Big Brother Power Rankings: The Jury Return

Well, the week of Aaryn as HOH has ended, and we had another endurance competition to go along with the return of an evicted houseguest! All things considered, there wasn't a ton of drama this week for the exception of the game of one houseguest falling apart, so we should get right into it.

WARNING: Beyond the jump includes spoilers on the new head of household and the returned houseguest. This will be televised on the Sunday show, so if you're waiting...

So Helen's game, which imploded rather spectacularly last week, completely combusted into a pile of ash this week. Aaryn smartly put her and Elissa up, and would have been happy with either of them going home.

The only shock that came from this week was Elissa winning the power of veto. She took herself down, sealing Helen's overall demise, and Helen was evicted this week with only Elissa voting in her favor.

Here's where it gets crazy: the endurance competition was two things in one. The four jury members were competing to see who would get back into the house, and the remaining houseguests were competing for head of household. As the jury members dropped, they left the house, and the remaining jury member would be back in the game for at least this week. Judd was the only jury member to hang on for any significant length of time, so he comes back into the game. Hooray Judd! The competition continued and Elissa ended up winning Head of Household. Huge for her game, and is likely to throw the house into significant disarray, as the Aaryn/Andy/McCrae/Amanda alliance orchestrated Helen's removal, and Andy in particular was a swing vote to get Helen out. Depending on how deep Elissa's grudge is with Aaryn as compared to Andy, this could be a pretty big week.

An interesting alliance point, though: Aaryn may be falling out of favor with Andy/Amanda/McCrae, as she seriously considered replacing Elissa with Amanda, and McCrae and Andy have both become close with Superpawn Spencer. If Aaryn goes up this week and doesn't win the veto, they may fall in line pretty quickly with ousting her over, say, GinaMarie.

Anyway, here are the power rankings for this week. I have no clue, guys:

McCrae could be nominated this week. It's a definite possibility that Elissa will want to nominate a power couple, but the target would be Amanda in that scenario, not McCrae. In the event Amanda is brought down off the block, one assumes Aaryn would be the renom. It's a tough position to be in, but the house is really upside down right now.

Andy is a houseguest I'm concerned about given his role in Helen's eviction. He's playing an excellent game currently, and I don't think he'll be a target this week, but it could happen. Overall, though, he's still in the best shape of anyone save McCrae.

Elissa, because why not? Won the veto to take herself off the block, won the HOH to possibly remove a big power player and remain safe this week? She's gone from certain eviction to back in good shape. This could fall apart in a heartbeat for her, but for now, it's difficult not to see her as someone in a good position in the short term, at least.

Spencer's wheeling and dealing, along with the fact that he could theoretically pull together a mini-alliance with Andy and Judd, not to mention maybe possibly replace Aaryn in 3AM, shows that his status as perpetual pawn might be paying dividends. He's safe this week for sure. He's probably safe next week, too. If he sticks around longer than GinaMarie, who knows what's in store. Spencer's an enigma wrapped in a riddle.

A hearty return to Judd, who got blindsided in the double eviction but won his way back into the House. If anyone but Elissa won HOH, it would have been very likely that he'd be shuffled right out the door again, but he has a decent chance of sticking around this time, especially if he's able to repair some of the issues that ultimately plagued him in the previous run. He should be safe this week, regardless.

Aaryn's worst case scenario right now is in the HOH room. She's in serious danger of going home this week if she doesn't win the veto, as she would almost certainly be a nomination if someone comes down, assuming she isn't initially put up with Amanda or McCrae. That she's won four HOHs and a veto so far, however, is what makes me rank her higher than Amanda, who can't win anything.

Amanda is the probable target this week, and will rely fully on other people in her alliance to get her off the block because she is apparently incapable of winning a competition. It remains to be seen as to whether she'll actually go home this week, but she's not in a good spot.

I refuse to raise GinaMarie's ranking any higher until she actually does something of value. There's nothing to say about her because there's nothing about her worth talking about at this point.

This is likely to be the most exciting week of the season so far. I really can't wait until Sunday.