Big Brother S 16 E 40 type TV Show network CBS genre Reality Where to watch Close Streaming Options

What a glorious fool that Cody was! What a beautiful, silly soul he had! Some people are good at Big Brother because they see the game in a certain vivid way, and you imagine that Cody looked at Big Brother as a kind of battlefield. He was a man of honor. He was a warrior who wanted to fight other warriors. He was well-liked by all–so handsome, they all said, with pretty eyes and chiseled chin. His hair was perfect. He fought for 97 days with his truest ally at his side. He imagined himself as an equal partner in the alliance; perhaps he even thought he was the important one, the man who went out there and got information. (A fist gone mad might think itself a brain.) You imagine him at the end of a long quest, mere footsteps away from the Grail, turning around and grasping the hand of his best friend. “Come with me, brother!” he says. “We’ll go together to our final reward!”

Poor fool. Cody won the final Head of Household competition. He had two options: Bring Derrick, or bring Victoria. Derrick was his ally; Victoria was Victoria, a floating meatbag, a non-being. He sent Victoria out of the house: “This is my ride or die guy. I’m so sorry, Victoria.”

Was there any doubt, from that moment on? Did Cody ever have a chance at beating Derrick? He made a piddling attempt at arguing his case. When Frankie asked him, point blank, if he was the puppet, Cody got nervous, petulant even. Throughout the back half of this season, we have seen a cycle repeat: A player leaves the Big Brother house thinking Derrick was their best friend, and once outside the fog lifts, and they realize he was their executor. But Cody was still inside the Big Brother house; it’s possible that, as the curtain closed on Big Brother season 16, he was the one person left on the planet who didn’t realize how complete Derrick’s domination had become.

Let’s run a counter-factual, shall we? Derrick and Cody came down to a tiebreaker for the final Head of Household. They had to guess how long the first part of the HoH comp lasted, in seconds. Derrick guessed 3013; Cody guessed 3120. A mere 108 seconds more, and Derrick would have won. What does Derrick do, in a situation like that? Cody is his most truest ally. But… 97 days is a very long time to be trapped inside of a hellhouse, far away from your family, every day knowing you are one step closer to half a million dollars. Why take any chances, when the Grail is within sight? Derrick told us, in the diary room, that he considered Victoria a truly good friend. And he knew, the same way everyone knew, that Victoria would never win Big Brother. Derrick played maybe the most careful Big Brother game in history, never leaving anything to chance–would he have taken any chances at this, the final moment?

We’ll never know the answer, not really: Derrick will say, as he said during the finale, that it was always his intention to bring his fellow Hitman to the Final Two. Maybe he’s right; maybe he was confident enough in his jury votes. Or maybe Derrick doesn’t really know what he would’ve done; maybe he didn’t want to find out. Derrick threw so many competitions this season because he didn’t have to win them; is it possible, consciously or not, that he threw this final Head of Household competition? Or maybe he had a different purpose? Derrick’s whole strategy in Big Brother has been to let his enemies guide the knife into their own back: Turning allies against allies, convincing people that what was in Derrick’s best interest was in their best interest. Was this the plan, here at the end? Did he want Cody to choose his own death?

You imagine Cody entering the final throne room of some subterranean kingdom, let’s say ruled by a race of dwarves or maybe giant spiders, and seeing at the center of it all the shimmering Grail. He takes a step forward… and suddenly, the ghosts of all the warriors he has killed along the way appear in a beam of light. “Together we can defeat them!” Cody yells at his friend. But the ghosts only attack Cody… and as they attack, Derrick peacefully walks forward, touches the Grail, and disappears in a beam of light, leaving Cody in the depths.

NEXT: Derrick Rex

This wasn’t the most exciting season of Big Brother I’ve recapped—that’d be Big Brother 14, the year of Dan’s Funeral Resurrection—but this was my favorite by far. The personalities were almost as colorful as the perpetually neon clothes. There were crazy players and smart players and Jocasta and Victoria—and most crucially, in light of how toxic things got last season, everyone kind of seemed to like one another. (Was this the huggiest season of Big Brother ever?) This doesn’t necessarily matter for Big Brother—and it’s fun when there are genuine rivalries, when the animosity boils over in elaborate ways—but I loved the wacky gentility at the core of this season. Zach could insult Nicole to her face and call her Froot Loop Dingus—but he was also self-aware enough to throw Froot Loops around as he got evicted, a hilarious act of petulance. And Frankie descended into a dark pit of paranoia, but he was savvy enough to have a farewell for all his fellow houseguests. (“Victoria: Please try to win something.”)

