Welcome back, loyal readers, to “Survivor Kaoh Rong” (a season I can spell more accurately than the editors, evidently. Why has the spell check been off this season?) Episode 10… I mean the “Survivor Game Changers” Finale. Though, given the first part of the episode, you could be forgiven for making that mistake. Think about it: A large, cocky jock talks down to Tai, who runs to Aubry for comfort, and using her skills, she gets him to do what she wants done with his hidden immunity idol. Beat for beat, it’s pretty much the same thing.
After Probst brags about the size of the crowd at the finale, we get to his summation of the season, which is mercifully brief. The only things of note are his summation of the contestants (which we’ll get to in a minute), and one little tricky bit right at the beginning. Now, Probst is no stranger to hyperbole, particularly when recapping a season. So, naturally, he started off his narration with “For the first time, ‘Survivor’ stranded 20 game changers…” and I prepare to rant my head off about how “Survivor Heroes vs. Villains” exists, and although I find it to be somewhat overrated, it’s still miles ahead of this particular season. Then, however, Probst saves himself by finishing it off “…in Fiji.” Well played, Probst, well played. Technically a true statement, but you’re REALLY stretching there for a “first”.
Credit where credit is due, though, Probst did do a good job in building up our other player’s chances. A lot of people, myself included, were bemused when both Aubry and Troyzan, people who hadn’t really gotten much screentime, made the finals. How would Probst build them up? Well, I have to say, he actually did a pretty good job of it. He highlighted Troyzan’s idol find and him biding his time, while with Aubry, he highlighted her tenacity. About the best he could do, given the material the editors gave to him.
Onto the episode proper, and we get the fallout from that last Tribal Council where the fine print determined everything. Cirie, naturally, bears the brunt of it. No one period would be pleased with a supposed ally taking their advantage and trying to play it (perceivedly) against them, and let it be said that Sarah is not known for being able to control her temper very well. Naturally, Cirie’s attempts at pointing out that she was trying to do it to protect Sarah fall on deaf ears, and again, who can blame Sarah? Without knowing the information that Cirie knows, she has no proof of what Cirie’s saying, and the scheme was so out there that it’d be ridiculous to believe in any case! The pair do seem to calm down after a bit of talking, but Sarah makes it clear that tensions are still running high. Still, she does try to get all the facts, confronting Tai around the fire about whether he had planned to vote her off. We also find out that the reason Michaela went was due to her being Cirie’s lieutenant. Logical, but it could have been better foreshadowed.
Now, Tai is in a golden spot here. As I said, Cirie’s story is pretty unbelievable, even if it is true in this case. Sarah’s mad at Cirie anyway. All Tai has to do is lie. Just one little lie. Say that he never had any such plans. Cirie takes all the flak, and can’t really do anything about it, since she would NEED Tai for this next vote. But, of course, Tai does the stupid thing, and reveals to Sarah that he did indeed plan to vote for her. Sarah takes it well. And by that, I mean that her rage turns pretty much exclusively on Tai. Way to go, slugger.
In fairness to Tai, he brings up a good point later on about people’s attacking of him. The overarching theme of these vote offs is basically “Tai is a liar who can’t be trusted.” Tai, however, says there’s a double-standard, and that he’s just doing what everybody else has done in this game. And… Yeah. What HAS he done that’s so much more terrible than anyone else? I guess you could make the argument that Tai PRETENDS to be loyal more than some other people, but it’s not like he’s HIDING the fact that he’s talking other strategies with other people. Really, the only factor here is that he’s going after Sarah, the first person to do so in this game, and Sarah isn’t taking it well. That’s not a mark against Tai, though, and I really do feel like the players this episode (not named Aubry and Cirie) unfairly chastise him for just playing the game. Lay off, people.
Much like last episode, our number of players left leaves no time for strategizing, and we hop into our traditional “Maze and Puzzle” challenge, which I like slightly more than others for being colorful, and having a tricky puzzle. It’s a compass rose, but built in a vertical frame, and with pieces that fit multiple places. Not the strongest individual challenge that ever was, but for the standards of this season? I’ll take it. It’s a fairly close-run thing, but Brad Culpepper takes it, making a joke about himself being a brainless jock. Funny, but since he’ll be ACTING like a brainless jock in just a minute, I’m not sure how true that actually is.
