bluepenquin
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Post by bluepenquin on Aug 15, 2020 22:11:26 GMT -5
The final four fire making challenge was instituted in Season 35 and has been used in every season since if I'm not mistaken. And I strongly, strongly disagree that Natalie was just as deserving as Tony, who really should have won unanimously. According to the people on Sele, Natalie played very poorly in the first couple of days, which is why she became a target and was voted out first. The fact that she got four votes just shows how dumb the Edge of Extinction is as a concept, as well as the fact that she had pregame friendships (specifically Jeremy and Tyson) that were more or less unbreakable. And she didn't even play that well when she got back in, as she needed immunity idols to survive and chickened out of challenging Tony in fire herself. Fortunately, Natalie apparently alienated numerous people on the Edge (Rob alluded to this in FTC, but it was confirmed by Dani, Yul, and Wendell, among others) and lost a lot of potential votes. If she had actually managed to win over Tony--who I think played literally the best game ever--because of the Edge, that would have ruined the season. It was a great fire challenge, and the emotion displayed afterwards was heartwarming. And Rob was wrong because that could have been the chance for Natalie to get rid of Tony if it weren’t for the mandatory fire challenge. At the first TC back, everyone played their HII, so Natalie couldn’t take out Tony. Second one Tony won, no chance there. She could have taken Tony on in the fire challenge, but she said she wasn’t comfortable with it. Cop out? Maybe. While Natalie did not win as many immunity challenges as Tony (though she won the one that did help), she was a beast while at the edge. It’s amazing how many advantages she found and used to get fire tokens, I loved the extortion and Tony’s reaction to it. Don’t get me wrong, Tony did play a strong game. But I would have been just as happy had Natalie won. Hopefully like avid said, it’s the last we’ll see of Extinction for awhile. Oh, and Ben’s sacrifice for Sarah...wow! Guess he knew he wasn’t going to win so he was willing to be voted out. Still, very selfless and courageous, putting friendship above $2 million. I like the auto fire challenge for the 3rd spot. What happened too often when only final 2, but also when going with 3 - the person to win the final immunity essentially chose the last person to go on the jury which usually meant they were not getting their vote. Too often - the person not winning the last immunity had the advantage in winning. I liked Natalie - but I would have had a problem if someone spending 35 of 39 days on Extinction/Exile island (whatever the exact name was an # of days) would have won. I thought the Ben/Sarah ending was lame and bad for the game. I saw it as either Ben quitting or realizing he wasn't going to win and wanted to leave being the 'good' guy. I prefer the idea that everyone plays to win - and especially in a season of winners like S40. I am a Sarah fan - and I felt the way that played out was belittling what Sarah had accomplished on her own. Tony or Sarah deserved to win - and they were very fortunate to have Ben around for them.
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bluepenquin
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4-Time VolleyTalk Poster of the Year (2019, 2018, 2017, 2016), All-VolleyTalk 1st Team (2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016)
Posts: 12,440
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Post by bluepenquin on Aug 15, 2020 22:24:09 GMT -5
Finished S15 (China) for the 2nd time. What I remembered when seeing it when it first came out; I thought Amanda was the best player and had a awful performance at FTC that cost her. After watching it a 2nd time - I felt Todd was by far the best player and clearly deserved to win, no matter what Amanda had done at FTC.
I am not a big fan of the season when looking back. It had way too many unlikable players for me. And then had a couple players that didn't understand the game based on what appeared to be having barely watched the show before playing (Courtney and James). I am guessing that both of them were casted into the show as opposed to trying to get on the show? Both players lasted a long time - but neither showed the kind of 'strategy' I like to see. Couple this with a list of players that really didn't exhibit much strategy (Denise & EriK) and a couple players that thought they were way smarter than they were (Jean-Robert and Peih-Gee) - and I felt this was a pretty bad cast overall. And then Amanda is difficult to watch after seeing her 3 seasons. I now consider her among the most overrated players.
Todd was a great player - but wow, it sounds like the wheels came off of his life after winning the big money. Denise was very likeable. Erik and Jaime got married. James was always fun to watch if not ever being a great player. Trivia (I don't know the answer): Has a female ever won the most popular player and prize money before? It seems like it is always males? This season had 2 women (Peih-Gee and Denise) make the final 3, but James being the easy winner.
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bluepenquin
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4-Time VolleyTalk Poster of the Year (2019, 2018, 2017, 2016), All-VolleyTalk 1st Team (2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016)
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Post by bluepenquin on Aug 15, 2020 22:26:10 GMT -5
BTW, Season 21 and Purple Kelly is my next season to watch again. After reading the backstory - this may be my most anticipated 2nd viewing of a season yet.
