Jipijapa

Can someone explain to me what happened to the guy who got lost in the woods during one of the previous episodes? I missed 2 weeks of this, watched episodes 3 and 4 but still didn't follow what happened.

Yes - Jose really had zero chance. Maybe earlier in the season with warmer weather, he might have, but it would have taken days for his clothes to dry (if at all) and with low calorie intake, he just wouldn't have been able to build a fire big enough and keep it going to dry out. It was just basic common sense for him to immediately reach for the button. Frankly... the only common sense he displayed all season... Maybe we just didn't see enough of Jose due to editing or bad footage or whatever, but it struck me that he was there to show off or advertise his skills, not to actually fulfill the objective. I know little about boating but even I knew that he was going to have a big problem with that boat. Also, agreed with the commenter uptopic: like Alan, David's attitude grew better and better as time went on, and I think the discovery of the Dungeness crabs was the turning point (this is before he found the tide pool); reminded me of how things seemed to turn for Alan when he invented the plastic-bottle traps that caught the crayfish. There's a turning point for both contestants when they realized they had found a sustainable, predictable food/bait source. The one thing in common they both had: tide pools. Real (in David's case) or artificially made (in Alan's case). If I were a contestant in Vancouver Island again I would definitely try to build a tide pool out of rocks or something. A lot more durable than a gill net.

Tapping out immediately was probably the smartest thing Jose ever did on the whole challenge. He knew it was over the minute he got totally soaked. In that weather? There was no way he would have been able to get himself dry in time to forestall hypothermia, or near-hypothermia. Since he was starving as well, it would have been pointless. Yay for David and Larry. I sort of had a soft spot for Larry, because a lot of guys in my family are like him. Very whiny and swear a lot, but it's mostly all noise, and having a pessimistic surface attitude is sometimes just only one part of who somebody is. Larry's words were often at odds with his behavior. He bitched and moaned endlessly, yet he had the gumption (and hope) to move his camp successfully. He cried and screamed a lot, yet he lasted longer than all but one of the contestants. As we saw with other contestants who talked a good game and looked the part, who you are on the surface is not necessarily who you are deep down. Why did both these guys last so long? I think it's because they were more desperate than the others. They didn't have lives they were happy about, back home. David was a credible winner but he also had the good fortune of having a productive location. Once I saw his discovery of the tide pool with the crabs in it (in a recent episode), I knew he would probably win unless he did something really stupid. I like the fact that David won, too, because it means that the winner isn't always going to be some alpha-male, squirrel-eating quasi-military type (wasn't Alan a corrections officer or something like that?) David and Larry were more everyman. Yay also for Nicole making the final four, although I agree that she did not have a real winter strategy to fall back on once her gill net failed her. I'm the most sorry that Tracy tapped out so early; I would have liked to have learned more about her, but she just had bad bear luck.

I, too, don't understand the "I need my kids" justification from Nicole when it was clear that she was screwed because of the lack of food sources. (And why was her tap-out termed "a distress call"?) Her decision to leave was very sensible; I just don't know why she needed to articulate a reason other than that. At this point, I have to think the winner will be David, if only because he seems to have hit the jackpot with reliable food sources.

In terms of attitude, Nicole seems a lot like this year's Sam... someone who wasn't taken seriously in the beginning, but whose sunny demeanor may be a factor in being long-lasting. And while David may be a bit of a dork, I would put him #1 in the motivation department, as he really really REEEAAALLLLY wants that money. No psychological stuff about inner demons for him. No yadda yadda about "doing everything I came here to do." (Hey, does anyone besides me want to see some of these guys guest star on Mantracker -- as the prey???)

I was kind of stunned that Nicole would do something so risky as go into Bear Territory looking for a carcass. If she really staked her entire game on one gill net... hm, I'll have to reconsider her. Wait, we jumped to Day 50? When did that happen? I must have missed it? I'm not into David-bashing, but he was just getting greedy with the fish and frankly, it served him right that someone stole his stuff. All during the episode I kept saying "Stop! Quit while you're ahead! Aggggh!" I think he actually forgot the water was ball-freezingly cold when he went in after his line. Larry's sudden breakdown on camera was quite dramatic. Props for him starting the camera. Once again though it makes me feel like life in the Larry Household back home must be pretty chaotic. The only wisdom takeaway from this episode was Jose having the manbits to confess on camera that he had broken one of his own cardinal rules ("Don't force the wilderness to follow your script"). I'm glad no one tapped this episode because this is the part of last season that I really liked: the Final Four, gutting it out for glory. To me it feels like this is when the best part of the show starts... once you've gotten rid of the unlucky, the unprepared and the people who "did all they came here to do."

Fusco is going to be one of the chief pleasures of my future series rewatch.

I started watching POI from the beginning because of the JJ Abrams involvement, and because my mom was really into Michael Emerson. Five years later, I am really into Michael Emerson too. However, I wasn't very impressed with the show for the first half of season 1 and almost stopped watching. Then it came back from winter hiatus and well, someone at CBS must have given the producers some notes after the first 13 episodes, because it improved greatly. I don't think I missed a single episode -- although I did sleep through a few, at least until Root returned as a regular. How I loved that crazy bitch.

