Idol Speculation: “Survivor Kaoh Rong” Finale: Everybody Hates Cydney

Say what you will about the finale of “Survivor Kaoh Rong”, but in my opinion, it was entertaining. Sure, it was pretty bog-standard at times, and sure, where it DID deviate from the norm were areas that would be pretty controversial. But it was still hilarious. And, as the title may indicate, our highlight of the night was once again the result of a fire-making challenge at the final four.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, and start back at the beginning, where Mark the Chicken threatens his own life in the game by waking everybody up at oh-dark-thirty in the morning. Tai, no fan of the snooze button, takes Mark out for a cuddle session by the beach, where he talks about his drive to win the game, and while it’s a confessional we’ve seen a million times before, it’s still kind of sweet. Around this time, we also get more of a “Michele is determined” confessional, which is unsurprising and uninteresting.

Once dawn has actually broken, we get to hear some strategy from Aubry and Tai. The pair agree to stick together (smart for both of them, since Aubry needs a solid ally, and Tai needs the girls not to stick together and get him out), and correctly decide to target Michele. The grounds for this, rather than Michele being the biggest jury threat after Aubry, is that Cydney’s the person most likely to be swayed to their side. Not the only logic I’d expect from this crew, but I can definitely see their point in this matter. Either way, the pair come up with the best option for both of them.

At our reward challenge, we get our first misstep: Copying “Survivor Worlds Apart”. Granted, if you’re going to copy an element from “Survivor Worlds Apart”, this challenge is one to do it on. Each contestant slides tiles with numbers on one side, line patterns on the other, into a hole, hitting a pan. Once all their tiles are slid, they must carry as many as possible on the flat of a machete to a finish table. There, they pair up matching line patterns, using the numbers from the three unique tiles to open a combination lock, winning reward. While I do wish we got an original challenge, as always, this one is a pretty good one to do, bringing in a nice “do it yourself” aesthetic, but having several fun stages to watch. I’ll let it slide this time.

While our challenge comes from “Survivor Worlds Apart”, our reward comes circa “Survivor Exile Island”. It’s a full-course meal with a protein bar added on for somewhat of a comedic effect. A pretty good reward to have (though not the best we’ll see tonight), and it’s not a game-breaker like a challenge advantage, so I’m happy there. I’m also happy that we get a pretty even challenge overall, though Aubry ends up taking the lead to win. While she does lose a lot of it, due to a mistake in the pattern matching, she ends up winning the challenge overall, good for her. And, of course, Probst offers her the chance to bring somebody along for the ride. After a bit of thought, Aubry chooses Cydney, which, contrary to what Michele will say later, I say is the correct decision. She and Tai were talking about needing to bring Michele into the fold, and what better way to do so than by sharing a feast with her? On top of this, if the goal is for Michele not to win immunity, then you want to maximize those chances by bringing someone along, and in terms of challenge ability, Cydney is the clear choice.

The food works its magic, and Cydney hops right on board with Aubry. She admits she’s playing in the middle, which frankly is what she should be doing, but she also says her “ideal” final three would be herself, Aubry, and Tai, so that seems pretty definitive to me. As I said last week, and will continue to say this episode, Cydney has played an excellent game overall, having a very good read on people, and always making sure she has a backup plan to stay in power. But if I WERE to find a flaw in it, apart from perhaps moving away from the old To Tang when she would have been pretty well guaranteed final three against less-likable players, it would be this here. Aubry and Tai should NOT be Cydney’s idea final three. Michele and Aubry should be. At this point, with how many days there are left, we have to assume that there’s going to be a final two at this point. Whether Cydney can win against anybody left, I don’t know, but your primary goal going into a final three should be to have people who will take you to the end on either side of you, thus lowering the pressure on that final immunity challenge. Going with Aubry and Tai means that you’re stuck with at least one person who won’t take you regardless (Tai), and one person who sees you as a threat (Aubry). Going with Aubry and Michele means that you have your biggest competition angling to get each other out, rather than yourself. BOOM! Guaranteed spot at Final Tribal Council. Keep that in mind. The food is working its magic.

Back at the camp, we’re in reruns, as Michele points out to Tai that they’re on the bottom, and that perhaps they ought to work together to oust Aubry. This is also where Michele criticizes Aubry’s taking of Cydney on reward, and again, I have to disagree. You’re pissing off two people regardless, and since there’s no way Aubry is taking you, she’s going to be leaving someone behind to plot with you regardless. Better to leave Tai behind, since he’s more firmly on her side. Just like last episode, Tai talks about it being an individual game, and how he may need to flip on Aubry for his own benefit, but this time I don’t buy it. Once bitten, twice shy, but if Tai wasn’t going to flip on Aubry when he was pissed off and it was in his best interest, no way he does so now.

Not done with our repetition of “Survivor Worlds Apart”, the immunity challenge is ALSO a repeat of a challenge from that season. Running to a platform in the water, contestants take a key back to shore and unlock a ladder, which leads to second key, which unlocks a ball and rope, which they use to pull down a ladder, which leads to a third key, which unlocks a pole with which to push off a bag of puzzle pieces, which then must be used to solve a puzzle to win immunity. An overly complicated challenge, and overall just kind of dull, though I’ll admit that the puzzle is nicely different, and the stairs and ladder unfolding was kind of cool to watch.

As with a lot of boring challenges, it’s saved with a good bit of back-and-forth. Aubry once again takes an early lead, but stumbles on the puzzle, while Tai and Cydney trade places a lot, and Michele oddly slows down on the physical portions of the challenge. That doesn’t matter as much, though, as Michele comes back to win immunity! A nice win on her part, but probably the worst possible outcome for Aubry. Now that her primary target is gone, she herself is likely to become a target, and at the very least, she’ll have to vote out someone who’d likely take her to the final two.

Sure enough, as soon as we get back to camp, the wheels start turning. True to her word about keeping her options open, when Michele broaches the subject of getting rid of Aubry, Cydney jumps right on board. We don’t see her advocate for getting rid of Tai, which at this point would probably be her best move, but since it seems like Michele wouldn’t go for that anyway, it’s probably not that big of a deal. And Aubry is a real threat, so might as well get her out anyway.

Tai, on the other hand, is not so easily swayed. We get some lip service to the fact that he MAY decide to just keep it simple and vote for Aubry, but with the way he and Aubry talk, plus the history they’ve had together, you can tell it’s not going to happen, and a tie (or a Tai, if you will), is going to be forced. If you needed any big evidence for it, look no further than the notable conversation where Cydney asks Michele if she ought to practice making fire, and Michele says no. If that wasn’t epic foreshadowing for a fire-making challenge, as well as for the outcome, I don’t know what is.

That particular Tribal Council, in a rarity for the season, is pretty ho-hum, though to be fair, we all know it’s just window-dressing for the main event. Sure enough, we get our promised tie, and Cydney and Aubry, the two allies, just duke it out in a fire-making challenge. And let me tell you, this is the highlight of the episode. Oh, not because it’s incredibly close like the battle between Bobby Jon and Stephenie on “Survivor”, nor is it hilariously bad like the one on “Survivor Cook Islands”, but for the jury’s reaction. The whole “Jury may not interact with players.” rule has varied in how strictly it’s enforced, and this is by no means the most emotive jury we’ve ever seen, but this was really lopsided in how the jurors wanted it to go. I mean, I know Cydney made some enemies on the jury, but she was just REVILED by most of them. Granted, it was kind of funny that Cydney’s fire never really even got off the ground, but this was really a case of “Burn the witch!” level of ill will towards Cydney.

In the end, the jury gets their wish, and Cydney gets the axe. Especially after that trashing she took from the jury, I have to say it’s a loss. As I said, Cydney’s game may not have been the strongest out of everyone left, but that’s more of a testament to the strength of the others games than to any weakness in Cydney’s game. She played hard, and by and large she played well, and so will be missed. That said, if someone had to go at this time, she was probably the least interesting person left, and the least likely to win, so from that perspective, it’s the least of all evils. As I say, though, no disrespect there for Cydney. She has well earned a good spot in “Survivor” history.

Michele, naturally, is upset back at the camp, given that people are only NOW starting to realize that this season is going to be a final two rather than a final three. The three try and console each other, repeating over and over that there CAN’T be any more votes, and that they’re at the end. Frankly, I’m sick of it! Look, wishful thinking is one thing, but this is just denying the facts! Sometimes the game doesn’t work out the way you want it to, and that can be frustrating, but there’s no sense in denying it!

See? There’s tree-mail right now telling you to go for your final challenge, and now you’ll have to do the hard work of deciding who to go to the end with. Probst is taking off the necklace, once and for all confirming that… they’re the final three and will go on to plead their case at Final Tribal Council?

Please hold for a moment while the blogger goes and puts his brain back in. It fell out due to being improperly secured during that sharp turn.

POP! Ok, so yes, the optimists were right, and this is a final three. Have to admit, I didn’t see that coming. They got me. Good one. Granted, I generally prefer final twos over final threes, and so am a bit frustrated in that regard, but, due to how impressed I am at the producers pulling the wool over our eyes so, I have a hard time being frustrated at it. Plus, what we get instead is also really cool.

Yes, for once Probst’s grandstanding about “A ‘Survivor’ First!” was not, in fact, grandstanding, but the real deal. Rather than play for immunity, our players instead play for the right to kick one member off the jury. They’ll leave Tribal Council, be sequestered so they can’t unduly influence the votes, and get no say at the Final Tribal Council. Now, I know for a fact that this twist has some backlash, and I can’t pretend it’s not without merit. Something just seems unfair about putting some poor schmo on the jury only to have his or her last moment in the sun ripped away on the whim of one player. It goes against what seems to be at the core of normal “Survivor”. I, on the other hand, really like this twist! True, it does seem to fundamentally change “Survivor” from what we knew, but frankly, a good twist will do that. Personally, I see this as merely adding a new layer of jury management, and like it better than, say, a “challenge advantage”, because it’s less of a guarantee, and requires brains to be used smartly. So yeah, I think this is a cool idea! Wouldn’t want to see it used EVERY season, but if they brought it back, I wouldn’t complain.

The challenge itself? Well, in a fitting parallel to the beginning of the season, the past has come back to haunt our contestants. You remember how the first immunity challenge had a choice of a puzzle or a stacking end, and nobody did stacking? Well, not being ones to waste an opportunity, that horrible stacking option is now the final challenge of this season. You could avoid it temporarily, but not entirely, if you made it to the end. Even though it’s not an immunity challenge, and it’s visually boring, this is probably my favorite final challenge in a while. Though not exactly endurance, it’s not a strength challenge, and seems tough enough to be worthy of coming last in a season. Plus, as I said, the parallels to the beginning of the season are a nice touch.

Once again, we get a good back and forth challenge, and once again Michele edges out the competition, leaving her with the decision of who to vote off. Talking with Tai, Michele reveals to no one’s surprise that her primary target is Joe, due to being an unpersuadable Aubry vote, which makes perfect logical sense. Michele also considers taking out Neal, since he’s also a likely Aubry vote, but with more persuasive skills than Joe. Not bad logic, and Tai certainly pushes evicting Neal, but I’m inclined to say that Joe is still the better option. Not that Neal is a BAD option, since he is probably an Aubry vote, but I feel like Neal would be more open to persuasive arguments than Joe would. I hear the argument about Neal being able to persuade others, but, much as the show would have us believe that Final Tribal Council votes can be swayed, I feel like, with maybe a few jurors as exceptions, everyone’s vote is locked in by the time we get to Tribal Council. So, I say go with the least-persuadable sure vote against you.

Aubry being Aubry, of course, does not let one of her jury advocates go so easily. She attempts to switch the vote on to Scot, since he’s deemed “Most likely to give a bitter speech.”, which Michele seems to consider, but I’m not buying it. Michele has played logically pretty much the entire game, and logic dictates that Aubry, being Michele’s biggest threat, needs to have any sure votes for her taken away.

With fewer stakes, and a more predictable outcome, this Tribal Council is also little to write home about, though again, the vocalizations of the jury are a joy to watch, and we do get a bit of a spat near the end. Unsurprisingly, Michele goes for Neal, who was far more of an Aubry advocate than I though, REALLY tearing Michele apart as he leaves, comparing her to a suckling puppy. I get that Neal was an Aubry fan, and that he didn’t really get to see Michele’s game, but that was HARSH, man! For all that I am an Aubry fan, and think that of those remaining, her game was the best, Michele is still not to be disrespected. She played both sides of the fence masterfully from behind the scenes, and was incredibly flexible. She makes an excellent winner for the season. Maybe not the BEST possible winner, but excellent nonetheless.

Since it’s nigh-on impossible to find new things to talk about on Day 39, Tai, Aubry, and Michele pretty much just give us the standard confessionals you’d expect at this point in the game. Michele has the “I’ve played a good game.” confessional, Tai the “I love the game so much.” confessional, and Aubry the “I’ve learned so much!” confessional, mixed with a little bit of “Good game” confessional as well. Hopefully Tribal Council will be more interesting.

Sad to say, but it’s not. While by no means the worst we’ve ever seen, I don’t feel it really merits a blow-by-blow, especially since we’re going to have a lot to cover following the end of the episode itself. So, without further ado, here are some highlights:

-Even though he had perhaps the least to say out of anybody, Nick arrogance still managed to shine through. His “question” basically amounted to a preschooler’s guide to Final Tribal Council, with a little bit of personal advice thrown in for the players. Frankly, I wouldn’t have bothered noting it were it not for the fact that the image of Nick teaching preschoolers about “Survivor” makes me laugh.

-I’ll admit, the show got me one more time tonight. Julia’s question had me fooled. What everyone (including myself) saw as a locked “Michele” vote starts lambasting Michele in her question, talking about her early-game weakness. She turned it around of course, but it was still a well-done fake-out.

-With regards to that, actually, Michele’s answer to that was pretty bad, I thought. She and Aubry both gave pretty good Final Tribal Council performances overall, but while Aubry was maybe less exciting overall, she was more consistent. Rather than try and say that she wasn’t as weak as she seemed early game, Michele owned up to it and used it instead. This lead to the emotionally punctuating moments that Aubry didn’t have that may have clinched Michele’s win, but still, it seemed like Michele was admitting that she was kind of pathetic early on, and not in a good way. Just an odd choice to me.

-So, for all that worry about Scot being a bitter juror who might shake things up, he ends with… a hula dance. Oooh-kayyyy…

-And yeah, sending off Mark the Chicken was a nice farewell to the season. Good for you, show.

As I’ve been hinting at, Michele ends up winning in a 5-2 vote, and I have thoughts on that, believe me, but first, let us talk briefly about the reunion show, which, while not as bad as the reunion show of “Survivor Caramoan”, is still pretty bad. Too much time spent on celebrities, and not enough time with the contestants. So many unanswered questions. Who voted for whom? What do the pre-merge boots think about everything? What would Neal have asked at Final Tribal Council? And what did Cydney have to think about everything? Seriously, I can kind of get the logic in ignoring the pre-merge boots, even if I think it’s a douchey move, but ignoring CYDNEY? The lady who was a MAJOR influence on the course of the game, and even made the final episode, doesn’t even get a QUESTION at the reunion show? I’m so angry at this, I’m going to switch to text-speak. WTF, MAN?

Oh, and of course we also get our preview for next season. It’s going to be called “Survivor Millennials vs. Gen X”.

Ha ha! No seriously, what’s it going to be called! This can’t be the actual title! It sounds like a MAD TV parody?

This isn’t a joke? It’s the actual title and theme of next season Hoo boy, where to begin?

Well, I suppose to start off, THIS IS A STUPID TITLE! We’ve had “versus” titles before, but those have been succinct and roll off the tongue. This title lolls around like it’s on a bunch of painkillers. Secondly, the theme is stupid. Apart from seeming more gimmicky than other tribe divisions, it basically amounts to diving the tribes by age. Which you already did. “Survivor Nicaragua.” Yeah, remember how that went? Granted, I’ve always said the concept could be done better, and maybe this season will give us that, but still, if you were going to reuse an idea, why this one? And, thirdly, THIS IS A STUPID TITLE! Seriously, even “Survivor Worlds Apart” knew not to call itself “Survivor White Collar vs. Blue Collar vs. No Collar”! It’s not even like finding a good title was hard. Here, I’ll give you one right now: “Survivor Generations” Is it lame? Sure. But it’s still better than “Survivor Millennials vs. Gen X”! Hell, from now on, I’m referring to it as “Survivor MGX”. I am NOT typing out that title week after week!

Ah, but that’s a rant to have next season, and a long way off in the future, so for now, we’ll just pretend it doesn’t exist. For now, it’s time to talk about the big issue of this season: the winner. Well, I say “issue”, but really, “controversy” would be a better word, because surprisingly enough, I don’t have much of an issue with Michele winning. As I have said before, and will say again, Michele played a great, if subtle, game. She never gave, up, was able to adequately play the middle without taking flak for it, and took risks. Is she the person I think SHOULD have won? No, of course not. As an avowed Aubry fan, I stand behind the fact that Aubry played the best game of the three. Aubry faced setback after setback, yet still came into positions of power, and was the driving force behind a number of flips and votes in the game. Had she won, she would have earned it. But Michele earned her win as well, I don’t begrudge her that. In my mind, this is not a case of the jury getting anything “wrong”, or of an “undeserving winner”, partly because in the case of the latter, I don’t take “deserving” into account, because I don’t think it’s a thing that should really come into play on “Survivor”. Both Aubry and Michele played great games, and while I think Aubry’s was better, Michele did not “steal” the game from Aubry, as some have claimed. She played a good game as well, and it earned her a win.

