Big Brother finale recap: The season 24 winner is crowned
It's been a wild season, Big Brother fans, so let's get to all the action of the season 24 finale!
We pick up during the first leg of the final HOH competition, where each of the three players is holding on to a giant, spinning hot dog, trying to become the last one standing and the first player to move on to the third portion of the HOH competition. After 36 minutes, Taylor becomes the first player to fall, meaning she'll be playing in Part 2 against whoever's the next to fall. At 46 minutes Monte finally falls, and Turner secures his spot in the final leg, getting himself that much closer to winning the final HOH.
So, off we go to Leg 2. Monte and Taylor must put all the Veto and HOH competitions in order using tags that they have to transport to two separate boards using a zipline. Both players have the same strategy, where they focus on one board at a time rather than bouncing between the two, doing their best to make sure they get the correct order before buzzing in their answers. Taylor comes in with a great time of 7:04, but Monte just barely beats her out, finishing at 6:41. That means Taylor's fate in this game all depends on who wins the HOH and whether they want to take her to the Final 2. With that said, Turner and Monte have had a Final 2 agreement for awhile now, and it could be a long shot for her to make it to the end.
Before we crown the winner of the final HOH competition, we check in with the jury to get their thoughts on the players left in the house. Somewhat surprisingly, most of the jury seems to think Turner doesn't have much of a chance to win. They laugh when asked about his game, and there's an overarching theme that he's aloof, not serious about the game, and that he hasn't made much of an impact. I'm not saying Turner is the clear winner here, but I'm surprised to see this view of him. I think he's clearly played a good social game while also winning competitions and helping steer The Leftovers to the end.
Similarly, I'm not sure the jury thinks very highly of Taylor either. Joseph and Jasmine point out her great social game and how hard it is to survive the block five times, but everyone else seems to think she's done very little to make her mark on the game. All of this is to say that I get the sense the jury is pretty locked in on Monte as the clear winner should he make it to the end, but Taylor is known for making her case when she's seemingly down and out. Anything can happen though, so we have to wait and see how it plays out.
That brings us to Turner and Monte battling it out to become the last HOH of the season. They listen to three statements about each member of the jury and have to determine which one is false. After 8 questions, the one with the most points is the winner. The two are tied through the first four questions, but then Monte pulls away and wins, becoming the season's final HOH and securing his spot in the Final 2. All that's left is to pick who he'll sit next to in the end. Somewhat surprisingly, Monte chooses to evict Turner. Their bond seemed solid, but Monte clearly thinks that he has a better chance at winning if he's sitting next to Taylor.
As always, the jury has the opportunity to ask the remaining two players questions before they cast their vote for who should win. It's a lot of softball questions, giving Taylor and Monte a chance to clearly lay out why they should be the winner of the season. There's not a lot of friction, and the talking points are the same. Monte makes his case as the clear overall winner, as the one who made the biggest moves, whereas Taylor leans into the fact that she had to survive the block all season long and play a game that prioritized building relationships above anything else.
Then, each player gets their own speech, one last opportunity to sway the votes, and it has to be said that Taylor absolutely kills her speech. While Monte once again lays out all his accomplishments in robotic fashion, Taylor leans into the fact that she was the face of this season, saying that no one defined this season more than her, and that the jury can choose a winner by a different definition this year, that resilience in this game should count as much as "big moves." In my opinion, I don't see that much difference between the games of Monte, Taylor, and the recently evicted Turner. All of them played strong games in different ways, all of them won competitions, so anyone who made it to finale night has a case to be the winner.
We'll never know how much that stirring final speech made a difference, but in the end, and through all the drama, it's Taylor who comes out on top and wins the 24th season of Big Brother by a huge 8-1 vote, becoming the first black woman to win the competition. It's a great story, seeing her come from the gaslighting and attacks of Week 1 to then winning the whole thing because of the relationships she had built. This is a massive win, and on top of everything else Taylor also wins the vote for America's Favorite Player, the first time it's ever happened in the history of the game. While this season had its ups and downs, its fun moments and its shameful moments, finale night felt joyous, with Taylor more than deserving to come out on top.
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