Board 8 > Reality Show General Discussion Topic: Fewer Villains, More Inspiration

(+) Yeah! (+)

I like Ben.

Wow, I was initially expecting a Tiffany blindside but when the third Q vote popped up I thought it was Q. I figured Venus would be the only other person left out of the blindside.

I didn't see Liz's giant Q, so I figured she went with Siga.

Also , that's now four of the last five boots that have been from the six. What a great alliance.

I was honestly still hanging onto the bizarro-edit Q win but this episode once and for all murdered that, burned it and pissed on the ashes.

I guess Kenzie is my new winner pick but I haven't really been scrutinizing it too much.

Right before the vote, I said "I think it's Tiff"

Hilarious how not a single idol was played correctly. Kenzie is SPEECHLESS at how Siga just left her in the dust. She might not be winning either since her position just went up in smoke. Would have been better if she'd stuck to her guns.

Underleveled posted...

I was honestly still hanging onto the bizarro-edit Q win but this episode once and for all murdered that, burned it and pissed on the ashes.

Venus was very much not in this episode, either, so her bizarro-edit winner chances are up in flames too.

The most likely winner possibility is Charlie imho.

Amber & Vinny getting eliminated tonight would finally bury this season.

Rihanna (Shut Up and) Drive

Is that one of the great Rihanna songs on the radio?

Underleveled posted...

Amber & Vinny getting eliminated tonight would finally bury this season.

Haven't been watching. Has this season been that bad? I knew not to expect much with the COVID format and 90-minute episodes, but... did it somehow manage to be even worse than I expected?

Danny being only two years younger than Juan and Shane blows my mind. How is this guy not like 19?

Well, you can't say Ricky & Cesar only won that leg because they speak Spanish.

BlueCrystalTear posted...

Haven't been watching. Has this season been that bad? I knew not to expect much with the COVID format and 90-minute episodes, but... did it somehow manage to be even worse than I expected?

It hasn't been BAD, but the boot order has consistently eliminated interesting teams, while I would argue the three most nothing teams in the thirteen-team cast are still in the running going into the final 5.

The problem was that a lot of the teams were interesting for just how bad they were at the race, so it makes sense that they went out early.

Mewtwo59 posted...

The problem was that a lot of the teams were interesting for just how bad they were at the race, so it makes sense that they went out early.

Yeah, but Juan & Shane and Yvonne & Melissa have had bad legs too, yet they're both still in the final 5. Like, literally the three teams that have been flat personalities all season are still in, and we only have Amber & Vinny and Rod & Leticia left to provide excitement.

They've had bad legs but they're acceptable racers who have made some mistakes. Sunny & Bizzy, Kishori & Karishma, Anthony & Bailey and Maya & Rohan were all actively terrible at the race and the first half of the season was (marginally) more exciting for it.

Underleveled posted...

They've had bad legs but they're acceptable racers who have made some mistakes. Sunny & Bizzy, Kishori & Karishma, Anthony & Bailey and Maya & Rohan were all actively terrible at the race and the first half of the season was (marginally) more exciting for it.

I'm not saying they're not actively terrible, I'm just saying that you'd think by this point that ONE of the boring teams would've screwed up enough to get eliminated. Like, Yvonne & Melissa's best performance thus far is 4th Place. After eight legs. And they beat Angie & Danny now, who WEREN'T entirely terrible racers.

I will say this Survivor cast has really grown on me. When I think of a "dud" on this show, I think of someone who fits both of the following:

-Brings little if anything to show show in terms of character/personality
-Is more-or-less inconsequential to the game

And since I'll usually give the benefit of the doubt to someone who that happens to through extenuating circumstances (for example, being unnecessarily medivaced in episode 3), I would say Tim has been the only true dud of this group.

Inviso posted...

I'm not saying they're not actively terrible, I'm just saying that you'd think by this point that ONE of the boring teams would've screwed up enough to get eliminated. Like, Yvonne & Melissa's best performance thus far is 4th Place. After eight legs. And they beat Angie & Danny now, who WEREN'T entirely terrible racers.

To be fair, Angie & Danny are only the second not-terrible team to be eliminated (after Derek & Shelisa). Being consistently mediocre is good enough to go far in this season with how weak the entire cast is.

Currently watching last night's Survivor episode and popped in to see the conversation around the Liz blowup and this exchange:

BlueCrystalTear posted...

The winner of this challenge will have to pick 3 people. Liz has nothing to worry about.

Pokewars posted...

Q: I'm about to end this man's whole career.

I heartily lol'd

MartinFF7 posted...

I heartily lol'd

She worried too publicly... also Q is in bizarro world. I admit my comment didn't age well and I can laugh at it accordingly.

