Sorry for the late post. I was travelling again & on the road yesterday... Do real bloggers have laptops? Probably.
So... ROB! Rob, Rob, Rob.... Did you love it? I know that I talk to a lot of people who wanted Rob to win, but that there are also a lot of you who didn't want him to win. You all know I fit into the first category. Yeah, he could be pretty cocky and smarmy, but honestly... even my boyfriend Jeff said that Rob played the closest thing he's ever seen to a perfect game. It was brilliant. He went there to win and that's what he did. He didn't get sucked into the whole, "you're my buddy and I can't possibly vote you off" thing. And I know some of you disagree, but you know that it's the way I think the game should be played. As Rob said a number of times, "I didn't come here to make friends." And it's true. If you're Rob, you've got a lot of friends back home and what's more - you've got a wife and two babies to support and as we all know, being a reality TV show contestant is Rob's job. Some people are plumbers or doctors and others go to work in a tropical country with 17 other random weirdos and have to make all of those weirdos listen to what you say, respect you and vote for you to have a million dollars. It is a job and Rob worked damn hard at it.
You've probably all seen the show by now, so I'm not going to do much play-by-play. Let's just talk about the interesting parts.
1) When Ashley wins immunity AGAIN, forcing the group to vote off Andrea. What the heck... when did Ashley all of a sudden get good at challenges? Was she all along maybe and I was just looking at Grant? Possible. At any rate, it looked like a good opportunity for the girls to form an alliance and vote off Rob, right? It also looked like Rob wasn't going to play his immunity idol. Clever editors.... Later at the reunion show, Ashley told us that she and Natalie knew about Rob's idol, so they knew they couldn't vote for him. Ah-ha! Clever Rob for making sure they knew it! So bye-bye Andrea.
2) Down to the final four - Rob wins immunity and was the happiest guy EVER! He wanted it bad, and almost got beat again by Ashley, who then got voted off. Poor girl. She was M-A-D about it and although it looked like she eventually forgave Natalie for it, she certainly had not forgiven Natalie at the final tribal council.
3) Rob picked the BEST FINAL THREE COMBO EVER. Seriously, he could not have asked for a better couple to take to the jury than Natalie and Phillip. Natalie was young and cute, but sorry, kinda dumb. She never worked at camp, she never made friends outside of her tribe, she did everything Rob told her and she never won challenges. Her entire arguement was that ummmmm... she's the youngest female contestant ever and she followed Rob to the finish. Right. The 'riding coattails' strategy has worked in the past (other Natalie with Russell) but that was because Russell was so hated and because other Natalie was able to argue that she was in on the decisions and was actually a partner in the process. This Natalie just sat back and gave the million to Rob.
4) Phillip flakes out. Phillip honestly could have maybe had some more votes if he'd played his cards right. He got one vote in the end from Ralph (who actually voted for some guy named Phile) just for giving Ralph a compliment. He could have talked about 'being the villain' as a strategy. Told them that he was being such a jerk and such a weirdo BECAUSE he knew that that was a way to get people to take him to the end. Unfortunately, he did not say any of this. He said he 'changed his strategy' but then didn't talk about what his strategy actually was. He, just like Natalie, gave Rob the money by sitting there and thanking Rob for getting him there and admitting that he was only there because of Rob. Really? Phil was pretty awesome and honest in the questions though. I think he was sincere in his comments about Ralph, and I loved when he basically told off... who was it? Ashley or Julie? Ashley I think.... "NO, I will talk if I want to." Ashley: "No you won't." Phil: "Look, I'm talking right now, whether you like it or not." Hee. He just sat there in his ancestral robe and feathers and made no attempt to win the money. It was more of a giant "Screw You All" to the jury. Awesome if you're Rob.
