Slide-guitar into the moments immediately post-nominations, as Dustin hugs Jen, Jen (briefly) tries to look like she"s totally fine with it, and Kail realizes what a dipshit notion it was for her to SUGGEST to Dustin that he nominate her. I mean, to honest-to-God give him the idea! Okay, he probably would have done it regardless, but still! Dick celebrates that Dustin"s nominations are a cover of Dick"s own from last week, apparently not considering the possibility that Dustin could be just as unsuccessful in ousting them as Dick himself was. Kail blahs that she"s going to try to trust Dustin. Dustin, for his part, DRs that he availed himself of the opportunity when Kail "threw herself at" him as a possible nominee -- as, really, who wouldn"t. And then, once again, we see Jen crying in the bathroom -- picturesquely, for the cameras, dabbing gingerly at her eyes. And lest you think this display is more than just a display, she actually says, aloud, "I don"t want to go home." No one"s there. I mean, I kind of like Jen -- largely because of how much Dick hates her, frankly -- but Jesus. Dial it back, Sarah Bernhardt. Anyway, Jen DRs that she was upset about her nomination in part because it was so unexpected. Which, fair enough.
Sometime later, Dustin takes Kail up to the HoH room, sits her down, and informs her that she"s about to learn something that no one else in the house knows: she"s not his target at all! Zach is. So Kail is, like, a double-plus-pawn. Despite how absurd a tale this is, Kail is all flashing eyes and flushed cheeks as she apparently buys it and nods intensely as Dustin orders her to "fight for PoV." And then he reminds her that he"ll be fighting for it -- obviously -- which you would think would cause some kind of switch in Kail"s brain to flip and make her realize that therefore Dustin is going to be fighting to keep his own nominees in place -- including her -- and maybe doubt some of what Dustin is trying to sell her on. Apparently no such switch exists in Kail"s brain. So much for intelligent design! Dustin DRs to us that he"ll be happy as long as he can get rid of any of his four targets this week: Jen, Kail, Zach, or Nick. Back in the HoH, their talk has concluded, and Dustin tells Kail she can cry. Heh. She keeps it together and takes off.
Bathroom. Jen is reapplying her makeup when Nick enters and sits next to her. She"s telling him how hurt she was by Dustin"s nomination when Kail bustles in, and Jen fully rolls her eyes, practically at her, which is kind of hilarious. By this point in my tenure in the house, were I Jen (assuming that the unitard penalty hadn"t caused me to quit), I would probably be hissing bile at Kail and feigning narcolepsy whenever she tried to talk to me. She seems like a perfectly nice person but, like, the kind of perfectly nice person you want ringing you up at the supermarket, not half a pillow away. ANYWAY, Kail briskly chirps, "Didn"t see that coming!," and though she kneels down near Jen and tries to get in on the conversation, Jen totally ignores her and keeps talking to Nick, who for some reason spends this sequence scratching his forehead with the end of a fork. I hope he"s not planning to eat with that after he"s had it in the bathroom. Kail says she"s shocked, and Jen snuffles that she"s not shocked, she"s hurt. Kail, brushing her teeth, bends over and reminds Jen that they survived this before, and can again, and Jen whinges that she"s not worried about going home, she"s hurt. With Amber behind them, washing her hands and staying entirely out of the conversation from what we can see, Zach bends down and gives Jen a hug (aw), and Nick says that if Jen wants to talk later, he"s around. Once everyone else has left the bathroom, Kail gets all Julia Sugarbaker, telling Jen that they"re the two toughest "girls" in the house and will get through it. Jen"s like, "Seriously, I"m not mad about-- eh, forget it."