Still, the question remains: Why Michele over Aubry? We can only speculate, but there are some reasons being touted that I have to just dismiss. Some argue that Neal’s elimination cost Aubry the win, which I think is absurd. he would have been one more Aubry vote, but that’s still only three for her, so Michele wins either way. Contrary to what the show says, I DON’T buy the indecisiveness on the part of people like Jason, so I don’t think Neal’s presence would have drastically changed the outcome. Nor do I buy the conspiracy that the producers implemented the “remove a juror” twist last-minute to prevent a tie. Maybe I’m naive, but I tend to give the producers the benefit of a doubt on things like this, and attribute it to “Survivor” luck that they tend to work out well. Look at the mutiny twist from “Survivor Thailand” as an example of implementing a twist and having it go wrong. Did Aubry put the wrong people on the jury? Again, I have to say I don’t think so. Recall that even some of the people who voted against Aubry, like Jason and Scot, were complimenting her right before they were voted out. That seems like the sort of person you’d want on the jury, so how was Aubry supposed to have known? Was this a “bitter jury”? What evidence is there for it? There was no ranting about people’s games being ruined, nor any tirades from anyone but Neal, who wasn’t even there. That, to me, says no bitterness, especially since there IS a case for Michele’s game. No, I think it was a combination of two factors that did Aubry in this time, both of which were, to a degree, out of her control. The first was the tightness of Jason, Julia, and Scot. I’ll admit this was a failing on my part, but while I knew that Julia was definitely in Michele’s corner, I counted on Jason and Scot being free agents come Final Tribal Council. I should have realized that tight in-game usually means tight on-jury. I think wherever Julia went, Jason and Scot would follow, so that’s three Michele votes right off the bat. A hard hill to overcome. Had Aubry voted out Michele post-merge, or Julia pre-merge, things might have been different, but in the case of the latter, there’s no telling how things would have unfolded from there, and I can see why Aubry didn’t consider Michele a threat, since her game was so on the down-low. Second, and I think most important, is timing. Both Aubry and Michele had a “rising from underdogdom” narrative to work with, and I’d say both used it to great effect. I would say that Aubry’s story overcame greater odds and had greater successes, but that’s just me. The advantage that did Aubry is is when her story peaked. Aubry showed her true self right around the Scot vote, fairly late in the game, but it made the back half of her game seems somewhat weaker. In comparison, Michele’s big moments mostly came at the end, what with getting Neal off the jury and surviving Tai’s double-vote. This makes Michele’s successes more recent, and therefore more prescient in the minds of the jury. Again, not saying that that’s ALL Michele had going for her, but I think it ultimately tipped the scales.

Even without the ideal outcome, though, this was still a great season! While maybe not as big in terms of characters as its predecessor, “Survivor Cambodia”, it still gave us a lot of likable people with really excellent strategy and fun blindsides! What more could you ask for in a season of “Survivor”? I know some complain that the players weren’t as over the top or as likable this season as others, but I’d counter that you can’t expect every season to top the previous one. It’s just not realistic. As it stands, what we got, while admittedly probably not the stuff of “Survivor” legend, is still upper-echelon “Survivor”, and I look forward to seeing many of these players back in the future!

But, before we leave these players for a while, let us reflect back on my stupidity in my rankings pre-season, and find out where I went wrong.

Peter: I may have given him too much credit, and slightly overestimated his time in the game, but I nailed him otherwise.

Aubry: Her personality I got, but I should have gone with my heart rather than my head on her time in the game. She lived up to, and often surpassed, my greatest expectations.

Joe: Wrong, but in my defense, those biographies and introduction videos make everyone seem more exciting. How was I to know he’d be the new Julia Landauer (“Survivor Caramoan”)?

Neal: Wrong, obviously. I think he had what it takes, but he never really got the chance to show it off, and so went a lot earlier than expected.

Liz: She seemed to have what I thought she would, but was a target much earlier than I guessed.

Debbie: Definitely kookier than I would have thought, but she still acquitted herself very well. Better than I thought, anyway.

Cydney: Dead wrong. There were ASPECTS of her character, particularly early on, that lined up with how I thought she’d play, but she was WAY smarter and made it WAY farther than I would have said. Still, if I’m going to be wrong, this is a good way to be wrong!

Darnell: Wrong. Much less socially aware, and much shorter lived than I thought.

Alecia: She did give me a reason for that “tough” description, but I was still wrong about how long she’d last.

Jason: Wrong. He was dramatic, but in a way that gelled with his tribe, and so made it much farther than I predicted.

Jennifer: I predicted neither her neuroticism nor her early exit. Wrong, but fun.

Scot: He was MAYBE a bit smarter than I predicted, but I’m giving myself this one overall. He left about when I though, and played about how I thought.

Anna: I try and give the “pro poker player” occupation the benefit of a doubt, and look what happens! Wrong!

Nick: Well, he was an arrogant douchebag and left the first time he was vulnerable, so TECHNICALLY, I was right.

Caleb: Right on personality, wrong on time in the game. Then again, how could I have predicted his medevac?

Julia: Wrong. While I can’t say she was any more interesting than I thought, she did make it very far, and was pretty good strategically.

Tai: Wrong. He was far more flexible than I would have thought, and lasted longer for it.

Michele: If there’s one consolation to Michele’s win, it’s that I CALLED IT! NEENER NEENER NEENER!

As I said before, good cast, good season. My feeling overall is that people like this season less than I do, and the success of Aubry probably has something to do with my inflated score, but even taking that into account, I think this season stands on its own. It has a lot of strategy right from the get-go, has generally likable heroes who end up succeeding in the end, and even if it’s not ground-breaking, it’s still solid. This season was under-hyped before it began, and I think now I understand why the medevacs were emphasized over the gameplay. While quite good, the gameplay still wasn’t groundbreaking, whereas the medevacs were something we don’t see every season, and for good reason (though Probst attributing all of them to heat was an error on his part). Thus, you want to emphasize the most unique aspect of your season, to make it stand out. Granted, I think they still could have talked about a season of “heroes and villains, and epic blindsides” along with the medevacs, but I can definitely see from a marketing standpoint why they might not be what you want to emphasize.

If nothing else, this season has given me one thing that I love, and therefore it’s time for another…

TOP 5 AND BOTTOM 5!

Today, we’re talking about my personal favorite contestants of all time. Not the best ones, just the ones I enjoy watching the most and least. Guess who ends up on the list from this season.

TOP 5

5. Rupert Boneham (“Survivor Pearl Islands”): Like I said, this list is for the people I enjoy watching the most, not the people I think played the best games overall. In fact, Rupert is maybe the best exemplar there is of how good gameplay does not automatically equate to entertainment value for me. Despite having next to no strategy, and generally getting carried along for being an easy vote, Rupert is still a fun guy to watch. You can tell that he’s trying to live every minute he can to the best that he can, is over the top and hilarious, and I admire his stick-to-it spirit. He’s one of the guys who got me into “Survivor”, and I owe him for that, plus I can identify with the “fat little picked-on kid” thing. That said, Rupert does fall low on the list because of his overall poor gameplay, and the fact that we’ve seen too much of him overall. Three times was all he needed. Still, he’s so over-the-top and crazy fun that you can understand why he got brought back so often.

4. Stephen Fishbach (“Survivor Tocantins”): Stephen perhaps best exemplifies what I generally like in an entertaining “Survivor” character. He’s smart, but a little neurotic. Witty, but can take jokes and potshots at himself as easily as others. Stephen played a really fascinating game, making alliances with people you wouldn’t expect him to bond with, and showing himself to be tougher than even he thought, making him intensely compelling. His second showing wasn’t as good as I had hoped, but he was still a lot of fun to watch, even if it was at the expense of his misery.

3. Kass McQuillen (“Survivor Cagayan”): Put down the hate sticks, this is my list! What can I say, I think “older” ladies (within the context of the show old, not actually old) who can still be strategic are incredibly compelling. They, in general, are the ultimate contradiction in terms, the supreme underdog. Many like Kass simply for her snarky comments and seemingly no sense of social grace, but for me, I like that she has hidden depths. Look a little deeper and you’ll see a woman who knows a lot more than she lets on, and is able to at times fool even the audience. That means that, no matter what you watch her for, you’ll always get a surprise. Plus, she had that incredible come-from-behind victory on the puzzle. That, in my book, helps make a great character.

2. John Cochran (“Survivor South Pacific”): Pretty much the previous contestant I identify most with. Cochran exemplifies all things that are “nerdy”, at least within the context of “Survivor”. he could reference just as well, if not better, than the rest of the audience, and as seen in his second outing, the guy really did know his way around the game. Granted, his antics did sometimes descend into self-parody, and that keeps him from the top spot of this list, but even keeping that in mind, he’s still a character like no other, and in many ways, a really good one.

1. Aubry Bracco (“Survivor Kaoh Rong”): Yes, she of the numerous “Survivor” comparisons has won me over. It’s fitting that they showed the tweet of her cosplaying as Cochran at the reunion show, since that’s what ultimately won me over. No, I don’t want to have sex with Cochran, but it did bring home to me that Aubry, in many ways, was Cochran, but with more social graces and less of a stereotype. She made references, but didn’t go overboard with them overall. More than that, though, Aubry was once again a good underdog story. Someone who had arguably some of the worst luck “Survivor” could shower upon you, yet kept digging and somehow would up in the end. Sure, she didn’t win, but that’s how the game goes sometimes. For what it’s worth, I really enjoyed her, and look forward to seeing her in the future.

Honorable Mention: Kathy Vavrick-O’Brien (“Survivor Marquesas”): If Aubry is Cochran with more social graces, then in many ways, Kathy is Kass with more social graces. Another “older” lady who didn’t seem to belong out there, yet somehow weaseled her way into the end with some solid gameplay moments along the way. Kathy also has a good underdog story arc, being one of the best examples of people learning to play as they go, and being very likable on top of that. Two things keep her from the list proper. Partly, she’s not as intellectual as someone like Kass, and it’s a personal preference, but I prefer watching intellect to outdoor skills. Second, and more important, she falls outside my “nostalgia zone”. I watched “Survivor Marquesas” many years after it had aired, so I don’t hold much special attachment to the season. If I did, Kathy might have supplanted Rupert on the list, but Rupert has that nostalgia factor, and just edges her out. She’s still awesome, though.

BOTTOM 5

5. Roger Sexton (“Survivor The Amazon”): This is a case where my rage would probably be much higher if I had a nostalgic attachment to this season. As it stands, though, sexism will not be rewarded, except with a spot on the “Bottom 5”. “Battle of the Sexes” seasons seem to bring out the worst tendencies in male “Survivor” contestants, but Roger exemplifies that, in a sense, by being the least extreme about it. Rather than be an affected, over-the-top sexism, Roger just seems casually sexist in general, pretty much ignoring the women come the merge. In some ways, though, this is worse, since it makes it seem as though this is how Roger really is, rather than an exaggerated character. This, in my eyes, makes him an awful human being, and hard to watch as a result.

4. Kat Edorsson (“Survivor One World”): I’ve had many a rant about this young lady, so I’ll be brief here. While there are exceptions to this rule, I generally like my characters intellectually stimulating and witty. Kat is the opposite of this. She, as a character, exemplifies every stereotype associated with the valley girl. She is stupid, vapid, and unfunny, which is perhaps the worst indictment of all. She’s not an awful human being, like some on this list are, but she’s no fun to watch either.

3. “Purple Kelly” (“Survivor Nicaragua”): Technically, she’s a stand in for everyone who gives up on “Survivor”, but still justified in that Kelly Shinn, aka “Purple Kelly”, exemplifies my problem with this type of character. People quitting, at this point in the series, was nothing new, but people who brought nothing, and gave up under the lamest of circumstances, are wasted space. You can’t help but think “that spot could have gone to someone worthy!”, and it’s pretty hard to like someone when you’re thinking that.

2. Phillip Sheppard (“Survivor Redemption Island”): My problem with Phillip may not be his fault, but, to paraphrase the man himself, “He annoys me greatly.” The man took time away from actual interesting people to go off and act crazy, and I don’t mean that in the racist way. Phillip, rather than talk strategy, garbled crazy philosophy, and THOUGHT he was talking strategy. Especially in his first outing, the man did NOTHING to merit being cast on the season, yet the marketing department kept coming back to him as this “hilarious” ball of comedy. Which he wasn’t. I hope I’ve made that clear.

1. Russell Hantz (“Survivor Samoa”): And so, we come to the ultimate delusion of grandeur. Like with Kat, I feel as though I’ve talked about this a number of times, so I’ll be brief. Russell is basically a grown up whiny little kid who grossly overestimates himself, then bitches and moans when things don’t go his way. He has no respect for the game, is misogynistic, simplistic, and a leech on our viewing time. May he be gone from our screens forever.

Honorable Mention: Colton Cumbie (“Survivor One World”): Colton was basically another Russell Hantz, although he focussed more on racism than sexism, and amped the whininess up to a whole new level. I leave him off the list because, after the tragic and unfortunate death of his fiancee, Caleb Bankstown (“Survivor Blood vs. Water”), I feel like the poor guy has had enough hard times, and doesn’t need me putting him down. The least I can do is keep him off the list proper.

PHEW! I’m just about beat. After a satisfactory end to a great season, I’m about ready for a short break! I may be away for a couple weeks, but don’t worry, you’ll still get your off-season content. I’ve got a special blog I’ve been wanting to do since the season began, so keep your eyes peeled. And, of course, “Survivor Retrospectives” will be up and running again before you know it!

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor Kaoh Rong” Episode 5: Dr. Peter, Headache Inducer

Ooh, Peter. Peter, Peter, Peter. You’ve got the vestiges of a good “Survivor” player in you. When you’re knocked out of the power position, you clearly know what you’re doing, and go note-for-note in the direction you need to. But give you an ounce of power, give you a glimmer of hope, and you become nigh-on insufferable.

Don’t believe me? We get a prime example of “good player” Peter at the start of the episode. We begin at Chan Loh, since the vote off of Alecia was SO inconsequential that we don’t need to see any of To Tang’s reaction to it. Joe seems to have some trouble with his finger, and so with much fanfare, Dr. Peter is brought over to examine it. The whole thing doesn’t seem severe, but Peter admits in confessional that, while he’s still out to get the rest of his tribe, he needs to keep that on the down-low. He’s the obvious next target, and to get out of that position, he’s going to need to make himself useful. Playing up his “doctor” role might just help endear him to his tribe, especially as evidenced by Debbie asking what they’d do without him. When you’re in the position Peter’s in, the best way to play is to keep your head down, make yourself useful, and hope you don’t go to Tribal Council. It worked out for Ethan Zohn on “Survivor All-Stars”. In other words, in at least this one instance, Peter is playing things exactly as he should.

Neal, however, is playing like a decision-maker in the head alliance should, and not believing a word of whatever Peter says. Debbie may be swayed, but Neal refers to Peter as a cancer, and thankfully not in the zodiac sign way. No, Neal decides that, if Peter is the main threat to the alliance right now, then Peter needs to not have the hidden immunity idol. Neal, therefore, concludes that he should have the idol, and starts looking around significant looking trees. It’s not long before he happens on a not-very-well-hidden clue. Maybe it’s just that the blue wrapping for the clue made it stand out more than red or yellow, but it seemed like, where the other clues were hidden deep in their respective trees, this one was just kind of lightly shoved in there. In any case, the clue leads Neal to digging up the box, which leads to him discovering the need for a key, which leads to him finding said key, which leads to him getting the idol. Pretty much the same story as at the other camps, though this one isn’t dragged out nearly as long. Neal has little to no reaction to the new twist with the idol, other than to say that this means he’ll have to look extra-hard for an idol, or at least someone else who’ll play it with him. Though he does get in some words about how this gives him a certain amount of power, compared to the arrogance often shown on this show, it’s quite mild.

It seems even MILD talking about being in a power position is enough to trigger a switch, however, as that’s exactly what happens. As advertised, everyone drops their buffs. It’s always nice for a switch to happen, since it helps prevent dull Pagongings later on, but at this point the switch methodology itself isn’t very interesting. They’ve at least dispensed with the damn show-offy colored eggs originating from “Survivor Cook Islands”, but now it’s just “Pick a random buff.” every time. Come on, guys, give me a school-yard pick for once! Make things interesting and different! Are you just turned off by “Survivor Gabon” that much?

