Survivor 50 "In the Hands of the Fans" Discussion Thread

[Wendy Pleakley]

Okay, 54 of the first 55 minutes of this episode were skippable...

Ditto to really everything you said.

The episode annoyed me at the start because it's the same old disaster tribe scenario playing out.

I assume they still have fire since they had 8 fish, so it wasn't the heavy hand of production necessarily, but it still grows tiresome.

They spent a lot of time on the reward which I didn't love, but it was an old school "event" type reward like watching a movie, which I did appreciate.

The rest of the episode made up for it.

Existing and new relationships came into play.

People had to deal with recognizing the danger and skill sets of people one considers friends, and so the decision making was as interesting as it has ever been.

Giving Rizzo the idol feels similar to people helping Russell in HvV. Not knowing who the new guy really is and underestimating what he can do. It will be interesting to see if Rizzo can make the use of the idol bluff technique he did so effectively last season, when up against seasoned veterans.

 

[dmw]

I hope they never do a celebrity focus again! Ugh...

Yep, the three tribe approach and one being weak stinks. As I stated in other discussions, I prefer only two tribes to start, then one merge.

Flint/Fire - it's silly to lose flint when obviously it does not matter to a team that knows how to start fire without it.

Christian standing behind Ozzy making faces as Emily spilled the beans was priceless!

I really appreciated Mike's exit. He was gracious and you could tell he understood this was a game, and he was outplayed.

 

[artvandelay]

I hope they never do a celebrity focus again! Ugh...

Yep, the three tribe approach and one being weak stinks. As I stated in other discussions, I prefer only two tribes to start, then one merge.

Flint/Fire - it's silly to lose flint when obviously it does not matter to a team that knows how to start fire without it.

Christian standing behind Ozzy making faces as Emily spilled the beans was priceless!

I really appreciated Mike's exit. He was gracious and you could tell he understood this was a game, and he was outplayed.

Unfortunately, we have a visit from Mr Beast some time soon

 

[CynBeth]

I always watch on streaming sometime later that week it goes so much faster. Glad it was Mike instead of Emily.

 

[dmw]

I'll say it again... losing flint just needs to go away. So many shots of fire in the tribe without flint - it's a non-issue.

Double elimination night - the Charlie/Rizo vote was the only one that was hard to predict.

Overall, this episode was not great. Too much talking - it needed a reward challenge, idol hunting or something different. This could have been a 60 minute episode.

Maybe the merge next week will add a bit more excitement...

 

[rd805]

I could be in the minority here, but i was sort of wishing they would have went to TWO larger tribes for a few votes rather than a massive too big of a merge.

I feel asleep in the most recent episode. Editing is very uneven, and the tribes that continue to vote out muscle early in the game, acting like they won't have a chance to get them come mid game proves to be a horrible strategy (looking at you disaster tribes!).

 

[Wendy Pleakley]

I could be in the minority here, but i was sort of wishing they would have went to TWO larger tribes for a few votes rather than a massive too big of a merge.

I feel asleep in the most recent episode. Editing is very uneven, and the tribes that continue to vote out muscle early in the game, acting like they won't have a chance to get them come mid game proves to be a horrible strategy (looking at you disaster tribes!).

I agree, but if history is any indication it will actually be a "mergatory" vote where the tribe is split in two for voting in some way.

We'll see what happens but I'm skeptical we'll see a true merge with the full group voting.

It's wild to have a merge of 17 people.

 

[dmw]

I could be in the minority here, but i was sort of wishing they would have went to TWO larger tribes for a few votes rather than a massive too big of a merge.

I feel asleep in the most recent episode. Editing is very uneven, and the tribes that continue to vote out muscle early in the game, acting like they won't have a chance to get them come mid game proves to be a horrible strategy (looking at you disaster tribes!).

the three tribe start just creates problems. They should have gone back to starting the season with two tribes. But, someone thought that three tribes, and then mixing them up if one got too many people booted was more "entertaining".

 

[CynBeth]

Wish Rizo had gone over Charlie.

 

[PUSH]

I didn't watch live last week because I was in Disneyland, but I'm back this week... unfortunately.

