Stuck Between a Rock and a Mean Girl in a Really Bad Bathing Suit

I'm going to start with the end.  Very disappointing.  I think the women have made a huge mistake forming that alliance so early, non?  On one hand, you're in an alliance.  On the other hand, you don't actually like any of the people you're allied with.  As well, if the tribe continues its downward spiral, it won't matter if they have an alliance anyway because the men will just pick them off when they finally merge.  The early, 5-person alliance worked last season because the people got along (for the most part) and because they kept their TRIBE strong and won challenges allowing them to go into the end together. This time, the girls based their alliance on who they thought was "most athletic looking" and are focused only on their 5, not on the tribe as a whole. 

Having said that, I feel like Nina's one of those people who got off the Survivor bus on the wrong foot.  (Christina is also in this boat.)  It happens to good contestants every season.  Nina's an ex-cop who kinda gives the cop vibe... not in a good way.  She's not the friendly cop - she's the one who pulls you over for speeding and gives you that look...you know.  At any rate, I have a feeling I'd way rather hang out with Nina than with Kat or certainly with Alicia... but Nina just didn't do herself any favours.  She let the young whippersnappers get to her.  Survivor's a funny game that way - it's very much about who can put up with people the best and keep a smile on their face the whole time.  Remember how Sophie almost didn't win because no one really liked her?  Well... she really had to back-pedal at the end to convince people she really was a nice person.  Nina never got that chance.  Especially when you go into the game as different - in Nina's case she's older than the others - you need to find a way to fit in. 

Colton is having the same issues.  He doesn't fit in with the men, so he's over at the women's camp trying to fit in there.  But he's killing his own chances.  The best thing to happen to Colton is that the girls finally had enough & kicked him out.  Quite the drama swings from poor Colton!  He went from crying and lonely and "Oh poor me - I don't fit in anywhere!" to being in charge of a new alliance in the matter of.... well minutes on the show, but probably a couple of days in real time.  Once he got kicked out of the girls' tribe, he decided to tell the non-ab-4 about his immunity idol.  Well played, sir!  (Is he reading my blog?)  All of a sudden, he's got himself an alliance with Jonas, Leif and Troyzan and he's king of the world!  If the women ever stop losing, it's going to be lovely to see the looks on the abs' faces (What? They have faces?) (Oh, I'm kidding!) when Colton plays that idol. 

So, sticking with the men... can we talk about Tarzan Greg for a sec?  What the what is he wearing?  I'm not sure if they're underpants or a speedo swimsuit, but that banana-hammock is the WORST thing I've seen since Philip's pink y-fronts.  Eesh.  And then, he starts doing some sorta primal dance moves around the fire... whaaaaaaaat?  I wish I could un-see it. Shudder. It also seems that Tarzan is the one who doesn't fit in (surprised?) now that Colton has his alliance and the ab-masters have theirs. 

Back to the girls.  My "I totally want to punch that girl in the face" moment was near the start of the show where Alicia is gloating about how bad Christina was at Tribal Council (uh, OK....) and then goes on to say that "If she was swimming in some ocean and was drowning, I don't think I'd save her."  Really?  Wow.  This woman is a SPECIAL ED. TEACHER!!!!   How does this person get job that requires patience & compassion??  (Remember Naonka & how horrible she was?  She was a teacher too.  And I believe she either lost her job or was pretty severely reprimanded when she got back to the real world. Right?  Would you approve of Alicia spending any time with your child?)  Ugh.  Then she pulls a move that really only girls can appreciate - she meangirled Christina even more by saying to her face that everything's OK.... saying that "It wasn't my intention to disrespect you," all the while telling us that she'd actually be OK with Christina drowning in front of ther.  Yep.  This kind of girl gives women everywhere a bad name.  (As an aside, isn't that one of the most overused phrases these days - "It wasn't my intention...."?  Usually, for people who say that, it actually IS their intention... it's just a good phrase they've learned that in their minds absolves them from guilt.)  Finally, can we all agree that Alicia's bathing suit top (is that what it is?) is some really bad style?

What is happening here?

Finally, there's Kat.  Kat is stupid.  Sorry, that's harsh. It wasn't my intention to be so harsh.  (See what I did there?  It was totally my intention.)  Yeah, she's cute and has lots of energy and stuff, but wow.  She just kept jumping off the balance beam in the challenge even though she didn't have to.  She lost the challenge for the team but they kept her instead of Nina because Kat's in the alliance.  A couple of the gals - Chelsea & Kim - know that it's a bad deal.  Chelsea wanted to get rid of Kat instead, but Kim didn't want to upset the apple cart.  I think Chelsea was right - there are enough women at this point that they'd be fine if they went 'against' their alliance, and they'd have a better chance of winning with Nina than with Kat.  My favourite was Nina calling Kat a "dumb broad"... yeah, it's petty name calling... but she's saying what we're all thinking.  Now that Kat got to stay & she knows how poorly she performed, hopefully it'll be a wake-up call to do better. 

