Game Changers: Finale

I think the jurors were fairly astute in their observations & comments – especially Michaela! If she’s not in law school, she certainly should be. Ozzy & Debbie’s arguments proved to me that they were the dumbest people left in the game. Also par for the course that crazy Debbie would side with Ozzy, who she voted out, and Brad, who she felt like betrayed her. Ozzy’s criticism of Sarah’s her "low" play especially rankled me. How can he judge her & say that she didn’t have to “stoop so low” to win & then claim his massive experience on the show as proof that he’s right? He’s had more opportunities to win this game than anyone, but still couldn’t do it!

The finale started with an epic moment when Cirie went home without getting a single vote. Holy cow!! Sucks that Cirie had to go out like that, but I love that this moment happened. Do you think if EVERYONE had played an idol that they just would have sent them all back to camp? I feel like that’s the only fair thing to do. I was sorry to see Cirie go, though. She was a canny player who was extremely likable & I think the scheming for the rest of the episode would have been more epic had she still been around.

In a season full of twists and records, the finale did not disappoint! I’m inclined to call this the greatest season of Survivor ever, though I am aware some recency bias may be coming into play here. At the very least it’s a Top 5 season.

Soon to follow is Aubry, and now the Final 4 is all Team Try Harder. This truly was a dominant season for our team. We blew out the previous record-setting score (228: Michal & Ben - 2nd Chance) by 66 points. That’s a nearly 30% increase. I don’t think we'll see a score this high again ever.

As I’m watching the final 4 compete I realize that Brad is now wearing a sack for a shirt. When did that happen? Was it around the same time that he became a mega-douche again? He reverted back to his first season self in an extremely off-putting way. I do think it had something to do with starvation, but I also think his domination at challenges brought his arrogance to the fore-front.

They kept talking about the “elite” group of castaways who have won 5 immunity challenges. From my research, the only other person who has done this within a single season is Ozzy. (Though before looking it up I’d guessed that Kim & Mike were in that group…) There are others who have done it over multiple seasons, but that seems like kind of a cheat.

I’m glad Sarah didn’t decide to split votes & do a fire challenge. There was no upside there for her, but there was huge upside for her to simply listen to Tai & take what he said seriously. The fact that Troyzan didn’t even consider that a fire challenge might come up in that final vote was just one more indication that he was NOT paying attention to how this game really works. I’m glad he gave that very gracious exit speech at the end of Final Tribal, that salvaged his dignity somewhat.

And speaking of Final Tribal, I really liked the new format! I think it’s great to hear the jurors discuss & argue with each other. You knew they were doing that at Ponderosa anyways, so it was nice to see that happen on camera instead.

In the end Sierra, Debbie & Ozzy voted for Brad – the “bitter Betty”s as Michaela called them. Everyone else voted correctly for Sarah, and we now have another Survivor champion!!

As opposed to Adam from last season who I thought was a very weak winner, I think Sarah may be one of the best. The caliber of player she was up against was off the charts, and she played a very crafty, strategic, yet subtle game. She also was super well-spoken at Final Tribal and argued her case really well.

Then we were on to the reunion where we could see how terrifying Brad could look with that molestache, and see Tai at his best in that spiffy blue sweater. Nothing else very interesting happened throughout the reunion, though I really liked hearing what would have happened in a tie. Do you think Probst dropped that info in here because it might actually happen next season!?

I’m going to hold out hope that this is the case, because I’m none too impressed with the preview of next season. Anything after this season is going to be a letdown of course, but seriously? Heroes, Healers & Hustlers? In Fiji… again? The only way this gets interesting is if the “hustler” tribe is actually full of hustlers a la Ocean’s 11 & Zootopia, and not bell hops & administrative assistants like the preview indicates. And that surgeon!! Good Lord, can they please stop bringing surgeons onto the show?

The Teams:

Michal & Ben "Try Harder" - 294 points

1. Tai (84 pts)
2. Caleb (-3 pts)
3. Sarah (79 pts)
4. Troyzan (43 pts)
5. Brad (91 pts)

MoonBee "Steel Magnolias" -  129 points

1. Michaela (28 pts)
2. Cirie (36 pts)
3. Andrea (52 pts)
4. Ciera ( -5 pts)
5. Hali (18 pts)

Doug & Bri "Original Manbun" - 123 points

1. Malcolm (5 pts)
2. Zeke (34 pts)
3. Aubry (42 pts)
4. Jeff (9 pts)
5. Sierra (33 pts)

Baggadocious "Legends of the Fall" - 71 points

1. JT (11 pts)
2. Tony (-4 pts)
3. Ozzy (31 pts)
4. Sandra (6 pts)
5. Debbie (27 pts)

Prop Bets:

