loki567

That was always something I found interesting about Joe. He's a complete strategic lightweight and not even that good at comps, and yet to hear people tell it, you would think he's an absolutely unbeatable superman. It feels like a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. He only becomes so dangerous because people make him dangerous even though he doesn't do much at all. I feel like we already know where his game is going. The returning player I'm most interested in is Wentworth. I think there's a prime Stephenie LaGrossa story there. From the bits and pieces I heard, I think her ego might swell coming into the season with a bigger fanbase and perception. I could see her going full Queen B which would be fantastic in my opinion. The last few seasons have been so blah and non-offensive that I badly want a love-to-hate villain.

She's obviously filthy rich but she was more or less banished into a corner before the revival. I can't see even any conservative outlets touching someone with such horrible impulse control.

This is a good time to mention that between Survivor AND Big Brother, virtually every season with returning players has seen at least one of those returning players reach the finals. And the only season it didn't happen is Big Brother 11, where the producers specifically threw in a twist to knock out that season's sole returning player. It is an absolutely amazing streak.

Naviti strong wasn't anything except the usual majority alliance, "I would never turn on you! Ever!" stuff that majority alliances always do. Every member of Naviti who made the merge tried to vote out another member of Naviti over a Malolo at some point. So this wasn't a Redemption Island, Rob's cult-situation. SEA BASS nearly launched his own coup against Wendell and Dom. There was clearly cracks in the armor that a good Survivor player could have exploited, but I think good players realize you have to be willing to risk losing in order to win. Laurel wasn't willing. She had that same problem that a lot of players do, paralyzed by indecision. She was so afraid of screwing up final-whatever positioning that she didn't realize that doing nothing? meant you lose.

I just think the reunion is such an absolute shit-show that it almost feels disrespectful to talk about the rest of the season in that thread. I'm at the point where I want to pretend that reunions never happen anymore and the season ends when they're on the island. The fact that Probst uses Survivor to continue his masturbatory talk show host fantasies is just... *Ugh!* If that's the price the producers pay to keep him on the show, I wish they stop paying it and let Boston Rob or Parvati or whoever take over hosting duties. Anyway, I agree that Laurel shouldn't get a break. I can understand the premise that you have to do everything possible to get to the F3 but I personally think it's more important to give yourself a shot to win the game. You definitely don't want to be in a position where you have to comp-beast the end of the game but there was no scenario that Laurel was winning at all. It was obvious for most of the merge that she was going to get crushed if she went to the F3 with these two and she got crushed at F3. Where are the points in her favor? I know she didn't trust Kellyn, Angelina, or Sea Bass but that's Survivor. Work with people you don't trust on certain votes.

I agree completely. I prefer the back-and-forth which feels more like a legitimate conversation and not a bunch of bad actors doing a monologue. I wasn't a Laurel fan by any means but I did like the fact that she got to state her case. Definitely felt like we got a more realistic view of the game dynamics out there than this one person is awesome, this one person sucks.

"Seems fun but doesn't make compelling tv," could describe literally everyone in this cast.

IMO, an all-time horrible season had one of the best FTCs I can remember. I thought it was really well-argued by everyone, even Laurel. I'm seriously wondering if the jury made a deal to split the votes and go to a tie. The first five jurors voting for Dom and the last five voting for Wendell felt strange to me.

Shockingly, I think Laurel has replaced Kellyn as my most annoying contestant of the season. That might have been because I can now sign in relief that Kellyn didn't win. But something about Laurel's smug, "I'm going to lose at F3," smile on her face during every confessional just drives me up the wall. I watch an embarrassing amount of reality television and whenever I see one (or two) players dominate a season like this, there's usually a couple of commonalities. One of those big commonalities is a large part of the cast just doesn't talk to each other, at least about game. Most of the game talk is run through the kingpin. And once a certain dynamic has been set up for 30+ days, it's hard to break it even when you're desperate. Considering what a brick wall Laurel's been, it really should have popped in Kellyn/Donathan/Angelina's head to make a pitch at Sebastian. It didn't seem like it occurred to them AT ALL and I think the reason is because they never had that game relationship with him previously and weren't willing to break through the initial awkwardness.

