simplyme

Excellent point. Also, I believe every single challenge so far has been a redo of a challenge in a former season, so modifying this one would break pattern. (Sorry if that crushed the hopes of anyone looking for new challenges. Apparently they are relying on the players and advantages/twists to be the game changers, not the challenges.)

Argh. Excuse random cutoffs as my tablet freaks out and posts mid-thought. So, yeah. Sarah telling Cirie about her advantage was stupid. Cirie and Andrea then targetting one of Sarah's allies and telling her was ballsy and could have bitten them bad. I think Sarah may be making a mistake if she's planning to play the middle for the rest of the game because that's going to alienate just about everyone. Flipping to vote out Debbie because she was 6th in the alliance and was also very close with others not in the alliance? Good, strategic move. Continuing to float back and forth and be directly responsible for putting people on the jury without committing to a side? That's going to leave a lot of people ticked off specifically at her.

Technically, I believe it was andrea who turned to zeke and suggested the word reinventing. I wouldn't be surprised if jeff's blathering turned her in the right direction. As to the idols Courtney Yates mentioned, @colorbars is right. No one knows about Troy's. They probably suspect Tai has one (not two) but don't know for sure. Simplymom is gobsmacked that everyone tells Cirie all sorts of stuff. Like

I think one thing that gets overlooked in this season is how well Candice does in challenges. She wasn't brought back for HvV just because of the mutiny. She's very much a force to be reckoned with in a number of the challenges, especially the "cling to a pole while two people try to pry you off" challenge and the totem pole challenge that Ozzy is known for. She made Ozzy earn it by hanging on for two or three hours through a rain storm before she finally slid down. I sometimes wonder what Candice's gameplay would have looked like had someone other than Adam been cast. (I know it's useless to ponder, but I still do.)

I recently rewatched Fiji and this us very close to what I thought. Jeeeeeezus. I'd forgotten exactly how annoying Lisi and Rocky were. Alex was a snake, but it took a long time to show. Edgardo... I ended up kind of liking. He didn't really do anything that offensive except end up in an alliance with jerks, and he was both better at reading people and staying under the radar than Alex was. He just happened to be the one to go first. That said, there weren't a lot of people I actually liked this season either. Michelle, Yau Man, and Earl, I guess. Some I was neutral on. Had Cassandra played a strategy other than "I was everyone's supporter and comforter" during TC and actually owned her game, I would have liked her, but I ended up disappointed. Dre was just painful to watch a lot of the time. Mookie had possibilities but failed me epically. And Boo was mystifying. Sometimes he seemed sharp. Sometimes he was dumber than a box of rocks.

I know most players his season seemed to like Terry Dietz in the end, but for some reason he bugged the heck out of me. I think it was that he came across as feeling like he thought was better than others, always right, and the actual leader of something. So, um, past confidence and into arrogance, I guess. Me watching Panama Exile Island: Terry: "Well, Jeff, I had to make a managerial decision about what would be best for the tribe blah blah..." Me to TV: "No, you didn't, you jackass. You just needed to vote, like every other member."

I think we're seeing more goats in the finals because people are getting better strategically at this game, not because the early-season F2s were so much better of a format. As @303420 pointed out, F3 should help to negate the goat factor a bit. As to the drama factor, regardless of whether it is F2 or F3 the peak is usually going to be the final immunity challenge and the following tribal that sets the finalists. Number of finalists seems irrelevant to me in that. Having just rewatched Panama (12) and Cook Islands (13), I'd forgotten how powerful the original hidden immunity idol was and how much it affected things. Now I really want to smack Tyler Perry. Never, ever bring that thing back again. If we're stuck with themes, part of me wants to see a tribe of geeks. Not sure what the other tribe(s) would be, though? And imagining Survivor's idea of a geek terrifies me a bit.

The one thing I like about the F3 is that in theory, at least, it means there's SOME chance that at least two people sitting up there should have a shot at getting votes. With an F2, it's pretty much over once someone wins the immunity challenge unless that person is a moron. They take the goat. I mean, the way Cagayan ended bugged the hell out of me, but that's the way F2s work. I would have loved to have seen that as an F3.

