Idol Speculation: “Survivor MGX” Episode 9: Will Can’t Have Alcohol

Guys, I have an announcement: Will can’t drink alcohol. No beer, no wine, no spirits, no mixed drinks. Nothing. Zip. Nada. Poor sap has to make do with only soda. And what a sad existence that must be. But let’s focus on the main point here, and that is that Will Wahl is not legally allowed to drink. The man must be abstinent while his tribemates are in the throws of Dionysian bliss. He cannot have a single drop of that sainted liquid that makes one drunk. There will be no imbibing of intoxicating beverages by the young man with the uncannily deep voice. And, just in case I haven’t made it clear, Will cannot drink alcohol.

Ah, what a traditional way to start a blog, talking about the main focus of the episode. Now we move onto the strategy talk, as the usual fallout from Tribal Council ensues, along with the time-honored tradition of calling the people who flipped on you “idiots”. Our culprit tonight is perennial idiot Jay, who brings up the point that Zeke, Adam, and Hannah are now on the bottom of the Gen-X alliance. I’m willing to admit that this point is fair, but on the whole, I can’t condone Jay’s assessment. After all, where would the threesome be if they had stuck with him True, they’d be the bottom of a seven-person alliance rather than a nine-person alliance, which is seemingly better, but I’d argue (and I’d say the later parts of the episode back me up) that the nine-person alliance is more fractious than seven-person alliance in this case, and, as Hannah will bring up later, that threesome have more power in the latter alliance, despite the increased number. Here’s my problem: I can, to a certain degree, excuse people saying “Well, why ISN’T my alliance the obviously right move to make?” before the votes are cast. But hindsight is 20/20, and for Jay to not even RECOGNIZE why his alliance might not be attractive to Hannah, Zeke, and Adam is preposterous.

Chris also takes the time to brag about how his position is improving. Which is true. Good assessment, Chris. Yeah, really not much more to say about it than that.

But enough about that, this is shiny, happy “Survivor” time, as Adam for once manages to not completely screw up consoling someone after the vote, talking with Taylor about why it was the correct move for him to go against Taylor. Namely, Adam points out that Taylor and Jay were gunning for HIM, a point that even Taylor can’t deny, so we quickly move on to talking about the dirt that Taylor and Adam have on each other. Adam knows about Taylor’s food stash, Taylor knows about Adam’s reward steal. This helps to justify Adam’s revealing of information last episode, a move panned by everyone but myself, it seems. Basically, Adam and Taylor are in a “Nuclear Option” situation. Both have information that could, if not destroy each other, then at least cripple each other’s games pretty hard. That is a way to build trust, albeit tenuous trust. And, given how the Cold War went in general, you could argue that the analogy makes for bad strategy, but I still see the point in it. Granted, Adam really needs to give up on this whole “Make Taylor and Jay trust me.” thing, since that ship has clearly sailed, but here, at least, he has one good attempt at it. I’ll give him credit, though: I really like his “If you wanted me to stick with you, why’d you try and vote me out?” confessional.

Taylor consoles himself with food, and his attitude is really starting to annoy me. What Taylor is doing here is effectively sabotage, not really any different from what Scot and Jason did on “Survivor Kaoh Rong”, but at least they were TRYING to piss people off. Taylor really doesn’t seem to understand why it’s wrong, though he does at least admit that he’s doing it more to give himself an advantage than anything. I just keep thinking back to the likes of Julie McGee
from “Survivor San Juan del Sur”. She similarly stole food, and the castigation of her in response was a factor in her eventual quit. Taylor? True, he does get voted out for his trouble, but the man ultimately gets off pretty lightly for what I’d consider a serious offense. Stealing is one thing, but stealing from literal starving people is another thing entirely.

In keeping with our new upbeat attitude, we get our second instance of HANNAH attempting to console someone on the losing side of the vote. Having learned from her mistakes with Adam and Zeke, Hannah actually does a good job of talking to Jay about her decision. She’s friendly, but not condescending, and explains how her feeling of greater power by working with the old Takali led to her flip, and Jay, who really has very little choice at this point, seems to still be on good terms with her. Despite what episode 3 of this season might have indicated, Adam really needs to take lessons from her.

We head on to our reward challenge, and, in what may be an “Idol Speculation” first, I really feel no need to describe it step by step. It’s your average generic obstacle course, and ultimately in this case, the individual steps don’t matter. It’s boring, it’s a team challenge post merge, it’s for burgers and drinks at a spa, and Will still isn’t allowed to drink alcohol. That’s about all that really matters.

Oh, and Probst is making a big deal about the fact that teams will be decided by a schoolyard pick. This is often the case on “Survivor”, but rarely do they actually bother to show it. The only times they DO show it are when it has a major impact on the episode, like when the contestants of “Survivor Kaoh Rong” called out how it would fall down alliance lines, and skipped it entirely. Naturally, with something so impactful on the episode, we’re going to watch the pick go one by one, and see where it all goes wrong for one team.

Or, you know, we could cut right to the fact that the purple team is pretty much all old Takali, while the orange team is all old Vanua, with Taylor and Jessica being the only respective switches, that’s cool too. But surely if they brought up the schoolyard pick, then it must have major repercussions throughout the episode. I mean, the orange team picked by Hannah ultimately loses, so that must do something. Look, she’s even getting a confessional about it! It must lead to something this episode! SPOILER ALERT: This is the last time we hear about the schoolyard pick having any impact.

We get our requisite enjoyment of the reward, with Taylor bragging about his eating habits as a garnish. Then we return to a classic “Survivor” staple: the drunken idiot. Newer fans of the show may not be aware of this, as the tradition has dropped off in recent years, but “Survivor” used to have a mean tendency to give people just enough alcohol and just barely not enough food to have someone make a complete drunken ass of themselves. Think of Tom Westman’s performance during the merge on “Survivor Palau”, or basically any time “Big Tom” Buchanan (“Survivor Africa”) was allowed anywhere near alcohol. Unlike Will. Who can’t have it. Having no one named “Tom” on this season to take the fall, we settle for Bret, who seems to determined to prove all stereotypes about Bostonians true. He even sort of KNOWS he’s being set up, admitting beforehand that he should probably limit himself, though Chris informs us that this went out the window very quickly. Granted, Bret gets off easy, with the extent of his drunken exploits being a bombastic cannonball into the pool.

