Keanu Soto was met with an unfair fate on Big Brother 27. Not only was he put up on his “thought to be ally” Vince Panaro’s HOH, but he was sacrificed to the Mastermind and had to leave abruptly after his fellow houseguests stabbed his voodoo doll and evicted him. Keanu opened up about feeling hurt by being nominated by Vince’s HOH again, if he would have taken Rachel Reilly to the final two, and if his kindness was his downfall.
From the very beginning, Keanu was the target this season. He was put up week after week and saved himself, either with the Power of Veto or Blockbuster. The weeks he wasn’t on the block, his allies were HOH, or there were bigger houseguests to go after.
After Rachel’s untimely elimination in the White Locust competition, Keanu latched on to his old ally, Vince. But Vince had wronged him and his friends too many times by putting them on the block and evicting them. Yet, Keanu still trusted him to take him to the final two. Vince did not turn on his number ally, Morgan Pope, and decided to take Keanu out at the final five because he knew he couldn’t win over him.
Keanu got into a few fights with other houseguests, including Ava Pearl during a veto competition and Ashley Hollis during a veto meeting, but he always kept his cool.
Find out what he had to say about his time in the house and meeting Season 20 contestants Kaycee Clark and Tyler Crispen.
CBS
You constantly gave people who wronged you second chances, like Vince. Do you think your kindness hurt you in this game?
Keanu Soto: Coming into this game, I wanted to make it a point that winning will always be more fun than fun is fun, in my opinion. But, if I wound up winning the $750,000, and I had to become someone I wasn’t to do it, that was something that I wasn’t willing to negotiate on. So, while my kindness may have been my demise in this particular game, overall, it is not a weakness, and I choose not to look at it like one.
It’s unfortunate that I got taken advantage of a couple of times there, but I wouldn’t change it.
You and Rachel had an up-and-down relationship. Would you have taken her to the end despite her already being a winner?
Yes, I absolutely would have. I romanticized this vision that I had, where “to become a legend yourself, you have to beat a legend.” I most definitely would have done that, just for that alone. The way I looked at it was, “There is no losing in that scenario because I’m a part of history either way.” Had I beaten a legend and possibly become one in the process, great. If she became the first two-timer winner, and we accomplished something that was going to be very difficult to do, because outside of each other, we were both working with the other sides of the house. That would have been difficult to get a final two.
Just to get to be a part of a two-time winner or beat her in the process would have been good. Just like Ian [Terry] in Season 14 beating Dan [Gheesling].
Were you hurt that you went home on Vince’s HOH? And do you think he made a mistake taking you out?
[Chuckles.] I wasn’t hurt that I went home on his HOH. I was hurt that I was up on his block again. I forgave him a bunch of times. At this point, Rachel wasn’t in the game anymore, so believe it or not, I still would have taken him to the final two had I not copped out and had the option to.
I do not think he made a mistake taking me out. Absolutely not. I don’t think it’s ever a mistake when you take someone out who is going to beat you in the end. I think he understood that. Do I think it was right to take me out at that moment? A lot of us believed that Morgan was the bigger target. From that point, I believe he made a mistake, but I think I was a lock to win over him, so ultimately, that was not a mistake on his end.
When you told Ava, “I believe you have a prompt,” during your Veto win, why do you think she took it personally? Were you hurt that no one congratulated you?
I think she, at that point in the game, was considered mild-mannered, so me being the demonstrative personality that I am, and saying something so abrupt like that as a personal attack against her. It most definitely was not.
I was just frustrated, not because nobody congratulated me or anything like that, but because, when I won — you had to be there; the tension in the room was crazy — the fact that I did it in such a calm, collected manner. There was no doubt in my mind that I was going to win. You could feel the energy in there because nobody wanted me to win. When I took that last step, and knew I was going to win, I took a look back at the bench, and not a single person on that bench made eye contact with me.
When I won, it was very quiet. Nobody was happy. I took that particular block from Mickey [Lee]’s HOH very personally because her reasoning for putting Rylie [Jeffries] and Kelley [Jorgenson] up next to me was because they were my friends, and that really bothered me.
When you saw veto queen Kaycee Clark come into the house as your mystery veto competitor, did you think at that point you’d have a greater chance of being taken off the block?
Oh, man! Watching Kaycee come in was a treat. Coming in, I was a recruit, so I wasn’t very familiar with the show coming in, but I did binge a lot of it in preparation. Season 20 was, by far, one of my favorite seasons. Watching Kaycee and Tyler [Crispen] play. I was fortunate enough to meet both of them. That was great. That was also the season I told my mom to watch, so she was prepared. So, I’m sure she geeked out over that as well.
As soon as I saw Kaycee, I knew I was a lock to win it. When I gave her a high-five, I felt like she rubbed her veto powers on me, because I was able to get a three-peat. That was a very cool moment and one of the highlights for me this season.
Big Brother, Season 27, Sundays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, 8/7c, CBS
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