‘Big Brother’ Fall Edition: Why ‘Over The Top’ Could Top The Regular ‘Big Brother’ Game

Summer is over, but Big Brother isn’t. The Big Brother fall edition starts just one week after Big Brother 18 wraps, and while it won’t air on CBS, it will be accessible 24/7 on CBS All Access. The full-length episodes with live evictions will stream every Wednesday night and they will be available on demand the next day.

TV Guide has revealed details on the new season, titled Big Brother: Over the Top, which will put the fans in the driver’s seat with an exciting twist that we haven’t seen since Season 1 of the summertime reality show debuted back in 2000: Viewers will vote for the Over the Top winner.

#BigBrother: Next season's winner to be chosen by fans https://t.co/ns31jbfkll pic.twitter.com/bwxyYNTWTq

— Dalton Ross (@DaltonRoss) September 22, 2016

Each week, the HOH will announce the names of the safe houseguests in a live “safety ceremony” which will stream live on Saturdays at 10 p.m. ET. The new nominations will take place Sunday nights at 10. In addition, twice a week there will be live diary room sessions instead of those seemingly rehearsed pieces fans see now.

According to the CBS website, the new season of the show will showcase weekly live eviction episodes, as well as weekly recaps and round-the-clock live feeds with no scheduled blackouts. The promise of no blackouts is great news for diehard Big Brother fans who don’t appreciate the sudden switch to the fish tank whenever something good is happening during competitions or Power of Veto ceremonies.

The Big Brother fall edition will also feature “unprecedented” interactive components that will have an immediate impact on the game. In addition to more audience voting opportunities, there will be a Flashback feature on the Big Brother: Over the Top menu. Fans can click on the calendar in the live feed menu to instantly go back to any moment in the game. CBS also promises more viewer power and influence in the fall edition of the Big Brother game.

Big Brother Access shared more details about the Over the Top season, which is not to be confused with Big Brother 19, which will air next summer on the CBS network. According to the spoiler site, The Amazing Race casting team has cast new faces for the Big Brother: Over the Top cast, but at least one Big Brother veteran will also show up. CBS All Access subscribers will get the chance to vote for one former player to return to the game and play Big Brother: Over The Top. Voting is currently under way for either Season 18’s Jozea Flores or Big Brother 17’s Jason Roy. Either way, longtime Big Brother host Julie Chen will still be heavily involved in Big Brother: Over the Top.

One other big change: While the usual Big Brother grand prize is $500,000 for the fall edition, the winner will get $250,000.

In an interview with Zap 2 It, Big Brother executive producer Rich Meehan said the online version of Big Brother will appeal to loyal live feed watchers as well as broadcast viewers. In addition, producers won’t have to deal with “the restrictions of broadcast television, which means anything goes.

Longtime Big Brother producer Allison Grodner said that while the competitions will be downsized for the 10-week Big Brother fall edition, they will likely play out longer for live feed viewers.

“It’s still Big Brother but it’s live,” Grodner said.

“The competitions won’t be as big [but they] can possibly play out longer, people will be able to see everything, it won’t be blocked. You have to have some catch up [for people who don’t watch the feeds], but the feeds are now primary. It’s a whole new way of looking at it.”

Grodner also promises that there will be more incentive for the Big Brother players to stay awake instead of sleeping all day, so the Over the Top feeds will be more interesting than the regular Big Brother feeds.

While the cast of Big Brother: Over the Top cast has not yet been announced, the current cast members had mixed feelings about the fall edition when they were told about it. According to Big Brother Feedster, Final 3 contestants Nicole Franzel, Paul Abrahamian, and James Huling were recently told about the fall season, and they weren’t all excited about it.

The trio was asked to give advice to the new houseguests, a chalkboard with their tips will be left in the Big Brother house for the new “tenants”, but Franzel was especially bummed to find out that a fall edition of the show will start literally on the heels of the summer edition because she thinks the Season 18 cast won’t get to enjoy the full year of post-Big Brother.

Fans can sign up to see the Big Brother fall edition on CBS All Access for $5.99 a month. Big Brother: Over the Top viewers will also have on-demand access to more than 8,500 episodes of past and current CBS shows, including every episode of the past 18 seasons of Big Brother.

Big Brother: Over the Top kicks off Wednesday, September 28 at 9 p.m. ET on CBS All Access.

[Featured Image by Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images]