Just as a note I will be attending dinner this evening with Jan from Survivor:) She is a friend of the family, I was going to watch the finale in her company last night however she had a number of promotional things she needed to do ( the reunion wasn’t REALLY live by the way)…And I havn’t even seen a single episode this season…ah well…cheers to Jan!
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I hate how they drag out the final with all the wishy-washy “Let’s Walk Down Memory Lane” thing. Personally, I’d rather have the final last an hour and the reunion last 2 hours.
They used too much time recapping Ghandia/Ted thing at the reunion. Give them 30 seconds to tell us that their spouses are okay, then MOOOOVE on.
I thought Stephanie looked like Jennifer Aniston in her video application.
Lumps of coals to the producers for once again showing us how shallow they are. Want to get on the show? Submit an application of you romping around naked!
The final vote where the jury got to grill the 2 survivors was so bitter it took a lot of the fun out of it.
I’m glad Helen regained her sense of humor at the reunion.
Jeff slamming people on their (lack of) strategies was hysterical.
Robb is still obnoxious and that’s a shame. He could be an incredibly handsome young man if you took away his personality.
Where the hell was DavidB?
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I thought it was interesting that Shii-Ann admitted that they threw an immunity challenge to get rid of Jed. If they hadn’t done that, the whole show could have turned out different. Such a stupid decision at the beginning of the game, but it threw off their numbers going into the merge. They were way too cocky and probably thought they could afford to throw one, but it ended up totally screwing them. I wonder if any of them realize it now.
I can’t believe how pissed Helen still was at the reunion! Get over it, you’re supposed to form alliances with people who can get you to the end, then try to team up with someone you can beat! Not love and trust everyone to do exactly what they said. If I were on Survivor, I would lie to everyone if I had to, and expect others to do the same. Hello, you’re trying to win a million dollars, not make friends. The friends will come after the million;)
I don’t think so. In fact, if I recall correctly, it was Clay who went to Ken to tell him that Ted was the Chewing Gum on the outs with everyone else–that’s how Ted ended up with the TC vote(s) that upset him enough to take his boat road to nowhere. I was pretty much mystified that Ken was getting on Brian’s case about that, and that he didn’t ask Clay anything about it–especially when Ted turns around and accuses Clay of being a racist, apparently based on what Ken had told him at Loser’s Lodge. All in all, what the heck?
Fat chance! It would be a fantastic experience, but I do a terrible striptease. 
Hey ThatGuy, report back with any tidbits you can get out of her. Very cool!
Minty - Ted said his racist stuff re: Clay was based on comments by Helen.
Thatguy - bring beer!
Ok, have to add my thoughts!! As I was chuckling over Helen’s bitter tirades, a thought struck me. Ted said that Helen told him that Clay had made some racist remarks. I don’t recall seeing anything like that on the show. What I began wondering was did Helen plant that particular seed, simply to see if it would bear fruit? Just how strongly was she standing behind Brian?? Maybe I am giving her too much credit for being devious (Man, do I love a devious nature in this game!), but still, and interesting twist.
Oops. My bad.
Frankly, I wouldn’t put it past Clay to have made some ignorant, redneck racist remark about Ted. I also wonder what Ken was getting at when he tried to get Brian to tell “the truth” regarding why Ted had to go.
Poor Tanya–I mean, to become known for being unable to keep your food down (including the clip in the “remembrance” section), have your father die, and then sound like you’re going to puke again during the reunion…
The “kiss my fish” line cracked me up.
Last night reminded me of something I’d thought before.
How come these folk never really explore their surroundings? That cave and river were SO cool! I guess they said their canoe sucked, but we didn’t really see them going ANYWHERE. Other than, say, that one walk Knobb and the cop had.
I assume the response would be - no energy/food.
But I just hope if I had 30+ days in Thailand/Africa/Austrailia/etc., I’d do more than just lie around.
I wonder if they are instructed to no go too far from their base. Or to always be witin easy reach in the event anything spontaneous came up.
I really wish that Mark Burnett would stop trying to fool us into believing the live section is still wherever Survivor was. As soon as they changed I could tell, all of a sudden the survivors were cleaner and chubbier. Why does he keep doing that.
Oh yeah - I assume you cought the part where he said he looke “like a real doorknob!”
I think everybody needs to get off of Jan. She played the game perfectly. In the final 3 IC, if Brian gets a cramp (a la Ethan), and she outlasts Clay (who was on his last legs when Jan gave up), she could have come away with the $1M. What could she have done better, strategically?
Pash
She did nothing strategically. In fact, game wise she really did nothing at all. She never did well at challenges, and was a really huge liability in the team based physical challenges. Last place Jan was consistently bad at the individual IC’s too.
Basically she got a free ride because Brian and Helen enjoyed how compliant, easily controlled and fooled she was.
The only upside to Jan was her fillingness to embarass herself on camera repeatedly.
Did Jan even try to play or was this her big adventure with those handsome boys at the camp? Not once during her entire stay did I ever get the impression she was try to play, nevermind win.