All is not calm, though, as Sunday comes out of the woodwork to deliver some intrigue. I said back in episode 3 (there’s that episode again) that I thought there was more to Sunday than the show was giving us, given a good remark of hers at Tribal Council. Then she quieted down until recently, and I wrote it off as my reading too much into it. But evidently I was correct the first time, as there’s some gamer left in Sunday yet. A fairly bad gamer, to be sure, but a gamer nonetheless, and that always leads to some fun with regards to strategy. Basically, the wounds from the vote where Jessica was saved haven’t fully healed, and while the pair are civil to each other, Sunday admits that Jessica probably needs to go sooner rather than later, especially as the old Takali a a fractured bunch. I would complain about this coming right out of nowhere, but in this case, I’ll give it a pass. This conflict would only really have arose starting in episode 5, at which point we had the switch, so there was really no need for Sunday to comment on her suspicion of Jessica until now. What I WILL complain about is the poor strategy behind it. I get not trusting Jessica, I really do, but holding the old Takali together is really in Sunday’s best interests in particular. At the moment, the old Vanua are chomping at the bit to get rid of each other. Like or dislike each other, if the old Takali can stick together for the next few votes, they’ve got this in the bag. Keep that majority, and ride it to the end. Granted, that’s not so good if you’re on the bottom of the old Takali, but if anything, Sunday is is the best position of the old Takali. She’s well liked, and so has a chance of winning no matter WHO she’s up against, and while she seems to be firmly in the Chris and Bret camp at this point, she could still potentially swing over to the Jessica, David, and Ken camp. Or, she could let all but one old Vanua go, and then use that old Vanua member along with Chris and Bret to gain a majority and a guaranteed finals spot, where again, she would have a decent chance at winning. Certainly there’s something to be said for making a big move and bolstering your resume, but as this season has demonstrated, one must wait for the proper timing. For Sunday, this is throwing out the baby with the bathwater, to use an old cliche.

But I want to like Sunday! QUICK! Cut to even worse gameplay! Oh, good, Adam is trying to ease tensions with his enemies again, that should be worse. Sure enough, Adam proves to us yet again that he can’t have more than one good soothing moment per episode, and ends up talking with Jay out in the water. Still bitter about the Mari vote, Adam gives him a “How’s it feel to be on the bottom?” talk, and while I do think Jay exaggerates QUITE how much of an asshole Adam is being here, I can’t deny that it’s not really Adam’s smartest play, and he does come off as kind of an ass in this case. Admittedly, Adam is at least not playing both sides of the fence, or at least is being more subtle about it, but the damage on him just keeps getting worse. Again, while making enemies of eventual jurors is a categorically bad thing, in the case of people like Jay and Taylor, it was inevitable due to the Figgy vote. But when Jay goes to complain about Adam to the group, thereby taking the talk away from Will’s sobriety for a minute, Hannah and Zeke join in on what an asshole Adam can be. When your CLOSEST ALLIES don’t like you, your chances of winning are shot. I still personally like Adam. As someone who’s got a naturally loud voice, I can relate to the whole “shouting in confessionals” thing, and I like how focussed he is on pure strategy. Mind you, the latter point is part of his downfall, but I’ll be talking about that when we get to Tribal Council. My point is that I’ve accepted the fact that Adam will not be winning this season. He may make it to the end, but I don’t see him really acquiring the votes necessary to win it all. Enjoyable to watch, but not good for winning.

After a really pretty sunrise, we see that Sunday’s quest is not done, as she goes to Jay about the possibility of using him, Will, and Taylor to blindside Jessica, which Jay agrees to, as he doesn’t have many options at this point. What is interesting to note here, though, is that this is further proof that Hannah, Zeke, and Adam going with the old Takali was the right move. Unlike Jay, Taylor, Will, and Michelle, who were a tight, nigh-unbreakable foursome, the old Takali, while in greater numbers, have difficulty working together. Push comes to shove, they’ll join for a vote, but those old divisions are there, and working in the favor of Adam, Zeke, and Hannah. It’d be one thing if the old Takali was a solid six who COULD be broken up by a good strategist, but this isn’t the doing of Adam, Hannah, or Zeke. The old Takali are doing this to themselves, with little to no outside prompting. Again, more evidence that Jay really is wrong in saying that the move last episode was a bad one.

Our immunity challenge is only slightly more remarkable than the reward challenge. A returning challenge from “Survivor South Pacific”, our tribe members hold a large wooden bow with a ball on top of it, while standing on a balance beam. At specific intervals, contestants will move down to a narrower section of the beam. If they fall off or the ball drops, they’re out. Last one standing wins. Pretty standard difficult endurance challenge. While it is a reused one, it isn’t overdone, and as it’s been five years since we’ve seen it, I’m willing to give it a pass in that regard. What DOES bug me are the bows. Could we put in at least a LITTLE work to make them look authentic. I know we’re kind of in the era of “Plastic ‘Survivor’”, but a little more effort would be appreciated.

Speaking of things from over five years ago, we bring back a twist no seen since “Survivor Redemption Island”, presumably put on hold to distance the show as much as possible from that God-awful season. If people want to, they can opt out of the challenge and eat grilled ham and cheese sandwiches, potato chips, and imbibe some soda and beer. Except for Will. He can’t have the beer. Just thought I’d clarify it.

Once again skipping over the important decision-making part of the challenge, we cut right to finding out that only Zeke and alcohol-free Will opted out, which makes sense, especially when you consider that you’ve got surfer dudes in the challenge, as our little puritan Will points out. I’m actually surprised MORE people didn’t drop out, though I applaud them their dedication to the game.

Normally I’d just skip right to the outcome of the challenge, but I do want to draw attention to one early drop out. Bret is out pretty early on, which is no surprise for a top-heavy guy, but the look of betrayal he gives the food and drink is just priceless. You know he just wanted to drive in the “Drunken Bostonian” stereotype a LITTLE BIT MORE, and instead has to settle for Will getting drunk. Oh, wait, I forgot, Will can’t drink alcohol. I guess Probst mentioning it IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FREAKING CHALLENGE wasn’t enough of a reminder.

