Big Brother (US)

It's interesting when one takes the time to look back back at 2009, several scandals that occurred this year were related to television. There were four big reality scandals that occurred in 2009, most of them happening in the second half of the year. They have stayed fresh in pop culture buzz.

This list doesn't count Jon & Kate's drama, all the injuries on Survivor, So You Think You Can Dance, and Dancing with the Stars, Chima's explosion on Big Brother, or Adam Lambert's sexual preferences. Those events pale in comparison to the five scandals listed.

Lately, what we've been hearing about reality television has been awful. The winner of Big Brother became a drug dealer by using his prize money to bankroll his illegal activities. A family that appeared on Wife Swap perpetrated a hoax involving their six-year-old son and a helium balloon. Is there anything good to say about reality TV?

Here's something. Survivor: Cook Islands winner Yul Kwon is joining the FCC. He has been named deputy chief of the consumer and governmental affairs bureau for the FCC.

That's the Federal Communications Commission. Chairman Julius Genachowski made the appointment, and it wasn't because Yul did well in challenges.

Adam Jasinski, the guy who won CBS' reality show Big Brother last year (Big Brother 9), just got arrested for using his prize money on something he shouldn't have.

He used the $500,000 to buy a bunch of oxycodone pills and was arrested Saturday in Boston for trying to resell them. Spending a half mil on pills and then reselling them? This sounds like the worst business decision ever.

(S11E30) Natalie and Kevin made it scheming all the way into the final three on Big Brother 11. But, did they make it to the final two? Did one of them win the half-million dollars? Or did Jordan blow them both out of the water? It was an unlikely final three and the first two-hour live season finale. Despite the rather lame "high school cliques" theme to the season, it definitely had its moments of BB history.

(S11E29) The Big Brother 11 finale will be a two-hour extravaganza on Tuesday evening. It's going to be similar to the Survivor finales with all of the houseguests, a big reunion, and love and joy abounding. Well, Chima should be missing. I'm not so sure on the love and joy either. Perhaps it will be fisticuffs and brouhahas. Hey, if Natalie wins it all, I can see the audience going into uproar mode. It will be live and should be interesting. But we had to get through the latest episode first.

(S11E28) They say to "expect the unexpected" on Big Brother 11. Well, tonight showed that the viewers can expect an unexpected scheduling of events. Here I was expecting to see the hamsters dwindled down to two tonight. But that wasn't to be the case. However, I did expect Kevin to dress up all spiffy and funky. Sure enough, he did. He had matching red sneakers to complete the outfit.

If you want to discuss last night's episode of Big Brother 11, head on over to the TV Squad review of the show. But if you want to know who won the first part of the final head of household comp, stay right here. Perhaps if we had Jeff and Russell in the competition, they'd still be up on the log.

But think about it. We have players not as um ... enduring (or at least one is certainly not as endearing) left in the game at this point. I mean, how long can they hang in there? A half-hour? Maybe an hour? Well, I'll tell you they were up there for much longer than I thought. If you want to find out more, read on past the jump. Extreme spoilers ahead!

(S11E27) Yep, we're nearing the end of Big Brother 11 as the final four gets chopped down to the final three. It's not the final three (or four) I would have imagined at the beginning of the season, but rarely does my first impression hold out. As the very pregnant Julie Chen mentioned at the top of the show, there is one representative from each original clique left in the game. I also wouldn't have predicted that she'd last the season. But she proved me wrong.

(S11E26) Now, this is downright frightening. Natalie is the head of household this week in the Big Brother 11 house. I can deal with that ... sort of, kind of. I don't care for her and I don't want her to win the half-million. But I can cope with her winning HoH once this season. What I can't abide by is the outfit. We're talking funkadelic gone horribly awry.

(S11E25) It's the end of the line for the two lovebirds of the Big Brother 11 season, Jordan and Jeff. With both of them sitting in the nomination chairs tonight, it's inevitable that one will go home. Kevin and Natalie hold the power in the house, and lone wolf Michele is but a lone vote. Kevin doesn't vote unless there's a tie.

(S11E24) Kevin wanted to win the head of household on Big Brother 11. Sure, the room and the basket of goodies is always fun. But the tough part, especially this late in the game, is making the right nominations and planning ahead for the veto competition. Nakomis (BB5) did it right. She literally invented the backdoor plan -- put two hamsters on the block, but neither of them your real target. Then, if the veto is used to save one, slap up your target with no way to escape. Did Kevin do that? Nope. He put his two targets on the block.

(S11E23) You don't always see them wearing them, but three out of the final five hamsters in the Big Brother 11 house wear eyeglasses. It was four out of six wearing them before the Russell boot last week. Yes, Russell wore glasses. I recall him mentioning that they didn't want him to wear them in his diary room segments. Perhaps they didn't fit the persona of his brawny beastie-boy character the show wanted to portray.

Once again, the Big Brother 11 show ended with their version of a cliffhanger -- a head of household competition started, but not completed on the live show. Yet again, they think show fans should wait until Sunday evening to see which worthy (or not) hamster won the competition.

But I say ... why wait? It isn't like they're still going to be stumbling and sliding yet on Sunday night. It's over as I write this up for you. You could know the winner, figure out the best game plays, and strategize with the best of them. Oh wait. I forgot. We don't have the "best of them" on the show this season. Read on for extreme spoilers for Sunday night's show.

(S11E22) Well, we all knew sparks would fly tonight on Big Brother 11. After being backdoored by Jeff in the last episode, Russell practically promised to pull a Chima. Don't you just love it when foolish moves are named after the houseguest who did them? A Marcellas, of course, is not saving yourself with the veto and getting evicted. A Chima is a complete breakdown, tossing all to the wind while wreaking havoc in the house.

(S11E21) My goodness, whatever could be making Natalie smile in the Big Brother 11 house? Could she have actually won a competition for the first time this season? Perhaps she's thinking of the Lydia/Jessie reunion in the jury house -- picturing scenes of Lydia scratching Jessie's eyes out or something. Maybe she's proud to be wearing a doo-rag which clashes with her shirt instead of her neatly color-coordinated um ... urban wear. Maybe she's thinking of adopting a pit bull so they can wear matching little outfits. Or maybe ...