Big Brother Reindeer Games was a holiday spin-off that ran for six episodes in December 2023. Nine returning players competed at a place called Santa’s Lodge for $100,000 — no nominations, no eviction votes, no jury and no live feeds. You won competitions or you went home. Nicole won it, becoming the first two-time Big Brother winner.
- When: 11 to 21 December 2023. Six episodes across two weeks.
- Cast: nine returning players, drawn from seasons 3 through 25.
- Winner: Nicole, $100,000. Taylor second, $25,000.
- Format: three competitions per episode. Lose the last one and you are out.
- No live feeds. Pre-taped, with no feeds at any point.
- Host: not Julie Chen. Three former houseguests ran it as elves.
- A second season: never ordered.
What was Big Brother Reindeer Games?
Big Brother Reindeer Games was a competition show wearing a Big Brother costume. It kept the players, the competition style and the branding, and threw away nearly everything else that makes Big Brother what it is.
Gone: nominations, the Head of Household, the veto, eviction votes, a jury, and the live feeds. What was left was nine returning players in a set called Santa’s Lodge, competing straight, with the loser of each episode going home.
It existed because of a hole in the schedule. The writers’ and actors’ strikes of 2023 left CBS short of programming that December, and this was made to fill it. That is not a criticism — it is the reason a good little show got made at all.
How did Big Brother Reindeer Games work?
Big Brother Reindeer Games ran three competitions per episode, each feeding into the next. Once you see the chain, every episode reads the same way.
- Naughty or Nice. Usually a puzzle or a clue game. The winner does not win safety — they win the right to hand somebody a disadvantage in the next competition.
- Jingle Bell Brawl. A physical competition, sometimes individual and sometimes in teams. The winner chooses who goes into the elimination.
- Santa’s Showdown. The elimination. Two players head to head. The loser goes home, with a parting gift.
The parting gifts were the running joke and they got meaner as the show went on. Cameron went out with a Jelly of the Month subscription. Cody got a fruitcake. Josh got an ugly Christmas sweater. Danielle got $5,000, which rather undercut the bit.
Who was in the Big Brother Reindeer Games cast?
Nine players, spanning twenty years of the show — Big Brother 3 through Big Brother 25. Four had won their original seasons.
- Nicole — BB16 seventh, BB18 winner, BB22 third. Won Reindeer Games.
- Taylor — BB24 winner and viewer favourite. Runner-up.
- Xavier — BB23 winner. Out in the Episode 6 semifinals.
- Frankie — BB16 fifth. Out in the Episode 6 semifinals.
- Britney — BB12 fourth and viewer favourite, BB14 eighth. Out Episode 5.
- Josh — BB19 winner. Out Episode 4.
- Danielle — BB3 runner-up, BB7 sixth. Out Episode 3.
- Cody — BB16 runner-up, BB22 winner. Out Episode 2.
- Cameron — BB25 ninth and viewer favourite. Out Episode 1.
Running it were three more former houseguests as elf ambassadors and competition hosts: Derek from Big Brother 23, Tiffany from the same season, and Jordan, who won Big Brother 11. Julie Chen did not appear.
What happened in each episode?
Big Brother Reindeer Games ran six episodes over two weeks, on a Monday, Tuesday and Thursday pattern both weeks.
Episode 1 — 11 December
The first episode of Big Brother Reindeer Games opened with Naughty or Nice as a clue game — work out the title of a Christmas carol. Britney won it and handed Cody the disadvantage.
The Jingle Bell Brawl put them on a balance beam delivering letters to Santa into each other’s mailboxes, then carrying the collected letters back. Britney’s reward for winning the first competition was starting with one letter fewer; Cody’s punishment was starting with one more. Frankie won, and sent Cameron and Xavier to the elimination.
Santa’s Showdown was a 57-piece yeti sweater puzzle. Xavier finished first. Cameron went home, with a Jelly of the Month subscription.
Episode 2 — 12 December
Episode 2 opened with Naughty or Nice handing out torn sheet music and asking which of nineteen carols was missing. Cody won and gave Taylor the disadvantage.
The Brawl went to teams of four, hanging ornaments of different weights on deliberately unstable trees. Cody picked his own team — Nicole, Frankie and Xavier. Taylor’s disadvantage was having to finish a tiny tree on her own before her team could even start. Her team won anyway.
The Showdown was a matching game against five wish lists. Cody went home, with a fruitcake, having won the first competition of the night.
Episodes 3 to 6
Big Brother Reindeer Games extended Episode 3 to ninety minutes, and it needed them — the Brawl was a hamster wheel relay where each player was handed less time than the one before, and Britney ran hers in under three minutes. Danielle went home with $5,000. She later called it one of the best blindsides in reality television, and she was not being kind about it.
Episode 4 took out Josh, who had volunteered to take a disadvantage rather than being handed one. Episode 5 took out Britney.
The finale ran as two semifinals and then a final. Xavier went out in the first semifinal and Frankie in the second, leaving Nicole and Taylor. The last competition came in three parts: spin sections of a post to build a track for antlers to slide through, then stack and balance thirty-two snowflakes of varying size and weight. Taylor took the first two parts. Nicole took the third, and the game.
How did Nicole win Reindeer Games?
Nicole won Big Brother Reindeer Games and $100,000, and in doing so became the show’s first two-time winner — Big Brother 18 in 2016, this in 2023. Taylor finished second and took $25,000.
The way it finished is the part worth keeping. Taylor won two of the final’s three parts. Nicole won the one that counted. In a format with no votes, no jury and nobody to persuade, the whole thing came down to which of them was faster at stacking snowflakes.
Was Big Brother Reindeer Games any good?
Better than nearly anyone expected, and that became the story. It arrived with no real promotion, six weeks after a season most fans had not enjoyed, and the common reaction was surprise — a fair number of people said outright that they had more fun with these six episodes than with the ninety-odd days that preceded them.
It averaged around 1.88 million viewers. The competitions drew genuine praise, which is not something Big Brother hears often.
The obvious limitation is that it is not really Big Brother. No feeds, no scheming, no long game — nothing to watch between the competitions, because there was no between.
Will there be another Reindeer Games?
Big Brother Reindeer Games has not been renewed and has not been formally cancelled. As of late 2026 it has sat in that state for three Decembers.
Producers have spoken warmly about the possibility of doing it again, which is the sort of thing said about a project nobody has commissioned. The strike-shaped hole it was built to fill closed, and nothing replaced the reason for making it.