Survivor 2-Hour FINALE 05/11/2003

[Ferrous]

*Originally posted by Roadfood *
To those who think that Jenna deserved to win because of how she was after the final four, all I can say is that I don’t care how she was in the final four, my gripe is that she didn’t deserve to get to the final four in the first place! …

I don’t recall expressing an opinion as to whether Jenna “deserved” to win. I’m not sure I even know what that means.

Whether or not she “deserved” to win (and obviously the jury thought she did), the fact remains that she did win, and she did it through her own efforts. Nobody carried her, she did it by winning the challenges when it counted, by correctly picking her final opponent, and by adroitly playing to the jury.

My only point about her changing was that it made me feel better about her winning. I couldn’t stand her before, the thought of her possibly winning would have make me want to hurl things at the screen too. But based on what I saw last night, I started to like her. I no longer begrudge her winning. But I have no comment on the entirely abstract question of whether she “deserved” to win.

[John_Mace]

Anyone who saw Matt’s facial expressions and lame excuse after he stepped off the perch couldn’t help but see that he threw it on purpose. He’s not a good liar. I’m certain the whole jury clued into that.

I still think the stupidest “loser” was Colby(?) who picked that very popular woman to go to the final 2 with him. She’s the one who ultimately won, and he knew that she would. Repeat after me: “It’s a GAME! You are SUPPOSED TO WIN!”

[levdrakon]

*Originally posted by Libertarian *
Well, he lost thirty pounds for one thing. That tends to make a person look skinny.

True, but everyone lost a lot of weight. Everyone else seemed to lose it more or less purportionately, except for Heidi’s boobs of course.

**As far as Jenna being lazy, yes she was. She admitted last night that she was. And she said she was ashamed of herself. [T]he fact is that the very hardest workers — especially if they’re loud or obvious about it — often end up getting kicked off pretty early in the game. **

She said she was ashamed of herself but she also lied to the jury about why she chose Matt, so she has no credibilty in the honesty department with me. Right up to the end she was conniving & lying, so there’s no maturing or turning around that I can see. She was still lying & conniving at the after-show, IMO. It’s just too easy to say you’re ashamed of yourself when you’ve got a $1,000,000 check sitting in your pocket. Anyway the first two people voted off this season were voted off for being lazy, weren’t they? So at least among the men, being lazy was definitely a bad thing not to be rewarded, unless you’re female with good T&A I guess.

If I were Jenna’s mother, I’d be ashamed at her behavior, right through the after-show. Unless I clearly understood that was precisely how she intended to play the game as she understood the rules.

Thing that makes my head hurt is, do you get rewarded for being sneaky, conniving, backstabbing & lying, or do you get rewarded for honesty, hard work, showing some integrity & fair play? I couldn’t figure it out based on what the jury said, and what the jury did. Seems like what they wanted was one thing, but what they rewarded Jenna for was quite another.

Anyway, I don’t think there’s anything to Matt & Jenna’s being cutesy with each other during the final show. Haven’t all final two’s done that? I think it’s written into the script. Who wants to go on national TV being a sore loser or conceited winner? Thank God Heidi didn’t win. I’d have hurled at something she’d have said.

[Little_Nemo]

Obviously in retrospect, once again we the viewers suffered from having a lot of the reality edited out of a reality show. It appears that this time the producers did an anti-Lex; they made a crazy man look sane. The other possibilites are the jury voted on sympathy (does anyone know the details of Matt’s financial situation that Jenna was talking about at the last council?) or maybe they just voted for who looked better (I wouldn’t put it past this particular crowd). There have been years when the best player won (Richard and Bryan) and years when the best player didn’t win (Michael, Tom, and Kathey) but this was, in my opinion, the first year when the best player didn’t exist.

Matt should have said the following in his TC speech:

I played the game well. That’s what got me to the final two. If I lied or cheated along the way, that’s part of the game and all of you did the same.

I worked hard around the camp. It didn’t matter whether I was part of an alliance or not. That had nothing to do with the game, it just made everyone’s life easier.

I was generous. Whenever I won something, I always shared it. I even gave up the visit from my mother that I had won so everyone else could have their own visitor.

So in conclusion, whenever I did something underhanded it was to advance in the game. Whenever it wasn’t necessary for the game, I was above board and didn’t screw anyone over.