This twist was terrible. It came down to dumb luck. Genevieve and Colby both seemed to be in a great position through the first part of the game, but they drew the short end of the stick. Genevieve was spot on when she said it came down to the color of rock she drew. She was playing so well. It hurts even more, because Genevieve is probably my favorite player of the new era, and maybe one of my favorites of all-time. If she had made it through this random draw, she could have gone very far. It's also tough because she found two idols that could have saved her, but because they brought in celebrities, it changed how idols work, and she had to give them away. She did literally everything she could and it still came to a SitD play. I really hope she gets another chance at some point. She deserves it, and she's got to be up there for players who have been screwed by production.

Colby's words were so touching. You can tell he's fully come around. In his second and third times, he realized he had the wrong attitude and wasn't appreciative, but he very much was this time around.

This season started off so strong, but the past few episodes have all dipped down in quality. The Zac Brown content, then Angelina/Charlie weren't super exciting boots, and now this awful twist.

It also really irks me that Jeff continuously says that it's the fans who wanted this, when in reality they rigged the questions so much to skew the average fan who doesn't fully understand what they mean. Also, I'm not sure fans wanting twists meant they wanted random luck.

I really hope we rebound from here. I knew we were going to lose players we love. It comes with the territory. But the way we lost them hurts.

 

[artvandelay]

I didn't watch live last week because I was in Disneyland, but I'm back this week... unfortunately.

This twist was terrible. It came down to dumb luck. Genevieve and Colby both seemed to be in a great position through the first part of the game, but they drew the short end of the stick. Genevieve was spot on when she said it came down to the color of rock she drew. She was playing so well. It hurts even more, because Genevieve is probably my favorite player of the new era, and maybe one of my favorites of all-time. If she had made it through this random draw, she could have gone very far. It's also tough because she found two idols that could have saved her, but because they brought in celebrities, it changed how idols work, and she had to give them away. She did literally everything she could and it still came to a SitD play. I really hope she gets another chance at some point. She deserves it, and she's got to be up there for players who have been screwed by production.

Colby's words were so touching. You can tell he's fully come around. In his second and third times, he realized he had the wrong attitude and wasn't appreciative, but he very much was this time around.

This season started off so strong, but the past few episodes have all dipped down in quality. The Zac Brown content, then Angelina/Charlie weren't super exciting boots, and now this awful twist.

It also really irks me that Jeff continuously says that it's the fans who wanted this, when in reality they rigged the questions so much to skew the average fan who doesn't fully understand what they mean. Also, I'm not sure fans wanting twists meant they wanted random luck.

I really hope we rebound from here. I knew we were going to lose players we love. It comes with the territory. But the way we lost them hurts.

I agree. New Era Survivor has become a lot like Big Brother. Random twists can ruin everything you accomplished and you’re gone.

 

[Wendy Pleakley]

I didn't watch live last week because I was in Disneyland, but I'm back this week... unfortunately.

Who goes to Disneyland during Survivor 50?

Oh wait, I did the same during AU vs. The World.

I'm more forgiving of this episode than most people based on a glimpse at the Reddit discussions.

We can rehash the old arguments that splitting a merged tribe up isn't really a merge, but I think it was an okay approach in this case.

It allowed us to have 17 big characters come together sooner rather than later. There was always going to be something like this to address the size of the cast.

Genevieve was arguably the only "screwed" player. Kamilla paid the price for her flip last episode. Colby didn't have a vote but he ultimately agreed to risk it on a journey (I think, I don't remember the details). He also arguably could have tried for an old school alliance in that vote.

I guess I overlooked the issues with the episode and twists just because it was so cool to see these 17 characters come together, We got to see Colby, Coach, and Cirie together talking about legacy. There was a lot to love.

Christian continues to impress as an entertaining and astute player. I try not to think of such things, but is he in winner edit territory?

 

[rd805]

take many people's least favorite vote round (split into two groups of 5 and double elimination), and make it a triple.

What an amazing concept, Jeff! /s

Blood Moon could have literally done anything else and it would have been cool. Very, disappointed - even if i'm genuinely kind of happy 2 out of the 3 were eliminated.

