Big Brother Season 26 - Episode 34 - HoH Competition & Nominations

[Fuskie]

Previously on Big Brother, AINSLI had some bad news for the Surviving Seven and they first said See Ya to Leah. At the HoH competition, Chelsie got her third HoH of the season. Knowing exactly who she wanted out, Chelsie made the obvious nominations. With the Veto up for grabs, Kimo said Aloha to safety, and after he escaped the block, his bestie took his spot. At the second eviction of the night, Angela's nine lives ran out. 

Tonight, see the gameplay you missed during the action-packed double. Then, with only 5 remaining in the battle for $750k, winning HoH will be more important than ever. Plus, two more Houseguests hit the chopping block. All this right now on Big Brother!

In the aftermath of Leah's eviction, Chelsie celebrated her Head of Household win alongside Cam. They quickly devised a plan to target Angela for eviction, considering her as a bigger competition threat than Kimo and Rubina. Chelsie also believed Angela would nominate her. She assured Kimo that he’d be a pawn on the block with Angela as the true target, though Kimo wasn't happy about it. Chelsie told Makensy that their trio with Cam remained strong. 

When Kimo won the Veto, Chelsie consulted with the rest of the House before choosing Rubina as the replacement nominee. She slipped up and told Angela she was looking for volunteers to go up on the blog against her. Realizing that she really was the target this time, Angela made a plea to Makensy and Cam to keep her safe, arguing that Rubina was due for a competition win. Despite her efforts, Makensy stuck to her belief that Angela was the bigger threat, leading to her eviction.

The Final 5 Houseguests celebrated their surviving the Double Eviction, pausing momentarily to watch Angela's picture on the Memory Wall turn grey. Then the celebrations resumed and both Leah and Angela were soon forgotten. Privately, everyone knew that two sides were remaining, Kimo & Rubina and Cam/Chelsie/Makensy. With Chelsie unable to compete it came down to whether Kimo or Rubina would win Head of Household, or Cam or Makensy. Whichever side won, the other would be targeted.

For the second Head of Household competition of the night, AINSLI informed the Houseguests that the government had destroyed a critical key card she needed to take over the world, and the Houseguest who reassembled it first would win. The eligible Houseguests raced to complete a tiny 30-piece puzzle using tweezers in a classic competition usually reserved for the Power of Veto.

While Rubina struggled, Cam and Makensy were neck and neck. Makensy neared completion but faced a setback when an entire column of her puzzle fell apart. In the Living Room, views of each of the other four Houseguests. She criticized what she saw as a lackadaisical effort by Cam, worried that Rubina might win, and worried Makensy's puzzle had a weak foundation. The intense competition saw each of the Houseguests having to start over repeatedly.

In the end, Makensy completed her puzzle, and though the tiles were not fully aligned, they were in the correct order and she won the competition for her third Head of Household of the season, effectively gaining control of the HoH room for two consecutive weeks and further solidifying her power in the House as well as her competition resume.

Rubina and Kimo immediately recognized the difficulty of their position, with Makensy firmly in control. Chelsie’s decision to evict Angela in the Double Eviction appeared justified and Makensy’s win felt like confirmation of their strategy. Makensy and Chelsie solidified their own Final 2 deal, agreeing to take each other to the end over Cam. Chelsie, confident in her influence over Makensy’s earlier decisions, believed she could argue that she had driven the strategic choices during both of Makensy’s HoH.

Hoping to avoid nomination, Rubina sought to leverage a conversation she had had with Chelsie before the Double Eviction, telling Makensy that Chelsie had been suggesting Makensy’s competition wins made her a threat and encouraging her to target Makensy. While Makensy acknowledged her own competitive prowess, she was surprised by the possibility that Chelsie might already be eyeing her as a target.

Following Rubina’s revelation, Makensy confronted Chelsie, who denied instigating the conversation with Rubina and privately defended herself saying that she hadn't actually said Rubina should target Makensy. Chelsie was surprised that Rubina had thrown her under the bus but was relieved that Makensy seemed to believe her version of events. Still, she recognized Rubina as a threat to her game.

Meanwhile, Kimo, one of the last two men remaining in the House, tried to strike up a conversation with Cam, suggesting that they work together to reach the end. However, talking to Cam was like talking to a brick wall as Cam, recognizing Kimo’s desperation, would not engage. He later relayed Kimo’s attempt to Makensy and Chelsie, using the information to reinforce their trio and that Kimo, as a strong social player, should be their target.

At the nomination ceremony, Makensy unsurprisingly placed Kimo and Rubina on the block. In her speech, she acknowledged that everyone left in the game was deserving, and the time had come for them to start targeting each other. 

Though Kimo was her preferred target, she privately confessed she was open to either nominee going home. Both Kimo and Rubina understood that their only hope was for one of them to win the Veto and somehow convince Makensy to shift her allegiance away from Chelsie and Cam.

With no episode on Wednesday, Thursday will be a 2-hour episode, with the Power of Veto in the first half, and the live eviction in the second half.  Sunday's show will be at 10 pm, then the next episode will b Friday, October 11th, with the 2-hour Season Finale on Sunday, October 13th.