channel4

Another week, another twist to the Big Brother U.K. house.

If you're recording the shows and watching them later, like me, you might want to go elsewhere.

Warning: spoilers after the jump.

As ever folks, look away now if you don't want to know who will be facing the chop in the Big Brother 7 public vote over here in the U.K. this week...

Warning: spoilers after the jump.

As they say just before the classified soccer results here in the U.K., if you don't want to know the results of this week's nominations in the U.K. Big Brother house, look away now.

Warning: spoilers after the jump.

(S02E08) This season has been an absolute roller coaster ride. As if the first season's crazy relationships and antics didn't confuse us enough, this time around, everything stepped into the next realm of bizarre. There's love triangles (love quadrilaterals?), murder, babies, threesomes, pimps, affairs, proposals, and Guy being considerate. The first episode was relatively weak, but the rest of the season has had a lot of strong points. The plot thickened considerably without sacrificing any of the laughs.

The seventh series of Big Brother made its way on to television screens in the U.K. this evening, featuring a bunch of housemates who can really only be adequately described as 'desperate'.

Among the wannabes were a gay Muslim from Glasgow called Shabaz, an aristocratic student called George and a woman called Leah, who has spent £35,000 on plastic surgery -- including obtaining unfeasibly large breast enlargements that appear to defy gravity.

The most expensive pantomime in British television history came to an end on Friday night, and Cinderella finally got to go to the ball, when the previously unknown 'non-celeb' Chantelle Houghton won Celebrity Big Brother by a landslide public vote.

The final order ran like this: first out was Traci Bingham, then Pete Burns, followed by Samuel Preston, then Maggot, then Michael Barrymore -- and Chantelle was crowned the winner of Celebrity Big Brother 2006.

You can say what you like about the reality TV format, but Big Brother stands head and shoulders above the rest in terms of construct; it can really only be described as car-crash television at its best - and utterly captivating viewing, even at its worst. Who cares if it's mostly scripted and produced by cynically-minded manipulative TV execs? It's still a great watch, and this year's gang of paranoid, self-obsessed B-list nutcases gave us 23 days of insanely brilliant television.

No-one will be able to forget MP George Galloway mimicking a cat, or Pete Burns with a face like he'd been in the Aardman fire, or Michael Barrymore's obsessive cigarette hoarding, or Dennis Rodman's hyper-libido, or Traci Bingham's preening and pouting, or Jodie Marsh on the end of incessant bullying.

But most of all, it'll be remembered for making a mockery of showbusiness by placing a novelty non-celebrity into a group of desperate wannabes and handing her an career overnight.

Today marked the online premiere of the new U.K. Channel 4 sitcom, The IT Crowd. I'm an IT guy myself, so the curiosity overcame me, and I had to watch this first episode. In fact, if the premiere episode is any indication of what to expect, I may just keep on watching it. I just hope they keep providing them online, or I may be out of luck.

It's the second last day of life in the Celebrity Big Brother house for the remaining six housemates who will all face the public vote to decide the 2006 winner on Friday night.

Former Dead or Alive singer Pete Burns, disgraced entertainer Michael Barrymore, U.S. actress and model Traci Bingham, The Ordinary Boys frontman Samuel Preston, Goldie-Lookin' Chain's Maggot -- and, of course, the fake celebrity Chantelle Houghton from Essex -- will all line up and whittle down to one with a cash prize of £25,000 awaiting the winner.

The odds are stacked 1/5 on in favour of the young blond promotions girl who will celebrate her 23rd birthday next Thursday, whilst Michael Barrymore runs in at 28/1, Maggot at 25/1, Preston at 11/1 and Pete Burns a rank outsider at 50/1.

Personally speaking, I would rather see Preston win, but Chantelle has held her own for over three weeks with a bunch of bitter, so-called celebs and probably deserves her shot at fame -- not least of all for putting up with Dennis Rodman's excessive, leery behaviour for the duration.

Who do you want to win this year? Give us your vote in the comments section below and we'll do a full roundup of the whole series and the final outcome on Saturday.

The bookies got it right tonight when Member of Parliament George Galloway became the fourth housemate to be evicted from the Celebrity Big Brother house, followed by former basketball hero Dennis Rodman in the surprise double-eviction. The non-celebrity of the house, Chantelle, now looks favorite to win the show, having survived her only real test of the public vote against two potential heavyweights.

In his post-eviction interview with Davina McCall, George was unrepentant about his behaviour towards his fellow-housemates and his cat-mimimickery performance with Rula Lenska, but appeared to be taken aback at the swathe of negative press he'd received whilst in the house - particularly from his fellow-politicians.