She has to be once of the weakest, most pathetic players to ever make it to the final four. Heck Magilla the monkey deserved the money more then she did.
After showing Stephanie’s audition tape last night, do you all realize how many borderline porno tapes they’re going to get for next season? It boggles the mind…
I was just having this discussion with a co-worker of mine, actually. Everyone complains that certain people don’t deserve to be in the final 4 (or 3, or 2 or 1) because they “didn’t play the game”. The thing is…playing the game passively can be just as effective a strategy as playing it actively. Jan was a liability in challenges, but she always tried her hardest. That, and the fact that she contributed around camp, deferred the laziness criticism that gets bandied about to people like Clay, who just laid around.
Not taking an active scheming role doesn’t mean that you didn’t play. On the contrary, riding along on the coattails of people who are making enemies while you’re flying under the radar is a pretty effective method to get far in this game. Look at Vecepia last season. Look at Ethan. It gets you to the final group, and one critical immunity win (which Jan happened to lose) can put you in the position of being in the final two against someone who’s stepped on some toes. For how much everyone on the jury raves on and on about “integrity of the game” (do these people not realize that those who claim they played the game with integrity are always on the outside looking in at the end?), the ideal position to be in at the end is to be sitting next to someone who had to betray people that trusted them. If Jan had won the final immunity, she could have taken either of the guys to the final two with her and won, simply because Clay and Brian schemed to get there and she didn’t…so no one had any grudges against her.
Yes, I wanted Brian to win, simply because I appreciate the skill it takes to scheme your way to the end and still have enough people like you to get the votes. But I can also appreciate that the way this game is set up, sometimes doing “nothing” is just as (or more) effective than doing a lot.
And I also got a good giggle out of Jan’s comment in the final immunity challenge…when asked by Jeff what was the first thing she’d do when she got home, I believe she said she wanted 4 beers in each hand and a giant pizza. LOL She was a hoot.
I think that Brian is definitely the best Survivor player ever. The way he played Clay, Ted, Jan and Helen was just classic tactics. His dominance of the final immunity challenges was testament to his skills. I loved how slowly he walked over to eat the spider.
Jeff was the best reunion host ever by an order of magnitude. Definetly the best reunion show ever.
The only thing missing was the explanation of the whole Ken-Brian, Clay-Helen rascism accusations. That was definetly the most bizare part of the show.
Jan was kinda clueless, tho, as demonstrated when she said “No one ever suggested that we dump Brian or Clay!” Helen - rightfully - was astounded.
Jan gave the best explanation IMO - due to hunger, fatigue, etc., she was basically an automaton. By her own admission, I do not think she did much “playing” - at least near the end.
To the contrary, she was successfully “played” by Brian and Clay. She HAD to be pretty “out-of-it” for their approach to not seem incredibly transparent. Even the dead baby bat could tell Brian and Clayy were concerned with nothing other than their own self interest. Heck, they even convinced her not to mention it to her friend. Can you say gullible?
Please explain to me what benefit she derived from voting for Helen? With the stones, at least she and Helen had a chance. And I cannot imagine anyone truly believes she had a chance to beat Brian in the final challenge, which always involves stamina. Yes, she always tried hard. But trying isn’t always enough.
She screwed up twice in the final stages, when it really could have made a difference.
Jadis - don’t forget - she also wants a cee-gar!
Huh?
Both of those players schemed alot, especially Vecepia. Ethan actively worked the game as well. “V” was an active member of the Moron Brigade, turning on them just at the right moment.
Ethan also worked hard at his game and in the camp, kicking butt at the challenges while not alienating the group. By final vote counts, Ethan did a much better job the Richard Hatch (who was almost voted off the island numerous times and barely won) or Brian (who barely won despite being surrounded by consistently clueless players and being matched against a well disliked player).
In fact, the only stronger player then Ethan was Colby (well until his blunder with Tina- which started the “don’t bring someone nice rule” which Brian was obviously aware of).
Best player of all time: Ethan.
Worst player overall: ? Hmmm. Big catagory. I will have to think on that won a bit. Yoga butt breathing boy comes to mind though.
Worst winner (tie): Velocipia. Although I did enjoy what she did to Sean. Single handedly helped kill off the I am very religous you can trust me approach to winning scheme. Tina (took the coattials of Colby to the top). Won based Colby foolished did not take the despised Keith to the jury with him.
Of course these are IMHO. Curious to hear yours.
Just speculating, but I think they may have edited something out of the Ken questioning and Ted racism subplot.
After Ken asked his question to Brian and got the answer, they cut to him sitting down, with his head down and visibly upset. Perhaps Ken had asked Clay something, and that part was edited out?
I noticed something fishy (no pun intended with the girl’s audition tape) about that too The Controvert. It did fit right, he demanded an answer than said he didn’t get the truth from Brian, but it just kind of ended there, it was just very weird, like somebody in the back was gesturing “stop it stop it! drop the racism issue!”