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Post by bbg95 on Aug 15, 2020 22:37:20 GMT -5
Finished S15 (China) for the 2nd time. What I remembered when seeing it when it first came out; I thought Amanda was the best player and had a awful performance at FTC that cost her. After watching it a 2nd time - I felt Todd was by far the best player and clearly deserved to win, no matter what Amanda had done at FTC. I am not a big fan of the season when looking back. It had way too many unlikable players for me. And then had a couple players that didn't understand the game based on what appeared to be having barely watched the show before playing (Courtney and James). I am guessing that both of them were casted into the show as opposed to trying to get on the show? Both players lasted a long time - but neither showed the kind of 'strategy' I like to see. Couple this with a list of players that really didn't exhibit much strategy (Denise & EriK) and a couple players that thought they were way smarter than they were (Jean-Robert and Peih-Gee) - and I felt this was a pretty bad cast overall. And then Amanda is difficult to watch after seeing her 3 seasons. I now consider her among the most overrated players. Todd was a great player - but wow, it sounds like the wheels came off of his life after winning the big money. Denise was very likeable. Erik and Jaime got married. James was always fun to watch if not ever being a great player. Trivia (I don't know the answer): Has a female ever won the most popular player and prize money before? It seems like it is always males? This season had 2 women (Peih-Gee and Denise) make the final 3, but James being the easy winner. Hmm, I actually think China has one of the best casts of any season, but you are right that they weren't (minus Todd) the most strategic group. Todd actually has his life together again. He's been sober for a while, and he's engaged. I actually am acquainted with his fiance (he used to work at the place where I would get my hair cut, but I had no idea that he and Todd were in a relationship). Todd also makes delightful figurines like these: https://www.instagram.com/p/CCNResRpsev As for female fan favorites, Cirie, Kim, Lisa, and Jane have all won the award.
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Post by bbg95 on Aug 16, 2020 23:58:49 GMT -5
I have reached the merge in The Amazon. I did like the swapped tribes, as I felt the initial ones had gotten a little stale. It was also satisfying to see Roger get voted out, as he seemed to rub everyone outside of his core alliance the wrong way. It's kind of interesting comparing this situation to the one in Vanuatu. Here, the men actually had the numbers, but Roger alienated enough of them that some flipped. Whereas in Vanuatu, Sarge and company were in the minority but foolishly thought that Julie and Twila would flip on the other women (to be fair, this was in part because Julie lied to Twila, but still).
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Post by XAsstCoach on Aug 17, 2020 0:21:18 GMT -5
I thought the Ben/Sarah ending was lame and bad for the game. I saw it as either Ben quitting or realizing he wasn't going to win and wanted to leave being the 'good' guy. I prefer the idea that everyone plays to win - and especially in a season of winners like S40. I am a Sarah fan - and I felt the way that played out was belittling what Sarah had accomplished on her own. True, and the only way I could have seen this go bad for Sarah is if everyone found out about it. Not sure if Ben mentioned it to anyone in the jury, but as this was unfolding I couldn't help but think if it leaked out Sarah could be THE goat of all time. Kind of moot after the fire challenge. But I didn't think Sarah had a strong game other than the alliance. I mean we could see that Tony is the maestro of the alliance. Sarah may have had her inputs, didn't think she had as much screen time to show how strong her strategic game is...at least none that I noticed.
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Post by bbg95 on Aug 17, 2020 5:56:25 GMT -5
I thought the Ben/Sarah ending was lame and bad for the game. I saw it as either Ben quitting or realizing he wasn't going to win and wanted to leave being the 'good' guy. I prefer the idea that everyone plays to win - and especially in a season of winners like S40. I am a Sarah fan - and I felt the way that played out was belittling what Sarah had accomplished on her own. True, and the only way I could have seen this go bad for Sarah is if everyone found out about it. Not sure if Ben mentioned it to anyone in the jury, but as this was unfolding I couldn't help but think if it leaked out Sarah could be THE goat of all time. Kind of moot after the fire challenge. But I didn't think Sarah had a strong game other than the alliance. I mean we could see that Tony is the maestro of the alliance. Sarah may have had her inputs, didn't think she had as much screen time to show how strong her strategic game is...at least none that I noticed. I really doubt Ben would mention this to anyone on the jury because the whole point of it was for Sarah to have a move without Tony. I don't think it would have actually mattered if both were in the final three, as the jury didn't seem to have much respect for Ben and likely wouldn't give Sarah much credit for taking him out. That said, I think Sarah beats everyone except Tony, especially if she eliminated him in the fire making challenge and had him campaigning for her. I think she pretty clearly played the second best game of anyone out there, and there's no way she'd ever be a bigger goat than, say, Angelina. I view her situation as a better version of Fishbach in Tocantins, as I think she would have gotten at least a couple votes. Both were viewed as sort of the second in their dynamic duo, but Stephen wins against most people not named JT, and Sarah does the same against most (all?) people not named Tony. Also, if Sarah had won, I definitely think her edit would have given her more screen time and highlighted her moves a bit more. Another issue is that she's not the most dynamic character to begin with. Her win in Game Changers was kind of boring, despite her dominance. Apparently, she's much more charismatic in real life.