Tiff said in exit press that both Kenzie and Maria volunteered to give up their spot for Liz, but Q wouldn't let them. I don't believe that's ever happened with someone picked before, just people in Pearl Islands and SJDS who won the challenge giving their reward spot away.

Q is the biggest goat this season and I have no idea how he could rectify that.

hello this is Zen, I watch Survivor but don't talk about it much

this fucking Applebees shit is hilarious. Q is my fucking hero

Finished my rewatch of 41 the other day. Like 42, my general opinion of it remains the same - a flawed season with enough great stuff to keep it in the "solid" range and slightly north of the middle of my rankings. Another very good cast. Even if there are fewer genuine stars than 42 or 45 (a lot of which is due to underutilization; Naseer, for example, could have been a legend with a stronger edit), the only person who is even marginally unlikable is the first boot.

41's biggest problem is coming before 42. 42 was able to be so much more narratively strong because it didn't need to explain all the twists it was using, since 41 already had to use precious runtime to do so.

Yeah, I imagine 41 with 90 minute episodes could be a much stronger season.

I will say this - as much as I hate the "murgatory" thing, one thing I think 41 and 42 got right with it that 43 and beyond have failed to do is offer an individual immunity challenge to the people that lost the group immunity, that way a strong player isn't screwed by a crappy draw (also in 42 it saved one of the best people who was most likely going home that night without it).

Underleveled posted...

Yeah, I imagine 41 with 90 minute episodes could be a much stronger season.

I will say this - as much as I hate the "murgatory" thing, one thing I think 41 and 42 got right with it that 43 and beyond have failed to do is offer an individual immunity challenge to the people that lost the group immunity, that way a strong player isn't screwed by a crappy draw (also in 42 it saved one of the best people who was most likely going home that night without it).

Yeah. That way you can still have the first challenge be a reward (and "tribal" immunity), and then have a second individual challenge (which, because it's individual for only six people, means production can be a little more creative than doing a stupid "stand in place for a long time" competition).

Teach me edgic

Maria says something like "if we don't blindside tiff that would be a million dollar mistake". Since they used that and tiff went home, doesn't edgic call that a winners quote or whatever?

Time to go back into casual lurking

GTM posted...

Teach me edgic

Maria says something like "if we don't blindside tiff that would be a million dollar mistake". Since they used that and tiff went home, doesn't edgic call that a winners quote or whatever?

I don't know if Maria is winning this tbh. We've gotten very little personal content for her and you'd think they'd have wanted to invest more in the Malcolm/Denise thing for Charlie and Maria if it was indeed Maria winning. The comparison would be more obvious since in Philippines, those two child-abusing dirtbags took Denise to F3 instead of Malcolm, where she promptly waxed their disgusting butts. (Thankfully, there's no such scum this season.) I actually think Kenzie will try to take Maria out and probably succeed.

[Charlie] is my top winner contender right now but I legit could see anybody pulling it out. A few notes here:

• Everybody keeps saying they'll never vote for Quitavius to win. This has to mean something; either he's getting owned at FTC like nobody has in a good while or he's gonna actually manage to change their minds. I don't know which it is, but the latter is much less likely given how people like The Hantz in HvV, Muffin, Troyzan, Laurel/Yanni, Angelina and Noura all got labeled as goats by mid-merge and that was that. None of them got any votes, save for Muffin since she threatened to ground Baylor if she didn't, and it didn't matter what they said at FTC. (Examples are F3s only.)
• Venus was an insignificant bystander for this last episode; if she was winning, we'd have at least heard some of her thoughts. My thought of her being the bizarro world winner was most likely wrong. She's starting to feel like the pre-finale boot... Abi-Maria style.
• Charlie talking about training his grip strength means this isn't going to be the last challenge he wins, unless that was put in as a major red herring.
• Kenzie was on my radar for a good while but she wanted to make BIG MOVEZ for no reason (Tiff was floored in her exit press, saying something along the lines of "Girl, you don't vote out your #1 with like ten people left on the beach!") and then was excluded from the idea she proposed. This right here feels like it's explaining why she loses. She might be the runner-up.
• Ben is drawing dead. We know zilch about his relationships at this point and only get him making "This does not rock" jokes, plus the fantastic scene where Kenzie comforted him when he was feeling lonely. That made me think he'll vote for Kenzie to win the season, since he's likely finale fodder.

So my current thought for placement is something like:
1 Charlie....
2 Kenzie....
3 Quitavius
4 Liz..........
5 Ben........
6 Venus....
7 Maria.....

With either Charlie winning final immunity and taking Quitavius OR Charlie winning at fire. Obviously, there are OTHER things in play, too, like the "Siga Strong" crap. The editing has become extremely complex with the 90-minute episodes.

