Survivor 50 | Episode 1 | Recap

0:00 [music] [music] [music] >> We're live.

0:55 Welcome back to the Nullified Take Channel on YouTube. But we've got the TNT takes for you on Survivor 50, the most awaited season I would say of all time. We've been waiting for What was it now? 5 years for our next All-Stars season. Andre, how excited are you that it's now here and we've witnessed what I think is probably one of the best premieres I've seen in a very long Maybe even the best premiere I've ever seen. Like I just really enjoyed this premiere. Yeah, I mean since 40, for sure. I think I was super excited for I mean Tony said that 40 was like the Super Bowl of Survivor. I don't know what this makes this, like the Olympics or something. Yeah. >> [laughter] >> Yeah, I don't know what this makes it, but it's I don't know. It just had everything. There's a lot to talk about for this specific episode. Like I got really excited. And we're going to be a little bit loose with the format. We're not going to chronologically follow what happened in the episode.

1:47 We're going to get the crowd involved. We're going to get them to ask us questions or maybe bring up certain topics that they want to discuss or hear us discuss here on the podcast. and we're just going to talk about everything and anything that happened in this episode. But let's start off with the beginning of the show. You know, did it feel epic to you? That intro, seeing the history of Survivor. I mean, I saw my whole childhood flash in front of my eyes when I was watching that cuz I was so I can't remember. I was like 12 or something when I started watching the show. It was so exciting to see it. Absolutely goosebumps. I was I just saw the whole thing and I was quoting every single thing that was being said there. I just I It was such a love song to the fans, which I'm very excited about cuz it feels like they've gotten about us the last 40 since the since 40, so for them to come back and say, "Look, this is really a love song to you." it just made me feel so good.

2:37 Yeah. And I'm hoping like I only watched it yesterday. I haven't had much time to jump on the internet to see how fans have reacted to it. I haven't seen ratings or anything like that. But I'm hoping that this season does open Jeff's eyes to maybe doing things a little bit differently. there are still some controversial things that happened, like, you know, the whole rice thing. Do they get rice? Don't they get rice? Do they have to earn the supplies? The fans voted that they had to do both of those. where were you on the fence for that one, Andre? Were you like, "Yeah, let them earn it." or were you thinking, "Let's give it to them in the beginning. Let them have a little bit more energy to strategize and so forth." because new era to me, one of the things I've always been critical about is that it is just such a difficult thing for the fan that's on the losing side if they have to earn their flint, if they have to earn some food. They We just see these tribes getting steamrolled because out there, that's the difference.

3:29 Like having a cup of rice between a tribe could be the difference between having an the energy to actually go out there and compete versus not having it. So I probably would have been like, "Just give them more supplies in the beginning of the game." personally, but it seems like I was on the sort of outer when it comes to most of the fans. Yeah, I'm two minds of this cuz obviously you want things to be generally equal when it comes to the resources that they have. probably maybe a bit of balance. Maybe give them the rice, but maybe withhold the supplies from them because you do get some good character moments, right? You get You get Christian Are we calling him Hubicki now, I guess? you know, making the fire, which is the first time since I want to say Yau-Man, I want to say since season 14, which is pretty wild to think that nobody else has thought about putting a piece of like water on their glasses and least try it. I'm sure people have tried it, but nobody has been successful until now.

4:19 So we don't we miss out on those character moments sometimes. So do give them rice. I don't really care too much, like Yeah. I was at Tyson in his season was like, "Yeah, we I ate better than I ate at home, so who cares?" >> [laughter] >> yeah, I think I mean, we see Australian Survivor a lot of the times. I haven't watched it this week. I know it also premiered, but they do get more food. And I think that it actually adds to be the game play because people can actually think and they're not deprived of food because that sort of just doesn't give you that energy to do things. But also, another thing that I really liked and I'm going to say hello to everybody very soon cuz I can see a lot of people here in the live. another thing that I really liked was the tribe dynamics. Having the three tribes with eight people in it feels like it's going to work a lot better than having three tribes of six. And it kind of takes me back to when we used to have two tribes of eight, 16 players playing the game.

5:11 There's just more room to move strategically in an eight-person tribe compared to a six-person tribe. The six-person tribe format for me is just not exciting. It feels like there's not any room to move. Alliances get set very soon. You can't move like if people don't get along, they're forced to work together basically because you're stuck in these pockets of three or twos in a six-person tribe. That And this eight-person tribe, it just feels like there's it's more dynamic. It gave me that old-school feel to it. Not just the We didn't only just have old-school players come and play the game again, but we also it just gave me that vibe. I don't know if you got the same thing from that, but I really Maybe they've hit the jackpot here. Maybe 24 players in this shorter format, three tribes of eight. If they want to keep it at three tribes, maybe that's the format moving forward. It did feel a little Australian Survivor with the size of the cast, which I was I was a big fan of, right? Because sometimes it's okay to leave lose a couple early on sort of to even it out.