-->

People involved	Castaways Involved	Method of measurement	Stakes	And the winner is...
Bag v. Ben	JT + Ozzy v. Tai + Sarah	Longevity (bonus if 1 whole team elimated before the other loses a player)	1 drink	Ben + bonus
Michal v. Melissa	Sierra v. Ciera	Longevity	1 drink	Michal
Moon v. Doug	Michaela v. 3 of Doug's team	The bet is that any 3 of Doug's team end up doing better than Michaela	???	I don't remember how this bet was supposed to play out - I will let commenters determine that!
Moon v. Ben	Varner wins the whole she-bang	100:1 odds	2 bits	Ben

Game Changers: Episodes 10 & 11

Two episodes have passed & 3 players have gone home. Tomorrow is the finale and I don't have a lot of time to post now. Which is too bad - this season has been fabulous & I wish I had the time to reflect more on the last couple episodes, especially the last 20 minutes of this last one!!

Quick recap: Sierra got ousted due to Sarah's scheming to get her legacy idol. She raised suspicions among the remaining contestants, but Andrea still got the boot anyway. It's hard to know how much went down there, though, because the show wanted to devote more time to the next tribal council. And rightly so!

I still don't fully understand what happened. Cirie tried to use Sarah's own advantage to save her, but couldn't. Her entire hand was revealed & Sarah was PISSED and yet somehow Michaela is the one who went home. What?? Sarah stole Tai's vote and voted with Brad & Troyzan to oust her. Cirie voted Aubry & Michaela & Aubry voted Tai. How did this go down? I still don't fully understand all the scheming that happened here. I like that somehow Troyzan & Tai didn't end up playing their idols through this madness, though I don't know how they could be so steely.



The Teams:

Michal & Ben "Try Harder" - 124 points

1. Tai (45 pts)
2. [Caleb (-3 pts)]
3. Sarah (21 pts)
4. Troyzan (27 pts)
5. Brad (34 pts)

MoonBee "Steel Magnolias" -  112 points

1. [Michaela (28 pts)]
2. Cirie (19 pts)
3. [Andrea (52 pts)]
4. [Ciera ( -5 pts)]
5. [Hali (18 pts)]

Doug & Bri "Original Manbun" - 105 points

1. [Malcolm (5 pts)]
2. [Zeke (34 pts)]
3. Aubry (24 pts)
4. [Jeff (9 pts)]
5. [Sierra (33 pts)]

Baggadocious "Legends of the Fall" - 71 points

1. [JT (11 pts)]
2. [Tony (-4]
3. [Ozzy (31 pts)]
4. [Sandra (6 pts)]
5. [Debbie (27 pts)]

Power Rankings:

1. Try Harder: Are we uncatchable? I think so. The only chance the others would have is if Cirie or Aubry swept the votes at final tribal, and even then it might not be enough if Tai & Troyzan play their idols mostly correctly.

3. Steel Magnolias: Cirie played a really solid game until this last episode where she should have read the fine print.

2. Original Manbun: Aubry is NEVER on the right side of the vote, but she is still miraculously in this game. Will she make it to final tribal on this same crazy yet weirdly effective game plan?

4. Legends of the Fall: Sup.


Douche of the Week:

Andrea, and then maybe Cirie? I can't choose for the 2nd episode!!

Game Changers: Episodes 8 & 9

We are in Los Angeles and got to have a bit of a Survivor reunion with Moon & Melissa this last week. In honor of the occasion, I decided to do a bit of live blogging during the episode, a la Bachelor blog.

But first the previous episode: it might as well have been could have been named ‘an homage to Sarah.’ She got all the attention & seemed to make a lot of smart moves. This was one of those episodes where it felt like they were gearing us up for her ultimate victory. I say this based on my personal opinions around the way Survivor producers give air time. For example, she was seen to read how long the advantage she got was valid for (down to 5 players) which leads me to believe that she will be around when it gets down to final 5. Additionally, her comment about being the first player in Survivor history to correctly play the stolen vote advantage was telling. If she’d misplayed it within that episode it could have been the producers showing a little egg in her face. But she didn’t, which leads me to believe that she is actually calling that one correctly.

Getting rid of Debbie was a pleasure. That cuckoo cougar may have been less annoying to the other castaways than Michaela, but she was definitely more annoying to me. I will not miss her. She stole too much air time from more deserving players.

Now, on to the most recent episode!

Moon & Melissa joined us at our VRBO for the event. Between bites of unexpectedly tiny pizza we caught up on life in LA and poured one out in memory of Baggadocious’ team. “We couldn’t have drafted a worse team if we tried,” concluded Moon gleefully.