Of course there's a huge chance I am way off on this but that's the beauty of analyzing the edit. Sometimes you're right, sometimes you're wrong. Like I called Gabler one of the top two contenders going into the finale in 43 and some people laughed at me... and I still mock them to this day. Cassidy had been drawing dead since like F8, people!

BlueCrystalTear posted...

Muffin

I don't even know who tf this is supposed to be

Also, before I even knew what edgic was and was still watching casually enough to not even fully understand what made a winner's edit stand out, I called Todd and Bob as the winners of their respective seasons from episode 1 and never changed my mind. Knowing what I know now, Todd was a reasonable pick but I'm not sure how I got Bob right. Also pretty certain I had Yul and Tom pegged as winners from very early on, but probably not from episode 1. Again, knowing what I know now, maybe I understood edgic more than I realized.

GTM posted...

Teach me edgic

Maria says something like "if we don't blindside tiff that would be a million dollar mistake". Since they used that and tiff went home, doesn't edgic call that a winners quote or whatever?

Time to go back into casual lurking

Not really because she also had a quote like "This could come back to bite me, or it could be a game-winning move" and the former is very often fore-shadowing. There's also been lines over the past two episodes where, at first, Maria said "Kenzie wants to make this move for her resume, and that might put a target on her back", now Kenzie backs out but Maria does the move instead... so is this foreshadowing that it's just going to put a target on Maria?

There's various other reasons to rule Maria out, though I would've said there were reasons to rule out Dee and Yam-Yam (and certainly Gabler, and definitely Erika) too so it's hard these days.

Dels posted...

There's various other reasons to rule Maria out, though I would've said there were reasons to rule out Dee and Yam-Yam (and certainly Gabler, and definitely Erika) too so it's hard these days.

Honestly, edgic is pretty much out the window in the new era, or at least, it has changed and edgicers are still trying to find the new rhythm. Dee has had the closest thing to a traditional winner's edit post-40, and even hers was far from cookie-cutter.

Underleveled posted...

Honestly, edgic is pretty much out the window in the new era, or at least, it has changed and edgicers are still trying to find the new rhythm.

I think a lot of people are trying not to be "sore losers", so they don't wanna just throw their hands up and say "that was bullshit!!!" because it's bad look to say "edgic is dead" just because you failed to get it right. But I do kinda think some of it has been... very divorced from pre-40 editing trends.

Like, Gabler for example, the people who called it say, in retrospect, "He got consistent confessionals every episode telling us he was laying low and underestimated but that he was still playing!", but like... I'm pretty sure that's a completely normal thing that tons of losing finalists got. You telling the viewer you're playing well while no one else ever talks about you has generally been a strong sign of losing, an easy way for editors to give a bit of suspense to a losing finalist and make the result not completely obvious, but not actually really supporting that player.

Or like how my biggest issue with Erika (and I casually binged this season so wasn't following edgic) was how she was totally absent from episodes 2 and 3, then in ep 4 Deshawn is like "So Erika's a huge threat we need to get out." To me, one of the biggest trends in edgic is that if you have no story then randomly get brought up as a threat, that's because you're not important and you're just randomly coming up now to justify a specific plot, but you don't have a throughline. I just ruled her out right then and there. But apparently it was part of a new trend where they like to have their winner randomly seem in danger pre-merge even if they weren't actually in danger.

Dels posted...

I think a lot of people are trying not to be "sore losers", so they don't wanna just throw their hands up and say "that was bullshit!!!" because it's bad look to say "edgic is dead" just because you failed to get it right. But I do kinda think some of it has been... very divorced from pre-40 editing trends.

I mean, I think in general the way edgic is handled needs to be reevaluated. I know I've brought this up before, but Jeff has explicitly said that editing has shifted from telling a story over the course of the season to telling each episode as its own story. That's directly from him. And I don't think edgic has fully adapted to this new style of storytelling.

They've been doing the "each episode as its own story" thing for a while before 41, so I don't think that has much to do with how edgic isn't as reliable as it was before.

Yeah, it makes it really hard since a lot of Edgic has been about throughlines. But then again, the throughlines are still there. Maryanne's was all about showing oddballs can still win, it was mentioned over and over that she was "an outsider" and etc. Dee did consistently mention playing for her family or whatever. (A bit weak but sure). Erika at least reminded us she was going to go from lamb to lion.

