Idol Speculation: “Survivor 46” Episode 8: Everybody Needs A Thneed

Up until now, I thought Thneeds only existed in the esteemed mind of Dr. Seuss.  Even Universal Studios would not be so money-hungry as to put out an item whose purpose is literally to be useless.  But it seems it DOES exist in our plane.  Only here it goes by another name: The Q Skirt.  

Before we get into our sales pitch, however, we have to do damage control.  Ben is understandably devastated by the loss of his friend, particularly as he saw Tim as a grounding agent for his game.  He’s upset, but not game-endingly so, and he’s comforted.  A decent recovery, so I’ll give him a pass.  Q?  Not so much.  He’s not happy at all that we aren’t talking strategy.  Dude, get the stick out of your butt.  There’ll be plenty of strategy talk later; let the man lick his wounds a little bit!

Q’s need for strategy talk gets satiated anyway when the second group comes back.  Most everyone, Tiffany and Kenzie in particular, are shocked that Venus remains, with her having been the plan prior to the Tribal.  Venus, as she did at Tribal Council, immediately steps up to take credit for the move, something Tevin finds privately hilarious.  She did this at Tribal Council as well, something I failed to mention last time, but didn’t do a “Matt’s Mess-Up” for since it’s still relevant here.  Soda, to her immense credit, was kind to Venus despite their personal animosity, and Venus taking credit for getting her out.  

Credit, however, is a valuable commodity on “Survivor”.  You don’t want to take it too early, as Emily learned well on “Survivor 45”, but you also need it at the end, lest you end up like Cassidy on “Survivor 43”, and not be able to claim moves you made.  Tevin, however, is not sweating Venus as a threat, and thus allows her the credit for now.  Less chill about the whole thing is Liz.  She’s mad that BOTH Tevin and Venus are claiming the move, saying it’s hers since she’s been against Soda the whole time!  Really what this highlights is that everyone’s the hero of their own story.  From what we’ve seen, Tevin was the main move and shaker on the vote, but that’s because of what we’re shown.  Venus probably DID think she pulled it together by talking to Charlie and Maria, and Liz probably HAS been putting Soda’s name out there at least somewhat.  Neither may be what actually swayed the votes, but you can see how everyone thinks it was their move.  Fascinating little psychological moment.  Point is, Liz is now getting a case of Big-Move-Itis, something likely to spell the end for her long-term if left unchecked.  

Morning does bring some new strategy talk to satiate Q.  Seems that there’s a vacancy in the 6 with Tim gone, and despite him being mad at Charlie last episode, Q is now willing to let him take Tim’s place.  This, it seems, was Maria’s plan all along.  Turns out she WASN’T lukewarm on the 6, as had previously been assumed, but just wanted her true number one, Charlie, in there.  Charlie, for his part, is open to the idea, but is wisely wary.  Apart from the obvious factors of being the last one brought in, and Q still harboring some wariness of his own (we see Q later express concern over how loyal Charlie will be), Charlie declares this the “weakest six in the show’s history”.  Time will bear him out as correct, admittedly, but at the time he said that?  Eh, he’s being a BIT hyperbolic.  This is not as tight a six as one would want, but compared to, say, the personal disfunction that was Casaya (“Survivor Exile Island”)?  I’d give these guys at least a decent chance of sticking together, at least at this point of the episode.  Of course, Casaya functioned in spite of personal animosity, and we’ll later see that this six does no, so maybe not the best comparison.  But on paper, at this point of the episode?  A bit over-the-top.  

But now Q decides to switch up the show he’s on.  No, you’re not watching “Survivor”.  This is now “Shark Tank”, where Q is one-man pitching the titular “Q-Skirt”. This is an innovative garment that looks like an ordinary hoodie, because it IS an ordinary hoodie!  But instead of wearing it normally, you tie it around your waist, hood by your crotch, to use as a “Kangaroo Pouch” to hold whatever you so desire!  Look, in the most GENEROUS interpretation I can give it, this idea is goofy as hell.  Credit where it’s due, however: Q is a brave southern man to suggest men wearing skirts as a regular thing.  That takes some confidence in oneself, and I applaud him for it.  His enthusiasm even wins over the skeptical, both Charlie and Tevin signing up for one when they start getting made.  Guess we know the first item to be made available in Q’s merch store.  

Q isn’t done with the whimsy, however!  Turns out he’s been trying to get a game of Hide and Seek going since the start of the game, and now has enough people to make it actually work.  Tiffany mocks the idea, which I have to say is a bit mean.  There is no age at which Hide and Seek is not fun, Tiffany.  Understandably she’s found fairly early, since she put little effort into it, though she does outlast Liz, at least.  Ben and Hunter are ultimately victorious, the former by camouflaging himself low to the ground with a tarp, the latter by hiding in a.tree above the shelter (which Tevin did predict; they just looked in the wrong trees).  Honestly, this is my favorite scene of the episode.  Just a fun, whimsical passing of the time.  The sort of camp life scene I can get behind.  

Of course, some people still have to make it all about the game of “Survivor”, with Q and Venus in particular both saying that this tell them things about other people in the game.  Some of it I buy.  Q noting that Liz plays hard by going deep in the jungle to look for him, or Venus noting Maria’s resourcefulness in her camouflage headdress, for example?  These make a certain amount of sense, and are traits to look out for moving forward.  But Venus saying Tiffany isn’t playing because she didn’t try very hard, or Q watching out for Hunter and Ben because they won the game?  That seems a bit much to me.  Those things are mostly, if not completely unrelated.  And frankly, the strategizing is unnecessary.  Just let the fun camp game be the fun camp game.  

Speaking of games, Tevin is in the middle of making a chessboard when Venus comes over to talk about her strategy some more.  Tevin butters her up well, though oddly so well that it makes Venus suspicious.  In conferring with Tiffany about it, Tiffany notes that Venus is no threat, and should be kept around as a goat for the end.  She suggests going after Maria.  No justification is given, and it really doesn’t matter.  Tevin brings this back to Q, noting that she’s targeting one of the 6.  

Now, obviously Q reacted badly to someone targeting someone else in the 6 with Tim last episode, but that was with a guy he barely knew, who seemed only half-interested in the alliance anyway.  But this is Q’s #1.  The person he’s stated he’s closest with in this game.  Surely he won’t blow up all of his alliances over one aside comment…

And there goes Q saying Tiffany now has to go.  See, this is why Charlie doesn’t want to work with you too much, my dude!  You fly off the handle at the slightest perceived slight!  If people don’t do exactly what you say, BOOM!  They’re gone in your eyes!  I get the philosophy, but there needs to be some NUANCE.  You spent the last two weeks building this relationship, and you’re going to throw it all out, blow up your main alliance, because of one aside comment?  That’s just bad gameplay!  He even reveals Tiffany’s idol to Maria in the process!  Just thoroughly burning the bridge at that point.  

Also, while I understand what his personal justification would be, I feel duty-bound to point out, Q, that if ANYONE who suggests moving against the 6 needs to go, by definition, YOU would need to be voted out for getting out Tim!  Something that, maybe, Q realizes down the line…

As Probst correctly notes, the challenge today is a good old classic.  The “Hang onto a Pole” challenge first seen on “Survivor Vanuatu”.  Speaking of that season, Probst claims Ozzy set the record at 2 hours, and that seems to pass muster.  Yet, I somehow feel like the Vanuatu version went longer.  If so, mention it!  I will not stand for this Twila erasure!  Anyway, point being, good challenge to bring back.  

This being the final 10 means it’s also time for rice negotiations, and I will give people credit that they TRY to negotiate, but Probst stands firm.  That, plus the combination of Probst not knifing the bag?  Way lowers this one in my estimation.  

However, the cast does make up for the lackluster proceedings a bit by actually not going for it!  Q and Liz are ultimately the only ones who volunteer (reasonably so, since they’re the first two out, as we soon see), and Probst needs four.  Actually a good bit of drama, though again, Probst’s countdown could be improved by having it be rice draining from a knifed bag instead.  Come on, that was one of the coolest things last season; bring it back!  

After Q “throws the challenge” again, and Liz falls off, we get a few more drops, and then the banter starts.  Say what you will about this season, but it has good banter, and good running gags. When Probst announces they’re seven minutes it, he gets corrected to “Several”, doubtless making Jelinsky feel a good amount of joy.  Dude may have been voted out first, and may have looked kind of ridiculous, but he’s added to the “Survivor” lexicon, as Probst notes, and that’s a feat in and of itself.  Q continues to pitch The Q Skirt, saying everyone here will get a free one.  He revokes Probst’s however, when Probst mocks his challenge performance.  Fair enough.  Again, loving the banter, loving the rapport.  

Charlie and Venus both highlighted wanting to play in this challenge, so you’d expect one of them to win.  Instead, anticlimactically, Hunter wins, showing off at the end by hanging JUST FROM HIS LEGS!  Seriously, dude freaked me out.  Challenge may have bene a foregone conclusion, as Q notes, but at least the banter makes up for it.  

After Q gets his “temper tantrum” as he’ll later call it over the rice out of the way, we find out that indeed, the plan to blindside Tiffany was not just a whim, but what Q actually wants to do.  I have already outlined the reasons this is stupid, so we need an alternate target, one that can be much more reasonable.  Sure enough, Liz’s Big-Move-Itis rears its head again, and she hops on the “Get Out Tevin” train.  Not sure WHY she wants out Tevin, aka the one guy who’s seemed to give her the time of day, but I suppose there’s the whole “Claim Credit” thing discussed earlier, in her mind.  Venus is, of course, on board, but as soon as this gets to the 6, they’re going to turn it on Liz.  That would make sense, right?

Actually, NO!  Instead, pretty much everyone is on board with this!  Ok, Kenzie and Tiffany I get since they’re not as committed to the 6 (and in Kenzie’s case, not even in the 6), and want Yanu to remain invisible.  But Charlie and Maria?  What good does this do you?  Showing that Q hasn’t fully burned the Tiffany bridge (yet), and highlighting precisely WHY he should want to keep her around, Tiffany lets Q in on the plan, over the objections of Liz.  Q, naturally, runs to Hunter with this news.  To give Q his due, he DOES seem willing to let this one go, even though it’s not the plan he came up with.  Hunter, however, is not, and so goes over to Charlie, Maria, and Liz to discuss things, aka the thing Q asked him explicitly not to do!  This also clues in Liz on the original Tiffany plan, which she doesn’t seem surprised by.  Perhaps that was more public knowledge than we thought.  

The ladies, sans Liz and Maria, notice this, and so Venus goes over to interrupt, lest the target turn back on her.  Honestly, good on her!  One of the reasons I find “Survivor Redemption Island” so frustrating is that the players there let social norms get in the way of shaking up the game.  You’re on the outs anyway!  Disrupt their dynamic somehow!  They can only vote you out slightly sooner than they otherwise would have!  So, kudos to Venus for trying to shake that up.  She’s not that effective at it, but the effort is there, and appreciated.  

So yeah, our choices have boiled down to Tiffany and Tevin, two people nobody should be looking to get out just yet, since the 6 technically have a majority.  Whoever you vote out, you break up the 6.  No wonder Charlie has no faith in you all.  This is also, incidentally, where Charlie learns about Tiffany’s idol.  Put a gun to my head, I’d say Tevin is the SLIGHTLY better option to go with, since Nami has more members left at this point, but that’s VERY slight.  Again, the ultimate takeaway here is that both options are terrible.  

Luckily for those two, a new, better target presents themselves at Tribal Council.  That target is Q, who again goes on his “I let people down” self-pity rant like he did during Yanu’s losing streak earlier in the season.  Only this time, there’s no indication of it being an act, like he told us his previous “Vote me out” wish was.  

Really, I can find no logic in this.  Was Q upset that his alliance was falling apart, largely by his own hand?  Was it because of the failed rice negotiations?  Did he legitimately think he failed because of Hunter’s talk?  I DON’T KNOW!  I can’t fathom the logic here!  If I were to TRY and look at it in the best light possible, I COULD say he’s doing a Zane Knight (“Survivor Philippines”) and trying to get people to WANT to keep him around.  Seems like they already did, so like with Zane, this is a stupid plan!  And again, I have no idea if that’s what Q was thinking!  Frankly, I’m not sure Q was thinking at this point.  But hey, at least he’s staying true to wanting people who move against the 6 voted out.  

Naturally, all hell breaks loose, and we have a legit “Live Tribal” with everyone strategizing on the fly.  Tiffany finds out that she was targeted, and that Q blabbed about her idol.  Tevin wants to go along with Q’s request to be voted out.  Charlie and Maria have no idea what to do.  It’s chaos, and decently fun chaos, but again, I thought we were done with whispering at Tribal.  Why bring it back?  

In case it wasn’t clear, Q is the obvious correct boot.  With all this dissension, the 6 is dead at this point, so that’s no longer a consideration.  Q’s erratic gameplay, at this point, is such that he cannot be trusted as an ally, and thus has little use to anyone left in the game.  Granted, after this stunt I don’t see him getting votes in the end, but that’s a long way to drag a goat, and Venus is right there.  Better to eliminate the X factor and be done with it.  Hey, at least this made for a lot of fun “WTF?” Voting confessionals, and Ben even gets to bring back “That Does Not Rock”!  Good on him, getting his catchphrase in again!

Does this group do the sensible thing?  Of course not!  Pretty much everyone turns on Tevin, sending him home WITHOUT Q GETTING EVEN A SINGLE VOTE?  Them not wanting to change on the fly I could MAYBE understand, but after that performance, after that perfect demonstration of what makes an unreliable ally, not a single person votes Q?  I don’t understand these people.  

Yeah, I’m sorry to see Tevin go.  He definitely didn’t deserve it after that stunt Q pulled, and contrary to what I thought of him pre-season, dude was charming, and even a decent strategist.  Fun as Q is, he could wear out his welcome over time, and I wouldn’t say that would be the case for Tevin.  As such, this is a bummer.  

While figuring out the logic of these people eludes me, I have figured out this season: This is the “Survivor Gabon” of the new era.  Big characters?  Slow pre-merge?  Gameplay based more on personal grudges and fleeting vibes than on actual strategy?  This has Gabon written all over it.  Granted, it’s not as over-the-top as Gabon, but it also lacks the more hate-filled moments of that season, so it kind of balances out.  As such, I foresee this being a “Love it or Hate it” season, near the top or bottom of everyone’s favorites, depending on how they feel about drama.  

As a lover of Gabon, after tonight, I’m kind of high on this season!  Yeah, the start has been slow, but there was some good, entertaining chaos tonight!  If that momentum can keep up, we may yet have a legendary season on our hands!

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.  

“Survivor” Top 5 and Bottom 5: Occupations

Well, I promised y’all some more pre-season content, and I’m swiftly running out of time to do so!  The writing bug has bit, so let’s scratch the itch, and keep up my self-imposed obligations at the same time.  This of you who are long-time readers can probably guess what’s coming, but for those who only hopped on as of the last couple seasons, allow me to explain:

Back when I started the blog, sometimes recapping the episode just wasn’t enough.  I had more that I wanted to talk about, hence the creation of this feature: TOP 5 AND BOTTOM 5!  Yes, the all-caps are mandatory when it’s not in the title.  Basically, at the end of a given blog, I would take some topic relevant to the episode, and list off my personal Top 5 and Bottom 5 things in that category.  Usually something relevant to the episode, or to the discussion currently going on in the “Survivor” community at the time.  There wasn’t a set schedule for this, as I personally couldn’t predict when something I felt like talking about would come up, but I tried to do it at least once a season.  If you’re wondering why you don’t remember the one for “Survivor 41”… Well, that’s because I didn’t do one.  

