Auntie Anxiety

Just finished watching this show today and thought the first season was excellent. I was busy raising kids during the 80's, so I didn't know much about what was going on in the 80s, except for Dallas, Dynasty and out-sized shoulder pads. Totally looking forward to the next season. Netflix was ingenious in this undertaking. I bet it introduced an huge Hispanic audience to the Netflix brand.

Couldn't agree more, spaceghostess. I think that was Shane's problem with the witch coven from the get-go. He wanted to embrace the experience, push himself, do whatever possible to survive while those two harpies acted as if they were sitting on a bench waiting for the bus to arrive on Day 40. And Danielle (who couldn't wait to get her "name" back, as if she had trademarked and copyrighted it), it's really time to stop patting yourself on the back because you were able to maintain your vegetarianism. I value acting like a mensch far more than not eating meat for 40 days. Get over yourself, dear. I'm pretty good at reading people, have a fairly high emotional intelligence and I found Eva's apology hollow and phony. Hope it made her feel better about herself. Alana hugging Shane was profoundly ridiculous. You could tell by her face that she was thinking about how she was going to get herself out of that situation. It seemed quite clear that she hadn't given her actions a second thought up until the time the camera was focused on her reacting to the video. I mean, didn't the group have at least five seconds to speak to each other before being filmed at the reunion? Even if they hadn't yet seen the episodes, wouldn't a normal person rethink how s/he treated someone else and, I don't know, maybe apologize before being shamed into it? I've heard a rumor that there are things like phones and emails that one can use to communicate. And how dare EJ not be the leader of the entire group! [/sarcasm] Was that supposed to be in his contract, Laura? To play daddy to that woeful group of do-nothings? Last time I checked, you were all adults, all signed on to be on the show, all KNEW or should have known what it took to survive (since they were all veterans of the show) and no one should have expected to be provided for by anyone other than themselves. It wasn't EJ's job to make the 40 days into Club Med for all the hangers-on.

Honora really appears to have embraced the homeless persona thing, dog and all. Would it have killed her to maybe put a comb through her hair for the occasion? What a poseur. Dani, who looked lovely btw, let them off easy. I don't think I'd ever talk to those assholes again. Chris is a tool. Alana sucks the wad. Laura seems to have rationalized her horrendous behavior. I don't care how tired and hungry and terrible someone is feeling.....you do NOT treat a teammate like crap and try make excuses for it after the fact. Those extreme conditions show who you really are, including being a douche to someone who doesn't deserve it.

Thank you, lovebug. Even with the tranquilizers, the caiman almost got away.

I thought it was also a "let's feel good about ourselves" moment. There are some survivors I didn't like, some I felt neutral about, but the only one I'm disappointed in is Laura.

Best part of the episode was when the dolphins showed up. After the reunion, I don't want to see any of those people anymore.

With regard to Honora, it just goes to show you that even a broken clock is right twice a day.

From the previews, it looked like Honora had a few choice words for Chris (called him a sexist or mysogynist or some such thing). I wonder if she watched his first episode and saw how he treated his female companion in order to buttress her accusations.

Hooray for a reunion show. I just recently posted that they needed to do one, just so that Dani could call out the assholes who bullied her for no reason whatsoever. We need a drinking game: Have a shot whenever they cry "editing." Those guys with guns on the boat made me wonder if perhaps I made a mistake and was watching Narcos (which is very good, btw, if you need something to binge-watch).

Didn't I see this same mob goes crazy plot line in the first season of The Strain? Yeah, I stopped watching that one too. And Matt, I apologize, but you are always going to be Randall from The Wire in my eyes.

I was just thinking about how much I would love to see a reunion show and have Shane and Dani totally humiliate and embarrass those assholes.