“But surely,” you say, “this one will have SOME intrigue to it! After all, there’s an uneven number of people, and no Exile Island to send them to. Probst admitted as much to everyone there. No doubt this will lead to an epic twist of awesome proportions!” Well yes, not having an Exile Island, and not wanting to have uneven tribes does make for a lot of creative scenario possibilities. Of the myriad of solutions before production, they go with… Adding in what is basically an Exile Island, and just playing it the same old way. Yes, there is one To Tang buff hidden amongst the Chan Loh and Gondol buffs, and whoever draws that must go the way of Stephenie LaGrossa (“Survivor Palau”), and live at the crappy camp by themselves. Unlike Stephenie, however, the person at To Tang will get to avoid Tribal Council. They will not compete in the immunity challenge, and they’ll instead rejoin the losing tribe from this episode. Basically exactly how it worked on “Survivor Exile Island”, “Survivor Fiji”, and “Survivor Gabon” when they did their switch-ups. How original. I know, in all fairness, that it’s not a bad way of doing things, and the fact that Exile Island wasn’t a part of this season before now means that it comes as a sadistic twist to the players this time, but I was hoping they’d go a different direction. Give us a switch-up like we’ve never seen before! Instead, while such a switch-up has been absent for a while, we still got something repeated. I’m probably alone on this, but it felt like a bit of a letdown.

If the method of switch-up is disappointing, though, the results certainly aren’t! We’ve got a fairly even switch-up this time around, with both tribes being fairly evenly matched in both challenge ability and strategy potential. The new Chan Loh keeps things very even, retaining Neal and Debbie, and gaining Jason and Cydney from To Tang, and Michele and Nick from the old Gondol. Meanwhile, the new Gondol has kept Tai and Anna, while gaining Peter, Aubry, and Joe from the old Chan Loh, leaving Scot as the only old To Tang member on Gondol. As I say, fairly evenly matched all around. Chan Loh may have a SLIGHT strength advantage, but even that’s negligible to a large degree. Still, both tribes are intriguing. There’s a clear 2-2-2 split at Chan Loh, making it impossible to shake out who’s on top, but should make for some interesting politicking. More unbalanced is Gondol, where the old Chan Loh would seem to have an advantage, having the largest single block of any original tribe. However, that block includes Peter, who’s stated in no uncertain terms that he wants to undo his tribe, and could very easily flip away to get rid of Aubry and Joe. Meanwhile, you’ve got Scot, who’s on his own, and while you do still have two original Gondol, Tai and Anna weren’t exactly paired up in any way. So, you’ve got a lot of different dynamics that could happen here. My guess would be that Peter would play the smart game, and use this time to exact his revenge on his former tribe, since he’s at the bottom there regardless, and probably pull in Scot as another swing vote. Tai and Anna would probably stick together, since they don’t want the old Chan Loh to overtake them, and get either Aubry or Joe voted out. As we’ll see, though, that may not necessarily be the case.

Before we continue our intrigue, you may notice that I’ve neglected to mention someone. Or maybe not. She hasn’t had much screen time. Fair Julia is nowhere to be seen on either tribe. by process of elimination, she drew the unlucky To Tang buff. Yep, the youngest person out here is the one who has to live on their own. Tough breaks. It also means, as Michele notes, that the women’s alliance of Gondol, which had seemed poised to run this game, has now been completely split up, making them easy pickings no matter who loses. Will they be good enough to weasel their way back together, or is the luck of the buff against them? Time will tell.

One positive to say about this season is that, apart from some bullying of Alecia on the parts of Jason and Scot, this is a very jovial season. Despite the new Gondol probably being the more fractious of the new tribes, things start out copacetic, with everyone admiring their new camp, and all seem to be bonding well. Tai, having evidently gotten over the loss of Caleb, now sets his sights on Scot as his new boy toy, under the guise of lifting him up to a high tree to get mangoes. Scot initially doesn’t seem too keen on the idea, but since he goes for it later, it all seems pretty good. Speaking of Scot, he once again proves his “Not a brain” thing by thinking that he’s going to be on the bottom of this tribe, just because he has no ally there. Dude, have you watched ANY “Survivor”? In these situations, the person with no ally is ALWAYS the swing vote! Between that and your strength, you’re the safest out of anyone on this tribe!

Dissension begins with Peter, who, now that’s he’s in a position of power, has slipped BACK into “Bad Strategy Mode”. Specifically, he’s the one rallying for the former Chan Loh to stick together and target the old Gondol members, particularly since if they lose, Julia, another old Gondol member will be coming back into the fold. Not a bad concern, but this ISN’T the smartest strategy for you, Peter. By making it a tribe vs. tribe thing, and giving your old tribe an advantage, you pretty much guarantee getting picked off at 5, if not sooner, and give yourself less room to play by not trying to form a multi-tribe coalition. He floats the idea of voting off Anna to Scot, who seems on board, but Aubry is a bit concerned. She sees Peter’s point, and certainly doesn’t want the old Gondol becoming a rival to her and Joe, since the pair would then become targets, but Peter also can’t be trusted. He needs to be gotten rid of at some point. That said, she doesn’t say too much about it, and I think the smart move is to stick with Peter for at least this vote. Peter does need to be gotten rid of at some point, but now might be a bit premature, since Scot could then just go to the old Gondol and pick off you and Joe, should you next lose. NEXT vote, it might be good to consider getting rid of Peter, but better to keep it simple for this first vote. Still, you have to admit, intriguing dynamics! Damn, this switch gave us some exciting new talk!

Things are pretty happy-go-lucky at the new Chan Loh as well, with Debbie showing off all the amenities their camp has, like… a chin-up bar. Ok, not what I’D consider the biggest positive of their camp, but if that’s what you want to focus on, Debbie, far be it from me to judge you. Once again, though, Debbie proves why it’s best not to assume she’s just crazy, by quickly setting out to keep herself and Neal safe. Since it’s likely that the old To Tang and Gondol members will stick to whom they know, she needs to court one side. She chooses To Tang, which makes sense, since they already have fewer options. Debbie starts out by courting Cydney, in a way you wouldn’t expect. Debbie admits that she can tell that Cydney is more than just a pack of muscles, which Cydney ultimately does not deny, despite keeping that side of her under wraps for most of the game so far. After checking in with Jason, Debbie seems to have done her duty in keeping herself and Neal safe. Excellent work.

After a quick scene at Gondol where Tai gets his wish in getting Scot to help him get mangoes, we see that Anna is no slouch in the social department either. Not being an idiot, she realizes that she and Tai are the obvious targets, given that Julia’s eventual return to the game is a big threat should Gondol lose this next immunity challenge. Therefore, Anna commences throwing Tai under the bus, spilling the beans about his idol-hunting first to Aubry and then to Joe. For the time being, it seems to work. Not a bad play on Anna’s part.

For a brief time, we also check in with Julia at To Tang, who’s not doing too well. With no one there to help take care of things, she’s become severely dehydrated, wheezing and trembling under the shelter. Normally, I’d brush this off, but since last episode, it’s clear that dehydration is nothing to sneeze at. Julia does eventually pull herself together, but also says that she feels like she needs the older people in this game to take care of her. For what’s effectively our first real Julia scene, it doesn’t make her look all that good. The woman’s obviously tough, and pulls herself together pretty well, but also come across like she needs someone to take care of her, showing the negatives of her age in this game. It remains to be seen, but I think Julia might just be toast.

Back at Chan Loh, it’s now Nick’s turn to once again egotistically profess how good he is at the social game. This time, tough, he actually backs it up, going to talk to Jason about the pair forming an alliance, bringing along Michele and Cydney to make a majority. Jason certainly entertains the idea, and it’s not a bad plan, just kind of standard. While the dynamics on Chan Loh aren’t QUITE as interesting, given that, as Nick says, it’s a simple 2-2-2 split, there’s still debates to be had about which side is better and who Jason and Cydney will go with. On the one hand, as I’ll discuss at the end of the episode, it seems like To Tang and Gondol teaming up would be the smart move for both of them, but on the other hand, Cydney was basically left out of Nick’s conversation. That personal bond with Debbie might swing things.

After the obvious confessional of Jason talking about how good it is to be in the power position, it’s time for our challenge, which, in a first for this season, isn’t all that exciting. Two members from each tribe swim out to untie a fishing net with 14 wooden fish puzzle pieces in it. Once the net is back to shore, two other tribe members untie the fish from the net, hook them onto a pole, and carry it up the beach, where the remaining two tribe members try to solve a fairly complex puzzle with the fish. First puzzle solved wins immunity. Not to say that this challenge is bad, since that puzzle is really cool, and it is largely original, but it just doesn’t feel all that big or interesting to watch. It does remind me somewhat of the fishing challenge from “Survivor Samoa”, particularly in the puzzle, but I can’t say it really copies any previous challenge, so points there.

Once again, this episode does a fantastic job of giving us evidence for both sides going to Tribal Council. Admittedly, with all this talk of the threat of Julia coming back to Gondol, the smart money is on Gondol losing, but that doesn’t mean that one can’t see Chan Loh losing this one. It helps that this is a very back and forth challenge, keeping one on the edge of their seat the entire time. Ultimately, though, Peter and Anna can’t figure out the puzzle for Gondol, and lose the whole thing, despite the impressive performance of Scot carrying the entire fishing net by himself.
When we return to Gondol, the team as a whole is dejected, but overall keeps a stiff upper lip. Unsurprisingly, Peter, Aubry, and Joe are debating who needs to go. Aubry and Joe seem to be more for getting rid of Tai, having bonded with Anna. Peter, however, sticks in his opinion that Tai is valuable as a provider, and thus Anna should go. Normally I’d say that Peter, being a possible target himself, should just keep his mouth shut and go with what Aubry and Joe want, but he states his opinion in a pretty modest way, doesn’t force the point too much, and Aubry and Joe seem willing to listen, so I guess it was ok. It’s certainly enough to sway Joe and Aubry agrees, making Anna the target.

But of course, the good stuff from Peter can’t last. Sitting by the fire with Tai and Anna, he flat-out ADMITS that the old Chan Loh are sticking together, and that either Anna or Tai is going home. Peter, did you learn NOTHING from your previous Tribal Council? YOU DO NOT LET THE PEOPLE YOU’RE VOTING OUT KNOW YOU’RE AGAINST THEM! Is that REALLY that hard of a lesson to learn?

Sure enough, Peter’s blabbermouth once again comes back to bite him in the butt, as Tai comes to the conclusion that the rest of the audience has: Peter is an arrogant prick. Partly out of wanting Peter gone, partly out of not wanting to leave with the idol in his pocket, Tai pulls it out for Anna and the newly arrived Scot to see after Peter leaves. He says he’ll play it that evening, and that then if the three vote for Peter, he can be gone. Not a bad strategy, all things considered, and I admire Tai’s willingness to play to idol, but I’m not sure it’s Tai’s best move at this point. Like with Peter, it would get his old tribe in the majority, but that means that he’s still on the bottom of their group. Furthermore, you should never play the idol if you don’t need to, and I don’t think he has to this time, and not just because he’s not the target of the alliance. If Tai thought about it a bit longer, he might have realized that this arrogance of Peter’s probably annoyed Aubry and Joe as well, and that the pair might be willing to vote him instead, especially if he and Anna swear to vote out Scot afterward. They don’t necessarily have to keep that promise, but since Peter is a threat to them, Aubry and Joe might be tempted. Then you get the majority, and you keep your idol. All good!

While it seems set that Peter’s going home, Aubry throws another monkey wrench into the equation by telling Scot that Anna is the target. Having bonded with Tai, and knowing the idol rules thanks to Jason, Scot concludes that the idol might be more useful down the road. Hence, he goes to tai and encourages him not to play it, since he’s not the target tonight. This is where the new twist with idols is really fun to see. Now we’re getting new dimensions to strategy that we’ve never seen before, and it’s great to watch. Admittedly, I don’t know how Scot can promise anything, since he himself does not have an idol, but it’s fun to see conversations we haven’t seen before on “Survivor”. That said, because Scot can’t promise anything, it doesn’t help Tai as much as it seems, but the fact that he’s supposedly not the target does make Tai question his decision regarding the idol. Smartly, he decides to bring it to Tribal Council, and see whether or not it seems right to play it. this means that we’ve got a fair bit of mystery on our hands, so this won’t be the most predictable Tribal Council ever, but signs still point to Peter going.

We start off with Aubry making the same mistake as Peter, and revealing that it would be wise for the three old Chan Loh to stick together. She at least says it in a more subtle and not as arrogant way as Peter might have, and no one seems to mind, but watch yourself, Aubry. you’ve been playing a good, subtle game thus far. Don’t screw it up now.

Next, we get Anna and Tai pleading for their lives, Anna taking the more logical, strategic route, while tai plays up to people’s emotions, highlighting his status as provider and even tearing up a little bit at how hard he works. Nothing really spectacular there, just always nice to see dynamics play out in this manner.

Beyond this, it’s usual Tribal Council banter, but the mystery of the vote holds one’s interest. But what comment could Tai possible use to swing his use of the idol? Enter Joe, who’s decided to speak up for the first time in a while. And after hearing him speak, it’s clear that Joe really shouldn’t have. Joe puts forth the theory that, since he hasn’t really seen anyone looking for an idol, perhaps the twist this season is that there are no idols to be found! Joe, please don’t speak up again. Don’t get me wrong, that’s not as crazy an idea as it sounds. Fans have floated the idea of that very twist for years. But, it would never logically happen. Production gets too much drama from idols for them NOT to be in place. This is the “women’s alliance” assumption from “Survivor Heroes vs. Villains” all over again. It’s quite easy to see why one could think that, but it’s completely the wrong conclusion, and that assumption could lead to disastrous results later on. Granted, this isn’t quite as bad, since once Joe gets back together with Neal it will become clear that there ARE idols in the game, but still, it’s just the clue Tai needs. Deciding that this ignorance is an opportunity not be missed, Tai opts to let Anna go, which I think is his smartest move. If you’re not the target, unless NOT playing the idol spells certain doom for your game overall, it’s best to hang onto the idol. Further, since Anna and the women’s alliance wanted Tai gone anyway, it’s not like he was particularly beholden to them. If he can make it to the merge with Scot, Tai’s in great shape. Not sure how Jason will feel about forming the super-idol, but it’s an interesting possibility, and gives everyone some room to play.

That said, as a fan, I am sorry to see Anna gone. We didn’t get a whole lot of her, but what we got seemed to be at least decent at the game. Conversely, Peter is repetitive and annoying on all accounts, and it’s be nice to see him gone. Next episode, it might be the smart move, but for now, we will simply miss Anna.

This, though, brings me back to Chan Loh, and the debate of which side Jason and Cydney should take. This episode makes it clear that they should go with Michele and Nick. The major threat of siding with Michele and Nick was the women’s alliance making it impossible to get a foothold. With founding member Anna gone, though, the old Gondol become fractured, and much less of a threat. Conversely, the old Chan Loh now becomes the major united front, which needs to be gotten rid of. Whether or not Jason and Cydney see this or get a chance to act on it, I don’t know, but if they’re smart, that’s what they’ll do.

Overall, this episode was a pretty good one. Oddly, the least interesting part was Tribal Council. I don’t know, while they did a good job of hiding who was going, it not being Peter felt anticlimactic. Still, there was excellent personal dynamics and good strategy on both sides, so no complaints about that. I look forward to what the next episode brings!

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor Kaoh Rong” Episode 4: Everything the Light Touches

What? If Tai can quote “The Lion King” in relation to “Survivor”, why can’t I? Figured I might as well jump on the “Tai Trang Train”. The “Tai Traing”, if you will.

Bad puns aside, let us leap into the episode proper, as we’ve got some heavy subject matter to cover. Or rather, let us leap into the “Previously On..” segment, as it deserves commenting on. Now, don’t get me wrong, this one is largely a good recap, as for once it pretty much confines itself to what happened in the IMMEDIATE episode prior, rather than calling out certain plot points from way back in the season, thereby telling us what to look out for. Had it just confined itself to that, I would have no need to mention the recap, save perhaps to praise it for its humility. But no, it just had to give us some hyperbole about how “This is the toughest season of ‘Survivor’ ever.”, and give us contestant testimony to support this. Once again, I must voice my disagreement on this point. Yes, we’ve had some contestant complaints about the environment this time, but by and large they’ve been sort of the standard stuff you get in the first few episodes of a season. The upcoming challenge is tough, I grant you, but the season as a whole? I have yet to be convinced. Perhaps I’m just stubborn, but I feel like you need to save hyperbole like that for the end of the season, when you accumulate more evidence.

