Was There More To White Locust?

So I’ve been sitting around doing whatever it is I do in life, but this twist has still been in the back of my head since feeds returned last night and Rachel was gone. I was going to let it just linger, but my partner in crime, Summer, brought it up and she felt similar, so she encouraged me to write something up.

This is all speculation and by no means guaranteed. I don’t have any inside connections with CBS and choose not to even if I could because I still do like the surprises and don’t want the entire season spoiled for me.

With all that said, let’s get into it ….. (reference to my favorite YouTuber RottenMango)

I posted about the initial reaction I had in my vent thread because this was just so confusing. I have watched the show since season 1. And yea, I missed a few seasons after 1 (life got crazy around 2003), I still saw all the fun stuff like All-Stars and such. However, in all that time, there has only been one person to ever be evicted from the show without a vote, and that was Justin during the spin-off series BBOTT.

So let’s compile some notes and try to put this all together, but I make no promises about my storytelling abilities to be anywhere near the level of Stephanie at Rotten Mango.

White Lotus / White Locust / HoH

This is huge. From what we do know, there was a pretty big buildup for this twist, including making us watch Unlocked to get more info. As of right now, it’s over. There was a brief comp of some sort, Rachel was ‘sacrificed’ (Ashley said they used those words), and somehow Lauren won HoH.

We haven’t heard anything about the HoH comp. The only thing we do know is that Lauren won, and Morgan didn’t even know they were playing an HoH. So, it sounds like it was all the same competition where Rachel lost, which is wildly absurd. This means that they had a comp where 3 people didn’t even get a chance to play for HOH (Kelley, Will, and Ashley) and 1 wouldn’t have had a chance to play for safety (Keanu).

Now, why the ‘White Lotus’ part is huge also goes to something Julie tweeted…

The way the storytelling of White Lotus (the show) goes, you basically have two storylines happening throughout the season. Almost feels like you’re watching two different shows until closer to the end when they start intersecting. So, why would Julie tweet that and then have a comp called White Locust, which is clearly a play on White Lotus?

Rachel Suddenly Bad At Comps

This is a brief section, but Rachel has won a number of comps throughout the years (roughly 9 or so). She also won a few legs on The Amazing Race. She’s no slouch. So let’s just do the math:

• The maze competition started at 6 minutes to complete.
• Four people went ahead of Rachel
• She had 3 1/2 minutes to complete the puzzle
• This means each person – on average – lost 37.5 seconds per round
• If Rachel had competed as normal, the next person should have had just under 3 minutes for their turn.

Even Vince mentioned how Rachel had so much time left, but failed, so he was confused. How does someone who is good at comps do so poorly on that comp?

Wording

Big Brother has been careful with their wording. They have been using the term ‘eliminated’ while Ashley mentioned how production likely wants their reactions when they announced ‘Rachel had been sacrificed’ Odd phrasing

Putting It All Together

I’m going to say it right away, I don’t believe we’re done with this twist, nor is the season done with Rachel. There is just no way the following events all happened:

• Julie teases about two shows
• Hyped up White Locust twist is just a quick comp where someone went home
• 3 people didn’t get to play for HOH
• Keanu wouldn’t have been able to play for his safety if that was the HOH comp mixed in
• Rachel suddenly became terrible at comps

My theory is that we will see something along the lines of this:

In the end, we find out that Rachel was actually playing her own game, and there were clues along the way. Much like Amy pulling levers and junk during the opening episode, it’s quite possible that Rachel is working with (or against) the Mastermind, and she has a different goal. In fact, I think Rachel was told to throw that comp, which is why she was suddenly so bad at it.

So I think by Thursday, we are going to see Rachel return somehow. Perhaps the mastermind is keeping her ‘locked away’ where she is going to be given fairly easy puzzles, which will help her return to the game.

It’s also possible that because the entire house wasn’t given a fair chance to compete, her ‘escaping’ will reset the week and all of this starts back over on Thursday night with 9 people still in the house.

Will it mean that Rachel is not a normal player? Hard to say. It’s possible Rachel will ‘lose’ toward the end, but be revealed to have been fighting the mastermind and rewarded with like 100k or something. And all of that was likely in the contract from the start.

Conclusion

I have been watching the show for far too long and have watched feeds every single summer (and blogged about it) since BB13. My gut feeling is that this twist is not over. They are not just going to evict someone without a vote. And this entire week won’t count. I wish I had seen the White Lotus to think of more connections to the actual show, but I am almost certain at this point that this is not going to be a normal week in the house with Rachel just going quietly.

Big Brother is not going to just fumble something this badly.

What are your thoughts?