Following this season's “American Veto” and “Deepfake HoH” upgrades, “Big Brother 26” is ready to dish out some new twists to its unsuspecting houseguests.
Ainslie, alongside past winners Taylor Hale, Jag Bains and Cody Calafiore, first hinted at the power of the AI Instigator during Tuesday's special recap episode, saying, “One thing I've learned is America loves to influence the game. I'm giving America the opportunity to make another game-changing decision.”
CBS reported last week that 5 million votes were cast for America's Veto, ultimately forcing Quinn onto the block, and now America will have two new chances to influence the game. (Plus, Wednesday's episode averaged 3.19 million viewers, the highest-rated of the season, and was the No. 1 show of the night in adults 25-54.)
Fresh off Thursday's live eviction, in which Makensy won in the AI Arena and willing pawn Cedric was ousted in a 6-3 blindside against Rubina, TheWrap provides some details on how the AI Instigator power works: Essentially, it's a combination of three previous twists: America's Player, Team America, and Saboteur.
Starting Thursday night at 9pm ET/6pm PST, Americans will be able to vote for HouseGuests to serve as AI Instigators for the week, with a limit of 10 votes per day. Voting will close on Thursday, August 22nd at 12pm ET/9pm PST.
The selected houseguest will be announced on Sunday, August 25th (unless they're evicted next week?), and will have to “use their AI avatar to spread misinformation about the housemates and create chaos,” in a similar fashion to how Quinn controlled AI Angela this week.
A second round of voting will then take place, with proposers being awarded prizes ranging from $5 to $20,000 depending on how well they meet expectations.
But first, a late-night backyard endurance challenge will take place on Thursday night to determine the next Head of Household. And as always, the unexpected happens.
“Big Brother” airs Wednesdays, Thursdays and Sundays on CBS. 24/7 live feeds are available on Paramount+ and Pluto TV.
