★★★★★ 0/5

Big Brother

Nine's Big Brother is a faithful return to a watercooler format, but so far the cast is very white and very young.

40
Leave a comment

Big Brother has entered the building after an absence of 5 years, this time on Nine.

New host Sonia Kruger shuffled onto the Dreamworld stage via a huge neon eye before an enthusiastic crowd. Early nods from the first series, including narrator Mike Goldman and a catwalk (now running parallel to the stage) were all there.

A confident Kruger showed us glimpses of the house, most of which had already been published by weekend newspapers. It’s a bright mix of retro and contemporary, pool and garden, and includes a “Secret Room.” The diary chair is hot red and black leather.

The first housemate is Michael: 26, copywriter from Qld. Hairy, unshaven, admits he “looks funny” and could double for Tim Minchin. He is the first to enter the house. “I need to go the toilet,” he says. “This is the worst because I know I’m being filmed.” Michael is quick with the punchlines and should become an early favourite. “Laundry, that’ll happen.”

Next up is Sarah: 30 Car Sales Person from NSW. “I love a chat,” she says. She enters a Parlour Room where she can watch Michael via video.

She is followed by:

Angie, 21 Sales Rep from Qld. “I want to be a girly girl,” she says. “My friends call me Mange because of the way I eat. I love to eat slobby foods.”

Zoe, 23 Student, a 6 foot girl from the NSW bush, who has never had a boyfriend. “I don’t like rude people,” she says. Zoe is a conservative and doesn’t agree with “boat people.” Should prove to be outspoken.

Layla. 23 Unemployed from Manchester, living in Queensland since February. “My bad habit would be that I don’t shut up.” She’s hoping for a surfer dude in the house with a big surfboard.

Josh. 28 Musician, lead singer in a band from South Australia. “I pretty much live pay cheque to pay cheque,” he says. “Mum would describe me as a lovely boy.” Surfer. He enters the house and joins Michael, both now watched by the girls in the Parlour room.

4 more housemates enter:

Charne, 32 Pin up Girl, works at Dracula’s on the Gold Coast. “Do your own thing, that’s my mantra,” she says. “I’m not anyone else, but myself.” Nicknames: Chaa or Va-Va.

Estelle, 23, Law student from Victoria. “Humanitarian law is something I’d really like to get into,” she says. Describes herself as “a little bit street,” and “a debate queen.” Dislikes anyone who is racist, cruel to animals, homophobic, or sexist. Cool.

Stacey. 24 Account Manager from NSW. Nickname ‘Totes.’ This city lover says, “Maybe I’m too much but maybe someone will like me one day for that.” Could be Julia Zemiro’s doppleganger?

Hmm. There’s a lot of big hair in this house…

Finally another male arrives: Bradley, 18 ‘Checkout chick’ from Coraki, New South Wales. “I would call myself a geek and proudly. Talking to a girl is like talking to an alien for me.” He has never gotten to second or third base with a girl. Bradley also stutters. Should prove a popular inclusion.

With all of the females in the Parlour, Big Brother set the girls a challenge -to match up the boys with their secrets.

They are:
I have the IQ of a genius.
I have Ornithophobia as a result of an emu attack.
I have been fired from every job I ever had.
I haven’t had a girlfriend since I was 11.
I am a juvenile offender.
I have dated more than 100 women.
I am a multi-millionaire.

The girls have one week to match the secrets but forbidden from direct questions. With that they entered the house and joined the boys.

“It’s like an infinite supply of women,” observed Bradley.

4 more males will enter the house this week, including 2 on Tuesday in a Live event (1 will be the multi-millionaire).

It’s great to have Big Brother back on the telly, the social experiment aspect to the show can throw up so many surprises. But casting wise I feel like it’s similar to previous years.

They are predominantly young. They are all so, so white. Nine, where is the diversity, please? You’ve cast with the same approach you take to The Block. Keep ’em white, keep em young.

This show sorely needs some ethnicity. It is screaming for someone who arrived as an asylum seeker to trigger some discussion and understanding. Former housemate Merlin put that topic on the table years ago. I hope that’s coming in the next few males, but by the same token I’d be very concerned about one person from a multi-cultural background being in there on their own.

The age range 18-32 is very narrow. No eye candy yet. Is anybody gay this year? Granted it’s only early days, but first impressions are so terribly important in the current TV landscape.

Also looks like we will be getting a BB dog. Red Dog nod?

Sonia Kruger will fit very well as host. I look forward to her settling into very big shoes and giving us her trademark wit.

Camera work in the auditorium was awkward. Backs of heads? Really?

I also feel like the secrets (and we use that term loosely for some) have been disclosed too early. Farmer Dave had a secret in previous Big Brothers. Logan twins was a compelling secret. “I haven’t had a girlfriend since I was 11,” is no secret….