You’d think, with the obvious emphasis on the harshness of the environment and medical evacuations, that this episode might be devoid of strategy, but you’d be wrong. Granted, what we see is largely devoid of strategy, but we do get one interesting nugget early on. As you’d expect, it comes from Chan Loh, where Peter is reeling from the past Tribal Council. Debbie is being self-congratulatory about the whole affair, but not overly so. She admits that she played her part well, and Tribal Council went exactly as she planned. This bragging doesn’t bother me, since it pretty accurately captures what happened, and is done in private, rather than to the tribe. To help her go up in my estimation, she plays off the whole thing to Peter very well. She tells him that she wanted to save him, how he’s needed in the tribe, which is exactly the right way to play it. The major danger now is that Peter defects and blows your whole game up. Making him as comfortable as possible limits that dangerous possibility. Peter, while frustrated, also plays the whole thing off well, openly expressing mainly shock that it was Liz and not him. He does keep his true feelings pretty well under wraps, but it’s still somewhat clear that he’s not fully on board the whole “Chan Loh” thing anymore. He makes this quite clear in his confessional, swearing to take his revenge on the tribe when he can. Like I say, he plays this all well, and I can’t fault him for how he’s playing this. Yes, he’s been burned by the tribe, but rather than go off and rant, he simply decides to no longer trust them and bide his time, while giving a fairly convincing outward appearance of loyalty. What I CAN fault him for is saying that this vote “Weakens our tribe physically and mentally.” Technically he’s right, but then again, you could say that about EVERY vote. You see, losing a member never ADDS strength to your team, and therefore every vote loses you strength. If he’s saying that Liz was a big contributor… I just don’t see it. I could see the vote severely weakening the tribe if it was PETER voted out. I could even see Peter’s point if the other target of the night was Debbie or Joe, as it could be argued that Liz was physically and/or mentally stronger than they were. But Peter, your targets were Neal and Aubry, arguably the two people most equivalent to Liz. This vote was the wrong decision only because it hurts you not because it particularly weakens the tribe more than any other option you had last episode. Get over it.

Wow, reward challenge time already. They must be getting it out of the way early so we have plenty of time to deal with the medical emergencies at the immunity challenge. And yet, that challenge looks very much like the one with the promised emergencies. And that’s because… it is. Yep, I’ll be talking about it more at the end of the blog, but this episode has shot its bolt early, getting all the exciting stuff out of the way early. Not much the producers can do about it, since there’s not enough material there to make up a whole episode, but not the most auspicious way of doing things.

But what is this challenge of challenges, so tough that it takes down three of our competitors? An obstacle course. Yep, just a pretty basic, pretty dull obstacle course. The tribes climb over a few hurdles, dig under a log, dig up three bags of balls, and then try and get those balls into holes via Skee-Ball. Yeah, not exactly an exciting challenge, not helped by the presence of Skee-Ball, which I maintain is an incredibly LAME element in a challenge. Yeah, the streak is broken. This one just sucks.

So, if the challenge itself is not that challenging, what takes our competitors down? The environment. Yep, this challenge is being played in 110 degree heat, the temperature at which everything has evidently been operating for the past few days this season. Not to say that challenges haven’t been played in heat like this before. Notably, the “Court-Ball” challenge from “Survivor Guatemala” was played in similar heat. What makes this one different is the continuousness of it. The “Court-Ball” challenge was run in rounds, giving people a chance to recover and drink some water. And even THEN, people were still beat from the challenge. This challenge runs nonstop. It’s a race, not a points game.

Oh, and duration. Duration plays a big role in this challenge. To Tang gets out to an early lead, followed closely by Gondol, with Chan Loh bringing up the rear. Not that it matters. Digging up the balls proves harder than anyone else expects, and while To Tang is up two bags to the other teams one apiece, that doesn’t stop things from going on for 45 minutes. I don’t think anyone anticipated that those balls would be that hard to find, and it’s definitely a contributing factor to how this challenge turns out.

And then… a breakthrough! Due to stick-to-it-iveness, Chan Loh finds bags two and three in oddly rapid succession, and moves on to (shudder) Skee-Ball. Rather than let one person run that portion of the challenge, they divvy it up so that Aubry, Debbie, and Peter all get some balls in holes, netting them an easy victory. Not too long after, Caleb finds bags two and three for Gondol, and starts doing that Skee-Ball thing. Things look bad for To Tang, especially since they’re so worn out that they’re kicking the sand rather than really digging. Scot and Jason seem to have stopped altogether. Not that Alecia gives up, though, as she keeps encouraging the tribe to keep digging. While I’m no Alecia fan, I do admire her tenacity. Regardless of the situation, she doesn’t just lie down and die, which is not always easy to do on a losing tribe. That said, her manner in going about all this is a bit overdone. Not that she shouldn’t be saying what she’s saying, but she just keeps repeating it, and that combined with the heat makes it all very annoying. And I’m not even out there! Scot, who is out there, gets fed up with her, telling her to dig rather than cheerlead. Frankly, this isn’t a clear-cut “One side is right” thing. Keeping morale up is essential, and Scot effectively killing that morale is not a good thing. But I could see how it would get annoying, so yeah, I feel him. Though his “How many bags have you found?” argument holds no water, as finding them is largely luck-based, not effort-based.

Oh, I’m sorry, did I just ignore Debbie collapsing from heat stroke? Yeah, I did. Sorry about that, I don’t mean to take away from the gravity of the situation. Only, compared to what we’re GOING to see, it looks very minor (though no less serious), and the Alecia stuff matters more in the long-run anyway. But yes, despite her protests, Joe calls for medical, who don’t respond as quickly as they usually do. I guess they’re just not used to coming out while a challenge is still running. They get there quickly, though, and get to work. They put an umbrella over Debbie, hook her up to vital reading machines, and pour cool water on her, the usual treatment for heat stroke. Despite that fact that we know three people collapse but only one gets evacuated, and Debbie’s early collapse makes her likely to stay, it does get a big heart-wrenching. I think it’s because you can’t see her eyes. Maybe it just gives me flashbacks to Russell Swan’s collapse on “Survivor Samoa”, but that makes things seem serious.

Of course, we can’t have the doctor come in without Probst buddying over and talking to him. I’ll admit I probably exaggerate how bad this is, but I would point that the medical evacuations of Mike Skupin (“Survivor The Australian Outback”) and Bruce Kanegai (“Survivor Exile Island”) both had gravitas and were easy to understand, and there was NO NEED for Probst in either case. Just seems like he’s bothering the doctor and pandering to the audience unnecessarily. Oh, but this time is particularly egregious, since he needs to be WATCHING THE CHALLENGE! I know, they’ve got other people there to watch the challenge, but we don’t need Probst bothering the doctor. Time would’ve been better spent watching the challenge.

Speaking of which, after it’s revealed that Debbie’s going to be ok, we turn back to said challenge, which has become something of a cliffhanger. Gondol is having trouble getting their last ball in the hole, most likely due to the fact that they worked front-to-back, rather than back-to-front. Meanwhile To Tang has FINALLY found their bags, and sends Jason on to test his Skee-Ball skills. He does manage to get three balls in, but it’s not enough, as Caleb eventually sinks their last balls to win reward.

The drama is not passed, though, as both Caleb and Cydney are down. Cydney basically can’t move, while Caleb wanders over to the shade, and then flops down on the ground. Thankfully, both having caring tribemates to care for them, but medical is quickly called for both. And while I may have given Probst a lot of flak earlier for bothering the doctor, this is where he really shines. He wastes no time, calling in all available personelle to handle the situation. He even gets Cydney looked at, despite the fact that no one had called out specifically for her. Now, when the situation is really serious, he leaves the doctors alone, and even pitches in wherever he can, mainly talking to Caleb, trying to bring him around. I cannot give Probst high enough praise, as well as the whole “Survivor” crew. they handle everything swiftly, professionally, and most likely saved someone’s life. Because this is bad. Russell Swan bad. Yet their grace under fire needs to be commended. If there was one positive to come out of this horrible, horrible situation, it is getting to see these guys perform really well.

It’s a little more unclear between Caleb and Cydney who’s going to get the axe medically. Both seem semi-conscious, and are convulsing pretty badly. In the end, though, when Caleb stops even nodding, it’s clear he’s going to be taken away. I’ve said before, and I’ll say again, that it’s always sad when someone has to be medically pulled from the game. Everyone deserves a respectful exit, and the right to finish their game on their terms. Even if that person is Colton Cumbie (“Survivor One World”). That not happening is very depressing in and of itself, and anyone going that way would be a loss. And don’t get me wrong, I am sorry to see Caleb go, if only for the death of a beautiful bromance. That’s just it, though. That’s all he brought. Of the three people who get heat stroke this challenge, Caleb ultimately brought the least to the table. Debbie and Cydney are both bigger characters and better strategists than him. I wish no one had to go, but if someone had to go of those three, Caleb is the least of all evils.

Whoo-wee, what an emotional roller-coaster! An action-packed first-half of the episode! Other drama cliches! Still, the game continues, with Tai transitioning us back to the game by pointing out that girl power is still a thing on Gondol, and with Caleb gone, they now have full control. Tai swears he won’t go out with an idol in his pocket, which is exactly how you want to play the game.

Some of you may be asking “Well, what was the reward?” Kitchen supplies, and some coffee. that’s it. All that pain, all that loss, for cookwear. Not worth it. Oh, but it gets worse! All this might have been avoided, but for one simple change in the challenge! You see, I watch those “Challenge Previews” on CBS.com. The ones where the Dream Team runs the challenge to see if it works. In that iteration, there were bamboo chutes placed over where the bags of balls were, so that people could find them faster. From a design perspective, I get why they were removed. The challenge becomes less of a straightforward race without them, and gives us potential for come-from-behind victories, like we got. But that also likely added the 45-minute search part to the challenge, which I’m sure was a contributing factor to the evacuations. Was it worth it? Probably not.

It seems the emotional moments are not quite over, as Debbie gets in some words about what she was feeling while being looked at by medical. It’s nice, but it doesn’t really amount to anything, and after that nice transition back into game mode we had with Tai, I think it might have been better served if we’d gone without.

Here, we get a title card letting us know that Caleb is ok, and wants to play again. It feels like a bit of a weird placement, but it’s good to get that info out of the way quickly, and assure the children watching that no, Caleb isn’t dead. While he wasn’t the most exciting character, I wouldn’t mind seeing him back at some point, if only to let him finish the game properly.

Shifting back to gameplay mode, we get Alecia and Scot arguing again. Oh goodie, we haven’t seen this before! Alecia is, understandably, upset at how Scot treated her during the challenge, and Scot and Jason are once again dismissive of Alecia, outright telling her that she’s going next. Again, like with the challenge, the guy’s treatment isn’t cool, but I understand it. Alecia may be in the right, but she won’t shut up, and can’t argue her case very well. It’s like we’re waiting for her to get voted off.

We might have to wait a while, though, because it’s challenge time! Gee, I wonder who’ll lose this time? I mean, we’ve had SO MUCH strategy talk from Gondol and Chan Loh, it could be either one of them! Who would have guessed?

Still, if the result of the challenge is predictable, the challenge itself is semi-cool. It’s a fairly standard “Run through the jungle and dive in the ocean to retrieve puzzle pieces, then solve the puzzle.” challenge. Not directly copying anything, but it does bear a close resemblance to the first immunity challenge from “Survivor Philippines”, which, as this is not the first immunity challenge, I’m ok with. That puzzle, though, is really cool! It’s your basic snake puzzle, but rather than having traditional puzzle pieces the tribes just have different lengths of rope they have to put in a frame. None of the ropes can cross, though. It’s a tricky puzzle to solve, and a really creative concept. For that, I’ll give this challenge a pass.

When To Tan predictably loses, Alecia tries to salvage the situation by saying “I did my best.” Giving her no quarter, To Tang leaps on her not saying “WE did our best”, since Cydney was working on the puzzle as well. Again, I’m in sympathy with Alecia here, since she’s fighting for her life, but her defenses of herself are just SO ANNOYING, that you can sympathize with To Tang. In fact, they’re so fed up with her that they freely admit that she’s the one leaving, and ask to go to Tribal Council then and there. Probst says it’s ok with him, but Alecia has to agree to it as well. Alecia does the smart thing and says no. While the situation certainly seems hopeless, it’s better to go out bargaining and trying to weasel something up than to just roll over and die. Good for you, Alecia. Also, it just feels right to not do Tribal Council immediately. That needs to be saved for special occasions. As I’ll get into shortly, this is kind of the opposite of a special occasion.

Sad fact: The fact that Alecia opted not to go immediately to Tribal Council makes her smarter than the entire Manono Tribe of “Survivor One World”. Weep for that season my friends.

Killing ANY pretext of misdirection, we cut immediately to Tribal Council, which for the first time this season is completely boring. We know Alecia’s going, everyone there knows Alecia’s going, so the whole thing is just an exercise in futility. Much though I have sympathy for her situation, I’m not sorry to see her go. Alecia really didn’t bring anything new to the table, and this has been building for a while. This was not the sort of grand exit that deserved an impromptu Tribal Council, this is one that needed to be shoved at the back of a two-parter, which this effectively was.

As to the episode as a whole, it’s tough to call. I can’t in good conscience say it’s a BAD episode, but definitely the weakest thus far. It’s not really it’s fault, though. The first half, the half with the medical drama, is great! While it’s never good to see people go down like that, it does make for compelling tv, in a perverse sort of way. I may malign medical evacuations as taking away from the strategy of the season, but used sparingly, they can really enhance things. Plus, what I’m realizing is that, every so often, we need one of those real life-threatening situations to remind us of the gravitas of the game. Would I be happier without them? Yes. I don’t like people coming that close to death, but in a game like this, it’s bound to happen. It showcases the professionalism of the show in general, and Probst in particular, and is quite the eye-catcher. Had that been the whole episode, it would have been fantastic. But it wasn’t. We had to tack on an obvious, telegraphed exit to the whole thing, and that really did the episode no favors. I’m happy we got that exit out of the way, plus having an impromptu double-elimination means that we’re more likely to have a final two at the end, which I enjoy, but the second half of the episode just can’t compete, and that REALLY drags things down. You know how little we care about Alecia? She didn’t even get the final words of the episode. Caleb did.

Before we go, though, there are two points that I feel need to be addressed. First off, this season has REALLY copied “Survivor Cagayan”, and I don’t just mean in terms of twists. The tribes this season are shaking out like they did on that season! Think about it: We’ve got a tribe that is a complete disaster, voting out the strong in the first two votes only to lose their weak player in the third vote (Luzon and To Tang), the tribe that largely wins, but loses one immunity challenge, and seems to be more fractured (Solana and Chan Loh), and the tribe that, while it has alliances, never loses and stays relatively unified (Appari and Gondol). The challenge wins and losses even exactly line up! Admittedly, I feel like these tribes are more deeply divided than the ones on “Survivor Cagayan”, but the similarities in how the three tribes shake out are freaky. Why do I bring this up? Well, mainly because it’s an odd coincidence, but also because something weird happens with it: I don’t mind. Seriously, with how blatantly and closely this season is copying “Survivor Cagayan”, one of the best seasons ever you think it’d be nothing but downward comparisons, but it’s not. True, I still think “Survivor Cagayan” is the better of the two, but we’re only four episodes in! “Survivor Kaoh Rong” could very well usurp that position over the course of the season, and is doing a very good job. Why? Well, they copied the element that worked the best from “Survivor Cagayan” as well: getting a great cast. Again, they’re not to “Survivor Cagayan” goodness levels yet, but we’ve got a lot of great characters, some nice strategy, and often found in the same person. That makes the show good, and makes it not matter how much the show is repeating itself. If the cast is good, then the season can stand on this own.

My second note has to do with some actual speculation. I know, speculation on a blog called “Idol Speculation”, who would have guessed? But, as we saw in the preview, a tribe swap is nigh. I’m sure this was planned for the time, as we’d be down to 14 players, making for a nice, even tribe shrinking, but with Caleb’s unfortunate evacuation, we’re down to 13. How will they make up for this uneven distribution. I don’t know, but here’s a thought: make them a reward. Divide up the tribes so you have two teams of six, rather than seven. Schoolyard pick is probably best for this, but random division could work as well. With no Exile Island this season, what do you do with the seventh person? Make them the reward. Go straight to a challenge, and the prize is not a feast or easier camp life, but a number, an extra number to play around with. Perhaps a bit demeaning to the person being used as reward, but wouldn’t that be exciting? Make it happen, producers!

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor Kaoh Rong” Episode 3: Rise of the Eyebrow

Do not be fooled by the lameness of this opening paragraph. This was a fantastic episode, and I intend to do it justice. However, the best way to open talk about this episode involves spoiling who goes to Tribal Council, and while I’m not shy about referencing the outcome of an episode in my blog, I do try and keep it from the opening paragraph, so that those who want spoiler-free blogs can realize their error and look elsewhere. With that said, I shall now start a new paragraph, that shall hopefully be more on-point than this one.

It’s a good thing Chan Loh didn’t vote off the ER Doctor. I think Neal needs to have that eyebrow looked at. It there was ever any proof that the old adage of “If you keep making that face, it’ll freeze like that!” was true, Neal is it. That eyebrow didn’t come down ONCE during Tribal Council, and that can’t be comfortable.

But I’m jumping ahead to the slightly more mockable parts of this episode. Instead I ought to start off, like the episode, over at the To Tang tribe. Newly returned from Tribal Council, they’re not at all sure that voting off Jennifer was the right decision, due to keeping in relative challenge weakness. Scot in particular voices concern, in the process proving his “I don’t have brains.” comment from episode 1 by telling Alecia that he was the second vote for her, out of loyalty to Jennifer. Thankfully, once Alecia walks off, he’s at least smart enough to realize that Alecia now has him at the top of her hit list. He and Jason just shake their heads, showing how much they consider her worth in the game.