Oh, God. So Amber goes straight from the bathroom to a bedroom to report to Dustin that Nick"s in the bathroom, "playing" Jen by comforting her. Though she also says that Jen"s crying is an act, so I"m not sure which of them she"s more pissed at. Dustin says that Jen was the last person to talk to him before his nominations, and that the only people to approach him in the twenty-four hours before he announced Jen and Kail were the two of them, and Zach: "Does that sound fishy to you?" Uh, not really? I"m sure everyone talked to you before your nominations, but that the only ones you specifically remembered were the ones who fit the pattern in your head? Anyway, I really wish I had a screen grab of Amber"s face as she stares back at Dustin, because...wow. She"s like Brandene the Slack-Jawed Local come to life. Not a bright girl. So Amber stares at Dustin for ten minutes, trying to do the math in her head, and then announces, "I think Zach, Nick, and Jen are an alliance." No, HE thinks that. YOU just figured out what he was getting at. "I think so too," says Dustin, giving nothing away, but maybe -- just maybe -- laughing a little inside. Amber suggests that, depending on how PoV shakes out, he might be able to backdoor Nick. I"m sure that"s not the first time Dustin"s thought about backdooring Nick.
Who"ll be playing in the Veto Competition? Kail, Jen, and Dustin, of course. Kail doesn"t want Dick, Daniele, or Zach to play, since any of them would keep Dustin"s nominations as they are. So of course Dustin picks Daniele. Jen picks Jameka -- or should I say God picks Jameka, using Jen"s hand. In the DR, Jameka explains that, as far as she is concerned, Jen did not just choose her ball by random chance; rather, it means that God has chosen Jameka to play for Jen. I don"t know which version of the Bible she studies with, but apparently that"s in there. Anyway, Kail picks Jessica. Everyone"s happy about the picks, except Kail. Dustin picks Eric as the MC for the Competition, which will kick off in just seventeen little hours.
On the loveseat in the bathroom, Jameka chats with Kail, as hilarious churchy organ music plays in the background. Jameka explains her theory about Jen"s choosing her for the Competition, and how it means that God wants her to win so that she can take Jen off the block, and Kail sort of goes along with it, because once God"s involved in something this inane, there"s not much point in getting into an argument about it, Dick. Jameka says that God has already determined the outcome of the Competition, and that the rest of them are just "walking it out." Kail sagely agrees.
At this point, Jen enters and squirts a bunch of mouthwash or tooth whitener or alcohol into her mouth -- who the hell knows -- and is still swishing it around in her mouth as Jameka takes her aside to tell her how Jameka will be on her side in the Veto Competition. Jen takes it in sort of quizzically, and they hug it out, and then, in the DR, Jen explains that Jameka"s into religion and everything, and Jen"s not, but she"s happy God is kind of in her corner on this one.
In the kitchen, Jameka tells Dustin and Dick that if she wins the Veto, she"ll be using it on Jen. Dick is instantly spoiling for a fight over it, even before she"s said anything about the Big Guy. Dick clarifies that if Kail had pulled Jameka"s name, then Jameka would be playing for her, and Jameka basically says yes. Dick asks whether she"d be playing for Zach if Zach had been one of the nominees and pulled her name, and Jameka says that it"s the same situation: if her name is pulled, she feels it"s pulled for a reason. Now, I think her rationale, such as it is, for this position is kind of silly. But I can kind of appreciate the sport of it, like she"s just decided that, in order to make this stultifying enterprise the tiniest bit interesting for herself, she"s going to try to win in order to make something happen. And furthermore, she"s straight-up announcing to Dustin that one of his nominations is in potential jeopardy, and he"s okay with that, so once again, the only reason Dick is doing what he"s doing is because he loves to be mad. But then, unfortunately, he DRs what has been Miss Alli"s view -- that God is not involved in reality shows -- and to hear her opinion on this matter come out of Dick"s hideously disfigured head is upsetting. Anyway, Jameka knows that Dick thinks what she"s saying is ridiculous because he"s an atheist, but she doesn"t care. Someone, please remind me why ANYONE is in an alliance with Dick? Everyone hates him! Back in the kitchen, Dustin is -- sincerely or not, it"s hard to tell -- politely asking questions to understand Jameka"s notions of predestination, and even though neither of them is talking to him, Dick has to make a big production of announcing that he"s not going to discuss this anymore, and leaves the room, adding, in case you weren"t sure, that he"s not trying to be rude. Yes, I"m sure it requires no effort at all.
