Survivor Philippines (Season 25)

[Fridge_Break]

pretty sure this show has never given players anything like that in a reward challenge.

I remembered a similar reward that was mentioned above, and went back to check. It was Doritoes and Mountain Dew that was a reward in Australia. A little better than beer, but jeesh, not by much.

In regards to Abi sitting out so many challenges, I thought you could not sit out the same people in back-to-back challenges? It seems like there were times where she sat out both challenges in an episode, and I thought you couldn't do that? Or am I just not keeping track right?

It's been a couple of seasons since I remember Jeff telling them that they couldn't sit people out in back-to-back challenges. Maybe they still enforce it but don't show him explaining it anymore, I'm not sure. Although Abi did sit out a lot of the challenges early, the first 3 or 4 episodes didn't have a reward challenge at all. And then she was going to participate in the giant ball challenge this last week, but the compromise happened before she even got a turn. Probst conveniently forgot about that when he ragged on her in the immunity challenge.

Malcolm is a choosen one for sure. As is Denise. She's got the winner edit IMO no ? Am I the only one to think that ?

You're not the only one

[Jenny]

Interesting that Katie complained that Jeff made her look like more of a challenge loser than she was, just as we were talking here about how he's being unduly hard on Abi, and even poor Dana. Mind you, Katie seems a bit of a whiner, but still, it does seem like they are setting this up for a bunch of challenge kings/physical players to make it to the end.

As for Dawson, what an idiot. She had a golden opportunity to gain Jeff K's protection but didn't have a clue what to do with the info, and now from that interview we find she had another piece of choice intel - that Denise fully plans to get back with Malcolm. They've seen Malcolm in challenges - she only had to tell the guys that Denise is only riding them until merge, and if they are smart they should get rid of her now because she may be good for the team now, but she's a major threat as an individual. Of course, that info might only be hindsight on Dawson's part - thinking she saw that coming when in fact she didn't - I do have a hard time believing Denise would reveal something so important.

The strength of Denise and Malcolm's alliance ala Colby-Tina was that no one was really onto it until they got voted out. I would have thought that they'd make an effort to distance themselves on their new tribes and make people forget that they were once on the same team.

[MarieM]

Ah yes, Malcolm and Denise do have an alliance that remind me a lot of Colby / Tina. Which indicates why Jeff is in love with Malcolm, as he was with Colby

[genevieve]

Ah yes, Malcolm and Denise do have an alliance that remind me a lot of Colby / Tina. Which indicates why Jeff is in love with Malcolm, as he was with Colby

if that's true, I can only hope the result will be the same as S2

[MarieM]

Why ? So far Malcolm isn't as bad as Colby was. We'll see

[Habs]

I remembered a similar reward that was mentioned above, and went back to check. It was Doritoes and Mountain Dew that was a reward in Australia. A little better than beer, but jeesh, not by much.

In the first season, there was a beer reward. One beer for the winner of the reward challenge. My, how things have changed!

[Jenny]

Burnett wrote a book during the filming of Survivor 1 that makes for an interesting read. There was a reward that was supposed to be a beer (maybe another one?), but the players were all really exhausted and had it in their heads that the reward was going to be something really good. At the last minute, they put together a makeshift reward that involved taking Kelly to a local bar for some beers and respite from the game - funny thing was, it was only the crew's commissary, and all the people in the background at this bar were crew. She was blindfolded there and back, so had no idea she wasn't at a real bar.

Rewards have come a long way, but when was the last time someone got a car?

[genevieve]

In S1 there was a pizza reward - I think the whole tribe had to share one slice . I remember it because Rudy declined.

And when Kelly was taken to the "bar", she and Jeff watched the premiere of Survivor. I'm not sure if they really were watching the show at around the same time it was broadcast, but I do know the lag time between filming and airing was not much, so it was plausible.

Perhaps they eliminated the car reward because of the "curse"? (more likely they just haven't gotten any car sponsors in a while)

[Jenny]

IIRC, Survivor 1 started airing while they were still playing the game, I think the only time that happened. Makes it a lot harder to manipulate the show for storylines - kinda wish we could go back to that, but then again we'd likely miss things that didn't seem important to the producers at the time but ended up affecting the game.

I think it's also the only time the winner was announced to the players at final TC.

[jamesy]

And when Kelly was taken to the "bar", she and Jeff watched the premiere of Survivor. I'm not sure if they really were watching the show at around the same time it was broadcast, but I do know the lag time between filming and airing was not much, so it was plausible.

It sounds like she just got a sneak preview of the first episode. Filming appeared to take place Mar-Apr 2000 but didn't premiere until the end of May.

[Habs]

It sounds like she just got a sneak preview of the first episode. Filming appeared to take place Mar-Apr 2000 but didn't premiere until the end of May.

IIRC, they watched the first 15 minutes of the first episode.