Ken ends up winning the challenge, which surprised me somewhat. This is a challenge that doesn’t favor the top-heavy, and as a man’s center of gravity is higher than a woman’s, I’d have expected one of the ladies to take it. Probably Jessica, given her performance in the previous immunity challenge. Granted, Ken is not the most top-heavy looking guy, but the center of gravity thing is still a problem. Frankly, all this means is that the immunity necklace will not impact the ultimate vote.

With talk of potential immunity idols JUST NOW coming up in our majority alliance, they agree to split the vote between Jay and Taylor. Frankly, it’s the smart move. There’s always a chance at a fracture, and splitting the vote makes it easier for the alliance to fracture, but even if two people defected to Jay’s side, making the vote 5-3-4, they’d still be down in numbers come next episode. Ultimately, the idol is a greater threat. Sunday is the only one not on board, due to wanting to use Jay, but she pulls on her big girl panties with Bret and agrees to go along with the smart move. At this point, really the only indicator that either Taylor or Jay ISN’T going home is the fact that David stated that either Taylor or Jay was going home. Usually, that means you’re safe.

As Sunday’s plan never really got off the ground, Jay and Taylor go in for one last smorgasbord before Tribal Council, where Taylor brings up that Nuclear Option he’d been talking about all episode. With Adam’s name being about as low as “General Grievous” with the pair, they agree to bring it up at Tribal Council, as a last-ditch effort to save themselves. Why they don’t bring it up BEFORE Tribal Council, when they’d be more likely to get the plan changed, is a mystery to me. I know we’ve seen plans change last minute at Tribal Council more and more over the recent seasons, but the tried and true method of getting one’s plan in place beforehand is still better.

I could take this time to talk about the good strategic double-talk, including subtle bringing up of the old Takali fractures by the old Takali, but I think our nuclear war takes precedence. While I’ve still little respect for Taylor, if you ARE going to invoke a Nuclear Option at Tribal Council, this is the way to do it. Rather than just spill the beans on Adam and hope for the best, Taylor first confesses his own food-stealing sins to the group (lumping Adam in with him in the process) so that Adam has no ammunition against him, and then tells the group about Adam’s reward steal. Taylor here is banking on the recency effect. True, he did something bad, and I’d argue something objectively worse, but by bringing up Adam second, the focus is more likely to be on Adam rather than him. Taylor also has the advantage of playing offense here. Taylor knows what he’s going to say, while Adam has to react, making his argument much less coherent. Adam, in contrast, comes off as desperately trying to salvage his reputation, admitting to most everything, but denying that he actually ate any of the food Taylor left. To make matters worse, Adam must once again do all this at full volume, making his desperation all the more apparent. All the while, Hannah tries to hide in her shirt from the awkwardness. The particular moment that highlights what makes this discussion so fascinating is Adam’s making the fair point that stealing a reward, particular the loved ones visit (which has been the crux of Taylor’s argument) ultimately doesn’t matter much in the game. Taylor points out that it affects people’s emotions, which are part of the game. Basically, Taylor is making an emotional argument. Objectively, what he did was worse, actively sabotaging a vital part of camp life, while Adam is potentially taking away something nice from something else. Adam, meanwhile, if focussing on the logic of it. In the end, his advantage isn’t much of an advantage, unless used properly, whereas Taylor has already committed an egregious offense. It’s two opposing styles of playing the game, and it’s quite dramatic to see them come to a head.

It also does a good job at highlighting what Adam’s problem in the game is. Adam is a strategist. A pretty good one too, apart from having all the subtlety of a foghorn, by which I of course mean no subtlety at all. But he’s a PURE strategist. And while “Survivor” is a strategy game, Adam seems to completely ignore the emotional aspect of the game, which is his downfall. At the end, if you can’t get people, even your own allies, to like you, you’ve got no chance at winning the game. You need both strategic intelligence and emotional intelligence. Adam has one, but not the other. Fun to watch, but ultimately a losing strategy.

Of course, the same argument could be made in reverse about Taylor, that he plays on all emotion, no logic. And that would be fair. But Taylor’s gone now, so I feel like that point is obvious.

So, what wins out in a battle of emotion vs. logic? Well, as should happen in a game of strategy, logic wins out. Taylor is sent home, which I think is the right move. True, Adam has been pretty well branded as untrustworthy by most everyone left, but he’s also been branded an asshole, making him less likely to get a counter alliance together. Therefore, he can be picked off at any time, or taken to the end as a goat. Conversely, Taylor is a likable challenge threat who could easily slip past the radar and make it to the end, even winning. Plus, I would like to remind you, the man actively sabotaged the tribe. He’s EARNED his exit. And no, I’m not sorry to see him go. Everything out of his mouth was just completely inane, and his “holier than thou” attitude that made him the stereotypical “Millennial” this season wanted just became SO ANNOYING! One could argue that he was good as someone to nag Adam, but given Adam’s current standing in the game, I’d argue that we have plenty of that. Like I said, ultimately the smart move. Our old Takali plus Adam, Zeke, and Hannah alliance has a good thing going. It may need to be shaken up, but it’s too soon.

This was a different episode for this season, and I mean that in a good way. For the first time, by NOT focussing on the “Millennials vs. Gen-X” thing, we got some intriguing debates with the emotion vs. logic thing, and we got to see both sides fracturing, with some good setups for episodes to come. Add onto that an explosive Tribal Council, and the running gag about Will not being allowed to engage in underage drinking, and you’ve got yourself one hell of an episode. So much so that it deserves a…

TOP 5 AND BOTTOM 5

The merge episode is one of the more distinctive parts of the show, and a list of the best and the worst definitely bears talking about. We’re an episode late, I know, but somehow it feels like the right time to get to it. Really not much more to explain than that, so, too the list!