6:05 So you get a chance to get to know or at least the characters of current season. but I was never the biggest fan of the six-person tribe, to be honest. At least like every so often. You don't need it every single season. It just got a little bit boring for me. So happy that they at least did some room to remove it here. Okay, let's say hello to a few people here in the live. We've got Villy Willy here saying, "I hope I'm not late." Christian in here is well saying, "Hey man." Hey Christian, welcome back to the live. Jenny is back saying, "This may be the best opening episode of US Survivor in a decade." I think we're agreeing with you on that. Well, at least since Survivor 40 cuz it was pretty epic to see all the winners come back to play the game as well. Georgette is here. Hello, Georgette. Jay is saying, "Good to see this guy is still alive. I've been missing for a couple of years now." "We're so back.

6:56 Welcome back. You have been missed." Thanks, Jenny. Really appreciate that. Yeah, the 40s were a bit of a nightmare. let's see what other people are saying here. "Jenna played too hard, too fast." obviously, we're going to talk about Jenna quite a bit. And disappointing, Andre, for Jenna to come back for the first time in so many years. She's the sole representative of season 1 and for her to go out first. Like she said, "First in, first out." What did you make of Jenna's game play coming into this tribe? Like I mean, I guess we'll jump straight into it because ultimately her torch got snuffed at the end of this episode. Yeah, I mean, she made a mistake of sort of strategizing a little bit too early before they even went to I think that's sort of like the golden rule that people talk about on the first like don't ever strategize or target somebody before you need to.

7:47 And I think she sort of made that mistake. And I think she kind of sort of went into it thinking, "Look, I need to pet play fast. I need to play it at a high pace." But lacking sort of that context of "Oh hey, I haven't pet played since season what? Eight?" so maybe her perception of how it should have gone maybe is a little bit off. and I was quite glowing of her in the in the draft. I took her, so I'm pretty disappointed that those are my people already gone. but yeah, she played way too fast. And look, I was how good Cirie is. But if you don't get her out early on, she'll get to the end and I mean, she probably won't win. But she'll get she'll get very far. So you know, two minds on it. She had the right idea, but I think her execution was off. It's just interesting to me how every single time players go for the big players early on.

8:40 We saw this in Australian Survivor versus the world. You know, Parvati got targeted early on by Rob Bentele that season as well. I guess and Cirie as a pocket or unit in that specific unit there. And how players are coming out to defend Cirie or Parvati and how these big players I mean, they're big players for a reason. They've got the social game. They've been networking for years. Like I feel like Jenna probably hasn't been as connected maybe in the Survivor community and with all the players as Cirie. Like Cirie just had the social capital. And ultimately, you know, when we're going to do the draft later on, I actually gave cuz one of the points that we have to give for this episode is for the person who made the biggest move. And to me, the biggest move, even though it might have sort of exposed them to a degree. I don't think it did. Was Ozzy cuz Ozzy really went to bat for Cirie in this moment and really saved her here.

9:33 I mean, did you expect the Ozzy-Cirie duo to be a thing coming into this season? Cuz they've never really They've worked together, but they've also not worked together. Cirie's backstabbed Ozzy before. Like, did you think that this was going to happen in this tribe so early on? Cuz he seemed to be the difference between her going home and not going home. No, I And I guess we haven't gone there. We've gone to an Ozzy-Cirie >> [laughter] >> alliance here. I guess he's going by Ozzy now, which I don't buy. I saw shades of the old Ozzy there sometimes, but I did see a really good showing from Ozzy, very early on Ozzy, I guess. Yeah, no, I think I did think that they might have worked together. Only if Ozzy could sort of shelve his sort of like self-righteousness. And you sort of see that early on where, you know, we actually didn't see much of Ozzy in the last season with Cirie.

10:24 And I did hear that they did work together quite well on that season. So, I think it shouldn't be too much of a surprise if But I mean, if you've only really seen Micronesia, you'll be like, yeah, no, Ozzy's going to go after her quite a bit. But I thought I thought that was a very interesting duo, and I think that there are shades of, you know, to call back to Australian Survivor Parvati and Cirie. I think that sort of if you don't break them up early on, they might go pretty far. So, I'm all for that. Yeah. there's lots and lots to talk about when it comes to Ozzy, so I'm glad you didn't go into everything in this exact moment. Let's read a couple more comments here from people who are here. Come on now, we all know the results were contrived and the production was going to do whatever twist they wanted, regardless. I think there's a lot of that probably out there where people think that, you know, that they were going to choose what they wanted to choose and maybe give the fans like a bit of a throwaway bone.

11:17 Like, should they have been a bit more transparent about the votes? Like, how can they be more transparent at this stage, Andre? Is there anything else that they could have done? Like I don't know. Maybe like an online poll. Maybe. >> have had those results. Maybe that's a callback to like when people were voting off who they thought was going to be voted off, and I think Gervase was like spoiled to be the voted off in season 1 or something like that. Like, for those ones I don't really care too much. I mean, it sounds like every single one of them is like 60/40 or like, you know, could go either way. I guess for except for the idol stuff, which obviously everybody's going to want idol. I'm surprised 10% of people didn't want idols, to be honest, but That's crazy. Yeah, I don't think there's anything they could have done really about that. It's just >> Well, it was funny because they said that they wanted the advantages to be I can't remember the word that they used, but it was something like to be overpowered. Like, they wanted overpowered advantages this season, right?