The winner also gets an Italian dinner with two other people, so Brad takes Troyzan and Sarah. Now, Troyzan I have no qualms with. The pair are tight, and it would be suspicious of him not to take Troyzan. I can see an argument for leaving a loyal soldier at camp, but again, the suspicion would have been too great. I will, however, dispute the Sarah choice. Granted, both she and Tai serve as swing votes here, but Sarah is mad enough at Cirie that I feel like her vote is a safer guarantee than that of the easily-manipulated Tai. Not the worst choice, but not optimal.
Tai had previously told Brad about his two idols, in an attempt to find safe harbor. Brad, for whom Tai has overall been VERY loyal and a good ally in general, decides not to believe Tai, but does offer him a deal: He’ll take Tai to the end, but only if Tai plays an idol on himself tonight, and gives the other to Brad for safekeeping. Tai, not being an idiot, is wary of this deal. Leaving aside the fact that we KNOW that in this scenario, Brad plans to blindside Tai after this vote, giving up one of your idols for NO REASON is a terrible idea in any scenario.
Oh, but the stupidity here is not limited to Tai. Let’s say that Brad’s plan had worked, and Tai had given Brad an idol, which he then would not have returned, and not had a “non-transferrable” clause to fall back on. Then you have an INCREDIBLY pissed-off juror, with a jury that’s not a guarantee for you in any case. Plus, Brad approaches Tai in COMPLETELY the wrong way, strongarming and ordering him around. Where else does this send him to but the arms of Aubry, that comforting voice that tells him to do what’s best for HIM, which is exactly what he wants to hear. Brad really did need to watch more of “Survivor Kaoh Rong”. History repeating itself.
The only true wrinkle in the plan is Cirie, coming up to apologize to Tai for bungling the last Tribal Council. Normally adding Cirie to any strategy would help equate to its success, but in this case, Aubry is the superior choice, and so Cirie is shooed off. Say what you will about Aubry, she is GOOD at working Tai. I feel like she’s good at working other people, but as I’ll get to during her exit, she just had no shot at it.
Of course, we all know that Aubry’s going. Any pretense of Tai working with her is thrown out when she describes him as a “rat” at our first Tribal Council. These are not the words of someone trying to ensure a swing vote stays on their side. Again, this is probably the most interesting of the Tribal Councils of the night, but all the witty banter is overshadowed by the fan-dubbed “Advantage-Geddon”. Proving once and for all why Aubry is awesome, Tai gets up and plays BOTH of his idols, one for himself and one for Aubry. The one for himself I get. There’s the very real possibility he could be targeted tonight. But why Aubry? She’s not strategically important to him. The most he can hope to do is make a 3-3 Tai. The only logical explanation is that Aubry played him again, and got him to save her. And yet we see next to nothing of her all season. Great choice, editors!
We’re not done yet, though. Sarah plays her legacy advantage, which I’m amazed it took her so long to do (there’s literally no advantage to NOT playing it). This, of course, gets Troyzan skittish, and so he plays HIS idol, leading to a non-hyperbolic “Survivor” first. No votes are read, not because someone was the obvious boot due to their gameplay, but because there was LITERALLY only one choice. With three idols played, and five people immune, Cirie is the ONLY person who can be voted out. Of course, we need ceremony for this. Probst eulogizes her as he has few players. And if a player is deserving of it, it’s Cirie. I’m not the world’s biggest Cirie fan, but I still respect her game, and all she’s accomplished through playing “Survivor”. She’s definitely one of the greats, and probably my vote for “Greatest to Never Win” at this point, so it makes sense. I just wish it didn’t go ON for so long! Look Cirie deserves respect, but this is overkill.
All that said, I am sorry to see her go. She was probably playing the best game out of the lot left (yes, even my beloved Aubry), and added a nice dynamic to our remaining finalists. She is sorely missed, even if she did get the honor of being the one to say “the tribe has spoken”.