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Post by XAsstCoach on Aug 17, 2020 9:16:01 GMT -5
True, and the only way I could have seen this go bad for Sarah is if everyone found out about it. Not sure if Ben mentioned it to anyone in the jury, but as this was unfolding I couldn't help but think if it leaked out Sarah could be THE goat of all time. Kind of moot after the fire challenge. But I didn't think Sarah had a strong game other than the alliance. I mean we could see that Tony is the maestro of the alliance. Sarah may have had her inputs, didn't think she had as much screen time to show how strong her strategic game is...at least none that I noticed. I really doubt Ben would mention this to anyone on the jury because the whole point of it was for Sarah to have a move without Tony. I don't think it would have actually mattered if both were in the final three, as the jury didn't seem to have much respect for Ben and likely wouldn't give Sarah much credit for taking him out. That said, I think Sarah beats everyone except Tony, especially if she eliminated him in the fire making challenge and had him campaigning for her. I think she pretty clearly played the second best game of anyone out there, and there's no way she'd ever be a bigger goat than, say, Angelina. I view her situation as a better version of Fishbach in Tocantins, as I think she would have gotten at least a couple votes. Both were viewed as sort of the second in their dynamic duo, but Stephen wins against most people not named JT, and Sarah does the same against most (all?) people not named Tony. Also, if Sarah had won, I definitely think her edit would have given her more screen time and highlighted her moves a bit more. Another issue is that she's not the most dynamic character to begin with. Her win in Game Changers was kind of boring, despite her dominance. Apparently, she's much more charismatic in real life. Let’s say hypothetically Natalie manages to blindside Tony and got him out. And Ben still manages to sacrifice himself for Sarah, you think Sarah would have won?
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Post by bbg95 on Aug 17, 2020 9:32:16 GMT -5
I really doubt Ben would mention this to anyone on the jury because the whole point of it was for Sarah to have a move without Tony. I don't think it would have actually mattered if both were in the final three, as the jury didn't seem to have much respect for Ben and likely wouldn't give Sarah much credit for taking him out. That said, I think Sarah beats everyone except Tony, especially if she eliminated him in the fire making challenge and had him campaigning for her. I think she pretty clearly played the second best game of anyone out there, and there's no way she'd ever be a bigger goat than, say, Angelina. I view her situation as a better version of Fishbach in Tocantins, as I think she would have gotten at least a couple votes. Both were viewed as sort of the second in their dynamic duo, but Stephen wins against most people not named JT, and Sarah does the same against most (all?) people not named Tony. Also, if Sarah had won, I definitely think her edit would have given her more screen time and highlighted her moves a bit more. Another issue is that she's not the most dynamic character to begin with. Her win in Game Changers was kind of boring, despite her dominance. Apparently, she's much more charismatic in real life. Let’s say hypothetically Natalie manages to blindside Tony and got him out. And Ben still manages to sacrifice himself for Sarah, you think Sarah would have won? I mean, I suppose if Natalie had taken out Tony, maybe. But I think her getting voted out first would still really work against her with most of the jury, and rightfully so. I think Natalie really needed something like Ben and Michele in the final three to have a chance to actually win the game. I think that a couple of other factors that hurt Natalie are that she alienated several jurors while on the Edge (there was probably close to zero chance that any of Yul, Wendell, or Danni would vote for Natalie under any circumstances due to this), and Tony would be campaigning hard for Sarah (i.e. by downplaying his own game to some degree and highlighting how much of a true partner Sarah was in their strategic decision making). So yeah, I think Sarah wins. Edit: Looking at the votes, Natalie would need to flip four votes from this group to force a tie (assuming Michele still gets zero votes, which I think is likely, as many of the would-be Michele voters voted for Tony because they wanted to ensure that the right person won the game): Adam, Amber, Ben, Danni, Denise, Kim, Nick, Rob, Sophie, Tony, Wendell, Yul. I can maybe see Rob and Amber flipping, but I just don't see two others.
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bluepenquin
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Post by bluepenquin on Aug 24, 2020 9:07:57 GMT -5
Finished Season 21.