 

[CynBeth]

I was thrilled Kamila and Genevieve are gone but sad for Colby wish it had been Coach instead.

 

[PUSH]

I guess now that we're at the merge, I can start doing my winner watch again. I found a guy on TikTok doing similar things this season, and I like the way he set it up. So I'm going to adjust my categories a little bit, and I'm not going to have a ranking within the categories. At least not at this point.

Winner Watch
Christian
Ozzy

High Upside
Aubry
Cirie
Dee
Rick
Jonathan
Rizo

Possible Victories
Emily
Coach

Unlikely Victories
Joe

Shot in the Dark
Chrissy
Stephenie
Tiffany

 

[PUSH]

Survivor 50 became Survivor again! This was a really good episode, especially for being such an easy vote. When you have big characters and egos, it becomes much less easy.

I was a vocal critic of the Blood Moon, but admittedly, it added some very fun drama coming back into camp. The Dee/Coach/Jonathan blow up was so fun and reminded me of old-school Survivor, where things got personal. I genuinely do not know what Coach was upset about with Dee. Did she do something to him? But it's Coach, so...

Aubry's lie about forgetting to play the idol??? That's crazy. What's even crazier was that Devens said they would have voted her out had they known she wouldn't play it! What?! That seems like huge information that would've helped make the last vote more interesting. And also... Genevieve could have stayed.

Watching Stephenie do a challenge against herself was very boring. Like, why? What does Survivor need to see/hear to realize it's not fun and entertaining. Survivor production is very stubborn, and they are not flexible. It's frustrating.

The challenge went on way too long. I don't mind those types of scaffolded challenges every now and then, but they have become so routine. And they take like 20-30 minutes to complete. Did we really need to see so much footage of people holding a stick with a ball and then their feet?

Everything at the beach after the challenge was very fun. Coach was peak Coach this episode. It's not quite as good as Tocantins, because I do think he's playing a character of himself now. I think he's very aware of what he's doing, whereas he wasn't back then. At least not as much. But it was still very fun to see everyone else play around him. I really thought he was going up until Dee played her SitD. Once that comes out, you know it's a foregone conclusion. Sam Phalen speculated that all that talk of switching to Coach happened right as production needed to shut it down to travel to Tribal Council, so they weren't able to finish. And then Dee tried to get it going again at Tribal as a last-ditch effort.

I'm going to miss Dee. I really like her. She was my favorite player on 45, and she's my favorite winner of the new era. I think she played the best game of the new era, and she's a top tier winner all-time. I like how she's not afraid to hold back.

It'll be interesting to see where things go from here.

 

[PUSH]

My updated winner rankings...

Winner Watch
Christian
Ozzy

High Upside
Aubry
Cirie
Rick
Jonathan
Rizo

Possible Victories
Emily

Unlikely Victories
Joe
Coach (previously in Possible Victories)
Stephenie (previously in Shot in the Dark)

Shot in the Dark
Chrissy
Tiffany

 

[rd805]

Dee became very unlikeable to me during this episode(s) -- I also didn't like her VERY abrasive attitude towards others in confessionals (but I understand, you need to be spicy to make TV edit). She was a good winner, obviously you need to play a near-perfect game to get a SECOND win, and losing Rizo who had the ties to Cirie/Ozzy was a big misstep. The 3 of them could have probably swayed the "middle" trio of Emily/Christian/Devens to go Coach there.

Good episode -

 

[CynBeth]

I have never liked Dee glad she is gone.

 

[dmw]

I enjoyed this episode. Some fun moments to watch. I really expected more chaos in the "largest tribal ever", and expected more Coach votes.

One key observation: with a merged tribe this large, it really does make it harder for alliances to come into play. It's not just one player that can swing either way - it is a "middle group". And, even the alliances seemed shaky at various times.

While last week's Blood Moon and three tribals was a fun twist, I hope they keep to a single tribal for the rest of the game. It is so much harder to get votes aligned in a large group, and gives the viewers more excitement.

I think that Cirie is a dangerous dark horse. If she makes it to the final three (I hope there is no fire making!!!), she could have a chance to win.