I understand the criticism that much of this season was just watching Derrick’s great plan come together. But what a plan! As the season finale reached its conclusion, a tone of inevitability settled into the proceedings—like one of those Oscar ceremonies where Return of the King wins the first seven prizes. The most exciting part of the finale wasn’t the final voting tally. It was the revelation of Derrick’s subterfuge, which came in stages.

First came the questions. The Jury had three queries apiece for the Final Two, although the tone of the questions told you a lot about where this was all going. Derrick had a clear description of his game play: “I never wanted to be at the forefront of anything. I always had the influence, I was always playing an intricate part in every nomination.” He insisted he never used his family as a strategy, and I think he was being honest—although surely he knew that so many bad things can be justified if a man genuinely believes he’s doing it for his family. He stated a devastating statistic: “I’ve gone 55 nominations without ever being nominated. It’s never been done with that many nominations.” And anyone expecting a blistering final speech went home disappointed: Derrick patiently told Victoria that he wanted to bring her as far as he could, but concluded that he couldn’t betray Cody and expect the jury to still vote for him. So Derrick very quietly made the following pitch for himself: The man who betrayed everyone Except That One Guy.

Cody knew the score by the time he gave his final speech. “Hearing that I was viewed as the puppet, that hit me a little in the heart,” he said—inadvertently accepting the argument against him by virtue of denying it. He listed all the people he helped to eliminate: “The puppet that sends a Beast Caleb, a Beast Frankie, and a Beast Donny out—in my book, that’s no puppet in any play.” Cody made Derrick’s job too easy; Derrick gilded his final speech noting that he won four Head of Households, gilding his résumé.

Then the secrets started to come out. First: Team America! Speaking as someone who has consistently argued against basically every loopy twist Big Brother, I am blown away at just how fun Team America turned out to be and shocked that the team actually kept it a secret for the entire season. How could you not giggle, watching the other houseguests watch Team America invent a phantom rodent and launch a Neighborhood Watch? And how could you not feel just a little bit for Cody, only just now realizing that his closest ally was probably lying to him about a whole lot of things? And then this:

“Everything I told you about my life and family, it’s true,” said Derrick. “But I did omit one fact. I’m not a parks and rec coordinator. I’ve been a police officer for 10 years. Undercover detective for three years. Thank you for saying I was too cool to be a cop, Nicole.” The look on their faces! Frankie had suspected something—another reason why I like this season so much is that Frankie and Derrick were in constant competition, even though only one of them seemed to realize it—but most people looked almost exultant with shock.

Derrick is one of the greatest Big Brother players in history. How high does he rank? You could demote him on the grounds that he’s less “interesting” than a more colorful player like Boogie or Dan. But by the same token, you could point out that Derrick played a much tougher, more cerebral game—that the whole point was not being colorful. (Remember: For much of this season, Derrick quietly transformed himself into a hipster version of himself, just so he could fit in with the youth brigade.) And you could point out that Derrick’s game was unflappable. He never really panicked; when a comp didn’t go his way, he always seemed to have a back-up plan. His closest ally in the house handed him half a million dollars.

Another way of looking at this season: Maybe Derrick has seriously elevated the level of game play in Big Brother. Here’s a man who lied to everyone all the time; a man whose greatest weapon was other people; a player who seemed to realize almost intuitively how every single person in the game mattered, how every player was a potential threat or a potential aid. Derrick claimed that he took Victoria to the final three, and he’s not quite wrong; Frankie and Caleb both wanted her out much earlier. In a season where alliances encircled alliances—the Bomb Squad, the Detonators, the Hitmen—Derrick had an impeccable sense of exactly when to shave off one ally without losing a vote.

Big Brother will never only have Strategy Players like Derrick, and I’m not sure the game would be fun that way. Part of what makes Big Brother such an intoxicatingly cuckoo bananas TV experience is how it mixes together supervillain-level strategists with lovable sex idiots and insane-o narcissists and Victoria. But I do wonder if there are people watching this season, learning how Derrick does what he does, and taking notes. I wonder if, starting next year, even the lovable sex idiots will realize that it helps to think five steps ahead. Is there a Derrick Style of Big Brother? Can anyone else be the smartest person in the room for 97 days running?

NEXT: Final thoughts

America gave Donny the prize for America’s Favorite Houseguest, which was a nice little grace note. Donny was never close to being a good player in this game, but he is maybe the most lovable guy to ever walk into the Big Brother house. (Nicole and Zach were apparently tied for a distant second—and although Julie Chen says another All-Stars season is a distant dream, I would not be surprised if Zach Attack returns next season.)

