If you caught last night's episode of Big Brother, you may have a general idea of how the first eviction is going to go this Thursday night, as Head of Household GinaMarie nominated McCrae and Amanda for eviction and the whole house seems to be on board to get them out. Of course, anything can happen between now and Thursday. It's at this point that I'll offer the SPOILER warning. I'm going to discuss who won the Veto and whether or not it was used ahead, along with some speculation on who's most likely to go home on Thursday.
Ok, you've been warned! Here's what's been going on on the Live Feeds.
McCrae won the Veto. He took himself off and Spencer was put up in his place. In all likelihood, Amanda will be sent packing on Thursday.
That's the update as of right now. As I said, anything can happen. We've yet to see a Pandora's Box open up this season, and while I can't imagine GinaMarie would use whatever gift she might receive to save Amanda, there's always the chance of a second Veto or a coup d'etat power making its way into the house this week.
Let's talk about what's been going on in the house. As you saw in the episode, Amanda was convinced GinaMarie would put up Elissa. Watching the feeds, I actually thought she was really just acting confident about that in the hopes that she could will it to be true. But from the start, GinaMarie was always planning on putting up McCranda. Sure, Amanda can talk about how she and McCrae were never coming after GinaMarie, but I think they would've sent GM packing if she'd been put up against Aaryn last week. And from GM's perspective, she stands a better chance at sticking with the Exterminators alliance right now than she does trying to trust McCranda. GinaMarie was only ever linked to them through Aaryn, and she says Aaryn told her to target McCranda, so that's what she's doing.
While Elissa seemed eager to get Amanda out, it was looking like Judd and the rest of the house was leaning toward evicting McCrae. I think on an individual level, everyone knows McCrae would be harder to beat in the final two than Amanda. And given how Amanda's been acting lately, I'm inclined to agree with that. Even if she could take credit for a lot of the bigger moves that took place earlier in the season, her attitude in the house, which has shifted repeatedly from being angry and yelling at people (mainly Elissa) to crying, hasn't earned her any points among the jury members. I feel like any cloud she might have garnered herself for her game moves will have gotten lost in that mess as her social game crumbled. On that, I blame too much time lounging and not enough time working on her relationships with people. McCrae hasn't made a whole lot of big game movies, but between the two of them, people might see him as a bigger threat in a Final-2 scenario, as he doesn't have a lot of enemies.
But McCrae's not going, at least not first. He won the Veto and all signs pointed toward him using it on himself, though Judd, for some reason, thought he was going to be able to convince McCrae to use it on Amanda, assuring him that he'd be safe if he did. No one else seemed to believe that was going to happen and they were right.
Amanda seemed blindsided by the nominations, but I don't think either she or McCrae were foolish enough to think either of them was ever a pawn in this situation. One of the first things Amanda pointed out after the nominations was that the whole house must have been involved in this, because there was no way GinaMarie would risk putting them up if she didn't have the votes to get one of them out. Granted, GM really only needs two votes (with her being the tie-breaker), and she'd have those in Elissa and Judd, but it seemed like Amanda realized Spencer and maybe even Andy had turned on them. So I don't think McCrae had any reason to think he'd be safe if he stayed on the block and took Amanda down.
Their last big effort to save themselves was to urge GinaMarie to put Elissa up on the block as McCrae's replacement. IF there's anyone they could get the house to unite against, it's probably her, as people's involvement with Elissa seems to border on maybe-friends (for Judd) and tolerance for Andy, Spencer and GinaMarie. GM was willing to listen to their arguments, and she gave off the false impression that she was considering it, but it seems evident - especially with last night's diary room sessions where she repeatedly reminded us that she's GinaMarie - that she wants to send Amanda or McCrae out the door on Thursday no matter what. I don't know why she thought it was better to blindside McCranda with the nominations, or why she was giving them false hope that she might save them, unless it was to keep Amanda from going nuts again like she did on Elissa. Or maybe she thinks being nice about it will earn her a jury vote from Amanda in the end. There's always that. Either way, from what we've seen, there was no indication that GM was ever considering getting anyone out besides McCrae or Amanda.
Spencer was put up in Amanda's place, which all but assures that Amanda will go home. Spencer's this season's pawn, and at the rate he's going, he could make it to at least the final three before someone cuts him loose. Or he'll be taken to the end because, aside from his willingness to be nominated every other week and vote with the group (usually) he's done very little in this game in the way of power moves.
I'm more curious to see how McCrae does on his own once Amanda is gone. He may very well be sent out the door immediately after she is, since there's a double eviction this week. Or he'll manage to squeak through and who knows? The exterminators could turn on one another.