Sure enough, Alecia is off bashing Scot to Cydney, in the process bringing up the “He was a pro ball player, so he has plenty of money!” argument. Just when you thought we could avoid THAT old type of scene! Fortunately, though, Cydney is there to provide us with some welcome relief. Yes, Cydeny has finally taken a break from either having terrible bedside manner (episode 1) or just being at best mildly snarky (episode 2), and given us something to actually enjoy watching. Cydney admits that Alecia thinks of her as an ally. How this came about, she’s not sure, but she lets us know that she’s playing Alecia, and intends to stick with the guys. We’ll see this better later on, but Cydney really plays this off very well, such that Alecia doesn’t suspect a thing. Props to you, girl!

We head off to Gondol, so we can conclude our three-part miniseries of “Tai’s Hunt for the Idol”. Somehow, Tai once again sneaks off without the tribe seeming to notice (someone really needs to set a watch on him), and considers the problem of retrieving the key. Rather than bark up the wrong tree again (my resistance lasts only one blog), Tai decides to try the pole-building method indicated in the note. Because nothing can be easy for the man, though, the tool specifically given to help retrieve the idol has gone missing. Taken for firewood and burned, presumably. Undeterred, Tai does the logical thing of stripping down a stick to be thin enough to push the key out of the tube, all while giving an inspirational talk about how much he’s had to overcome in life. If this doesn’t clue you in to his eventual success, the obvious dramatic music should.

Key in hand, Tai retrieves the idol. Funnily enough, it’s in the box conveniently marked “Idol”. Ok, I get that CBS thinks we’re all idiots who need these things labeled for us, but, CBS, the fact is we simply don’t. Plus, having a box marked “Idol” makes it all that much easier for people to cotton onto the fact that someone else has found the idol. Makes it all the more conspicuous, I say. For once, though, the idol itself it not conspicuous, and I quite like it. Just a simple half of a yin-yang symbol with the tribe animal mascot on it (a snake for Gondol, a tiger for To Tang, and a crocodile for Chan Loh). Definitely idol-like, but small enough that it can be feasibly hidden. Excellent work, props department. Props to the props, as it were.

But that yin-yang symbol is more than just for looks, as we find out when Tai reads the rules of the idol. Initially he dismisses them, saying “I know this stuff.”, but must then pause when the new twist to the idol is revealed. Basically, idols this season work as they have since “Survivor Fiji” onward: you play them after the votes are cast, but before they are revealed, and any votes cast for you are nullified. However, because of their shapes, these idols can be combined. When connected, they form one “Super Idol” which works like it did on “Survivor Exile Island” and “Survivor Cook Islands” where it can be played after the vote. This twist has been much publicized before the season, and now I have a chance to talk about my opinion on it. Much like this season, I remain undecided. Unlike past “Super Idols”, this one is a bit less overpowered, as there is an incentive to not playing two idols together. After all, if you’re in a tight spot, they only save you one Tribal Council, whereas separately they could save you two. Additionally, it’s potentially not just rewarding idol hunting but also the social game, as you’ll most likely have to work together with someone to agree to play a “Super Idol” on one person. A tricky prospect, making the “Super Idol” potentially less overpowered. It’s the “potentially” here that worries me. The flaw in the “Super Idol” is that it works well as a twist, assuming no one ever has more than one idol. If someone has two, there’s nothing stopping them from letting everyone know that they can’t be voted out, and then running to the end of the game. Why do you think the “Super Idol” was gotten rid of after “Survivor Cook Islands”? It essentially gave Terry Deitz and Yul Kwan free passes to the end, and arguably gave Yul the win on “Survivor Cook Islands”! It was overpowered as all get out. Still, as long as no one ever has more than one idol, I’m ok.

As an aside, I find the name “Super Idol” to be lame. I think it’s the same problem I had with the name “Medallion of Power” from “Survivor Nicaragua”. It’s descriptive, but it feels very un-“Survivor”. I can’t come up with anything better, though, and it’s still a better moniker than “Tyler Perry Idol”, so I’ll let it slide.

And that was all before our lack of opening titles. Yeah, this episode is one of the good ones.

We continue our story progression at Chan Loh, where Liz and Peter are out in the water discussing how they want things to go, should they go to Tribal Council. After making the obvious point that Joe is far more Brawn than Brain, Peter and Liz agree that they need to keep the goats, in this case Debbie and Joe, around a bit longer. Neal is their main target, due to being “A snake.”, and talking more game than Aubry. Just in case he has an idol, though, the pair plan to split their votes. They’ll tell Debbie and Joe to vote for Neal, which they think the pair will do if only to save their own skins, while they vote for Aubry as a safety measure. Not a bad plan for the pair all things considered. They do a lot of insulting of the other people on their tribe, which rubs me a bit the wrong way, but it’s not too bad. Yet. It’s also interesting to see how the power in this tribe has switched from the beginning of the game. In episode 1, it seemed like Neal and Liz were calling the shots, bringing together the “Young People” alliance. In episode 2, we started to get a bit more independent thought from Peter, and Liz seemed to be getting her finger in multiple pies. Now, we see a complete flip, with three pairs of people squaring off, and it seeming like the relative oddballs of the group are now the safest ones. It’s frankly a fascinating progression, and I’m glad we were shown it so clearly.

Liz, however, seems to have forgotten her “Sound travels well over water.” advice from episode 1, and Debbie hears every word. Realizing this would only make her a pawn in the game, Debbie takes action. Ok, what she SAYS is she’s fed up with Liz’s “self-entitled attitude”, which in my opinion really only showed up this episode, but the point is there. For all the crazy talk, for all the socially unaware moments she’s had, Debbie is not to be underestimated. She is a PLAYER this episode, and quite a good one too! She correctly assesses that, unless an upset of power is enacted, she and Joe will be on the bottom. Since she and Aubry have something of a connection, she turns to her first. Admittedly Debbie keeps the talk somewhat low-key, framing it as an emotional connection between he pair, and making certain that Neal is connected with Aubry, but with how this tribe’s been winning, a slow burn is not necessarily a bad way to play it.

Back over at Gondol, because we haven’t hit the main points of Tai’s personality enough in the first two episodes, we need to yet AGAIN hear about his love for all living things. Gondol feels like chicken tonight, and so one of their two chickens is about to be sacrificed. Tai is upset about this. Look , I like Tai a LOT, the guy’s really grown on me. But after three episodes, the repetition of Tai’s confessionals is getting old. Thankfully, Tai keeps this one low key. He jokes with Caleb about freeing the chickens, and certainly has a good cry about it, but admits that the guys need their protein, and comforts himself by quoting one of the best Disney movies ever! To show his support, he even helps with the killing of the chicken. He cries about it afterward, but it’s not overblown or anything.

Actually, something new does happen in this scene, or rather as a result of this scene. Nick’s true sociopath colors start to shine through. And before anyone cries “Slander!”, Nick’s confessional about needing to only have the appearance of emotions rather than actually feeling those emotions is textbook sociopathy. Plus, he’s wrong. While one certain needs to be able to control their emotions on “Survivor”, one cannot separate them from the game. Like it or not, they’re a part of the game, and must be addressed as such. Nick uses his “appearance of emotion” to bash Tai for his emotion, which does not sit well with Anna, who more and more appears to be emerging as the leader of the women of Gondol. They’ve been needing a fourth for a while, and the debate seems to have finally given us a nominee. She talks with Caleb, who seems to be on board, finding this to be a strong alliance. Specifically, she wants to target Nick, since she correctly sees him as untrustworthy. Tai’s idol suspicion probably hasn’t gone away, but Nick is overall the more pressing threat. Good call on all their parts, except Nick’s.

Speaking of idols, it’s time for To Tang to actually have success on their particular idol hunt. It seems that, despite time spent actively looking, the way for Alecia to find anything is to stumble upon it accidentally. Like with Gondol’s idol, there’s a clue hidden in a knot of a tree, saying to dig at its base. So, Cydney and Alecia start digging. Who then should show up but Jason, out for a leisurely stroll, if he’s to be believed. He ses the pair digging and goes off. Having seeming found nothing, Cydney sends Alecia back to get a hoe to better dig with. Here, though, we see the newfound cunning of Cydney shine through. In actual fact, Cydney had dug up the box and the tool with the clue on it, and simply didn’t want Alecia to know. Once she’s gone, Cydney reads the clue, only then to rebury it so Alecia can’t find it. The pair head back to camp, seemingly in defeat, only for Cydney to spill the beans about the clue as soon as Alecia is out of earshot. Everyone springs into action, with Alecia hot on their trail. The only problem now, though, is that the tool cannot be found again. Cydney had to rebury it, and now it can’t be found. After quite an impressive footrace, Jason has found the key to the box, but can’t seem to get it. He and Scot hit upon the same idea as Tai, and find a stick thin enough to do the job, Jason thanking his lucky stars that he has a tall NBA player on his side in this case. But now they have a new problem. Basically, at this point, whoever gets the key gets the idol. And who should be right there but Alecia, waiting to grab the key as soon as it falls. As if it wants to add to the dramatic tension, the cylinder the key is on teeters for a moment before falling. After a truly epic scuffle, in which I’m amazed no one got hurt, Jason comes up with the idol, and Alecia falls into despair. I have to admit, this was a fun scene to do. While I prefer more strategic play to physical play on “Survivor”, the occasional bit of physical play is welcome, and this was spectacular by those standards. Plus, we got to see more of strategic, deceptive Cydney, and though I kind of brushed over it, she did a really good job hiding her motives, staying good with Alecia by telling her that Jason figured out the key location by watching them, rather than her giving it away. Evidently she really shouldn’t be messed with.

Scot and Jason read about the new “Super Idol” twist, and Scot makes a reference to the “Wonder Twins”. Ok Scot, one point for making a nerd reference, but one demerit because that reference was to the “Wonder Twins”.

Before we come to our challenge, let us once again appreciate what an excellent job of balancing various storylines this episode has done. Every tribe has had something interesting going on, and there’s real mystery as to who’s going to go to Tribal Council this evening. Barring, of course, that you read the second paragraph of this blog, in which case you know that Chan Loh loses, but in the challenge itself, it’s really tense.

And speaking of the challenge itself, chalk another one up to this season! Not only did they come up with a great challenge this time, they actually make it pretty original. Basically, each tribe will carry three sacks of rice through the water to a wall with a tiny hole in it. After stuffing the three bags through, the tribe must then carry them over a balance beam to a table, where they must use a knife to rip open the bags to find three balls. Once all the balls are found, one tribe member at a time must race to get a ball into a notch by maneuvering it through a swiss cheese board. First two tribes to get all three balls though successfully wins immunity. Granted, the swiss cheese part is taken directly from “Survivor Worlds Apart”, but since we therefore haven’t seen it to death, and it’s pretty challenging, I’ll give it a pass. The rest of the challenge is just AWESOME! Simple, but difficult, and very fitting for “Survivor”. They’ve worked with rice and knives before, but very rarely, and never in this way, so it’s cool to watch.

Ah, but the challenge gets even better from there. As you’d expect, reward is also at stake in this challenge, but it’s a bit different this time. Instead of the two winning tribes getting the same reward with various degrees of completeness, the winning tribe gets to choose between camp comfort in the form of pillows and blankets, or their luxury items. Not only is it refreshing to see luxury items on “Survivor” again, but having a choice of reward can often make for some good drama. Remember Russell Sawn overruling logic to “Take care of the ladies.” on “Survivor Samoa”? More of that, please! Also, Jason’s luxury item appears to be a Care Bear. It’s so oxymoronic, and I love it!

If the editing wasn’t enough to make the challenge tense, the actual challenge itself adds to the tension. It’s a very close one overall, with Chan Loh losing only by seconds. Granted, Gondol is ahead pretty much the entire time, so their win is no surprise, but Chan Loh and To Tang stay very close the entire time. To Tang has a slight lead carrying the bags of rice, but fall behind on the ball portion, a fact that Probst gleefully points out. Then, under the guidance of Jason, Cydney comes back to race against Debbie, and ultimately manages to get the ball in the hole mere seconds beforehand. It’s a real heart-ponding race. THAT, my friends, is how you do a challenge! Plus, since Gondol wisely chooses stuff that’s actually helpful to survival rather than luxury items, we will get more of the hilarity that is Jason’s Care Bear, the unofficial 19th contestant on this season.

Heading to the break, Peter makes a comment about how this loss is nothing big, and now he and Liz’s plan can be put into action, getting Neal out. I’m sure this in no way sets up a dramatic downfall for Peter and/or Liz!

Were I a lazy person (which I am), I would say that the scene of Chan Loh preparing for Tribal Council is pretty much exactly the same scene as we had with them earlier in the episode, only amped up. This is true, but I feel compelled to go into more detail about it. In case we didn’t get the message about their split-vote strategy, Peter and Liz yet again talk about their split vote strategy. To make sure no one is sorry for them, we get real intense scenes of them talking about how stupid the other players are compared to them, and how this consolidates their power. Frankly, it works. Even though the outcome is entirely obvious at this point, I really do want to see them get their comeuppance.

When the pair put their plan into action, Debbie puts her plan into action. Being a bit more aggressive this time, she fills in first Aubry and then Neal about Peter and Liz’s plans for the evening, which gets both of them on their side. Aubry criticizes both Peter and Liz for not being very good at emotionally connecting, a fact which is then reinforced by a scene of Peter being condescending towards Aubry, effectively ordering her how to vote.

Now, when I say that the outcome of this episode is predictable, in that it has been HEAVILY foreshadowed that either Peter or Liz will go, I mean it. You would think, then, that there would be no tension left for Tribal Council. Oh, but there is! You see, Aubry does not take Peter’s attitude very well. Up until this point, Liz had been the target, mainly because Debbie and Joe didn’t like her very much. Now, however, Aubry would rather have Peter go. Normally, I’d hate this since it is an emotional argument with regards to “Survivor” strategy. However, I’m ok with it for three reasons. First, it gives us much-needed tension for Tribal Council. Before, it was very clear that Liz would go. Now, there’s question of Peter or Liz. Second, and most important, Aubry DOES have strategic reasoning to back it up, pointing out that Peter would be more likely to flip come the merge. Third, I’m rooting for Aubry, so I’m inclined to support her decision. That said, I think sticking with Liz for the boot is the better choice. Frankly, worries about Peter flipping could just as easily be put on Liz, and in terms of their flip, Liz is more likely to be successful at it. Liz looks non-threatening, and is therefore more likely to be put in an alliance against you. Conversely, Peter looks like a threat to everyone, and so would have a harder time finding safe harbor in which to flip. Plus, assuming there’s no swap anytime soon, Peter is definitely more helpful in challenges.

Thankfully Tribal Council has an air of mystery about it, because for the first two thirds of it, it’s all pretty standard. The trouble is that Chan Loh is actually pretty smart, and plays their cards close to the chest, which does not a stand-out moment make. However, hilarity first ensues that you realize that Neal’s standard answer to every question lobbed at him amounts to “Enigmatic pontificating about the nature of the game with left eyebrow knowingly raised.” Not to say that these aren’t good answers. They get Probst off your case, but keep your cards close to the chest. When you realize he’s saying his answers with the EXACT same inflection and the EXACT same expression on his face, the same-y-ness of it all just makes me crack up! Go back and watch for it again, it’s great. Seriously, Neal, get that thing looked at.

On about the third try, though, Neal’s raising of the eyebrow gets some results. After making a pretty good comment about “Whose plan is going to get stuck to.”, Peter can take it no longer, and openly admits that he’s not sticking to Neal’s plan, pretty obviously telling him that he’s getting voted out. I thought, Peter, that you were supposed to be the smart one. I guess he feels confident enough to reveal his plan out in the open at Tribal Council, but even if you’re SURE things are on lock, that’s never a good idea. It make you seem arrogant, and makes it that much easier for others to turn the plan against you.

Case in point, as you’d expect, the vote goes against Peter and Liz. Which one, though? Even the episode doesn’t seem sure, as it comes down to a tie between those two and Aubry. Is this just going to be a “thing” with this season now? All first votes for a tribe result in a tie? Some would probably argue that this was a way to prevent idol mishaps screwing with the vote, and it may very well be that way. My take, however, is that this really was a case of three twosomes each voting independently. Neal and Aubry really wanted Peter out, but Debbie and Joe wouldn’t go along with it, so they forced a tie to get Neal to cooperate. I may be wrong, but that would be my suspicion, and it shows where the real power is in this tribe, since Liz is ultimately sent home. As a consolation prize, she gets her torch snuffed by… Joe Anglim of “Survivor Worlds Apart”! Or at least his scalp, anyway. Seriously, I’ve been meaning to comment on it for a while, but the snuffer this season has a magnificent man-bun. Clearly, someone as fabulous as Joe had to be scalped to make such a snuffer.

While Liz is definitely the smarter choice, for the reasons I outlined earlier, it is a shame to see her go as a fan. She was overall better at the game and more likable than Peter seems to be. True, this makes her more of a threat, but it also makes her more fun to watch. And while I don’t normally mention final words on this blog, I must take issue with Liz’s “The numbers didn’t lie to me, the people did.” comment. Liz, on “Survivor”, they’re basically the same thing. You got outwitted, just admit it.

Sad exit or no, as I said at the top of this blog, this was a FANTASTIC episode! Once again, we get an awesome challenge, real development on storylines across the board, fun action, and really smart gameplay! What more can you ask for from a season of “Survivor”?