[Mahaloth]

Best. Survivor. Ever.

Well, except maybe season 2.

[John_Mace]

One of the reason I do like this show is that it’s so similar to real life situations. Sometimes you win by skill, sometimes by luck and sometimes you can coast thru on your looks. If it was always the best “survivalist” who won, it would be a different game, like Eco-Challenge. Part of the fun is not knowing how it’s going to play out. I’m not happy that Jenna won, but the fact is, she did. The one thing I can say in her defense is that she DID win the last 2 ICs. She’d’ve never won otherwise.

[Liberal]

To those who think that Jenna deserved to win because of how she was after the final four, all I can say is that I don’t care how she was in the final four, my gripe is that she didn’t deserve to get to the final four in the first place! Throughout the game she was shallow, clueless, arrogant, and lazy. If there were any justice, she never would have gotten the chance to “redeem” herself in the end because she would have been booted early on.

How delightfully Pharisaic! Maybe it was just a matter of a childish brain catching up with a good heart. You know what they say — the first shall be last, and the last first.

[RexDart]

*Originally posted by Madawc *
**
Deena, the hardcore feminist in disguise, couldn’t vote a guy to win the million.
**

Exactly. Hardcore feminism (aka vicious man-hating) has reared it’s head before with Survivor contestants. I recall one of the original show’s women going on celebrity Weakest Link and voting a man off in the late rounds just because she wanted a woman to win it.

**
And somehow, I get this feeling that the last IC/TC was rigged for Jenna to win… Anything that deals with balance on a sliver of wood, is purely in the advantage of a female contestant. In basic physiology, they have their center of gravity closer to “ground”. That’s one bullshit IC/TC in my opinion. They have to stop the balancing challenges, unless it’s a competition of the same gender. Utter bullshit final IC/TC…
**

You know, you’re onto something there. It seems like they always do the balancing competition when they have 3. They did it the first time around, and I think they did it the second or third also. And a woman always wins it and manages to stay in the game (this cost Rudy the game in the first one, as I recall.) It’s like they’re rigging it to give the women a chance. Maybe it balances out the other stuff the women are disadvantaged on, but frankly the women play the mental part of the game so badly they don’t deserve it anyways. There hasn’t been a woman on Survivor who deserved to win since Tina back in season 2.

[EhhMon]

Just watched the E! Entertainment channel’s coverage of the Survivor finale show. They interviewed Jeff Probst and he mentioned about how he went and confronted Jenna about why she got naked for the pb/chocolate. According to Probst, Jenna said, “I was more hungry than I was proud”.

Which gives us more insight as to how Jenna was perceived in the camp. Its all in the editing peeps, they purposely edited Jenna to look negative so we wouldn’t guess her as being the winner. And another thing Jenna said in question to the asked by Rob: She said, she made relationships with the people in camp. Something that Matt didn’t do so well, as he was busy being a loner.

[PunditLisa]

Exactly. Hardcore feminism (aka vicious man-hating) has reared its head before with Survivor contestants

Which is balanced by the hardcore misogynists (aka vicious woman-haters) Rudy (Season 1), Clay (Season 5), and Roger (Season 6). Do you think there was a chance in hell that any of those men would have voted for a WOMAN over a man?

[Atrael]

Probably the reason that irritates me the most about her winning is that the only reason she or Heidi got that far was because Rob liked having them around to look at and/or hope to hook up with. Let’s face it, he was really pulling the strings hard most of the game, and he liked having the pretty girls around. That’s what upsets me most. Not that Jenna couldn’t have had a change of heart, but more because she flashed her tits and ass to influence the guys. And the reason that upsets me is that it makes the game so unplayable for anyone that doesn’t look like that. While I don’t remember all the previouse winners, I think Richard Hatch was the only one to win that wasn’t “attractive” even Tina had a decent body. So if you were the 40 year old out of shape person, why would you even apply at this point? It’s become more of a “models survivor” than anything else. Oh well. Maybe next season will be better…I might watch.

[elf6c]

*Originally posted by PunditLisa *
**Which is balanced by the hardcore misogynists (aka vicious woman-haters) Rudy (Season 1), Clay (Season 5), and Roger (Season 6). Do you think there was a chance in hell that any of those men would have voted for a WOMAN over a man? **

Maybe Rudy. He voted for Hatch because he was allied with him. The other two aren’t worth the dirt on Rudy’s boots. Clay and Roger were idiots.