After commercials, it"s time for the Veto Competition. It"s art-themed, which means that everyone has to put on black turtlenecks and berets. They enter the Big Brother art gallery, enjoy wine and cheese (even for those on slop, so Kail stuffs her face). Jameka reminds us that her plan was to try to win, to keep her word, and to be selfless. Jessica, on the other hand, is going to play her hardest to keep the nominations as they are. However, her "hardest" still sucks. The game is, basically, deciphering pictograms. There will be a series of images based on Big Brother phrases (which, to me, means make a mental list of the things Julie Chen has said on more than eight hundred occasions and prepare to supply them as answers). They"ll get game dollars based on right answers. Answering wrong means you"re out of the game (and, weirdly, locks other players out from attempting to answer the one you fucked up). They"ll each start with $1000 in game dollars. But why, you might think, would they need it if a wrong answer doesn"t result in points debited, but in ejection from the game? I wonder!
Okay, for real, the pictures are so (a) dumb and (b) obvious that I"m going to gloss over this. Daniele answers the first two correctly and adds $1000 to her total. Kail gets the next one, for $750. Daniele guesses the next one wrong and is out of the game. I love that Jen is playing with a glass of wine on her podium. Hell, she did already say she knew she wasn"t going to be winning this one.
And here"s where it gets (somewhat) interesting: they get a chance to spend $750 of their money on a prize. It"s a trip for two to Barbados. Everyone oohs and ahhs, but no one really seems to be thinking seriously about taking it until Dustin buzzes in. The non-playing houseguests (particularly Daniele) are pissed -- Jessica breaks in to DR that she considered taking it, but decided not to because it would make everyone mad at her -- but Dustin enjoys the moment, and in the DR, he cheers that he and his girlfriend are going to have so much fun on the trip.
Back to the shitty old pictures. Kail buzzes in, makes a ridiculous wrong guess, and leaves the game. In the DR, she says that Dustin keeps telling her to trust him, but that she knows as well as anyone that the pawn always goes home. Jameka gets the next answer right and vaults into the lead. Dustin gets the next one, but he"s still trailing Jameka by $750. But then he gets the next one, and jumps ahead of Jameka.
But THEN, it"s time for more prizes. For 1500 Big Brother bucks, you can buy $5000. Jameka says she is tempted. To me? No-brainer. Yeah, people are going to be pissed, but people might be just as pissed at you for taking the last of the peanut butter or for things you didn"t even do, as in the case of Nick this week. So you might as well have $5000 for your efforts. Dustin apparently feels the same, because he buzzes in and takes it. And you"ll never guess what this causes Amber to do in the DR! Just kidding, you know: she bawls about his selfishness, and how awful it was for her to see this ugly side of him. It"s...not as ugly as Amber"s crying face. Sorry, dude. In the game, Jameka also starts crying, but not quite so you"d notice, though Dustin seems to, and cuts his celebration short.
So Jameka"s back in the lead, with just one question left. Whoever answers it right wins the Competition. It"s an image of power lines at the top of the frame, and hands, gripping air, in the foreground. Power...grab...it"s...augh, this is so frustrating! No one seems close to getting it, and then Jen buzzes in and guesses, "Safety?" Well, no. And though Jen is dumb, you can kind of tell she threw it by the way she instantly starts drinking her wine to cover how she can"t stop smiling. We were looking for "The Power Is Up For Grabs," by the way. In the peanut gallery, Dick complains that Jen threw the question on purpose so that Jameka would win and veto Jen"s nomination, as she had promised to. If she doesn"t, her god will be angry with her! But Jameka doesn"t look too pleased about the position she"s in. Does she reward Jen the challenge thrower, or back up Dustin the goodies taker? Two bad options! And vetoing Kail out of spite -- not much more appealing! There"s a smattering of applause for Jameka"s win, but the only one who looks happy about it is Jen. At the podium, Jameka tells Jessica that Jen threw the game, and in the DR, she says she regrets telling Jen that she would veto her if she won. Which is interesting -- does she mean by that that if she hadn"t told Jen that she"d be her veto surrogate, Jen would have played harder for herself and not left it to Jameka to save her? I guess we"ll never know. Jameka also says that in taking this action, Jen was thinking only of herself. Because I guess that she thinks if Jen won, she should donate the Veto to the Red Cross? Well, it is gold.