Again, my ex-boyfriend Jeff is frustrated.  "It's like talking to 6 year-olds," he says.  The women know they're totally dysfunctional, they all admit it's embarrasing, yet they refuse to really do anything about it.  Sigh.  I don't see it changing in the near future, and it's sad to see some good contestants go home while some rotten ones stay.  It ain't fair, I say.  Christina & Monica had better start searching for an immunity idol (why are they not doing this??) or scrambling a little better with some of the more reasonable women.  I'd way rather see them play this game than Alicia or Kat. 

Good Looking People I Want to Punch in the Face

Oh my goodness, where to start?  Well, this is a hateful bunch of eye-candy, non?  So far, I'll agree with a friend who said that it's hard to find anyone to like so far this season.  It's like there was a check-box on the application form that asked whether you have good abs or are named like a Kardashian. Thank god they're good looking. But, it is only the first day.... and there's always Jeff.

My former boyfriend Jeff was at once fabulous and completely ridiculous in the opening, didn't you think? He's standing on the outside of a helicopter - mid-flight - telling us about the upcoming season.  Then it dives away from us.  Very stuntman-esque, Jeff. He's showing us that even though he doesn't get to jet-ski from the middle of the South Pacific to LA any more, he's still got Survivor cred.  Hard core, Jeff.  Hard core.

One World... The schtick this season is that there are two tribes - men vs. women - but they have to live together on one beach.  Right.  Interesting idea.  Could go either way, right?  You could have a bit of a love-in where they all cooperate, or it can go the other way.  Which it did.  And somehow, the boys (at least the alpha males) are blaming the women, when we all know it's the men's fault.  I'm not even sticking up for the girls - it's just true.  The men started off by stealing the women's gear right off the bat.  So I think they really set the tone.  Then, when the women caught some chickens (well, it was Chelsea actually the self-proclaimed "country girl" and therefore, chicken whisperer), they thought twice about sharing with the men.  Can't blame 'em... And to be fair, they just wanted to negotiate fairly - we'll give you a chicken, you help us out with building our shelter, or making fire.  Seems fair... but no.  The big, muscle men figure they don't need chicken... a decision they will regret, mark my words.  (It's always the muscle-bound guys that suffer the most when they are hungry.)  Anyway, more on this later except for two things:  1) Why are the girls so completely incompetent when it comes to making fire anyway?  As I complain about EVERY season.... Why on earth don't people PRACTICE these things???? They KNOW exactly where they're going... don't you think it would be a valuable skill?  Ugh.  And 2) I'm interested to know what became of the chickens that Chelsea caught.  They clearly didn't eat them, as they had no fire.  They don't have a chicken coop as far as I'm aware, so did they just let the poor things go?  Did you not feel a little bad for the chicken when it yelped (OK, what noise do chickens make?) or clucked or whatever that sad, pathetic noise was that came out of its beak when Chelsea had it by the neck.  I had a twinge of vegetarianism, then made myself a bowl of chicken noodle soup.  For reals. Sorry, chickens.

So the cast...

Well, I have to say I was right in my initial dislike (via the TV commercial previews) of Alicia.  Now, after one episode, I want to punch her in the face.  Yeah, I know... violence is wrong and all that.... but honestly, she is an awful person.  I don't like to throw the word around too much, but this woman is the Queen Bitch.  She's already made an alliance of the 5 girls she thinks are most athletic, so unfortunately she might be around a while.  These girls are dysfunctional, though, and hopefully they'll see that she's the reason for it.  I mean, Alicia wanted to keep Kourtney with her broken arm over Christina, who she just hates.  (Kourtney ended up not being able to return to the game, btw, so no one got voted out.) Why does Alicia hate Christina?  Because Christina made a deal with the men whereby the men would make a fire for the girls if they wove some palm fronds together for the men's shelter.  Uh, that sounds kind of fair to me.  Let's remember that the women lost the challenge, so were without fire for cooking, warmth or most importantly for boiling water for days.  Perhaps Alicia can drink her own pee or doesn't mind getting tropical diseases, but if I was there, I'd totally be with Christina and get that damned fire made.  Unfortunately, it might get her voted off soon too, and it would be a shame.  To Queen B, it was "working with the enemy" but let's be honest, she's just a meangirl.  Christina finally lost her composure at Tribal Council when Alicia kept making her into Mata Hari, and she told Alicia to SHUT UP.  I so wanted some of the other girls to high-five her, but I think Alicia has them all living in a state of fear.  She's horrible.  Truly.

