[Survivor 15: China] The next Survivor

[stan4d_steph]

I just watched it, sort of. Not really worth watching IMO.

[KJSJpipe]

Seriously James? Two secret idols and you still get voted off?! :eek: Gut feelings are there for a reason, listen to them next time! He should have played one, even if he used them last night and next week that would have gotten him at least to the final 5.

[stan4d_steph]

Seriously James? Two secret idols and you still get voted off?! :eek: Gut feelings are there for a reason, listen to them next time! He should have played one, even if he used them last night and next week that would have gotten him at least to the final 5.Yeah, what a doofus. He really screwed that one up. Looks like Amanda's gunning to stab everyone else in the back.

[carolinakid]

I just loved everyone's (Todd, Amanda, Courtney)facial reactions when Jeff was reading James' name on all the papers! Talk about BLINDSIDED!!! Oh, I pretty much heard for certain that the next edition will be an ALL Stars II (Feb 08) and that James & one other from China (don't want to reveal in case it will be a spoiler for someone) will be part of the cast along with Yao Man & Jeff's girl Julie (can you say nepotism? she wasn't THAT memorable!), Cirie and 11 others...I'll try to post the complete list if I run across it again.

[cstephens]

I thought this was a terrific episode all around. So the big twist was that they did an immediate reward challenge after tribal council, with the winner and two people going to the exclusive Shaolin temple. I was actually very happy that PG won that one. You could see the look on her face when Jeff announced the prize. I think she would have been crushed if she hadn't won or hadn't been chosen to go. The only Chinese contestant actually wins the most cultural award to date on this season. Interesting that the subject of the challenge was about the culture itself. Did they engineer this for her to win, since she would have had more of a background, other than Jean Robert, though they were probably all given stuff to read? I thought she was going to pick James and Todd to try to play game, but it was actually nice that she picked Eric and Denise, more so once we found out that Denise had some training in karate. It was interesting that the outcasts got to go on the reward challenge while the main alliance all stayed at camp. There really wasn't that much game to discuss, though Amanda showed that she had other ideas.

The karate demo was pretty cool to watch, but as soon as they mentioned Denise's training, I knew that was going to show up some time. It was cool that she got to demo to the kids. Being able to perform at Shaolin temple is probably going to be something that Denise never forgets, though when she thanked PG for choosing her, I was figuring that meant she would probably vote her off at the next tribal, since that's how it happens a lot.

Courtney is still bugging me. When outcasts came back and PG was talking about the reward, it wasn't like she was just volunteering. She was asked. And Courtney is going on about "her" cave. Ummm, when did she become master of the cave?

I was also annoyed at Todd for being mad at PG for trying to play the game and suggest voting him off. Ummm, yeah, he's one of the strongest players, and she's on the chopping block. Of course she's going to try to stir it up to save herself and target him. I don't get when people think it's fine when they have to do this or that to play the game (considering Todd was going to try to blindside James previously), but if the game is played on them, then they're mad and it's not right, blah, blah, blah.

So Amanda now embraces and even implements the plan to blindside James that Todd had previously advocated and that she didn't like. Maybe they just haven't showed footage, but it's about time more people are seeing exactly how big a threat James was, both in his actions and with his two hidden immunity idols.

I liked the flying stars challenge - culturally related and fun to watch. Nice that Eric came out on top. I also liked in the machinations before tribal when Amanda had to finally convince PG to stop stirring the pot and just act as if she was going home. I know it must have taken a lot for PG to believe her.

And then we got to one of the best tribal councils ever, second to one from last year, imo. Everyone played the role they needed to play, especially PG emphasizing her being voted out and being on the jury and people needing jury votes. Even after they voted, and before Jeff started reading the votes, Amanda and Courtney were looking back and forth at people, rather guiltily. OK, you're not out of the woods yet. Until Jeff has read the first vote, James can still play an idol. Stop looking and acting guilty. But even though James later admits that he was suspicious, he doesn't play either of the idols - and he is completely blindsided. You could see Todd trying not to laugh, and when it all became obvious, we were busting up at the look on his face, and his pulling his cap down, the look of sheer joy on PG's face as she realized she was not in fact going home, and the laughter of the jury members at what was happening.

