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Big Brother's Tim had the 'biggest target on his back' from day one
Big Brother housemate Tim Dormer has proven himself to be one of the best players in history, after going without a single nomination for 56 days.
To the dismay of Australian viewers, the former Big Brother winner was sent home on Wednesday night, after newbie players took complete control of the game.
The big television personality tells Yahoo Lifestyle that while he vowed to never compete on Big Brother again, he was convinced to take part ‘for the fans’. Tim also reveals how he survived in the game, why Taras Hrubyj-Piper won’t win, and admits he’s trying to patch things up with former housemate Estelle Landy.
‘Biggest target’
Tim entered the Big Brother house knowing how to play the new format of the game, after competing on Canada’s version in 2016. While he had a strategic advantage over the other players, he also knew that people would be wanting to take him out as soon as possible.
“I knew that I would probably have the biggest target on my back having won before and then being such a loud character. I mean, Tim doesn’t fly under the radar,” he laughs. “I knew that my strategy would have to be to avoid nominations at all cost, which I did a pretty good job at.”
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He explains that it was vital to avoid being nominated, because as soon as housemates had a chance to take him out, he’d be evicted.
“I knew that it would be a very hard slog for me to get through this game to the finish line…I don’t think any of [the housemates] wanted to have been sitting next to me at finale.”
While evicted housemates constantly told us that Tim was one of the biggest threats, he says that his strong social game and relationships carried him through to the top six. The star put emphasis on creating strategic alliances with not only the OGs, but also new housemates such as Johnson Ashak.
Tim isn’t apologetic for the way he played, saying that his only regret is not winning the nominations challenge on Wednesday night.
“I do have a lot of heart, if you peel back the strategic mastermind [part], I am a very caring guy. But all [is] fair in love and war when you’re playing a game, and I was there to get as far as I could,” he exclaims.
‘Frustrating’
Over the past few weeks, Taras has gone from a quiet, unassuming player and morphed into a strategic, ‘cut-throat’ and polarising housemate.
Evicted housemate Tully Smyth called him a ‘smiling assassin’, and Tim has echoed this sentiment, saying that he always knew Taras was a threat.
“I had my eye on Taras very early on in the game. And it was really frustrating because the OGs did not want to make any moves against him,” he reveals, before adding that both Estelle and Dave Graham had deals with the housemate.
“I knew that he was holding back on challenges for the first half of the game, and then when he started winning them all, sort of halfway through the game onwards I just thought ‘Gosh, this guy has everyone wrapped around his little finger’
“[He] had so much trust built up with people but was abusing that trust, and it started catching up where some of the OGs were saying in their eviction, ‘Hey Taras has actually lied to me here, and we shouldn’t be trusting him.”
However, Tim has a strong warning for the newbie housemate, saying that he thinks Taras’ actions have ‘cost him the win.’
“If you get to the finish line with a wake of OG bodies in your path, the audience ain’t going to vote for you to win. And I’m not quite sure whether Taras understood that part of the game. He’s very strategic and he wanted to get to the end at all cost.”
‘Cost us our friendship’
Audiences have been following Tim’s on and off-screen drama with returning player Estelle, with the pair starting a Twitter feud.
After Estelle accused Tim and Anthony Drew as using herself and Tully as ‘punching bags’, Tim fired back, writing: “You are Big Brother’s Amber Heard. Cancel yourself and go away!”.
The star has since deleted his tweet and he says he's remorseful about what has happened between the two. “The game kind of has cost us our friendship and we’re not talking to each other at the moment,” he says sadly.
While he hasn’t been able to talk to her directly, he does address their relationship on his podcast The Big Mouth with Tim Dormer, where he apologises for his actions.
“I’ve put the call out to chat to Estelle, and hopefully, Reggie wants us to sort our stuff out before finale. So she’s onto it, I think. I think we will.”
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