Monday, May 14, 2012

Survivor One World Finale & Live Reunion

 
The Final Five returns to the Keanu camp after voting out Tarzan.  Kim wants to reflect on how far the woman have come & girls rule & boys drool.  Um, I don't think it's ok that the girls suddenly go feminist after they spent the first week or so whining to the boys about needing fire, or a proper shelter, or how cold & wet they were the moment a massive-ass storm came rolling in.  Future female Survivor contestants: if you want to be a shining light of feminism, learn how to make fire before you begin the game.  Learn how to build a shelter.  Keep an eye on your supplies & don't let bankers steal them.  Go out there already knowing the basics so you don't have to go running to the boys, making women look weak. So, good for you, Final 5, for making it this far, but don't claim it for womanhood.  It wasn't girl power that caused the original Menudo to self-implode, give up Tribal Immunity & vote Bill out, causing a downward spiral for the men that they couldn't recover from.  That was luck, & the girls took advantage of it.  Suffragettes, you are not.

Kim suggests to Sabrina they could vote Chelsea out, because she'd likely get lots of jury votes. Sabrina is shocked; betraying Chelsea has never crossed her mind before.  And this is why Sabrina shouldn't win Survivor - by this point, every option available should be weighed.  Sabrina later admits that she can't separate the game from reality, & if you can't do that, you can't play this game.  Alicia is also on Team Vote Chelsea Out, & it is crazy that everyone is forgetting the better target: Kim.

The Immunity Challenge is basically everything they could think of to throw in one challenge.  They have to untie ropes, unlock a gate, walk a balance beam maze, climb up a steep ramp, bounce around on a rope net, untie 5 bags containing puzzle pieces, climb back down, assemble the pieces correctly to get clues, use those clues to find 3 numbers, & use those numbers in a combination in the correct order to release a flag.  Can you repeat that one more time, Probst?  I'm just going to skip ahead to a flag being raised, because the rope net makes me think of poor Kourtney & her broken arm on that poorly-designed first challenge.  Sigh.


Kim wins Immunity for the 3rd time, & everyone is acting as if this gives Kim the power to take whomever she wants to the Final 4.  All it really means is that you can't vote for Kim.  If she wants Alicia gone, but Chelsea, Christina & Alicia want to take out Sabrina, they totally can.  But they are all blindly following Kim.  Good for Kim, but depressing & boring for us to watch.  Kim is not as entertaining as Boston Rob.

At Tribal, Probst asks Kim why this decision would be hard for her - isn't it easy to take people you could beat to the end?  And while you're looking through me with your baby blues, would you like to host the show, Kim? I don't want to be in your way.  If this is something you want, I'll just hand it to you.  Kim blinks & breaks her hold on Probst & says it's hard because she's attached to all the women left.  "I think it's just my heart...like, it does get in the way...Is that a song?"  Somewhere in Tennessee, curled up in Keith Tollefson's giraffe neck, is Whitney Duncan, now furiously writing a country song.

"What rhymes with vilified?"

Everyone follows Kim's orders, & Alicia is voted out.  I hope there's a supportive bra waiting for you at Ponderosa.  Week after week, your breasts tried to escape from my television screen.  I had no idea there were so many unflattering bikini tops for large busts.  Hopefully you were just as horrified as the rest of us.

Burn it.
Burn it.
Burn it.
You can keep this one.

This Tribal Council was the last time an Immunity Idol could have been played, so I'm wondering why Kim didn't give hers to Chelsea, even if only to play the "I protected my ally" card at the Final Jury?

The next day, the Final 4 do the Fallen Comrades walk.  It wasn't aired last season, even though they did it, but isn't it something for the Final 3 to do?  Not sure why it was done at this stage.  Anyway, usually it's boring & full of "oh, he played with such heart" & slow-mo montages as if these people died, & didn't just, you know, stop playing a game.

First up on the walk is Kourtney, & just like that the best 90 seconds of the 3 hour finale is over.  I hear her musical voice admit she'll probably be the brunt of "many a joke for many moons" & I guarantee to physically harm anyone who makes a joke at Kourtney's expense.  What happened to her was not cool.  Kourtney Moon, I pledge myself in your service, before the old gods & the new.  I will be your Brienne of Tarth, my fair Lady Catelyn, as long as we can do shots after I slay some motherf@$%ers.

Then there are a bunch of other people who were voted out.