I was thinking Laurel's only chance against Dom and Wendell in a F3 where they split the votes and Laurel picks up all the Malolos' votes (including Donathan). But people voting along tribal lines is rare and usually a case of people saying fuck you to Russell. I don't see that same backlash happening against Dom or Wendell. And I think either Dom or Wendell makes a move on the other before F4.

I can't see Laurel being able to make that argument in about an hour's time during FTC. Perception is reality in Survivor. If you're perceived as the stronger player in an alliance, than you're the stronger player in the alliance. If you're viewed as the weaker player in an alliance during FTC... well, then you're SOL. Most of the jury is going to have their minds made up by the time and I don't see Laurel being able to make the case that she was an equal contributor in the four-way alliance, especially since so much of the game ran through Naviti players. Not to mention, trying to convince jurors to vote for you by making the argument that they played the wrong way? Not going to work.

Color me (no pun intended) presently surprised that three contestants are African-American males. I can't remember that happening since Fiji. Doesn't guarantee anything, of course. I remember the weirdness of M vs. Gx having three Asian women and those three Asian women being the first three gone. In fact, looks like a pretty diverse cast period. Six out of the 14 people revealed seem to be PoC. After the blah-ness of the last two seasons, I'm hoping Survivor casting changes up somewhat. I'd love to see about half of cast of PoC just to give us some freshness in perspectives. Survivor does feel in a rut the last couple years with casts that do feel very similar to one another. Seeing the civil defender from Kentucky pinged my Hali radar. I was thinking that it would be funny if they cast her prosecutor boyfriend. Then she could show up for the family visit. Whatever, I need more Hali in my life. I know, right? That hairstyle is 90s as fuck.

Yeah, I thought that was a very interesting moment, Chelsea wondering if people were lying to her and then realizing, "Why would they lie to me? The game's over." Think about how utterly exhausting and depressing a mindset like that must be for 30+ days, never really knowing if you're having a genuine conversation with anyone. I think that more than homesickness is why people break down in tears during the family visits, just from relief of having a loving interaction with no strings attached.

The merciless death march of Wendell and Dom continues. Laurel almost impressed me but once again, push came to shove and she balked. She's waiting for the perfect opportunity that will never come as now there's no way that Wendell and Dom don't use their HIs next tribal council. I feel for Donathan who seems ready to go but constantly hamstrung by the fact that he needs Laurel's vote and she. will. not. make. a. move. Did Chelsea ever get a confessional?

The funny thing with Michele, the editors really did try with her. For an UTR female winner, 57 confessionals is quite a lot. For comparison's sake, Aubrey had about 70 and that's going to TC several times more than Michele. So for all the justified grief the Survivor editors get over the years for underselling their female winners, I don't think you can put Michele's win not being well received on them. Michele's win came off so unsatisfying because it was so unsatisfying. And yeah, I know it's not her fault who voted for her and in a purely philosophical sense that, "whoever gets the most votes to deserves to win," and Natalie was the better player than Russell, and all those Survivor fan platitudes. But Michele's margin of victory was two of the biggest sexist douches in the history of the game. Scot and Jason spent their beginning, middle, and end of their games bullying women and the fact that they got the last word, Scott in particular had the defining jury speech, was depressing as fuck. And I didn't buy into the "Michele's great social game," argument. The Jury speaks established Scot and Jason just wanted to see Aubrey and Cydney lose because those were the two they identified as most responsible for their losses. If there was some great bonding moment between Michele, Scot, and Jason, it gets shown because the editors did everything they could to prop up Michele's win. Now all that being said, I have no issue with Michele returning. Survivor always struggles with making young female castmates memorable enough to return and Michele would be a lot better than a lot of those names. Compared to SIERRA or Stephanie V. or Libby, Michele is an All-Star.

