by David McAlpine

Last time on Big Brother 11, the house started to split in two over the vote between Braden and Chima. Ronnie’s decision to evict Braden resulted in a 5-5 tie, prompting Jessie to give Braden the axe. In an ironic twist, Ronnie won HoH, making everyone question which side he’ll land on.

Jeff, Jordan and Laura are trying to figure out who didn’t go along with their plan, while Lydia and Chima are quick to rub it in everyone’s faces that Chima ended up staying. Ronnie does some bragging of his own by saying that he’s in the best position because he’s playing both sides and he can blame Michele for the vote.

Cut to Laura blaming Ronnie for the vote and telling Jeff, Jordan, Casey and Michele that he’s playing both sides. It’s a shame that this house is so split, because I think in any other circumstance, Laura would be the emerging power player. But instead, it’s Ronnie, who thinks he has everyone fooled about the vote for Braden. And he’s got the Athletes minus Jeff eating out of the palm of his hand. It really makes me cringe.

Chima calls out Michele for not voting with their clique, and I’m actually really impressed with how Michele handled herself. Chima came at her like a half-dead cat trying to get revenge and Michele really kept her cool, albeit widening the gap between the two sides of the house.

Laura, however, loses some strategy points in my book after she talks openly to Chima, Lydia and Kevin about Ronnie being the man in the middle. You’d think that being the “Big Brother nerd,” the girl would have a little more sense, but she just sets off another chain of people throwing others under the bus with “he said, she said” accusations.

Ronnie gets to see his HoH room and it’s…peculiar, to say the least. I’d say the looks on Laura, Jordan and Jeff’s faces (you know, that one where you actually don’t know what to say) summed it up. A giant bubble wand, the original Broadway cast recording of Legally Blonde: the Musical and a picture of his “Molly Kitty”…yeah. Exactly.

Jeff, Jordan, Laura, Michele, Casey and Laura sit out in the backyard discussing the last vote. It’s evident that everyone thinks Ronnie was the stray vote, but Ronnie insists on lying about it (and terribly, I might add). Casey confronts him about it and Ronnie says that the person who is pointing the fingers is usually the one who swayed. Flashback: Ronnie told everyone that Michele was the vote. Now he’s using that excuse? Please. This guy is flat out delusional.

This week’s luxury competition is for a private screening of "The Ugly Truth," the new romantic comedy starring Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler. Dan from last season returns to host the competition, much to the dismay of Jessie. It’s a battle of the sexes where each gender competes separately and the guy/girl who gets the most questions right about individuals of the opposite sex win a ticket to the new movie.

Aside from the ridiculous costumes that Big Brother is famous for, it becomes clear that the women know more about the men than the men know about the women. For the men, it’s close between Casey and Jessie, but Casey ends up winning. Michele, Chima and Natalie have to compete in a tiebreaker by guessing how long Dan would wait before trying to kiss a girl on the first date. Dan apparently says 243 minutes (so not an arbitrary number), and Chima gets the closest with 120.

To add insult to injury, the two winners have to pick the Have-Nots for the week. Casey wants to pick the Athletes because they didn’t have to compete last week, but Chima gets loud (and I mean really, really loud) and threatens to get Casey evicted if he doesn’t want to give the Populars the disadvantage. Casey gets scared and lets her decide, giving Jordan and Laura slop, cold showers and hard beds for the week.

Laura, Jordan, Jeff, Casey and Michele make a last ditch attempt to save themselves, and their response from Ronnie? “I want to backdoor Russell.” What? So you’re going to use two pawns from the outnumbered alliance to backdoor the biggest hothead in the house. Can I get a standing ovation, please? Ronnie has reached new heights of “mastermind” gameplay.

At least, until he leaks his OWN PLAN to the Athletes, possibly because he wants to create the illusion that he would only put Russell up to make the other side happy? Ronnie is just playing the puppy dog to the Athletes and making sure he gets approval for every move he makes. No matter how much in the middle and how much he says he’s playing for himself, he’s just playing into a stronger alliance that could crush him farther along in the game.

In the end, Ronnie gets everyone’s hopes up by giving Jordan and Casey their keys first, then nominating Jeff and Laura for eviction. I don’t see any way that anyone else but one of Jeff, Laura, Jordan, Casey or Michele is leaving this week, which is really disappointing, but it remains to be seen what the hell Ronnie is actually thinking.

Tune in to Big Brother 11 on Tuesday at 9/8c on CBS to see who wins the Power of Veto and if it will be used to save Jeff or Laura. Also, don’t forget to drop by CBS.com to vote for the first America’s Choice: what do you want to see next week’s Have-Nots eating?

(Image courtesy of CBS)

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