Josh Rosenblatt Week 1 - A Game of Human Chess: Big Brother

 To this point, the latest season of my favorite TV show, Big Brother, has been lackluster to say the least.  It has started off very slowly with different members of the same alliance being Head of Household (HoH) each of the first three weeks.  The main targets for the majority of the house have been the same every week; Kaysar Rhida and Janelle Pierzina.  The first HoH, Cody, wanted to put up the pair for eviction, but he wasn’t able to due to Kaysar winning safety and extending it to Janelle.  Memphis, the HoH of week 2, was friendly with Janelle and Kaysar and knew he could use them for information.  Thus, he elected not to target him even though his allies wanted to.  Last week, Tyler became HoH and finally put the pair up on the block next to each other, basically guaranteeing that one would go home.  After neither won the power of veto to save themselves, Janelle ended up being voted out of the house in a 9-2 vote.  

I am extremely excited for the next few weeks of Big Brother All Stars 2.  The game is going to have to pick up, as once Kaysar inevitably is voted off this week, the big alliance will have to turn on each other.  There has been no shift in power to this point, but that will change.  This was evident in the first all star season (14 years ago) where the same alliance, who Janelle and Kaysar were a part of, won HoH in each of the first four weeks.  This was until one member of the group realized he wasn’t going to make it far if he didn’t turn on his alliance.  This will happen in this season too.  The big, strong guys (Cody, Memphis, Tyler) will realize that they won’t want to go far in the game together as they will prove too strong as competition to each other.  I expect smaller alliances to form with people who, while not physically dominant, are strategically savvy.  It's an all star season after all, these people know how to play the game and make it far.  They know their mistakes or winning games in a few cases and want to adjust properly.  Chess doesn't end after four moves, and neither does big brother.