12:09 And then the very first advantage that someone gets is a block of vote. Like, a block of vote is not an overpowered advantage. Like, it's just a normal advantage. Wouldn't you agree? Yeah, I mean, it's not a six-person in a six-person Yeah, in a six-person tribe, maybe it's an overpowered advantage, but I feel like in an eight-person tribe, it's solid, but it's not overpowered. When they said overpowered, Andre, are we seeing the super idol come back? Are we seeing somebody get a super idol? Maybe. You know what I don't want to see? I want to see the Ko Rong super idol, actually. I thought that was a very That was a super idol that I think had the best balance cuz they required two people coming together. I think that's going to That's going to sort of be a theme here where, you know, the boom I'm not going to call the Billie Eilish boomerang idol. I'm just going to call it the boomerang idol. This is like a This is not It's This is like a very well-balanced sort of advantage where you don't get it.

13:04 You have to work with either target or work with somebody else, which is fascinating. But yeah, super idol, hopefully Ko Rong super idol. Not Terry's super idol. Oh, no, Yul's super idol. No, thanks. Yeah. Yeah, interesting. I wonder what advantages we do see. I think that the knowledge is power is a pretty strong one as well. So, obviously that will make a return. But I'm really hoping that we do get a shout-out to some of these old advantages that we haven't seen in a long time, cuz otherwise it's just going to feel like another season, wouldn't it? And this season does have that feeling of I don't know, it feels fresh. It feels like it's not just a copy and repeat of 48, 49, 47, 46, 45, like we've seen over the last couple of seasons. It's almost like a copy and paste. So, I'm really excited to see where it's going to go. What was your thoughts in regards to that early stages, seeing everybody in front of Jeff talking about, you know, he's seeing different parts of his life in front of him?

13:57 Like, you know, I've been hard on Jeff at times, and I've like the part of me that's hard on Jeff is him being the creative of the show and thinking about cuz I don't like his creative thinking in the direction that he's taking the show. But as a host, like there's no one that's got more passion for the show. And I really do love him as a host. I realized that when I was watching this specific episode that he's a great host. And the fact that he came into this being able to speak with authority. Like, how many reality TV shows out there have had the same host for 50 seasons? No one. Like, that is something that >> Yeah, and he can speak from authority. He's been there when Jenna and him started this whole thing. You know, he's seen everybody grow up from Colby being a 25-year-old to now being Dad Colby. You know, like so it just I don't know. It just had that throwback when you know, some of the some of the returnees, you could see how emotional they were coming back, you know, being there.

14:49 And it You know, you can see how much it means to people and how much they've thought about I know I'm talking quite a bit here, and I'll let you talk about Jeff, but even just them having thought about where they went wrong and not having had that ability for 15 years to make it right, you know, and see them come back. I think this is why returnee seasons are so great. This is why it's so great that we've got Jeff there that has been there since day one. Yeah, I mean, I have been very harsh on Jeff as well ever since he became sort of an executive producer. I feel like maybe the new bosses over at Paramount were like, Jeff, you just need to scale it back a little bit. Let's just Let's just give the people what they want at the end of the day. And it's like, you know, your ideas are fine, but we need something different. We need something a little bit of fresh. And I think this is a maybe the genesis about I think what Skydance bought Paramount a little while back. So, I think I think that might have something to do with it, and I'm all for that. You know, if we could just scale back Jeff a little bit to be more a little bit of a host, and yeah, he can throw out a few ideas here or there.

15:45 But don't give him the reins like he did in the 40s. So, let's see what 51 is like, but I'm loving him in 50 right now. Let's just hope that he doesn't go and become overbearing. But I mean, I think it's as much Jeff's legacy as it is the players' legacy as well. So, I'm really I'm really happy with the direction that this season has started. And I think that the way that Jeff has approached it has been one of the reasons for it, to be honest. >> Yeah. So, yeah, happy about that. And what's your thoughts in regards to the cast? Like, I mean, looking at the cast coming into this, I think you would have been forgiven to say that there's a couple I think we even spoke about that we really need to see Mike White come back. We would have loved to see Rob C come back. But ultimately, Mike White delivered in episode 1. Like, he was he was fun to watch. Buff Mike White, who would have known? Buff Mike White with a six-pack who would have returned to Survivor.

16:38 You know, it was it was fun. Like, did you have Who was a dud? Like, I don't feel like we had a dud in this cast. Like, it I feel like we had one dud, to be honest. I think Aubry was a bit of a dud. Cuz I don't feel like there's Like, I think good Like, the reason why we were so harsh on Mike White is cuz we thought that there wouldn't be any sort of change, and it's like, we, you know, we don't need Mike White, right? But I think Mike White's season in episode 1 proved that he has something new to give. You know, buff Mike White, he plays a little bit different than he did on his season. I want to see growth. I want to see differences and changes in people. I want to see how they choose to be different. I want to see how Ozzy becomes Ozzy and wants to change the way he works. But I just feel like, and I, you know, I don't want to jump directly to sort of the Aubry stuff, but I just felt like she was had she was the biggest dud here. I didn't see anything new from her. I saw, you know, Aubry from 39, was it 39, 38 back again?