I'm almost willing to guarantee that production drags Sea Bass to that fake idol and puts into his hands. If there's ever been a contestant lined up to have a humiliating exit, it's him.

Damn, that was a really good Ponderosa. Both Jenna and Michael showed way more personality than I remember from them during the show. I'm not shocked about the MIchael and Libby thing as I remember them sharing a Look during Libby's first TC after being voted out. Between that video and Kellyn's remarks tonight, Michael was probably driving most of the women crazy during the game.

I didn't love Michael, not as charismatic or well-spoken as my favorite underdogs, but I'll admit he grew on me. For eighteen years old, he seems incredibly mature and I really respect that. I particularly like how he laughed off Donathan's rejection of his idol plan, "That wasn't the answer I wanted." The strangest thing about this season isn't that they have a bad cast. It's how virtually every production decision this season has emphasized how bad this cast has been. Like the two tribes split could have been an interesting idea... except when you have such a boring, undefined group that's going through a slow motion pagonging. So we're left with no real idea why anything is happening except that once again, this group of people continues to vote along tribal lines. Tribal lines that formed like the first six days they were originally together. This season has been so bad that I'm almost having an ironic appreciation for it. It's almost the platonic ideal of a bad Survivor season, where everything that could go wrong did go wrong.

I don't know. So much of this board seems to be hate-watching but I'll say again, I really enjoyed FtWD and what it was turning into. And part of that was a smaller and more developed cast. Now Nick, who's been arguably the most developed character from the beginning, is dead. Madison might be dead. And by the end of these eight episodes, the newbies might effectively be the main characters. I don't like it. I don't like that the show I've been watching for three years seems like it's being tossed in the trash so it can become a TWD-clone. And I'm not sure if it's just the lighting or if the budget got cut, but did this episode look really cheap to anyone else? Especially when they're in the present.

I'm sort of amazed it took you this long as I argue this was the most substantial episode of the series so far. Virtually every other episode of Legion could be accused of doing a bunch of crazy and self-indulgent stuff to look cool. This was the first episode I would say they legitimately used their premise of "mutants with psychological issues," to actually do some character development. I can't quite get past the fact that Mom's boyfriend got utterly and absolutely hosed there. Syd didn't seem to care at all and just looked at itas one more step on her personal journey which is pretty character ruining for me. Also were they suggesting that Syd's mom was a rape survivor? So that adds one more completely horrible aspect to the whole situation.

Seriously Michael, you hear a HI is under the shelter and at that time you're the number one target, nicety and discretion be damned, go for it! I think this episode showed pretty clearly that Laurel doesn't have it in her to win this game. There are some people who are just utterly paralyzed by indecision if they don't have the backing of a stronger personality and that's Laurel to a T. By the same token, I give a lot of credit to Donathan that's he ready to make a move even if Dom or Wendell weren't involved with it.

I think that bump had to do with premiering after TWD finale. I seriously doubt they lost a million viewers because the second episode had the original cast. And those ratings are actually up significantly from season three's finale.

I don't think they ever showed it but Dom described her in Parvati terms.

Of course. I swear it seems like any female that is described by other players as "flirtatious," gets an invite back.

I agree that flipping between Ali and 9/11 really did kill a lot of the tension in the finale. I wish they either had another episode or rearranged the episode order to have one episode of the actual attack and then one episode of Ali being in Yemen. I actually think that the second-to-last episode would have made a more effective ending. Something about the systematic screw-ups really hit home in that episode. Especially when they used the real testimony of Condi and George Tenet and you realize, "holy shit, these people fucked up." Really as depressing as 9/11 was, everything that comes after is worse. Afghanistan, Iraq, rendition, Abu Ghraib, the entire Middle East being set on fire. And a lot of the people who were responsible for the screw-ups that led to the attack probably gained more power and stature after it. ETA: And holy shit, if anyone wants to hear what Michael Scheur, the real person that Martin was based on, said about John McNeil after 9/11: