Big Brother 24 has by far been the most talked about post-season in recent memory. Not since Big Brother 14 and Big Brother 15 when Twitter was really getting into the show have fans been still so into the season this long after the season finale.
And to help prove my point, today, a week and a few days after Taylor Hale took her historic victory bow, a lot of fans are currently in the middle of viewing a six-hour deep dive interview with Taylor by Rob Has A Podcast’s Taran Armstrong. And I have finished that deep dive myself. But only for the sake of covering it for you. I care about you all that much. I’m kidding. It was very interesting, and if you have six hours of your day to spare, I suggest taking it in. Taran goes over the season with Taylor, play by play, telling her some things for the very first time. Find the link above and again at the end. But for your abridged pleasure, here are some takeaways from that deep dive that we found the most interesting.
Taylor Was A Recruit. Most of us know this already from watching the Live Feeds. A casting producer messaged Taylor on Instagram to ask her about being on The Amazing Race. Still the reigning Miss Michigan USA at the time, Taylor says she told them she wasn’t so sure about The Amazing Race, but would be interested in Big Brother. Taylor was by no means a BB fan at that time, but she had caught BB23 and was sold on the season after the mission and success of The Cookout Alliance. Taylor said she had no real plans to become a BB super fan after watching the season, but when it became a possibility that she could be on the show, she took in everything she could find. She says she checked out Reddit, listened to podcasts and binged as many seasons as she could. She seemed to have paid the most attention to Big Brother 3, Big Brother 6, Big Brother 7, Big Brother 12 and Big Brother 14. What was most interesting, though, was that Taran pointed out that Taylor knew the least about the show than any other winner since BB12’s Hayden Moss.
Taylor’s Breakdown In The Bathroom Was About The House Vibe. Remember when we saw Taylor break down in the bathroom? We all wondered if she had overheard someone talking about her… She tells Taran that she heard nothing but could sense what was going on. “I would walk into a room and there was dead silence,” she explained. “It was really deeply painful. I really didn’t do anything to deserve any of that. I was so intensely ostracized … I walked out of the backyard and went into the bathroom and there was this silent empty house, and I could feel the weight of isolation on me in that bathroom. And that was when I just pulled it over and let it all out.
Taylor Discusses Colorism. Taylor tells Taran that even though Big Brother 23 saw the success of The Cookout, and the BB24 cast was diverse, she still faced colorism. “It was always darker skinned Black women that were seen as threats, that were seen as aggressive or angry, or a loose cannon …,” she explained of BB’s history. “I mean name all the things I was called that first week in the house … what did I ever do to indicate that would be the case. There was absolutely nothing there. There is nothing to call back on except for, wow, these biases are so deeply engrained in us that in this small group where there’s a pressure cooker we go back to those toxic ideas. I am the darkest skin Black woman in the house … ” Taylor then turned to Monte, who gave Daniel the OK to put Taylor on the block with Terrance… “Who is allowed to have that authority to put Black women at risk,” she asks … “It wasn’t just Kyle, and Brittany and Michael to a capacity, that used race as a toy in the game. That started way, way earlier,” she said. Taran explained that Daniel was concerned he would look racist, but thanked Monte for making him feel better about nominating Taylor and Terrance. But Taylor lets it be known that it wasn’t Monte’s place (or anyone’s) to give Daniel that permission.
Taylor Still Plans To Hold Michael and Brittany Accountable. “I think there’s a hint of racial bias, but it doesn’t feel completely overt,” Taylor says of Michael and Brittany sitting on the Kyle story for so long. “I’m not going to bring it into the game. So I understand Michael and Brittany’s hesitancy … they gut-checked each other. I would have done the same thing, but probably in a shorter time-frame.” Taylor said it was pretty hard to hear that Kyle asked “am I crazy here?” and Michael said no. She said that was an opportunity for Michael to set Kyle straight then and there.
“Have I had a conversation (with Michael and Brittany)? Yes and no,” she explained. Taylor said her biggest frustration wasn’t how long they waited to talk about what Kyle said, but it was Michael leaving her on the block while Kyle went up as the replacement nominee that week. “If you’re going to do something and say it’s not a game move … take the final risk,” Taylor said. “They said they wanted to right a wrong … Brittany should have set on the block that week. The vote is not going to flip against Brittany… I still need to have an in-depth conversation about that. I have no doubt at all that we are going to work through it. I still love them to death. Those are truly my life-long friends. But in being life-long friends, you have to have conversations like that and demand accountability.”
Taran also told Taylor that a lot of people took the message of the edit that Michael and Brittany were worse than Kyle. Taylor was shocked by that.
The Jury Had Settled On Voting Taylor. Taylor said that most of the houseguests watched the finale together and said that Joseph and Jasmine were particularly upset with the jury footage. The jury was very clearly locked, they told Taylor, and they were all clearly voting for her to win. “They only negotiated because they had to,” she explained. But they were already decided that if Taylor made it to the end, they all had her vote to win.
Taylor Tells It Like it is About Monte. Taylor had a lot of ups and downs with Monte, as we saw this season. Monte seems to think he righted his wrongs with Taylor, but near the end of her interview with Taran, she said some powerful things about Monte and how he handled himself in the game. “It’s funny that my journey started and ended with Monte degrading me,” Taylor said. “But disguising how much he was doing it under the veil ‘but I’m pro-woman.’ ”
To hear the full lengthy talk between Taran and Taylor, go here: BB24 Taylor Hale Deep Dive
