Celebrity Big Brother recap: More White House gossip — and a tearful eviction

Omarosa had a lot to say during her nomination ceremony in Sunday’s episode, but it was a silent action that had the houseguests talking in the aftermath.

“I am worried that my own alliance is turning their backs on me,” Brandi, who is nominated along Ross, says in the diary room, citing the fact that Omarosa winked at Marissa at the end of the ceremony as a reason to be paranoid.

Omarosa, blindly trying to stir up drama, calls out Ross for having multiple final-four deals. He denies any final-four deals…until Brandi unwittingly outs his deal with her, Marissa, and Ariadna.

Trying to figure out what is going on behind the scenes, Marissa and Ariadna recall that Mark told them Omarosa might put him on the block. They speculate that his time in the Head of Household bedroom was actually spent making a deal rather than pleading for his safety. (And, of course, they’re right.)

Pause for “the Twitter game,” where the houseguests ask each other questions as though they were fans on Twitter. Ariadna shares her feelings about Steve Harvey, who incorrectly crowned her as Miss Universe in 2016: “I love you, Steve. I really love him.” And Omarosa shares the craziest thing she experienced during her time in Trump’s White House: Anthony Scaramucci’s unprecedentedly short 10-day tenure as White House Communications Director. “Let’s just say it was surreal,” she says. “He had some very famous words for Steve Bannon.”

Un-pause because Brandi, as she does, takes another conversation on a left turn, asking James if he made a deal with Omarosa and Mark. James scrambles to give a non-answer while Mark wins the game with an actually believable denial: “Thanks for letting me know about this alliance I didn’t know I was in.”

On Sunday’s episode, James made a final-four deal with Omarosa, Mark, and Metta, but now James and his workout buddy Mark begin to question if working with Ross and Marissa would be a better game plan. James approaches Marissa to discuss a potential alliance and she’s game to work with him to save Ross, but she makes it clear that leaving Ariadna behind would be hard. As punishment for her indecision, James (really awkwardly) pets Metta’s stuffed owl. James had expected an immediate yes, but Marissa reveals in the diary room that she wants to wait to hear about the Veto competition twist before committing to anything.

Here’s the deal with the Veto competition twist. America voted between three twists on the traditional Golden Power of Veto: the Spotlight Veto, where the winner is forced to veto one of the nominations even if they want to keep things the same; the VIP Veto, where the winner has the power to use it twice at the Veto Meeting; or the Diamond Veto, where the winner can remove a nominated houseguest and also choose the replacement nominee.

Continuing to prove he’s the worst player in Big Brother history, Metta’s only question after hearing the options is, “If you win the veto can you put yourself up?” Marissa, on the other hand, realizes the power of the VIP Veto — which is what America chose — and gets very excited at the idea of being safe, taking down Ross and Brandi, and forcing Omarosa to nominate at least one person outside of her alliance.

Mark, Metta, and Marissa (so many M names!) are chosen by random draw to compete in the Veto competition in addition to Ross, Brandi, and Omarosa. The competition is called “Invitation Only,” and the houseguests have to collect puzzle pieces and complete their puzzle first. The game goes on for what seems like a really long time (bold of CBS to have an open-ended challenge like a puzzle during a live show), and cameras follow Omarosa as she puts in her final correct piece and hits her buzzer, but then it’s revealed that off camera, Ross had actually completed his puzzle first!

It puts Ross in an interesting position because if he uses the full power of the VIP Veto then he and Brandi are safe — but then Omarosa (who has repeatedly stated that her goal this week is to split up the pairs of Ross and Marissa and Brandi and Ariadna) could just nominate Marissa and Ariadna in their places. Ross chooses to use the first part of his power to take himself off the block, and Omarosa replaces Ross with his buddy Marissa. Just kidding! She shockingly nominates Metta because he wants to go home to his wife. Ross decides not to use the second half of his power and leaves Brandi on the block.

When the show comes back from a commercial break, the houseguests, particularly Ross, look stressed out despite it being a seemingly easy decision to honor Metta’s wishes. In their pre-vote speeches, Metta thanks the houseguests for a fun experience and Brandi keeps her speech short: “I just want to say thank you Metta for wanting to go home.”

The House unanimously decide to vote Metta out, basically making Omarosa’s tenure as HoH a lame duck reign.

Metta tells Julie he is very “cerebral” and claims to have had the houseguests on their “heels.” He also lets it be known that he is rooting for Ross to win but if he’d become HoH, he would have nominated James and Ross. Julie points out that Metta had lasted 20 days in the house and only had six to go, but “I could not live without my family another day,” Metta replies through tears.

Julie ends the episode by teasing a double eviction night coming on Friday. Wednesday’s episode will feature an HoH competition and nomination ceremony.