On the men's side, the meangirl is Matt.  I think I called it right in the last blog when I noted that he mentions that his claim to fame is starting up his own law firm, "The Offices of Matthew J. Quinlan."  Someone's got a good case of high-on-themselves.  On top of that, he's King of the Alpha Males.  There are (at least) four dudes who have made an alliance based on their tight, 6-pack abs and really, really good lookingness.  Now, I'm not saying I don't like looking at them, but I do find it funny how in both the male and female camps, the good looking people have bonded together.  (Not that there are any BAD looking people on Survivor... just degrees of good looking, right?)  The funny part of this to me is that 1) it's very high school, and 2) historically, on Survivor at least, this strategy doesn't work.  In the past how many seasons has it been revenge of the nerds?  It's certainly not been that person type, has it?  It's been the Everyman (Boston Rob) or the quiet observer who can get along (Sophie, Natalie) surrounded by weirdos (Cochran, Phillip, Coach... etc.)  At any rate, Matt is almost as hateful a character as Alicia... not quite.  His pals are Bill, "Big Mike" and "Jaybird".... or I'll call them the Ab-4.  Finally, Jay's voice cracks me up.  He's a big dude who's a model and then opens his mouth and has this high-pitched voice... kinda like David Beckham.  Please don't talk, just model underwear & we'll all be good. 

Right, then there's the battle of the Tarzans.  There's a pissing contest brewing over two guys who both want to be called Tarzan.  For real.  I crack myself up just writing that, it's so stupid.  Greg, our older plastic surgeon, tells Jeff he wants to be called Tarzan.  Well, that doesn't sit well with Troy (of the 12 marmosets), who apparently is "Troyzan"... And, well, he does have the monkeys to back it up, so yeah... he's mad.  Can you imagine, someone scooping your cool nickname?  Snort. 

As usual, we don't get to hear from everyone yet, so lots of characters still to develop.  I like Christina, and I like Jonas the sushi chef.  Nina seems good and Monica - the Ex-NFL Player's Wife (though you'll notice they just call her "Housewife") isn't as annoying as I thought.  Leif, the little person, is pretty cool so far (Jonas: "He's a super strong little dude!").  Sabrina is smart - I like her a lot.

And then there's Colton.  Colton is the most Gay with a capital G dude they've had on Survivor in a long time.  He's pretty awesome - with his great sense of humour and sweater tied around his neck.  He runs like a 10 year-old girl, but you can tell he LOVES this experience... and on one hand, he's playing the game hard.  He's bonded with all of the girls and was quite dismayed that he'd be on a team with all the men.  So when Sabrina found a hidden immunity idol but had to give it away to a man, who did she give it to?  The one man who's built a relationship with the girls.  As well, he quickly spoke to the "Leader" of the men, Matt, to say that yeah, he's being friendly with the girls, but it's so he can spy & report back to the men. Smart, right?  On the other hand, he's really got to get in there with his own tribe at least a little bit.  He needs to make some friendship with the other dudes who are more friendly like Jonas and Leif so that he's got some votes in his corner.  Otherwise, he might make it through once with an immunity idol, but then what?  I really want him to go far in this game.

We didn't even make it through one challenge without people getting hurt.  I do like that the challenges are tough, and Jeff was VERY clear in his instructions how to jump into the rope netting.  "Keep your arms in to your body and land on your back."  Yet very few of the contestants actually listened, and it's surprising that we only had one broken arm for Kourtney and some rope burn on Nina's face (poor Nina!  I think she had a fat lip too.)  When Kourtney broke her arm, they stopped the challenge so the medics could come in (they didn't know it was broken at the time, but she couldn't continue) and the men were allowed to choose whether to continue the challenge or not.  They did not.  Just took the win and said, "We figured we were going to win anyway."  Ugh... more bad behaviour.  Jeff even reminded them that they will probably want some good will to come their way later on.... and they didn't listen.  Jeff is trying... he really is.   I feel for him this season.  It's a lot of really, really good looking people who seem to have never watched Survivor.  It kinda reminds me of the movie Zoolander where Ben Stiller's character lives in a loft with a bunch of other male models until they go to a gas station and start playfully spraying each other with gasoline, then one of them lights a cigarette.  "Just because we have chiseled abs and stunning features, it doesn't mean that we too can't not die in a freak gasoline fight accident."  This season, we watch to find out if any of these people can figure out that there's more to being on Survivor than being really, really ridiculously good looking.