OH BROTHER

You have been evicted…

As Big Brother 10 limps towards its unseemly denouement on Friday it would be fashionable, even timely, to join the procession putting the boot-in. Yet while the ailing patriarch of all reality TV formats has undoubtedly spawned some hateful mutant offspring – and let’s not dwell too long here on the likes of The Farm, Celebrity Love Island, Totally Jodie Marsh or any of the Jade Goody vehicles – it’s still cooked up some rich entertainment for those ardent but diminishing minions still prepared to trough gamely through the dross.

A couple of years back, a small cabal of friends decided to enhance our Big Brother viewing by filling in a simple questionnaire during the launch show. Nothing particularly demanding to this: some gut reactions/first impressions on housemates as they walked in: Winner, Potential Couple, First Evictee, Worst and Best Hair – and for this series at least – the inaugural Big Brother’s Biggest Twat. Since that night these scrawled and crisp-greased musings have been stored in a dark recess of the magazine rack. But with the final imminent let’s see what they reveal – if anything – about our six potential winners…

CHARLIE

Rather succinctly dubbed ‘northern queen’ by one correspondent, the suede-headed Geordie inevitably elicited some abuse from our Mackem correspondent (‘Shearer’s secret cock buddy’), others suggesting that despite having ‘no neck… I don’t mind him’ and ‘won’t be lonely in BB10’. There was also speculation – right, sort of – that he would make a firm BB couple with Rodrigo, and also with Cairon (a contestant whose impact was so negligible it’s a wonder his mother remembers him. Hold on, isn’t that his first single coming out with BB9’s albino soul boy Darnell any moment now? Doh!)

LISA

‘Male chicken!’ is our first dispatch here, a rib-tickling satirical reference to the Brum girl’s fetching red Mohican on entry, while others thought she was ‘severe’, ‘too macho… but may calm down’ and a ‘female Napoleon – bound to be trouble’ and had a ‘fat arse’.  Lisa also figured in some other categories (winner of Best Hair, nominated for Worst Hair and as a Potential Couple with Angel). And yet despite some early gobbiness and a spot of class war with Freddie, Lisa could well be the dark horse come Friday.

RODRIGO 

Who couldn’t simply adore the chubby-cheeked, Royal-loving Brazilian? Well, us lot, it seems. A small measure of censorship prevents me posting one frankly offensive comment from my unreconstructed next door neighbour, while others seemed apathetically unsure what to make of him with notes ranging from ‘pretty, vacant’ to ‘possibly most genuine and nice’. Who knows? Even now. 

SOPHIE

After Siavash – and a smidgen behind early evictees Sophia and Beinazar – the erstwhile Dogface was given severely short shrift by our correspondents. ‘All body no brain!’ went one, others opining ‘dislike… empty… fool…’,  ‘clichéd dumb blonde’ and ‘Jordan junior’. Yet despite a revealing first night outfit no great amorous predictions were made, only odd ones like the enigmatic ‘I liked her puppy’. What does this mean?

SIAVASH

In two years of predictions no-one has attracted such unbridled opprobrium and even seething dislike as Siavash. It may just be that he was last in, dressed very ostentatiously and we’d all had more than enough by then, but the inaugural Biggest Twat champ was on the wrong end of comments like ‘up his own arse’, ‘self-obsessed spawn of the stupid dead’ and ‘fucking horrible’, the only olive branch being ‘intrigued if he can live up to his self-image’. Odds-on favourite then.

DAVID

Sheffield’s charity shop Vivienne Westwood enthusiast was mercifully spared our poison pens – the sole survivor of the second batch of BB10 contestants – so it would be unfair to speculate what hackles might have been raised. On the other hand it would be a minor travesty if he’s not shown the door during tonight’s first eviction.

AND THE WINNER IS…

As it stands it’s a three-horse race between Siavash, Sophie and Lisa – though it’s never wise to second-guess the public here. No-one of sane mind could have chosen Ulrika to triumph in this year’s Celebrity fest, and you’d be hard pushed to find anyone who’d confess to voting for Rachel Rice, last year’s anonymous champ. As for our predictions? With a whopping 75% of us plumping for Basingstoke’s self-styled dark horse – potty-mouthed comic geek Marcus – all votes were off at the last hurdle.

VICTORY LAP

With Channel 4 finally set to put Big Brother out of its misery in 2010, here’s a trio of quick suggestions to spice up its final season…

1. Get random!

Since the genie was let out of the bottle in series one, Big Brother has attracted the most deluded and insufferable wannabes on the block. A fact compounded by the powers that be at Endemol seemingly trawling this human flotsam for the wackiest and most outwardly outrageous, often cramming too many faux naive egotists in the same cage. Don’t bother. Let’s return to fundamentals and pick the contestants as randomly as possible.

2. Drop the all-singing/dancing tasks

This is not the Italia Conti Academy or a televised panto audition, so let’s do-away with these increasingly desperate, tedious tasks and tired dressing-up routines. Let the housemates get supremely bored. Make them suffer for their art. Bring out the worst in them. Breed arguments. Create conflict. Engender lust. Make great telly.

3. Just give ’em whiskey!

How are we ever to get the real measure of the housemates when their alcohol rations are so miniscule? This is Britain, for better or worse the binge-drinking capital of the world, so give them unlimited booze at all times. It would make a far more worthy ‘social experiment’ and reveal much more about our national character than plundering the genius of Lewis Carroll for cheap thrills.