I didn't know the answer, but I've been watching old Survivor seasons recently. My answer so far is that it either is not true OR it is true but only if there are either more than four(ish?) members of a tribe or the vote is not unanimous (minus the person being ousted). Three out of four episodes I watched today (two different seasons) followed the trend where the first name shown was safe. The first episode of season 12 Panama Exile Island has a woman voted out of her four-person tribe in a 3-1 vote. Her name is shown first, third, and fourth. As I continue to watch I'll let you know what trend(s) I see. Interesting question! UPDATE: It is not true that the first vote Probst reads off is always safe. S3 Africa, Episode 2, the person voted out has their name shown first. The vote is 5-2. So that's at least two cases out of five episodes I've watched where the first name shown was the person voted out.

As Debbie (and others) kept talking about the line in the sand (or concrete), an annoyed SimplyMom turned to me and said, "That isn't what that saying means." My response was, "Yeah. It's Survivor. They regularly invent new meanings for words and phrases." How kind of Debbie to later drive that point home with her new definition of democracy. :P Would it have been better to take out Sierra or Brad instead of Debbie? I think that depends who you are. For Sarah, taking out Debbie was the better move. Taking out Sierra probably guarantees no one in that alliance will work with her. Taking out a difficult-to-predict-and-control Debbie can actually be defended and leaves her with multiple options. For Aubry, Debbie is the one who gave her ammunition to present to Sarah. For Cirie or Andrea, taking out Sierra or Brad might have been better, but the vote had to be somewhat dictated by who Sarah was willing to vote for. Re: Sarah's comment about noticing registration tags: A lot of us seem to be on the same page. I said, "Why would we notice them? We don't care. You do."

Well, Zeus just made me snarf Pepsi through my nasal passages. Now I'm in pain and I'll never be able to see Troyzan without making that connection again. *sigh* *mutters* Greek gods, always messing with mankind.

Well, Zeke was caught lying, and britches are pants, so...

Personally, I'd kind of like to see a season where they started as one tribe and the immunity challenges had randomly drawn captains and a schoolyard pick for teams. Only the losers (and anyone not picked for a team) go to TC to vote out a member. This could be particularly interesting to me as alliances might determine who stayed more than the pure strength that often dominates the early stages. It could also be an unmitigated disaster. I'd just like to see it.

I can't imagine spending 24/7 with 19 other unrelated people for weeks while I'm hungry, sleep-deprived, and paranoid about them. Plus everyone has quirks and smells bad, and there's probably sand in places you never want sand to go. I've worked extensively with the public and can usually be diplomatic, but after a certain amount of time I guarantee that I would be irked enough by someone that I would manage to say something horrible, intentional or not. And sometimes once someone starts to irritate you, everything they do bugs you. (You probably know this if you grew up with a sibling.) Like how is it possible for them to breathe that loudly? All I can hear is the breathing!!! Er, or something like that. Maybe I can imagine it, or at least the bit where I lose it. How does this apply to Michaela? Well, imagine you're in that constantly irritable state with another person who can't hide their feelings (which Michaela admits she can't. They show on her face.) You know every time you or anyone else annoys them. Every. Damn. Time. I imagine it makes things more awkward and you may begin to resent that person whether you mean to or not, whether they're a nice person or not. As a viewer, I enjoy Michaela, but I can see where living with her could be a bit stressful, because there are times when we all don't want to know the truth about how others see us. But Michaela's face will give away that yes, our hair looks really bad, we look fat, and that was a dumb thing to say.

And different people have different metabolisms at different points in their lives. Heck, at one point I was put on a medication to prevent migraines. I swear I gained weight just looking at lettuce no matter how much I exercised. When I stopped that medication, the extra weight dropped off. So straight weight comparisons between two people or even between the same person at different points in their life aren't necessarily good indicators of activity levels. Ozzy also weighs more to begin with.

I don't know that he had much choice. Someone said, "Oh, I want to hear the Jeff story!" and Zeke said, "I'll tell it." Then he told it. So obviously someone had said something about Varner leaving with a lot of drama, and the people who weren't at the TC wanted the details. At that point it's better if Zeke takes control and tells the story since people A. are curious and will wonder, and B. can't keep their damn mouths shut.

Am I the only person who likes the braids? For some reason I think Ozzy Longstocking looks hot. I didn't know about dating LL either, though I'd heard about the porn. I think Ozzy in a swimsuit is as much Ozzy as I want to see. Apparently I like a little mystery in a person.

