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Survivor 34: "Game Changers" | RIP Dan Kay, Survivor: Gabon


Scrambled Aegon

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The first boot I was happy to see. I think Ciera is overhyped. It was fun watching her have an epiphany at tribal council and go to rocks, but other than that I've never enjoyed watching her. I'm sure she's a lovely woman, just not very dynamic IMO and very much a one trick pony.

I forgot how much I enjoy watching Malcolm. Dude is charming and capable. So much better than Joey Amazing. The war of wills with Tony and Sandra was kinda epic and I'm sad that it played out so quickly. If one of them had to go, I'm glad it wasn't Sandra. She can stop talking about being the queen already though, that's getting old. I have no idea how she got the guys on board. I wouldn't have said it was in their best interest. Tony just blew himself up with the paranoia. Too bad, he's amusing as hell, but probably exhausting to deal with.

I'm hopeful that Varner lasts a little longer this time around. I just love him, useless lump that he is. He hasn't had much camera time yet and if he went early, they'd want to capitalize on it, right? Please? And I'm glad we're getting a swap already. Looks to be a promising season I think.

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Looks like it may be a good season, I am still not happy with all the returning players but so far it was ok.

Tony basically begged them to vote him out. The editing was done to make us think he had a chance when in reality none of the guys were on his side.

What were they thinking in that challenge? You leave Mychala and Malcolm on the beach in what is clearly a very physical challenge? Pound for pound Mychala is the best challenge beast I have ever seen and she was reduced to spectator.

My personal wish as of now is that Mychala (sp?) lasts a long time. If she can keep her emotions in check and not voice her (absolutely correct) thoughts, then she could go a long ways.

Had a funny thought while watching this season "big moves season"...will the biggest move actually be sitting back and letting others try to show how they are the biggest game changers and pick each other off?

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Rewatched the premiere.

 

First things first, it's fantastic that Ciera and Tony are out right out of the gates. The show's constant harping on about "You need to Make Big Moves" nowadays has gotten really tiresome, and obviously this season looks like one that could be full of that given the theme (and that the theme probably came out of the "evolution of strategy" talk in Cambodia that went hand-in-hand with it.) Fortunately, two of the worst offenders in that regard are out right away: Ciera was fun in BvW but her only role in Cambodia was to be obnoxious about how people opposed to her "weren't playing the game", and pre-show stuff here made it seem like we could expect more of the same. Tony could be fun in small doses but I don't think they'd ever actually give us small doses of him. He'd dominate the edit in nearly any season he was a part of - he already got a ton of focus here, and while part of that is surely because he went out by the end of the night, I imagine if he'd gone home in week 4 or 5 or 6 or something, they'd still milk him about as much while he was around - so I'm happy that he's out and there's breathing room for the rest of the cast instead of focusing on his artificial, hyper-"strategic" antics. Like it literally took 15 minutes for the show to derail into a Tony Idol hunt, so. This is seriously an outstanding outcome and even if the rest of the season sucks, at least we got these two out of the way.

 

As for the episode itself, I did agree on the rewatch with a couple of friends who suggested that it started a little fast with a little bit of rushed focus on strategy. I do think that may have been inevitable with a returnee season of this cast, though - and I also think a lot of it probably had to do with Tony. Looking at the two halves distinct from one another, I think the first half was... okay - WWMD is a great hashtag, it's kind of interesting that in the "Game Changers" season the first person was voted out for seeming too aggressive, and I loved the Cirie/Tai scene. But ultimately the Ciera boot was a little more interesting in theory than in practice and the massive disparity between Mana and Nuku in terms of entertainment can't be ignored.

 

Second half though was incredible fun as a huge Sandra fan. It was basically a delightful fanfiction epilogue to her epic HvV repeat. Everyone's always said "Sandra only does well because she doesn't have to go to TC in the early episodes" - but here we saw her go to an early TC, adopt an entirely different strategy, and come out on top all the same, rallying the entire tribe to vote out a strong physical challenge competitor on a losing tribe. And while maybe they expected a swap and therefore weren't worried about Tony's challenge strength, the fact remains that she organized a group to vote him out and that after years of people saying Sandra would never survive in an early TC... she now attended two of them with one of the biggest targets any player could ever have, and she made it through without a single vote against her. I loved it.

 

Seeing a lot of talk of her being "egotistical" or playing up the "Queen" thing too much but I don't agree, she's not mentioning it in a bunch of random confessionals - only in her opening one which specifically exists to banter about previous seasons and in her voting confessionals, and then after Tony went out he mouthed off at her first, so of course she'd fire back (which is also smart strategically: it makes people more likely to remember "Wow, Sandra blew up at Tony" and less likely to remember "Wow, Tony said we're all riding Sandra's coattails.") I honestly feel good about Sandra's chances: yeah it seems impossible for people to keep her around... but it seemed impossible for her to make the end in PI, even more impossible in HvV, and even more impossible to even think of her surviving two TCs on a losing tribe without a single vote here... but it happened. Sandra is playing more or less perfectly for the target and reputation she has by downplaying her threat level as much as possible while also being willing to adapt and as a huge Sandra fan I'm thrilled about it. She has a colossal target on her back, but at the same time, if pretty much any player could overcome that target, it'd be her. And so far she's doing a hell of a job.