After commercials, there is Veto fallout. Outside, everyone"s just trying to get their pool on when Dick decides to confront him about the cash and vacation he availed himself of in the game. Dustin defends that he could have still won, even with all the goodie greed, if he"d gotten the last question right, though it"s not clear to me from the editing that they knew the final question would be worth as much as it was. Not that I think he needs to defend himself to Dick; I just think he should tell Dick that instead of coming up with bullshit excuses. And of course, back in the hiss fight, Dick"s saying it"s okay for Dustin to have taken the money because that"s what Dick would have done. But he wouldn"t have taken the trip. It sounds like Dustin"s actions have put him, in Dick"s estimation, even lower than Jen. Horrors! In the DR, Dustin shrugs that he was selfish, but I don"t see how. It"s not like anyone else is saying that they were going to take either the money or the trip but that Dustin beat them to the buzzer, the prick. (That may actually be the case, but no one"s saying it.) And as for the selfishness of losing the chance to keep the nominees the same? Daniele had a chance to affect that and gave a crappy answer and lost. Jessica had a chance to affect that and gave no answers at all. And DUSTIN was the one who made the nominations, so how can he be selfish if he"s putting his own supposed interests at risk? "Selfish" and "greedy" -- not the same. Also, I"m sure that $5000 and a trip to the Caribbean will mean a lot more to Dustin when he returns to his real life than will knowing that his fellow houseguests think well of him. In conclusion: shut up, Dick.
Amber tells Jameka that she"s pissed about Dustin, too, but Jameka"s not concerned, and says that she"s going to keep her word and trust that God will reward her for it. [Church organ.] Amber cries more, because she doesn"t like to see good people taken advantage of, though in the yard she"s talking about what Jen did, and then in the DR, she"s bitching about Dustin. It"s hard to be Amber!
Elsewhere in the yard, Daniele"s telling Nick and Dick that she"s pissed too. Dick tells her that Dustin"s scrambling now, and indeed he is, babblingly defending himself to Eric. Though some of what he says in self-justification is that he has $2700 in his bank account at home, which is not going to win him a lot of sympathy votes from the average BB viewer. In the DR, Eric confirms that everyone in the house is mad at Dustin right now.
So then, as if it"s not already tense enough, this is when Jen comes out. Dick accuses her of throwing the game because of Jameka"s promise. Jen denies it, saying that she took a shot because it was her last chance to maybe win. They boringly back-and-forth on it, and then Dick says one last cutting comment and Jen moves on to where everyone else is sitting. With Dick behind her, Jen babbles that she tried for a Hail Mary pass (I"m paraphrasing), and also gets in a dig about Dustin"s $5000. Behind her, Dick gets out of the pool, still having the fight by himself as he tells Jen that he"s never heard her apologize for anything. Maybe not; totally not germane to the conversation. Jen doesn"t respond, and then Dick has to walk over just in case she does, and then wander off again looking dumb. Fortunately for him, Daniele asks him, as he goes, to drop it, and he pissily says he won"t. Daniele says that he"s upsetting Jameka, but she says she"s fine. Dick claims that he"s just pissing everyone off because he"s saying what the rest of them are thinking. "I"m not thinking it," says Kail. Dick tells her that she"s "irrelevant to the whole thing," because of her relationship with Jen and her potential advantage if Jen"s nomination is vetoed...and then there"s a cut to commercials so abrupt that I"m not sure if it"s a mistake. Oh well.
