Big Brother 17 (US)

Big Brother 17 (also known as Big Brother: Takeover) is the seventeenth season of the popular American reality game show Big Brother. The season premiered on June 24, 2015, with the second part of the premiere airing on June 25, 2015.

Twists

 * The Battle of the Block is back as "fan favorite" for its second season. For the first five weeks, two HOHs are crowned, each HOH nominates two HouseGuests for eviction. The nominated HouseGuests must battle for safety in the Battle of the Block competition where the winning pair is safe and the HOH who nominated them is dethroned.
 * A new twist called the BB Takeover unleashed a new twist each and every week. After the third week, however, it was canceled.
 * A throwback to Big Brother 5's Project DNA, Big Brother 17 adopted part of the old twist: The Twin Twist. HouseGuest Liz Nolan has an identical twin, Julia Nolan. The two girls alternate shifts in the house, secretly switching places throughout the first 5 weeks. They survived the first five evictions playing as Liz, so both twins entered the game and played as individuals.

Weekly History

 * Note: John was evicted for part of Week 10, before winning his way back into the house

BB Takeover
For more information, see main article BB Takeover.

Though it was initially announced that the Takeover Twist would introduce a new twist every week, there were no additional Takeovers after Week 3. There was no official word addressing its absence from the game until August 11th, when Julie Chen discussed why the Takeover Twist was cancelled. The main reason was because of the Twin Twist and there being too much going on in the game.

Have/Have-Nots History
There were no Have-Nots during Week 3, Week 9, and after Week 10.

Notable Prizes

 * In a Week 3 Luxury Competition, Meg Maley won a cruise to the Bahamas with the NFL's New England Patriots Tight End, Rob Gronkowski.
 * After winning the Week 5 Battle of the Block, Liz Nolan and James Huling won a private meal from Outback Steakhouse. Vanessa Rousso also won the prize as she was the remaining HOH. Each one was allowed to bring someone else. Liz brought Austin Matelson, Vanessa brought Becky Burgess, and James brought Clay Honeycutt.
 * Becky won $5,000 during the Week 6 Power of Veto competition.
 * Clay won an Irish vacation during the Week 6 Power of Veto competition.
 * Clay revealed on Your Reality Recaps the actual prize was money towards flying out to Ireland and he plans to go to Costa Rica instead.
 * Becky won another $5,000 (bringing her total to $10,000), a Never-Not Pass, and the competition itself during the Week 7 Part 1 Head of Household competition.
 * In the Week 12 Head of Household competition, Liz won a trip outside the house with a guest. She chose to take Vanessa. Big Brother 16 HouseGuest Frankie Grande took Liz and Vanessa to Ariana Grande's concert at the Staples Center.

Notable Punishments

 * Due to Jason Roy and John McGuire losing the Week 4 Battle of the Block, and Liz Nolan being dethroned, they had to form a boy band known as the Whackstreet Boys and perform together any time their pager goes off, while wearing all white outfits for the entire week.
 * The band they spoofed, the Backstreet Boys, tweeted about this and said "Hey Jason, Liz & John.. we're definitely fans of your moves! #whackstreetboys @CBSBigBrother #BB17."
 * AJ McLean would later attend a taping of Big Brother and take a picture with Julie Chen.
 * Whackstreet Boys which was spelt as "Wackstreet Boys" was originally used on Eminem's website as a diss to the Backstreet Boys around 1999.
 * Audrey Middleton received a penalty vote for breaking the Have-Not food rule during Week 4.
 * Becky Burgess, Clay Honeycutt, Shelli Poole, Liz Nolan, and Julia Nolan also broke this rule but did not receive penalty votes.
 * After the Week 6 Power of Veto competition, various HouseGuests received punishments:
 * Shelli Poole had to win 2,400 battles with targets in 24 hours.
 * Vanessa Rousso and Jackie Ibarra had to be chained by the ankle while dressed as a squire and a knight respectively for 24 hours. Vanessa must constantly buff Jackie's shield, while Jackie must always wear her helmet, unless she is using the bathroom, which is when Vanessa buffs the helmet instead of the shield. Once the punishment was over, Vanessa didn't have to wear the squire costume anymore, but Jackie must continue to wear the knight costume for the week, as it is now called the Knight in Shining Armortard.

Trivia

 * This is the first season that had a transgender woman, Audrey Middleton, competing.
 * This season features the youngest cast in Big Brother history with an average age of 26.7, beating out previous record-holder, Big Brother 6.
 * With Julia Nolan entering the house after the Week 5 eviction, this season holds the record for the most HouseGuests with 17.
 * This season holds the record for having the most HouseGuests with the same first initial, with 7 HouseGuests' names beginning with the letter J (Jace, Jackie, James, Jason, Jeff, John, and Julia).
 * At the start of the season, Jace, James, Jason, and John were the only J names in the house as Jackie and Jeff were added in the BB Takeover and Julia was added in the Twin Twist.
 * This is the first season since Big Brother 14 to feature at least two HouseGuests who knew each other prior to entering the house and the first since Big Brother 9 to feature pre-existing relationships between brand new HouseGuests.
 * In this case, there are four: Liz & Julia and Jackie & Jeff.
 * This is the first season since Big Brother 6 to feature more female HouseGuests than male HouseGuests.
 * Big Brother 17 ties the record with Big Brother 15 for the most amount of female jurors with 6.
 * Until Week 7, only 3 HouseGuests have been permanent HOHs (James, Shelli, and Vanessa).
 * Every dethroned HOH was a different HouseGuest (Jason, Becky, Austin, Liz, and Jackie).
 * This was the first time in Big Brother history that a duo from another television show entered the Big Brother house as official HouseGuests.
 * In this case, these HouseGuests are Jackie & Jeff from Season 26 of The Amazing Race..
 * This is the first season since Big Brother 13 to have more than one female in the final 3.
 * This is the first season to have 2 HouseGuests win 4 official HOH's.
 * In this case, Steve and Vanessa have both won 4 HOHs.
 * This is the first season where each HouseGuest in the final 3 won 3 or more HOHs.
 * This the first season where seven HouseGuests have won at least 2 or more HOHs. In this case, Shelli, Vanessa, James, Becky, Liz, Austin and Steve all won 2 or more HOHs.
 * This is very likely because of the Double HOH twist. However, only five of those HouseGuests have had multiples official HOH reigns (Shelli, Vanessa, James, Liz, and Steve) while the others were dethroned once in their multiple HOHs (Becky and Austin).
 * Although Liz was dethroned once, she had two permanent HOHs.
 * This season is tied with Big Brother 6, Big Brother 15, and Big Brother 16 for having the highest amount of cast members winning at least one major competition between HOHs and POVs. In this case, 12 out of 17 houseguests won at least one competition.
 * This is the fifth season to have females win 4 HOHs in a row (Weeks 2 to 5). The other times it happened were in Big Brother 5, Big Brother 8, Big Brother 10 & Big Brother 13.
 * This season holds the record for the most HOHs won by all females combined, which is 12.
 * However, three of those were dethroned HOHs, so Big Brother 13 would have the highest amount.