 

Even if her huge threat level means she goes home immediately next week, we still got one great opening night of Sandra that adds a lot to her legacy and I'm happy for it, and I'll see every single episode that she survives as a cause for celebration as each survival means she continues to surpass expectations.

 

Sandra was the main player I was invested in going into the premiere and she clearly ended up the star of the night, too. Some stray thoughts are that like I said Brad was fun and Cirie/Tai was a fun scene. Debbie is pretty annoying and cringey and forced though and more "female Tarzan" than "female Coach" and I'd like to see her go ASAP. Could also very happily lose Malcolm or to a lesser extent any of Troyzan, Andrea, J.T., Sarah, or unfortunately Ozzy, despite having been excited about him going into the season, if he's going to be more watered down as a personality than his previous appearances + target Cirie (though I don't know the post-swap tribes.) Wouldn't really see any reason to shed tears for Zeke or Caleb either.

Lots of people on this cast I'm underwhelmed about but the good side is that that means there's theoretically a good chance of a given elimination satisfying me. At any rate we at least got off to a great foot here with Ciera/Tony going away and a great addition to Sandra's legacy, no matter what happens from here.

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2 hours ago, Scrambled Aegon said:

Seeing a lot of talk of her being "egotistical" or playing up the "Queen" thing too much but I don't agree, she's not mentioning it in a bunch of random confessionals - only in her opening one which specifically exists to banter about previous seasons and in her voting confessionals, and then after Tony went out he mouthed off at her first, so of course she'd fire back (which is also smart strategically: it makes people more likely to remember "Wow, Sandra blew up at Tony" and less likely to remember "Wow, Tony said we're all riding Sandra's coattails.") I honestly feel good about Sandra's chances: yeah it seems impossible for people to keep her around... but it seemed impossible for her to make the end in PI, even more impossible in HvV, and even more impossible to even think of her surviving two TCs on a losing tribe without a single vote here... but it happened. Sandra is playing more or less perfectly for the target and reputation she has by downplaying her threat level as much as possible while also being willing to adapt and as a huge Sandra fan I'm thrilled about it. She has a colossal target on her back, but at the same time, if pretty much any player could overcome that target, it'd be her. And so far she's doing a hell of a job.

I honestly think those people are bitter at her for getting rid of Tony. I, on the other hand, might be an even bigger fan now because she got rid of Tony, I'll throw in Ciera's vote-out as well. Ciera came into this with a huge amount of arrogance, from what I saw of the pre-season press. Both votes were the best possible outcomes in my opinion.

Here's to hoping Sandra and Cirie makes it far. Wouldn't mind losing Debbie and Ozzy back to back.

Also, does anyone else think these "advantages" are getting more ridiculous every season? I mean, it's not as bad as last season when Jessica didn't even know what the advantage was (if I remember correctly), or when Adam could steal someone else's reward...but jeez, they're really bad in my opinion. I think the advantage just basically told Sierra there will be a merge at Final 13, and possibly something "game-changing" at Final 6. And does anyone else think the theme is ridiculously ridiculous? Why why why?

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The goat scene this episode was absolutely fantastic and felt like something out of the first couple seasons. Loved it.

 

Brad Culpepper apparently loving to decorate is a development as fun as it is weird. Caleb does nothing for me either way as a personality but I don't like him as a casting choice, so happy he's gone and all my other favorites get to stick around for another week. Don't hate him but I do kind of hate that he's here and how the show handles him and he's never really interesting, so this continues the trend of good eliminations.

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I think we are getting to see Brad Culpepper as a person this season. In his season it was all about his wife and him being racist. I don't remember ever getting to know anything about him personally so yeah, the whole decorating thing came out of no where and that's what I enjoy about it.

I like seeing that Tai was able to recognize that Caleb could be a weakness for him later on.

Yeah, the goat scene was killing me for a few reasons. There is no way they could kill that baby or the mom, they would be vilified for it forever. If they had gotten a solitary goat that wasn't nursing, maybe. Ok the second stupid reason is we (by we I mean my wife) are currently "babysitting" a baby goat for a week, like 5 weeks old, who was rejected by it's mother so it needs to be bottle fed and stuff so when I heard that goat scream when it was picked up I was like oh hell no. I can't imagine my wifes face when she watches this episode!

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I have no idea what just happened. But I think, overall, from the little that I could understand, that J.T screwed up big time, again.