As someone who needs a lot of alone time, I felt sorry for Dani. Those idiots couldn't trust her? What the hell does that even mean? From my standpoint, they bullied her for no good reason other than that they needed to put someone on the outside to make themselves feel better about themselves.. Totally ridiculous. I thought at least Laura would be better than that. And I am sure the women would be the first ones to scream "bullying" if they had been the victims of this emotional abuse. As far as I'm concerned, Dani is a survival goddess, right up there with Jeff and EJ. The rest of the bunch can go pound sand. The big group catches a stingray and devours it, not even allowing EJ a taste, but feel completely entitled when Jeff snares another eel. It was very kind of Jeff to share. Alana falling into the water while trying to stab the stingray showed how completely idiotic she is. Yeah, good survival skills on that one. I'm sort of ready for this to be over. It's become too much like the show Survivor, just without that stoopid Jeff Probst.

I agree and I was happy that they did that. EJ saw Shane completely shut down when he was around those two women and EJ was also wise enough to know that Alana and Dani were drama queens. He and Jeff are fine on their own and didn't need the emotional crap that would have been inevitable. I also think they didn't want to be put in the position of having to be leaders/hunters for the rest of the group. Watching the others try to fish was entertaining; why would EJ want to shut that show off? With regard to the well, with so many people in the group, they have plenty of time to get water from the lake, boil it and cool it down for consumption. The perfect lazy job for Alana!

Alana can stop being so smug any time now. If Shane hadn't worked so hard all that time when he was with them, they wouldn't have had the time to sit around and bitch about him. Alana, it's BECAUSE of Shane that you and the vegetarian lasted this long, not in spite of him.

Meh. Probably not watching next season because this just got too silly and formulaic. Killing off William Hurt's character was a mistake.

argon, I had the same thought and really hope that the Discovery Channel is better than that (I just finished watching UnReal and it supported my views of "reality" tv shows). Yes, coincidences like that happen in real life, but the timing (leaving the old campsite, the amount of time it took to walk to the lake, showing up just before any of Team Alphamale had a chance to take a single bite)? Had to be a setup. Just like meeting up with Shane wasn't a coincidence, nor was the appearance of Team No Lips Harpies when Shane and the guys were sitting by the water. I did like that Shane didn't badmouth his former teammates and allowed them to show their true colors. I also thought that EJ was very diplomatic and showed his maturity, telling Team Harpie that it would be better for them if they stayed and Shane left with the guys. It appears that EJ might be the oldest person out there and life experience has taught him well. If they do break into two teams of four, I wonder what the personnel groupings will be.

I sorta can't wait to see the mean girls do the 7 mile trek to Piranha Lake. Nothing would make me happier than to see those two fail.

Actually I wanted to smack Daniel upside the head. The building manager (can't remember his name offhand) was nice enough to put his faith in Daniel and now the pool is ruined and needs to be repainted and the residents have to wait longer to use it. Thanks, Daniel. Apparently no good deed goes unpunished in Paulie.

I'm getting to the point of utter frustration. The only character I like is John. I've become so un-invested in all the rest.

Donna and Bos have become the only two characters who aren't written like caricatures of themselves. I've had it up to my eyeballs with the rest of them.

Yes, I agree that Tawney looked a bit puffy. I wondered if the actress was pregnant or had recently had a baby.

Teddy is just so damned menacing. Tawny really does need to run away because he's a nasty piece of work. I'm so confused about what happened in Florida, even though I've watched every episode.

I was extremely annoyed with Honora and decided that there was no way in hell the producers should have extended an invitation to her for XL. She is a very damaged and immature girl. If you listen closely, almost all her bitching and whining and attacking were really projecting her own feelings about herself onto her partners, telling them what she thinks they think about her. Sounded like Luke knew how to handle her using techniques he learned doing wilderness therapy but that's not his job here. If her goal was redemption for her piss poor performance in her first attempt, she's just proving to the audience that she isn't up to the challenge once again.

I don't know. The nurse seemed to be along for the ride while the green beret seemed to do all the heavy lifting. Maybe she learned some things about surviving from him because he was a great partner. Too bad he caught a disease from one of those nasty sand flies. Yuck. And hooray for a multi-purpose mosquito net. Smart.

Odi reminds me of a cross between C-3PO and Max Headroom. I like this show; it's different and a nice change of pace from a lot of other shows I am watching this summer (UnReal, Poldark, Rectify, Halt and Catch Fire, Deustcheland, and Jonathan Strange to name a few).