And to top it off, major kudos to James for accepting his position graciously. He wasn't angry about being voted off. He understood why it happened and that it was his mistake not to play an idol. Very classy.

[cstephens]

My husband had noticed this a couple weeks ago, but this was the first time I actually watched it for myself - they've changed the way they do the "opening credits". Usually, they just continue to show all the members of both original tribes. This go-around, though, once they got to the merge, they changed the opening credits to only show the people who were still on the merged tribe and then also the people who had then moved to the jury. (Before the merge, not sure if they took people out of the intro once they were voted out.) I think that's an interesting change, and it actually makes a lot of sense. The other people really don't matter anymore, and with no more than 10 people to show, it makes the opening credits shorter. As it was, in previous seasons, once they got toward the end, I would periodically watch the roll-call, and I wouldn't even really remember half the people they were showing.

I had mentioned about last week's episode that I thought it was weird that Todd was so mad when Denise told him that P.G. was gunning for him. So this week, he says that it would be smart for the others to vote him out, but he wasn't going to tell them that. Ummm, ok, P.G. already not only thought about it but tried to pull it off several days prior, and you got all mad about it.

The family challenges are often fun to watch, and it's especially touching to see the reunions. I noticed that Denise was the only one who had a spouse as visiting family. And it really shocked me that Courtney's father was British. With the way that she is, I just completely didn't expect her father to be English. I loved the look on his face when Jeff explained what the challenge was.

When they first showed the maze, I thought they were going to have one person talk the other through while blindfolded. I don't remember a challenge before where both people are blindfolded, and they have to find each other *and* find a particular location. That was pretty cool. Amanda and her sister with their bird-calling sounds were cracking me up. Courtney seemed irritated with Jeff's play-by-play. Ummm, that's what he's supposed to be doing. I thought it was cool that Denise won. I wasn't terribly surprised that she picked Todd and Amanda. At that point, it's about alliances. Even though P.G. had chosen her to participate in the last reward, I didn't think that necessarily obligated her to pick P.G. in return, though P.G. apparently did.

So, something else I noticed - what is with Amanda's butt? I've noticed over the past few episodes that either during a challenge or even when they're just walking around camp or something, the area around Amanda's butt is blurred. No, I'm not staring at her butt - the blurring actually catches my attention. This time, I noticed it particularly when they were getting on the boat for the reward challenge, I think. I'm presuming that her underwear or bikini bottom or whatever she's wearing is showing too much of her butt to be aired on TV without being blurred. Just seemed odd to me.

When they came back from their reward challenge, and they had chocolate on their hands that the others licked off - ewww. I thought that was kind of weird. I guess I wouldn't know unless I was in that position, but the thought of licking food off of someone's hand just strikes me as icky. I don't think I could do it. Maybe I just don't like chocolate enough.

So P.G. wins a do-or-die immunity again. In this case, I didn't think the challenge was skewed towards her like I thought last week's reward challenge was - the questions seemed a lot harder this time, and it was only because Todd missed the last question that she ended up winning.

Having to do with nothing, there was some point when Todd was doing a sort of diary entry to the camera, and his hair was just sticking up and all weird. He reminded me of a chia pet.