Edit: Also, Cirie is sitting on 90-something days right now. I want her to make a hundred days so badly. I think she'll be the fourth or fifth player overall. I want that milestone for her.

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Have to say I liked that hot mess of an episode. I really think the reward challenge set people up for failure since only two people could participate and add to that a former pro QB in a throwing contest!!! Troyzan was saved by them winning immunity.

Still a fan of Tai so it was nice to see him find an idol again, then actually use it to save someone on his tribe and gain favor with them. Not sure if that will be bad long term but short term that along with voting out Caleb he is making a strong case for himself.

Ok, tribal. Two tribes go, only one vote off. That twist was actually pretty cool but I think it could have been shattering had they not told them only one person was being voted off until they were actually at tribal, then it would have been even more chaotic. I also think it was JT who messed it up, I think he actually told Culpepper the truth and then Culpepper used it against him and saved her.

I assume some people will see this tribal as gimmicky but oh well. IMO it was better than the standard, "edit to show player X was going home when really all along it was Y"...

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dbunting 

You have Culpepper confused with other players. He was a Defensive Tackle not a QB, and there was no implications of racism the first time he played. He was just arrogant and in charge of his tribe. 

What we saw here tonight was more evidence that Fishback really won Tochinchins. JT is really not very good at this game. I will miss Malcolm. I really think he had a good shot this go around.

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38 minutes ago, Howdyphillip said:

dbunting 

You have Culpepper confused with other players. He was a Defensive Tackle not a QB, and there was no implications of racism the first time he played. He was just arrogant and in charge of his tribe. 

What we saw here tonight was more evidence that Fishback really won Tochinchins. JT is really not very good at this game. I will miss Malcolm. I really think he had a good shot this go around.

I think it's becoming clearer that Tocantins and Kaoh Rong had very similar endings; but at least J.T. is entertaining, and he actually seems like someone who has a personality, so I like him as a player (for all the wrong reasons though).

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2 hours ago, Howdyphillip said:

dbunting 

You have Culpepper confused with other players. He was a Defensive Tackle not a QB, and there was no implications of racism the first time he played. He was just arrogant and in charge of his tribe. 

What we saw here tonight was more evidence that Fishback really won Tochinchins. JT is really not very good at this game. I will miss Malcolm. I really think he had a good shot this go around.

Yeah I absolutely did combine him! Wow what a brain fart. I mixed Brad Johnson and Dante Culpepper!

As to the racism thing, I am pretty sure he was accused of being a racist. IIRC during a challenge a person from the other tribe was actually calling him that. And if IIRC Candice(?) accused him of it.

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5 minutes ago, dbunting said:

Yeah I absolutely did combine him! Wow what a brain fart. I mixed Brad Johnson and Dante Culpepper!

As to the racism thing, I am pretty sure he was accused of being a racist. IIRC during a challenge a person from the other tribe was actually calling him that. And if IIRC Candice(?) accused him of it.

You are thinking of John Rocker in San Juan Del Sur. Natalie Anderson was the one who accused him (correctly) of being a racist. She was pissed that he had voted out her twin sister.

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19 hours ago, Howdyphillip said:

You are thinking of John Rocker in San Juan Del Sur. Natalie Anderson was the one who accused him (correctly) of being a racist. She was pissed that he had voted out her twin sister.

https://www.realityblurred.com/realitytv/2013/10/survivor-blood-vs-water-culpepper-defends-himself/

Now, I have never re watched any Survivor episodes so I clearly will not know this as well as you but this article seems to back up my memory.

Rocker was a known issue before ever being on the show, well documented, I remember reading the SI article when it came out.

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5 hours ago, dbunting said:

https://www.realityblurred.com/realitytv/2013/10/survivor-blood-vs-water-culpepper-defends-himself/

Now, I have never re watched any Survivor episodes so I clearly will not know this as well as you but this article seems to back up my memory.

Rocker was a known issue before ever being on the show, well documented, I remember reading the SI article when it came out.

Even your article speaks about possible sexist interpretations of what happened with him, not racist. The racist confrontation happened with Rocker.

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I remember in Blood vs. Water Culpepper was accused of sexism by a black woman so maybe people are conflating the two.

Tough break for Malcolm.  He will probably be an Ozzy and keep coming back.

Sandra's game play is interesting because she's not flying under the radar at all. 

I have no idea what happened at that tribal.

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18 hours ago, litechick said:

I remember in Blood vs. Water Culpepper was accused of sexism by a black woman so maybe people are conflating the two.

Tough break for Malcolm.  He will probably be an Ozzy and keep coming back.

Sandra's game play is interesting because she's not flying under the radar at all. 

I have no idea what happened at that tribal.

Quick break down. JT wanted to vote Sandra out and tried to get Brad on board by letting him know he was safe no matter what. He told him that Sierra was the target. Brad screwed over JT and voted Malcolm out. Haley's role was interesting TV, but it didn't have anything to do with the vote.

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