Myles I have been with you since early days of episodic medium, then avclub for survivor, and I joined your Substack for your survivor reviews. Unbelievable job a year later growing the site from Saul to andor to mando and everything else you cover beyond worth the subscription price.
- Like the "Sword and Shield" as unofficial subtitle, hope it catches on! In fact, all post-40 seasons could use some fan-made title. The numeric titles are starting to blend together and its only been 4 seasons.
- Excited to see the Shot in the Dark finally work! I was starting to think the whole thing was an elaborate prank from the producers. It made for a bizarre first tribal ,and cant help but feel bad for Maddy for falling victim to a 3-vote tribal (although she seemed to be overplaying at camp anyway). Also feel terrible for Bruce but am happy to hear they are committed to bringing him back. When Sandra's daughter Nina played on Australian Survivor last season, she was med-evaced and was basically promised on the spot that she would have a chance to come back.
- I agree that Claire's move during the challenge was subtle but effective! I always like seeing what small strategizing players find ways to do during challenges.
- Not sure I'll listen to the Jeff Probst Pod every week, but will report back any interesting info I happen to catch.
- Carson may grow on me like Christian did, but for now I find his hyper Gen Z superfandom a little grating. Apparently, he caught some flack on Twitter a couple weeks back for selling T-shirts immediately after the cast announcement.
- I don't know if it challenges have become legitimately more intense in the 26 day game or recent casts are just smaller in stature but watching them try to move those huge blocks around the sand stresses me out.
- I haven't listened, but Probst interviewed Bruce and said he's welcome back on a future season. Every other early medevac is fuming. Bring back Kourtney Moon
- There is an INCREDIBLE season of Survivor that's airing right now... Australian Survivor. The more Probst messes with the components of Survivor, the deeper entrenched I get in other forms of it (talk to me about college survivor). It almost feels like fans love the game, and Jeff hates what we love. But at least the characters are fun and making insane decisions
- Remember last year when Gabler was threatening to play his Shot in the dark at Tribal 1?
This is my first time watching Aus Survivor and US Survivor at the same time. It makes the new style of US Survivor pretty stark in comparison to the pre-Covid format/editing style (which Aus Survivor keeps to for the most part).
First of all I had no idea there was an AUS Survivor and have just been hearing about it recently...hopefully that's on Paramount+ or something bc I'll definitely check it out. Second, this far into the show, unless they get guest hosts each season, this has evolved into the Jeff Probst hour for better and worse, so I mostly ignore anything that's not perfunctory. I don't think there's ever been three calls for medical in a single episode let alone the first one, so bravo for amping up ... something? Team Yam Yam so far, he is simply delightful.
Tonight was the first episode my 8 year old son stayed up with us to watch, and he was pretty wowed by everything, although he got lost with all the advantages at the end. That's OK, kid, that makes two of us.
It's too early to really get a sense of who everyone is and what their gameplay would be like, although I liked that although it appeared early on that they were setting Matthew and Brandon up as the archetypical big lunkheads who run the tribe despite generally sucking at challenges (and climbing rocks), they went another way and a) had the rest of the tribe be ready to vote Brandon out first, and b) Brandon figuring out just in time that he was in trouble and playing his idol.
Also, I'm not going to be the one to listen to the podcasts, but apparently Jeff already said that they're going to find a way to get Bruce on another season, so good for that guy. Watch him get voted out first.
It’s unfortunate my biases of HvV of Australian Survivor makes me look at this episode and groan (e.g., I’m really wishing they went with 2 tribes instead of 3), but I really hope for a good season. What I do miss out on are the moments outside of challenges. Because the Australian network 10 has Australian Survivor playing 3 times a week, there’s many moments where we see the tribes just chatting. There was such a sweet moment with the older gents of one tribe that I don’t think Survivor US would make air time for. It can be boring, but it also shows how relationships are formed and how that plays out later in the season. It’s stuff like that that we missed in 43 which gave Gabler his win.
It made me think; I do kind of miss the slightly hokey visual design themes of the seasons before they settled on Fiji as a permanent home. And there was probably diminishing returns in that--as Survivor is still popular but not the juggernaut that it was, production costs can be cut by settling in Fiji. But it was interesting when the sets and accoutrements had a Chinese aesthetic, or an African aesthetic, or a pirate-ship aesthetci, etc.
But yeah, while the addition of a Medieval Times aesthetic helps to make the season more distinct, it is a bit jarring to place that on a South Pacific island.
I listened to the podcast, but can’t keep a weekly ear on it, just because my watch schedule is so inconsistent. But they talked about the casting process, why they are doing the podcast now, timeline around setting up the show, and a lot of time focused on where the castaways go to the washroom (the cleanest method is the aqua-dump).
As a new Survivor fan (started at 42), Jeff doesn’t grate on me as much as he does a lot of veteran fans. He was self-depreciating on the podcast, and has a segment titled “Jeff, You Suck,” where he will air issues fans have with him personally.
-Solid first episode! Everyone in the cast seems fun and watchable.
-All the medical issues was so worrying!!! I was wondering if they’re being extra cautious or what because it was crazy for episode one
-I didn’t consider myself anti advantage until this tribal, too many!!!
-I didn’t like the birdcage. Conceptually I get it but I think there are too many moving parts for it to work as is. Might be better after merge or in a one world situation?
Myles I have been with you since early days of episodic medium, then avclub for survivor, and I joined your Substack for your survivor reviews. Unbelievable job a year later growing the site from Saul to andor to mando and everything else you cover beyond worth the subscription price.