17:33 But other than that, I don't think there were any I think it's Tiffany, maybe. But we haven't really seen too much of her, either. But everyone else were like slammed. Even the new era people, like, I thought Kamilla had a lot to bring. Rizo had a lot to bring. Genevieve was huge. I think that the new era picks were actually quite good, yeah. Yeah. Jay says, give her time, Andre. There's so much we don't see, and there's still a lot of time left in the season. And obviously, we can only we can only talk to what we've seen so far. But I agree with you, Andre. Like, that conversation between Genevieve and Aubry was so Aubry. It was so uncomfortable to watch. Like, she was so closed off. Like, if I was Genevieve in that moment, I would have been like, she's clearly not with me. She's clearly gunning for me. the body language was off. And I think I saw online some people were saying, oh, she did really good to be the strategic mind, sitting back and not giving much away.

18:26 But I think in a tribe like this where you already have cliques forming, I just don't know where she's going. Like, who she's working with, right? Cuz I One thing I did do is I listened to exit interviews for both of the players who left, Kyle and Jenna Lewis. And Kyle specifically spoke about the fact that she was on an island on her own. Like, she didn't really have people. They thought that Angelina was with her, but she wasn't. She ended up coming over to Genevieve and Kyle's side as well. And you know, we haven't spoken much about Kyle. Maybe we'll leave it to the end. Disappointing to see him go so early cuz I thought he had a really good start in the game. But let's talk about the fact that obviously early on here, we have a challenge Stephanie looks like she hasn't missed a beat beating out the challenge beats Savannah beats Savannah in that early portion of the game, which was interesting to see someone that's still in the game. She's bringing a lot of heat to the show.

19:17 Like, as an old school player, there was a lot of old school players that stepped up, even to the point where when they had to choose people to go out there and in the in the flint and the pot and pan and things like that. You saw Coach step up. You saw Ozzy step up. South Pacific was immediately brought to the front. You saw that interaction between them. What was your thoughts here from the old school players and how they stacked up with the new school players in these early challenges? Do you feel like they took a step back, or do you feel like they really showed that the old school still has something? Because what is it? War was a little bit disappointing. Yeah, I mean, does Stephanie age? Like, I feel like is she a vampire? Like, I think she looks as good as she did in maybe not his first season, but like certainly Heroes vs. Villains. Like, she was she was very fit and I was pretty impressed I was pretty impressed by Ozzy as well.

20:08 I thought maybe fat Ozzy would come. But, I like kind of like the returning gag of him like hurting his back. It reminded me a bit of Spider-Man. >> [laughter] >> hurts his back. Yeah, it's going to be a running gag. I think the old school players, you know, Jenna Lewis so notwithstanding, I think have been pretty impressive both physically and strategically. so, yeah, I've been pretty impressed by certainly Ozzy, by certainly the Dragon Slayer, Stephanie. They all they all have I mean I mean Cirie, she it was never really her forte physical challenges, either. But, so she showed her chops strategically as well. So, I'm pretty happy. I just hope there isn't a bloodbath when it comes to old school players, but I guess there aren't too many old school players in this cast. I guess if you count middle school as old school, then yeah, I like I'm a little bit worried about that, but there's no been no real signs on that right now.

21:05 It feels like they It feels like they've integrated a lot better into their tribes compared to again, Winners at War there was only two tribes, right? And one tribe the old school players really got found out on early and just fell outside of the numbers with middle school probably or what would have been perceived as new school at that time. But, yeah, I've enjoyed seeing them compete. Obviously, Jay away Savannah just came off season 50 didn't have much time to you know, in between seasons that would have definitely still had an effect on her, but I think that Savannah didn't do bad. Like, I was just saying I was impressed by Stephanie stepping up and doing so well. And I feel like Stephanie's she's getting stronger the older she gets. She's like the Benjamin Button of Survivor like you know, getting younger as she's getting older or something like that and getting stronger. So, that was that was interesting to see, but she's intense. She's an intense personality.

21:56 She's going to rub some people the wrong way for sure when they start mixing tribes and things like that. They definitely looked at this and they thought who could we put together in the tribes that could potentially work well. Like, Colby got a favorable draw with Stephanie being in that tribe obviously. Ozzy and Cirie favorable draw. So, they protected some of these old school players. Christian Hubicki and Devons connection very interesting as well. So, that tribe specifically is going to be the tribe of the you would almost say gamebots. Like, the people who understand the meta strategies of Survivor and how to play together with Emily coming in there and that alliance. So, it was Emily, Devons, Christian. Who was the other person? There was a fourth I feel like. Maybe the chat can help us here. Yeah, I'm blocking on that one. Yeah, but it was interesting to see that sort of dynamic come together which as some people I saw in the live here said that was probably I had Joe.