Top 5 and Bottom 5 had become less and less frequent as the seasons progressed, for a variety of reasons.  Partly this was just due to running low on topics I hadn’t yet covered (and after doing this blog for 10 years now, I think I’m entitled to that issue), but that was not the only factor.  The fact was that the more I blogged, the more tiring it became to write such long posts immediately after an episode, and adding in such a list added a good 1/2 hour onto the time.  Time when I could be sleeping.  Add onto that my often feeling like I rushed to get the list together to get to sleep sooner, and thereby not doing a job I was satisfied with, and you see that this particular feature was giving me issues.  Thus, I quietly seemed to shelve the idea, but I felt bad about it  It’s as much a staple of the blog as some random contestant bursting into my house to correct me on something, and thus I was loathe to give it up entirely.  As such, I sat around waiting for inspiration.  

And inspiration came, both in the form of a new topic I wanted to cover, and a new idea for how to do it.  After all, there’s no rule saying I can ONLY do blogs after episodes during the on-season.  And if what I need is time, why not give it to myself?  

So, we arrive at the solution, which you see here.  TOP 5 AND BOTTOM 5 will both continue to be a part of this blog, and no longer be a regular blog.  I’ll still do them when inspiration strikes, but rather than tack them onto the end of an already overly-long blog, I’ll do them as stand-alone features between episodes.  That way, I can take my time, and not feel like I’m missing out on sleep!  Everyone wins!

Now, since I’m sure some of you are not familiar with the format I use, let me briefly explained: I will list, in ascending order my favorite and least favorite for a given topic.  In this case, we’re talking about the various occupations “Survivor” contestants have had.  For reference, I’m talking exclusively about US “Survivor”, not because international seasons are bad, but just because I haven’t watched them, and so can’t really comment on the occupations listed in the chyrons there.  I’ll also include one “Honorable Mention” for each category, for something that I don’t think fits on the list proper, but I still want to talk about.  

Well, this introduction has gone on for a page.  Let us waste no more time, and get to the listing!

TOP 5

5. Former Federal Agent?: Right off the bat, we see that distinctiveness alone can earn an occupation a spot on this list.  Generally, the more specific, the better.  Here, the specificity of the former, coupled with the simultaneously specific and generic title of “Federal Agent” certainly make the occupation stick in the mind.  And, if that didn’t work, Phillip Sheppard would bring it up in every confessional that wasn’t about Great-Grandpa Jessum.  So, it sticks out for sure, but what makes it fun?  Well, friends, the answer is in the editing.  If you are blessedly free of the experience of watching “Survivor Redemption Island”, then the thing to know here is that the titular Phillip was portrayed as, well, not all there.  Talking about his tattoos giving him power, communing with the aforementioned Great-Grandpa Jessum, and flaunting his hot pink undies at multiple opportunities, Phillip was, fairly or unfairly, not portrayed in the best light.  This, in turn, made us question everything about the man, including what could be considered a relatively above-board occupation.  The editors, playing off this speculation, decided to have some fun, and added a question mark to the occupation, the first time they had fun with the chyrons (though by no means the last).  That is the legendary part that lands this occupation on the “Top 5” list, though I’ll admit it is barred from being higher due to it being a joke put in by the editing team, rather than just the occupation itself.  

4. Exotic Animal Veterinarian: Once again, specificity matters.  “Veterinarian” is a fairly generic, if harmless, job.  “Exotic Animal Veterinarian” is much more evocative in the mind, especially since your average “Survivor” local is crawling with said “Exotic Animals”.  Yes, Omar’s occupation from the upcoming “Survivor 42” inspired this list, and I’m happy to have him on here.  That said, I do have to gripe that most of the official sources just list his occupation as “Veterinarian”, which, as I said, much less interesting.  I have heard him called “Exotic Animal Veterinarian” in podcasts and non-CBS sources, so I’m willing to still say it qualifies, but I hope his chyron is the full, specific title when the season actually airs.  Such a title must not be confined to word of mouth alone!

3. Coconut Vendor: Wait, this is a job?  Really?  I mean, I guess it makes sense.  One can understand what a “Vendor” is, and if one sells exclusively coconuts, one could be considered a “Coconut Vendor”.  Still, the title alone makes you take a second glance, and that’s a lot of what this list is about.  Apart from just being an odd turn of phrase, the like of which is unlikely to be seen again on this show, it makes you wonder just what Vince’s business model is.  Like, is there really that much of a market for coconuts?  When you look into the details, it’s a bit more mundane.  Vince basically gathers coconuts that he sells as a cool, refreshing drink on beaches.  Sort of like those ice cream vendors, but with coconuts.  I can see how it works, but it still turns my head, as I said.  Coupled with the coupling of Vince and “nuts”, two ideas that, as the season demonstrated, stick together, and you’ve got an occupation that’s not only amusing, but appropriate to the subject as well.  

2. Magician’s Assistant: Yes, you will still be force-fed my love for “Survivor Guatemala”, even in the on-season!  While not as unusual an occupation as some we’ve seen on this list, in that the layman has probably actually HEARD of this occupation, it’s still one you don’t see every day, and so again, will likely turn a few heads.  And while the occupation itself is not one that really applies to the game of “Survivor”, think of the metaphors one could use in relation to this one!  Pulling off a blindside compared to pulling a rabbit out of a hat!  Being caught between two alliances is like being sawed in half!  Pretty much any reference to a magic wand being used in conjunction with the game!  And we get NONE of them, because Morgan was gone too early to do much of anything.  It’s this wasted potential that keeps this occupation from the top spot overall, but for how this occupation stands out from the many generic occupations we see on this show, it more than earns a high spot on this list.  

1. Mechanical Bull Operator: While we do not have the potential for metaphors here that we’ve had with some of the previous occupations, when I think “Odd Occupations” this is the one that comes to me.  Once again, it’s an occupation the like of which we’ve not seen before, and will likely not see again.  Visually, it stands alone for being SO long that they actually had to size down the font to get it to fit visually in the chyron.  But then, for me, there’s just the oddity of the occupation itself.  I mean, this is a job?  Granted, you have to assume that SOMEONE has to operate a mechanical bull where a mechanical bull is present, but the job title implies that this is the ONLY duty entrusted to John Kenny.  As one usually comes across mechanical bulls in bars, one would assume that it’s bar staff operating them, but as kind of a side thing, with their overall job title being “Bartender”.  I just envision John talking with someone about his career kind of like this: “What do you do?”  “I operate the mechanical bull.”  “Oh, you mean you bartend?”  “No, just the bull.  Nothing else.”  Like, is that what’s he’s referred to in his contract?  Does he just sit at the controls from opening to closing, giving patrons what they perceive as a chance at glory?  It just raises so many questions, and I have an inordinate amount of fun speculating about them.  How could such a job NOT top this list?

Honorable Mention: Russell Hantz’s Nephew: While this technically counts, as it was used in the chyron where the occupation goes, but I can’t put it on the list proper due to said technicality.  While I would consider “Related to Russell Hantz” as stressful as a full-time job, it technically doesn’t pay anything, mostly because Russell can’t afford it without that million-dollar check.  Brandon did, of course, have a regular job, but in the ultimate tip of the hand from the editors, they made it clear that Brandon was not who you were supposed to care about.  Rather, you were supposed to care about who he was related to, and who the show wanted to invoke to milk more cash out of the franchise.  I should be upset at this blatant motivation, but honestly, it’s just so brazen, it circles back around to being funny, and that counts for something at least.  

BOTTOM 5

5. Housing Case Manager: One difference you’ll notice from the “Top 5” list is that I don’t mention a lot of occupations specific to one individual in the “Bottom 5” list.  Instead, I’ll be going over broad categories of jobs, since to me, the worst jobs are the generic ones, the ones you can’t tie to any person in particular.  This is the exception, which is a real shame, because it comes from “Survivor Vanuatu”, I would argue the best season for fun occupations alone!  Aside from the aforementioned “Mechanical Bull Operator”, Vanuatu also gave us “Sheep Farmer”, “Drill Sergeant”, “Equity Research Assistant”, “Coffee Barista”, “Pre-Law Student”, and TWO variations on “Highway Repair Person”!  Perhaps that’s what makes this one so frustrating.  Don’t get me wrong, Rory’s job definitely stands out, but the wording, to me, is just unclear, as someone who has held the more general title of “Case Manager” in his career.  Is he a general case manager who specializes in housing matters?  Does he work for an organization that specializes in housing?  Is his case management related to home repair, or to the living situation of the people in the home?  My point is that, while I understand in general what Rory probably does, the specifics of it confuse me, and raise too many questions.  John Kenny’s raised a lot of questions as well, but I at least had a general idea of what he did.  With Rory, apart from being  related to social work, I just don’t get it.  It’s still better than being generic, so I would never DREAM of putting it higher on the list than this, but for how much it frustrates me, I had to include it here.  

4. Student: An occupation becoming all the more common, especially if the reports I’m hearing about the show lowering its minimum age to 16 are true.  We have now left the realm of individuality, and find ourselves in the doldrums of forgettableness.  I haven’t done the math personally, but I think it’s a safe bet that THIS is the most common occupation we get on “Survivor”.  So many people in some form of higher eduction end up playing, and this makes for a good catch-all term for them, that I feel like it gets slapped on a lot of players, both good and bad.  There’s nothing WRONG with being a student, but without a prefix like “Pre-Law” attached, it tells us little about that person, and next to nothing about their play style.  Students have gone early; they’ve made it to the end.  But we remember their personality, not their job.  Overall a good thing, but for this particular list, not so much.  

3. Model/Actor: These two are often paired together under the portmanteau “Mactor”, and as my reasoning for disliking both is the same, I decided to pair them together here as well.  While either does tell us a bit more about the person’s ambitions than the more generic “student”, there’s still a wide range under both those job titles, and a similarly wide range of success and failure.  There’s just very little to go on, other than this person is likely hungry for exposure.  And that’s really what sets these occupations above “Student”, the seeming quick grab for fame.  While this motivation is not UNIQUE to these occupations, a lot of the time, people holding these job titles come across as coming, not for adventure or the game, but to get exposure.  This is a generalization, of course, and there are always exceptions, but it feels hollow, especially during the time when I was a fan applying to the show, and felt every spot NOT taken up by a fan was unfairly snatched from me.  I’ve mellowed since then, but there’s still that knee-jerk reaction.  It didn’t help that we saw a rise in such an occupation around the time the show went HEAVY on the recruits, which while not bad in and of itself, got overused and led to several lackluster casts.  Thus, the career and the type of cast became intertwined, and the occupation still has yet to shake off such the whole stigma.  So, for all this vitriol, why is this only number 3?  Join me at number 2.  

2. Lawyer: Say what you will about students and mactors, at least they don’t try to shoehorn in how their occupation has prepared them for “Survivor” all the damn time.  The same cannot be said for our top 2 occupations on this list.  If I have to hear ONE MORE LAWYER talk about how they’re prepared to manage a jury, or manipulate, or argue their case, I will go and take the bar exam myself just to show them up.  Look, some occupations prepare you more for “Survivor” than others, but I think most would agree that the courtroom and the wilderness are two very different areas.  Even the “Arguing in front of a jury” part doesn’t match one for one, partly because you don’t need to convince everyone of your side, partly because there’s less facts and evidence, and more people’s perceptions.  That said, if they keep their occupational relations to a minimum, lawyers can be some of the more fun characters to watch.  My love of Kass McQuillen of “Survivor Cagayan” is evidence of that.  But for those that I love, it’s in SPITE of their occupation, and more so their forced links to it, not because of it.  

1. Professional Poker Player: As one would imagine, this occupation shares a lot of the same issues as the lawyer.  Once again, we have an occupation that LOVES to talk about how well it has prepared the person for “Survivor”, and how great they are at reading people.  The trouble is, no, no it really doesn’t.  Apart from their being a big difference in getting people’s tells when you’re close to them in a climate controlled room, and detecting a spoken lie in the wilderness, poker, at its core, involves a large amount of luck.  Now, “Survivor” has always had an element of luck in it, and if current trends continue, it will certainly match the luck present in poker by “Survivor 45”, but the two just aren’t comparable at the time of this writing.  You’ll note that, for all my disparaging of the lawyers, I DID note that some had had success in the game, and I could even concede one or two ways in which their career might carry over to “Survivor” particularly in the area of needing to persuade people.  But really, the big thing that sets this occupation apart is that, to my knowledge, every single person who has had this listed as their occupation is SO ANNOYING!  Not only is arrogance a common trait among them, but pretty much every single person with this as their occupation is either terrible at the game (see Adelstein, Garrett), “unpleasant” (to put it mildly) as a person (see Bellande, Jean-Robert), or both (see Khait, Anna).  Every single time they talk about how well-prepared they are, and every single time, they’re wrong.  There’s almost no variety in this archetype, and it just needs to end.  Please.  

Honorable Mention: One Immunity Idol: Continuing the trend from the previous list, our honorable mention goes to something that is not TECHNICALLY an occupation, but goes in the same place as one.  And once again, it’s the editors tipping their hand to what really matters to them, though this time, rather than being funny, it’s just sad.  “Survivor” is meant to be a social game, where the people playing it matter the most.  All aspects of them, including their occupation, are at least somewhat relevant information to impart to the audience.  When that gets dumped in favor of “Who has what advantage?”, you’re both showing that you have too many advantages in the show, and getting away from the core of what made your show great in the first place.  It may be a symptom of a larger problem, but that problem is great enough that it lands at least an honorable mention on this list.  

My, this goes on longer when I have the time.  Let me know what you all think of my choices, and I’ll see you back here in just under two weeks for the premiere of “Survivor 42”!

-Matt

Idol Speculation: “Survivor Island of the Idols” Finale: In a Mirror, Darkly

Longtime readers of mine will know that one of my favorite things to do with a finale blog is to point out how the finale weirdly parallels the season as a whole. It’s frankly strange how often this one (admittedly extra-long) episode is a microcosm for the season as a whole. This season, however, I can’t do that. Indeed, with rare exception, this episode has exactly the opposite of the strengths and weaknesses of the season as a whole.

Case in point, despite not emphasizing the season-naming twist too much, we start off with Rob and Sandra looking into the sun, discussing their history with the game. Not that this scene isn’t nice, but again, this is the finale of a journey we’ve spent 13 episodes (14 if you count double-length episodes as two episodes, which I don’t) on, getting to know the NEW people along the way. This finale should be all about them. Putting the emphasis on Rob and Sandra is, in my book, a poor move.

I shouldn’t give the show too much hate for this, though, since this is about the most we’ll see of the pair this entire time. What I WILL complain about is the lack of a recap. True, that’s been the case pretty much the entire season, and while I think it was a step in the wrong direction particularly in some episodes, I’ve been overall fine with it. The finale is the exception to this. Even in this day and age, the finale is usually the most-watched episode of any season. In addition to the loyal fans who follow the season religiously, you also get in some casuals who get curious about how this thing will end. I’m all for putting the fans first (especially since they’re what’s allowed the show to go on so long), but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t cater to casual viewers at all.