5) The bitter jury. Although the vote came out the way it should, those rotters on the jury still may have given it to someone else instead of Rob if they'd have had anyone half decent to vote for. They were still so bitter and it always, always amazes me how people cannot detach the show from reality. It goes to show you how real the emotions are for those people. They were downright mean this time out, I thought. Usually you get one meanie, but this time there was a lot of mean. Ashley was bitter. Grant was bitter. Julie was horrible to Natalie - asking if she thought her parents would be proud of her and saying if she was her daughter, she wouldn't be proud at all... Yikes! That's mean. (I liked Rob leaning over protectively to Natalie saying don't worry, they'll be all smiles later. So true.) Saying to Rob that he hopes his daughters will be proud of how he played because she doesn't know how they could be.... Gah! (Ummm... I'm pretty sure Rob's daughters will be pretty proud of their dad as they enroll in college that he's paid for....) Anyway, Steve was reasonably horrible to Phillip (as you'd expect) and Mike and Matt just seemed bitter and mad that no one was thanking "their God" for being there. (Ugh... as much as I liked Matt this season, and to each their own and everything, if I had to listen to Matt going on about "praising his God" one more time..... ) Which brings me to another thought? Am I as mean as the jury? I said out loud while I was watching... they are so mean... I would never say those things. Ummmm.... wait a sec. I do say those things.... in my blog. Hee hee. Oh well. If any of them ever read this, I sort of apologize. Maybe it depends who it is. : ) Anyway, I liked that Rob could have defended himself more, but knew to keep his mouth shut for the most part. He knew he had it in the bag and let Natalie and Phillip give him the cash.
6) And David. Ha! David - the lawyer - presented a case to the jury on why they should vote for Rob instead of asking questions! So amazing. David gets it. David saw the brilliance. Rob should at least buy David a beer.
7) The reunion show. My friend Kylie said she liked that they didn't bother talking to the "back row" people but I disagree. I like that they catch up with the people who didn't make the jury, so I missed that. Instead they spent a bunch of time letting David monopolize our hour by proposing on live TV to Carolina - a former Survivor contestant. Uh, did any of you other girls have your spidey senses tingling on that one? That she was shocked - and maybe not in a good way? Kept saying "Survivor likes to keep blindsiding me." I would find that horrifying, but that's just me. Russell was a good sport and shook Rob's hand. That was good to see. In other news, poolster Wendy forwarded me this link about Russell getting his own TV show:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/16/us-russellhantz-idUSTRE74F7DJ20110516
Will you watch? Speaking of making up, Phillip also apologized to Steve and they shook hands. Phil seemed a bit bitter and off, non? They brought in some lady to say that yes, Phillip was indeed a real special agent and there was no real surprise there. So what was with all the question marks then, Mark Burnett? If it's that easy to find out.... Matt looked good with a haircut and Andrea got all gushy about "liking" Matt and that seemed to make him uncomfortable in a "get away, stalker" kind of way. Grant is still pissed at Rob, which I found strange. Rob tried to make up and said they were friends again until episode 4 aired. I'd like to go back and see what it was that turned Grant, but Rob did talk a lot like, "all these losers" and "dum-dums" and "clowns" and so on. So I guess he's taken it personally. Too bad, because I do think Rob's sincere that he'd like to be friends with Grant in real life.... oh well. Again, do we have to go over it? The show is NOT called "Making Friends and Playing With the Most Integrity".... It's called Survivor and the thing is to "Outwit, Outlast, Outplay." There are loads of games from the time we're kids that involve deception. It's just that these people have to spend a lot of time together and develop emotional bonds which is what makes the show always so interesting. Rob - after playing four times mind you - learned that it's not at all about the emotional bonds. It's about controlling your tribe in a way that makes them respect you - which is where Russell had it wrong. He had the controlling part down, but they all hated him at the end of the day, where Rob earned some respect AND knew who to play against at the end. We could get into quite a philosophical discussion about Survivor - good vs. evil, the idea of redemption being to be saved from sin, thus saved from evil. Is it sinning? Can you play the game and stay on the side of "goodness" and "integrity"? Doesn't Rob's type of game play count as good? He protected and stayed loyal to his tribe until he couldn't any more - except Matt, oddly the one who was the personification of good and was the one who couldn't be trusted the most in the game context.
Next season will be another Redemption Island, so we can talk about it some more. And, it'll be interesting to see how it'll work - you'd think one guy won't win 100 challenges in a row again like Matt? Maybe. And who's your guess for the two returning Survivors? Jane? Phillip? Matt? Russell AGAIN? Please no. I want to see Marty from last season. Or even someone like Frans-questra who seemed like she'd be a good competitor but got a raw deal this time out. Send me your comments & thoughts and thanks so much for reading!!
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