22:50 Was Joe the other person that was working with him? And it's funny cuz Joe is like he's not really like a gamebot. But, I feel like Joe is just someone that can easily he can slide into any alliance. Like, he's just that kind of >> He also has scar tissue from his last season as he made very clear. He said, "Look, I was I was deep hardsed by Kamilla and Kyle last time essentially." So, I think he does want to play different for sure. He made that very clear. Maybe loyalty and integrity might not be the way that he's sort of approaching the game this year. Not sure. Could work for him because I think a lot of people if he keeps that a secret and he doesn't want to tell everybody he's going to play a different game, people might expect him to play the same game and to be the loyal guy and he can really play that up. >> He could play a like a JT type game in Heroes vs. Villains. Not that's a good thing, but you we saw that there was a massive change between JT's first game and his second game.

23:42 So, Joe might do the same thing. 100%. What did you think of the conversation between Ozzy and Coach when they went to the challenge? Ozzy saying that I'm sorry I should have voted for you. You should have won South Pacific. Coach saying I'm sorry I should have been a bigger man. You know, how much of it was performative versus them actually thinking it because they're just trying to build this bridge because I feel like they are two personalities that there's no world that they would really click. I feel like to me it was gameplay. I don't think Ozzy actually thinks that Coach should have won. I think they're cut from the same cloth these two. I think they're more alike than they like to admit. I think at the time they were both completely legitimate in their sort of that entire conversation. But, as you see, I think the old Coach and the old Ozzy will come back. And we saw a little bit of that, right? And we still saw that in the preview yeah, she's been completely I like this continuation of that storyline from South Pacific cuz like I said on the previous episode, I know that was one of the most underrated seasons and I think that's a worthy sort of through line to go.

24:48 And I just could believe that those two were picked out as like, "Oh, this is like Redux of South Pacific." so, I was a big fan of that and I liked actually I really on that I really like the way that they set up the challenge where you know, you could do the sort of like the stealing the stealing mechanism. That was really smart. Yeah, cuz it's not like, "Oh, yeah, Ozzy's just going to get it and win." You know, as all No, there's a little bit of strategy in that and it allows you know, Coach Wade to you know, come back and Love it. You know, I'm not going to give my vote, but I'm still going to going to steal your steal your stuff anyway. And then I'm going to be self-righteous about it. This is classic Coach. >> [laughter] >> Yeah, well, he didn't say anything. He didn't agree to it. If you don't agree to the terms that someone else is throwing out there that's not favorable to you, then how can you be held responsible?

25:38 So, I kind of felt for Coach there. >> He's technically right which is the best type of right. Yeah, and he played he played it right. Like, I was pro Coach in that situation. I liked Ozzy in the premiere episode more than I thought I would. Like, I was like, "Do I really need to see Ozzy come back?" But, it was fun to see Ozzy. It's fun to see Ozzy come in saying, "I'm going to try and play a new game." I don't think if I don't know if he can. Like, Ozzy's Ozzy at his core, right? Just like Coach can't play a different game. Like, Coach is Coach at his core. But, it was actually good to see Coach be competitive. It was good to see Coach able to outsmart in this situation. And I think again, because Coach is such a big character, right? And he says things that sometimes clearly is self-righteous and it's you look at it and you think he's you can look at him and say he's not a serious player. It actually masks the fact that Coach is actually a very strategic player. He's actually quite smart in the way that he approached the game, right?

26:31 And I think South Pacific showed it. And I don't always think people give Coach the strategist the credit that he deserves because he is such a big character. So, I was really happy to see him win in this kind of way. But, I wanted to also give a shout-out to our man Q, the agent of chaos being amongst these two out there also trying to steal the key and then And he was the same one. He was the same one. >> [laughter] >> And he was throwing Coach under the bus. He was the same one and he threw Coach under the bus when he tried to do the exact same thing which was hilarious. But, I kind of felt I don't know if you felt this way, Andre. Two icons of the game and Coach and Ozzy going there with a new school icon of the game, someone that's still building their legend. It felt like the handover of the torch. Like, "Hey, this is probably our last time coming out here, Coach and Ozzy. But, Q, you're now going to be that third big character in the future cuz this is not Q's only return.

27:27 Like, I'm putting it out there for the new school era. Q's going to I don't know where he finishes, but Q's going to come back a few times still because he's just too big of a character in my mind. Yeah, I mean, I honestly I wish Q had like won that challenge just for just to see Coach and Ozzy be on exile together. That would have been really great TV. Yeah, I think Q had a really great episode. Like, he wasn't he wasn't absolutely insane like he normally is. I'm sure that's going to become later in the season, but I think he's placed really well. Apart from I guess like the things that happened sort of that are out of his control. I thought that his early like the start of his game was actually perfect for him and I'm looking forward to old Q coming out. So, yeah, I think I think it's a worthy successor to Ozzy and Coach is Q for sure. A lot of the audience agreeing with us that Coach is an underrated strategist.