I don't really get why David is so unpopular. What don't people like about him, specifically? Jose's outrigger looked... bad. The fact that his boat was so tippy makes me wonder if he really knows what he's doing. I prefer "Scary Larry" to "F----in Larry" just because of his wide mood swings. I would not want to be married to a guy like that. His household must be pretty chaotic.

Loved the last episode and found it surprisingly upbeat. Am super glad they didn't kill off Harold. John being killed off... I can live with. As for Shaw's final hit... I believe that if the Samaritan guy (I forgot his name) had begged for mercy, she would have given it. But, he said "It's just business," and that was something she wasn't going to do any more. In a way, she was killing her own past self. The business-self. I think from now on, Shaw will do what she does out of a sense of connection -- with Root, Root's memory, or whoever's. No more doing things out of business. The only thing that struck me as false about this episode - and it was just a little thing really - was how cool and calm Fusco was acting when it looked like he and John were about to be finished off by the Samaritan goon cops or whoever they were. I mean, Fusco has a kid; no WAY would he have been acting that equanimous in the face of doom. But, as I said, it was just a small false note. Really liked the use of Amy Acker in this episode. She was both Harold's hallucination, and ours. But what was that bit with Shaw at Root's grave, seemingly dug up? What was that about? I didn't catch it, and I was wondering if it was some kind of tease about maybe cloning Root in the future or what not. I watched this show from day one. I was nearly ready to give up on it midway through the first season, but suddenly at the halfway point of Season 1 it got good, and never looked back. (This is only the second show I've ever stuck with all the way through... after Fringe.) I'll do a rewatch before the year is out. I believe that (like Fringe) this show will gain many many more fans in the years to come. It was really special and unique.

So, let's admit it to ourselves... we really just want to get to the part with the wolf. Whenever that is.

I totally wish they would have a few Season 1 people back for Patagonia. As for not wanting to see contestants all hairy and grunting inarticulately... maybe not, but I also thought Sam's thousand-yard stare toward the end was the most compelling moment of Season 1.

Ooh, Patagonia should be interesting. It's at the extreme southern end of Chile, so I think it's sort of gonna be like Vancouver Island with less trees and more llamas. It probably is difficult to find a logistically feasible place for this. You need a politically stable country; one where you can get permission from the government or locals to film, that's genuinely remote enough for no one to stumble upon you. The film crew needs instant access so they can retrieve the tapped and injured. It can't be too environmentally sensitive a place, so that contestants can live there for an extended period of time, hunting and fishing and chopping stuff down for shelter. I hadn't thought of places outside the U.S. and Canada, but Patagonia seems like it would work, as it is sparsely settled (and quite beautiful).

Can someone wise in the ways of woodcraft explain to me why no one bothers to build platforms? I mean, they have small logs and saplings galore at most of these locations -- and also sloping ground and rising groundwater -- so I'm confused as to why they don't get themselves the heck off the ground at least a couple feet. Loved last season, but this season I am mainly amused with how many mystical-sounding ways various contestants can express their boredom with Vancouver Island and their justification for tapping out. "I did what I came here to do..." "The land isn't teaching me anything..." "What am I here for?" At least David is honest: he's there for the money... Jose is cool but I also share the confusion over why we don't get to see anything. Larry's attitude is annoying, but he also makes me nostalgic for my dad and the rainy, fucked-up, profanity-laced camping trips of my youth. I am rooting for Nicole to avoid the bears, because she strikes me as this year's Sam. Now that Justin has actually faced some real misfortune, I am hoping he sticks around as well. But they... aren't...really... picking random people, of course. I'd be willing to bet that some of the people on Season 2 know some of the people who were on Season 1. As someone else said uptopic, the diehard survivalist community is not that large. At least, not the community of people who actually know what they're doing (unlike the woman who sliced her hand open, who just seemed in way over her head). I do think that if this show is to thrive after this season, they're going to have to look into finding different locales, as logistically tough as that may be. Turns out that Vancouver Island where no one can eat shellfish on the beach because of red tide is... well, a little more boring than Vancouver Island normally. Also: the predators. Chiefly the bears. It is really no fun seeing contestants who wind up in bear-infested locations, because there really is nothing they can do; it is a huge handicap to deal with, a battle they will never win. No amount of ingenuity will win out against a pack of animals who actually DO own the place. While Desmond's speedy exit was ironic, I did feel for the guy, and I certainly felt for Tracy. And it isn't great television either. One chance encounter with a predator is exciting; but every week of "OMG, the bears are back and their poop is right outside my tent" honestly makes me want to change the channel out of stress. It's a fine line for the show to walk, I suppose. I'd honestly really like them to try a new location without all those effing bears.

I don't see them killing off anyone more, except maybe Reese. (Fusco has a kid. They're not going to kill him.) I do see Finch being reunited with Grace. I am thinking the ending is going to have the same kind of vibe as the end of the first Matrix movie, in which our heroes definitively get the upper hand though Samaritan is not definitively beaten, and the world is effectively transformed without being outwardly changed. And it will end with a