The Survivor Thread

[GoGo Yubari]

Shane Powers is on Twitter. It's exactly like you think it'd be. Best Survivor on Twitter action recently has been Boston Rob's thoroughly confusing explanation of what Murlonio truly is, which is best experienced as narrated by Rob C. on his podcast (skip to when there's an hour and six minutes left).

Also I can't believe Survivor brought back that "both of you are going to Tribal Council and one of you gets to eat food while watching the other" shit for Cook Islands. That twist is dire. End result of that episode was so frustrating I couldn't watch any more for the day.

[GoGo Yubari]

Also, belatedly:

They are sticking in the same region, so no water challenges. Ozzy was only really amazing in the water challenges.

No water challenges in Samoa? It's an island! Surely they can manage those.

[RPS]

It is an island, yeah, but the water conditions aren't really well suited for swimming. Very very choppy waters with huge waves. Samoa and HvV, both filmed in Samoa, had no water challenges that I can remember.

Edited June 17, 2011 by RockPaperScissors

[GoGo Yubari]

Ah. Then yeah, dubious call.

EDIT: Oh, Cook Islands, stop making me hate white people.

[The Quasi Juice]

Ah. Then yeah, dubious call.

EDIT: Oh, Cook Islands, stop making me hate white people.

Hey, nothing wrong with Jonathan Penner

[GoGo Yubari]

Okay, got to the bottle twist.

Fairly bullshit, but it would have been a billion times worse if Raro had actually pulled off that win. Rebecca and Jenny going isn't the end of the worst as far as the season as a form of entertainment goes because, well, neither of them were entertaining at all. I love how the story of that tribe has now apparently turned into the white folks blindsiding everyone else. Good luck, Nate.

[RPS]

Ugh, the bottle twist. It could work post-merge, but should never be done pre-merge. Just seems unfair to arbitrarily make one Immunity challenge more important than the rest without informing anybody.

[GoGo Yubari]

To be honest, I still find "both of your tribes must vote out one member but the winning tribe will get the chance to totally fuck the losing tribe over while also eating stew in front of them" worse. Especially since it means that if you know you're on the outs in your tribe, it's in your best interest to try and screw the challenge up somehow. I'd sooner take overkill on people going out than making winning Immunity only matter in the most dickish of ways.

[GoGo Yubari]

Just hit the final five of Cook Islands, and RPS, I do have to disagree with one part of your assessment about one of the players in it.

Ozzy isn't a one-trick pony with water challenges. He's also an absolute beast at balance/climbing/agility challenges and is fairly solid in every area, except perhaps pure strength. Shit, he's even got game in puzzle challenges.

EDIT: Ahahahahahaha, the fire making challenge in Cook Islands. Amazing.

[GoGo Yubari]

Okay, Cook Islands finished. Definitely disagree with you, RPS, that really wasn't a bad season in the slightest. I mean, ultimately it was middle of the pack but there was a lot going for it, both in terms of the overarcing story and in terms of characters (Yul, Ozzy, Parvati, Jonathan, Nate, Cao Boi, etc.). Plus the Final Jury vote was probably the most suspenseful, unpredictable one since Richard vs. Kelly in Borneo.

Not looking forward to Fiji in the slightest, though. I've never heard a good word said about that one.

[RPS]

Hey, you are allowed to disagree. Cook Islands is not fondly looked at by the Survivor nerd community. I never liked it when it came out and have never re-watched it. Maybe I'll give it another try.

And as much shit as I give Fiji, there are some great moments. The have and have not twists though is pretty awful. However, the last 2-3 episodes pretty much set up a pretty epic Survivor moment that culminates in the finale. Like, I'd say it's on par with the Johnny Fairplay lying about his dead grandma in terms of how awful it makes the person look. Nobody comes out looking good, that's for sure.

[The Quasi Juice]

I don't mind Fiji, there are some good moments in there and like you said, the end is pretty epic. Also, Boo being one of the most clumsy Survivors ever is hilarious.

[GoGo Yubari]

Okay, starting on the first episode. "Rocky" vs. "Dreamz!" SILLY NICKNAME BATTLE.

[GoGo Yubari]

Okay, now Fiji's bottle twist, that was absolute bullshit. Wow.

Dreamz and Rocky are both unintentional comedy geniuses, too, following in the tradition of Judd from Guatemala and Robb from Thailand.