28:18 Also saying here that Ozzy is Ozzy now. It's not It's going to be Ozzy for me forever. Like, I like it's hard to we've known him as Ozzy for seasons, right? So, it's going to be hard to now refer to him as Ozzy. >> he can be Ozzy. Yeah, exactly. Well, that he needs to earn it. You know, if he if he's got to earn the right to eat, he's got to earn the right to be called Ozzy as well at the same time. Put it put it to a fan vote, Andre. We should put it to a fan vote. Q surprised me this episode especially with what happened on his tribe. Q should be on the challenge. I totally agree. Q would be Q would be gold on the challenge. He would be fun. And he would bring so much chaos to the challenge as well. I don't know if I actually asked you this, Andre. Do you watch The Challenge? Like, was that something that you casually keep an eye on? Yeah, I only watched the CBS version of The Challenge. I think I watched like two seasons, but only because I knew who they who you know, these people were.

29:08 But, yeah, no, I haven't did back in cuz I think there's I feel like there's so much lore and history. It's kind of like It's kind of like getting into Survivor you needed something like COVID to like watch every single season to understand sort of all the storylines. Which is what happened to me. Like, I started watching it just before COVID then COVID hit and then I went back and watched a lot of the old school seasons and know the characters. But, there's also eras to it. So, you could probably go back like a certain amount of seasons. You don't have to go back to season 1 cuz a lot of players like it's actually older than Survivor. I think it started before it. So, there's a lot of players from that early stages that don't really come back to the show anymore because it's too physically demanding. But, shout-out our man Chris Underwood. I heard rumors that he's going to be on season 42, so he's going to make it over to the main show. And a lot of people have really been wanting to see Chris Underwood play on The Challenge the main show cuz he did CBS and he was pretty dominant in that season.

30:00 Did you watch his season of CBS? >> I did. Yeah, that was the one that I did see. Yeah. That was That was a good season. Cuz I knew it was a good season. Yeah. Frank is saying Q is still not good at challenges, popcorn muscles. That's a That's a term being used in the challenge a lot. Like when you see somebody physically fit but they don't necessarily pull it out. but yeah, Q's been Q's been a lot of fun this episode. So obviously we see that interaction's there. Q then goes back to the tribe and you know, Q integrates really well. Like we haven't spoken a lot about I think it's the purple tribe. I'll just refer to them by the colors. It's easier to remember. you've got Colby, Stephanie, Genevieve, Kyle form an early alliance. It's probably I feel like the it's a it's an alliance of strategists but also an alliance of sanity and stability like within that group because that's like all the I feel like that's a very good core group that could go deep.

30:53 And then Q kind of get attached or latched onto that via Kyle somehow. And it wasn't fully clearly made you know, it wasn't I guess made clear to us how he fit it into that dynamic. But lots and lots of things happening with that alliance. That alliance had probably the most hits this episode even though they didn't go to a single tribal council because Q loses his vote ultimately. Colby goes and loses a vote as well giving them and they lose Kyle. So they've got two votes in that alliance. Like there's some real fear in my mind that one of them could go home in the next episode if they go to tribal council just because of the fact that they've lost the number and they don't have votes at the moment. Yeah. I just don't see them going to tribal council at least in the in the next like episode. I could be wrong but it just feels like they're seeding a lot of really good sort of dynamic dynamics here and I think they are all like pretty long term players. I think sort of like the clear target here.

31:45 I think the story they were trying to seed was the Aubry story. with Genevieve, you know, obviously there's a Colby Rizo connection and I think the only thing that is worrying for me about Q is that I feel like Kyle being evacuated was one of the worst things happen to his game. I think he could be very unlucky in that regard cuz it seemed like his biggest connection or at least like they seemed to be working together quite well. So I'm a little bit worried about that but I just see I do see Q making a pretty far and I do see Genevieve and I do see I see specifically Genevieve making it very far and sort of cutting Aubry early and then sort of it being more of like a long term story line of her how far she can sort of make it. That's what I'm seeing sort of the for that particular tribe but I think they're long term players. Yeah. Saying hello to one of my first ever subscribers on the channel. Dolores was one of our first 50 subscribers on the channel.

32:37 Hello Dolores, welcome back to the live. It's great to have you back. we also have Jay here saying Colby and Rizo's interactions were gold. That. for me I feel like I'm almost similar to I felt almost similar to Colby in this moment where you know, I like Rizo but I was like do we really need to see Rizo come back? Like I feel like the legend of Rizo is bigger than the player Rizo himself. But Rizo's pure reactions even to when Coach and Ozzy were called out to go do the challenge shouting out South Pacific and like he's like a he's one of us playing the game. So how can you not like Rizo being there? And then seeing the early interactions where he's trying to tell these old school players, "Hey, don't do camp. It's not how we play the game anymore, you know, save your energy." Being annoying to them because it's two different eras of the game sort of clashing I guess.