Now, I’ll admit, I did PREDICT this scenario, but not how it would come about. This episode was advertised as having a “‘Survivor’ First”, and many correctly predicted that with FIVE immunity advantages left, that this would mean that one person would be left without immunity and go home. I too subscribed to this theory, but after the immunity challenge, I thought not. I underestimated Aubry’s sway over Tai. I figured Aubry (or possibly Cirie) would HAVE to win immunity, leaving Tai to play an idol on himself and Brad, and combined with Troyzan’s idol and the legacy advantage, this would leave one persons left. Thank God it came down the way it did, since otherwise it would have been completely predictable. As it stands, we get fun, organized chaos that came about as a combination of twists and STRATEGIZING rather than just twists, making it infinitely superior to most of the season.
Oh, and yes, Tai DID save Aubry with that move, making Aubry’s manipulation of him all the more important. True, the vote was 3-2-1 in favor of Sarah going home, but that legacy advantage was getting played. I don’t see a scenario in which Tai DOESN’T play an idol on himself, meaning that without Tai, the one vote for Aubry would have been enough.
And another “Survivor” first: Cirie is the first person to be voted off without ever receiving a single vote against them on that season (no, Jonathan Libby and Wanda Shirk from “Survivor Palau” don’t count).
You’d think, with Aubry and Tai now scrambling, that we’d get some intriguing strategy post-Tribal Council. You clearly haven’t noticed production’s need to stick as many people as possible into the finale. Our immunity challenge today comes courtesy of “Survivor San Juan del Sur”, involving passing a ball through obstacles with paddles into an ending tube. First player to nab three balls wins immunity. Again, a very difficult challenge, and intricate, but it loses out to the first one due to scale. Also, while I can understand going back to a “Survivor” staple like a maze, going back to “Survivor San Juan del Sur” is a mistake. Not the worst season, but you can do better.
Brad wins again, with Probst commenting on how Brad is now one win away from tying the record of five immunity wins in a given season. Gee, thanks for spoiling the outcome of the next immunity challenge, Probst!
Aubry, however, is not done just yet. Granted, Sarah has a final three pact with Brad and Troyzan (formulated over their meal earlier), and since all Sarah really needs to do is GET to the end, there’s no incentive to break from that. Especially when you consider that Aubry is the one person left who might beat Sarah in the end. I can understand how it’s appealing for Tai. With the way Brad is treating him, it’s logical to assume that he’s lost that alliance. So, Sarah is the one who needs convincing. Aubry’s pitch is that since Brad and Troyzan won’t budge from each other, this gives Tai and Sarah each only a 50-50 shot at the finals. All things considered, not a bad pitch, given where she’s at. Aubry really has few cards on the table, and this is about her most convincing argument. However, it ultimately reads like Terry Deitz’s “Stress-free weeks” pitch from “Survivor Exile Island”. It’s weak at best, but ultimately could anyone else find a better pitch. You see, the flaw in Aubry’s pitch is that 50-50 ain’t bad odds, especially when Sarah in particular has an inroad with that pair. Again, I can see why TAI would want to go with Aubry. At this point, it would probably be his smartest move. Sarah, though? No chance.
Yet it’s TAI who suggests not going with the plan, citing Aubry as a jury threat. Ok, can’t fault the logic there, but Tai at this point is pretty much out of the running, so he might as well go with the people who WANT to work with him and take him to the final three. Sarah, continuing her theme of flexibility, agrees to do whatever Tai wants. What Tai wants, however, changes quite frequently, especially when Brad doubles down on his assholery to Tai. Again, the correct move for Tai is to vote out Troyzan (the only option, as Brad is immune), but I still don’t quite get Sarah’s stake in this.