TOP 5

5. “Survivor MGX”: A bit of an obvious choice, given how I praised the last episode, but I think it does stand out as one of the greats over time. Granted, my personal “short list” I drew up wasn’t so short, but this merge just has a lot more little intriguing connections that bolstered it up above some of the other choices. Really, the main thing that hurts it is that this is season 33, and so we’ve seen a lot of these plotlines done before, but this season did it well enough that it earned at least a number 5 spot.

4. “Survivor Cook Islands”: Two things set this merge above others: strategy and misdirection. When people think of the good parts of this season, they mainly think of Ozzy’s challenge dominance and Yul’s strategy. Both are prominently displayed in this merge, particularly Yul’s strategy. This is where we get him persuading Jonathan Penner to flip back over, and it’s just as good as you remember it. And while it was clear from the beginning that the Aitu Four would make a comeback here, the episode actually did a really good job of keeping us in the dark as to who would flip. We got Yul working Penner, but we also got Ozzy and Nate (yes, I’m sure there was a “Nate” on the season) bonding, and a potential flip there. Go back and give it a watch. I guarantee it’s a better episode than you remember.

3. “Survivor South Pacific”: Again, while a bit obvious, we had a really good resolution to a storyline here. Cochran overcoming the bullying of the old Savaii and changing up the entire game was really well built up here, and thanks to the narration of Coach, was really well put-together. Plus, we basically got our setup for the rest of the game, which made things exceptionally interesting.

2. “Survivor The Australian Outback”: Merges with food temptation are always fun, plus we had Jeff Varner get voted out over peanut butter, which is hilarious (except to him, of course). But it’s that dramatic ending that really makes the difference. One vote, from the first episode mind you, deciding the outcome of the course of the game is quite a big finish. Though, it’s not quite as big as our number one spot.

1. “Survivor Borneo”: This is one episode where I can’t disagree with the early season purists. Holding the record for most individuals to receive votes at a single Tribal Council, this could be argued as the true birth of “Survivor” strategy, given that a popular but threatening survivalist ultimately got the axe. Even as someone who was used to threats going at the merge, this still shocked even me. Seeing Gretchen go was just that powerful. And the mystery of strategy vs. emotions, much like with this current episode, made for compelling storytelling that has yet to be beaten.

Honorable Mention: “Survivor All-Stars”: Much like the season as a whole, this merge is a mix of entertaining and painful. We got heated personal discussions, and ultimately the less-likable characters (and Rupert) winning out. What gives it an honorable mention? That look on Lex’s face when Kathy keeps her immunity. That look alone deserves mention. I’m surprised there isn’t a meme of it.

BOTTOM 5

5. “Survivor Tocantins”: Rarely is there a “bad” merge on “Survivor”, and even calling the Tocantins merge “bad” is a bit of disrespect. “Underwhelming” might be a better word. We got some obvious strategizing, and good setup for later on, but no real fireworks to stand out. Plus, due to Joe’s medical evacuation, we were robbed of even having a dramatic vote to tend the episode. That alone is what sinks this merge to the “Bottom 5” list.

4. “Survivor Nicaragua”: If the merge on “Survivor Tocantins” has the sin of being underwhelming, then this one has the sin of being incomprehensible. Alina? The person we’ve seen next to none of is the one who goes home? That’s just not the stuff of legend, and really not what a merge should be.

3. “Survivor Cambodia”: Perhaps a more personal choice, but the sudden attack on Kass this episode was a real turn-off. I won’t say she did NOTHING to deserve the boot (she did piss off majority leader Andrew Savage at the previous Tribal Council after all), but like with “Survivor All-Stars”, the personal attacks, in this case between Kass and Tasha, really just brought the whole thing down. With too many people to be truly comprehensible, and no hilarious Lex-face to compensate, this one just doesn’t stand up in the end.

2. “Survivor Thailand”: While I often complain of the merge happening too early in more recent seasons, I will concede that the merge can happen too late as well. Such is the case here. With the old Chuay Gahn up 5-3, this just became a predictable Pagonging, brought down further by the slimy Brian Heidik winning the reward challenge, and us having to, unfortunately, learn more about his personal life. Gag.

1. “Survivor Guatemala”: Yes, even one of my personal favorite seasons, and one that I feel gets a bad reputation, does have the worst merge. The one real criticism I’ve seen levied against this season, apart from being forgettable, was that the cast was largely made up of assholes. I personally take this as mostly people being butthurt about Stephenie LaGrossa, who was America’s sweetheart after “Survivor Palau” showing her more strategic side, and people being unhappy that she wasn’t as pure and wholesome as they thought. In this episode, though, I can kind of see their point. The majority tribe at the merge usually has some power of the minority, but the second iteration of Nakum REALLY came down hard on the second iteration of Yaxha here. It didn’t help that the (admittedly intriguing) twist of opting out of the challenge for food was introduced her. While a good twist in general, this one served to highlight the tribe division, making non-assholes seem like assholes, and the assholes seem like bigger assholes. Not even a really cool immunity challenge can redeem an episode where most everyone is unlikeable and the bad guys win.

Honorable Mention: “Survivor Worlds Apart”: Really, there’s not a whole lot to hate about this merge. By and large, it’s just kind of standard. In fact, it almost didn’t make either list. Then I remembered that THIS was the season that gave us “Merica” for the merge tribe name. Still don’t know what they were thinking.

Bad merges aside, this episode of the current season was still really good. Those plotlines we saw starting in this episode seem to be growing, so hopefully intrigue will be the order of the day!

Will still can’t drink alcohol.

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

“Survivor” Retrospectives: Nicaragua

HOLD EVERYTHING! I’ve found the time in my hectic life to start writing again, so I demand that you drop everything and read my pointless pontifications about “Survivor”! In all seriousness, this is very belated, but it’s time once again to start up “Survivor Retrospectives” a (somewhat) objective look back at “Survivor” seasons past, and seeing how they hold up in the passage of time. And we’re starting off with a doozy of a season this time! Yes, what this summer’s editions of “Survivor Retrospectives” may lack in quantity compared to other summers, we more than make up for in the quality of the seasons that must be assessed. Now, not to say that “Survivor Nicaragua” is a good season, far from it. In fact, Nicaragua is one of the most maligned seasons to date, and many people consider it the worst season of the show ever. But extremely bad seasons are just as much fun to analyze as extremely good seasons, and oh baby do we have a string of bad seasons coming up! Nicaragua just happens to kick off that list. But, does Nicaragua deserve the terrible reputation it gets? Frankly yes. Even I, who loves to have unpopular opinions about “Survivor” can’t defend this season as being “good”. But, is it quite as bad as everyone makes it out to be? I think not. Let’s take a closer look, and see exactly what this season does right, and why it doesn’t outweigh everything it does wrong.

