S36: Ghost Island Preview and Speculation

[Lamb18]

Quote

I know it seems really stupid- but the winner is announced on the reunion show, not in this episode.  Not everyone has a chance to watch the reunion immediately after the airing.  If you discuss the results, you are in spoiler territory.  You have to take discussion of the vote tally and winner/loser there. 

I think it is stupid. I've been watching all the Survivor seasons on CBS All Access - took a break at Cambodia: Scot, Jason, Tai, Aubry, etc. In every single season the episode videos are packaged so that the winner is revealed at the end of the finale episode. The reunion is a separate episode that follows. That is even how it's presented when you watch. Even though the winner's reveal is live, it happens right after the final vote. Then the reunion follows.

If CBS considers announcing the winner as part of the final episode, why can't this forum???? It's silly not being able to say who the winner is in the thread for the episode in which the winner is announced!

[kassandra8286]

37 minutes ago, Lamb18 said:

If CBS considers announcing the winner as part of the final episode, why can't this forum???? It's silly not being able to say who the winner is in the thread for the episode in which the winner is announced!

I agree, it doesn't make sense. Even the heavily-modded TWOP didn't have that rule., you were certainly allowed to discuss the winner in the finale topic, just not the reunion itself.  Looking at last season's finale thread, that rule was pretty much ignored for the most part anyway. Prior to season 35 the finale/reunion threads were combined, so the rule was moot.

Edited May 21, 2018 by kassandra8286

[peachmangosteen]

1 hour ago, Lamb18 said:

Here's my guess: Laurel wins immunity at final 4 (Laurel, Donathan, Domenick and Wendell), picks Donathan, then Wendell and Domenick have to make fire. 

I'm thinking this is what's gonna happen, too. The ep description further makes me think this. And then whichever of Dom/Wendell wins the fire-making challenge will win the game.

[violet and green]

8 hours ago, Lamb18 said:

I think it is stupid.

I still don't understand why we can't discuss the previews on the episode thread either, or even who was shown voting for who at the very end. I don't seem to recall this preview rule for any other show, but maybe I'm misremembering. Anyway, people feel really passionate about it, and it's a rule - so I guess they feel the same way about the winner announced. It is an odd segmenting...

7 hours ago, peachmangosteen said:

I'm thinking this is what's gonna happen, too. The ep description further makes me think this. And then whichever of Dom/Wendell wins the fire-making challenge will win the game.

In  my dream outcome: I am thinking Donathan is going to have to win an immunity or two, and burn off both idols in one tribal. I wonder if he would be as dumbly loyal as Laurel and bring either Dom or Wendell, if he had any say in it. Maybe we'll be watching Sea Bass and Dom firing off...

Dom or Wendell would both be really worthy winners, though.

[303420]

5 hours ago, violet and green said:

I still don't understand why we can't discuss the previews on the episode thread either, or even who was shown voting for who at the very end. I don't seem to recall this preview rule for any other show, but maybe I'm misremembering. Anyway, people feel really passionate about it, and it's a rule - so I guess they feel the same way about the winner announced. It is an odd segmenting...

In  my dream outcome: I am thinking Donathan is going to have to win an immunity or two, and burn off both idols in one tribal. I wonder if he would be as dumbly loyal as Laurel and bring either Dom or Wendell, if he had any say in it. Maybe we'll be watching Sea Bass and Dom firing off...

Dom or Wendell would both be really worthy winners, though.

I vote for discussing the winner in the episode thread rather than the reunion thread, if it matters.

@violet and green, I've been driving myself batshit crazy running through all the possibilities, and I'm delighted to stoke your Donathan fire. 

As I've explained here and elsewhere, Donathan's E1 edit leads me to believe that he makes F3. 

I do think that Donathan will be the consensus F6 target and be out unless he wins immunity. I feel certain he makes F3, so I expect him to win F6 immunity.

If Dom/Wendell bounces the other before F4 and then loses F4 firemaking, we could see an F3 with neither Dom nor Wendell.

If we see Dom/Wendell face off in a fire making challenge, I think the winner of it wins F3. I think winning the fire-making challenge elevates a person in the eyes of the jury. I suggested last season that Chrissy should have picked Ben to at least rob him of the opportunity to win one more thing in front of the jury. You tell the jury you didn't want to shy away from your toughest competition and hope for the best.

But that same principle of being elevated by fire making applies to Donathan: if Donathan gets into F3 by winning fire making, it gives him a nice, recent, feel-good resume point in front of the jury.

I still see a chance for Laurel to win with a loyalty story or Sea Bass to win with a Fabio story (including immunities), but I find these so unlikely as to not be worth discussing.

[violet and green]

2 hours ago, 303420 said:

@violet and green, I've been driving myself batshit crazy running through all the possibilities, and I'm delighted to stoke your Donathan fire. 

As I've explained here and elsewhere, Donathan's E1 edit leads me to believe that he makes F3.

Oh, may it be so!

[KimberStormer]

In some ways I think if Laurel picks Donathan (or vice versa) and Dom and Wendell have to fight it out, it's only going to help whichever of the two wins the fire making challenge.  The one who loses is a guaranteed vote for the one who wins.  They obviously adore each other, and if they got to the finals without voting each other out??  The bromance would reach epic levels.