33:27 And then that moment between Colby and Rizo which was so pure which I think you know, Colby came at it from a point of view of you've just played the game. You're going to go through some stuff afterwards. You're going to have to mentally think through some things. I wish I had someone that could have like guided me through that process when I was your age. But if you needed to talk to someone, just let you know I'm here. I'm happy to be that person for you kind of thing. That's how I saw it. I think if it helps in his game, it's a bonus for both Colby and Rizo. But I felt like that was more conversation for after the game. Did you get that as well? Yeah. I mean what I got from that was that it was just really good TV. Like Yeah. That was such a great story line just to see and I would have never in like my wildest dreams ever think that Colby from season 2 would be a father figure to risk God. Like that just [laughter] wasn't that didn't enter my consciousness a year ago, right?

34:18 So I don't think it that means necessarily anything about their games. I just think that they're going to show that regardless because that's just such an iconic type of like, you know, very old school versus very new school and like again like we're talking about passing of the torch. I think there's sort of somewhat of passing of the torch from Colby to Rizo cuz like now he's a father figure and I thought that was super powerful. But I don't think that they're really part of that main alliance dynamic at all really. Like maybe Colby a little bit. but I feel like Rizo's maybe a little bit on the outs for that cuz we didn't really see him sort of interacting with the main alliance at all. yeah. So yeah. Still fearful for Riz Rizo but I think Riz Rizo's in a better position than what I thought he was going to be coming into the game just in the fact that nobody knew him. People thought he was going to be the sneaky player and I think he's coming across as endearing.

35:10 He's just coming across as a fan. He's coming across as very likable. In the back of their minds they're probably still thinking this like who was it Jenna Lewis who said Savannah had to have gotten blood on her hands. There has to be something big that she's done to be able to come and play back to back seasons. And I'm sure the same conversations are happening in the purple tribe about Rizo. Like what did he do because he's so likable. Maybe he's this conniving backstabbing kind of player and we just don't see it cuz he's likable in front of us, you know? So On his season, he was This is the way that he played. He kind of apart from the very first episode where he like basically cheated. you didn't really see him much pre-merge and I remember at merge we're like we haven't seen him at all. Like he's sort of hidden away. But that's I feel like that's how he plays the game. He sort of hides for the first half of the season then he comes out. He like he's a post-merge type of player. So I think that I think that is by design.

36:03 Maybe he might get cut early and you know, where he doesn't do too well. But I feel like if I could figure out any way that he plays the game, this is the way that he would play. And that's probably the smartest thing to the smartest way to play. Just relax a little bit and then once a few of the big threats get taken out then you take control which is what he usually what he did his last season. Yeah, Zudoman, welcome to the live saying here, "I'm fairly surprised that I'm enjoying Colby and Ozzy so much. I was pretty down on them during the preseason." I was down on Ozzy. I've always been a Colby fan. I've always liked him. I know that he didn't have a great showing in Heroes versus Villains and it was he just didn't enjoy his time out there and I think it came across. But Colby when I looked at his preseason sort of interviews a little bit cuz being one of the players that I was focused on, he kind of said like that this was like his last hurrah. He was coming out to have fun. He was trying to change the narrative about him going out there and not being in a good head space the last time he played and all this kind of thing.

36:56 So I think I'm not surprised by Colby as much because he's actually following through on his preseason promises when he did the interviews. but it's great to see. Like it's great to see the growth from these players that like to his point. I don't even think that he was 25 the first time he played. He was literally Rizo's age. Like it's he was a kid, you know? And now he's a grown man. So but I did want to talk about Kyle a little bit while we're on this tribe. Jay here says Kyle wasn't the best spot on his tribe. that to me shows me that he is the best player of the new era. He was the last player everyone saw win. People still wanted to work with him. He's a genius. And you know what? This episode made me want to finish 48 because obviously I haven't fully finished 48 yet. I'm just prior to the merge and I was really impressed by Kyle. Andre, like the guy was a winner. He came back. His whole conversation about people are not chess pieces and I need to form these relationships early on.

37:49 How likable he was. How well he integrated as a winner. Like I think he was going to go deep. I think he was he was going to go top five, top six. Like the game he played. If this purple tribe survived with most of his players intact, he was going to go far. I'm sure they would have cut him before the final unless he won some immunities, got some hidden advantages and stuff like that which is always a possibility in Survivor. I kind of agree with Jay. I don't know cuz I haven't seen his full game so I can't write his game against D and Savannah fully at this stage. But you would have been a better position to do that and I don't mind if you spoil. You can talk about that a little bit. I need to I need to still finish his season so I can have a proper opinion about it. But I was very I think out of the three players he played the best game coming back. Yeah, I mean he played a he played a very Yeah, he played a very different game than say D. D played a very sort of Boston Rob type of game. you know, he she was very dominant.

38:39 And that's like that's a game that works once really well. But then if you return then you're going to have a target painted on you. Kyle played a very different game where his I feel like his game was a little bit more subtle was definitely a lot more subtle where he was he was the one being chosen. He played the very he played a game that was very like you know, basically Joe chose him out of everybody to align with, right? And then sort of he slit the throat at the end. And that's kind of like the perfect way to be so socially good. And we saw it this episode how socially good he was and we saw it in 48 how socially good he was too. Like that's his game. That's like it's almost like a Cirie game in a way where it's like he kind of gets to the end. It's just the problem is that Cirie can't really win any immunities and but Kyle can, right? So it's basically you know, yeah, it's a very dangerous player.