It’s a fortunate thing that we have Tai playing with his emotions, as evidenced by that last Tribal Council, since otherwise, there’s no tension here. No witty banter, and as I said, Aubry’s pitch was flimsy at best. Sure enough, she goes home, but she should be damn proud of herself. She made top five, after coming into the season with arguably one of the biggest targets on her back. True, she didn’t win her season, but she was perceived as winner-caliber, and her season was the most recent one seen, and with the most returnees. Plus, she never really seemed to get her footing in the game, so for her to still scheme and plot her way this far? Damn straight it’s impressive! Shame on the editors for not giving us her story. Oh, and there WAS a story there! I don’t normally advocate watching the bonus confessionals for all but the most die-hard fans, but Aubry’s are worth a watch. The woman had good stuff to say; you should have shown it! Not a bad placing, all things considered, though, and I eagerly await a third chance for Aubry.
So, remember how copying an immunity challenge from “Survivor San Juan del Sur” was a bad idea? Yeah, still not the worst of the episode. That honor goes to our Final Immunity Challenge, a beat-for-beat recreation of the one from “Survivor Worlds Apart”, a FAR worse season than “Survivor San Juan del Sur”. Players run through a vertical “maze” retrieving bags of puzzle pieces with keys. They periodically go up a tower and down a water slide for more keys. Once they have the puzzle pieces, they assemble a lighthouse. The only new element is having to undo a combination lock to get the final piece after the rest of it is assembled, because we haven’t seen THAT before! Apart from committing the cardinal sin of not being an endurance challenge, this one is just generic when it isn’t stupid (I will never be ok with water slides on “Survivor”). Really a poor way to end the season, even given everything else that’s already happened.
After Brad’s inevitable win, he of course does the smart thing and targets Sarah, being his only real competition this season… Or he decides to go for Tai because he’s pissed at him. Ok, time to talk about Brad. I’ll admit it: he by and large won me over this season. He played a much better social game this time around, and even had an overall better strategic game. But this episode REALLY soured me on him. As I mentioned in the Debbie blow-up episode, while I think we may have jumped the gun in calling Brad “sexist” during “Survivor Blood vs. Water”, I wasn’t prepared to dismiss the charge entirely, since his manner of speaking could intimidate people, and possibly cause the aforementioned beliefs. And he REALLY showed his bad side this episode. Apart from a loss of strategic thinking, Brad is now treating someone he NEEDS very poorly, and it’s just wrong. Once Aubry and Cirie were gone, in my opinion it came down to a game of Brad vs. Sarah. I went back and forth on who I would want to win in this scenario, since both were very similar to me. Both have personal lives that I wasn’t too big a fan of (Brad for being rich and domineering, Sarah for being a Trump supporter), but that shouldn’t really be a factor. Both had games I wasn’t too fond of on their first outing, but improved this time around. Sarah played the more dominant game strategically, but she also had several advantages. Conversely, Brad was never in quite as dominant a position as Sarah, but also didn’t piss as many people off, and I could admire him playing from the bottom. All that said, coming into this episode, and guessing correctly that Cirie and Aubry were doomed, I was prepared to hope for a Brad Culpepper victory. This episode changed my mind. The arrogance ruined his social game, and a place at the end coming primarily from well-timed immunity wins does not a legend make. Plus, for all that Sarah rubbed some people the wrong way, she played well enough to betray someone yet STILL get the legacy advantage, so it’s not like she was horrible. Really, my only qualm with a Sarah victory is if people start citing this as evidence that her loss in “Survivor Cagayan” was only due to Kass. Look, I’m not going to say Kass wasn’t a factor, but Sarah played pretty awfully there. “President Lacina” is not what you want to be saying tow in friends and influence people.
Still, this Tribal Council DOES give us the best misdirection. The hatchet having evidently been buried, Tai suggests to Sarah that they take their fate into their own hands, rather than letting Brad and Troyzan control everything, and force a tie with Troyzan, leading to fire-making. This… Is actually a good idea for both. It shows that one didn’t just walk behind Brad Culpepper the entire time, and takes at least SOME agency back into their hands. Sure, Brad and Troyzan are probably telling you you’re safe, but of COURSE they’re saying that. Better to go with what you can predict.
This does not happen, however, and Tai is voted out in a boring Tribal Council. He’s another weird one where I’m both sorry and not sorry to see him go. I can’t say Tai brought NOTHING to the table, but I feel like we got enough Tai for a while. That said, I wish he hadn’t gotten such a thrashing this episode. The guy’s a decent-enough player. He really deserved better.