So Erik and P.G. try their best to turn Denise, but they fail, and Erik is voted off. It was interesting that Denise's testimonial during her vote was that this was probably the biggest mistake she'd make in the game. If she thought that could be the case, then why do it? I do think Erik and P.G. had a very valid argument. Denise has gotta know that she's fourth in her alliance, even without hearing what Todd and Amanda said with their siblings around. Unless she can win an immunity challenge, she's gone when final four rolls around. If she had voted with P.G. and Erik against Todd, she was guaranteed to get to final four since their three votes would control at the next tribal council. And she at least had a shot at final three since because if either she, Erik or P.G. won the immunity idol (and Erik and P.G. have had recently great track records at winning challenges), it would be them as final three. But she stuck with her alliance, relying on her trust, though I'm not entirely sure what that means. OK, next round, if P.G. doesn't win immunity, she goes. If she does, then Denise would go. P.G.'s win would only prolong Denise's stay by one week. In either case, her alliance wouldn't be breaking their word to her by voting her out. Once the "outsiders" are gone or at least not able to be voted out, they have to vote someone off from their own alliance, and I don't recall Todd or anyone else in her alliance promising her final four or final three.

With Erik out, that leaves four women and one man. I would actually like to see Todd voted out this week, so that would leave all women in the final four and beyond. That would be fun. I think this week is when the car challenge would be, so we'll find out who wins the car and subsequently, according to tradition, not win Sole Survivor. Maybe Todd can win the car as a consolation prize and then be kicked out.

If the women do make final four, I'd want Courtney out next. Hmm, I'd also be ok with her going next and then Todd going the week after that. I want final three to be Amanda, Denise and P.G. I'd be ok with any of them winning, though I think it would be great if Denise ultimately won.

[cstephens]

Wow, I didn't realize next Sunday is the finale of the show!

[stan4d_steph]

Well that was kind of disappointing. I was hoping Todd would get booted. I think if Denise doesn't win the next immunity she will probably be gone. Either her or Amanda. I doubt Todd and Courtney would want to take anyone "nice" with them.

[shna]

I'm just glad PG is gone. She was driving me up the wall.

[cstephens]

The reward challenge was fun because it wasn't just a matter of winning or losing on your own. You could potentially have done horribly on your own but still won because of other people. I did think it was interesting that Courtney got the most arrows. I can't believe that it was because she was all that popular. I'm wondering if so many people gave her so many arrows because they figured she wouldn't do well, so she was the least dangerous. Todd did a great job, but in the end, Courtney was responsible for Denise winning the challenge.

Denise picking Courtney to go with her made perfect sense as payback, and while there's a part of me that understands P.G. getting upset that Denise didn't pick her to go, it wouldn't have made any sense strategically to pick her. Denise's refusal to vote off Todd the week before pretty much cemented that Denise was sticking with her tribe, and as grateful as she might have been that P.G. took her to the Shao Lin Temple, that wasn't going to obligate Denise to return the favor. I understood Denise's comment about not wanting P.G. to get stronger, but I was surprised that she said it loud enough for P.G. to hear. I can't remember how close they were to each other in proximity.

I was really surprised at how completely lost Denise, Todd and Courtney were with the hot pot cooking. OK, so there's raw meat and vegetables and a boiling hot pot. It's not obvious that you cook your own food in there? Not a single one of them has had any experience with anything remotely like that? All that food, and they thought it was confusing? No wonder Amanda and P.G. were later annoyed by their comments. I thought Courtney's comment about just having pizza was pretty stupid. Ummm, hello, you're in China - they've already fed you American food a few times. Why would you expect that you'd be having pizza at the Great Wall of China? I thought Courtney's comment about Amanda being less likely to stir up trouble was pretty stupid too. Did she completely forget that it was Amanda who had engineered blindsiding James by voting him off?

It was nice to see the scenes of P.G. and Amanda bonding. I can see how demoralizing the whole experience can be for P.G., so at least she had some time of fun.

The immunity challenge with the revisiting of challenges was fun. It was seriously surprising that Todd did so poorly and was the first one kicked out. You could see the complete look of shock on P.G.'s face. The second person out was, not surprisingly, Denise on the balut challenge. She couldn't do it last time, so I'm not surprised she couldn't do it again. Jeff made a comment about it being a $1,000,000 decision, but honestly, it's really just about money. If it was something else, like her daughter would be killed if she didn't eat it, you'd bet she'd be able to get it down then. It's a matter of what's enough motivation for you. On the bouncing ball on a drum competition, Courtney lost, so it was down to Amanda and P.G. P.G. came close, but in the end, Amanda was faster, mostly because she chopped through the ropes faster.