In any case, the Lumuwaku tribe gets a note for everyone to pack their things and get on a boat. Have the producers thrown up their hands after Dan’s behavior, and just decided to scrap the whole thing? No, of course not! Everyone just goes to Island of the Idols where they’ll live in Rob’s super-shelter for the remainder of the game. Goodie. Because why emphasize the society that our new players have built, when you could emphasize the society Rob and Sandra have built? We also find out here that the whole “Lying about Island of the Idols” thing was dropped at some point as Tommy, the only player left who hadn’t been, expressed no surprise at what he saw. He did insist on the first hug, which was fair. Our players get new “special edition” buffs for the occasion, which appear to be black, because why have different and interesting tribe colors when all merge buffs could just be black? Rob and Sandra have some nice words of parting, and mercifully leave so that the focus can be on what we’ve all been watching this season for…

IDOL HUNTING! What, you thought this game was about the players? No, you fool, it’s all about idols and advantages! After Noura has a fun scene where she gushes about how nice the shelter is, Tommy points out that this is all too easy, and there must be some twist to this new camp. He correctly zeroes in on the new buffs they were given, and sure enough notes that one of the idols on the logo has been replaced with a machete. It’s subtle, but it’s there, so Tommy goes around examining the machetes. He eventually finds one embedded in a random coconut, which has been painted red on the inside. The only problem with this is that Tommy is colorblind, and has trouble telling what “red” is, thus not doing much to limit his search. What he does to combat this problem I’m sure a lot of people give him flak for, but honestly, I can understand Tommy’s logic here. Needing help, he goes to Dean, who’s really the only logical choice. Tommy’s made it clear that despite alliances with Janet and Lauren, he really doesn’t want to go to the end with them, so they’re out. Noura? Do you really think Noura would be a good idol-hunting partner? No, Dean is more reliable, and has helped out Tommy in the past, making him the best option for Tommy at this point.

Unfortunately, Dean has other ideas. He wants the idol for himself, and so makes no pretense about looking. Tommy notices, and so doggedly keeps searching on his own. Eventually he finds the correct clue: A red board along a path. Color-blindness be damned. Tommy peels it up to reveal, not an idol, but another clue. In this case, a letter “H” carved into some bamboo. Still befuddled, Tommy calls in Dean for help, and while Dean still doesn’t look like he’s helping, he actually is looking, just for himself. While Tommy is looking for a path intersection or a set of sticks laid out the same way, Dean thinks it looks like the rope swing that was set up, and so goes for a swing. He oddly does not look under the swing, which was the first place I’d look if I suspected the swing was hiding something, but Dean turns out to be right in this case. He notices a similar “H” carved into one of the shelter supports, and after waiting for everyone to be off somewhere else, pulls out an idol, and a nice note from Rob and Sandra. I’m of two minds about this. On the one hand, as a Tommy supporter, I’m sad that he didn’t get the advantage. However, one of the things I love about Tommy is that he’s done so well without the need for an idol or advantage. It’s a nice thumbing of the nose at a season that so seems to emphasize idols and advantages, and also speaks well to Tommy’s skill in the game. In that sense, I’m glad that his record of good gameplay wouldn’t be sullied with such a crutch. Dean, for his part, is happy at his find, but a little too optimistic about how much power this gives him. He notes his legacy advantage (fake), his idol nullifier (won in a lame coin flip), and his hidden immunity idol (actually an accomplishment). Of these, one just makes him look bad, and two need to be played correctly to be of use. Dean thinks this makes him a major threat in the game, and I’m not saying he’s completely out of the running, but the dude overemphasizes how important these things are. I think it’s his talk throughout the episode of how “historic” this is, and how a real fan of the show appreciates what Dean’s doing that gets to me. It’s ok to like these things, but for me, they’re not what the show is or should be about, and I don’t like that Dean is perpetrating the stereotype that they’re all this show focusses on these days.

Our immunity challenge for the day is another obstacle course, though with a lot of emphasis on ladders this time. Tribe members use sticks to get down rope ladder rungs to build, well, a ladder, and then have to maneuver a bag of balls up another ladder by moving its rungs. This all ends in a table maze, which is probably the weakest element of the challenge, but it’s otherwise ok. Obstacle courses are just so commonplace at this point in the game that they just all blend together anyway. Dean ends up winning, but since he wasn’t really a target at this point, it doesn’t really matter. Dean also gets to take someone to steak dinner, and so takes Noura. Not sure what it is about Noura this episode, but she REALLY leans into the whole “dating” thing, comparing Dean to a sleazy ex-boyfriend while also admiring him in confessionals. The pair make a pat agreement to take each other to the end that neither of them really believes, so the scene is more comedy than anything. Never change, Noura.

Dean does, however, plan to use his idol nullifier tonight, since Janet needs to play her idol that night anyway, and Dean and Tommy both want her gone. Surprisingly, Janet is on board with this plan. Not so much the “idol nullifier” part, but she is suggesting the votes be piled on her so she can idol out Lauren. Not a bad plan, but definitely risky, as we see in a minute. Of course, we need misdirection, and so Dean talks about potentially wanting Lauren out instead, since she’s a bigger social threat. Tommy, however, emphasizes the threat that Janet poses as well, particularly as she’s good at fire-making, as we saw at the beginning of the season. Weirdly, they’re both right. Dean is right when he says that Lauren is more of a social threat than anyone left, and Tommy is right when he says that Janet will beat anyone in fire making. Hence, why Janet needs to go. I’m normally all for voting out the biggest threat, but due to fire making, this is the last time you can realistically get Janet out, whereas Lauren can go pretty much at any time.

The show does its level best to convince us that there’s a chance that Dean will let Lauren be voted out, but I’m personally not buying it. The misdirection this season has been pretty good overall, but after 13 episodes, we’ve learned its tricks. We know that even if it looks like people are going to make the dumb decision, they continue to do the smart thing. Hence, Janet will go home via idol nullifier, exactly as everyone predicted. After a pretty tame Tribal Council (though mercifully without the commentary of Rob and Sandra), we get just that. Even if predictable, though, we do get the impact of the idol nullifier being played. Sure, we know it’s coming, but the impact on the players, Janet in particular, still makes for an effective moment. Janet goes home and I, like the rest of the fanbase, am heartbroken. Janet was a decent player in the game, but more than that, and excellent human being. Even if she was the smart choice to vote out at this juncture, she was a bright spot in an otherwise bleak season, and a different character type that we usually see make it this late in the show. I look forward to her return, and think her interview at commercial was completely justified. Glad to hear she’s inspiring others.

That said, we the audience are not the only ones to react to that idol nullifier. The jury is quite vocal about it as well, with Missy in particular giving a good “shocked” expression at the whole thing. Here’s where my heart starts to sink, as it looks like Dean may have a point. True, he’s been playing well for the last couple of episodes, and that’s not nothing, but is a lackluster first 3/4ths of a game no longer relevant? Is a flashy end really all that’s needed at this point? Are idols and advantages really the things we want in our winner exclusively? It’s a depressing thought, if true.

On our next day, Tommy continues his social game, by spinning complete BS to Noura. He has correctly realized that, while fire-making can be a way to win jury points, it’s also a huge risk. Tommy, being risk-averse, has made sure no one has ever seen him make fire, and so sells Noura on the idea that he’s never made fire before, and isn’t good at it, the idea being that this way Noura won’t want to put him in in the hopes of beating someone else. Noura admits that he’s playing her, but also says she likes the attention. I’ll also give Tommy credit not only for hiding his skills, but also for having the smarts to do his schmoozing BEFORE the challenge, thus making the lie less transparent. It does make the winner of our challenge more transparent, though. Since both Tommy and Dean have made deals to the end with Noura, Noura is going to win the challenge, a fact emphasized when we see that it’s a repeat of the challenge from “Survivor Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers”, where tribe members balance blocks that spell a phrase (in this case, “Island of the Idols”) on a wobbly pole. Not the worst challenge, but it doesn’t have the epic feel a final challenge should. It also favors women, who tend to have better balance, and so Noura ends up the winner. Good for her, but a predictable outcome nonetheless.

Much as Noura can be fun, here she’s a bit much for everyone. It’s an accepted phenomenon that when you win immunity, you’re a bit happier than the rest of your tribe. In this case, however, the rest of the tribe REALLY wants to know what Noura’s planning, since it kind of affects them. Instead, Noura cheerfully says she’s going for a swim and suggests they share a pineapple afterward. They do not take this well, especially since when Noura DOES come and tell them her plan, she does it in her roundabout way that makes her a fun character, but hard to live with. She eventually informs Lauren that she’ll be going to fire-making due to being a threat, which Lauren does not take well, mostly because Noura still insists on describing her as her “number one”, which she objectively is not at this point. Lauren keeps asking who she’ll go against, while Noura keeps insisting on explaining her logic. She eventually reveals that, wanting Lauren beaten, she’s sending Dean to fire, evidently having bought Tommy’s lie about being bad at fire. Naturally, Tommy and Dean are both happy about this. Lauren goes off to cry for a minute, though she quickly sets to making fire. She and Dean both have some trouble, though Tommy offers both advice, so that whoever loses will still be happy he helped. How he’s never called on this, I can’t say. About the only disadvantage is that Noura comes over to try and make peace with Lauren, but as it’s Noura, she doesn’t do a very good job of it. She keeps insisting on that “number one” thing, which really pisses Lauren off. Noura also doesn’t take the hint that Lauren wants to be left alone right now. I know this show thrives on conflict, but this really just felt uncomfortable. Too personal and too pointless at this juncture to be worth showing. As to whether this was a good idea for Noura, I personally would have kept Dean around for the end, and let Tommy and Lauren go to fire. You can’t trust anything anyone says, especially relating to fire-making, and if your problem with Dean is that he’s rallying at the end, putting him in a position to win fire-making only helps that. Take that away, and you undercut his argument, and let the two big social threats duke it out.

Contrary to how Noura is, Tribal Council is short and sweet. Since Noura already knows who she’s taking, we guarantee that Tommy is safe, and Lauren and Dean go to fire-making. It’s a decently close match between them, but Dean’s extra practice and not being annoyed by Noura pays off, as he wins, thus making his case better for the end. As one might expect, I am sorry to see Lauren go home. Her game was underemphasized, especially early on, but the woman had a lot of good plays, and can be proud of herself. She played well, and it would have been interesting to see how she would have done against the jury. She definitely deserves the Probst interview she got after her exit. I also look forward to her inevitable return.

After ending the fire making challenge, Dean, in an attempt to look better, points out that he’d only made fire that day. Not bad, but he says too much. He goes on to say “Tommy played you.” This makes him look weak socially compared to Tommy. As Jack puts it: “Tommy played YOU”. Fun fact: This is the first time all season that the number of men left is greater than the number of women. No small feat.

Since we’re now at Day 39, this of course means that we get everyone’s arguments for why they should win, before we head off to Tribal Council. Surprisingly, everyone’s got at least a decent argument. Tommy of course has his social game, and Dean has his “fourth-quarter rally” as he calls it. But Noura even brings up a good point: she could easily have been the first one out, yet rallied to become a major player in the game. True, Noura’s personality and long-windedness tend to counteract any chance she has with the jury, but on its own, the argument’s not half-bad.

Not content to just let things sit, Tommy and Noura discuss their opening statements. Tommy suggests that they need to go after Dean, emphasizing how he was pulled along as a goat the entire way, and never in power. He suggests Noura talk about this in her opening statement. Translation: “Noura, make my biggest target look like an ass for me so he’s easier to beat, while keeping my hands clean of any mudslinging.” Noura seems drawn in by it, even if she realizes what Tommy’s doing, and I’m happy because it reminds me of Chris Daugherty (“Survivor Vanuatu”) convincing Twila to not hold back in their Final Tribal Council. It’s actually a brilliant move that I can’t wait to see play out.

What’s that? We’re not getting opening statements this time. Yay. Guess that made that completely pointless.

Say what you will about this season, but if nothing else, the jury has managed to do something not seen since the switch to the new Final Tribal Council Format: BE INTERESTING! Seriously, apart from Wardog’s “The theme is not on trial here; you are.” comment on “Survivor Edge of Extinction” there hasn’t been one standout moment since we moved away from questions. This jury, however, delivers. Oh, it’s not always coherent what they deliver. Indeed, a lot of their debates over social game versus idol game become a jumbled mess, but at least there’s actual DEBATE and EMOTION going into it. Things never go out of control, thanks in large part to moderator Jamal, but they do get fun. Elaine calling out Noura for giving non-answers. Aaron calling out Tommy for dismissing the idol hunting part of the game. Karishma calling out Dean for not forming the needed relationships. And of course, Kellee calling out everybody. The lack of question-and-answer makes a blow by blow impracticable, but Noura gets dismissed early on due to using yet another “dating” metaphor. Thus, it comes down to Tommy, the social player, versus Dean, the advantage player. For once, there’s no obvious winner based on arguments. Tommy wins in the early portion, since it’s most about social game, and Dean admits that he didn’t make those bonds. Dean tries to spin it as a positive, saying that he didn’t break any bonds as a result, but with how many admit that Tommy was up in their alliance, coupled with Tommy doing a good job articulating his strategy, and owning up to his playing of Noura to guarantee himself safety. The second portion focusses on idols, advantages, and immunity wins, an area where Tommy is pretty much completely lacking. Tommy takes the appropriate tactic of downplaying the importance of these things, though this does incite debate amongst the jury whether that’s true (Aaron and Missy seem to feel it is, others not so much). None of this is helped by Dean’s revelation that he found the idol under Tommy’s proverbial nose. Even the revelation of the fake legacy advantage doesn’t hurt, as Jamal points out he was able to use it as a threat in spite of being a fake. Tommy doesn’t come out looking too good, but Dean also shoots himself in the foot. Having initially said he made no deals he couldn’t keep, he mentions having made final two deals with people sitting on the jury, and is rightly called out for it. There’s closing statements, but that’s basically the note we go out on.

So, it’s social game versus flashy game. As always, and as it should, social game wins out. Tommy wins, the first person to do so without an idol or advantage since Denise Stapely on “Survivor Philippines” (if you count winning immunity as well, the last person to match Tommy was Natalie White on “Survivor Samoa”). That is a good note for the season. One thing this episode did that the season as a whole avoided was to REALLY emphasize the importance of idols and advantages in the game. They were talked about, sure, but never really seen as a “necessity” before that episode. Unlike the rest of the season, the twist of the season overall was emphasized as the main focus of the season in this episode. That’s why someone like Dean, who only really started doing anything worthy of a vote last episode, is still talked about as a contender. So, for all that emphasis, it is satisfying to see the one guy who had NONE of that, and just played his social game, give a figurative thumbed nose to production. Tommy may not be the most interesting winner, but he did play an excellent game worthy of his victory. And I’m not just saying that because he was my personal favorite.

And so we come to our “live” reunion show. As has been highly publicized by now, it was pre-recorded, and we the viewers got an edited version. I’m of two minds about this. On the one hand, unlike an edited tv show, a truly live reunion can’t be edited super fast, and there are kids who watch “Survivor”. Wouldn’t want them picking up anything negative like that. Plus, with lawsuits doubtless pending, you want to make sure you don’t say anything that can be used against you. And, above all, this can hopefully avoid a “Jerri Manthey” incident like we had on “Survivor All-Stars”. That said, it’s not down to the show to police what they show, but down to families, and editing the reunion also gives the show control of the narrative, which they could do who knows what with. All that is suspicious, and on the whole, I think they should have kept it live, though I can understand why they did it the way they did, and won’t vilify them for it.

As to the show itself, it’s ok. Not great. We hear at least a bit from most people on the jury and up, but almost nothing from the pre-mergers, including our first Canadian! Also, why wasn’t Jack able to come? Dan I get, but why not Jack? Still, the big story is the Probst/Kellee conversation, and in one final twist on how the show has been, they handle it WAY better than they have so far. They admit fault. They explain that they’re going to do better. But most important, they give Kellee a platform to speak on her experience, and largely let her do it. Probst interrupts a little bit at one point, but for the most part, they handle things well here. It gives me hope for the future, and Kellee says she hopes that the incident won’t color the overall perception of the season.

I feel for Kellee, but unfortunately I think the damage was done. Even this overall lackluster, predictable finale, despite a nice outcome, doesn’t change anything. For good or for ill, despite everything good about this season, including a great and overall likable cast (again, Dan notwithstanding) with a good reaffirmation of the importance of the social game, when we look back on the season, what we’ll think of is the controversy, and it just drags the season down too much. I hope most of the cast gets a second chance, because they deserve a season unmarred by this controversy.