The final Immunity Challenge is pretty cool - using a long pole, they must move 10 small wooden bowls through a channel-maze-thing to stack all 10 on top of the structure.  It all sits on a spring, so it will wobble if you hit the sides, sending all your bowls crashing down.  Here's some inside scoop on how this challenge was designed:
Probst: "I would like to have a reason to say 'All the girls are on their poles now', ok?"
Design Team: "We will make it so."


Christina puts forth a great effort, but surprise, surprise: Kim takes the last Immunity & is in the Final 3.

Back at Keanu, Kim says to Christina "Pop quiz: we all know you're going home next unless you change my mind.  What do you do?  What do you do?"  Christina says it's been nice playing & she's just going to enjoy her last day, & you're forgiven & yay for spot #4.

After Christina holds her own head under the water, hoping to make it even easier for Kim to get rid of her, Kim is thinking maybe Christina would be an awesome person to take to the Final 3 after all.  Is Christina a genius?  Was she reverse-psychology-ing her the whole time?  Sadly, no...but that would have been awesome.

At Tribal, Alicia & Kat come out wearing CRAZY amounts of eye-makeup.  The Ponderosa videos reveal that Alicia has done the makeup for both her & Kat, & it's awful.  It's a more ridiculous version of my stage makeup from a production that I was in, playing a goth.


After a tedious Tribal Council, the Final 3 will be Kim, Chelsea & Sabrina.  Christina is voted out & seems totally fine with it.  I think she genuinely just wants people to like her, & think nice thoughts about her, & she wants to avoid confrontation.  I get that.  I'm the same way (unless you mess with Kourtney, & then I will cut you).  But I have to think that I would be different playing a game for $1,000,000.  I mean, I'm hardcore when it comes to our Rock Band parties, & there's no cash prize.*  You want to sing Carry on My Wayward Son?  Bitch, no.  That is my song.  There'll be peace when you are done.  Get off my damn mic.  Don't you cry no more.

The next day, Sabrina is getting emotional about making it to the Final 3 & you would not believe the triumphant music in the background.  You would think she's about to storm a battlefield or something.  If anyone gets to be Brienne, it is me.

On to the Final Tribal Council, & opening statements to the Jury.  Chelsea asks Probst if she can stand, because she feels "it helps out a little bit".  Probst says sure, & asks if she'd like to strip down & oil up, because that would probably help a lot.

Vote for me.

Chelsea's plea helped Kim more than herself: she worked with Kim, but at the merge she knew she had to leave her emotions out of it or she wouldn't get far.  So she couldn't do what Kim did without sacrificing the social game, while Kim made emotional connections with everyone.

Kim spoke about her love of the game, how she saw it as a game, the end justifies the means...  No mention of having an idol & never using it, & she didn't even use the "outwit, outplay, outlast" motto, which I thought strange.  She would have been one of the only people who could say they actually did all three (even if it was boring to watch because no one else around her would make any moves).

Sabrina says her strategy was to have balance - she knew she could be overbearing, so she underplayed the challenges.  She says she can't separate the game from real life.  Tells the jury she was laid off.  Pretty blah.

Jonas is up first, & is very serious.  "When I address you by a name, I want you to answer 'Yes, Master Jonas'" & then he dissolves into laughter.  He tells Chelsea she's cute & she is all "what? really?"

A different Taylor Swift shocked face than the one I've been using all season?  You've been Swifted.

Jonas blushes & says all the guys agree Chelsea is the hottest girl out there, & Kat, Christina, Kim, Sabrina, & Alicia all line up to get slapped in the face by a tuna-wielding Jonas.

Christina asks Chelsea "Why do you hate people?" & it's hilarious.  Chelsea says she had to take her heart out of the game, & she's really not a cold-hearted bitch in real life.

Jay says something, but mostly continues to be pretty.

Michael asks for a definition of "blindside" because everyone keeps telling him he was blindsided, but he doesn't play college football or know Sandra Bullock, so what gives?  Now that he understands, he asks Kim if she thinks she's perfected the art of a blindside.  Um, there is no art, you just have to be willing to make a big move.  The only other person willing to make a big move was Troyzan, & nobody would play this game with him.

Tarzan spends his time talking about his wife & thanks the girls for letting him get to the point in the game where his wife could set foot on the island.  Talks about how he will always remember her whispered breath & footprints in the sand until God brings them together again on an atomic level, & dude, we already covered that you're a romantic bastard.  Unbelievably, Chelsea hasn't had enough of this & says that he has opened up her eyes to the possibilities of love & never knew a love like that could really exist.  Whitney Duncan will be up all night writing country songs.