- Like the "Sword and Shield" as unofficial subtitle, hope it catches on! In fact, all post-40 seasons could use some fan-made title. The numeric titles are starting to blend together and its only been 4 seasons.
- Excited to see the Shot in the Dark finally work! I was starting to think the whole thing was an elaborate prank from the producers. It made for a bizarre first tribal ,and cant help but feel bad for Maddy for falling victim to a 3-vote tribal (although she seemed to be overplaying at camp anyway). Also feel terrible for Bruce but am happy to hear they are committed to bringing him back. When Sandra's daughter Nina played on Australian Survivor last season, she was med-evaced and was basically promised on the spot that she would have a chance to come back.
- I agree that Claire's move during the challenge was subtle but effective! I always like seeing what small strategizing players find ways to do during challenges.
- Not sure I'll listen to the Jeff Probst Pod every week, but will report back any interesting info I happen to catch.
- Carson may grow on me like Christian did, but for now I find his hyper Gen Z superfandom a little grating. Apparently, he caught some flack on Twitter a couple weeks back for selling T-shirts immediately after the cast announcement.
- I don't know if it challenges have become legitimately more intense in the 26 day game or recent casts are just smaller in stature but watching them try to move those huge blocks around the sand stresses me out.
- I haven't listened, but Probst interviewed Bruce and said he's welcome back on a future season. Every other early medevac is fuming. Bring back Kourtney Moon
- There is an INCREDIBLE season of Survivor that's airing right now... Australian Survivor. The more Probst messes with the components of Survivor, the deeper entrenched I get in other forms of it (talk to me about college survivor). It almost feels like fans love the game, and Jeff hates what we love. But at least the characters are fun and making insane decisions
- Remember last year when Gabler was threatening to play his Shot in the dark at Tribal 1?
This is my first time watching Aus Survivor and US Survivor at the same time. It makes the new style of US Survivor pretty stark in comparison to the pre-Covid format/editing style (which Aus Survivor keeps to for the most part).
First of all I had no idea there was an AUS Survivor and have just been hearing about it recently...hopefully that's on Paramount+ or something bc I'll definitely check it out. Second, this far into the show, unless they get guest hosts each season, this has evolved into the Jeff Probst hour for better and worse, so I mostly ignore anything that's not perfunctory. I don't think there's ever been three calls for medical in a single episode let alone the first one, so bravo for amping up ... something? Team Yam Yam so far, he is simply delightful.
Somebody's posted AUS episodes to youtube. There's also a FB group called The Tribe Has Spoken but I'm sure that's full of spoilers.
Oh sweet, thank you for the heads up!
Tonight was the first episode my 8 year old son stayed up with us to watch, and he was pretty wowed by everything, although he got lost with all the advantages at the end. That's OK, kid, that makes two of us.
It's too early to really get a sense of who everyone is and what their gameplay would be like, although I liked that although it appeared early on that they were setting Matthew and Brandon up as the archetypical big lunkheads who run the tribe despite generally sucking at challenges (and climbing rocks), they went another way and a) had the rest of the tribe be ready to vote Brandon out first, and b) Brandon figuring out just in time that he was in trouble and playing his idol.
Also, I'm not going to be the one to listen to the podcasts, but apparently Jeff already said that they're going to find a way to get Bruce on another season, so good for that guy. Watch him get voted out first.
It’s unfortunate my biases of HvV of Australian Survivor makes me look at this episode and groan (e.g., I’m really wishing they went with 2 tribes instead of 3), but I really hope for a good season. What I do miss out on are the moments outside of challenges. Because the Australian network 10 has Australian Survivor playing 3 times a week, there’s many moments where we see the tribes just chatting. There was such a sweet moment with the older gents of one tribe that I don’t think Survivor US would make air time for. It can be boring, but it also shows how relationships are formed and how that plays out later in the season. It’s stuff like that that we missed in 43 which gave Gabler his win.
I'll call it "Sword and Shield" too.
It made me think; I do kind of miss the slightly hokey visual design themes of the seasons before they settled on Fiji as a permanent home. And there was probably diminishing returns in that--as Survivor is still popular but not the juggernaut that it was, production costs can be cut by settling in Fiji. But it was interesting when the sets and accoutrements had a Chinese aesthetic, or an African aesthetic, or a pirate-ship aesthetci, etc.
But yeah, while the addition of a Medieval Times aesthetic helps to make the season more distinct, it is a bit jarring to place that on a South Pacific island.
I listened to the podcast, but can’t keep a weekly ear on it, just because my watch schedule is so inconsistent. But they talked about the casting process, why they are doing the podcast now, timeline around setting up the show, and a lot of time focused on where the castaways go to the washroom (the cleanest method is the aqua-dump).
As a new Survivor fan (started at 42), Jeff doesn’t grate on me as much as he does a lot of veteran fans. He was self-depreciating on the podcast, and has a segment titled “Jeff, You Suck,” where he will air issues fans have with him personally.
-Solid first episode! Everyone in the cast seems fun and watchable.
-All the medical issues was so worrying!!! I was wondering if they’re being extra cautious or what because it was crazy for episode one
-I didn’t consider myself anti advantage until this tribal, too many!!!
-I didn’t like the birdcage. Conceptually I get it but I think there are too many moving parts for it to work as is. Might be better after merge or in a one world situation?
-excited for the season!!
I think it will work better when we don’t see it deconstructed like this - curious to see how the other tribes end up confronting it.