P.G. fought a good battle, but in the end, she lost the war.

So I guess there's going to be no car challenge this time? I don't remember it coming this late. And it sounds like they're going back to having final two, not final three like they've had the last few times. I still want Todd out. I'd be ok with either Denise or Amanda winning, so that's who I want in final two. I am absolutely going to scream if it comes down to Courtney and Todd. I would pick Todd as more deserving, but to have Courtney in at the end? NO FRICKIN' WAY!

Season finale is on Sunday, and then the reunion episode!

[Sheila]

I can hardly wait for tonight, too. Love the whole Survivor finale plus reunion show thing.

I'm getting the chicken in the crockpot now, so viewing time will be uninterrupted. :)

[stan4d_steph]

No comments in here yet?

That was a really nice thing that Burnett did for Denise. How sucky to get fired from your job after going on Survivor.

I was kind of surprised that Amanda got so few votes. For a minute there I thought Courtney might win, and I was a little frightened. At least she redeemed herself a little during the reunion show.

I wonder which alumni will be going on the Fans vs. Favorites? There are probably spoilers out there, but I haven't read them.

[Sheila]

Yeah, I was a bit disappointed that Amanda did not win. However, she really sunk herself at the Final Tribal Council -- she never took ownership of her gameplay (just sat there apologizing). Todd really owned his nefariousness and I think the jury really respected him for it.

I'm so happy that Burnett gave Denise an impromptu prize. Leave it to bureaucratic systems to kick a person when they're down. Hopefully, someone from Denise's hometown will have seen her on the show and give her a much better job!

[pixar]

my guess is james will be on the favorites. I just don't see anyone else making that list. definitely not the top 3 this season.

and what's with denise getting fired from her job? there's gotta be a different reason than what she said was the reason. :confused: did she bad mouth her job back home during the season? to get fired from a $7/hour job is tough. but that $50k sure does help her.

[Sheila]

and what's with denise getting fired from her job? there's gotta be a different reason than what she said was the reason. :confused: did she bad mouth her job back home during the season? to get fired from a $7/hour job is tough. but that $50k sure does help her.

Wow, pixar, you have great intuition!! :eek: Someone just posted this at another Survivor message board. It's a public statement from the school that Denise is a custodian at:

http://www.douglas.k12.ma.us/

[KJSJpipe]

Huh, I wonder if Mark Burnet will take the money back. He gave it to her based on her sob story about getting a lower paying job when she returned from the show. It should be interesting to see if any thing happens or if he just takes it as a lesson that even though the show is over the contestants may still be lying/playing the game.

[oregontraveler]

She was on the CBS Early Show today, I didn't see the wole thing but a
school rep. was also on to give their side. I didn't hear if she is keeping the money.

[PanFan]

So where was the car challenge this season?

[KJSJpipe]

Denise apologizes (http://www6.comcast.net/tv/articles/2007/12/18/People.Denise.Martin/).

Interesting, she says she is sorry but never says what she will do about the money.

[CV12Pirate]

I do not like Todd, I respect him because of his answers. He stood up like a man and did not dodge any of the questions. However I still do not like him.

[Drince88]

Denise apologizes (http://www6.comcast.net/tv/articles/2007/12/18/People.Denise.Martin/).

Interesting, she says she is sorry but never says what she will do about the money.

From reading that link, it's almost like she's saying 'Well, I didn't ASK for the money, he just gave it to me, so that means I'm going to keep it' It's not quite the entitlement attitude a lot of people have, but it's darn close.

[IdahoMike]

Denise said today that she will donate the $50,000 to the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS foundation, so some good will come out of this whole mess.