Leif (who I totally captured in DrawSomething, as you can see) is bitter & wants to know why he was voted out.  Really?  You were 1 of 2 guys left, & it was clear the women were voting the men out after Jay left. Waste of a question.

Alicia stands up & man, she is delusional, & has an extremely poor grasp of the English language for a teacher.  "Kim.  You & I played this game very similar.  I was a kingpin.  I had my pawns: Christina & Tarzan.  You have your pawns: Sabrina & Chelsea.  Homegirl, you know if I was sitting next to you, you'd be shitting bricks right now.  Because without you getting me out, I would have had more chances of winning that money than any of youse.  And actually, I'm super gladder, because I didn't know Ms. Puerto Rico over here could actually be a potential threat, like, who thought that, you know?"

I'm also super gladder Alicia was voted out, aren't you?

Troyzan, sporting PJ pants, asks Kim one question that will determine if she gets his vote or not.  When did she decide to vote him out?  Kim says "When we voted Jonas out", but that was not what Troyzan wanted to hear, I guess, so no vote for Kim.  Maybe if she had said she knew he was a threat the moment she saw him?  I do find this stunt of Troyzan's surprising, because I would have thought a real Survivor fan would put aside any bitterness & vote based on how the game was played.

Kat gets up & says she was hurt & destroyed by Kim voting her out, but she's over it now & would like to share something.  "When I was 12, I had 2 open heart surgeries, & in order for me to have kids, I have to have another one in 12 years, which is, like, now, at 22." She's really trying, so no one tell her that her math is wrong.  Full House music swells & she teaches the jury a lesson in forgiveness & no day but today & pleads with them to not vote in anger.

Everyone votes, Probst grabs the urn & walks through the forest, & I'm hoping for another great journey-with-the-urn montage, because I cannot get enough of this video from the Vanuatu finale.



I mean, come on, that is awesome.  Probst takes the urn & hacks his way through the jungle with a machete all night long.  When dawn breaks, he finds a waiting plane that flies over an Indiana Jones map to the US, & then he skydives out of the plane, landing next to a motorcycle which he rides to LA.  Come on.  Bring that back.  Instead, he just walks into the studio.

Chelsea's eyebrows are brought to you by Benjamin Moore.
Now we're in NY for the live show, & hey, I see Blossom in the crowd for a split second.  What an appropriate amount of time to showcase someone who has nothing to do with Survivor other than her current show being on the same network!  Kind of like when Fringe's Walter Bishop shows up in the American Idol audience & you're like, "Hey, I just spotted John Noble behind Seacrest, smiling & being quiet!  Cool beans.  I bet Phillip Phillips is his favourite.  I'll just have to keep wondering, because spending time on that conversation during a live show would be ridiculous.

Probst spends 3 minutes soaking up the applause before reading the votes.  Sabrina gets 2 of the votes (from Troyzan & Leif), & Kim gets the rest.

The least surprising winner in the history of Survivor.

Now, my thoughts on Reunion Shows are that they are always disappointing.  Last season, Probst took a question from a little girl asking Ozzy, "How do you climb trees & swim so well?", yet he didn't have time to say one word to Mikayla, who was a lingerie football player being stalked by another contestant.  Seriously.  If you only have an hour, don't waste it on random audience/family members.  Talk to the people who actually agreed to be on your show.  I don't want to hear about Russell Hantz if he's not in the season.  I don't care about Colton's Mom (great job on raising a not-horrible person, btw).  I never wanted to know that Tarzan's wife only calls him by his nickname during sexytime.  And I really, truly don't care about how fabulous Blossom thinks Colton is.  I have low expectations for this hour.

Kim has just won, everyone is hugging, the rest of the Survivors come out & there's Kourtney!  I can't wait for Probst to give everyone an update on how she's been doing.  Probst says "Happy Mother's Day", & I think Awesome! He's going to talk to her first, because she's a Mom who is away from her son on Mother's Day to be here, on your reunion show.  Nope.

What we get is a "Worst of Colton" reel, & afterwards, Probst repeats some of the comments we literally just heard 10 seconds ago.  Already too much screen time for Colton.  He's awful & says he'll own up to it, but really he doesn't say much of anything.  Bill, or as my husband yelled when he first came on stage, "Prince!", tries to handle the Colton situation maturely, once again...


...but he's interrupted by Colton.  Bill raises his hand a little, to respond, & Probst shuts him down.