But that’s not what you want to hear about. You want me to talk about the reveal for next season. And I’m sorry, but I have to complain. Don’t get me wrong, I WANT to like this season. I WANT to be excited about this season. I mean, all-winners is an idea that ANY true fan has at least thought about. Come on, look at some of the people we’re finally getting to see again. “Survivor Guatemala” finally gets the representation it so richly deserves with the return of Danni. Yul comes back to finally prove he can play well without an original-rules idol. ETHAN FREAKING ZOHN will grace our tv screens again after 16 years of absence! So yeah, I want to be excited, but I can’t. That’s because, in that preview, they also mentioned something awful. Something dreadful. Something so horrendous, it may ruin the season before it even starts…

“Winners at War”? Really? THAT’S the best title you could come up with? Look, I know “Survivor Legends” is a bit generic, but it at least has more gravitas than this. And if you did need the alliteration, you could have kept it! Drop the “At”, call it “Winners War”. That sounds cool. “Winners at War” sounds like the news tagline for a minor feud between a couple that won the lottery. Everything about this season should be big and epic. That name is not.

Oh, and I suppose they also mentioned that “Edge of Extinction” is coming back. That’s also a big mark against the season, though my hope is that, like Redemption Island being on “Survivor Blood vs. Water” it’ll be merely pointless rather than actively awful.

Well, that was a lot. Only thing left to do is go through the cast, and note how wrong I was during my cast assessment.

KELLEE-The “Wentworth Loophole” continues. Kellee was certainly memorable. Didn’t make it quite as far as I’d thought, but she still did well.

RONNIE-Again, I wasn’t super far off, but I underestimated how annoying he would be, and as a consequence overestimated his time in the game.

CHELSEA-Wrong. Much more interesting, but much shorter-lived than I predicted.

DEAN-Dean is a weird one. I’d definitely say I was right in that he never really connected with the other members of the cast, but not quite for the reasons I thought. It also never really mattered to his time in the game. On the whole, wrong.

NOURA-She was definitely as out there as I thought, and I was initially right that she would rub people the wrong way. Yet, she lasted longer than I thought. Good for her.

VINCE-Had he actually kept his head down, he might have exactly matched my predictions. As it stands, I was wrong. He was much shorter-lived than I thought.

LAUREN-Wrong, flat out. Maybe her charm just didn’t come across to me, maybe she’s just not my cup of tea, but she was WAY better than I thought at the game.

TOMMY-CALLED IT! CALLED IT! NEENER, NEENER, NEENER!

KARISHMA-Kind of right, kind of wrong. She definitely struggled out there, but then the women’s alliance kept her alive. Ended up being wrong as a result.

AARON-For once this blog, pretty much straight-up right. Muscle kept around until the merge, but not much past that.

MOLLY-Right on time in the game, wrong on personality. She was not as big a character as I thought. Probably the forgotten member of the season, if I’m being honest.

TOM-Not as big a liability as I predicted, but still wrong overall. He lasted about as long as I predicted, though.

MISSY-I may have undersold her game skills a bit, but she lasted about as long as I thought, and left for being a threat, so I was pretty much right.

JACK-He had a bit more game than I gave him credit for, but I was otherwise right. Out after the swap.

ELAINE-For once, one of the biggest characters I predicted pulled through! Elaine did end up a better Lauren Rimmer (“Survivor Heroes vs Healers vs Hustlers”), and I am thrilled to be right about her!

JASON-Wrong. Overestimated his smarts and his time in the game.

ELIZABETH-Wrong. I overestimated her game savvy, and as a result, she didn’t match my expectations. She came decently close, though.

JAMAL-Pretty charming, and out at the early merge. Another “win” for me.

JANET-Wrong, and happy to be so. She was much better at the game than I gave her credit for, and I’m happy she made it deep.

DAN-Wrong, though who could have predicted that whole debacle.

Well, that about wraps up this season. Thanks for being patient for this to come out. Now, you’d expect to see my cast assessment for “Survivor Winners at War” up soon, since the cast is revealed, but I’m waiting for confirmation that name color is indicative of tribe, due to so many previous relationships staying together. With 2/5 of the “Villains” tribe on this season, some overlap was inevitable, but some of this just seems nuts. Really? You put Jeremy and Natalie on the same tribe? What on earth made you think that was a good idea? But there’s another reason for the delay. Lame name aside, this is the 20th anniversary of “Survivor”, and that deserves celebration. I think it’s time we go back and look at those season rankings…

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor Edge of Extinction” Episode 4: Sailor Wendy

Freeing chickens by moonlight/Spilling secrets by daylight/Busted ankle and she’ll still fight/She is the one named Big Wendy!

Yes, this introduction is corny, but it’s better than what we get on the show these days. Not only do we lack the awesomeness that is the “Survivor” theme song, but now we don’t even get Post-Tribal Council fallout. Why? Edge of Extinction, of course! Everyone’s favorite twist that just gets worse and worse with each passing episode! To its credit, though, we do at least get something different this time around. Reem and Keith were both allied, so their subsequent vote-outs were to be expected, and their bond largely intact. Chris, though? He is amongst those responsible for their evictions, and so you can expect initial conversations to be, well, awkward. What you don’t expect is for Reem and Keith to be so vindictive. Granted, I’d expect lack of food to do that to anyone, but they really lay into Chris as though he’s the scum of the earth, gaining schadenfreude from his blindside. Ok, Keith I can kind of get. Chris was his play to stay in the game, and it didn’t work. But Reem? Yes, Chris voted against her as well, but he was just a number among many, and was by no means the orchestrator of her demise. Someone like Kelley, Lauren, or Wardog I could understand, but Chris was just someone on your tribe who didn’t vote with you. Guess what? SO WAS KEITH! Oh well. I feel bad for Chris here, but at least his judgement day gives us something different to watch.

Moving onto the players ACTUALLY in the game (I still refuse to consider those on the Edge of Extinction fully “in the game”), we see that Wendy’s chicken crusade continues. Trying a different tack, she returns the flint, now ready to enact her own version of “Chicken Run”. Here we see that Wendy’s TRUE flaw in the game is her inability to keep a secret, well, secret. We saw her earlier talk to Rick about her chicken-freeing plans, and now she nearly does the same with David. Some might be inclined to blame this on her Tourette’s, and I can’t rule out that possibility. However, given that she’s been shown to be high-energy regardless, and she didn’t talk about her Tourette’s making it hard for her to keep secrets, I’m inclined to say that has nothing to do with it. Wendy’s just really bad at keeping secrets.

Not helping Wendy’s case is the fact that people (Kelley in particular) have finally caught on that she STOLE THE FLINT! Better late than never, I suppose. Since this only adds to Wendy’s already substantial pile of “Royally Screwed”, she’ll need a big shift in order for things to work out for her. Cue the tribe swap!

Actually, that’s about our only cue. We forgo our usual foreshadowing confessionals (the person on the bottom talking about needing a miracle, the person on top talking about how safe they are, etc.), which I like. Shake up the formula once in a while, I say. Sadly, what we replace it with is arguably worse. Yes folks, it’s time for PROBST HYPERBOLE! Watch as Jeff Probst tries desperately to interest you in what has so far been a pretty lackluster season by making out that your average shocked tribe expression is the BIGGEST the show has ever had! Look, Probst, I get what you’re trying to do, but this was just way too obvious. Yeah, this was probably the biggest reaction so far of the season, but of the whole show? Whether you want to admit it or not, “Survivor Gabon” exits, and was a good season. If nothing else, it gave us the over-the-top reaction to the exit of Marcus Lehman, which is the REAL “Biggest reaction of all time”.

Thus comes our promised tribe switch, this time to three tribes. Now, I get why this is done these days. It helps prevent supermajorities, and shakes things up from your regular switch. But at this point, it’s become so predictable, I think it needs to be retired, at least for a little while. People are starting to guess a switch to three tribes is coming, and planning accordingly. Shake things up! Keep people guessing! Make for a more exciting game WITHOUT being really predictable. Hell, you even know what the buff color will be before the reveal. It’s green. Because with the exception of Angkor on “Survivor Cambodia”, it’s ALWAYS green! Look, as green is my favorite color, I’m happy to see it used more often, but give us some variety for goodness sake!

Well, at least the breakdown of our switch gives us some variety, in the form of a rare fall-out. This is not really a “switch” so much as a “dissolution”, as there are very few new interactions to be had. Joe, Aurora, Julie, Julia, and Ron all stay on Kama. Aubry, Victoria, Eric, and Gavin remain together as well, joining Wendy on Manu. This means that our big five alliance, the one that’s voted together at every Tribal Council so far, makes up the new Lesu tribe. A fun concept on paper, being effectively a swap that’s not really a swap, but then, when you think about it more, it’s really lame. Here’s where I’d normally describe the new dynamics this creates, but there are practically none! Everybody stays with everybody else! The only new interaction is on Manu, and even then, basically all it does is help Aubry stay in the game longer. Granted, I’m in favor of this outcome, but it doesn’t really add anything to the season. Ultimately, this just makes the swap seem like a pointless waste of what could instead have been a challenge.

That said, I must now nerd-out “Survivor” style, and call Gavin for saying that there’s never been a swap like this before. Yes, Gavin, there has. “Survivor All-Stars”? Second swap? Chapera and Mogo Mogo just switched camps, with only Amber ending up with new people? Granted, that was two tribes to two tribes, and the camps at least changed, but still, pretty similar situation, no? Some might argue that “Survivor All-Stars” goes into the same category as “Survivor Game Changers”, but I think “Survivor All-Stars” deserves more credit than that. Yeah, it’s by no means a top-tier season, but it had some fun moments, so big emotions involved, and if you look at it as less of a season in and of itself and more a love letter to past seasons, it actually works really well. Yes, I would argue that it’s better than “Survivor Heroes vs. Villains” in that regard. Bite me. If nothing else, “Survivor All-Stars” is a guilty pleasure for me, and I think it needs more love.

Tirade over, we now go deeper into the dynamics of Lesu. Not since Angkor have we quite got a tribe that seems so screwed to be at the new camp. Post Angkor, it seems like the newly created tribe gets some advantage, whether it be an extra person (“Survivor Millennials vs. Gen-X”), getting a challenge beast on the tribe (“Survivor Game Changers”), or just getting someone who can make camp life extremely easy (“Survivor Ghost Island”), something seems to compensate the new tribe for their inherent disadvantage. This time, however, there’s nothing. True, no one with the possible exception of David seems to suck in challenges (and even then, David does usually have a knack for puzzles), but there’s no big guns either. No, Wardog does not count as a big gun, given his track record in challenges so far. Add onto that having to build a new shelter and start with no ship supplies, I’d say Lesu is in trouble.

Such tensions will usually get one person to crack, and this time that person is Lauren. She’s been having trouble eating, and the extra physical labor involved in the new camp is getting to her. I can’t say I don’t sympathize with her, but I must counter her claim that “‘Survivor would be fun.” Dear, I may not agree with Keith Nale (“Survivor San Juan del Sur”) a lot of the time, but this bit of wisdom from him rings true: “‘Survivor’ ain’t fun. Going on a cruise is fun.” I’m all for fans playing the game, but don’t have any illusions about what you’re getting into.

Moving over to Manu, Wendy is giving everyone the grand tour. Aubry should know the camp quite well, as it’s clearly the old Mana camp she spent the majority of “Survivor Game Changers” at, but evidently she’s being polite. Speaking of Aubry, her new lease on life is confirmed when Wendy begins spilling the secrets of Manu to her new tribe, which I can’t really blame her for. With no knowledge of the Edge of Extinction, she has no reason not to burn the people who perpetually kept her out of the loop, and since the old Kama seem set up to run the game, might as well ingratiate yourself now. Aubry goes full Boston Rob from “Survivor Redemption Island”, and laughs at the “ametures” (his words, not hers) giving up info so easily.

All well and good, but bear in mind that Aubry is with arguably three of the people most dead-set against working with a returnee from her old tribe. Why should she think Wendy will go before her, old Manu or not? Well, the answer to that is our old friends, the chickens! Yes, while Manu camp doesn’t have quite the amenities of Kama camp, it does have chickens, which Eric in particular is very keen on eating. Wendy once again sticks up for the chickens, and while Eric has a more sympathetic ear that most of the old Manu, he’s still pretty dead-set on killing a chicken.

Checking in with Kama, Joe now decides to turn on his “charm”, so that he doesn’t just have to rely on physical strength to carry him through the game. Not a bad idea in theory, but we quickly see that Joe doesn’t really know how to pull it off. The man was allied with Aurora and Aubry. Aubry is now gone, but he at least has Aurora on his side. This means all he needs is one more. Does he try to pull in Julie, the lady who has seemed most on the outs, and closer in age to Aurora, thus meaning a possible connection. No, that would be the SMART thing to do! Instead, he decides to try and convert Ron. You know, the guy Joe caught plotting against him LITERALLY TWO DAYS AGO! Look, a tribe swap can shake things up, but when all your tribe does is shrink, it’s probably not going to change things that much. Sure enough, Ron quickly reveals that his talk to Joe was all a ploy so that Julia could go through his belongings, checking for an idol. When no idol is found, Ron is willing to accelerate Joe’s demise, even at the cost of his tribe. I can understand the impulse, but I’m not sure it’s wise. Kama seems to be the overall weakest tribe, with their only saving graces being Ron’s puzzle ability and Joey Amazing. Get rid of half of that, and you can expect many a Tribal Council visit. With only original tribe members to vote out after that, there’s not a lot going your way.

Back at Manu, Wendy decides to enact Opertaion: Fly the Coop, sneaking in and releasing the chickens. It makes for a fun scene, and Wendy gives us Stereotypical Anime Girl Pose #5, which is something you rarely see on “Survivor”, so I enjoy it. What’s more, Wendy actually pulls the move off with SUBTLETY this time, waiting until everyone’s asleep, thus giving her plausible deniability. Good in theory, at least, but plausible deniability only carries one so far. Wendy, unfortunately, has been too vocal about the chickens, and so everyone can tell that she’s been planning this anyway. Things get worse when the chickens, territorial creatures, keep trying to come back to camp, forcing Wendy to shoo them away. Honestly, who can blame them for coming back? That was a sweep coop they had, with a net giving them a wide-open area. Shame we couldn’t have seen THAT being built. Maybe in place of, say, Edge of Extinction?

Eric in particular is mad about the chickens, stating that the first one he catches goes straight into the pot. This confessional is interrupted by the clucking of a nearby chicken. I have to admit, that’s good. It got a chuckle out of me.

Say, since we’ve got nothing by rehashed tribe dynamics for those IN the game, why no have some rehashed tribe dynamics for those out of the game? Yes, it’s back to the Edge of Extinction. Keith gives us a confessional about the temptation of the sail. What it means to him. How much easier than living on this island it is. Wow. A really touching confessional that brings something we haven’t heard before to the game. Almost makes this twist worth it. Too bad we have to the segway into more bashing of Chris for little reason. Chris, for his part, tries to redeem himself, and so takes out the fishing spear and brings back… wait, FISHING SPEAR! Dammit, “Survivor”, you can’t even stick to your own premise now! I thought “Edge of Extinction” players were supposed to get nothing, and now, not only do you give them rice, but you give them a fishing spear too? How is this in any way worse conditions than the regular camps? You’ve officially lost the right to say this twist in any way tests the metal of the contestants.

Chris comes back with fish, finally earning him some love from Keith and Reem. Talking about Reem for another minute, I’ll give credit that she’s at least toughening up during her time out there. When Chris and Keith complain about the conditions, she points out that this isn’t the Holiday Inn, and they can’t expect comfort. It’s fun to see from Reem, if only because it makes me see her as the second coming of Twila Tanner (“Survivor Vanuatu”) and it is glorious.