[cstephens]

So the season finale of "Survivor" started with a reward challenge involving their own little version of the Great Wall. Amanda ended up winning, but she had the option to share her pizza, beer and brownies (what is up with them craving pizza so badly anyway?) with either one or two other people. I didn't think she was going to pick any of them, to make it more "fair", but she ended up picking Todd only, which surprised me a little. Maybe she didn't want to show her hand further by also picking either Denise or Courtney, since she and Todd have been in an alliance all along. But I thought it was interesting that she didn't pick him so much because of their alliance but because she wasn't sure about him and wanted time to talk to him alone.

And then the four go on their final journey to remember all of their fallen comrades. Wait, didn't they say last week that there would be three tribal councils? Which would mean they're going back to only having a final two? Maybe there's still another twist coming up.

The last challenge was kind of like an endurance thing of who wanted it more, but it had the added element of having to balance the plates and such. It was interesting that Amanda decided to flip her one bowl around, which seemed to perhaps steady a bit more. And she almost got distracted by Denise's attempt to make a deal with her, but in the end, Amanda won the final immunity. Yep, Jeff said final immunity and Amanda would be in the final tribal council, but everything was still worded strangely that it made me wonder if something else wasn't up. Maybe they'd have a regular vote off to three, and then Amanda would get to pick who goes with her to final two, so her immunity would end up being a double-whammy.

As Amanda was going back and forth about what to do, whether to vote for Todd to force a tie (since she apparently couldn't persuade Courtney to vote for Todd) or to just vote off Denise, Courtney threw in her two-cents to the camera and made a comment that Denise shouldn't win because it's not a welfare gig. Wow, that was pretty harsh. Loser at life? Denise seemd to be doing ok for herself, and I'm not sure what kind of position Courtney thinks she's in that she feels entitled to look down at Denise. Because Denise is a lunch lady? That's ridiculous. Courtney herself has said that she's pretty much been a tagalong to get where she is, and Denise has had to fight. Courtney's comment really irritated me, on top of everything else Courtney has done/said.

In the end, Amanda chose to vote with her alliance, and Denise was voted off. I did think Denise's comment about Amanda having her back was a little deceiving because Amanda was right in that she'd made that comment a little while ago, not that day. And Denise has it confirmed to her that she in fact did make the biggest mistake in not voting with P.G. and Erik earlier, when they could have kicked off Todd, and Denise would have had a real shot at final three. And for Denise, Jeff said she was the final member of the jury. So what's going on? Is it still going down to final two, and the one not selected doesn't even get to be on the jury?

The three had a bad final night at camp because Amanda was upset with what Denise said and Todd's reaction and her perception that Todd threw her under the bus. But all was well the next morning, especially since they enjoyed some breakfast treats.

So we get to final tribal council. Yep, it's final three again, not two. Hmmm, but maybe this council ended in a tie, so they had to have a run-off. After all, they already know who wins once the votes have been cast since they're all doing it on camera. There is a chance there could be a tie, and if so, they couldn't very well break a tie on the live show, so they'd have to have a run-off right then and there. Maybe that's the twist.

The questions from the jury were pretty much what you'd expect. I did think it was funny that Todd's answer to Jean-Robert left him literally speechless, and James was just simply cracking up about it. I thought it was interesting that James said twice that he didn't want to be a Bitter Betty. I'm wondering if that was directed at Denise, who we find out is obviously very bitter, but her wounds were the freshest. Everyone else had some time for thought and perspective, but for her, not much time had passed at all. You could tell by Denise's questioning, or rather, commenting, that she was really just ticked off at Amanda and Todd, and she ended up voting for Courtney because Courtney was the one she wasn't mad at because she had never promised her anything or broken her word, really because she was never in a position to do either. The most surprising to me was Jamie's questioning. Easy-going blondie had the most direct, pointed, biting, combative questions, and she wasn't letting them off easy.