A lot of the conversation, including with Sonia Kruger, was about wanting to find partners, so I’m not convinced the show has necessarily revamped. But on first impressions it is at least a faithful return to what has been, and can still be, a watercooler format.

Whether it can succeed will come down to the mix of these 14 people. Will we like them? Will we be hooked by their social interaction? Or will they just be another batch of twenty-somethings with inane conversations that feel like every other season of the show?

One way to find out. I’ll be watching….

Big Brother airs 7pm weeknights on Nine.

40 Responses

  1. It just all felt very flat for some reason.

    For the premiere episode after many years off air, I expected more Wow factor.

    I’ll stick with it for a week or two but I also wonder whether I’m now too old to watch that demographic day in, day out.

  2. As a long time BB fan, this show felt different. Hated the on screen graphics, you can tell it’s an extremely low budget show. Also felt the interviews between Sonia and the Housemates awkward and didn’t see a point to them. But I do love the house and the housemates

  4. I’ve always loved BB and am just so excited to have it back,so any opinions I have will almost,certainly favour it.
    At first I was a bit surprised,like most people,that there wasn’t more diversity and ethnicity involved.I then realised perhaps ‘family friendly’ was their polite way of meaning non offensive and appealing to the majority of the masses,however Australia is a young multi-cultural country and that should have been addressed with a broader range of people.Aside from that I think they have chosen some interesting personalities and I’m sure we will see some clashes along the way(I hope so).Oh yeah one last thing,when some of the girls came out,they actually looked like the girls they would reject on the promos,had to smile.

  6. I do not understand how anyone can knock ch9 for lack of diversity….there is a foreigner in there, someone from Manchester UK which is the other side of the world. How can you get more diverse than that?

  8. Agree with dan, without an uncut show or live streaming the show loses the social experiment angle which is the only thing I like the show for. It’s 2012, pretty ridiculous to not be offering an online 24 hour option. The housemates are very waspy so far, but I guess we can’t really judge, for all we know 80% of the people who applied were white Australians aged between 18 and 35. And I would much prefer people being picked on the basis of personality instead of adding tokens just to not appear racist.

  9. Show was fun but I don’t see myself sticking for the long term unless there’s something truly dramatic to shake things up from the formula.

    Also like you I am severely disappointed by the lack of diversity. If you don’t have at least one or two people of a vastly different ethnicity people are going to call you racist.

    Not saying it’s right but it’s the way things are in 2012.

  10. Overall, it’s a fairly solid reboot from first impressions. However, it is very anglo and it already seems like once the shine has tarnished, we’ll have the same old same old again…maybe not…who can tell? Was it just me or did two housemates refer to Sonia Kruger as Gretel “…thanks Gretel” when she gave them their farewell hugs?

  11. I liked it but it will be very interesting to see the ratings tomorrow one thing that I really really hate is that there is no live streaming come on channel 9 you need live streaming so that we can see the real housemates

  12. I saw about 4 minutes total in between ad breaks of The Amazing Race, and I’ve seen enough.

    Watching people in their early 20s talk about wanting to find partners between oh my gods and wows…. I guess I really am getting old!

  14. David, I agree with you about the camera work during the opening introduction. The shot was changing every couple of seconds and had very odd choices, especially the shot behind Sonia’s head. I’m not sure if they were trying for a visual mataphor about the number of cameras that will be watching you from every angle, but it just came across as control room work experience.

  16. When i first saw Michael i was convinced his secret was that he was wearing a wig. Way too early to form an opinion as characters need time to develop but not sure if i will watch again. I watched most of BB on Ten but found nothing to get me excited with this one. I am older now and probably have moved on so hopefully they can find a new audience. Agree on the white casting comment. This does not represent the people we see on our streets today.If Nine want to be the new Ten they will have to get rid of the old world thinking.

  17. Pre recorded? I was expecting it to be live. I left for 20 minutes, missed the secrets , but then I noticed they were heading to bed at 2:11. It surely can’t be that hard to have a live opening show can it?

  18. Hey David, can I make a teeny-weeny criticism of your article? Re Josh: We get pay cheques here in Australia – and in most of the rest of the English speaking world too. It’s only the US that get pay “checks” because they can’t spell “cheque”. 🙂

  20. I thought BB was better than I expected. I didn’t even notice, or care that there was a lack of ethnic people and I’m visibly ethnic myself. I thought the girl from the UK said she was part Maori. But it’s pointless having one genuine asylum seeker on the show when many of them are bogus claimants anyway. I think it wouldn’t be representative, instead it would be seen to be peddling a far-left political agenda. I did find it odd how BB said not to ask questions blatantly about the secrets, yet one of the female housemates did seem to ask questions that were borderline direct. I hope the show lives up to the hype. I think it’s so far so good. There are some interesting characters there.

Leave a Reply