According to the “Next Time On…” preview, you can ask for the much-publicized medical evacuation episode. think I saw a blue buff under the torso shown lying down in the previews. Here’s hoping it’s not Aubry that collapses!

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor Kaoh Rong” Episode 1: The Puzzle Love Position

Come on in guys, and assume the position. Much like Debbie makes puzzles get in the love position, so I make blogs get in the love position. In any case, welcome back to “Idol Speculation”, my knee-jerk opinion that everyone is entitled to! We’ve got a very up-in-the-air season this time around. It doesn’t sound promising, but if this episode proves anything, there’s hope for even the most hopeless cases, so don’t give up just yet.

As a quick aside, let me note that this premier episode is 90 minutes, as opposed to the usual standard 60 minutes for regular episodes. I bring this up because, especially after this episode, I feel like 90 minutes is sort of the perfect length for a premier episode of “Survivor”. Premiers need to be longer than regular episodes, since in most cases we’re getting to know 16-20 people we’ve never met before, and that takes a while. You don’t want every premier to be 2 hours, though, since that seems extra-special. Hence, 90 minutes is probably for the best.

We start off with our usual over-the-top Probst narration, but I have to admit it feels a bit lackluster this time around. I think it’s because, rather than start off with his usual “This is (location) narration, he talks a bit about the 18 people competing first, and then goes on to describe, in great detail, how TOUGH this location is, how it will wear out our competitors this season. Not to say that this sort of Probst narration was ever absent from previous Probst narrations, but the fact that it’s what’s emphasized rather than the people, is not a good sign. Oh, Probst talks about the people, but compared to how he talks about the environment, it’s clear that the survival aspect is what’s overall going to be emphasized on the season, and that’s not a good thing. I’m sure there’s a subset of people out there who watch “Survivor” for the actual survival parts of it, but the game is at its most interesting when it’s about people mentally and physically competing against each other, not about people trying to hack it in tough environments. If you emphasize the latter, you imply that the former is too weak to hold a season together, and that’s not a good thing. Now, some might argue that medevacs, in and of themselves, are not bad things. After all, my favorite season, “Survivor Micronesia” had two, plus a quit due to the toughness of the environment. However, “Survivor Micronesia” had the main draw of returning players and great/ridiculous strategy we’d never seen before. The effect of the environment was just the icing on the cake. Here, it’s being built up as the cake, and that’s not what the vast majority of the audience is tuning in for.

We do eventually get to the contestant interviews and… they’re boring. Pretty bog-standard stuff you’d expect when you’ve got ANOTHER “Brains vs. Brawn vs. Beauty” season, with each side talking about their respective attributes and how those will win the game. Nick’s arrogance is on full display, but we already knew that was coming. The only highlight of these interviews, before the marooning really gets going, is Debbie, who has a great quote about how puzzles “Get into the love position for her.” Already, I like Debbie, if only because she’s obviously going to be a great quote machine for the season. I was laughing my ass off at that one. Which leads me to ask: Why was THIS not the title for the episode? Don’t get me wrong, the actual title (“I’m a Mental Giant”), is not bad, but this is a missed opportunity, folks! You could have had one of the great premier episode titles of “Survivor”, and instead you go with one that’s ok at best.

Things do improve slightly with the marooning, which is the usual “scramble to get supplies off the boat in a set time limit” start, and as one would expect, we get some delightful chaos out of it, but it’s getting old. In particular, since we JUST saw this last season, and that marooning at least had a twist on top of the supply scramble to change things up a bit. This, again, just feels standard.

Our humor highlight of this particular scramble is Tai Trang, one of many people to go after chickens. Unlike others, though, Tai isn’t going after the chicken as a source of eggs or protein, though. No, Tai tells us he’s a “friend to all living things”, and that he’s trying to keep the chicken safe. Um, Tai, you do realize this is “Survivor” right? You do know what happens to chickens on “Survivor”, don’t you? They’re sacrificed. It’s inevitable. Even the guy named “Chicken” on “Survivor China” got the axe first, probably because he called himself “Chicken”!

We set off to our camps with Debbie’s oh-so-delightful narration asking us who’s a good swimmer. Yes, much as I like Debbie’s quotes, they get old really fast, and I’ll be getting into my irritation in that regard a bit later.

First, however, we must check in with To Tang… Oh, excuse me, “Brawn”. Evidently our feeble minds are too weak to comprehend which tribe is “Brawn” as opposed to “Brains” or “Beauty”. Good lord, the FIRST “Brains vs. Brawn vs. Beauty” got this one right! Look, I’ll make a quick reference to which tribe is which the first time I talk about each of them, but as always, I’m going with official tribe names from then on. They just sound cooler. To Tang actually starts out pretty well. They take a minute to get to know one another, asking where each is from and what they do for a living, and all seem pretty copacetic before heading off to do shelter building. We also see that they’ve got good senses of humor, or at least Scot does. Our former NBA start mistakenly says that there are 5 members of To Tang when there are actually 6, and immediately quips that he’s not smart. After all, he’s on the “Brawn” tribe. Witty and self-depricating. I like this guy. Plus, I believe he may be the first former professional sports player to NOT try and hide the fact that he played professional sports. Is that a smart thing? Not necessarily, but seeing as how his tribe doesn’t seem to mind to much, I’m not counting it against him yet. Plus, it spares us the “Pro Ball Player tries to hide his past.” storyline, which can be interesting, but by now has become old hat.

We then cut over to Chan Loh, our “Brains” for the season, who waste no time in trying to separate themselves from the “Survivor Cagayan” brains tribe, by, well, acting brainy. They’ve certainly got the lingo down better, making jokes about running regression analyses on “Survivor” in the first five minutes. Peter has a pretty good showing here as well. Looking at him for about five seconds, you can tell he looks like President Obama, and he made a big deal out of it in his pre-season videos, about how much it annoyed him. Sure enough, Debbie comments on it early in the game, Peter’s first real test of interpersonal interaction. He takes it really well, just playing along with the comment, and noting privately that if his looking presidential makes people want to get out of his way, that’s fine by him. Good, solid early gameplay.

Now, however, we turn to the bad gameplay that is Debbie, who despite being hilarious, did not have a very good showing tonight. After talking about all the careers she’s had in her life (we’ll get back to that in a bit), she brags about being able to start fire like that (snaps fingers). That’s a bold claim on “Survivor”, and if you can back it up, it makes you a hero, and earns you a lot of stock out of the gate. If you can’t, you look like an idiot. Guess which camp Debbie ends up in? Yep, her attempt at fire making goes about as well as most attempts at fire making before flint enters the equation, and it doesn’t look good for her. Neal, for one, is unimpressed, though Neal seems to have something of a semi-pessimistic attitude. We’d gotten some quotes about how being a “Brain” was a good thing, notably from Lis, but Neal is the first one to make the fair point that being a “Brain” has aa stigma attached to it that may make you a target. While pessimistic, this is actually a pretty accurate assessment of matters, and Neal has a lot of other little insights this episode that make me really like him.

Last, but not least, we get our “Beauties” for the season, the Gondol tribe. As I predicted, Gondol is probably the most intriguing of the bunch as of this first episode. They may have had bonding scenes when they first got to the beach, but we don’t see them. Instead we drop right into shelter building. That’s ok, though, because the politics of shelter building actually play a big part in what makes this tribe interesting. Sadly par for the course, the guys generally are lifting heavy things while the girls are weaving palm fronds on the beach. The girls, though, are better multitaskers, as they talk and plot while weaving palm fronds. They find that they are all of like minds in this game, and agree to stick together against the guys, bringing one in as an extra vote. A pretty good alliance for them, it must be said. The numbers are too few for them to work against each other, and they seem to be three of the strategically smartest people in the whole game in general, and their tribe in particular. Working together, they could really run this season to an easy victory. They discuss the possibility of the guys plotting against them, as Nick asks Tai what he thinks about that possibility. That falls into nothing, however, as Tai has bigger concerns. Specifically, he has conservation concerns. It’s decided that the trunk of a tree needs a notch cut in it for their shelter, and sends former “Big Brother” contestant Caleb into a hacking frenzy. This upsets Tai, who compares it to someone flaying the skin off of a person. The hilarious thing about all this is that it’s clear that Caleb has absolutely zero fucks to give about this, telling Tai that he’s really whacking at the tree with a huge grin on his face. Tai gives us a lengthier confessional about his love of nature, and I start to worry that this sort of thing will get him voted off early. However, Tai then wins a lot of my respect by saying that he’s going to need to tone it down to win this game. He’s following the Rudy Boesch (“Survivor Borneo”) maxim of “I’ve gotta fit in. Me. Not them.” which I love to see, especially since it’s so rarely followed these days. He seems to mean it as well, since we then see him cutting off some tree branches with no whinging or moaning on his part.

Following a circular pattern, we head on back to To Tang, where the harsh environment that Probst claims to be the focus of the season, as even Jason (yeah, apparently Kyle Jason goes by his surname), the oh-so-tough bounty hunter, is getting beat by the heat and sunburn. As he’s quick to tell anyone, though, he’s still doing a lot better than Alecia, or “Blondie” as he calls her. While almost everyone on To Tang is visibly buff in some way, Alecia is the odd person out. The one of these things that is not like the others. It doesn’t help that she appears to be doing very little around camp, leading to a lot of gossip. Unsurprisingly, tough guys Jason and Scot agree that she has to go, with Jason evidently pulling in Cydney and Jennifer as well. Jason, in a very good confessional, though, admits that these two person alliances he’s forming are all alliances of convenience. They’re truthful when he needs them to be, which implies flexibility and a willingness to play the game, a good sign overall.

Darnell, we find, may also be in on the alliance. He’s not as aggressive as Jason, preferring a slower build to an alliance, merely talking with Cydney and the pair of them agreeing to warn the other if their name starts getting tossed around. Initially, Darnell is another one that I like. He’s taking it slow, building natural but more trusting alliance. Hell, starting out with a “Warn each other.” type deal is exactly how I’d play initially, if I ever got to go on. It’s a good early alliance foundation, but not so firm that it bogs you down or engenders feelings of betrayal early on should you switch. Plus, the guy is charming as hell. Take, for example, an incident where he heads into the water to use the bathroom. The rest of the tribe thinks he’s going too near the camp beach for that sort of thing. This could very easily have turned out to be a strike against Darnell, but he makes jokes and laughs about it, and no one seems to really hold that against him. True, part of that is due to the easygoing, no-nonsense nature of To Tang, but Darnell knows how to go with the joke, and that can count for a lot on “Survivor”.

It seems bonding waited until during shelter building at Gondol. We see everyone sharing their life stories, and Tai talks about escaping from Veitnam by boat, which is a pretty cool story overall. Caleb makes a crack about Tai’s being on the “Beauty” side of things, which is obvious enough, but makes him look like a bit of an ass. The real juicy stuff, though, comes from Anna and Julia, who early on seem to be the leaders of the female alliance taking over Gondol. The two bond particularly closely, agreeing to stick together until the final two. Anna in particular seems to be calling the shots, suggesting that Tai be brought in as the fourth alliance member. This makes sense. Apart from being the least “bro-y” of the guys, Tai is pretty useful around camp, it seems. The chickens of Gondol escape, and after 2/3rds of them are rounded up, Tai comes up with a method allowing the chickens to roam while still keeping them confined. That, Tai, is how you use your respect for all living things to your advantage: contribute to camp life in a way that makes people respect you.

Tai isn’t the only contender, though. Julia outs Caleb as a former “Big Brother” contestant, which might have turned people against him. After all, he’s already got fame and a certain amount of fortune, so why keep him around? However, it seems Caleb’s legacy from “Big Brother”, apart from the “Beast Mode Cowboy” nickname, was as a trustworthy guy, which is a pretty big plus when forming your alliance. The two have a good conversation with him, and his fate is left up in the air.

Joseph, the 71 year old of Chan Loh, gets his standard “I’m old but I can hack it.” confessional out of the way so we can get to the much more intriguing Debbie. The first thing to note in her confessional is what her occupation is listed as. In her initial confessional, the one where she talked about all her occupations, her job was listed as “Retired Army Colonel”. I may have the rank wrong, but the point is, her next confessional lists her job as “Waitress”. Later on, her job will be listed as “Chemist”. All these are occupations she says she’s had over the years, and I LOVE this gag! It’s subtle, but a hilarious little thing to watch for this season! It’s like the “Former Federal Agent?” designation for Phillip Sheppard (“Survivor Redemption Island”). Same sort of little joke. The only way it could be funnier is if her job designation cycled through all of her occupations during each confessional, instead of switching to a new one each confessional. As it stands, though, it’s still great. Less good, though, is the content of her confessional. Big surprise, she and Joseph, as the older couple, are the work horses, focussing on surviving the elements before playing the game. Debbie claims that she and Joseph plan to be around for a while, since both of them are wiley, but I’m not sure that’s the case. Debbie, in case I haven’t made it clear, is not coming off very well so far. She’s making outrageous claims a la Benjamin “Coach” Wade of “Survivor Tocantins”, but to me, she comes off overall like another Debbie. Specifically, she reminds me of Debb Eaton of “Survivor The Australian Outback”. It might just be their similar accents, but I think there’s some similarities in personality as well. Both are very loud women who seem to rub the tribe the wrong way, making suggestions that don’t get followed, and socially just don’t fit in with the tone of the tribe. Since Debb was the first one out her season, she’s not exactly the person whose game you want to emulate.

Sure enough, Neal and Lis start talking about how this is a “Young Person’s Tribe”, which is a bit ironic since overall Chan Loh is actually older than the other tribes this season. Nevertheless, the two agree that the older people just don’t fit in very well, and ought to be the ones to go. Neal talks with Peter and he agrees, with Aubry presumably brought in off-screen somewhere, and the young person’s alliance is born. Not a bad alliance. It’s pretty standard “Survivor” fare, with the like-minded people bonding together against the outliers, emphasized this time by a nice shot of Debbie and Joseph lounging on the shore while the other four are out at sea. I do like how it’s brought together, though, as Neal shows some pretty good manipulation on his part. He’s pretty clearly the ringleader, a role I didn’t expect for him, but partially due to Peter not stepping up as much as I thought he would. He doesn’t seem like it though, talking individually and confidentially to bring people together. It’s subtle, but he seems like he’s overall pretty persuasive, and I can still see him doing pretty well overall.

Breaking with our “three tribe scenes, then commercial” standard, we look in on Gondol again, as Tai actually pretty smoothly gets the group to continue working while he looks for the idol or an idol clue. Showing some “Survivor” acumen, Tai notices three conspicuous dead trees in the middle of the path to tree mail, and so starts digging them up to look for the idol Given that his search is ultimately fruitless, it may just be his love of trees, but the logic is there. Sadly, he digs too deep, and is therefore gone so long that his tribe starts to suspect something is up. They go after him, and we cut to commercial. Cliffhanger!

Picking up right where we left off, the others find him. Tai tries to cover his tracks, but no one really believes him, and Anna says that he’s no longer trustworthy. Sounds like Caleb just got a fast-track into the alliance.

But enough strategy! Time for more talk about the harshness of the environment. Sadly, my girl Aubry isn’t taking it very well, and has a big of a freak-out. She’s not doing that badly physically. As Lis says, her lips aren’t chapped or anything. No, Aubry has basically been caught up in her worry about the environment, and is now worrying about worrying. As an inveterate worrier myself, I can sympathize, and the tribe as a whole seems very comforting. Not surprisingly though, they’re privately concerned. Debbie speculates that this may be more than Aubry bargained for. More worrying is Lis, Aubry’s supposed ally, who says that this may be a sign of instability further down the road, making for a bad alliance-mate. Aubry may not be out, since she seems to pull herself together, but it looks like she may be on the bottom of the alliance at least, if not a target for elimination. Also, here we get our one overt call-back to “Survivor Cagayan” where Neal wonders if this may be history doomed to repeat itself, with one person disrupting camp life. Neal, I like comparisons to past seasons as much as the next guy, but that’s really stretching it. Aubry’s in a bad spot, but she’s no J’Tia.

To Tang, meanwhile, is not suffering from the heat so much as it is from bugs. Ear bugs, specifically. After an establishing shot of a HORRIFYING huge bug to take us to camp, we see Jennifer wandering the beach in pain, unable to sleep. Some sort of bug crawled into her ear earlier in the day. She paid it little mind, thinking it would crawl out of its own accord. Instead, it seems to be burrowing into her ear, causing such intense pain that she can’t sleep. When a commercial break takes us to the next day, she’s seriously worried about her potential performance. The rest of her tribe is as well, though more in the “We need to win” vein than anything else. Thankfully, while Jennifer is trying to rest, the maggot or whatever it is, comes up for air. The tribe seems to be treating it in a calm and collected manner, at least until Cydney starts hollering about how ugly it is. Excellent bedside manner, Cydney! Scot does manage to pull it out and crush it, though, making Jennifer feel a million times better. Which is good, because it’s CHALLENGE TIME!