It certainly wouldn't help Laurel.  She can't beat either one.  If it gets to that point she lost long ago.  Although tbh I might be tempted (as a Survivor nerd) to not vote for Dom or Wendell if they got to the F4 together: that's not playing to win, either.  It's not a team game.  Honestly, I wish there was more discussion of that fact, that "Dom and Wendell" is not a thing.  "Dom and Wendell" can't win.  Only Dom, or only Wendell.  They're not really playing that great if they're not keeping that fact in mind.

Edited May 22, 2018 by KimberStormer

[kikaha]

5 hours ago, KimberStormer said:

 Although tbh I might be tempted (as a Survivor nerd) to not vote for Dom or Wendell if they got to the F4 together: that's not playing to win, either.  It's not a team game.  Honestly, I wish there was more discussion of that fact, that "Dom and Wendell" is not a thing.  "Dom and Wendell" can't win.  Only Dom, or only Wendell.  They're not really playing that great if they're not keeping that fact in mind.

How do you feel about Parv, Amanda and Cirie taking each other to F4 and F3 in Micronesia?  

[KimberStormer]

Not ideal of course, but it's a good point.  I feel like I can at least see the distinction between the three of them more, why they might think people would vote for them over the others.  Like Amanda didn't vote out Ozzy and betray the alliance, Cirie did vote for Amanda at one point, etc.  But that's probably more editing and many years of hindsight talking.  It seems like Dom and Wendell are such a unit this season, it's hard to distinguish them except purely by personal preference, like how I like them both a lot but I have a crush on Wendell.  I can't really say "well Wendell did X, which Dom wasn't involved in", you know?

I imagine all these things will be more clear after the finale!

[Nashville]

10 hours ago, KimberStormer said:

In some ways I think if Laurel picks Donathan (or vice versa) and Dom and Wendell have to fight it out, it's only going to help whichever of the two wins the fire making challenge.  The one who loses is a guaranteed vote for the one who wins.  They obviously adore each other, and if they got to the finals without voting each other out??  The bromance would reach epic levels.

Not only that, but Wendell has one single solitary chink in his gameplay resume: the lack of an individual immunity win.  Which would no longer be the case if Wendell were to beat Dom at the F4 firemaking challenge.

[Earlfor1]

Having watched the finale, I have to say that this season was edited strangely compared to others.  It was so obvious that Wendell or Dom was going to win. It was just a matter of figuring out which one.  Speculating this season has not been as fun as in the past based on how they decided to edit the season. There were episodes in which Wendell was hardly seen, and Dominic dominated the airwaves.  It was all Dominic all the time.  Now that the season is over, I wonder if this was to hide the winner or if Dominic was a better story teller than Wendell.  

I hope next season that the edit is a little more balanced.  Many of the players seemed invisible, but they were making so many unaired moves.  I am so over Probst and his alpha male fascination. 

[peachmangosteen]

I think it's usually pretty obvious who will win. Or that there's only 2 or maybe 3 people who have a shot. But I do still agree that the editing was off this season. I'm not sure exactly why/how though.

Dom is the type the editors love/they think we love and Wendell is a much quieter player and they have always downplayed quiet players in editing. But even knowing that I still find it ridiculous that Dom got 28 more confessionals than Wendell.

[MissEwa]

20 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

I think it's usually pretty obvious who will win. Or that there's only 2 or maybe 3 people who have a shot. But I do still agree that the editing was off this season. I'm not sure exactly why/how though.

Dom is the type the editors love/they think we love and Wendell is a much quieter player and they have always downplayed quiet players in editing. But even knowing that I still find it ridiculous that Dom got 28 more confessionals than Wendell.

This combined with your post in the reunion thread has made me think that what Wendell got was, in a lot of ways, the female winners edit. Which is interesting because he is actually pretty alpha and the kind of guy Jeff would usually go mad for - athletic, attractive, a provider around camp. 

The edit was definitely weird and didn't give us an accurate picture of what was happening. People were left out, and I think strategy was left out. 

Angela's invisible edit took all the wind out of the F4 fire-making - and I wonder if it's a thing they're still ironing out, because Devon got only a marginally more visible edit last year, almost like they give people very low-key edits when they go out in ways that the audience might not think are fair, because it cuts out the backlash if we don't really know them. 

[peachmangosteen]

43 minutes ago, MissEwa said:

Angela's invisible edit took all the wind out of the F4 fire-making - and I wonder if it's a thing they're still ironing out, because Devon got only a marginally more visible edit last year, almost like they give people very low-key edits when they go out in ways that the audience might not think are fair, because it cuts out the backlash if we don't really know them. 

I agree and I kinda get it, but by making us not care about the person who goes at 4 by making them invisible, they make the F4 fire-making challenge boring and obvious. 

[MissEwa]

3 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

I agree and I kinda get it, but by making us not care about the person who goes at 4 by making them invisible, they make the F4 fire-making challenge boring and obvious. 

Very much so. If they keep it - and it looks like they will - I hope this is something that changes as it becomes just another part of the game.