Frankie wasn’t even in the running for America’s Favorite Houseguest—a fact that seemed to make him physically ill, although he maintained his composure. Frankie is like the Dark Prince of this season, and in hindsight I find him a fascinating and paradoxical figure. He presents like a classic reality-show clown, but he also lived for backroom plotting, but he was also a generally loyal member of his final alliance, but when his back was against the wall he pulled the “I have more Twitter followers than you” move, but after his eviction he was the picture of serenity happily praising the men who backstabbed him, but somehow he found himself squabbling with Caleb and saying the immortal line “That’s not an action. It’s a word.“

But it was Derrick who got the final word, of course. Julie asked him what he would do with half a million dollars—plus his Team America bonus—and he turned to the audience, found his wife, and said: “Jana, you let me know.” Then, to Julie: “I had to play the game in this house, but she’s the boss.” And then his wife walked onstage, and she had their baby in her hands, and the last thing we saw of Big Brother was a family reunited, wife and daughter hugging one of the greatest players in the history of reality television.

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The show was over, the cameras were off, the players all gathered together in joyful reunion. Donny hugged Jocasta, and Nicole kissed Hayden, and Caleb walked toward Amber, and Amber retreated behind Devin, who suddenly blurted out “I HAVE A DAUGHTER!” and started crying.

Caleb was sad… but only for a moment, because all of a sudden a movie producer tapped him on the shoulder and said, “Beast Mode, I want you to star in my new war movie. How come you are so cool?” And then next to the movie producer there was a fashion guy who said “I am a fashion guy from the world of fashion, and I want to design a new fragrance called Beast Mode Sex Machine. Can I smell your sweat?” And next to the fashion guy was a cyborg with a red blinking eye who said “Caleb, I come from the future where we worship you as a god, you are definitely a cool guy who all kinds of ladies would want to make sex with. Can I get an autograph?”

Zach hugged Frankie, and whispered something in his ear. What did they say to each other? The chronicles do not say, and perhaps it is not for us to know; perhaps there are secrets that only lovers know.

But then, a confused look crossed Derrick’s face. He looked around. He asked: “Where is Victoria?”

“Victoria?” asked Julie Chen. “What are you talking about?”

“Victoria!” said Derrick. “She was just right here a second ago.”

Julie Chen laughed. “Ain’t been no one named Victoria here for nigh on 50 year,” she said, lighting her corncob pipe and straightening her straw hat. “Yessirree, last time I knew someone named Victoria was the Great Winter of ’64. Strangest thing you ever did see,” continued Julie Chen, spitting some tobacco out of the side of her mouth. “A local gal named Victoria just up and disappeared one day. Never did see her again.

“But,” said Derrick, “But that’s not possible. I knew Victoria! She was my friend. She was in the house this whole time!”

Julie Chen laughed and laughed and laughed, like she’d never heard anything so funny.

“I don’t know what to tell you, sonny,” said Julie Chen. “Ain’t been no one named ‘Victoria’ in this house all summer long.”

Derrick hugged his baby close to him, pondering. He looked up into the sky… and for a moment, he had a vision. A beautiful woman, wearing a wedding dress made of diamonds that glittered like tiny supernovas in the cosmic tapestry. She walks down the aisle… no, floats down, carried aloft by a cloud. Flowers fall in her wake: Pretty bluebirds soar overhead, dropping rose petals, singing songs in the language that all animals spoke before the coming of Man. This woman that Derrick sees, she looks so familiar… and yet with every passing moment, his memory of her fades.

He can just picture her, though, walking to the end of the aisle, greeting her beloved: a regal figure, wearing a red cape over a golden tunic, his skin bright green, his father’s sword glowing in the starlight, the scar over his left eye a monument to his final duel with the Dark Emperor Dredgehog at the Battle of Lilypad Atoll.

And although Derrick knows this is just a vision, a dream of an impossible world—although he knows that, in a few moments, he will have no memory of any of this—he feels a sense of all-encompassing joy as he sees the woman take the webbed hands of her great love, and stand beside him in Holy Matrimony. Look how she smiles, as the thousand trumpets of the Cumulus Court welcome her home at last. She turns to her champion, smiles even wider as the sounds of revelry fill all the halls of their kingdom.

“Oh Froggington,” Victoria whispers, “How I have missed you.”

Follow me on Twitter: @DarrenFranich