And in the end, Todd won with four votes, with Courtney getting two votes and surprisingly to me, Amanda only getting one vote. I think Amanda really tanked herself in her answers to the jury. Yes, Todd had lied and cheated as well, as much if not more so than Amanda, but he completely owned up to it, that it was strategy, part of the game and he meant to do all of it, while trying to keep the personal relationships separate. Amanda waffled entirely too much, and she did play it off as if none of the betrayals were her fault, at one point even saying she had no choice but to vote someone off. She didn't want to be blamed for the bad stuff, but in the same breath, she also wasn't then going to claim the credit, though she tried to claim her rightful credit for James' ouster. But she played both sides, so I think she really just made people angry, whereas Todd might also have made people angry, but you could at least respect his game play.

I can't even say how much it irritated me that Courtney came in second. I wasn't too fond of Todd after a while, but he definitely deserved to win after all his machinations.

And since there was no tie whatsoever, I don't know if they just made a mistake when they had Jeff do the promo about there being 3 tribal councils or if they just deliberately lied about it.

Denise ended up being the key to the game. (Jeff tried to talk about Courtney's "welfare" comment, but both she and Denise seemed to blow it off, with Courtney saying she had apologized and Denise saying it wasn't a big deal, so Jeff just moved along. I was really surprised that Denise was that blase over the comment.) And her decisions in the game were motivated by what she talked about all throughout the game. She kept saying that she wasn't ever the popular kid in school, and that she was always the one who got picked last or never got picked at all. And her holding onto that hurt is what cost her final three and ultimately, it turns out, P.G. winning it all as well. Denise had been taken in, to some degree, by the "cool kids", aka Todd and Amanda and their alliance, and Denise couldn't abandon that. She said she was never picked as a kid - but she was picked in the game eventually - by P.G. and Erik. But P.G. and Erik were outcasts as well, and Denise's fixation meant she would rather reject the outcasts who were trying desperately to gain her favor and try to stay with the "cool kids" (which is probably why she refused to vote off Todd) in the hopes that their acceptance of her was real, that she could really and truly be included in their group. And in the end, when they did ultimately reject her, like we saw coming for weeks, she was angry that yet again, she was tossed aside by the "cool kids". Jeff made a comment about how it was nice that James was able to put aside his feelings and vote the game because some people just can't let the personal feelings aside. I wonder if that was directed at Denise, who clearly voted her emotions at the end.

When Jeff announced the fan favorite, I wasn't surprised at all that James won. The added twist came at the last break when Jeff announced that, because of the story Denise told about having been fired from her job when she returned, Mark Burnett had decided then and there that she would get $50,000 to help her out.

I liked Denise for some time, but her stubbornness in not seeing the game started to annoy me. And then I felt sorry for her about having lost her job. And then I saw this story (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071218/ap_on_en_tv/people_denise_martin;_ylt=Avg4z8zvbZZXajhIiPOoMcpx Fb8C), where it turns out that Denise's tearful confession wasn't entirely truthful. Her boss at the school district says that she was promoted, at her own request, to custodian, which included higher pay and more benefits, before she went on the show. When she returned, she wanted to go back to being a lunch lady, but the position was no longer available. This is a far cry from the sob story she told on the show.

So the next season of "Survivor" will be in Micronesia. (OK, yeah, I'm geography-challenged, but where the heck is that?) And this time, it's going to pit a team of returning contestants (all-stars) with rabid fans who have studied and know every aspect of the game. That's a nice twist that sounds like a lot of fun (depending on who the returning people are) - looking forward to seeing it, wherever they are...

[Burnt Toast]

Basically Fans vs. Favorites will use the SAME facilities and areas (like Uulong island, used for one of the tribal camps) used for the Palau season.

[anniem8]

I can't remember; have they always had another Survivor start in February? Or are they hurrying it along because of the writer's strike? I realize they film way in advance, but are they showing it sooner to help fill in?