Rick said in an interview that another advantage Chris had coming back from EoE was a note from Ron to Julie saying she should work with/trust Chris. Really does seem like the EoE folks were pulling for whoever returned to win (and the fact that the votes were heavily weighted by time on EoE - 8/9 longest people on EoE voted for Chris, 3/4 of the shortest voted for Gavin). jsc1953 said, jury tampering was basically built in.
Victoria said that apparently her “I’m voting for Gavin” as she exited was an attempt to make him look like a threat and get him voted out… she said he had betrayed her because he was supposed to vote for Chris (which I guess would’ve made it a 2/2/2 Rick/Chris/Vic vote and allowed a revote). I don’t know if that’s really a betrayal by Gavin or just a Tyson-esque mess up though.
I do wish they’d cut down on the amount of HIIs. I wonder what the side effects would be, though… would it just lead to more Pagonging? With having more superfans play, I do think the switch to ‘voting blocks’ is here to stay (at least for now) and that helps negate potential Pagonging. Not as many people who will sit around and just let the one easy winner lead them to the end.
How I would love a season free of gimmicks and returning players. Put a group of unknowns together and play the game straight - no Redemption Canyon or Edge of Extermination or Blood vs. Semen or Davy vs. Goliath. Or any chance of any player returning after being voted off.
Straightforward challenges that incorporate equal parts athleticism, problem solving, and stamina are what I want.
Instead we now get to look forward to Boston Rob and Sandra’s “Boot Camp”. Spare me such malarkey.
mmm
I just checked and the last season we had without A) a ‘theme’ to divvy up the original tribes or overriding gimmick, or B) returning players was… season 19, Russell Hantz’s first season! :eek:
Finally watched the episode last night. I’ve got to retract my previous claim that a win by Chris was a “fuck you” to the producers. It’s obvious the producers really, really wanted it - give an HII to the returnee, really?
My new theory is that the long term Edgers voted for Chris because they had to justify their own decision to stay on EOE for so long. The vote was split pretty evenly depending how long you were on EOE - Wentworth was the only long timer who voted for Gavin, and Victoria was the only short timer who voted for Chris. I think the Edgers were desperately holding on to the idea that they could have won if they had been the person to return - Chris, as noted, played the best game possible after he returned, so if they didn’t vote for him, they’d be admitting they had stayed on that island for absolutely no reason. This stupid twist had better die an immediate and unmourned death.
I actually almost said this season was, but we did have returning players? I kind of forgot about it, though.
Jeff is going to write about this season one day admitting it was a snoozefest. The people they picked to be on it turned out to not be all that interesting.
They aren’t “on” season 39 in the normal sense: They aren’t competing, and are not eligible to win. They won’t even be on the tribal beaches.
Of course, last time Big Brother did that kind of thing (4 returning vet “coaches” who weren’t playing the game and not eligible to win) they were given a choice to enter the game proper after the 4th eviction and of course they chose to do exactly that. So who knows.
I would love to see[spoiler]Parvati win and take her rightful place ahead of Sandra as the greatest Survivor ever. Sandra’s second win was an example of one of those horrible seasons I mentioned above when the goat wins because the jury was too bitter to award it to the clear best player in the final 3. (Russel Hantz)
And that second (cheesy, unearned) win is the ONLY reason Sandra has any claim to the title at all.[/spoiler]
Easily the worst final three they’ve ever had — the third person voted out and two goats.
You could try to make a case for Gavin. He played a decent social game and had a knack for aligning with the right group when it came to voting. But that was pretty much it. He was a follower, a reactor, and didn’t build nearly the resume he thought he did. With the exception of Julie, I can’t think of anybody post-merge that he beats.
And Julie did less than nothing, strategically. She was on the wrong side of almost every vote, and was obviously kept alive simply as someone everybody wanted to sit next to in the end.
Chris played more game in 3 days than the other two did in 39. So, as ridiculous as the situation was, I think the jury made the least bad choice among three bad options.
Overall, the season was fairly entertaining due to a handful of the personalities involved, but far from their best. And the ending sucked.
I would hope the producers learn from this and try to keep such a terrible final three from happening again.
Gavin was by no means a goat. Chris had to fight hard, and do tricks like hand his necklace to Julie (who was the goat, certainly) and go toe to toe with Rick in firemaking in order to beat gavin.
I suppose “goat” is a relative term. But the only possible scenario in which I can envision Gavin having the slightest chance of winning is if he’s in the final three with Julie and the EoE returnee. That’s exactly what happened, and he still didn’t win. Seriously, who else could he have beaten?
You may be right, but my point is that that would have been a very low bar. And Chris’s one risky move was enough to beat Gavin’s entire body of gameplay. So I’m sticking with my “worst final three ever” assessment.
I really want to see a “goat” own it. Gavin came close to doing it. Call out all the people who made big moves just for the sake of making a big move, only to end up on the jury. If you’re safe, there’s no reason to rock the boat.