Since it’s been a while, though, I feel compelled to remind everyone that this blog will contain spoilers. If you want to watch “Survivor Nicaragua” spoiler-free, do not read this blog! If you want to know whether Nicaragua is worth watching, but don’t want spoilers, scroll down to the bottom of this page, where I will have a section labeled “Abstract”. There you will find a spoiler-free opinion on the season as a whole, which should help in your decision. But enough chit-chat! Time to dissect this season for all it’s worth, starting with the place we usually begin, the cast.

CAST

As with many a bad “Survivor” season, people will tell you that the cast is the big problem with the season, and Nicaragua is a great example of this. In my opinion, however, the cast of Nicaragua is NOT it’s great weakness. It’s not a good cast, don’t get me wrong, but people tend to take a few bad apples and say that they poison the whole cast, forgetting that there were actually a few good characters in amongst the bad. Chief among these, most people will tell you, is Brenda Lowe, our “villain” for the season. I put “villain” in quotation marks on the basis that, at the time it was airing, most people considered Brenda a villain. Nowadays, though, compared to the rest of the cast, she’s considered the best thing to come out of Nicaragua, and therefore a hero. It also helps that she’s the only person from Nicaragua to ever come back. I can’t deny, I like Brenda about as much as everyone else does. A smart strategist who also happened to be an attractive young woman, Brenda was inevitably compared to Parvati Shallow (“Survivor Cook Islands”), which I don’t feel was entirely fair. The pair aren’t dissimilar, but while Parvati mainly played the flirt game and brought together a women’s alliance (along with a few side deals), Brenda took a different route. True, Brenda did use her looks to win a few allies to her side (notably Chase Rice), but she took the more straightforward route of creating a dominating alliance, and then spinning around those not allied with her to keep them off-balance. Not dissimilar, but also I think selling Brenda a bit short, making her seem like she was just a clone of Parvati. As I’ve discussed before, seasons and people can fall victim to simply coming after a popular season, and being compared unfairly to that season. Granted, I don’t think Brenda has too much of a problem with this, but I would say she’s slightly underrated. Not quite as underrated, though, as her strategic rival, Marty Piombo. Initially on the opposite tribe from Brenda, it seemed as though Marty was going to be Brenda’s rival come the merge. After the inevitable tribe swap, though, that storyline was sped up, as Marty ended up on the same tribe as Brenda, and in the minority. This, however, made him infinitely more interesting. Now Marty was having to struggle for his life, and as an obvious target, he was likely to be gone. Thankfully, Marty was no dummy, and despite being targeted numerous times before the merge, managed to talk his way out of it many times, most famously with his “Chess Grandmaster” lie to Jud “Fabio” Birza, who we’ll be talking about later. This made for a really compelling story, and there’s a reason these three episodes of the season (where Marty was struggling and on the outs) are remembered most favorably out of all the rest of the season. Marty made for good tv, and between his wit and his strategy, I also liked him a lot. A shame he hasn’t come back.

Of those who are remembered fondly from Nicaragua, Brenda and Marty are about the only ones who get any sort of talk today, but people forget that there are a few others from Nicaragua who, at the time at least, were actually quite popular. In particular, a duo of older women (a demographic “Survivor” loves to ignore, for whatever reason) who are now forgotten unfairly, in my opinion. First up is Holly Hoffman, our underdog for the season. Holly was initially maligned coming in, and not entirely unfairly. Her first major act of the season was to crack under the strain of survival and the game, and toss fellow contestant Dan Lembo’s shoes into the ocean, having first filled them with sand. Not exactly the start to make anyone like you or be impressed with you. Holly, however, saw what she was doing and turned her game around, becoming another of the strategic masterminds of her tribe, along with Marty. Things really took off for her after the tribe swap, where she managed to take control of her game, and even overcome being on the bottom a few times. It was a similar story arc to Kathy Vavrick-O’Brien’s on “Survivor Marquesas”, only with not quite as sharp a learning curve. Whereas Kathy clearly had no idea what the game was about going in, you got the sense that Holly knew what was going on, and was just unable to make use of it at the start. Still, she was an interesting character and good strategist who wasn’t a jerk, and very easy to like. Even she, though, was somewhat overshadowed by the other awesome older lady, Jane Bright. In a sense the opposite of Holly, Jane was no strategic mastermind, and brought into the alliance more often than not (even though Marty had it in for her, for whatever reason), but her big factor was her survival skills. One of few people to ever come on the show knowing how to make fire, Jane proved to be an invaluable asset from that standpoint of the game. These days, it’s rare to see a hard-core survivalist on the show, but to have it be one of the oldest people in the game? Unheard of! No one talks about her anymore, but it’s important to remember that, at the time, Jane was the most beloved of the cast. Don’t believe me? She, and not the currently-beloved Brenda or Marty, won the “Player of the Season” award. And I’ll admit, while I nowadays find her vacuum of intelligence a bit grating, I still like her. It’s just cool to me to see this little old lady doing so incredibly well compared to these young bucks. So yeah, Jane’s pretty cool, and so is Holly. In effect, it could be argued they started the modern trend of having awesome older-lady characters on the show, and they deserve credit for that. But even though they started the trend, I find that they are not remembered precisely because of said trend. The older-lady characters who came after them did what they did, but better, and were from overall better seasons. As such, Holly and Jane kind of get the shaft. Still, this does not change the fact that Holly and Jane are pretty cool, and arguably high points of the season.