So, our finalists are Sarah, Brad, and… Troyzan? Are you sure there was a Troyzan on this season? I mean, I’m sure he’d give some weak argument about hanging in there and making good social bonds. But, we all know that with this jury, that now leans heavily towards the strategic, there’s no way that would hold water…
So, our finalists are Sarah and Brad. They talk about their strengths over generic shots of the finalist’s breakfast and burning some crates at camp. Sarah does her “cop and criminal” metaphor again, but swears to be honest at Final Tribal Council. Should she temper that honesty with tact, I can applaud this. Brad touts his challenge victories and good relationships as his key to winning. Pre-Tai, I would have agreed with this. Post-Tai, not sure the social game is how you want to go, buddy.
Our Final Tribal Council is noteworthy in that we finally get to find out what that “Jury Twist” Probst was promoting was. It’s… Underwhelming. Basically, rather than ask individual questions, Probst asks the players to have an open forum with the finalists about each aspect of the game, and what their thoughts are in that area. Now, I’m sure this gets a lot of hate, if only because many “Survivor” purists are resistant to change, I have to ask: is it really that big of a change? True, it gets Probst more involved in Final Tribal Council, which does rub me the wrong way, and I wouldn’t blame anyone for hating it for that alone. Still, the jury is the jury, and if there’s something on their minds, they’ll find a way to work it in, regardless of Probst’s categories or not. And those categories? They cover just about every aspect one could possibly vote on: Physical game, survival game, social game, strategic game. My point here is that while it is kind of yucky that Probst is leading a discussion, instead of acting with discretion, we’re really not getting anything that different from a usual jury. Heck, my thought was that, due to the number of unanimous votes of late, Probst would simply have the jury confer and cast one ballot for a consensus winner, which would have undermined “Survivor”. All that being said, this DOES mean we miss out on the hilarity of jury questions, so while I don’t think this is the worst, I’d prefer to go back to the old format after this season. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
That being said, we do get a sense of where the jury’s coming from. Troyzan, as mentioned, is pretty much out of it, though people like Aubry and Andrea do try and get him to argue for a Sandra-type game. He takes it in good grace, and joking aside, the guy is a GREAT sport about the whole thing, and should be commended for that alone. Troyzan aside, Sarah seems to be the frontrunner, with most praising her strategic game but point out that her ease in deception rubbed many of them the wrong way. This would be the point where Brad steps in, but he doesn’t come off so good either, getting lambasted for his treatment of Tai, and doing himself no favors when Michaela (who was very restrained tonight), asks him what he knows about her, and he can only rattle off the most basic facts. In fairness to Brad, he was never really allied with Michaela, but the fact remains that he still didn’t know her in quite as much detail as needed, and comes off looking bad as a result.
And yet, for all that the jury as a whole favored Sarah, the vote was still as close as it’s been since “Survivor One World” five years ago. And by that, I mean Sarah wins 7-3. A deserving winner for her game, and I wouldn’t mind seeing her back, but she’ll never be one of my favorites. I’m just too big a Kass fan, I guess. And Brad knew, as well. For all his cockiness in-game, you could tell by the look on his face at the vote read, he knew he had lost it.
Still, Sarah did bring us the best reunion show I’ve seen in a while. Oh, yes, they actually did it pretty well this time! True, we still didn’t hear from as many people as I’d have liked, but we hit a lot of the highlights at least briefly, got some good stuff from Sarah, and the hilarity of Brad trying to avoid being told that, had he put pride aside and voted out Sarah at the final four, he’d likely have won, was great. It’s fun to see Probst get thrown off of his game, at least when not done by Sia. Plus, we FINALLY get the reveal of what happens in the event of a tie. It’s a question many “Survivor” fans have been wondering since we moved beyond seven person juries and a final two. The answer is pretty much what most of us guessed. The person left out of the tie casts a deciding vote. Underwhelming, but probably the fairest answer I could come up with. What’s interesting to me is that Probst seemed to imply that the vote would have happened the night of the Final Tribal Council, rather than at the reunion show. This makes sense, since otherwise the edit would have had an impact on the vote, but I do wonder how that would have been shown. It would have cut out a lot of the tension from the reunion show, knowing ahead of time that everything came down to one vote. And yet, we STILL don’t know what happens if there’s a tie at only the final two, like what could have happened in “Survivor Micronesia”.