One of my biggest arguments against Dee last season was that she consistently received no follow-up on plots from the previous episode, even if they were really important to her. For example, she had a huge rivalry with Sifu, but the episode after he was voted out - I was sure if she won there'd be at least one confessional saying "So Sifu got voted out, that's good since he thought I voted for him / since I've been against him from day one" etc but she had nothing. Similarly after she voted out Kaleb, no follow-up, she's just not in the next episode, even though he called her out directly at tribal. I was like, surely you'd take the easy opportunity to give her a recap confessional saying "Last night, we voted out ____" at least one of these times, just to make sure casual viewers remember her? But they didn't.

...tl;dr, edgic is tough. I wish Naomi was still around to just tell me who wins.

Underleveled posted...

I don't even know who tf this is supposed to be

Missy 29 probably

I am not very far into this episode and... I am seeing Maria downfall signs galore, and she was who I was thinking was going home anyway.

Venus is smart to be like "We gotta break up that Siga trio" here - and who better to take out than the one who beats everybody?

I'm not gonna lie, I was terrified during that whole sequence. I kept thinking back to...I think it was Jaime finding the idol in S44, and it's so exciting for someone like her to find it...and then we get a confessional from Matthew saying he planted a fake idol for her to find, since he had the real one. But Venus finding an idol is pretty amazing.

Blaziken posted...

I'm not gonna lie, I was terrified during that whole sequence. I kept thinking back to...I think it was Jaime finding the idol in S44, and it's so exciting for someone like her to find it...and then we get a confessional from Matthew saying he planted a fake idol for her to find, since he had the real one. But Venus finding an idol is pretty amazing.

I am so happy that she found that like you would not believe. Not only is she in the minority, she's the one who recognizes the threat of Maria/Charlie/Ben, and that Maria is probably the leader.

Venus was giving Kenzie too many red flags, and yet Kenzie seemed dismissive of the idea that Venus actually found it. Which is SO AMAZING. And Venus is actually shutting up about having it! She learned from the mistakes of the others. Hunter should've never told anyone and Tiff should've only told Kenzie since Kenzie was there with her when it was found. Jem should've told Tim the truth instead of being sketchy.

Jeff: This reward is for pizza (gluten free) and Soda.

Me: Man, alone time with a juror is huge.

God DAMMIT. The one person who I hoped to go out.

Loved the new version of the snake. That was something new and different, and also quite challenging.

Maria winning this means Quitavius may be leaving us, since he's Maria's goat, and nobody wants him taking up their F3 spot. Charlie might wanna do it. Ben might be a better choice to break up Siga, since Charlie is open to working with Venus and Kenzie and Ben is not.

Maria handled that pretty poorly, and this spells doom for either Ben or Quitavius. VERY CLEAR who her priorities are, and the others feel even more burned than normal - particularly Liz. So Liz will team up with Kenzie and Venus, and Charlie may have to go along with them. He's... the swing vote now? Never thought I'd see that.

BlueCrystalTear posted...

Maria handled that pretty poorly, and this spells doom for either Ben or Quitavius. VERY CLEAR who her priorities are, and the others feel even more burned than normal - particularly Liz. So Liz will team up with Kenzie and Venus, and Charlie may have to go along with them. He's... the swing vote now? Never thought I'd see that.

What sucks is that the end result is probably Q going home, even though taking out Ben would improve the season so much more (seriously, do not let the Siga 3 make half the final 6).

For the love of God, target Ben! Even if Q is close with Maria, do NOT let the Siga 3 reach the final 6 together!

Blaziken posted...

What sucks is that the end result is probably Q going home, even though taking out Ben would improve the season so much more (seriously, do not let the Siga 3 make half the final 6).

Ben is the epitome of a one-note character that only has one quality scene all season. That time Kenzie comforted him was fantastic, but that's all I got.

And now it seems like it's gonna be Venus and Quitavius for the two choices tonight and that fucking SUCKS since they're the two best castaways to make merge this season. They've both been electric personalities. That said, Venus has an idol, and if she plays it successfully and takes out somebody like Q, thus improving her likelihood of making F3, she might actually... win it after all? She'd be a hilarious winner, in the same vein as Fabio.

But yeah, they need to target Ben, to force Charlie to be loyal to them.

Liz is right up there with Q and Venus in terms of being just an amazing personality this season.

What happens if Charlie plays the Shit in the Dark to hide which side he's on, and this forces a 3-3 tie? That would be... something else.

Liz venting about Quitavius in front of him is the comedy I crave. This season has had the best comedy nuggets that I've noticed in quite a while. This season is what I was hoping for with 90-minute episodes.

Jesus Christ, Venus. Why would you hint you have an idol?

Blaziken posted...

Jesus Christ, Venus. Why would you hint you have an idol?

She needs to play it now. But she's too cocky, and she's not fostering any trust with Charlie. In fact she's doing the opposite.