Now we move onto the characters who are kind of mixed bags. First and foremost is winner Fabio, who I mentioned before. Living up to his in-show nickname, Fabio was very good looking, but an idiot and accident-prone. The latter trait was occasionally funny, but for the most part, Fabio always felt to me like a waste of space. At the time he was a fairly well-liked winner, partly because of his claim that he played up his stupidity to get farther in the game. I buy this argument to a degree, but he’s still pretty much a dumb blonde, and it’s not that surprising that he’s been forgotten in the passage of time. I’ll talk more later about how he was the best possible outcome for the season, given the final three, but on the whole, not the best winner of all seasons, and it’s understandable that he’s forgotten. Also to be mentioned is early boot stunt-cast Jimmy Johnson. As a different take on casting sports stars on previous seasons, the show cast Jimmy J., a former football coach and sport commentator. Not a bad idea in concept, and it helped that Jimmy J. actually was a big fan of the show, but the trouble was that he just wan’t very interesting. All he really had going for him was the stunt aspect of his casting, which wasn’t much, and so while not hated, he is pretty well forgotten. The only other person who fits in this category is Matthew “Sash” Lenahan, another potential strategist of the season. I say “potential” not because Sash wasn’t strategic, but because he never really got the respect he deserves. Unlike a Brenda, Holly, or Marty, Sash had no charm to back up his strategy. He THOUGHT he was charming, but he came off both to the audience and the cast as a schmoozer who was completely full of it. I can’t say I don’t see where it comes from, and I get that people may not like Sash, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t deserve respect for his moves. He was pretty much an equal partner of Brenda, was really the one responsible for not letting Marty get a foothold post-swap, and even managed to come back from being put on the bottom of the merged tribe. People may say that I’m overestimating his influence on the game, and that I’m the only one who really cares about him on this season, but damn it, Stephen Fishbach (“Survivor Tocantins”) has called him “underrated”, so THERE!

Now, sadly, we must move into the bad people of this season. As an individual, the least offensive far and away is Jimmy Tarantino, aka Jimmy T. An obnoxious braggart, Jimmy T. was never really destined to be liked. He was out quickly, his only saving grace. I didn’t like him, the audience didn’t like him, and he was overall just a waste of space on the season. Still, most would agree that he’s better than the terrible duo of Na’Onka Mixon and “Purple Kelly” Shinn. Now, the latter I can’t talk too much about, as she’s remembered for the manner of her leaving the show, which will be covered in the “Twist” section, but suffice to say here that she is, far and away, the biggest waste of space the show has ever had. Apart from her exit, the only thing memorable about her is her hair color (hence the nickname), and that’s not a good thing. This combined with her exit makes her one of the most reviled “Survivor” contestants ever. But she’s nowhere near as bad as Na’Onka. Put simply, Na’Onka was seen by most as rude and mean. She bitched about just about everybody else, played favorites, and dared to go up against crowd favorites. Apart from her exit (which will again be talked about in the “Twist” section), she’s most remembered for tripping up fellow contestant Kelly Bruno in an attempt to get a clue to the hidden immunity idol. This would be fine, if it weren’t for the fact that Kelly had a prosthetic leg, thus labeling Na’Onka as “The Woman Who’s Mean to Handicapped People”, never mind the fact that Kelly proved to be perfectly competent, and her leg in no way seemed to affect her physical game. Not an easy person to like, and I completely sympathize. Talking about Na’Onka leaves something of a bad taste in my mouth as well. That said, however, I give Na’Onka a bit more credit that everybody else, if only because I found it fascinating how someone so obnoxious, how such an awful human being, could last week after week. She’s not a pleasant aspect of the season, and it doesn’t help that she’s arguably the most memorable thing in it, but Na’Onka gets a slightly bad reputation, in my mind. What I cannot deny, though, is the fact that the rest of the cast was awful. Unlike the Na’Onka’s or Jimmy T.’s of the world, they weren’t mean or obnoxious, but they were just bland to the point of being unpleasant. It’s a bit hard to describe, but with so much of the cast as these boring, stereotypical Americans, combined with a number of unpleasant characters, those who were merely boring looked the worse. All everyone, including myself, could think was “Why couldn’t we have gotten GOOD people on the show, instead of these blank slates?” I think the best demonstration of this in Ben Henry, aka Benry, possibly the most bland person on the entire planet, who contributed nothing to the game, yet seemed like he was a big shot in his own brain. not an endearing quality. The rest of the cast not mentioned was similar, and this really is why the cast fails so much. While there were a few good people in there, the most remembered people were unpleasant, and even those where were boring came off badly, so it’s hard to call the cast overall good. Still, one should not forget those who were good, and so I rank this cast perhaps higher than others might.

SCORE: 5 out of 10

CHALLENGES

As I’ll discuss in the “Overall” section, I can kind of see why the cast of Nicaragua didn’t get a very good reception. For all my praising of some individuals, the cast overall is one of the weaker ones. No, what really suffers are the challenges of this season, which, if you look at them, are actually quite good. You had a lot of creativity thrown in at all phases, combined with some really memorable visuals. There was the Plinko board, the chute for cannonballs, the giant water wheel! Most challenges this season felt dynamic and epic. Even after the merge, we got a lot of great challenges. there was balancing coins atop a sword, the treasure chest puzzle, a lot of really quite good individual challenges. As concepts, they’re simple, but their design and execution really elevates them. And that’s a good way to describe this season’s challenges: they took a lot of risks. Some elements of challenges are repeats, to be sure, but for the most part, we had original challenges this season, which were mostly hits. Part of the problem, though, is that with every risk there comes the possibility of failure, and the trouble is that the failures were so spectacular that they’re what’s remembered, and partly explain why this season is not remembered for its challenges (that and the fact that other parts of the season were so unpleasant that people don’t even want to contemplate its challenges). Some challenges just seemed out of place for the theme of the season, like a blindfolded moving of grilling supplies. Some ideas were good in theory, like an obstacle course where teams had to smash through walls of straw, wood, and “Brick”. Once it was made clear that this was a reference to “The Three Little Pigs” however, people couldn’t take it seriously. It was just too immature and too modern for a show like “Survivor”. Then there were the challenges that just failed outright, but got overused, such as the “Hanging by a rope over the water” challenge. But the king of the bad challenges has to be the “Gulliver’s Travels” challenge. It’s bad enough when “Survivor” has to plug a bad Jack Black movie, but to have them make it into a challenge is awful. As if the reward (seeing the movie) wasn’t bad enough, the challenge featured the visual of not-competing Dan Lembo (remembered, if at all, for being short, annoying, and contributing nothing) sitting in a far too big chair, adding a sense of ridiculousness to an already ridiculous challenge. So yeah, there were some real stinkers in this one. On the whole, though, there were still a lot of good challenges to be found here, and I think that the overall opinion on the season unfairly maligns the challenges.