Our challenge today technically originates on “Survivor Samoa”, but is more directly copied from the second immunity challenge of “Survivor Cambodia”. Tribes first race up a pair of A-Frames, then tie rope to pull a crate. Then, of course, you solve a puzzle, with the first two solved puzzles winning immunity. A reused challenge, to be sure, but a cool and infrequent one, so I’m willing to let it slide.

I’ve talked briefly about the challenge abilities of Lesu and Kama, but let’s talk Manu for a second. Since most challenges are “only as fast as your slowest member”, I’d say they have an edge. They have puzzle ability in Aubry (and, as we’ll later see, Wendy), and probably the only guy comparable to Joey Amazing in Eric. With no real challenge sinks, I have a hard time seeing them lose a challenge. Kama has some of the physically weaker members, and Lesu just a lack of big guns, but Manu has no real weak suit. Give them any time of challenge, they’ll probably do well. That said, I feel like Manu is the most likely to lose based on targeting. They’ve had a lot of talk about taking out Wendy, and the vendetta against returnees may still stand for Aubry. True, we’ve had some talk on both other tribes about vote-related topics (Ron’s plan against Joe, Lauren being ill), but nothing that coalesces very well. Hell, despite Lesu being favored to lose based on strength, I’d say they’re least likely to lose based on screentime.

However, that all goes downhill pretty quickly, so let’s talk idols for a moment. I always favor the split idol when multiple tribes need immunity, but what they go with here is pretty cool as well. Probst pulls out a wooden phoenix to pair with the dragon, looking to be at war with each other. The idols have a theme and feel like they fit together, yet aren’t identical. It’s a cool and different way of having multiple idols. I still prefer having one idol that splits apart, but I like this better than either having a mini-idol or multiple copies of an idol, and I could see some creative idols coming out in the future as a result.

Dodo music heralds the demise of Lesu, as even a favorable amount of confessionals can’t spare them a trip to Tribal Council. Back at camp, everyone is devastated. As well they should be. This is the group that voted together every single time this season. The group that, as a result, has had the chance to form the tightest bond. And now they have to turn on each other, much sooner than expected. This should be touching. This should be the highlight of the season. This Tribal Council, on paper, should be the emotional equivalent of the Dan Barry boot on “Survivor Exile Island”. It should be that heart-wrenching. And yet… I don’t care.

You are, perhaps, wondering why I don’t care. The answer is simple. The vote out at the aforementioned Dan Tribal Council was impactful because of the time we spent getting to know the La Mina Tribe. While perhaps not as interesting as the clashing personalities on Casaya, we still knew who these people were. We still met them. We still cared about them. Who can we care about on this tribe, based on what we’ve seen? David and Rick? Ok, fair, they’re a funny and smart pair, but they still have yet to truly stand out. Everyone else? Lauren found an idol, good for her. Doesn’t make her a memorable player we’ve bonded with. Wardog? Fun for how he always ends up in charge of the boot, but still yet to carve a name for himself, and seems like he’s trying to hard when he does. Even Kelley, taken on her own merits this season, hasn’t done much to earn investment. As a returnee, she has an advantage in that department. And even THEN, we’ve seen more of people geeking out over her than we have anything from her properly. I love Kelley Wentworth as much as the next guy, but she needs to step it up. Bring out that charm and grit we saw on “Survivor Cambodia”.

Moving on to the strategizing, David and Rick quickly nix the “Vote out Kelley” plan, on the basis that “The time isn’t right.” according to David. Translation: Wardog won’t go for the plan, and we need him as a swing vote. As such, they decide to target Lauren due to her illness. This makes sense, as Wardog has seemed to favor that type of strategy so far. Plus, David suspects that Kelley has an idol at this point, and thus Lauren is the “safe” vote. Ok, this episode will completely redeem itself if David’s proclamation there is what ends up biting him in the butt on this vote.

Kelley and Lauren, as you’d expect, are our other pair, and quickly decide to target Rick as being more likely to flip in the event of the merge. I can kind of see that, but if I was Lauren, I’d push harder for David. Bigger threat, not great in challenges so far, and getting rid of him gives you power over the returnees left. Perhaps Kelley wouldn’t go for it? In any case, Wardog once again finds himself the swing vote, and at this point I think we have to assume that it’s his maneuvering that’s got him in this position. Given that he’s the swing vote at pretty much EVERY vote so far, it has to be intentional. He claims to be unsure of what to do as we head off to Tribal Council, but really, the outcome is obvious. Lauren will go home tonight. She’s fun and all, but Rick has been built up as a big character for the season, if not the overall breakout character of the season. No way we lose him now. That said, it will be the wrong move for Wardog. The debate here is down to strength versus loyalty, and given that the old Manu will almost certainly be down in numbers come the merge, loyalty is needed. Plus, Wardog as an in with at least Kelley, whereas Rick and David seem inseparably tight. Then again, who said Wardog always makes the smart move?

Rick kicks off our festivities tonight with a fun fake broadcast for the “Lesu News Network”. Frankly I’m surprised it took him this long to make a joke like that. The wait was worth it, though, as it is quite funny. Sadly, the rest of Tribal Council does not live up to it. Again, it SHOULD be really emotional. Everyone hits all the right beats, talking about how bonded they are, and how they don’t want anyone to go. But because we just don’t care about the people experiencing it, we don’t care about the experience.

Even the shock that Wardog did the smart thing and send Rick home isn’t enough to save it. Granted, it’s better than a predictable vote, but now I’m just sad we lost one of the biggest characters of the season. It was the smart move, but Rick brought much-needed levity to the season. With him gone, not only does Kama’s dominance seem assured, but now it will be all the more hollow without our funny man.

This episode needed to help a season that has been struggling overall, but did not deliver. There were one or two bright spots of humor, but apart from that, again, we just don’t care. It’s still salvageable, but we need to connect more with this case, and we need to do it now. Can it be done with Edge of Extinction taking up more and more time each episode? Possibly, but it’s an uphill battle. Still, I’ve been wrong before. Perhaps this is one of those times.

As a final note before I sign off, I want to talk briefly about our “Next Time On…” preview. I normally don’t mention these, as doing so would be pointless, but I feel so strongly about something that I need to call BS. Much as it pains me to say it, I don’t see an Aubry/Wendy/Victoria alliance coming to fruition. Victoria was too set against returnees. My guess is that, like Ron with Joe, it’s just another diversion. You heard it here first!

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor MGX” Episode 6: OH YEAH!

Ladies and gentlemen, readers of all ages, it is my great honor to welcome you to this year’s “‘SURVIVOR’ DUNCE PARADE”! Yes, for every smart strategic move on “Survivor”, there are at least half a dozen dumb ones, and while the strategic game may be the best aspect of the show, the bad gameplay is often as entertaining. So, we’re here to celebrate it tonight! The bungling of easy challenges! The blatant calling-out of allies! Revealing secrets that were actually not secrets! Giving up immunity (ok, that one didn’t happen, but a celebration of all things stupid on “Survivor” would not be complete without mentioning the dumbest of dumb moves). And we have a spectacular grand marshall this year. The paragon of all things stupid from the most recent episode, put your various appendages together for MR. TAYLOR LEE STOCKER!

What? You thought it was going to be Figgy? Well true, she’d have been a worthy candidate, but at LEAST she had the sense to question, even for a single second, Adam’s loyalty. Taylor? Blindly faithful up until the end. And while he may not have made the stupid mistakes that Figgy made, I get the sense that he was complicit in them, which makes him guilty enough in my eyes. Or maybe I just wanted to fake you out in that opening paragraph.

Our return from Tribal Council is surprisingly subdued, but united votes will do that. Our actual surprise here comes from one of the positive comments. With every vote, there’s a virtual guarantee that at least SOMEONE will be happy with the results, usually the person who orchestrated it. Therefore, one would expect Chris to be happy, since he got his “revenge” on David and CeCe, or perhaps Zeke, who managed to survive despite his original tribe being down in numbers. But no, our positive outlook tonight comes from David, who tells us that people he can’t trust need to go. Really, David? CECE was the one you couldn’t trust. You’re surrounded by two members of the opposing tribe, and stuck with a guy you’ve been against pretty much from the beginning, and yet CECE wasn’t trustworthy. Go soak your head.

Heading over to Ikabula, our designated narrator Jay is at it once again. Since this is Jay talking, we know it’s either going to be talking about perseverance, or the benefits of being a millennial. What’s that? It’s both? HUZZAH! Jay gets a little teary over needing to take care of the tribe, which would be a sweet scene were it not immediately followed by the incredibly selfish act of idol hunting. He takes Will along, so I guess it’s KIND OF teamwork-y, but even that’s a stretch.

Picking up a random bamboo stick ultimately yields Jay his reward, as he’s fortunately not so stupid as to overlook the tribe symbol. Having only marginally less trouble than David at breaking sticks, Jay eventually gets the idol, and he and Will take a second to admire it. Jay does endear himself to me slightly by badly singing the “Survivor” theme song while finding the idol. Many former contestants will tell you that they hear the song when important things happen in their game, and it’s nice to hear it vocalized so blatantly. And while it was hilarious to have the actual theme song play over Jay’s singing, I must protest the fact that you’ll play the intro music HERE, but not actually show the intro on the show. But back to Jay and Will. Smartly, they decide to keep the idol between themselves.

CRASH!

ME: Michaela?

MICHAELA: No, it’s the Kool-Aid Man. Of course it’s Michaela! I’m here to bust up this little idol party!

ME: That’s all well and good, but did you have to bust up my apartment as well? I have to sleep here.

MICHAELA: Sleep is for the week! I’m sleeping on a crap-ass beach, how do you think I feel?

ME: A crap-ass beach you don’t have to pay for.

MICHAELA: You sayin’ I get stuff handed to me? I worked my way through college like I work my way through challenges. You really want me gone? This tribe is gonna turn into another Angkor without me.

ME: You’re tribe’s not here right now. And I’ve got a blog to do. You value hard work? Let me do mine.

MICHAELA: Fine, just remember, I am the quote machine!

(Michaela jumps out the gaping hole in my apartment wall.)

Hmm, perhaps it’s time I start monetizing this blog. In any case, it cannot be denied that what we’ve got here is another hilarious Michaela moment. No sooner have Will and Jay agreed to keep the idol between the two of them, but we pan over to Michaela bursting out of the underbrush, having just wondered her way into valuable information. Granted, this isn’t entirely on her, as the camerawork and editing help make this scene as funny as it is, but it’s still great. Plus, I love her comment comparing Will and Jay to huddled-up eskimos. There’s something about the juxtaposition of eskimos and “Survivor” that is inherently hilarious, and is yet another feather in Michaela’s quote cap. She also says that she’ll keep a lid on things for now, but that she knows that Jay won’t play that idol on her, and so will bust things up for her own benefit. A smart way to play, but I want you to remember this potential disloyalty to Jay for the future, because it’ll be a bit hypocritical of her down the road.

We head off to our reward challenge, which is a good old-fashioned blindfold challenge. This is your pretty standard “Get the puzzle pieces and solve the puzzle.” type one, but what makes it stand out is how sadistic it is. Usually, the most you have to do to get a puzzle piece in these sorts of challenges is untie it. This one gives us real puzzle-type obstacles, usually revolving around undoing something to reach the puzzle pieces. But the true sadism is the puzzle itself. As puzzles on “Survivor” go, this one is basically an 8-piece picture puzzle, not much more complicated than a child’s jigsaw puzzle, but usually people are allowed to do the puzzle without the blindfold. Here, we’ve got the caller doing the puzzle, but directing the BLINDFOLDED players in doing it, adding a layer of difficulty never before seen on the show. And I love it. It’s a simple challenge, all things considered, but deceptively tricky. My only real complaint is that we didn’t get an explanation of what the obstacles were before the challenge, making it hard to follow at times, but the sheer sadism of it wins out in the end.

Thus begins the Figgy stupidity. With Vanua’s return, and the revelation of the demise of CeCe, Figgy is ecstatic that Michelle is still in the game. Oh, and Zeke of course. Can’t forget about Zeke. She likes him too! Kind of. Sort of. Not really. I really shouldn’t have to spell out why calling out your allies is a bad idea, but I will at least play devil’s advocate and point out that there is precedent for such callings out to work out well. The most famous instance would be Scout declaring how happy she was to see Twila in the merge episode of “Survivor Vanuatu”, which Twila notes is kind of a stupid idea, but the fact that the pair placed third and second respectively somewhat undermines the point. Precedent does not override basic logic, though, and I must still call it a horrible move by Figgy.

Remember that puzzle that I said was really simple and easy to solve, apart from the difficulty of directing someone who can’t see in doing it? Yeah, Figgy sucks at that. Takali gets a pretty major lead, largely due to David sucking at anything challenge related (though I’m inclined to give him a pass on this one since it’s often the skill of the caller, not the runner, that determines skill in these sorts of situations), but can’t solve the puzzle. And you can’t make any arguments about a lack of good communication ruining it. This isn’t a situation like the Jerri and Amber missed connection on “Survivor The Australian Outback”, where it was clear that the pair just weren’t getting their point across. Figgy was getting Ken to do what she wanted. It’s just that she couldn’t solve one of the simplest puzzles in “Survivor” history.

Speaking of “Survivor” history, we get a repeat of “Survivor Kaoh Rong”, as Hannah starts to feel faint in the heat. I would like to take this time to remind you that Hannah sat out this challenge. At least Debbie, Cydney, and Caleb had the excuse of playing a long challenge. Probst, wisely not wanting to take many risks (“Survivor Kaoh Rong” is doubtless on his mind as well), and tells her to sit in the shade. She still has tingly cheeks, though, so Dr. Joe is called in, and diagnoses a panic attack. Since we got no hype about a medical evacuation prior to this season getting started, nothing comes of it, and it barely counts as a footnote in the episode.

Vanua, despite having David on their team, manages to come in first, largely thanks to Michelle being the only one competent at puzzles doing the calling this challenge. This earns them a variety of baked goods, which they indulge in, while also dumping praise on Michelle. Amongst those with a brain is Zeke, who begins to think that if Figgy is tight with Michelle, then perhaps Michelle ought to go, since Figgy isn’t exactly his friend. Not a bad thought, but should Vanua go to Tribal Council again (a likely occurrence, since they’re really the only tribe we get any strategy from pre-immunity challenge), I don’t think that would be the smartest move for Zeke. Yes, Michelle is a threat, and yes, Figgy calling her out is a problem, but you have to think short-term as well. Right now, David is most likely the next to go. True, he has an idol, but he can probably be blindsided, and Zeke doesn’t have a way of knowing that at this point. This puts Zeke in the power position in future votes, deciding between sticking with Michelle or Chris. If Michelle goes, by contrast, then Chris is really in the power position, deciding between David and Zeke. Besides, in a sense Figgy calling out Michelle specifically makes the pair less threatening, since everyone else will target them. Can’t fault his logic overall, but it’s just not the best logic.

Hannah talks about panic attacks at Ikabula. Nothing comes of it. Moving on…

We FINALLY get to see Takali in this episode, and it’s time to board the stupid train once again! Figgy and Taylor are once again discussing the merits of revealing their “secret romance” to the group. Figgy tries to redeem herself in the eyes of the audience by being the member of the pair to question whether doing so would be smart, but Taylor shoots her down by pointing out that they’ve got the numbers anyway. I would remind you that Adam has been on the bottom of your “Triforce” alliance, and has every reason to get rid of half of a power couple such as yourselves. But then again, when did we ever equate Taylor with strategy? The pair reveal their romance, which both Jessica and Ken take with hilarious sarcastic surprise. Nothing less for our two morons of the season!