Before getting into the challenge itself, though, let me first compliment this episode on GREAT storytelling so far. Each team has had some talk about alliances and who should/shouldn’t go first, so each one seems like a plausible candidate for Tribal Council attendance. More importantly, though, they’ve made each story INTERESTING! No matter how it turns out, we should get a good Tribal Council. There’s no one tribe where I think “Aww, we have to go back to THIS storyline?!”. Ok, To Tang is maybe not as interesting, and Gondol may have the most intricate dynamics, but no one’s slouching, and that’s not always the case.

As for the challenge itself? Kick-ass! Starting out on a platform, each tribe swims to a boat. Once all six are in, one tribe member dives down to untie four oars under the water. Once untied, the boat must be taken to shore. Here comes the cool part. The boat must them be pushed on shore and give WHEELS to pull it up the beach. Once it hits a certain point, tribe’s have a choice: they either remove a box that has puzzle pieces. or a box of things to stack from a wobbly platform. First two tribes to complete either of the two tasks win immunity. While the addition of fire is always nice for first immunity challenges, this is still a great showing. The boat part is standard enough, but the adding of wheels is an awesome change-up from what we usually see, and the addition of a choice in how to do the challenge is a great dilemma that the show needs to do more of. On top of that, while there are some parts that only two people do, the tribe stays together for the most of it, which is always a plus in my book. Really, the only way this challenge could be made better would be if one tribe or the other had chosen to take the stacking route. All three taking the puzzle is a bit lame, but understandable.

The first tribe to finish wins a full fire-making kit, while the second tribe wins only flint. Pretty standard stuff for three-tribe seasons. More important, though, is immunity, and to go with our kick-ass challenge, we have a kick-ass immunity idol. A little buddha-looking guy sitting atop a bull with bones sticking out everywhere. It’s like a weird hybrid of the immunity idols from “Survivor Fiji” and “Survivor Blood vs. Water”, and it works really well. The best part? It LOOKS like one idol, but comes apart into separate idols, and STILL looks cool. Multiple idols for the past few seasons haven’t really done that, and as my frequent readers will know, I’ve missed it dearly. To have it brought back here is just the icing on the cake.

It seems that fate dictates that one tribe should have a horrible start at the first immunity challenge of a “Brains vs. Brawn vs. Beauty” season, though this one at least changes it up. Chan Loh actually starts out pretty well (though I initially worry about their chances since Aubry talks about needing to prove herself, implying that she may fail and they go to Tribal Council), and it’s To Tang that has the major screw-up. Darnell agrees to be the diver for To Tang, only to lose the mask immediately after diving. When you’ve got complicated knots to undo, this is no small loss. Gondol ultimately gets out first, with Chan Loh not too far behind, though it’s worth noting that Gondol changed out divers a few times, meaning they had fresh strength, whereas my girl Aubry got all four paddles for Chan Loh, the only member of one tribe to do all the diving. Fortunately for To Tang, they don’t end up quite as far behind as Luzon did at their first challenge. The boats are heavy and hard to get up the beach, so they’re able to catch up there, as you expect for people labeled “Brawns”. In the end we get some great shots of tribes trying to force their boats up the beach, and it all seems to come down to the puzzle, with Chan Loh ultimately arriving first and Gondol lagging behind. Aubry and Lis work on the puzzle, and solve it pretty quickly, giving Chan Loh the first victory. Score one for Aubry! She really rallied against her earlier perceptions, at least in my book. We don’t get to see what her tribe thinks of her now, but they seemed pretty happy for her, so I’d imagine she’s working her way back deeper into the fold. In the end, it’s a pretty close competition between To Tang and Gondol, possibly one of the closest in the history of the show. It’s all a matter of which tribe can orient their piece the correct way to go in, but Gondol gets it just earlier than To Tang, possibly a result of Alecia copping out at one point. As I said, probably the worst of the three outcomes, since To Tang had the least strategy overall, but that’s a relative comparison. There’s still interesting stuff going on there.

When you lose your tribe a challenge on “Survivor”, trying to deny it can be bad, but you need to be careful how you own up to it. Frame it like a one-time thing, and try to turn the focus on to something else. Do NOT follow Alecia’s example here of insisting that it was your fault and offering little to no explanation or justification. Also, do NOT do what Darnell does and give blame to yourself when there was already another scapegoat available. It’s one of the few missteps of the night, for both of them, but in Darnell’s case it’s probably not fatal. After all, Alecia was supposed to be the target anyway, and her being partly responsible for the challenge loss should just seal her fate.

But no, it seems more’s going on at To Tang than initially indicated. That, or Darnell’s screw-up with the mask just really pissed Jason off, because Darnell is now on the chopping block, according to the powers that be. Not if Alecia has anything to say about it, though! When both Scot and Jason try to tell her that she’s safe for tonight, and to cut the drama, she just keeps on talking, trying in vain to justify her existence on the island, and doing a very poor job of handling questioning about the hidden immunity idol. Hey, that’s another good point. Where HAS the talk about the hidden immunity idol been from To Tang? Not that they shouldn’t be talking about it, but this is the first we’ve heard of that being a factor, and now suddenly it seems like a big deal. Could have brought this up earlier, you know.

Alecia’s other negative factor is Cydney. You’ll recall that she and Darnell had a loose alliance, and her personal dislike of Alecia only deepens her resolve to save Darnell. That’s good; she now has time to talk to the tribe and switch things back… Oh, wait, she’s going to wait and say her piece at Tribal Council. Don’t get me wrong, Cydney, it’s becoming more fashionable to do that on “Survivor”, and it certainly makes things more dramatic, but in terms of smart strategy, better to get things sorted out BEFORE Tribal Council.

Let me pause here for a minute, because up until Tribal Council, I was LOVING the art direction of this season. I’ve already professed my love for the immunity idol, and the buffs this season have been pretty. But Tribal Council itself just rubs me the wrong way. There’s only so many times you can do the tree house/city on water concept before it gets repetitive, “Survivor”, and you’ve met your quota. Admittedly, the large amount of blank space behind the contestants does make this Tribal Council stand out a little bit from the rest, but it just feels repetitive overall, and that’s a shame. Even the things AT Tribal Council are pretty interesting. The torches are decent, and I really like the urn this season. It continues the bull motif we’ve been seeing, and it has this great voodoo/tribal drum feel to it. Shame that Tribal Council itself is so lackluster.

If the aesthetics of Tribal Council fail to impress, though, the events of Tribal Council do much better. Jason makes no secret that Darnell and Alecia are on the chopping block, which opens the floodgates to the “Bashing Darnell” segment of the episode. Pretty much everyone lays into Darnell for his mistake, and while Alecia does get some flak for her cop-out on the puzzle, the bulk of the loss seems to be placed on Darnell, which Probst comments on repeatedly. Yeah, don’t know what it was, but Probst seemed a bit off at Tribal Council tonight, basically repeating himself in terms of phrasing and harping on similar topics, to the point where it seemed redundant. He had a good moment where he described Cydney’s movements during Alecia’s defense, but other than that, it felt like Probst was a bit off of his game tonight. Maybe he was sick? Anyway, Darnell doesn’t do a very good job defending himself, kind of blandly saying that he’ll do better, so Cydney comes to his defense. She doesn’t really do much herself, but her support does convince Darnell to be a bit more aggressive in his own defense, and when he puts his mind to it, he does a damn good job! He really pulls at the heartstrings, talking about the hardships of his life and how much he craves a second chance, such that he has both Jennifer and Jason talking about switching the vote back to Alecia. Since we head to the vote shortly after, and we can bet that both Cydney and Darnell will also be voting for Alecia, it seems like Alecia may be going home. In a surprising twist for the first Tribal Council, though, we have a tie, an actually “Survivor” first! I wonder why Probst didn’t hype that fact up? On a revote, it seems Darnell’s plea fell on deaf ears, and so he’s the first to go. It’s a shame, really. I think he had more game in him than we got, and at least he did more to help himself than Alecia. Plus, since he fits in better with the group, I think he’d have been better to keep around in the long run. Still, it made for an exciting Tribal Council, so props there!

This is an interesting first episode for me. I’ve been very back and forth on this season, and I hoped the first episode would give me some indicator as to the season as a whole. I liked it, for sure, but it wasn’t the stuff of “Survivor” legend, as first episodes go. We got some good strategy, and a few characters started to emerge (Debbie, Tai), but it was dragged down by the repeated references to the toughness of the environment. At least after the intro, though, these were few and far between, and what did come usually had some connection to the episode as a whole (notably the Aubry stuff). On the whole, this episode makes me think this season will be reminiscent of “Survivor Vanuatu”. A couple of big characters and interpersonal conflicts, but with the focus more on advanced gameplay and strategy. This implies that the season won’t be as exciting or memorable as some other seasons. That said, I’m an avowed fan of “Survivor Vanuatu”, so it gives me hope for the season overall.

But, as per tradition, it’s now time for:

TOP 5 AND BOTTOM 5!

I normally don’t talk about the titles of specific episodes, since most people don’t remember them anyway, but since I commented on it this episode, I might as well get out there what I think the best and worst premier episode titles are. And yes, I’m just doing the premier ones. I need to stretch out the topics for these “Top 5 and Bottom 5” lists somehow.

TOP 5:

5. “Want to See the Elephant Dung?” (“Survivor Gabon”): Perhaps an odd choice for this list, but the wackiness of this title makes it stand out, and that alone is enough. I’ll grant that it works better when you can hear the voice of Gillian Larson saying the quote, but even without that, it still intrigues you, which a good first episode title should do. It’s reliance on accent makes it low on the list, but fun is enough to put it on the list at all.

4. “Two Tribes, One Camp, No Rules” (“Survivor One World”): When I first decided to do this list, I intended to put “Big Trek, Big Trouble, Big Surprise” from “Survivor Guatemala” on this list. While I do like that episode title, and love “Survivor Guatemala” as a season, I found that they filled somewhat similar spots, and I thought this one was just better. There’s something about that cadence of the three-things list that works for an episode title, promising grand things to come. In the case of ‘Survivor One World”, those things never really came to pass, but it definitely emphasized the big twist of the season, and while a bit cliche, does the job of getting you hyped for what is ultimately a lackluster season at best.

3. “The Marooning” (“Survivor Borneo”): Sometimes simple things are the most effective. Many early seasons had first episode titles that were plays on this term, but “Survivor Borneo” did it first, and I’d say did it best in this case. While the sheer basicness of the title keeps it from being higher on the list, it does evoke that rough, survivalist feel the season was going for, and gives a sense of the grand adventure to come, thereby doing its job very effectively.

2. “I Can Forgive Her, But I Don’t Have To Because She Screwed With My Chickens” (“Survivor Cook Islands”): When “Survivor” switched to episode quotes for titles, a few people came along who were basically title generating machines, and few were better at this than Jonathan Penner, who originated on this season. Here, we see his poetry at work, bringing us probably the most memorable premier episode title of them all. It’s funny, and it tells so much in just a simple title, though that’s probably because it’s the longest episode title period. Speaking of which, that’s what keeps it out of the number one spot: it doesn’t roll off the tongue very well. With that said, it still needs to be acknowledged for being witty and fun, which definitely puts it among the best of the best.

1. “The Importance of Being Eldest” (“Survivor Thailand”): What can I say, I’m a sucker for bad puns and literature references. This title was always going to be on the list, but what put it in the number one spot was when I realized how well it fit the season. If you’re looking for arc, “Survivor Thailand” is almost an old vs. young storyline. The ultimately dominant Chuay Gahn tribe lost 3 out of the first 4 immunity challenges, and looked set to be dominated by the younger Sook Jai tribe. But though guile, wit, and a fake merge, they emerged dominant, proving the maxim that “Age and treachery will overcome youth and skill”. When a title fits a season that well, it can only be given the number one slot.

Honorable Mention: “They’re Back!” (“Survivor All-Stars”): A pretty obvious title, I still kind of like it. Simple, but it promises what we want promised from a season like this. I keep it at the Honorable Mention level because I hear it differently than how it’s spelled. I hear it with a bit of a pause in the word “Back”, such that it would be written out as “They’re Ba-Ack!”, to give it a kind of sing-song feel. Hearing this tonation makes me like the title more, but without the spelling, I can’t be sure that’s what they were going for, and so I can’t put it on the list.

BOTTOM 5:

5. “Slay Everyone, Trust No One” (“Survivor Heroes vs. Villains”): Ah, Coach, another quote master for “Survivor”. This title sounds pretty awesome, and you’d think it’d get a spot on the “Top 5” list as a result. Well it would… IF IT WERE CORRECT! Oh, my issue here is not with Coach “Dragonslayer” Wade, but with the producers here. The ACTUAL quote is “Trust No One, Slay Everyone.” Why they changed it around, I don’t know, but it irks me to no end.

4. “You’re Looking at the New Leader of Your Tribe” (“Survivor Redemption Island”): I’m a bit torn about this one, though it definitely belongs on the “Bottom 5” list for being boring and a bit on the long side. Long titles only work if you’re Jonathan Penner. However, judging by appropriateness to the season, this one fits the bill perfectly. After all, this season was basically “Survivor Boston Rob”, and the title of this episode perfectly conveys that that’s what’s going to happen. That doesn’t make it good, though, and with the other problems I mentioned, it ends up here on the list.

3. “Young at Heart” (“Survivor Nicaragua”): Cliche’s do not make a good episode title, “Survivor”. Not unless they’re made into puns. Quit doing that.

2. “Back to the Beach” (“Survivor Marquesas”): This one is just lame. “Survivor” titles are supposed to be epic, the stuff of legend. They should convey a sense of adventure! This conveys a sense of MTV Beach House, and I don’t mean the Pagong tribe here. I know that “Back to the Beach” was supposed to be the theme of the season, but it was lame even then. This was just one idea that simply didn’t work.

1. “Something Cruel is About to Happen… Real Soon” (“Survivor Fiji”): Yes I hate a lot of things about “Survivor Fiji”, and I’m coming to realize that the episode titles are one of them. Pauses in episode titles do not work, and like some of the other entries on this list, this one just feels generic and tacked on. I know it’s a quote from the episode, but since Fiji was so lackluster as a season, the quote is lackluster as a title. Form follows function, I suppose.

Honorable Mention: “I’m a Mental Giant” (“Survivor Kaoh Rong”): Like I said earlier, this isn’t technically a bad title, so I can’t put it on the list proper. I just want to acknowledge the missed opportunity. Debbie’s quote would have been a much better choice.

I don’t know about you, but I, for one, am intrigued at where the strategy this season is going. Looking forward to sharing further thoughts with you all!

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor Kaoh Rong” Cast Assessment

The new cast of “Survivor Kaoh Rong” has been released? Well, it’s about bloody time! Under a month to go now until the premier.

In all seriousness, welcome back to “Idol Speculation”, my knee-jerk opinion that everyone is entitled to! As is now tradition with the blog, with the announcing of a new cast, and very little information to go on, it’s of course time to make predictions about how these people will play and what position they’ll end up in. Because that’s what the internet is for. We’ve got another “Brains vs. Brawn vs. Beauty” twist in what looks to be a season rehashing a LOT from previous seasons. Still, as I’ve been noting in my “‘Survivor’ Retrospectives” series, a good cast can often make up for a bad everything else. Will this cast be good enough to overcome my doubts pre-season? Read on and find out!

Chan Loh Tribe (Brains):

Peter Baggenstos (34, ER Doctor, Minneapolis, MN): Barack Obama? Who put YOU on “Survivor”? And no, I’m not just making this up out of whole cloth to illustrate the “repetition” this season, he really does look like Barack Obama. Hell, he even comments on it in his video on CBS.com. But the comparisons don’t end with looks. Peter seems to be a natural alpha-male, leader type, which normally I’d count against him, but looking at the makeup of the tribe overall, not very many of them, apart from Peter, are willing or able to carry the mantle of the overt leader. Early game, at least, you need an overt leader, and if Peter is willing to fill that role, I see no reason these people won’t let him. I am a little concerned about how well he’ll bond with his tribe, since he is one of SEVERAL Tribe choices I’ll be questioning in this blog. Don’t get me wrong, it takes a LOT of smarts to become a doctor, and the guy doesn’t seem stupid to me. The trouble is that I don’t feel that’s his greatest asset. His muscles are. While he doesn’t like “Bros”, he seems like very much that type of guy, if a little more serious-minded than the stereotype usually is, but as I say, this team is going to need to be led early on, and Peter will definitely fill that role. This bodes well for his time in the game, but not his overall winning. As said overt leader, he’ll definitely be kept around until the merge, but once the merge hits, he’s doomed. The trouble is that then he becomes a threat, and the covert leader (or leaders) start to take over, which will spell his doom. Now, I don’t get the sense that Peter know’s what he’s doing in the outdoors, which may bode ill if this season is as rough as everyone claims, but I try not to make guesses as to who’s going to get medevaced or not. Taking that out of the equation, Peter’s probably out sometime around the mid-merge, end of story.