Really, the only minor misstep of the reunion show is the Zeke/Varner stuff. I’m a proponent of the idea that CBS as a whole handled the incident as tactfully as they could at the time, and I was happy to see both Varner and Zeke at the reunion show. That said, it REALLY didn’t need to be brought up. Whereas before it was an integral part of the game that needed to be talked about, now it did feel like ratings bait. And you could tell that Zeke in particular was uncomfortable with the whole thing, eyes darting back and forth pretty much the whole time. Varner did pay homage to Zeke being the real victim, and I don’t want to pile on angst to a guy who’s dealt with enough already, but MAN after that pat note did he focus on himself. The book deal, in particular, was unnecessary. All that said, though, if they were going to talk about it, they still did it ok, making sure to emphasize that what Varner did was wrong and pretty much condemning him for it.
Oh, and there’s the next season. “Survivor Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers”. I hate this title. It’s clunky, and does nothing to hide the fact that this is a rehash of the “Collars” twist from “Survivor Worlds Apart”. They even have the same freaking buff colors! The cast, from what we saw in the preview, didn’t look like anything special, but didn’t look bad either, so I’ll reserve my judgement for a full cast announcement. Still, “Survivor HvHvH”, as I will hereinafter call it, is starting off on thin ice. Oh, and Jeff? I get how “Hero” and “Healer” could be positives, but I don’t think “Hustler” really qualifies.
All that said, it’s time for the traditional…
TOP 5, and… THAT’S IT?
Yes, partly because I am tired, this season only gets a “Top 5” list with no honorable mention on it. However, this is not due solely to laziness, but also to the fact that my subject this time, in honor of the fallen jury questions, is, well, jury questions. They’ve been a staple of “Survivor” since the beginning, and even if they have gotten bland over the years, the best still need acknowledging. Since a “Bottom 5” list would pretty much be “See seasons 31-present”, there’s no real point in doing it. Only other point to note is that the ANSWER to the question will be a factor in the best jury questions. That said, let’s get started with…
5. “The Right Place for the Wrong Reasons” (“Survivor Samoa”): The only double-digit season to make this list, Erik Cardona’s jury speech, decrying Russell Hantz for being an awful human being while praising Natalie White for recognizing this and playing him for a sap falls into the “So bad, it’s good” category for me. It’s SO over the top and SO ridiculous that I can’t help but love it! Plus, it’s bashing Russell Hantz, which I can always get behind.
4. “Day at the Races” (“Survivor Vanuatu”): When I do a list for the best Final Tribal Councils ever, “Survivor Vanuatu” would definitely be near the top. It combines emotion and strategy beautifully, with a fascinating master class in BS courtesy of Chris Daugherty. That said, very few of the individual jury speeches stand out. Combined, they work great. Individually, they’re just ok. Sarge’s speech takes it, though, for successfully fooling me into believing that Chris might NOT have his vote on lockdown. Props, good sir.
3. “Anyone ELSE Deserving” (“Survivor The Amazon”): One of your stock jury questions is “Who on the jury should be sitting there instead of you/your opponent?”, and would therefore escape my notice, were it not for Heidi Strobel’s version of it in “Survivor The Amazon”. You see, Heidi had REALLY wanted to use this question to make finalists Jenna and Matthew pander to her. Instead they pandered to Rob, and Heidi was VERY upset about it, blatantly leading them on until Probst had to shut it down for being too much even for him.
2. “Rats and Snakes” (“Survivor Borneo”): Yeah, you knew this was coming. It’s a classic for a reason. It’s got drama. It’s distinctive. It pretty accurately summarized the game up until that point. Really, the only reason it’s not number one is that it’s just too overplayed at this point. Still, there’s a reason we have the “Order of Sue-Hawk-abies” on this blog. People just can’t resist a metaphor-filled diatribe.