Moving onto our immunity challenge, we continue our trend of standard challenges that are secretly diabolical. Two tribe members race across a balance beam in the water, and then up a post to retrieve three bags of coconuts apiece. Once all six bags are back and hung on a platform, two other tribe members open them, looking for three balls mixed in with the coconuts. Once the balls are found, they then race to get those balls through a table maze into three slots at the end, with the first two tribes to fill their slots winning immunity. As I say, this’d be a pretty basic obstacle-course type challenge were it not for two factors. First is that pole they need to get up, which is hard-core. As far as we can see, there’s no ladder rungs or anything, it’s basically climbing up a small pyramid and then a thin pole. Pretty gnarly stuff. Second is our table maze, which breaks the standard norm for “Survivor”. Usually, a table maze is just that: a maze of a table with holes in it. Sometimes there’s paths, sometimes there’s swiss cheese. There’s a sentence I never thought I’d write. But overall, this one stand out by having raised obstacles to get around instead of holes. Judging by the overall performance seen in this challenge, I’d say our players weren’t expecting that.

Another nice thing is that we get a back-and forth challenge. Ken falls off the balance beam early, setting Takali behind, while David’s relative lack of suckage keeps Vanua in the game. That’s relative, though, as strong hauls by Jay and Ken, plus some good running by Taylor, puts Takali back in the lead. Then, Ikabula overtakes everybody on the table maze. This is, once again, largely thanks to Michaela. In true old-school “Survivor” hero style, she pretty much single handedly wins them the challenge, even compensating for Hannah’s shaky performance.

Michaela’s challenge performance costs here dearly, though. No, I’m not talking about the victory in and of itself. In terms of her overall game, though, it may have been a Pyrrhic Victory. For all that I’ve praised Michaela this season (and will continue to praise her), this challenge showed some cracks in her game. First, while I won’t deny that Hannah’s challenge performance was doubtless frustrating, Michaela snapping at her to shut up was the wrong thing to do, and especially the wrong thing to do repeatedly. Michaela has a sharp tongue, which we kind of saw in episode 2 with her contempt for “Figtails” (which, as a side note, is actually a pretty cute couple name), but here it really comes out in full force. She can protest that she loves Hannah all she wants, but it’s clear that Hannah wasn’t happy with it, and it implies a weak social game on Michaela’s part. Not a good weakness to have in a game designated “A social experiment.”

But her second mistake? Well, while Ikabula was pulling ahead, Zeke and Michelle were struggling for Vanua. Not that the Jessicas (yes, “Figgy” is really named Jessica, look it up), were faring much better on Takali, but it was pretty clear Takali had the edge. Therefore, Michaela decided to take a page from the book of Laura Morett (“Survivor Samoa”), and call out how to win the challenge, a la “Survivor Blood vs. Water”. Now, why would she do this? Well, the obvious justification, which is what she goes with, is that despite neither Zeke nor Michelle going home last episode, Vanua is still technically the only tribe in which the “Millennials” have no majority. Therefore, it’s much easier to guarantee that your tribe gains a bigger majority by ensuring that the tribe that has majority Millennials (that isn’t yourself) goes to Tribal Council is to help Vanua. A fair justification, and after all, didn’t all call that move “brilliant” when done by Laura? True, but there’s a couple of key points here that really take away from Michaela’s overall game here. Ensuring a majority-Millennial tribe goes to Tribal Council would be a smart move IF “Millennials vs. Gen-X” were to hold true until the end. But the tide is clearly shifting, as both Vanua and Takali are developing cross-generational alliances. Game theory dictates that the only smart move at this point is to jump on that train, since attempting to from an original-tribe alliance will most likely fail. There’s incentive on both sides to work with the other. Granted, the one tribe that DOESN’T seem to be following this pattern is Ikabula, so perhaps Michaela can be forgiven for not recognizing this. Still, it highlights her old-school gameplay style, which is entertaining to watch, but doesn’t bode well for her success. After all, the reason that old-school gameplay got supplanted by new-school gameplay is because the latter beats the former. Look at “Survivor Cambodia”, where even old-school players had to delve into new-school tactics to be at all successful. But even if you forgive Michaela for not having her finger on the pulse of the game, there’s one key difference between her situation and Laura’s that makes the move smart for Laura but not for Michaela. That difference is Redemption Island.

Consider for a moment the fact that people sitting on Redemption Island are effectively out of the game. True, producer twists can have them influence the game, and they aren’t being fed or well-cared for, but people on Redemption Island have been voted out. By and large, their strategic game is over, and it all comes down to the challenges. Even if people took umbrage with Laura’s helping Tina, no one could do anything about it. In contrast, Michaela still is in the game, and people CAN hold it against her. As I discussed with Figgy talking so much about Michelle at the reward challenge, revealing one’s hand is risky at best on “Survivor”, and more often than not will come back to haunt you. If this season does go down the path it seems to be going down, then Michaela being hard line “Millennials all the way.”, plus being a challenge beast, will only make her a prime target. Not to mention, she clearly wasn’t thinking this way earlier. Threatening in confessional to busy Jay’s game over an idol is hardly the stuff of “Go Millennials” gameplay. Frankly, Michaela’s help seems to come right out of nowhere, and it’s not for the better.

Plus, I’d point out that despite Laura’s helping Tina seeming to be a good move at the time, since Tina is ultimately the one who beat Laura for a chance to go back in the game, it didn’t help her very much in the end.

Michaela’s help gives Vanua second place, and I have to admit, this was really good misdirection from the producers. They gave us the strategic talk from Takali the episode BEFORE they go to Tribal Council, so that they don’t need to give us any this episode, and can make it look like Vanua will go instead. Well-played, well-played.

The discussion we get back at camp is pretty much what you’d expect. Adam is caught between two halves, Figgy and Taylor are overconfident, and Ken and Jessica try and swing Adam. Really, the only stand-out argument comes from Ken, who both manages to make things very personal (swearing to have Adam’s back all the way), and a logical argument, making the obvious point of “Why would you be loyal to an alliance where you’re on the bottom?” But I will admit that this DOES give Michaela’s move slightly more of a point. By calling out a Millennial majority alliance, she puts more pressure on everyone to stick in that alliance. Not doing so would seem to offend her, and Adam might need her vote down the line. Is it worth it to get rid of Figgy at the potential cost of Michelle?

Yes. Yes it is. Unlike some other votes this season, this one is a clear right/wrong choice. As Ken says, Adam has no reason to stick with a majority that put him on the bottom. Neither does Zeke. Should a merge come next episode (which I don’t think it will, but I also have a hard time seeing the old Gen-X people losing more players in future Tribal Councils), the you’ve got eight former Millennials and six former Gen-X people left. If Adam and Zeke flip, the majority flips, and since they’re on the bottom, they have every reason to flip. It could be argued that they’re trading the bottom of one alliance for another, but even if the old Gen-X can unite for a vote or two, those divisions are still there, and can still be exploited. Plus, given the choice between being on the bottom of the majority that will PROBABLY vote you out (the Gen-X side) versus the majority that will DEFINITELY vote you out (the Millennials side), better to go with the former every time. Granted that logic didn’t really work for Cochran on “Survivor South Pacific”, but no one said these were guarantees. Plus, let’s say Adam DOES stay loyal. Now he has Figgy as an ally, who, I would remind you, is stupid enough to reveal valuable alliance information in front of the enemy. More trouble than it’s worth.

We get probably our best Tribal Council of the season this evening. Oh, not because of the strategy talk; that’s all pretty standard stuff for a tribe of five, but from our alpha couple of Figgy and Taylor. After a masterful deflection of a Probst question by Adam (focussing on the “Does Figgy look at you the same way as Taylor?” part takes the subject away from the “Can you be trusted?” part), Figgy and Taylor blather on about their love. This would be pretty standard stuff, but Probst, wouldn’t you know it, is an ordained minister, and offers to marry them on the spot. AND THEY ACTUALLY CONSIDER IT! They ultimately don’t go through, unfortunately, because wouldn’t THAT have been a Tribal Council. Shame on you! You are contestants on a reality show! Have less restraint! Entertain me, peasants! The strategy talk holds up ok on its own, but there’s little originality to it, and frankly, it’s all overshadowed by proposed marriage.

Sure enough, little miss stupid herself is sent home, and the Hallelujah Chorus can be hear from the throats of all “Survivor” fans. The Taylor/Figgy love fest was getting annoying, and Figgy made such a mess of herself that it was quite satisfying to see her go. And, as I say, it was the right decision. Figgy was a liability of an alliance member, and she was against you. True, you’ve potentially put Taylor on the warpath against you, but he’ll probably be gone at the merge, if not before. Should Takali keep losing after that, well, Adam does have a hidden immunity idol, mitigating the risk of this move backfiring. A nice smart move in sea of entertaining stupidity this episode.

For all that I normally rant against stupidity on “Survivor”, there comes a point where it’s just too hilarious not to love. This episode passed that threshold in the first 15 minutes. Best episode of the season so far. A little bit of strategy there, but mostly fun, if poor, gameplay. Should be fun to see what depths we will dive to next.

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor Cagayan” Episode 8: Loyalty Amongst the Horsemen

Ok, I know that “How does loyalty factor into your profession?” is one of the stock questions for a slow Tribal Council, and I know that it’s expected to showcase how loyalty is important later in the game, but really, did you have to ask LJ of all people? He’s a HORSE TRAINER for God’s sake! Of COURSE loyalty enters into that profession. About as much as any other profession.

But I get ahead of myself, the problems (and good points) about this episode don’t start at Tribal Council. No, they start at the “Previously On…” segment, which once again goes beyond recapping the previous episode, and drawing our attention to seasonal themes that spoil what the plot of the episode will be. I should say they aren’t as bad as previous ones (as they can be misleading; I thought the episode was going to center around cookie hunting), but emphasizing the Tony/LJ loyalty was probably a bad move for the overarching plot of the episode. ON the plus side, we do get the hilarity of Probst attempting to make an unsurprising vote sound dramatic. Yes, saying “And that’s exactly what happened.” is the most exciting tease ever, Probst! Actually, I think it enters into “So bad it’s good.” territory in my book.

The episode proper begins with a return from Tribal Council, which despite being less controversial than the Tribal Council before it, somehow causes a bigger and more unpleasant argument. Thankfully, this argument is confined to the screen, and does give us the benefit of setting the exciting parts of the episode in motion, by…

TONY: A compliment! How is that a compliment?

ME: Hey, what gives? I thought I sprayed my blog with “Fourth Wall Proof” coating! Seriously, does one overly loud, obnoxious, and obstinate contestant have to burst into my blog EVERY season?

TONY: HEY, HEY, HEY MAN! Why are you complaining? You should be focusing on me, Tony the screenhog! But not just a screenhog! The poor, picked-on screenhog, that’s me.

ME: Four votes at Tribal Council, from people who were outside your alliance? Poor you. And since your inability to read Kass makes me doubt your understanding of this, I should tell you I’m being sarcastic.

TONY: But it’s not like that, man! They made ME the target, out of everybody on the alliance. I’m not as strong as some. I’m not a schemer. So why go for me?

ME: I’m sure it has NOTHING to do with your being upfront about the alliance, being obnoxious, and doing everything in your power to convince everyone that you’re the ringleader of the alliance. By the way, that was sarcasm again. Oh, and that thing about you being the ringleader of the alliance? Yeah, that’s pretty much true.

TONY: But my being upfront means I’m not a threat! It’s the QUIET schemers like LJ that are the real threats! They should be the targets, not me.

ME: You see, Tony, the REASON the quiet schemers are the threats is that no one THINKS to vote for them, because they don’t give them a REASON to. By being loud and obnoxious, you give people several reasons to target you.

TONY: But what about Woo?

ME: Woo is a threat for his physical prowess and his likeability, I’ll grant you, but let’s face it: he’s not a proactive player. You, Tony, are pretty much proactive to a fault, and you’re not exactly a weakling.

TONY: But man, them calling it a compliment was just an insult.

ME: Actually, Spencer had a good point. They voted for you because you were a big threat. Maybe not the BIGGEST, but you were up there, and you probably would have won them brownie points on the jury.

TONY: Oh, I never thought of it that way.

ME: See Tony, you just need to be a little more circumspect about these things, and maybe a little less paranoid. Isn’t that better.

TONY: Not really. Hey, I’ve got an idea! I’ll concoct a convoluted revenge scheme that will only serve to lower my place in the tribe! I’m a GENIUS!

ME: Ok, that’s it. Where’s my nice new “Luzon” Buff?

(Tony beats me to a pulp and runs off, leaving me in traction).

Fortunately, Tony was kind enough to leave my fingers intact, so the blog will go on. It turns out that Tony’s revenge scheme is to turn on LJ, as Tony sees him as an equal, a delusion I must correct. Although this episode would indicate otherwise, LJ is not Tony’s equal, but his superior. They have similarities, but LJ manages to play smartly and strategically WITHOUT being abrasive and alienating people. Still, this does mean that it would be wise for Tony to eliminate LJ, as LJ is one of Tony’s biggest threats come Final Tribal. Good on him for recognizing that (albeit for the wrong reasons), but it’s too soon, for reasons I’ll discuss when we’re closer to Tribal. At the moment, though, what I can comment on is Tony’s way of eliminating LJ, which is STUPID. Tony’s plan is to blow up a conversation he purposefully led into, in which LJ casually suggested that if Woo was hiding a cookie, it might be wise to vote him out. In this way, Tony can hopefully get his alliance to turn on LJ en masse, thus eliminating a threat without making Tony seem the bad guy. I’ll admit, in terms of a goal, this is an admirable plan: eliminate an ally without losing face. The trouble is, much like his plan for throwing cookie flack onto Jeremiah, there are SOO many ways this plan could go awry, and only works if EVERY member of your alliance buys into it, which I find unlikely for Jefra, as LJ is her closest ally at this point. If even ONE person is on board, they turn against you, and everything solid you had goes out the window. Moreover, this relies on EVERYONE believing you over LJ, which if he’s really a charmer as you say, will probably be a no-sell.

The reward challenge already? My, this episode is moving fast! Since this episode seems determined to make me dislike it, we have a team reward challenge with reused elements. Divided into teams of three, the contestants will attempt to hook a ball and string around a hoop to release a bucket of sandbags. This particular aspect I can’t identify as being from any one season, admittedly, but releasing a bunch of things from a tower and what are effectively grappling hooks are nothing new to the show, so I don’t really count them. Once the sandbags are released, contestants toss them through a netted tunnel, poking the netting to move those that do not make the end, a la “Survivor Blood vs. Water”. Admittedly, this means we’re not getting something that’s overdone, but I still pine for original challenges. Finally, taking a cue from “Survivor One World” (clearly the smartest move ever), contestants bounce their sandbags off of a trampoline, attempting to land them in nets. The first team to land five sandbags in separate nets wins a spa day reward. As reused challenges go, it’s admittedly not too bad, since the elements are not overdone by any stretch. Additionally, three teams instead of two is a nice change-up, but I’m still not a fan. It’s the MERGE, give us individual challenges already!

Since the teams are randomly chosen, things end up very uneven, with Spencer, Tony, and Jeremiah going up against Woo, Tasha, and Kass, as well as LJ, Jefra, and Trish. You might expect Spencer, Tony, and Jeremiah to dominate, and while it would still be a somewhat close race, you would be correct. According to Tony this is a good thing for him, as he wants to be in on strategy talk, and according to him, people strategize and bond over all the good things that come on the reward. For once this episode, Tony is talking sense. There have been several occasions in which a reward has led to a person staying long beyond what alliances say they should. A notable example is how a reward trip with Stephenie LaGrossa on “Survivor Guatemala” helped keep Gary Hogeboom around an extra episode, and arguably helped Danni Boatwright win. However, even when making sense, Tony still can’t be entirely right. Yes, bonding does occur when going on a reward, and yes, it can be a good time for strategic talk, but having people GONE from the camp is ALSO a good time for strategic talk. And Tony, you’re leaving behind six VERY unhappy people. Bear in mind, unhappiness can bring together bitter enemies. Look at the Chris-Eliza-Twila-Scout alliance of “Survivor Vanuatu”. Twila and Scout HATED Eliza with a passion, and she returned the feelings, but mutual bitterness about their positions in the game was enough to make them the final four. Pretty impressive.