EDIT: Oh god, this season's just Palau II: Palau Harder, isn't it.

EDIT II: Just got to episode six. Man, Rocky is pretty much Son of Judd.

[GoGo Yubari]

Fiji COMPLETE. It wasn't the abysmally awful season I was expecting, but like Pleatherface said back on the favorites/least favorites thing, Fiji is pretty much The Yau-Man And Earl Show, and definitely the second-worst season of Survivor I've seen as of yet (Thailand is worse because post-merge it just became an absolute chore to get through, whereas in Fiji there was still some great episodes here and there). That big moment you guys alluded to really is in Dead Grandma territory, except it's probably worse because at least Fairplay was self-aware about what a dick it made him.

Also, wow. Final Jury was a trainwreck, and not even in the fun Thailand way.

Alex and Lisi, what the fuck. Especially Lisi, whose criticisms were as ridiculous and prone to histrionics as... well, her entire game.

I want a picture meme for Dreamz structured like "(Insert awful thing he did this season.) WILD CARD, BITCHES." Like, what really stuns me is the contrast between how Dreamz comes off on the show and how the other castaways perceived him him as somehow being a major threat at Final Jury. Glad Earl won, because fuck, if Cassandra or Dreamz had won I would have been furious.

And for as terrifically Yau-Man played the rest of Fiji, I can't believe how open he was about it being Dreamz who went at four. Why give him reasons to not give it to you?

Up next, China. Thank god.

EDIT: Ahahahaha, it's the Ashley Massaro and Jean-Robert Bellande season! This will be weird.

EDIT II: One thing I will say is that it features one of my favorite blindsides that I've seen up until this point. Y'all probably can probably guess the one.

[The Quasi Juice]

Fiji COMPLETE. It wasn't the abysmally awful season I was expecting, but like Pleatherface said back on the favorites/least favorites thing, Fiji is pretty much The Yau-Man And Earl Show, and definitely the second-worst season of Survivor I've seen as of yet (Thailand is worse because post-merge it just became an absolute chore to get through, whereas in Fiji there was still some great episodes here and there). That big moment you guys alluded to really is in Dead Grandma territory, except it's probably worse because at least Fairplay was self-aware about what a dick it made him.

Also, wow. Final Jury was a trainwreck, and not even in the fun Thailand way.

Alex and Lisi, what the fuck. Especially Lisi, whose criticisms were as ridiculous and prone to histrionics as... well, her entire game.

I want a picture meme for Dreamz structured like "(Insert awful thing he did this season.) WILD CARD, BITCHES." Like, what really stuns me is the contrast between how Dreamz comes off on the show and how the other castaways perceived him him as somehow being a major threat at Final Jury. Glad Earl won, because fuck, if Cassandra or Dreamz had won I would have been furious.

And for as terrifically Yau-Man played the rest of Fiji, I can't believe how open he was about it being Dreamz who went at four. Why give him reasons to not give it to you?

Up next, China. Thank god.

EDIT: Ahahahaha, it's the Ashley Massaro and Jean-Robert Bellande season! This will be weird.

EDIT II: One thing I will say is that it features one of my favorite blindsides that I've seen up until this point. Y'all probably can probably guess the one.

Chicken?

[GoGo Yubari]

I was still referring to Fiji, actually

EDIT: Okay, his blindside reaction was pretty priceless. Not as great as Judd's "scumbags" rant in Guatemala, but up there.

[The Quasi Juice]

Oh you're talking about the latin guy. Yes, that was extremely epic, because "the Horsemen" were so cocky and all.

Edit: Also rewatching China. Lots of boobage in episode 2. Also lolz at Ashley's cooch being blurred, and I believe Amanda's underpants basically get blurred 50% of the time in China.

Edited June 29, 2011 by The Quasi Juice

[GoGo Yubari]

Yeah, Edgardo. I think they did some editing magic and that hysterical moment where Edgardo and Alex's shit-eating grins were crushed at seeing the first Edgardo vote was actually for Dreamz's vote for Mookie, but it was still amazing.

Also, Ashley may not have lasted long but "I'm voting for Derek Zoolander... I mean, Dave." was priceless.

[The Quasi Juice]

Rewatching China is actually more enjoyable than seeing it the first time. I forgot the hilarity that is Jean-Robert and how clueless James was.