Big Brother 8, UK style

Just wanted to note that Big Brother 8 just debuted in the UK. We caught it while preparing our dinner last night around 9pm (lucky us). Apparently it's a lot bigger here than in the US, as it was on at least two TV channels (TV, which we finally got working) for several hours straight last night. Tonight, it was also on at 11:30pm so I'm assuming it is again showing for several hours.

The UK intros the houseguests like they're already celebrities. Each contestant gets their own video preview, then they come out of these vans that drive up. The crowds go wild (and boooo, for a lot of them, even though this is the first episode). Each contestant geeks it up for the crowd and the cameras on a red carpet, spots their families in the crowd, and then led directly into the BB8 house from there. Wildness. The houseguests we saw included an albino, a blind person, a gay dancer, among others... Not making this up.

Also, we noticed that both of today's issues of the London daily papers, the London Paper and London Lite (these are equivalent to the Red Eye?), featured front-pagers about BB8. I think they said the premiere had 3-4 million viewers. Those numbers would be just so-so in the US... not sure what they mean here.

Funny eh?