Big Brother Blowout: JANKIE Twist Traps Houseguests in Backyard, First&Time HOH Shakes Things Up

Making up for their poor performances on The Wall and OTEV, the Big Brother 26 Houseguests certainly pulled off an overnight marathon in Jankie World this week, as Ainsley's replacement AI wreaks havoc on the game. Teased at the end of Thursday's live eviction episode, Ainsley's vacation left a Junior Artificial Neuro-Kinetic Intelligence Entity in charge. That acronym is JANKIE and that's just what the digital tot seemed to promise. Basically, everything was just what a kid might want: an eternal carnival with pizza parties and ice cream parties and singing and dancing. But all of it is mandatory and outside in the heat and lasts all week long. "It's almost like being held hostage by a toddler from hell," said T'kor after barely a day in the brightly-decorated backyard. "This is giving Dyre Fest 2.0 vibes," added Chelsie, referencing the Season 24 twist that trapped Houseguests in the backyard for a weeklong music festival disaster (think the real Fyre Fest). But as much as the conditions were dire (or is that "Dyre"?), there was still a lot of game to be played, and some major concerns for many of the people in the House. While taking Quinn out last week might have seemed the right move for Chelsie and her allies, it did still leave that power trio of T'kor, Kimo, and Rubina intact and in the House. Now, with just eight people left, a voting block of three is basically the majority, when it comes down to it. And Chelsie can't play. Honestly, eliminating Quinn may not have been the best move in the long-term. The only way to potentially weaken the trio is to not let any of them win Head of Household, because you do not want a tight three at seven players. As part of his party good-timing ways, JANKIE's Head of Household competition was S'more-tastic. Just hold your skewer against a marshmallow pressed against a plate/fire while standing on a platform for as long as you can go. The advantage the rest of the House has against the trio is that they've notoriously not been fantastic at competitions, with each of them having won only before. Cam and Leah have also only won one, but Leah is basically unaligned while Cam is arguably part of another trio (but really a duo with a working arrangement with Makensy for now). The trio needed to step up like they never have before and they ... absolutely did not. T'kor was out within the first half hour, with Kimo falling out right behind her at one hour, 10 minutes. Makensy's back issues knocked her out next, at 2:28. That's when things got really impressive, as everyone else was locked and loaded. JANKIE was trying to distract them with terrible jokes and his awful theme song, but it turns out your friends might just be your worst enemies. At the five hour mark, T'kor asked Filipina Rubina, "How do I say five hours in Tagalog?" After fumbling the start of her answer, Rubina giggled a bit, shaking her shoulders ... and her marshmallow. She never quite recovered, dropping her marshmallow and ending any hope of the trio taking victory. And before that, she was looking rock solid, so huge props to T'kor for providing the distraction that may have just jeopardized her game, or at least her power structure in the House. With only Angela, Cam, and Leah left in the game, Angela started wheeling and dealing. For all the critics of her game, she's proving very effective in her strategy of annoy, disrupt, spread paranoia, and mix it with (fake) tears, emotion and overt expressions of love. She kept the not-tears away this time. At first, she'd been just lobbying for safety for herself (and Cam, for some reason), but with just the three of them left, she publicly lobbied for them to all agree they wouldn't put the other two up. Considering this came at about eight hours into the competition, and no one had come close to enduring as much as they had, it wasn't an unreasonable -- or unprecedented in BB history -- type of request. And the others took it. Again, this was done publicly in a game where your word is just about all you have. After securing her safety, she hung in there another hour and then declared that as she had already won two HOH's and neither Cam nor Leah had won one at all yet, she'd rather they get the letters from home and care basket. And so she dropped. Here, Cam decided he was tired of competing and challenged Leah to finish the competition on one leg, as it was looking like it could go on for hours yet. Leah agreed, much to Chelsie's disappointment. Her jealousy and concern that Cam would choose Leah over her flared up again with him making the game harder on himself in this moment. And it also proved his undoing, as Cam was the first to lose his balance, leaving Leah victorious at 9:55 with a nearly 10-hour Herculean effort from both of them. It was a victory well-earned, and an endurance competition worthy