Fabio is the type of winner I do not like winning. One of the most important things to me in Survivor 'strategy' - is knowing what the vote is going to be at tribal. This tells me that you either are leading the voting or have a social game that allows you to understand or be aware of how others are going to vote. Fabio voted in the majority 6 of 9 times. Chase and Sash claimed that Fabio would often times come back from Tribal and say 'What just happened'. This to me is a sign of a bad player. By comparison - Chase voted in the majority all 10 times he went to tribal and Sash all 11 times. That said - I also place a lot of value on winning challenges and finding immunities. Fabio did win the last 3 challenges - when it appears he would have been voted out if he had lost any of them. All told - I am not sure who should have won. I think Chase had a very good FTC in owning his strategies, while the editing during the year made him just sound indecisive and wishy/washy. Sash was edited as being very strategic - but then he also came across as being so untrustworthy. Chase wins if not for NaOnka and Purple Kelly being allowed to vote after quitting.
Purple Kelly - yes, I see she was edited out of the show. What is odd to me - both Kelly and Nay quit - yet Nay wasn't mostly edited out of the show. Why the difference? I am also not sure why they edited out how cold most of the players seemed to be during the season? It was the factor for the 2 that quit and even Jimmy Johnson talked about how cold it was. As for clothes - I have sympathy on this. That said, it didn't appear that Kelly was left with less clothes than Brenda or Alina. However, if one is wet and cold all the time - that is really miserable. Hard to tell with the editing - but I am not buying the backstory on Purple Kelly being a strategic player. She was in a strong alliance with Kelly, Sash, Nay, and possibly Chase - but I don't believe that she was leading this alliance.
Another thing about editing and casting - I never understood why they continued to believe that controversial and (unlikable) players makes the show more interesting? I guess I know why they thought this, but I think they were wrong. I think they are less likely to cast controversial players than they used to. And players that go off on FTC just end up looking bad - Dan & Jane.
Finally - Yve is the best looking female over the age of 40 to play the game. She got very little air time
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Post by Deleted on Aug 24, 2020 9:10:12 GMT -5
Fun Fact: Chase is a pretty successful country singer right now
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Post by bbg95 on Aug 24, 2020 9:54:51 GMT -5
Finished Season 21. Fabio is the type of winner I do not like winning. One of the most important things to me in Survivor 'strategy' - is knowing what the vote is going to be at tribal. This tells me that you either are leading the voting or have a social game that allows you to understand or be aware of how others are going to vote. Fabio voted in the majority 6 of 9 times. Chase and Sash claimed that Fabio would often times come back from Tribal and say 'What just happened'. This to me is a sign of a bad player. By comparison - Chase voted in the majority all 10 times he went to tribal and Sash all 11 times. That said - I also place a lot of value on winning challenges and finding immunities. Fabio did win the last 3 challenges - when it appears he would have been voted out if he had lost any of them. All told - I am not sure who should have won. I think Chase had a very good FTC in owning his strategies, while the editing during the year made him just sound indecisive and wishy/washy. Sash was edited as being very strategic - but then he also came across as being so untrustworthy. Chase wins if not for NaOnka and Purple Kelly being allowed to vote after quitting. Purple Kelly - yes, I see she was edited out of the show. What is odd to me - both Kelly and Nay quit - yet Nay wasn't mostly edited out of the show. Why the difference? I am also not sure why they edited out how cold most of the players seemed to be during the season? It was the factor for the 2 that quit and even Jimmy Johnson talked about how cold it was. As for clothes - I have sympathy on this. That said, it didn't appear that Kelly was left with less clothes than Brenda or Alina. However, if one is wet and cold all the time - that is really miserable. Hard to tell with the editing - but I am not buying the backstory on Purple Kelly being a strategic player. She was in a strong alliance with Kelly, Sash, Nay, and possibly Chase - but I don't believe that she was leading this alliance. Another thing about editing and casting - I never understood why they continued to believe that controversial and (unlikable) players makes the show more interesting? I guess I know why they thought this, but I think they were wrong. I think they are less likely to cast controversial players than they used to. And players that go off on FTC just end up looking bad - Dan & Jane. Finally - Yve is the best looking female over the age of 40 to play the game. She got very little air time Interesting thoughts. I haven't seen this season, and it's pretty low on my list because it's almost universally regarded as one of the worst. The reason Purple Kelly and NaOnka were allowed to vote was because of the precedent set in Palau in which Janu was still allowed to vote after quitting. Many people believe that production encouraged Janu to quit in order to preserve Stephenie for another week. This didn't matter in Palau, as Tom was a runaway winner (Katie having one of the worst FTC performances ever didn't help), but this interference did eventually come back to bite them. I honestly don't know that many people thought Purple Kelly was "strategic." I think it's more that she was good socially, which is how she ended up in (not leading) the dominant alliances. As for best-looking female players over 40, off the top of my head from the seasons that I've seen, I'd say Tracy in Micronesia, both Laura Morett and Monica in Blood v. Water, Dani in Winners at War (honorable mention to Amber as well), and Ruth Marie (who was 48) in Panama.