SCORE: 7 out of 10

TWISTS

Most people will say the cast is where this season falls short, but I contend that it’s really here, in the twists, where this season falls flat. Plain and simple, there were just too many of them, and most of them fell flat. While it’s fair to say that some of them were good IDEAS, it’s hard to come up with a single major twist (either producer-implemented or cast-implemented) that actually panned out. And they started even before the season began! For Nicaragua, fans were allowed to vote on one person who would enter into the game, based on one-minute videos on CBS.com This led to the inclusion of Jimmy T. in the cast. Not a bad idea in theory. The trouble is that, as mentioned, this twist gave us Jimmy T., who both didn’t last long and was incredibly annoying, leading to a lot of letdown from the fans. Things didn’t improve when it came out that the top 10 finalists for the contest (the only ones fans were allowed to vote on) were CBS recruits told to apply this way. Not a good day for CBS. Also minor but worth mentioning is the fact that starting in Nicaragua, “Survivor” shifted back to airing on Wednesday nights, as it had during “Survivor Borneo” but not since then. It didn’t impact the season as a whole, but it is a part of “Survivor” history, and did show that the fancies is loyal to a fault. Rather than give up on the show (easy to do 21 seasons in), people shifted their viewing schedules. Trust me, this factoid is the HIGH point of the twists.

Starting in the game proper, we have another twist that was in theory a good idea, but in practice ended up a bad idea. This time around, the tribes were divided up by age, into the 40 and older Espada, and the 30 and younger La Flor (initially hidden from the contestants by mixing the tribes entering). A pretty simple twist, but it makes sense. We’ve had “Battle of the Sexes”, why not “Battle of the Ages”? And like some other twists I’ll discuss in future retrospectives, I think this one had the potential to be a good twist, but was brought down in execution. The problem was that, despite CBS’ efforts to counteract this effect, the obvious outcome of the younger people dominating the older people in challenges (except for Jane on the individual level) came to pass. I place part of the blame on CBS, as I think they could probably have found some more fit older contestants, or else made the challenges more puzzle-heavy than they were, but part of it’s just the nature of “Survivor”. I’m ok with the “Old vs. Young” twist, as it had to be done at some point, but even I admit that it fell flat. Not that CBS didn’t TRY to correct for the physical disparity, of course! Oh no, we had to sit through the poorly named and poorly planned out “Medallion of Power”. A little item hunted for at the start of the game, the tribe with the Medallion of Power could hand it in at any challenge and be given an advantage in said challenge. An obvious attempt to balance out the challenges for the older contestants, this twist was even stupider than its name, which is saying a lot. Apart from making the older contestants seem like wimps for having to have this crutch, the Medallion of Power was overpowered, to say the least. Add on the fact that the younger contestants held onto it for most of it’s (admittedly short) tenure, and you’ve got a twist no one loved, including myself. Thankfully, it was retired in Episode 5, and will never be heard from again. A minor note: this season changed up how the idol was hidden. For once, it was by no major landmarks, instead relying on correctly calculating how many yards the idol would be buried from a certain landmark. Additionally, the clue was done pictographically, rather than a word clue, which was a nice change. It made the idols harder to find, and allowed the viewers at home to play along, since no visual clue was shown in the editing to where the idol was. This wasn’t a major twist of the season, but it’s a very positive little detail.

Apart from the aforementioned sabotage of Dan’s shoes by Holly, nothing of note happened until Episode 5, when the tribe swap occurred. In a change up from past swaps, a leader of each tribe was randomly selected by rocks. However, rather than have this person simply get first pick on the new tribe, the leaders were told to select a certain number of people from the other tribe (to make the numbers balance out) to join their tribe. Holly and Brenda ended up picking, which didn’t lead to much excitement. Brenda was already the leader of La Flor, so this just gave her more power, and while Holly wasn’t the power player of Espada (that would be Marty), she had been moving up the ranks, and this only cemented her power position. Once again, this is not a bad idea for a swap, but the execution ended up being poor, because it just game the power players more power. Admittedly, this one could be seen as successful, as it gave us the compelling “Marty as Underdog” storyline, but it would have been cooler to see someone on the bottom be in control.

Following on the “Marty as Underdog” storyline, we get his surprising survival as an underdog, first by getting Kelly Bruno targeted at a double Tribal Council, and then by making Jill Behm seem a bigger target. This also got Sash his hidden immunity idol (Brenda and Na’Onka having found the other one), as he made a deal with Marty that, in being saved, Marty would give up his idol to Sash. A shining moment for Sash, and a rare moment of stupidity for Marty, but as I say, not as bad as some of the other aspects of this season.

Now comes the merge, and here’s where things get tricky. It’s worth noting, though, that during the merge was the first instance of someone left out of a reward challenge post-merge being allowed to choose a side to root for, and go with them on reward potentially. A pretty good idea, but not a major twist of the season, just one of those little things to like. The dominant alliance was always hazy at best, so we got some nice blindsides. I say “Nice” in that they were really tricky blindsides, but had the problem of getting rid of good people). After the surprising vote-off of Alina “Dirt Squirrel” Wilson for no particular reason, the power trio of Brenda, Sash, and Na’Onka (the only discernible alliance) took out Marty, who at this point was really a fan favorite. A good gameplay blindside, but as I’ll discuss in a bit, it was the start of a negative turn for the season. One of the favorite contestants got voted out, with several episodes to go, this is not a good thing. This was followed by a shake-up, in which Na’Onka flipped along with a few other non-memorables to join Holly’s alliance, voting off Brenda in the process. This seems like a good “Survivor” move, and it is. The trouble is, like Marty, Brenda was a darling of the fans (though less so after her vote off, as she refused to “scramble” which many people saw as arrogant and pathetic), and to see her vote off, most people to root for were gone. Not to mention, this kept Na’Onka, who EVERYONE hated, in power. Not a good situation for the show, but it could still recover. And it might have done, if not for what happened next.