[levdrakon]

*Originally posted by Atrael *
Probably the reason that irritates me the most about her winning is that the only reason she or Heidi got that far was because Rob liked having them around to look at and/or hope to hook up with. Let’s face it, he was really pulling the strings hard most of the game, and he liked having the pretty girls around.

What’s more pathetic is he knew & admitted these chicks wouldn’t give him the time of day in the real world. What a schmuck - he lost it all!

Of course, for Rob this was more of a Star Search opportunity for him to launch his comedic career, so he got what he wanted.

Reality my ass, the whole thing is just too MTV.

[gex_gex]

I don’t see why Matt should have won because he “worked hard.”

The game isn’t about working hard. If you can avoid being voted out without working hard, kudos to you. You’re playing the game better.

If all you’ve got is “hard work” then you’re going to be great on a construction site, but terrible in a game of diplomacy and relationship-building.

[minty_green]

*Originally posted by levdrakon *
Of course, for Rob this was more of a Star Search opportunity for him to launch his comedic career, so he got what he wanted.

While I’m sure Rob will milk it for all it’s worth–and the guy appears to be genuinely funny, so more power to him–it’s also entirely clear that Rob was dead serious about playing and winning the game.

In fact, Rob told our own David B that he had read all of his Survivor articles at RNO before leaving for the Amazon, including the past versions of What Amazonian Survivors Should Have Learned. He even bought and read the book What Would Machiavelli Do? on David B’s recommendation. Rob was not merely another Los Angeles bartender using Survivor as their big break into showbiz.

Incidentally, would anyone have any interest in a How to Win at Survivor thread? David B’s article is great, but this season has plenty of its own lessons in it, and it could be fun to see everyone’s strategies.

Even more incidentally, I ended up in 8th place for the season in the SurvivorNews.net Piranha Pool. Not too shabby!

[Algernon]

I had a disagreement with my daughter regarding the physical appearance of the final 2 during the announcement of the winner.

I expressed surprise at how “cleaned up” Matt and Jenna were. I said something to the effect that in previous seasons they had the final two appear with the same clothes, same facial hair, etc. as they did at the final on-location tribal council.

She disagreed, saying that they’ve always done it this way.

minty, could you (or someone else) please settle this disagreement please? What are the facts?

[minty_green]

In S1, they read the final votes while everyone was still on the island. After the show became such a hit, secrecy of the outcome became a bigger concern, so they started doing it back in the states.

In S2, both Colby and Tina were cleaned up in the studio. Actually, I would describe Tina as tarted up, and Colby as fattened up. I think they were wearing the same (washed) clothes, however.

I don’t recall the Ethan-Kim J. finale in S3, except that it took me a jarring couple seconds to realize when they’d switched over from the tape to the live feed. As for S4, my videotape ran out (I had been out of the country) before the votes were counted for Vecepia and Neleh, so I have no idea what they looked like.

In S5, they had obviously told Clay and Brian to duplicate their appearance on the island. They both had full beards, same clothes, etc. Not sure why, since there was no question that the vote reading and finale were occurring in Los Angeles. I actually thought that, given the real context and the fact that they weren’t emaciated any more, they both looked pretty silly.

S6 was, I think, the first time they’ve made no effort to duplicate, even momentarily, the look of the the final contestants from the actual TC with the jury. They weren’t wearing the same clothes, Matt didn’t have his goatee, and Probst made it perfectly clear that they were in New York and live, not in the Amazon.

I’d still rather have them do it the way they did in S1, but if they’re going to insist on revealing the vote back in the States, I prefer the more honest approach of S6 to the half-assed “illusion” of the other shows.

[BiblioCat]

Nelah and Vecapia were all cleaned up just like Jenna and Matthew. There was no attempt to make it seem like they were still on the island like they did with Brian and Clay, and with Colby and Tina, and with Ethan and Kim.

[twickster]

S3, they also duplicated their appearance at the final Tribal Council – I remember Ethan saying what a drag it was to start the beard again 6 weeks before the airing of the finale.

[Algernon]

Thanks minty, BiblioCat, and twickster. I appreciate the responses. I guess both my daughter and I were half right.