When we come back, it"s time for America"s Player. Apparently, America has chosen "I"d do that for a dollar" as Eric"s catchphrase, and in order for him to succeed in the task, he has to get at least three other people to say it. The way he"s chosen to work his magic here is via dare. For starters, he gets some giant pillowcase in the living room and asks if Jessica and Dick think he could fit in it. They"re like, "Sure," and he says, "I"d do that for a dollar." The sequence continues with Eric being carried out to the yard (repeating his catchphrase several more times) and swung around for a while, and doesn"t result in anyone else using the expression. Once he"s alone with Dick, Eric tries another tack, saying that he"s gotten so sick of Amber"s hackneyed expressions (really? I"ve been hung up on her bad grammar) that he decided to make up a nonsense phrase and try to get everyone saying it, in a secret jab at Amber. Dick, unsurprisingly, is on board, and soon we"re seeing the two of them in the kitchen with a bunch of other houseguests, being dared to jump into the pool fully clothed. He does that for a dollar. This is what you get, America, for not voting for "Sweet Chicken."
In case you were wondering if there would be a queerer alliance nickname this year than "Mrs. Robinson," fear not: it"s LNC, for "Late Night Crew," and consists of everyone in the house except Kail, Zach, Jen, and Nick. In the HoH, Dustin calls the LNC to order and announces that Jameka"s going to veto Jen, and that the replacement nominees are Zach and Nick. Shocking a nation, Daniele moves for Zach to be nominated, but she"s in the minority, and as everyone else in the LNC starts falling in line behind Nick"s nomination, Daniele starts to cry, and then tries another tack, trying to run Jen down in the hopes that Jameka won"t veto her nomination. Daniele claims that Jen "sucks at everything" (er, except winning competitions) and that her only skills are lying and manipulating people. Amber points out that Nick has these gifts as well. Daniele doesn"t want to accept this, and trudges off, presumably to find her snuggle buddy. Once she"s gone, Amber says that this is part of the problem with Nick -- that Daniele"s defense of him is fucking up their alliance -- and Jessica says that it"s not their job to deal with Daniele"s personal life. Well, true.
And in the bathroom stall, Daniele cries. She quaveringly DRs that Jessica is attacking her personally, and that Nick is her best friend (with benefits?) in the house.
Back at the LNC board meeting, Jameka makes a case against Zach. It seems to boil down to "he"s shady." Guess God wasn"t guiding her side in that debate. Dick points out that they"re all shady. Jameka reiterates that if it were up to her, she"d want Zach gone. The fact that we"re going out to commercial on this line suggests that Zach is fine.
Pre-Veto. Heavy hangs the head that wears the Veto. Blah blah blah. Zach"s not worried; he doesn"t think Dustin will nominate him. Nick thinks that if Jameka vetoes Jen, Dustin will definitely put up Zach. Kail thinks that if Jameka uses the veto on Jen, Dustin should keep his word and nominate Zach instead.
And, Veto Ceremony. Why should Jameka veto? Jen appeals to Jameka"s (god"s) angle by saying that she thinks everything happens for a reason. Ha! There"s not really much to say after that, so she wanly concludes by saying that she enjoys being in the house. Kail? As Jen rolls her eyes, Kail tries for the Mike approach, saying she doesn"t want to make a case for her own veto at the expense of her friend, Jen. Jameka? This week, she"s learned some things about people"s character (shot of Dustin, looking sheepish). Jameka"s heard the phrase "actions speak louder than words," but she wants her words and actions working in concert, which is why she is doing what she promised and vetoing Jen"s nomination. Amber? Crying. Jen takes the veto and hugs Jameka, and Zach and Dustin make room for Jen on the couch. Heh. Dustin gets up to announce his replacement nominee. He prissily says that there are people in the house who have been playing all sides, and have won themselves friends strategically. Nick, I think he"s talking to you. Nick, only looking a little shocked, sits next to Kail.
In the DR, Daniele cries; Dustin says that they need to cut off the personal relationships among houseguests; Nick says that he was nominated because he"s, guess what, a threat, but that he hasn"t given up and isn"t just going to sulk about it like Kail"s doing. Which is a great throw to Kail, who doesn"t like her odds against Nick. However, she says that "everybody loves Nick," which shows just how much she"s been missing by going to bed early. And Jen is mad that Dustin nominated Nick -- madder, she says, than that he nominated her. And Amber? Crying. Whatever time of day or night it is as you read this, know that, right now, Amber is crying.