1. “The Hyena and the Mush” (“Survivor Africa”): Sometimes you want a deep jury question that really throws things up in the air. And sometimes you want a curveball question for humor’s sake. Tom Buchanan delivers in that department, giving us a completely random and pointless question about a hyena licking its butt after eating the corn mush at camp, purely because his vote was already decided, and he just wanted to dick around with the finalists. There’s something about the insanity and irreverence that just appeals to me, and makes this the most memorable jury speech in my mind.
Now, on to the other tradition of this blog, noting how WRONG I was in my pre-season predictions!
Jeff Varner-We start off with a partial victory. He did last about as long as I thought, but he was more of a strategic presence than I guessed, and I could not have told you the manner of his exit, since I avoid spoilers.
Sandra-Pretty much right, although I do give her credit for being more of a power-player this time around than I could have predicted.
Cirie-Wrong. While I was right that she would be underestimated on the whole, she DID do a good job lasting after the merge, and staying the powerhouse a lot longer than I guessed.
Ozzy-Wrong about time in the game, right in that he’s still as dull as a sack of hammers.
J.T.-Wrong. Played much worse than I though, and as a consequence went out much earlier.
Andrea-Wrong. While I’m still no fan of hers, she DID prove that she’s got some chops on her, even if this is TECHNICALLY her worst performance in terms of placing.
Troyzan-Wrong again. Man, that’s a pattern tonight. The man lasted much longer than I thought, though I was right about his overall impact on the game.
Malcolm-Wrong, though in my defense, NO ONE could have predicted that stupid twist Tribal Council.
Brad-Wrong. Like I said before, guy really proved what he was capable of this time around.
Ciera-Even though I didn’t say she’d be first out, I’ll still give myself this one. I said she’d go early, and personality and reason for exit went pretty much to the letter of what I said.
Sarah-Wrong. Definitely a contender for Brad for “Most Improved”. Though she didn’t know the real reason behind her exit on “Survivor Cagayan” as I predicted.
Tony-Right, for once this blog.
Hali-She went out a bit earlier than I expected, but I’d say I was right otherwise.
Sierra-Sort of a reverse Hali. She still behaved as I expected, but lasted slightly longer than I thought she would.
Caleb-Wrong in that he went out sooner, but I don’t think I overestimated him too much in terms of strategy.
Debbie-She was pretty crazy (who would have guessed), and I GUESS she qualifies as a mid-merge boot, so yeah, I’ll give myself this one.
Tai-Wrong. Dude went WAY farther than played better than I’d have thought.
Aubry-Yeah, she didn’t win, but again, I think she did exceptionally well considering her start to the season. I’ll give myself this one.
Michaela-While I don’t think I overestimated her strategic capabilities, I did underestimate her time in the game. She got me there.
Zeke-We fortunately got nice Zeke this time around, so he played better and lasted longer than I guessed.
“Survivor Game Changers” as a whole is a mess, plain and simple. It was a poorly-conceived all-stars season, that loses out even to the ACTUAL “Survivor All-Stars” due to the latter at least paying better tribute to seasons pasts. Twists were thrown out left and right such that the status quo never got established, thus neutering such shake-ups. We had a few good episodes here and there, and things definitely picked up towards the end of the season, when the twists stopped coming and we could actually follow what was going on. But then we also have the Zeke outing episode and an underwhelming final three. I’m not saying that developing new characters is bad, or that we’d only have been happy if our favorites were in the end. But look who we lost: Aubry and Cirie, arguably two of the most popular players left in the end. And who’d we end up with? “This is My Island!”, “Fuck You Brad Culpepper”, and “President Lacina”. Not that these people didn’t earn their way to the end, nor did they play bad games, but they’re just not people we’re inclined to root for. All that said, I don’t think this is an AWFUL season. I’d just put it in the realm of below “Survivor South Pacific” and above “Survivor San Juan del Sur”, where it’s still technically GOOD, but there’s much better stuff to offer. Here’s hoping that “Survivor HvHvH” is at least better than its title.
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.
idolspeculation 