Cody and Danielle break down that tree-mendous Jingle Bell Brawl on ‘Big Brother Reindeer Games’

Joyce Eng
·3 min read
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Not to be hyperbolic, but “Big Brother Reindeer Games” has delivered some of the best and most exciting comps and comp results in franchise history in just three episodes so far. In the second episode, Cody Calafiore, as the Naughty and Nice challenge winner, got to pick his teammates for the Jingle Bell Brawl and assembled a comp beast dream team of his Season 16 cohorts Frankie Grande and Nicole Franzel, in addition to Xavier Prather, leaving Danielle Reyes, Josh Martinez, Britney Haynes and Taylor Hale on Team Underdogs.

But anyone who thought Cody’s super squad would dominate was very, very wrong. Even with Taylor having to decorate an extra tree as her disadvantage punishment, the underdogs breezed through the comp — and at one point were two trees ahead of Cody’s team — and pulled off the upset to secure safety. But the Season 22 champ, who was eliminated in Santa’s Showdown at the end of the episode, has no regrets about his team.

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SEE ‘Big Brother Reindeer Games’ episode 3 recap

“We didn’t know the elements of it, so I didn’t know if it was going to be all of us working together or it was exactly what you saw — this relay race where I didn’t even get to go,” Cody tells Gold Derby in an exit interview with Danielle (watch above). “You don’t know what anybody’s strengths are because we all do well in certain comps and we all do poorly in certain comps. You can only do the best that you can with the circumstances that you’re given. If I knew that it was a different type of comp, I’d be like, ‘Oh, let me cater to that.’ We don’t know what we’re getting into, but I will stick to Xavier, Frankie, Nicole. They are incredible at competitions, they’re so well-rounded, and it’s no disrespect and no knock to anybody else. … It was insane. I’m like watching them like, ‘Man, all you guys whining over there that I didn’t put you on my team. You’re smoking us!’ It wasn’t even close.”

Danielle, who was eliminated in the third episode in dramatic fashion, was initially hesitant about joining the comp-heavy “Reindeer Games” since she’s not a comp beast, but the Season 3 legend clarifies that she’s just not good at timed comps (which, naturally, was also what took her out). “I do well when I’m competing with someone. If I can compete with you, it’s all on,” she explains.

The underdogs erupted into a euphoric celebration that unsurprisingly went on for way longer. “It was like we won the Super Bowl,” Danielle describes. “It was almost equivalent to the Giants beating the Patriots when they ruined their perfect season. For me, not being a comp beast … the elation — it was just so good. The celebration was much longer than what you guys saw. I think we celebrated for like 15 minutes or something.”

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