[Jenny]

This is from imdb:

The final reward on "Survivor: Borneo" was originally going to be a bottle of beer. However, since the rewards in the past were so much bigger (consisting of things like a barbecue feast and a night on a luxury yacht), the Survivors thought that the reward was not good enough and considered a mutiny. Since the show's sponsors were coming to the island, the producers were forced to change the reward so that a mutiny would not occur. The reward was changed to a night out with host 'Jeff Probst (I)' at a local bar where the winner got to watch the first 15 minutes of the first episode of Survivor. Kelly Wiglesworth won the reward. What she didn't know was that the "bar" was actually the production crew's mess hall in disguise and that the people in the bar were all actors. (At one point Wiglesworth noticed a neon sign that read "Survivor Bar" and asked Probst what a sign like that was doing in a Malaysian bar. Probst told her that since the crew spent so much time and money there they put a sign up just for them. She believed it.)

[genevieve]

PML!

[Prancer]

(more likely they just haven't gotten any car sponsors in a while)

Ding!

They have had rewards that have involved beer, though, or at least they have given the players beer a few times. I remember this because booted contestants have complained that the beer is disgusting. Since Survivor doesn't have a beer sponsor, they always give the players whatever local brew is the cheapest. You will notice that there is never a label on the bottles.

It used to be that they based rewards on whatever the players were most craving, which is why there are things like pizza and Doritos and chocolate and peanut butter instead of healthy foods. From what Jeff has said about product placement, they will tie rewards to products whenever possible, so I think the selection has changed somewhat to reflect that. I was shocked that the letters from home last week were actual letters and not videos on a Sprint phone.

[Sparks]

I remember Kelly eating what looked like pasta with ketchup on it.

[genevieve]

what a tense episode - so much potential for a zillion different alliance configurations! I'm disappointed that Jeff and his minion went with voting out RC, although I'm not surprised. I can only hope that Jeff gets his comeuppance down the road. He's so obsessed with lasting longer than Penner - I really, really, really want him to go out first, now

I do get why Skupin changed his vote - if he hadn't, and there'd been a tie between Pete and RC, RC would've lost on the revote and Skupin would be outed as voting against his tribe. Sigh.

Lisa revealing pretty much everything going on

Pete and Abi are despicable, which will probably make them 2 of the final 3

Yay to Denise for finally having immunity, even if she still had to go to Tribal.

[TygerLily]

Lisa revealing pretty much everything going on

And yet her alliance still seemed to think there were only two HIIs in play.

I really, really don't like Abi. I remember in the first episode thinking I hated RC, but Abi is so obnoxious I was rooting for her in the end. Ah well.

[Erin]

I really, really don't like Abi. I remember in the first episode thinking I hated RC, but Abi is so obnoxious I was rooting for her in the end. Ah well.

Yeah, I kind of grew to have some affection for RC in the end. She actually reminds me a bit of Eliza where she came across as a bit annoying at first, but on reflection, I can't really see anything wrong with her. And given who the people are on the show that don't like her, it makes me think there's a lot more wrong with them than with her. Good for her for having a classy exit too (although I wouldn't be shocked to see her be a bitter juror).

Anyone get the feeling that Abi has actually started to believe her own lies about the HII? I mean, I guess she really does think that RC left the clue out, but I think she is so stupid that she doesn't understand that she's even more deceitful. Can't stand that girl either.

[Jenny]

I do get why Skupin changed his vote - if he hadn't, and there'd been a tie between Pete and RC, RC would've lost on the revote and Skupin would be outed as voting against his tribe. Sigh.

I thought it was 5 votes Penner, 4 votes RC and 2 votes Pete, so RC was going no matter how Skupin voted.

Since the majority (without Penner, Skupin and RC) went with the split vote plan, I'm guessing that RC thought that she and Skupin were joining Penner's tribe and voting off Pete? And Penner thought the same thing?

So why didn't Skupin vote with RC? I guess they told him last minute that it was Penner and he didn't have time to communicate with RC? Odd.

I figured that the split vote plan was going to happen when they went to TC without telling us who the other Skupin/RC/Penner's tribe potential alliance was going to target - that was never shown, so you knew that alliance wasn't happening.

Penner for knowing when to play his idol, and at smartass Pete thinking that Matsing's idol is out of play. Interesting that Lisa dodged Jeff's direct question about the threat of Denise/Malcolm getting back together - must be her old media training from back in the day

Anyone get the feeling that Abi has actually started to believe her own lies about the HII? I mean, I guess she really does think that RC left the clue out, but I think she is so stupid that she doesn't understand that she's even more deceitful. Can't stand that girl either.

Indeed - imagine RC at home watching the show and finding out that Abi blabbed about the clue RC found, brought in Pete without consulting her, and proceeded to hunt down the idol without her - and did she even tell RC once it had been found?

Also, we've started the jury now with 11 players, so looks like it will be a 9 jury/2 finalists ending.

[genevieve]

I thought it was 5 votes Penner, 4 votes RC and 2 votes Pete, so RC was going no matter how Skupin voted.

you're right - for some reason I thought we were already at 11 and the votes had been 5 Penner/3 RC/2 Pete, in which case changing 1 vote from Penner to Pete would have forced the revote between RC and Pete.

I'm not looking forward to the Penner explosion next week - makes me think it's his last hurrah. Was really hoping we could get yet another cross-tribe alliance going (Penner/Skupin) for some verrry interesting moves, but it looks like Penner will just blast Skupin.