The episode began with Sarah coming clean about breaking up the “line in the concrete” alliance of 6, and for us it began with a discussion of how Zeke has been playing the game too hard this season. He seems to think he needs to make moves just to make moves sometimes, which will likely be his downfall…. Dum dum duuumm….

The reward challenge seems to push the castaways to their limits of coming up with 11-letter words. After 50 minutes of puzzling, Probst starts giving them massive clues, but it’s unclear if anyone realizes it. Eventually Andrea figures it out, thus confirming her as the strongest puzzle solver in the game.

Zeke makes a reference to the game being like climbing Mt. Everest, which is funny because I’d referred to voting Sandra out as being akin to climbing Mt. Everest earlier in the night.

“It gets harder and harder every day,” says Zeke. “How would you know, Zeke?” asks Moon.

Moon claims Michaela is the smartest player left in the game. Ben questions this. Moon says she’s clever, sharp & picks things up quickly. Everyone agrees she needs Cirie as a mentor, and interested in seeing where that goes. Ben argues that these qualities do not give her the appropriate toolkit to win Survivor, and now there’s a discussion of whether Aubry is the best social player left in the game. She continues to remain safe despite rarely being in the majority alliance. “But if you don’t have the intel,” asks Ben, “how much can you really do?”

“Oh, hydrogen!” interjects Melissa. A commercial for a hydrogen-run car has just come on, which is something that apparently has been long-anticipated by the Jones tribe.

Zeke wants to make a final 5 with him, Sarah, Troyzan, Brad & Michaela. Team Try Harder is doing a happy dance, though this ends up being a short-lived alliance.

Moon compares Culpepper to Jaime Lannister. I didn’t get more details on this, but am super intrigued. Moon, perhaps you can share more in the comments about this?

At tribal council we all marvel at Tai’s decision to not play an immunity idol. “Who is his leak? Who is his informant?” Moon demands. A good question, and I seriously have no idea. No one trusts him & it looks like his closest allies all voted for him. So was that just amazing gut instinct?

In the end, Zeke goes home, and Michaela cries. I didn’t realize that Michaela cared so much about him. Between her & Sarah, Andrea bullied two people into voting out someone they really didn’t want to. What’s interesting about that is that it will likely embitter them against her and ultimately be the reason that she goes home. Also, she’s clearly one of the biggest challenge threats, so it’d probably be inevitable that she be targeted anyway. But I still think this was a moment when Andrea made decisions based on personal feelings rather than sound strategy. And I think it was a mistake.



The Teams:

Michal & Ben "Try Harder" - 108 points

1. Tai (45 pts)
2. [Caleb (-3 pts)]
3. Sarah (19 pts)
4. Troyzan (27 pts)
5. Brad (20 pts)

Doug & Bri "Original Manbun" - 84 points

1. [Malcolm (5 pts)]
2. [Zeke (34 pts)]
3. Aubry (17 pts)
4. [Jeff (9 pts)]
5. Sierra (19 pts)

MoonBee "Steel Magnolias" -  78 points

1. Michaela (12 pts)
2. Cirie (18 pts)
3. Andrea (35 pts)
4. [Ciera ( -5 pts)]
5. [Hali (18 pts)]

Baggadocious "Legends of the Fall" - 71 points

1. [JT (11 pts)]
2. [Tony (-4]
3. [Ozzy (31 pts)]
4. [Sandra (6 pts)]
5. [Debbie (27 pts)]

Power Rankings:

1. Try Harder: Try Harder just reached one-derland. We are undeniably in a strong position with 4 players still in the game and Sarah being my front-runner to win it all. Culpepper still seems solid too, despite recent set-backs. And Troyzan & Tai have 3 hidden idols between them. So it’s a pretty good spot all around..

3. Steel Magnolias: after Sarah I think Andrea is the strongest candidate to win it all, though I also think her strengths are too obvious & she’ll be marked as a threat. All the same, with Michaela’s earning potential & Cirie’s sound strategy this is still a solid 3. They have a lot of points to make up, though, so it’ll be an uphill battle..

2. Original Manbun: Aubry & Sierra don’t have enough combined oomph to challenge either Harder or Magnolias. Both are capable of making big moves, but I don’t think enough people like Sierra for her to win, and I don’t think Aubry’s accomplished enough to win either. Either could be a good person for a stronger player to take to the finals, though.

4. Legends of the Fall: and fall they did. Thinking about Moon’s comment, though, about how bad this team was…. Maybe we should do a season where we try for the lowest score? I.e. we draft for the worst players? I’d only want to do it on a season where it’s all n00b castaways, but it might be a fun twist for a season...


Douche of the Week:

Debbie for episode 8

Andrea for episode 9… she just got too obsessed & obnoxious about targeting Zeke imo