who was expelled for using a racial slur, eight pre-jury Big Brother 25 houseguests are now watching from home. The early evictees now have almost no bearing on the game because they were evicted so long ago. If the game were shorter, early moves would still have an impact, which would raise the stakes and make the game much more challenging and thrilling. No one would’ve had time to take the risk to sit back and throw competitions in the beginning of the game.
Big Brother 25 is a good example of why 100 days is too long for the game. As the competition continues on, the houseguests seem over it and ready for it to end. In addition, some of the twists feels like filler, as the weeks need something to keep viewers interested. Shorter games also create a sense of urgency for the houseguests because they have to play hard from the very beginning. This makes for a better Big Brother game experience for the houseguests, as well as the viewers.
Big Brother 25 airs Sundays at 10 p.m. EDT, Tuesdays at 8 p.m. EDT, and Thursdays at 9 p.m. EDT on CBS.