A new episode of Big Brother 17 airs tonight on CBS. Read a live recap here.
Julia was evicted on Thursday, and only five HouseGuests remain. Who will win HoH tonight and secure his or her place in the Final 4? And which two HouseGuests will be nominated? Let’s find out.
The episode begins with the continuation of the HoH competition. Steve is hoping either Vanessa or John wins HoH since he believes Austin and Liz will be targeted by them. Austin and Liz know they’re a target and want to win this HoH. Austin takes an early lead, but Vanessa and John are very close behind. Liz is going at a much slower pace and dropping a lot of eggs. She seems to be out of the competition early. Eventually, Vanessa overtakes the lead from Austin. Austin begins to slow down and drop eggs too, and John is now in second place. Soon it’s very close between Vanessa and John, but Vanessa still has the lead. John is hoping to finally win an HoH, whereas Vanessa knows she’s everyone’s replacement nominee if the Veto is used. They both really want to win this HoH. Liz realizes she won’t be winning HoH, so she claims the luxury prize: a trip outside of the Big Brother house. Toward the end of the competition, Vanessa and John are both working on their last egg, but it’s Vanessa who gets her tenth and final egg into the slot first. Vanessa wins HoH.
Steve and John both feel good about Vanessa winning HoH, but she admits in the diary room she is uncertain what to do. Targeting Liz and Austin is the obvious move, but she feels like she is sitting in the middle of two duos regardless. Vanessa then confronts all the other HouseGuests to find a reason for whom to target. She demands information out of them to see which deals were made. She wants to know if she was anyone’s immediate target if she did not win HoH. Steve reveals to Vanessa he made a deal with Liz that if she were HoH and had to cast a tiebreaker vote, then she would vote in his favor. Vanessa now believes this is a reason to target Liz. She tells Austin and Liz she knows about this deal, but he tells her she would have went back on that deal. John is the last person Vanessa confronts, and he tells her he made a deal with Austin since Vanessa advised him to do so. Vanessa says she doesn’t remember telling John this, which bemuses John. We then see a flashback of Vanessa suggesting to John to make a deal to Austin for a backup, but with the intention of breaking it.
Austin tells Liz that Vanessa knows about the deal she made with Steve, so Liz pulls Vanessa aside to clear the air. Austin joins the conversation, and Vanessa is making it clear that she doesn’t fully trust Liz and Austin. Liz is in tears and says that she never would have stayed true to the deal she made with Steve, especially since he took her twin sister out of the game. She also reminds that she took out Vanessa’s biggest threat (James) in the double eviction. Liz says she always planned to stay loyal to Vanessa. Vanessa then tells Austin that John told her that the two of them talked about possible nominations for the forthcoming week. Austin denies this, but we see a flashback of them talking game. John admits it may be difficult for him to win against either Vanessa or Steve in a Final 2 scenario, and Austin says he feels the same way about sitting next to Liz. Austin suggests that the two of them may need each other going forward. Vanessa then tells Liz and Austin that she will just go with her gut when deciding nominations.
Vanessa then talks to Steve in the HoH room. After being nervous about Liz and Austin, she has decided that she now wants to target John. She tells Steve that she knows Steve would choose John over her to go to the Final 2. She believes that she’s stuck in the middle of two duos, so they are equal in her eyes. However, since John has yet to win an HoH, she believes no one will target him. She thinks everyone else would bring him to the end instead of her. She is worried John will take her place in the Final 3, so she wants John out. In the diary room, Steve vents his frustration with Vanessa’s plan. If either Liz or Ausin left this week, then it would be Vanessa, Steve, and John against only Liz or Austin. However, if John leaves this week, it will be Vanessa and Steve against Liz and Austin. Even though Vanessa’s plan puts her in a good spot to be chosen to come along to the Final 3 (Steve would always target Liztin and she believes Liztin will always target Steve), he doesn’t believe leaving a showmance in at Final 4 is a smart decision. Vanessa then reveals to Austin she will be targeting John this week, and she strikes a deal with Austin for the upcoming week to keep one another safe.
The game talk ends as Frankie from last season walks into the house. The luxury prize Liz won was a VIP experience to go to an Ariana Grande concert. She also gets to choose someone to go with her, and she chooses Vanessa. We then see them get their hair and makeup done, and they must be in disguise so no Big Brother fans recognize them while they’re out in the real world. They also get to meet Ariana backstage and get some of her merchandise as gifts before the show. It’s all basically an unnecessary Grande segment, but it seems like Liz and Vanessa had a good time despite having to spend an evening with Frankie Grande.
Afterwards, John talks to Vanessa in the HoH room. Vanessa is very candid and reveals that she is threatened by John. She tells him that she knows Steve and John are just as loyal to one another as Liz and Austin are to each other. She asks him if he would take her to the end of the game over Steve, and John says he would. John is also aware of how Vanessa’s mind never stops spinning. In the diary room, he says “the only psychology that works on Vanessa is reverse reverse reverse reverse reverse psychology.” He tells Vanessa he would understand if he’s nominated with Steve. However, that may not have been wise of him to say.
At the nomination ceremony, Vanessa nominated Steve and John for eviction. She tells Steve that this was just a game decision and John that she feels he is standing in her way of making it to the end of the game. Afterwards, we hear from Vanessa, Steve, Austin, and John in the diary room. Vanessa believes she made the move that was best for her game. Steve feels confident that he’s not the target, but is still uneasy being on the block. Austin hopes nominations stay the same. John knows he will be evicted if he doesn’t win the Veto.
And that wraps up tonight’s episode of Big Brother. Thanks for reading and come back Tuesday for another live recap.