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bluepenquin
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4-Time VolleyTalk Poster of the Year (2019, 2018, 2017, 2016), All-VolleyTalk 1st Team (2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016)
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Post by bluepenquin on Aug 24, 2020 11:00:45 GMT -5
Finished Season 21. Fabio is the type of winner I do not like winning. One of the most important things to me in Survivor 'strategy' - is knowing what the vote is going to be at tribal. This tells me that you either are leading the voting or have a social game that allows you to understand or be aware of how others are going to vote. Fabio voted in the majority 6 of 9 times. Chase and Sash claimed that Fabio would often times come back from Tribal and say 'What just happened'. This to me is a sign of a bad player. By comparison - Chase voted in the majority all 10 times he went to tribal and Sash all 11 times. That said - I also place a lot of value on winning challenges and finding immunities. Fabio did win the last 3 challenges - when it appears he would have been voted out if he had lost any of them. All told - I am not sure who should have won. I think Chase had a very good FTC in owning his strategies, while the editing during the year made him just sound indecisive and wishy/washy. Sash was edited as being very strategic - but then he also came across as being so untrustworthy. Chase wins if not for NaOnka and Purple Kelly being allowed to vote after quitting. Purple Kelly - yes, I see she was edited out of the show. What is odd to me - both Kelly and Nay quit - yet Nay wasn't mostly edited out of the show. Why the difference? I am also not sure why they edited out how cold most of the players seemed to be during the season? It was the factor for the 2 that quit and even Jimmy Johnson talked about how cold it was. As for clothes - I have sympathy on this. That said, it didn't appear that Kelly was left with less clothes than Brenda or Alina. However, if one is wet and cold all the time - that is really miserable. Hard to tell with the editing - but I am not buying the backstory on Purple Kelly being a strategic player. She was in a strong alliance with Kelly, Sash, Nay, and possibly Chase - but I don't believe that she was leading this alliance. Another thing about editing and casting - I never understood why they continued to believe that controversial and (unlikable) players makes the show more interesting? I guess I know why they thought this, but I think they were wrong. I think they are less likely to cast controversial players than they used to. And players that go off on FTC just end up looking bad - Dan & Jane. Finally - Yve is the best looking female over the age of 40 to play the game. She got very little air time Interesting thoughts. I haven't seen this season, and it's pretty low on my list because it's almost universally regarded as one of the worst. The reason Purple Kelly and NaOnka were allowed to vote was because of the precedent set in Palau in which Janu was still allowed to vote after quitting. Many people believe that production encouraged Janu to quit in order to preserve Stephenie for another week. This didn't matter in Palau, as Tom was a runaway winner (Katie having one of the worst FTC performances ever didn't help), but this interference did eventually come back to bite them. I honestly don't know that many people thought Purple Kelly was "strategic." I think it's more that she was good socially, which is how she ended up in (not leading) the dominant alliances. As for best-looking female players over 40, off the top of my head from the seasons that I've seen, I'd say Tracy in Micronesia, both Laura Morett and Monica in Blood v. Water, Dani in Winners at War (honorable mention to Amber as well), and Ruth Marie (who was 48) in Panama. According to Probst - they changed the rules to where the Producers reserve the right to exclude players who quit during the season from being able to vote. I am not surprised that this season is related so low. It was the season following an all-star season. I think Season 41 will suffer the same problems if I was to guess. Just curious what impact Purple Kelly had on the dominate alliance. In the end - it seemed (via edit) that she was more of a pawn for Brenda. Kelly quit the episode after Brenda was voted out. This put her on the outs for the first time and may have played a part in her decision. Probst gave them the rest of the day to make their quit final. It sounded like Kelly was considering sticking around, but then it started to pour down rain again on the way to tribal and she was clearly getting miserable again. The timing of the rain helped push her.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 24, 2020 11:38:53 GMT -5
Natalie Anderson is going to be on The Challenge... going to need someone to explain that show to me
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Post by Hawk Attack on Aug 24, 2020 13:04:22 GMT -5
Natalie Anderson is going to be on The Challenge... going to need someone to explain that show to me Ohhh I love that decision for her! She belongs on there. Those people are the CrossFit comp beast types.
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