Behind Big Brother: where to from here?
- Published by David Knox
- on
- Filed under News
The news of the death of Big Brother is gaining the show more publicity than most of its recent stunts. No doubt fans, ex-housemates and production staff are still reeling from the shock.
Another coming to terms with the show’s demise is the fansite behindbigbrother.com, which has long a tradition of calling the show to account. It has frequently broken stories, speculated, rumoured, gossiped and provided an alternative forum to the show’s official website. It does this with a passion for the format logging both supportive and critical stories. But as the show itself now winds down, where to for the website and its legion of fans?
Site Administrator David, shared his thoughts with TV Tonight on the end of the format, together with what it means for the site itself.
“Reality TV is still a relatively new form and ways to give it longevity are still being attempted. When you look at Big Brother Australia as a whole the show has still managed to catch over 500,000 viewers almost every night which is a fairly impressive feat. Not good enough for some it seems, and this is most definitely one of the reasons why Ten have dumped the show,” he said.
“The dumbing down of our series has also added to its demise. In the first few years it was more about the psychology of a group of humans being cut off from the real world and placed into a manipulative space. The concept was brand new for Australia and no one was quite sure how it would be taken and exactly what would happen. Then EP Peter Abbott did a fabulous job and it was a shame to see him go.
“Compare those seasons with what we’ve been fed over the past few years and the show has been overwhelmingly dumbed-down with cookie-cutter housemates, the same tasks, predictable twists and much less of a focus on the true concept.
“It’s a shame the Australian series isn’t as successful as the UK series, which has been running for nine strong years now and is recreated year after year with things no one would ever expect. That said, the UK version isn’t perfect either.”
The sudden end of Big Brother will have huge ramifications for the website which devotes around three months of the year to the series, and another three to another TEN reality series, Australian Idol, via a second site.
“Plans for BBBA are up in the air at the moment as we’ve been caught off guard as much as everyone else,” said David.
“Our off-season forums will remain live and as we head into the next Australian Idol season the sister site BehindIdol.com will relaunch,” he said.
Even without the show that inspired them, the message from the BBBA team is “we’re not going anywhere.”
In other BB news, TEN will screen Sunday’s eviction from 7pm – 8:30pm following a half hour Daily show.
6.30pm BIG BROTHER
7.00pm BIG BROTHER – EVICTION
8.30pm ROVE
9.40pm DEXTER
10.50pm FLIGHT OF THE CONCHORDS
11.25pm FORMULA ONE GRAND PRIX
1.40am VIDEO HITS UP-LATE
2.00am HOME SHOPPING
11 Responses
Asde101, Pamela is from Canada.
As much as it’s been loathed by some, BB has created a very steady income for many many people.
Anna Bligh commented on the potential loss of jobs and production talent for QLD with BB ending, but so many others involved in fan based activities/businesses will be heavily affected.
I’m just so sad that BBBA is ending. i couldn’t sleep the other night knowing i will never visit behindbigbrother.com. We’re a family there.
the moderators are basically my brothers and sisters who i barely speak to.
but, a few days later i’m strong. i have to be strong. btw, my userblog is the highest ranking one. what will i do now. oh i know, gettalife!
The US season is about to start its 10th season, Pamela who said they did not have a show like Big Brother in America obviously does not watch much TV.
Anyway the whole problem with the show was censoring it, Lees single and out-there Housemates the show itself is not stale just the people they choose.
This year has had the most boring lot ever and that is thy it is failing.
I know I was just having fun Dave!
And that Idol site is no where near as popular or frequently visited as that Big Brother Site.
As indicated above the team already does more than BBBA. The point of the article was to show they reassessing what they do. Given their track record THEY are “not going anywhere” even if BB isn’t necessarily the future focus.
lol@ “we’re not going anywhere.”
Its like you have to yell at the guy “That’s it!! Its over dude!!”, does one hang around the movie theater after the credits have rolled?
It is one TV show after all, everyone from the hosts, the network the crew are moving on, is one going to try remain in that same period of life complaining about the past and trying to re-capture the glory days?
Its like opening a scene on a dusty highway, pan across to a car pulling up out front an old rundown house. The car stops as we reveal an old man in a rocking chair with a laptop rested on his knees. The occupant of the car gets out and makes his way to the old man.
The old man states he runs the website “Behind Big Brother” and when the driver looks at the laptop, he finds that it isn’t turned on, its not even plugged in.
I agree with God (LOL).
You don’t care. Please don’t speak for the rest of the Australian population.
Matthew, I care!
I couldn’t stand the show (when we were forced to see the end of it in order for the next program). I think another reason viewership dropped, is cause it almost always ran overtime and filled up so much airtime. Last week, it was on almost 4 times more than BB US which is consistently on 3 hours per week. If it was only on a few hours per week, and didn’t run late, then i’m sure it wouldn’t be axed now, as it wouldn’t have irritated as many people as it did.
Honestly, who cares? I look forward to the day when Australian Idol and SYTYCD get axed… It took 8 years for BB, I can wait another 8 more.