Oh, this is what it feels like when the doves cry.  I get it now.

Probst goes into the audience to talk to Colton's Mom, & she apologizes for her son & the audience awwws.  Save it for your talk show, Probst.  Jeff attempts to help her excuse her son's behaviour by saying that since Colton was accepted for being gay, that tells him the Cumbie family is accepting of a lot of things.  Like racism!

Instead of going back to the stage where the contestants are, Probst moves back a few rows to Blossom.  Excuse me?  No worries, Probst assures us that Mayim Bialik isn't there to promote her show, Big Bang Theory, on CBS Thursdays at 8, she's there because she's a fan!  Who wrote to him last year!  And now is taking up time saying how fabulous she thinks Colton is & that he should have had more time & that she would love to see him on Survivor again.


Probst then pulls a random guy to his feet who says on behalf of the audience, we all hated the character Colton was playing, not the actual Colton.  Um, speak for yourself, clueless random guy.  Why couldn't you have asked what the deal is with the hot badass chick stuck in the f@#&ing SHADOWS on stage?!?



Kim wins the Player of the Season & the $100,000 that goes along with that.  I have to say it's interesting that she won, even though she doesn't have a twitter account, & therefore hadn't been campaigning for votes like, say, Troyzan & Chelsea had been.  She doesn't have the kind of online relationship with the viewers that some of the Survivors have, yet she still won.

We get a preview of next season, which will be in The Philippines, & will feature 3 previously medically evacuated Survivors who will join 3 tribes of new players.  So NOW we'll talk to Kourtney, right?  Because she was medically evacuated in the first episode?  Nah.  Nobody needs to know about the broken arm that cost Kourtney her job as a motorcycle mechanic.  Colton's bacterial infection masquerading as appendicitis is much more intense.  What's that?  Colton was fine after a few rounds of anti-biotics?  Oh.  Nevermind.

Probst then mentions the Survivor Auction, where you can bid on items from the season, with all proceeds going to Survivor: Stand Up To Cancer.  Hey, you know who outwit cancer?  The girl in the shadows on your stage.  Maybe now would be a good time to hear about the tumor she had removed after she left the game?  The tumor that two Survivor medical evaluations missed?  And, I don't know, maybe WISH HER WELL LIKE A DECENT HUMAN BEING???



Not. Cool.  Kourtney, let's get those shots soon, k?  Slaying makes me thirsty.

And so Survivor: One World is over.  I hope I've added some entertainment to a season which has been pretty blah.  I'll be back next season - I'm really hoping Jonathan Penner & Michael Skupic will be 2 of the past Survivors returning.  Penner is one of my favourite Survivors, & his last evacuation broke my heart.

Anyone you'd like to see back?

Thanks for reading, feel free to comment, subscribe, & follow me on twitter: @MomOfKai


As for the Ponderosa videos, Americans can view them at  cbs.com, & here they are for the rest of us (there's an almost cat-fight between Alicia & Kat in Alicia's first video.  Where was this drama in the show?):

Tarzan:




Alicia:




Christina:







*not that we have Rock Band Parties...that would be lame.....

5 comments:

sassinak said...

dudette! you totally failed to mention a) kim's horribly distracting outfit and b) her even more distracting mustache!

i pray for penner i gotta say... i want them to do an all injury rejects season... (and eliza, just cause)

John Sciacca said...

Lisa, I thoroughly enjoyed your blog all season long and can't believe how similarly we saw -- and wrote about -- the show. (I just didn't quite share your undying love of Kourtney, but it's probably only because I didn't get to know her AT ALL! Thanks, Probst!) Anyhow, I hope you write tons more and I can't wait to read all of it.
Best,
John
My bloggie on the finale: http://johnsciacca.webs.com/apps/blog/show/15072346-survivor-one-world-perception-is-not-always-reality-finale-

Anonymous said...

i swear, if we dont get those drinks one day, the universe is CRUEL.

-kourtney

Anonymous said...

Hi Lisa, Not sure how to contact you on here? Would be interested in linking your recaps on my Survivor page next year. Hit me up if you're interested...

http://chipwrecks.com/

anon said...

"I'll be back next season - I'm really hoping Jonathan Penner & Michael Skupic will be 2 of the past Survivors returning. Penner is one of my favourite Survivors, & his last evacuation broke my heart."

They both will. Also someone by the name "Russell Swan" (google him) yeah he was the one in Samoa with Hantz that almost died in that challenge.