At first, though, it seems that Tony has nothing to fear, as we get Woo being his usual self, quickly getting over his disappointment at losing the reward. Nerdy references aside, I will give Woo this: he ALWAYS maintains a positive attitude, which is very hard to do anywhere in general, and on “Survivor” in particular. That nothing fazes him is very commendable, and means that I can’t help but like him. However, strategy talk is inevitable, and LJ decides to initiate it with Trish and Jefra. He takes the pair out on the boat, where they agree that maybe, just maybe, Tony’s deal is that he’s bitter over getting votes at Tribal Council. NO!? Really? I would NEVER have guessed! Oh, and Tony, you know that thing I said about your plan being very easily countered? Well, one of the ways is having the person you intend to target independently spill the beans to some of the people you were trying to win over. Which is what happens. The only real bad point of the conversation is when LJ swears undying loyalty to Tony, and admits that he’s comfortable at the moment. I stand by the assertion that LJ is actually a good strategist, and that the only reason we haven’t seen much of him this season is because of all the big personalities dominating the screen this time (read “Tony”). However, it seems that LJ does have something of a blind spot. You do NOT get “comfortable” on “Survivor”. It’s a curse. The minute you admit you are “comfortable” in a confessional, you need to go and plan a blindside immediately, because the “Survivor” Editing Gods are setting you up for an ironic finish this episode. Also, do not swear undying loyalty to ANYONE, particularly Tony. I’ll admit, for LJ he might be easy to beat at Final Tribal, but there are a LOT of other people whom LJ could beat very easily at Final Tribal, many of whom are not as erratic and unpredictable as Tony. Tony is definitely NOT one of the people you want to swear undying loyalty to, if you feel the need to do it to anyone, which you should not.

Tony’s strategizing predictions do come true, though, as he attempts to woo Spencer and Jeremiah. He says he wants to keep them around to use at a later blindside (not this Tribal, though), and they happily tell him they’re his pawns, which I do not buy in the slightest. Jeremiah maybe a little, but Spencer is nobody’s pawn. Privately, both admit that they say “Yes” to Tony because they have no other choice, but don’t actually trust him, which is smart on both their parts. The one weird aspect in all of this is that Spencer refers to Jeremiah as his “right-hand man”. Um, Spencer, perhaps you’ve forgotten a certain someone named Tasha? You know, perky, overly eager to strategize, been on the same tribe with you since the beginning? No? Ok, I guess she’ll just have to strike out on a career of her own.

Speaking of Tasha, it seems she’s auditioning for the theatre, as she so overdramatically and blatantly asks LJ to come strategize with her via “discreet rendezvous” that I can only assume that this is not actual strategizing but an attempt to gain an acting career (not bad, but needs some work). LJ decides not to go since Tony is right there and paranoid, and LJ does not believe Tasha can offer him anything. I’ll agree with the Tony argument, but you could have gone later. And incidentally, Tasha is able to offer you something. Let’s say you keep to the six, and given how Tony talks about things later, let’s say you get rid of Kass at the final six and go to the five together. You are down 3-2 against Tony, Trish, and Woo. While now might be a bit early to perform the actual blindside, it’s good to get bids in early, as you will have to take one of them out AT SOME POINT. Oh, and incidentally, my remarks about saying you’re “comfortable”? They apply here as well.

For all that I’ve ragged on Tasha, and I probably will continue to rag on Tasha, I should probably devote a bit of blog to discussing her gameplay. Tasha plays an interesting game, very different from what I expected early on. Her religion has really not come up at all (thank goodness), and she’s tougher than I expected. The flaw in her gameplay, in my mind, is this overdramaticness that I mentioned earlier. She has good ideas and fundamentals, none of her strategies (save “Eliminate Garrett over J’Tia”) are particularly bad. The problem comes in that she’s so blaze about the whole thing that it drives me nuts, and somewhat exposes her gameplay. Good strategists on “Survivor” do not DEMAND to be allowed to go strategize, they do it. Actions speak louder than words, when it comes to strategy, and while Tasha does have many actions to her name, her words are speaking so loudly that it’s annoying, at least to me. I come to watch subtle strategy, not people acting like they’re being subtle.

While the immunity challenge does provide some relief in the form of an individual challenge, it’s a weak one. A basic memory challenge in which Probst shows a sequence of things, which the contestants must then recreate one at a time. I’ve said before and I’ll say again that this type of challenge is just too easy, generic, and unexciting for my taste. To top it all off, they’re memorizing COLORS this episode. Not anything culturally relevant. Colors. Probst himself explains the problem when commenting that the challenge is like a first grade task. It is. But we don’t COME to “Survivor” to see a simple first-grade task, we come to see big, exciting challenges! This is not one of those challenges. I suppose if I were to find a positive light, I would admit that the mechanism for displaying the colors is pretty cool, but other than that, I’ve got nothing.

You’d expect the former Luzon to do well, and you wouldn’t be wrong, though both LJ and Tony outlast Spencer and Kass, somewhat to my surprise. Tasha ends up taking the whole thing, and I’m happy for her.

Sure enough, Tony cannot just leave well-enough alone, and wants LJ gone tonight, since otherwise he must eliminate potential allies Spencer and Jeremiah. I’ll admit that wanting to keep Spencer and Jeremiah around is not the WORST move for Tony, since they’re kind of on his side, but it’s still too early. The problem is that the only person you could easily flip with the lie would be Woo (since he’s not the brightest, and would be on the chopping block if Tony was telling the truth), and you could get a five person majority that way. But Tony, then you’re leaving being the majority in the majority, to being the minority in the majority, pitting yourself and Woo against Tasha, Spencer, and Jeremiah. I’ll admit you’d have the advantage physically, but one puzzle, and you guys are done. There’s a time to flip, but it’s when you’ll stay in the majority anyway. On top of that, Tony seems to think his old alliance will welcome him back with open arms, whatever move he makes, which I do not think is necessarily the case.

As if to further prove this, a conversation with Trish reveals that she, rightly, thinks it’s a poor idea to break things up this early. Kass agrees, which makes me cringe. Kass, I’m trying to help you out here, but you’re making it hard. Things make at least some sense if you’r eplaying the swing vote, but going loyal to the new Solana is a BAD IDEA! Stop doing it. Still, Tony goes to Spencer and Jeremiah, telling them to pull for LJ, which they agree to do, having little choice beyond a risky cookie usage. LJ, meanwhile, encourages everyone to split votes between Jeremiah and Spencer, to prevent cookie usage. This would be a good plan, if your allies weren’t turning on you. I suppose he doesn’t know that, but at this point, anyone who believes someone other than LJ is leaving tonight is never going to be convinced.

Not that this stops Tribal Council from trying. Tony kicks things off by bragging about his “Bag of Tricks”, which Probst rightly points out means that it’s likely that Tony will pull off a blindside tonight. We then get the aforementioned idiotic “Horse Trainers require loyalty.” bit from LJ, which is still stupid even an hour later. Not to be outdone, Tony then digs himself deeper into oblivion by bringing up the whole “construction worker” lie. So six episodes ago! And Tony, do you not think that people on the jury talk to one another? What gives you ANY doubt that Sarah has by now spilled the beans to Morgan, and now LJ, about your true profession. Just come clean and deal with it. I suppose there is one good point about Tribal Council. Kass gets asked the loyalty question as well, particularly given her flip a few episodes ago. She admits that loyalty matters in life, but points out how STUPID a question that is, in and of that the game is a separate situation, and you need to check your normal behaviors and priorities at the door. From a psychological perspective, the situation does have a large command over people, and so I think Kass speaks the truth, though I’ll get more into its implications in the special blog post I have planned for later.

If, by some miracle, you’re STILL not convinced that LJ will be going home, look no further than the music at Tribal Council. Unlike most, I don’t have much of a problem with their relatively new “Blindside” track played at Tribal Council, because the music is usually a hardly-noticeable background event of the show. In this case, however, it’s so blaring and so blunt that I really can’t condone it.

Yes, LJ is gone, and despite many major goofs this evening, I am sorry for his loss. Although he didn’t show it, and will probably never be invited back due to not being a major character, he was a good, deserving strategist, whom I these days deeply regret not making my male pick to win it all. I miss him, and I’m certain that Stephen Fishbach does as well. It doesn’t help that the only people who benefit from this are Spencer, Tasha, and Jeremiah. Tony and Woo lose credibility with the others, and Tony also loses likeability points with his old alliance. Kass, Trish, and Jefra have lost any alliance beyond themselves. Again, Tony, this was not the time.

This episode was predictable, poorly paced (all the before-immunity scenes seemed rushed), and a low point of the season… but it still wasn’t bad. The chaos between immunity and Tribal was a lot of fun to watch, and even though the result was predictable, we did get a power move to shake things up this episode, making the next one completely unpredictable. Also, while probably the worst or second-worst ( a toss-up between this episode and the last one), the rest of the season is strong enough to bear the weight, as it wasn’t TERRIBLE like we’ve seen some other seasons. Still, hopefully the next episode can get back up to par, though if one of the highlights is Woo injuring himself, I doubt it.

-Matt

Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

“Survivor” Retrospectives: Vanuatu

Well, following “Survivor All-Stars”, the show seemed to be on a streak.  “Survivor The Amazon” and “Survivor Pearl Islands” were both very well received, and “Survivor All-Stars”, while not the greatest season ever, was very much a tribute to the past, and so was still pretty well liked.  But going into the 9th season (Vanuatu), the big question was “How do you top returning castaways?”  The short answer is that you can’t, but unfortunately, it is part of what led to Vanuatu being seen as a poor season overall.  However, is it really deserved, or was it just bad timing?  Does the season whose best review calls it “forgettable” really fall at the bottom of the barrel?  Read on and find out.

First, though, a quick reminder that this review does contain spoilers. If you just want an opinion on how watchable the season is, scroll down to the bottom of the page, where I will have an “Abstract” section that will answer this question, while only talking about this season in the broadest of strokes.  But let’s waste no more time, and plunge into the review.

CAST

In my cast preview for “Survivor One World”, I listed off 4 types of seasons, and cited Vanuatu as an example of a strategy-dominated season.  You can read my full description of the implications in my blog, the link for which I have provided (

https://idolspeculation.wordpress.com/2012/01/19/idol-speculation-survivor-one-world-cast-assessment/), but suffice to say that seasons dominated by strategists usually are not received well, and that’s certainly true of this season.  A boring cast is one of the things most often cited as why Vanuatu was a bad season.  Here, though, I have to disagree.  While I do admit that Vanuatu had fewer “characters” than previous seasons, it was also one of the few seasons where nearly everybody was good at playing the game, and almost nobody shirked away from strategy.  The few exceptions (such as Dolly Neely) were quickly disposed of, leaving us with an intriguing, unpredictable game.  Seriously, looking at the season as a whole, without knowing the outcome, would you guess that Chris Daugherty would walk away with the million?  The man lost the first immunity challenge for his tribe, and was the last man standing against a strong, six woman alliance that had systematically picked off his allies!  I wouldn’t have given him any odds to win, and yet he did.  While I won’t go into much detail on the others, you certainly can’t deny that everyone who made the merge, at least, went in for strategic thinking with few qualms.  This, to my mind, made the season very intriguing.

Another major criticism of the season, which goes along with it having fewer characters, is that there were no villains to hate.  You couldn’t root against anybody, couldn’t hunger to see someone gloriously voted off, because, even when being strategic, these people were nice, or else working out of desparation.  Chris might have been good villain material, and he certainly had the one-liners for it, but having a villain win was considered bad P.R.  This led to Ami Cusack (who my dog is named after) being classed as a viallian, which, to a degree, she deserved.  I’m sorry, Eliza Orlins, but Ami snuffing out Travis “Bubba” Sampson’s and Lisa Keiffer’s torches after only the slightest HINT that they might vote you off, counts as villainous.  Does this mean that she’s a bad person?  No, none of the contestants are, they just played strategically.  A lot of people don’t like the moral conflict, being unable to outright hate someone, but I personally find it fascinating.  Pushing the limits of morals, seeing the duality of people’s personalities and actions, for me, that’s a thrill ride, and a big part of what I like about this cast.

While I will admit that this season did not have the biggest characters, I also wouldn’t say that it didn’t have ANY characters, it’s just that they’re not talked aobut very much.  Lea “Sarge” Masters is the prime example, portraying the stereotype of the drill sergeant, barking orders around his tribe, and getting fed up with more lackluster members like Rory Freeman.  Also a character was Twila Tanner, who portrayed the southern, hard working, no nonsense mom to the point where it cost her a million dollars. The problem was that these people were strategists as well as characters, and even then weren’t the most extreme characters ever, they still had some of the characteristics.  Two other people I should note, even though they aren’t “characters” are Chad Crittenden and Julie Berry, the former being the first contestant with a prosthesis (which, in a sense, is all he is remembered for, as he had the approximate personality of white bread), and the latter dating Jeff Probst for a significant period of time.  Both were ok strategists, who weren’t the greatest characters (although Julie’s attempt at nude sunbathing was a valiant effort), but got remembered for things unrelated to the game.

In short, I’ll say that what other’s see as weaknesses in this cast, I see as strengths.  A cast doesn’t need to be polarized characters to be exciting, and it was refreshing to see a majority of strategists at the merge.  It made for interesting psychology, and for my money, made this one of the better casts.

Score: 9 out of 10.

CHALLENGES

The best way I can describe the Vanuatu challenges is “meh”.  This is not to say they’re bad by any stretch of the imagination, oh no!  When they want to be awesome and epic, they take it to the extreme.  For instance, the Final 4 Immunity Challenge, a Vertical Maze, was truly exciting and new, making it one of my favorites (not quite top 5, just due to the number of amazing challenges, but easilly top 10).  The problem is that the inverse is also true: when the challenges aren’t amazing, they’re boring and forgettable.  Seriously, although the challenges aren’t awful or cringe-inducing, everything just seems toned-down and phoned in this season.  I think it was hindered by a few problems. First of all, the location is once again “Generic South Pacific Island”, so it didn’t have a distinctive culture to draw on.  Scratch that, it DID, but aside from a few Tamtams (and a hilarious incident with a pig that I’ll discuss in the “Twist” section), they didn’t do anyting with it, and this was the nation that invented BUNGEE JUMPING!  Seriously, you couldn’t come up with ANY good bungee jumping challenges?  The other big problem, though, is the main twist of the season, which I’ll here reveal is the return of the battle of the sexes.  As I mentioned in my review of “Survivor The Amazon”, when a season is “battle of the sexes”, you have to make the challenges fair for both men and women, which means generally toning down the intensity of the challenges.  This is fine, as long as you make the challenges interesting and clever, as they did in “Survivor The Amazon”.  However, the challenges in Vanuatu are simplistic and held back, which just doesn’t do it for me.  It did give us one staple challenge, which is to line tribe members on a balance beam, and have them navigate around each other, but this was the exent of it.  Again, the challenges aren’t bad, and when they’re good, they’re REALLY good, but for the most part, a weak season challenge-wise.

Score: 5 out of 10.

