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"Big Brother 3" Review By Shawn McKenzie 07/13/2002 Do you know what drives me crazy lately about some reality shows lately? It’s when they claim to be completely new and improved, and you can’t tell the difference between the “new-and-improved” and the “old-and-outdated!”
In other words, this season of CBS's “Big Brother” so far looks like it will be the same as the last season. There are a few changes physically, like new toys (a hot tub), new pets (an iguana), new skylines (the banning of the banners being flown over the house), host Julie Chen is wearing tighter clothes, and the contestants are much better looking people, but it is essentially the same format-wise (unless they pull a Mark Burnett-like twist halfway though the season.)
This may sound like I am trashing the show. On the contrary, I am in fact not trashing the show itself, just the false promises of it being “new-and-improved.” I liked “Big Brother 2” and thought that it was a vast improvement over the first season. “Big Brother 3” does not have to claim to be better than last season, because last season I believe they got the formula right.
The first season went wrong because of a variety of reasons. The way the rules were set up allowed the show to boot the most interesting contestants first (remember the militant black man and the stripper? They were the first two to go!) The competitions consisted of a bunch of arts and crafts. Finally, it got old because it aired almost every night of the week (remember ABC’s brilliant strategy of doing just that with “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?”) It got boring after awhile.
“Big Brother 2” changed the voting-out process, dumped the arts and crafts, and scaled it down to three nights a week. It made for a compelling summertime guilty pleasure. The only thing I objected to was the show’s initial decision to not tell the contestants about the 9/11 terrorist attacks, especially since one of the contestant’s cousin worked in the World Trade Center.
If “Big Brother 3” ends up being exactly like “Big Brother 2,” I’ll be satisfied. I’ve only seen the first two episodes, and it looks to be on par with last season. Most of the contestants are acting as if they have seen the first two seasons, plus a few of the seasons of “Survivor.” Immediately after a few of the contestants are done with the first challenge on the first day (a food challenge where they have to sit in a tree the longest), they start forming alliances and deciding on who they are going to nominate for eviction. Whether or not they will split into groups based on age and come up with goofy names like last season’s Chill Town remains to be seen.
If you liked last season of “Big Brother,” you will like this one. I still kind of hope that something new will happen, but as they say, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!”
Ratings System:
DO NOT MISS THIS SHOW!
Try to catch this show every week...
If a better show is on, tape this one...
If nothing else is on, maybe this will be good...
If this show is on, change the channel immediately!
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