Whoever made that Barney Fife comment... Thanks. Now all I can think is that Sierra needs to turn in her one bullet. :P

Okay. Found it. From Zeke's Hollywood Reporter guest column : "I applied. I didn't discuss my trans status in my initial video because I wanted the show to desire me as a game player and an eccentric storyteller, not as "The First Trans SurvivorPlayer." They did. Casting called back two hours later, and I began to panic." And from an EW interview with Probst : "My story with Zeke goes like this. I met Zeke in casting and loved him. I still have my original notes from that meeting. He was very engaging, gifted in his ability to manipulate with his words, and he wore this crazy Hawaiian shirt and had poofy hair. We knew we were doing Millennials vs. Gen X as a theme and we wanted him on the Millennials tribe immediately. It wasn’t until after he left that I was told he was transgender. From that point forward we agreed that if his story was to be told, he would be the one to decide when, where, and how." From those two quotes, I got the impression that Zeke's appeal was primarily Zeke.

This is my favorite essay that deals with essentially that: http://therumpus.net/2012/05/peculiar-benefits/ And now I, too, will shut up on the topic. :) Thanks for a great discussion, though, folks.

Cirie appears to be practically leading one alliance and yet still working the other side just in case. She's very good socially and works her way in with people. We saw Cirie talk to Sierra about changing the majority vote from Michaela to Hali with the argument that if Hali had the idol, it was important to flush it. She then made sure no one knew her real reasons for changing the vote were to save Michaela by voting for Michaela (as assigned or volunteered). She also made sure Michaela did not change her vote from Zeke, which would give away that she knew something. Had Cirie banded together with Andrea, Zeke, Ozzy, Michaela, Hali, Aubry, and Sarah to take out Brad or Sierra, she might have tipped her hand and become a target. The scurrying to put that together definitely would have been noticed, and there are three unplayed idols out there. Most people think Tai has one. Cirie is good at this game precisely because she goes for the subtle move to remove opponents instead of Zeke's Big MoveZ Rawr! I'll also add that although Hali seems nice, no one really seemed connected to her. If you don't have a single ally, it may be better to take you out than worry about keeping you as one of my numbers.

There's a book called Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? that I read years ago. It did a good job of explaining that people spending time with others who have had some of the same experiences they have had is pretty much a normal psychological reaction in life. (Yes, I'm way oversimplifying.) I think Michaela's willingness to talk more freely with Cirie and take her advice is because Michaela knows that Cirie shares a lot of the same cultural characteristics. It also isn't that Michaela doesn't know some of what her problem is. What she needed was the support of someone she identified with to tell her "I was like that. You can change." Hearing that she needs to not show her emotions (which she already knows) from someone she doesn't have a lot in common with can come off as condescending criticism, even if it's true and well-meant.

Except he didn't tell them he was transgender until the late phases of his interviews. Also, since he probably has medications that he has to take and I imagine there are medical interviews, etc before one goes on Survivor, I don't think he could truly not tell them at all. In MvsGX, I felt Zeke was fairly charismatic and well-spoken and either naturally unusual or knew how to create a character to stand out. Whether that's good or bad is a matter of preference, but I can easily see casting being interested in him without needing the extra hook. At least I always knew who he was, right from episode one. In Caramoan I had a lot of trouble telling the difference between the four blonde women on the fans tribe until they were whittled down.

Because unless you have amazing thigh muscles that you can clamp reeeally tightly for over an hour, you'll just slide down the pole.

Apparently this cast has decided that the point of Game Changers is to see who can blow up their own game in the stupidest possible way. Yes, Zeke, I'm looking at you and your abyssmal lack of timing. You don't take out your own allies when that will leave you all alone, untrusted, and easy pickings. Nice job by Cirie to keep Michaela in the game. I agree with @Bryce Lynch that Cirie voted Michaela because she didn't want people to know she'd told Michaela (or was working with her). Same reason Michaela voted for Zeke. Cirie and Zeke just used their pull to get the vote switched to Hali, who they apparently feared could conceivably join the other alliance if left in the game. By not directly going for a member of Brad's posse, Cirie maintained the bonds she's started to build with people in all alliances. I was slightly impressed with Debbie's suggestion to go for Ozzy. It was good timing. I was not impressed by her need to preen over it. Pride's a bitch.