‘Big Brother Canada 4’ finale review: Watching the internet burn

“Big Brother” is, at least structurally, a game of competitions. We may say that it is about strategy, and in some ways it is. The people who are adored the most by fans are the ones who can win be manipulation, lying, scheming, and entertaining with their strokes of genius. Otherwise, this is akin to watching old reruns of “Double Dare.”

Well, tonight, we watched a two-hour edition of “Double Dare.” We want to try to stray from hyperbole thanks to frustration in the moment, but we feel like Kelsey and Nick / Phil are, strategically, the worst final two in the history of “Big Brother Canada.” Not only that, but they are arguably the worst final two in the history of the North American game. Maybe “Big Brother 9” was worse? That’s our blind spot; maybe Maggie from “Big Brother 6” is not particularly well-liked, but she was an excellent puppetmaster.

The brothers and Kelsey’s games both benefited heavily from twists. In the case of the latter, she was able to come into the game after being evicted, using knowledge of Mitch in order to evict the game’s biggest threat. In the case for the former, they were gift-wrapped their first Head of Household because Canada let two people take part in a game of chance. (The majority of the public seemingly voted for Nikki.) Other than Kelsey with Mitch, neither was the engine for many strategic moves at all this season. They just won competitions at the right times. Kelsey won her way to the final two and evicted Tim in the process. In some way, you could say Tim also benefited from a twist in that he arrived a week late; yet, he hadn’t gotten to watch any feeds, and in some ways it made him more of an outsider and caused his road to be harder.

(Sidebar: While we love Tim as a character, the fact that the guy gave up in the second half of the final HoH really knocks him down a few pegs on the list of greatest players ever.)

Now, the jury vote … really? The brothers are your victors?! They got the lion’s share of the votes, which is shocking given that they at one point tried to put themselves on the block. Also, most of the jurors seemed to think they were full of it based on what we’ve seen. The shade Joel through was GLORIOUS.

So Nick and Phil are your winners, and it’s hard to say a whole lot more about the finale with such an unsatisfying end in terms of narrative. You can’t say that the boys are terrible winners when it comes to competition wins, as they dominated much of that late in the game. Also, at least they weren’t previously evicted, so they won the game while being in the house the entire season. Yet, they were the beneficiaries of some lucky plays, and for many viewers, we know there was frustration over what was at times a feeling of self-entitlement about their own honor and integrity versus that of everyone else.

And now, our watch (or we should say, our watching) has ended. We’ll be back tomorrow to cover the finale further with interviews of all of the final four, plus also Nikki (who we didn’t get a chance to speak with after her eviction), Joel, and Mitch. You’ll be able to check all of those out over at the link here.

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