Late in the game (Final 8), Na’Onka, despite being in the dominant alliance, decided, for no apparent reason, that she’d had enough, and would like to quit. Having done nothing for the past 20-odd days, Purple Kelly jumped right along with her, and decided that she wanted out. This is what the season is remembered for, and it is a HORRIBLE twist. Seeing people quit is never fun, and seeing people quit this late in the game for no discernible reason is downright despicable. On the heels of the two great games of the season being ejected, this felt to most viewers, including myself, like a great insult to the game. And it was. The kicker, though, was that Na’Onka and Purple Kelly were still allowed on the jury, which many people saw as an insult. Probst’s justification was that Janu, who also quit post-merge on “Survivor Palau” had been allowed on the jury, so precedent was set. I get this justification, and I agree with it. That doesn’t make it feel good, however. This led to the “Quitter clause” now standard in “Survivor” contracts, wherein this who quit the game can be denied the right to sit on the jury, or even get their prize money. Yes, that’s how bad this twist was, and the major issue is that THIS is what’s remembered about this season. Not good.

It’s during this period that we also get the “Someone can give up individual reward for extra camp supplies” twist, which is a fun edition, but nothing major. The Libertad camp also got set on fire at this point, which was mildly interesting, but had been done before on “Survivor The Amazon”, and so came off as trite and cliched. The only other thing of note this season was that Fabio went on a string of immunity runs to win the game, which was mildly impressive to watch, but again, we’d seen it before. Sash did overcome being sent to the bottom of the totem pole by Brenda’s vote out, but again, not that impressive.

This was a season screwed over in terms of twists. A lot of front loaded producer-implemented twists made the season seem weak from the start, and while the twists were eased up on later, most of the twists, both producer and cast-based alike, really just didn’t come off well. A few minor ones, like the pictographic idol clues and the sit-out being allowed to bet on the winner were kind of fun, but they just don’t overcome the overwhelming sense of horribleness these twists exude.

SCORE: 2 out of 10.

OVERALL

Nicaragua is not the most unique of locations, but the production did what they could to make it unique. They gave it a conquistador theme to help distinguish the season, and while it made it distinct, they made it a bit too over-the-top for a “Survivor” theme. For my part, I found the Christian Iconography off-putting, even though I concede it’s appropriate for the theme. This was also where we REALLY started getting into “plastic” “Survivor”, where everything put in seemed a little too fake. We’d gotten it somewhat with “Survivor Samoa” and “Survivor Heroes vs. Villains”, but it came out in force here. Everything just felt like it didn’t fit in with the show, and this trend would not be corrected, even partially, until “Survivor Philippines”, and even then it took a while. One detail that I don’t hear people talk about, but that I think really hurt the season, was the theme music. For some reason I can’t comprehend, the producers, rather than go with an original theme song, decided to use the version from “Survivor Borneo”. This was a terrible creative decision. This wasn’t any sort of anniversary for the show, nor was it some sort of All-Star season where they might have wanted to hearken back to seasons past. What this move came off as was a “This season is bad, so let’s make it look better by reminding people of a good season!” play, and it really undermined the season before it started.

But that’s just the production theme, what about cast themes? Well, the cast themes are, if anything, worse. As I said, a major problem of this season is timing, and not just because it came after the acclaimed “Survivor Heroes vs. Villains” (though that was also a contributing factor). No, Nicaragua was never going to be one of the great seasons, just due to the facts that the twists were lackluster, and most of the cast was boring or unpleasant. No, the timing problem really shows itself post-merge. Even with a season with a weak cast, there are one or two standouts that, if they make it to the end, can make the season ok. In this case, those standouts were Marty and Brenda. That the two went back-to-back, fairly early in the merge, was a hard enough blow. But then, right on its heals, comes the quitting of Na’Onka and Purple Kelly. Think about this for a second. You’ve got the two fan favorites thus far, the two best strategists, the two most dynamic players of the game, voted out one right after the other, with several episodes to go. this alone is hard enough to recover from. But then you get the two most DISLIKED players, quitting, right afterwards, leaving a bad taste in your mouth. All anyone could think was “Why did THESE people get to stay longer than Brenda and Marty?” I’m not saying that Brenda and Marty being voted out, or Na’Onka and Purple Kelly quitting would have been easy to handle on their own, but happening one right after the other, the badness just compounded, and the season couldn’t recover. You were left with a bunch of bad people around, although Jane and Holly might have salvaged the season a bit, but our final 3 ended up being Sash, Chase, and Fabio. A unlikeable strategist, a boring nice guy, and a likable idiot. Of the three, the Fabio win was probably the best possible outcome, but even then, it was a poor choice. Notice also that the final three was entirely young people. While both tribes had their unlikeable people, it was clear that on the whole, the older side was more interesting and more likable. To have the young people dominate so, it was the final nail in the coffin. The big problem with the season though, is the quit. It’s unpleasant, and it’s what’s remembered out of the whole season. While this season does have a few underrated qualities (Brenda and Marty, and some minor twists), I cannot deny that the overall effect of Nicaragua is unpleasant. Is it overly hated on? I’d say so. But does it deserved to be hated? Yes. Yes it does.

SCORE: 16 out of 40

ABSTRACT

Nicaragua is not one of the shining jewels of “Survivor” A lot of boring cast members and unpleasant twists make this one a hard watch. I’d recommend this one only for the hardcore “Survivor” completionist. One contestant does return in a future season, but they make so little of an impact that Nicaragua does not need to be seen to appreciate them. Still, although you will find it hated in the community as a whole, it has one or two minor details that might make it worth a watch, if you’re willing to tolerate a lot of irritating elements. On the whole, though, I agree with the consensus. While I’m not as vehement in this stance, I say skip this season.

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.