When Dennis was announced as the fifth housemate to be evicted, everyone in the house was shocked -- mostly because the eviction was unexpected, but partly because Chantelle had defeat him in the public vote. He waltzed out to his post-eviction interview with his usual swagger and couldn't-give-a-shit attitude, the dissed everyone in the house in an ungrudging fashion.

The final on Friday night is hotting up to be a blistering evening, with Pete Burns sidelined, Maggot a bit of a non-event, Michael Barrymore losing his grip on reality -- and only Samuel Preston and Chantelle holding their act together for the public.

The Celebrity Big Brother housemates seem to have calmed down since their outrageous argument from Monday night, but grudges still remain and suspicions continue to cause friction between the group.

George Galloway in particular has managed to single himself out for villain status, with Chantelle, Preston and Michael Barrymore all on the receiving end of his eloquent barb, but Pete Burns didn't escape the criticism for going a bit too far in making life difficult for Chantelle and Preston during the complicated banking task.

The result of the tensions has been a split down the middle of the house, with Dennis Rodman, Pete and George segregating themselves from Chantelle, Maggot, Preston and Michael. All the while Traci Bingham floats around in a bit of a daze.

In other news, rumors are circulating to suggest that six housemates will make it through to the final night on Friday, with no evictions on Thursday night.

Only time will tell.

With only four days remaining in the U.K. Celebrity Big Brother house, relations are showing the worst possible signs of strains, particularly in the wake of the recent banking task, which seems to have been entirely designed to cause the highest possible amount of friction between the housemates.

Chantelle and Samuel Preston did their best to disguise the nature of their not-so-secret banking task from their all-too-aware fellow housemates, despite the repeated grillings from a malicious Pete Burns.

The other half of the group group finally managed to deliberately fail all of the allocated tasks as instructed by Big Brother, with Chantelle and Preston completely unaware they were being monitored by their fellow-housemates as they luxuriated themselves in a private members' club.

However, shortly afterwards, the group were gathered at the dining table to be informed that everyone had actually passed the task, which didn't stop George Galloway and Michael Barrymore going at each other over trivial stuff like cooking and cigars.

The twists and turns of life in the Celebrity Big Brother house trundle on relentlessly, with a cruel punishment for George Galloway for (yet again) discussing nominations with his fellow housemates.

Everyone was gathered in the lounge on Saturday afternoon and Preston read out a transcript of a conversation George had with Rula Lenska on Thursday about who he would have nominated in his previous punishment with Preston (also for discussing nominations).

Big Brother then erected a polling booth in the main area of the house and instructed all of the housemates, except George, to cast their vote on whether George should be allowed to nominate. They voted 4/3 in favour of denying the Member of Parliament his two nomination votes. In the ensuing round, Chantelle, Dennis Rodman and George were all nominated to face the public vote during Wednesday's double-evitions live show.

In other news, the housemates were forced to don Lycra leotards for a silly dance task on Saturday, and then Big Brother set the group a complicated money-counting task on Sunday which involves Chantelle and Preston gaining access to a luxury private club, which they must keep secret from the other housemates (although, the other housemates can see them on the monitors), whilst the rest of the house must keep up the pretence of counting money and deliberately fail the task.

Faria Alam, the woman probably most famous for her public affair with England soccer coach Sven Goran-Eriksson, now follows Jodie Marsh as the second person to be evicted from the Celebrity Big Brother house.

George Galloway, Maggot and Michael Barrymore all selected her during Monday's private nomination process, and the public voted to eject her from the show in a stand-off with Pete Burns and Dennis Rodman.

In other news, the house appears to have recovered from the confusing race row which erupted yesterday, after Faria finally owned up to her involvement in sparking off the whole issue -- and most of the housemates spent today preparing for a potential eviction when Big Brother awoke everyone with an alarm of gloomy bell tolls.

Later in the day, Preston kicked off a spate of therapeutic hugging around the house, before everyone was set a task to paint self-portraits, depicting themselves "inside and out".

Tensions are starting to fray considerably in the Celebrity Big Brother House, following almost two weeks in confinement for the B-List stars.

Following a 'Mods and Rockers' party to celebrate Preston's birthday last night, the housemates have discovered that Faria Alam, Pete Burns and Dennis Rodman will face the public vote as a result of yesterday's nominations (which presumably included Rula's "pants of power" nomination).

As a result, the mood in the house has shifted considerably, with a race row flaring up over misinterpreted comments made by Faria over the possibility of a non-white housemate ever winning Big Brother, which ended up with Traci having the finger of blame pointed at her by Dennis.

In other news, George has been chosen by Big Brother to take part in a secret task to win the housemates a luxury food budget, and has been cleared of any wrong-doing out in the real world when Member of Parliament Chris Bryant asked the Speaker of the House of Commons if it was "entirely in order" that George could sign parliamentary motions put before the Commons during the time he has appeared on the show.