Aubry Bracco (29, Social Media Marketer, Cambridge, MA): Oh boy, this is going to be another Julia Landauer (“Survivor Caramoan”) situation, isn’t it? Yes, though I rarely get crushes from “Survivor”, and I don’t find Aubry as physically attractive as Julia, I have to admit, I’m smitten. What can I say, I have a thing for nerds. And, at first, this was fine. It seemed, from reading her bio, like Aubry could actually do pretty well. She’s definitely a “younger” contestant, but on the older end of that, and seemed mature for her age, which would allow her to bond well with both major groups of contestants. While she did think and act a bit outside of the box, she does work in a field that requires you to be very social, and seemed to be able to get things to go her way, against all probability (writing a children’s book instead of a thesis, for instance), all stuff that could make her a real threat to win. And then I saw her video, and yeah, my confidence dropped considerably. She’s not just a “little” nerdy as she claimed, she’s a LOT nerdy. While I admire that, it’s not very good on “Survivor”. In that stressful an environment, such people/behavior can get really old, really fast, and though this particular brains tribe seems to be one that would be amenable to letting one’s freak flag fly, even that has limits. From what I’ve seen of her, Aubry passes those limits by a mile. I think it’s her talking about zodiac signs that pushed me over the edge. After getting burned by my hopes for Max Dawson on “Survivor Worlds Apart”, I guess I just consider talking about zodiac signs to be the “Survivor” equivalent of kryptonite. Too weird even for this show. And while I could see her initial tribe putting up with that sort of behavior, especially if Aubry is smart enough to find a good alliance (which I believe she is), I REALLY can’t see anyone on the other tribes letting that stick around. Hence, my prediction is that Aubry goes shortly after the swap, if not sooner. I hope I’m wrong. For all her quirks, Aubry does seem like a nice person who’s got some smarts underneath, which is a good combination for the show. As it stands, though, I just don’t see her being worth the trouble to most people.

Joseph Del Campo (72, Former FBI Agent, Vero Beach, FL): If Peter seemed like a kind of weird choice to put on the “Brains” tribe, then Joseph is a completely INSANE choice! Did you just not have enough people to fit the “Brains” group, CBS? Well, then maybe you shouldn’t have done the “Brains vs. Brawn vs. Beauty” twist this time! While it is cool to see a contestant this old on the show, a rarity in itself, I’m not wild about Joseph. He mainly just talks about how cool being an FBI Agent was, which is fine, it just gets old after a while. Also, like Peter he seems more physically inclined than mentally inclined, and again, I think would have fit much better on the “Brawn” side of things. As such, between that and his age, I don’t see him lasting long, probably not even making the tribe swap. While I do question some of the “Brains” choices here, most of them do seem to value smarts in some capacity. Not so much Joseph. Unless he can really prove himself in an early challenge or two, this guy is going to be off very quickly, just for being different.

Neal Gottleib (37, Ice Cream Entrepreneur, Sausalito, CA): Here we have the reverse Aubry. Neal was someone I initially looked at and thought he was a goner. The main thing was just that he was weird. An entrepreneur, sure, and definitely with enough education to qualify as a “Brain”, but he was just so bohemian, so new age, that I thought for sure he wouldn’t be able to fit in, and would be a quick target for his unorthodox lifestyle. What first turned me around on him was the realization that a lot of the “Brains” people had their own quirks or foibles, and so probably would be a bit more accepting of other people’s quirks and foibles, making him less of an early target. But it was his video that really turned me around on him. His quirks, which seemed extreme on paper, are much more subdued than you’d expect in person. On top of that, his talk about pitching himself to people and how he prepared for the show completely turned me around. This is a guy who knows what he’s doing; how to be an influence from the shadows without really leading. This turnaround was so spectacular that I’m actually making him my male pick to win this whole season! Now, I’ll say up front that that’s not a very high bar he passed, since I’m not impressed with most of these guys in terms of game skills, but Neal was just too good to pass up. I don’t really see him being seen as a threat or a liability at any point, and he’s got the brains to make the game go where he wants it to, and so I can’t really justify giving the male pick to win to anyone other than him.

Elisabeth “Lis” Markham (27, Quantitative Strategist, Brooklyn, NY): Lis is a tough one for me to get a read on. She definitely belongs on the “Brains” tribe, with her occupation being “Quantitative Strategist”, and she likes counting cards in blackjack, so she’s got the edge she may need to win. As with pro poker players, though, I question how well skills at card games transfer over to “Survivor”, and while she uses a lot of big words, she doesn’t stand out from the crowd to much. Not to say that she’s just another pretty face, though. She definitely strikes me as intelligent, which is a plus, and I don’t see her being boring or anything, she just doesn’t really make a huge impression. Part of that is that this is the first time I’m seeing the cast, so it may take me a bit to really get to know all of them, but Lis didn’t really pull me one way or the other. She could be fabulous at the game, or she could be a complete wreck. For my prediction, I’ll give her the benefit of a doubt and say that she’ll go far. I think it’s the fact that she’s studied game theory, something that I’ll say DOES apply between the real world and “Survivor”. I don’t see her being the leader of an alliance, but I suspect she’ll weasel her way into a second-in-command position. A lieutenant if you will. As for position, I doubt she’ll be out early, but with little to make her stand out of others, I’m guessing she’s gone in the early merge area.

Debbie Wanner (49, Chemist, Reading, PA): Ah yes, one of the people I called out as looking like a favorite of mine pre-season, and the new information I’ve gotten on her has done little to sway my thinking. I’m not AS big a fan of her as I thought, mostly due to the Aubry factor, but she’s got a lot going for her. Here, we have a tough older woman who’s got a lot of hidden depth, and a lot of varied interests. This can make her relatable, and a real threat should she make the switch, since I could see her bonding with anyone on any tribe. That said, she also talks a lot about her army training, which definitely makes her pretty strong for her age, but also, to me, drives a wedge between her and the rest of her tribe, save perhaps Joseph. While the “Brains” this time around are fairly accepting, I feel they’re more in for free-spiritedness than army regimentation. Thus, the first few days for Debbie will be a struggle. Again, like Joseph, she’s going to have to prove herself early on or she’ll be out quickly, but her younger age and more relatable experiences give her a better chance, I’d say. The real kicker, though, is that I don’t think she’s there to win. She talked a lot about proving something to herself/her kids, which says to me that she may not be willing to do what it takes to win “Survivor”. If she can find that competitive drive, she’s a force to be reckoned with, but without it, I say she’a a pre-swap boot. If she makes the swap, though, I like her chances much better. Press releases describe her as a “Renaissance Woman”, and I have no reason to doubt that label. She’ll definitely be enjoyable; I just hope she sticks around long enough for us to see a lot of it.

To Tang Tribe (Brawn):

Cydney Gillon (23, Bodybuilder, Douglasville, GA): When you’ve been a “Survivor” fan for as long as I have, you start to notice certain character types that the show likes to have. One of these is that of the “sassy black woman”, who’s usually loud, opinionated, and unwilling to back down. Now, it’s easy to see why the show likes to cast such people. After all, “Survivor” is best when it has at least one or two bigs characters, and this character type is usually pretty big. As to the track record of such characters, it varies. Sometimes they can be brought along in a position of power, like Crystal Cox on “Survivor Gabon”, or they can be out incredibly early for being irritating like Jolanda Jones of “Survivor Palau”. I bring this up because Cydney is this season’s requisite “sassy black woman”, and I can’t help but let the past performance of similar characters influence my opinion of how she’ll do. Hence Cydney’s a question mark for me. She could get really irritating really fast, or she could be a nice balance of a character. She could crash and burn early, or she could make it deep. If I were to bet on one side, though, it’d be the “crash and burn” side of things. As I say, this is a character that can get really irritating, both for the viewer and the player, and I see little to nothing in Cydney to balance this out. The fact that she says she has a hard time relating to certain types of people, particularly other women, says to me that Cydney is not long for this world. Since she is strong, I see her making the swap at least, but once she’s on a new tribe, I don’t really see her being able to hack it. Out after the swap, but before the merge.

Darnell Hamilton (27, Postal Worker, Chicago, IL): Darnell is just a nice guy, plain and simple. He’s not overcomplicated, seems to tell it like it is, and just has this sense of charm and amenability about him. If he had a few more smarts, I’d have made him my male pick to win it all. Again, I can’t stress enough that this guy just exudes likability. Add onto that his strength, and there’s little to no reason for him not to make the merge, at least. I’m even going to go a bit farther, and give him a “mid-to-late merge” boot prediction. I want this guy to do well, but I just don’t see him having the strategic smarts he needs to save himself when the time comes. He’ll probably get into an alliance easy, but once that alliance fails, or turns on him, I don’t see how he can come back.

Alecia Holden (24, Real Estate Agent, Dallas, TX): Usually, when we have self-described “tomboys” who look like the young, attractive blonde that Alecia is, I just roll my eyes and mark them for early elimination. Alecia, however, seems to have some credit to back up what she says. Once again, it’s hard to put a finger on exactly why this is, other that the fact that she doesn’t like lying and scheming, whereas most young, attractive people would use their looks to scheme their way to more time in the game. Now, it would be easy to say this makes her more of the fool, but on a tribe noted for “Brawn”, that’s probably a good thing, to keep it uncomplicated. Not saying she’ll win, by any means, but I could see Alecia doing decently well. She seems tough enough, and causes little drama, so she’ll probably be an early merge boot.

Kyle Jason (31, Bounty Hunter, Detroit, MI): Unfortunately for Kyle, he’s probably the first one out of the “Brawns” group when the lose. The name of the game, on this particular tribe, is “uncomplicated”. What we’ve got here is a group of people not so much interested in the strategic part of the game, and instead wanting to keep things simple and drama-free. Kyle, being a bounty hunter, is in a profession where drama is the order of the day. While being a dramatic person might not be a required skill for being a bounty hunter, it’s often perceived by the general public that you have to be that way. On top of that, from how he talks and describes himself, I’d say Kyle is someone unlikely to hold anything back, which again, is not a good trait to have on a tribe that values not rocking the boat. Since I’d say this tribe has a good chance of winning a number of challenges, he might stick around until the swap, but not much beyond that, and I’m calling him a pre-merge boot for sure.

Jennifer Lanzetti (38, Contractor, Salt Lake City, UT): Agent Melinda May from “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”? When did you get here? You’re not even on the right network! Actually, for once, the comparisons end at looks. Jennifer is definitely a tough, strong, no-nonsense older lady, which will serve her well on this particular tribe. Like a lot of people in this group, she doesn’t seem to like lying or deception, so I’m not sure she can really win this game, but I see her doing well. She’s not so forceful as to get kicked out early, but she does seem to have SOME force behind her, so unlike some on this tribe, I don’t see her going down without a fight when things inevitably go south. Add onto that her possibly being a closeted challenge threat, and I’d put her boot sometime in the mid-merge area. Definitely going to last a while, and probably fun to watch as well.

Scot Pollard (40, Former NBA Champion, Carmel, IN): So, as if it wasn’t COMPLETELY obvious that the show was trying to recapture the zeitgeist of “Survivor Cagayan”, they also cast yet ANOTHER NBA player on this season. They have to be TRYING to be unoriginal at this point. There’s not a lot to say about Scot, since he’s a pretty uncomplicated guy. Strong, but not a lot upstairs, pretty much your quintessential “Brawn”. Unless he gets really sick or something, I can’t see him being a target early on, but once the merge hits, he’ll be too big of a threat for his own good. As physical threats are wont to do, he’ll probably be out in the early merge, and the show will be none the worse for wear for it.

Gondol Tribe (Beauty):

Michele Fitzgerald (24, Bartender, Freehold, NJ): Oh boy, I’m going to have a hard time with this name. I’m used to “Michele” being spelled with two L’s. And, if I’m right, I’m going to be writing this name a lot. You see, Michele is my female pick to win the entire game. While I’d normally be inclined to write off someone who is put under the label of “Beauty”, this tribe in general, and Michele in particular, has a lot of depth to her, which is good. Michele’s not just another pretty face, she’s cutthroat, and really knows her way around this game. She’s got the analysis, she’s got excellent social skills; I really don’t see what can stop her from winning. She’s definitely cunning enough to control the game early, and from what I’ve seen, she’ll be able to influence others post-swap and late-game. Basically, she’s got more base knowledge of manipulation and “Survivor” than most anyone else on this list. Oh, and she’s a “Harry Potter” fan. Yes, my loyalty can be so cheaply bought.

Anna Khait (26, Pro Poker Player, Brooklyn, NY): And so, we return to the realm of “Why was this person on this tribe”? Anna is another very smart, very deep woman, which again, the “Beauty” tribe desperately needs, considering how everyone other than Brice and LJ were boring on “Survivor Cagayan”, but isn’t the pro poker player slot usually on the “Brains” tribe? Just doesn’t make sense to me. Still, I give Anna good odds in this game. True, my hatred for the “Pro Poker Player” type is well known, but Anna plays it down, emphasizing more her social skills, and not her occupational background. Hence, I suspect she’s got a good handle on her abilities, and which of those will ACTUALLY be useful out on the show. On top of that, she’s more overtly determined to win than most of the people on this season (not that others AREN’T determined, they’re just less open about it), which means she’ll probably fight hard to stay in. Not sure she quite has the killer instinct to win, but I’d still make her a post-merge boot, probably sometime in the late merge.

Nick Maiorano (30, Personal Trainer, Redondo Beach, CA): I’m not going to mince matters. This guy is the first one out, no question. And I don’t mean first one out of his tribe, I mean first one out PERIOD! The guy looks strong, sure, but he’s SO full of himself, SO convinced of his superiority to everyone else, that it’ll get beyond irritating after five minutes, and better strategists than him will take him out just to put him in his place. Don’t believe me? Allow me to quote from his “Entertainment Weekly”, bio, specifically his “Personal Claim to Fame”:
“I’ll always be a better listener than you. Meaning, I listen to people better than you do, I’m more interested in people than you are, and I accept people more than you do. And yes, sometimes I pretend to do these things, but at least I pretend, whereas you just check out and are narcissistic.”
Hypocritical much? I see NOTHING narcissistic about calling yourself better than everybody else at all! Face facts: this guy has NO IDEA how he comes across, what his abilities really are, and he’s doomed as a result.

Caleb Reynolds (28, Army Veteran/Former “Big Brother” Contestant, Hopkinsville, KY): As if it wasn’t enough to copy the premise of “Survivor Cagayan”, we now also have to copy “Survivor Blood vs. Water” and have a former “Big Brother” contestant on the show. Actually, it’s pretty easy to see why Caleb was made famous on “Big Brother”. He’s a fairly likable guy, but a bit simple and one-note, talking a lot about the same subjects over and over. I don’t see his as being that smart, but his is strong, which this tribe needs, and less irritating, which will definitely keep him around until the merge. Like I said, I don;t see this guy having a lot going for him other than being likable and strong, so he’s probably an early merge boot, but I also see him being a semi-enjoyable watch that never gets too irritating.

Julia Sokolowski (19, Student, Boston, MA): One good thing I’ll say about this cast is that, with rare exception, no one out here is just here to be a “pretty reality contestant”. Everyone has some edge, some maturity, some depth, something that makes them unique, which can’t be said of every season. Julia isn’t an exception to this, but out of everyone here, I’d say she some the closest. Oh, she has spunk, superfan status, and some life experience, what with her having taught English in Tanzania and all. The problem is that, despite all this, Julia still come off as somewhat immature. Not in the whiny, no-self control sense, but just not a full grown-up yet. This wouldn’t normally be much of a problem, but this is what I would describe as a very mature season of “Survivor”. however old they are, everyone comes off as an adult in some capacity, and while she’s further along than a lot of 19 year olds, Julia is just not there quite yet. This makes her stand out, and I’d argue puts her game at a lesser caliber than anyone else on this season, and dooms her chances. She’s definitely out before the merge, and probably even before the swap. A nice enough person, but this is a season that does not suffer children gladly.

Tai Trang (51, Gardener, San Francisco, CA): Yau-Man 2.0 So, we’re even copying “Survivor Fiji”, now? Actually, I’d say Tai is like a combination of Yau-Man and Bob Crowley (“Survivor Gabon”), in that he’s not as book-smart as Yau-Man, but he is crafty and seems to be good outdoors. As you’d expect from someone older and fairly quirky, Tai stands out, and I definitely don’t see him winning. He isn’t as bad as some of the others on his tribe, though, and if he can find the right group of people, he’ll probably go far. As it stands, I’m saying Tai goes out around the tribe swap. He might be able to find a niche with time, but the swap doesn’t really allow for that.

So, there we have our new cast. Does it make up for the repetitiveness of this season, or does it just augment the failure? Sad to say, but it’s too soon to tell. A bit of a cop-out, I know, but it’s the best I can do. I will say that in this cast’s favor, there’s almost no one there who seems like a non-entity. Everyone has some interesting potential story, something going for them that makes me want to watch them. And, for all that I kvetched about repetitive casting, I will say it’s not as bad as I expected, and a lot of it was just for the sake of humor. My problem, though, is that while these characters seem interesting, sometimes people who are interesting on paper are actually quite boring on camera. Alternatively, they could be irritating, and you wish they’d just get voted out sooner. My point is that while there’s very little on this cast that strikes me as BAD, there’s also nothing on it that gets me super-excited, that I’m absolutely SURE is going to be a great watch. Hopefully the cast will turn out better than even I expect, since this season has some stuff working against it from the beginning. If you want that judgement, though, you’ll have to read on Feb. 17th, when I blog about the premier!

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.