Skip to main content
TiersBig BrotherSeason 16
Aired summer 2014 · The twist-stacked summer

Battle Of The Block

The most twist-stacked summer of the modern era. Two HoHs per week, a Battle of the Block that can dethrone one of them, a Team America twist installed by public vote, and a Detonators alliance forming inside it all. Big Brother running its mechanics at full volume.

Filmed
Studio City, California
Studio City soundstage
Premiered
Jun 25, 2014
CBS · Sunday, Wednesday, Thursday
Episodes
37
37 episodes across the summer run
Format
16 houseguests · two HoHs per week
twin HoH, Battle of the Block, Team America
Cast size
16 players
16 houseguests, three of them voted Team America
Host
Julie Chen
Julie Chen's sixteenth summer at the helm
01The take

Battle Of The Block.

The most twist-stacked summer of the modern era. Two HoHs per week, a Battle of the Block that can dethrone one of them, a Team America twist installed by public vote, and a Detonators alliance forming inside it all. Big Brother running its mechanics at full volume.

Battle of the Block is what happens when Big Brother stops asking which twist to use and starts running them all at once. The cast had to play through a thicker rule book than any prior summer.
02The shape of the season

A rhythm worth tracking.

The most twist-stacked summer of the modern era. Sixteen houseguests play through twin HoH every week, a Battle of the Block that can dethrone one of them, a Team America public-vote side mission, and a Detonators alliance forming inside the chaos. Big Brother running its mechanics at full volume. The twist stack is more than any prior season tried, and the producers signal the experiment by midseason. Julie Chen hosts a summer the franchise has been calibrating against ever since.

03Where it sits in the canon

The #07 slot.

Slot #07 of 20 in the Big Brother Editor's Canon. The neighbors below frame what we ranked above and below it.

No spoilers. Every page is reviewed before it goes live.
04What to watch for

5 moments, no spoilers.

  • Ep 1 · the twin HoH reveal

    The format opens with two Head of Household competitions running in parallel, and the cast learns on Day One that the room will carry two power seats every week instead of one.

  • Ep 2 · Battle of the Block

    The losing nominees from each HoH's pairing fight to dethrone one of the HoHs. Watch how the new mechanic reshapes which alliance pairs make sense to back.

  • Ep 6 · Team America installed

    Three houseguests are voted by the public into a separate side mission, paid in cash for completed tasks. The twist turns parts of the cast into players within players.

  • Ep 14 · the Detonators form

    An alliance emerges that becomes part of the season's spine. Notice how the room reorganizes around it once the twin-HoH math starts contracting.

  • Ep 30 · the late stretch

    The twist stack thins out as the cast contracts. The texture of the final stretch is what reveals how much weight the format was carrying earlier in the run.

06Also appears in

Cross-references.

Also appears in
Big Brother S16 — Battle Of The Block — tiered.tv