TWISTS

If people don’t complain about the cast of Vanuatu, the twist is usually their target, and with good reason.  As I mentioned before, the main twist of this season was a redo of “battle of the sexes”, which in and of itself was a good idea.  The problem is that it had been done not even two years ago, so it still seemed fresh in people’s minds, and it seemed like a cheap cop-out on twists.  Now, the show was no stranger to reusing twists (the tribe swap being a prime example), but this was the first time a main twist was completely rehashed, so again, it seemed like a cheap move on the part of CBS.  I would agree that reusing a twist so soon would be a bad idea, except for two reasons.  The first is that it was somewhat forced on the producers, rather than a concious decision to reuse the twist.  The DVD of Vanuatu (which I highly recommend) explains it better, but basically, the season’s opener (one of the best ever, I might add, with the natives attacking the boat, and a very violent welcome ritual) separated the men and the women, as part of the custom of the natives.  The trouble is that when this happens, people talk, and once people talk, you have to put them on the same tribe, to prevent pre-game alliances from forming.  The second reason I don’t mind a redo of the sexes is that the outcome was different.  I don’t mean just the ultimate winner (although that was a change between seasons), but just in how the tribes played things.  For one thing, while tribes did divide along age lines (so there were SOME similarities to the first battle of the sexes), this time the older group came out on top, as opposed to the younger group of “Survivor The Amazon”, which made for some interesting gameplay.  Also, this time, gender loyalties stuck beyond the merge. Bottom line, same twist, different game, makes it ok in my eyes.

Part of the battle of the sexes twist was the opening ritual, in particular one aspect.  The men were offered a chance to climb a tall pole greased with pig fat to retrieve a spiritual stone, rumored to bring good luck.  However, were they to fail, the women would get it.  Lots of superstition sprung up around the stone, so it made for good tv, and I’m glad it was in the game, and the challenge had a lot of potential as well, with lots of men falling flat on their faces in the offing.  The problem is that the man the natives picked to go first was an FBI agent, who scaled the thing on his first try, with almost no effort.  This really depleted the tension and the interest in the twist.

I suppose what could be considered the next “twist” was the “Fat Five” alliance of Chris, Chad, “Bubba”, “Sarge”, and Rory.  Not so much in that the alliance existed, that was old hat, but that it was the first time someone (Chris) failed so miserably in the first immunity challenge, completely costing the men victory, and lived to tell about it.

Our next twist is a first, one not brought on by contestants or by the producers, but by nature itself.  An earthquake shook the island, which was at least interesting to see.  It was followed by natives coming to each camp, asking for a leader.  “Sarge” was chosen for the men, and Scout Cloud Lee for the women.  They were then designated to change up the tribes, with a “One cuts and the other chooses” deal.  This was a fairly unique way to change up the tribes, and one that I rather enjoyed.

Coupled with this twist is another player-supplied one.  Rory, who along with “Bubba” had been exiled to the women’s tribe, at a 5-2 disadvantage, somehow made the merge, “Bubba” having gotten the axe for trying to signal the men’s tribe to throw the challenge.  The thing is, Rory was a throughly disagreeable individual.  Loud, abrasive, and prone to tantrums, virtually everyone wanted Rory off.  Given that he was the man who threatened to invoke the “slash, burn, and salt the earth” policy, this is hardly surprising.  Yet he showed remarkable amounts of cunning and resourcefulness and made it through, much to everyone’s amazement.

One minor twist came a few days after the merge.  At tree mail, rather than a challenge, a pig showed up, leading to hilarity and intrigue.  No one knew what the pig was for, only that he could not be eaten, much to the dismay of “Sarge” and Twila.  It was also funny trying to see Eliza haul in an entire pig by herself.  So, a lot of fun and mystery with this twist.  The one drawback was that it only lasted one episode, and the reveal was simply that it was a gift for a tribe that 4 people would visit for a reward, so a bit lackluster there.

The only other major twist to speak of has already been talked about, namely that Chris managed to survive 6 women who wanted his blood.  This, for me, rocks my socks, and makes up for all the so-so parts of the season.

So looking at the season, one can see why others don’t like it.  They reused a lot of twists, what few there were, and a lot of the twists were lackluster.  While I admit this isn’t the greatest season twist-wise, I think a lot of the twists were underrated, particularly Chris’ feat.  Also, a lot of the twists came from the people, which I liked, so I think this season is respectable on twists.

Score: 8 out of 10.

OVERALL

So I say there’s a lot to like about this season, so why is it so disliked?  A lot of it, I think, has to do with timing.  It came right after a run of really great seasons, not to mention the meta “Survivor All-Stars”, which would be hard to top in epicness without getting returning castaways.  This made an alright season seem less good by comparisson.  Also, the generic location worked against the season, hard though the producers tried to combat it.  This, plus the reused twists, make a lot of people neglect this season.  For my money, though, one thing saves it: the gameplay.  As I said, nearly everyone this season came to play, and it shows with some really great gameplay, not to mention a lot of unpredictability.  Bottom line, that’s enough for me, and I like this season a lot.  It’s not the strongest season ever, but there’s a lot of things to love.

Score: 30 out of 40.

ABSTRACT

Vanuatu is a great season to watch for any fan of good gameplay.  Nerely everyone brings their “A” game, and it shows, making for a delightful, unpredictable season.  While this is not the best season for those who like big characters, or those who love watching challenges, it is still a very good season, and well worth a watch.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor One World” Episode 13: Dare to be Stupid

Ah, the penultimate episode!  A time when everything can change!  A time when we find out the weak spots in alliances!  A time when, once again, every castaway has an excellent move placed in front of them, and all uniformly reject it.

Hello, and welcome once again to “Idol Speculation”.  We’re at the penultimate episode, and let me tell you, I can’t wait for the finale, but then again, a lot of that’s because I can’t wait for this season to be over, but there’s still some things to like.  Lets find out what they are…

We come back to Tikiano camp to find that the girls are uniformly trashing Kat.  Ok, I know I’m not one to talk about this, particularly given that I ripped Kat a new one during this blog, but this just seems cruel.  Kick her while she’s down, why don’t you?  Admittedly, Kat can’t hear them, so I suppose it’s all well and good, but it just seems pointless.  I mean, the woman was in your alliance for 33 days, have a little respect, you know.  Why bother trashing someone for no good reason?

Strangely, the one person who still seems to have their head in the game is TarZAN.  He goes on about his whole-game strategy.  He seems to have taken a leaf out of the book of Sandra Diaz-Twine (“Survivor Pearl Islands”) in that he does what it takes to make it to certain game milestones, even if it means voting out people he likes.  For all that I’ve trashed TarZAN, this IS a halfway decent strategy, good for him.  It gets even better when he first goes to Kim and tries to convince her that taking out Chelsea is a good bet for the finals, and what’s more, she seems to buy it.  Afterwards, when Alicia comes up, he manages to do the same thing with her!  Man, this is great stuff!  Where’s this TarZAN been the entire game?

Of course, TarZAN must them ramble on about his shocks again, thus restoring equilibrium.

Next up, we get a twist: a scene involving Christina in which she is NOT uniformly trashed by the entire cast!  Admittedly, it starts out with dream interpretation on the way to tree mail, but it does get better.  Chelsea, realizing that there’s a 3-3 split with herself, Kim, and Sabrina against TarZAN, Alicia, and Christina, tries to sway Christina over to her side.  Christina pays in kind by immediately telling the others about Chelsea’s scheming.  Now, I’m actually going to be nice to this episode, because, as I’ve said, I enjoyed it, but this just doesn’t make sense to me.  Christina, you’ve been trashed by every contestant here, have every reason to distrust every single one of them, and then you go and tell them every scheme you’re privy to.  No wonder you get so trashed by every analyst left!  To be fair, as Christina does (at the time) have an alliance of 3, it might behoove her to stir up trouble to try and get Chelsea out, but somehow I don’t think Christina was thinking like that.  I think she just had immense loyalty to Alicia and Kim.

As a side note, in order to help convince Christina to flip-flop, Chelsea promises to take her on the reward.  Remember that now.

Off to the reward challenge, and I’m rather surprised to find a original challenge this season.  No really, it’s original.  Ok, the puzzle does have some reused elements, but it’s not particularly based on a challenge from any one season.  Basically, castaways run around a post to unscrew a disk (thereby making themselves dizzy) three times.  The disks then become part of a puzzle to unlock a combination lock, the winner being the first person to unlock their lock.  Although it’s not one of the great challenges, I have to admit, I like it.  It’s fun visually, we get some good slapstick from dizzy castaways, and the puzzle is fairly clever.  I particularly like that though you may have the 3 right numbers, they are not placed in the correct order for the combination lock, so there’s a certain element of luck involved.  This gives the potential for come-from-behind victories, which are always exciting.

Chelsea wins, and then is given the ever-difficult “Who you gonna bring?” choice.  Chelsea swears she won’t make the same mistake as Kat in the last episode, and bring the people she likes.  She proves this by… bringing the people she likes, in this case Kim and Sabrina.  Wow, way to NOT reveal alliances, Chelsea.  I look forward to this biting you in the butt later.

So the trio go on reward (dinner and a night on a luxury ship), and revel in excess.  They even get to shower, which we get to see in person, because CBS has now seen fit to stick a cameraman in there.  I know it’s reality tv, and people sign away their souls and their privacy to be on the show, but this just seems excessive.  I mean, “Survivor Vanuatu” had a shower scene, but they didn’t stick a cameraman in there!  It just seems beyond indecent, particularly given how dirty these people must be.  And don’t give me any “It was a HIDDEN camera” statements, that camera MOVED.

Dinnertime, and the three revel in their success, commenting how nice it would be for all them to be in the final 3.  Even Kim admits that she thinks the other women will stay loyal, and that she “feels good” about going to the final with Chelsea and Sabrina.  Here we finally see Kim have a major flaw: Cockiness.  It’s hardly unique to her, and it’s undone many a brilliant “Survivor” game (recall Ken Hoang of “Survivor Gabon”).  Still, it could be fatal, given her options.  Although Kim has played a great game, and certainly deserves to win more than the others, one must still account for jury bitterness.  While having not played particularly strong games, Chelsea and Sabrina are both very likeable, and could beat Kim because of jury bitterness.  This is as opposed to TarZAN, Alicia, and Christina, all of whom Kim could beat no matter HOW you slice things.  And yet Kim goes and sides with Chelsea and Sabrina.  I sense her undoing is nigh.  Now, it’s not a death sentence for Kim’s game.  She’s played well, and Richard Hatch (“Survivor Borneo”) is often referred to as “the cockiest ‘Survivor’ ever.” and he still pulled out a victory.  Still, it’s not necessarily a good sign for Kim.

On the subject of who people can and cannot beat, I will take this time to address the issue of “TarZAN will grab the men’s votes”.  It’s prevalent throughout the episode, but I’ll take the time to discuss it here and avoid it later.  While it is true that jury bitterness could sway things in TarZAN’s favor, just given that he has a “Y” chromosome, I just don’t see it happening, and I think these fears are unfounded.  TarZAN has played the game like a crazy person (note my “Top 5 and Bottom 5” from several episodes ago), and has made several enemies in the game, including the men.  Jumping ahead a little, you’ll note that Mike flipped TarZAN the bird at Tribal Council.  Evidence enough that he’s not particularly well liked.

Our reward ends with the women luxuriously lounging, with Chelsea commenting that this is “..like a honeymoon.”  Well, Chelsea, since neither of you live in North Carolina, that may be possible.

On the less luxurious side of things, however, all is not in golden time.  Alicia and Christina are rightfully pissed at being at the bottom of the pecking order, and actually begin to strategize against Chelsea and (to a degree) Kim.  In particular, Alicia has suddenly turned into a master strategist, coming up with some genuinely good ideas, even going so far as to show knowledge that Kim is being deceptive to everyone.  Somewhere in my bashing of her, she’s actually learned how to play the game, and not in a way based on likes or dislikes.  You’ll note that her other ally is Christina, the woman she was on the WARPATH against for the first half of the season.  Overcoming personal problems for self gain?  THAT’S GOOD STRATEGY!  She’d be an alright winner, if it weren’t for the fact that she was downright mean and unlikable to everyone around her.  Still, her accomplishment has to be acknowledged.  It’s like what I think about Brian Heidik (“Survivor Thailand”).  He’s a despicable person, but you have to respect the gameplay.

However, this respect is undone somewhat when the trio get back from their reward.  For all that I bashed Kim earlier for her cockiness, she does, at least, know how to dig herself out of it to a degree.  Realizing that TarZAN doubtless strategize against her, Kim spins Alicia a tale of how TarZAN was trying to get her (Alicia) out behind her back, so as to make Alicia mistrust TarZAN.  Again, it’s a GOOD MOVE, rather similar to one Julie Berry pulled on Twila Tanner in “Survivor Vanuatu”.  Alicia falls for it completely, telling us in an interview that she think’s she’s being played, and won’t allow it to happen to her.  To emphasize her point, she gesticulates wildly.  So, a woman named Alicia is going on a diatribe while bobbing her head and waving her finger in our faces…  I see no ripoff in this whatsoever!  *cough*”Survivor The Australian Outback”*cough*.

Before we hit challenge time, we get another TarZAN tidbit.  He psychs himself up for the challenge by saying that there’s no way he’ll possibly win, and these “feminine genders” will beat him again.  Way to boost your spirits TarZAN, I’m sure you’ll win with that attitude.  And is it wrong that I can’t get over the fact that “feminine” isn’t a gender?

Anyway, it’s time for… Challenge Time!  And I’m inventing a new “Survivor” Law that I’m calling the “Letdown Law”.  It’s really quite simple: For every episode that has a creative, original reward challenge, we must balance it out by having a boring, rehashed immunity challenge.  In this case, we’re ripping off “Survivor Redemption Island” (and why anyone would want to rip off “Redemption Island” is beyond me) with the “Build the Fish Skeleton” challenge.  I’ll admit this challenge is difficult, and it’s a clever puzzle, but it’s just so boring to watch, and it looks ridiculous!  Thankfully, we do get some drama with just how much the lead flip-flops back and forth, with Alicia pulling our a narrow victory.

After the challenge, TarZAN, realizing that his time is numbered, of course tries to ingratiate himself to the women so that they might be inclined to go along with his plan.  I mean, women LIKE to be called “bitches” to their faces, right?  What do you mean, no?  Just because I got my sex education by reading “Janet Evanovich” novels doesn’t mean anything!

There’s more strategizing, with everyone coming up with good strategies, even being willing, at one point, to force a tie.  Instead (and I’m jumping ahead here because nothing really interesting happens at tribal) they all do the stupid thing and vote TarZAN out.  Why is it stupid.  Well, for Christina and Alicia, it rids them of a potential ally.  For Kim, Chelsea, and Sabrina, it rids them of a beatable castaway.  What’s the upside?  Kat’s belongings don’t get disrespected (as a side not, it confounds me as to why the man would do that, when it gains him absolutely nothing but enmity, but it confounds me even more that things which fit Kat also fit TarZAN).

Tribal, however, does bring up a point that now confuses me: EVERYONE TRUSTS KIM!  Oh, it’s not as though she has them all fooled, both Alicia and Sabrina have ADMITTED that Kim could be lying to them.  So, they go with the plan, knowing FULL WELL that they’re probably being played.  Like I said last time, please just give Kim the check.

It’s strange, I should really hate this episode.  It has all the hallmarks that I hate: reused challenges, failing to act on good gameplay, bad misdirection (I didn’t think for a minute that Chelsea was going home, given TarZAN’s screen time), but I just don’t.  It was exciting, it kept me enthralled, we got some good potential gameplay, and it’s almost over.  Please, God, let it be almost over.

So where do we stand?  Well, barring an INCREDIBLY bitter jury (which, from what I’ve seen of Ponderosa, does not seem like this cast), Kim has this won.  Let’s find out how, this Sunday.

Or possibly later.  Things are winding down here, but I might be busy on Sunday, and will probably have to miss the showing on Sunday.  My computer is having sound problems, so I’ll have to wait even longer than usual to see the episode.  Still, I should have a finale blog up by 5 P.M. eastern time on Monday.

See you when I see you!

-Matt

Title credit to Jean Storrs.