39:30 It's a very subtle, very under the radar. And I wouldn't be surprised if we saw Kyle again. Like No, he's coming back. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah. He I can't see a world where Kyle doesn't. Like Kyle he deserves to come back like he you know the fact that he got to play 50 and then first episode unfortunate accident now becomes only the second winner ever to return and not be voted out with Michelle Fitzgerald which is something that he'll hold for a while. >> technically Jenna Morasca never got voted off. True. Oh yeah Jenna Morasca as well. I think I think that's the closest parallel because she yeah. Yeah so he deserve Jenna never came back and I would be and this is the thing about Jeff he can be cruel sometimes like you know but I think Jenna had some stuff going on in her personal life Yeah this is a completely different circumstance yeah this is a bunch of accidents.

40:22 Well I'm talking about even I'm even talking about Jenna and the fact why she never returned I think there was stuff going on in her personal life outside of the game which made her less appealing for and it's also very documented that she was not in the headspace to come back in the last like 10 20 years yeah. Yeah but Carl's definitely coming back. Like I think he's definitely one of those winners that I would love to see come back I'd love to see a winners at war two at some stage maybe season 60 or something like that or whenever they want to do it one of the things I'm really optimistic about is that if we have a good season if the fan turnout is there if people get interacted if the season holds up to the way that it started I don't think we're going to wait until season 60 for the next returnee season I'm calling it now season 53 season 54 we'll have a returning season and they'll probably be a lot more players from that middle school new era that will come back Dom at some point please.

41:14 Yeah. Dom needs to come back so yeah so I just really think that the returnee season we want to see people play the game that have these moments like Joe saying I missed an opportunity I didn't see Carl and Kamilla pull one over me and I'm not going to let that happen again we want to see Ozzy having thought about losing the game multiple times and how he can change his game Colby coming back trying to change the narrative like it's compelling TV to see people try and right the wrongs the redemption arc of players to take a term here from Australian Survivor you know that's something that's compelling to us as viewers we want to we're invested in these players. Yeah season 54 Survivor US Redemption essentially I think that's that's a perfect theme I think like there's a lot of themes that I do want to see in returnees there's like there's the there's a redemption season there's rivals as well would work really well it's just there's so many ideas that they could go with it's just I also feel like the fact that we haven't had returnees for so long I think there is still a fan appetite for returnee season I was always I actually preferred sort of returnees I know that the challenge does it quite a lot but I always wanted like a newbie season and then a kind of like an all star season and just alternate between I that

42:34 Might be too much for some fans to be honest but I would have liked that where people can kind of graduate to the all star sort of thread and every other season could be an all stars you know. I like maybe not every other season but every other four season maybe. I like it I mean we've got enough players now how many players did he say played the game 700 and something players have played the game what was the number I can't remember anyways it's a lot of people who've played Survivor there's a like I'd love to see >> 750 I think yeah. Yeah so I'd love to see Rob C come back like if we've got multiple all star seasons maybe we get an opportunity where he comes back >> Johnny Fairplay there's plenty. Johnny Fairplay I would love to see Johnny Fairplay come back I mean they had the whole dead grandma thing in the in the intro and I'm like what where's Johnny like he's it's a memorable moment we want to see Johnny come back so On Johnny's podcast he did say that two weeks ago that was not in the cut so you never know they could be prepping him for a return.

43:27 Interesting I wonder if they had to ask like they wouldn't have to ask him like you sign away your permissions and rights to so I don't know how he knows that. Okay. Golisano I could see that Chris and Andre every five years a rewind for some. Yeah a rewind for some to come back every five years I think 51 and or 52 will be next returnee season to be honest wow you think that soon Jay like it's a bit bold Yeah I would love it like even 51 like I'm all for it like bring 51 and give us a second chance season where we get to vote double down on the fan stuff let us vote some people back into the game like the fact that second chances has only had one season we've never seen another heroes versus villains we need to see another heroes at this there's some great themes that needs to come back and again I think the reason this season feels fun is because there's a theme this we understand it's in the hands of the fans we've got it's a it's a it's a throwback to the old school players coming back it adds to everything to me like I just a lot of the decisions that Jeff has made has felt lazy from a creative perspective 41 42 43 44 that's lazy like put some effort into your seasons think about some themes bring like we love a good theme like even you know the ones that kind of were hit and miss like you know could be early misses yeah HHH

44:47 Yeah. Yeah exactly something like I remember I remember that season I don't remember what 46 was I like if you told me what's 46 I'm like is that was that Q season maybe I don't know But like what was 47 I think 47 was Q I think 47 was Q season I can't remember like but Exactly that's the point. >> [laughter] >> Yeah. Dolores is saying exactly lazy no themes just numbers. Jay saying [clears throat] here I think 51 or 50 could be new era all stars since CBS said they want to have a whole year celebrating the show so why not celebrate it by doing two returnees I agree like if you want to create a buzz if you want to create hype and bring viewers back to the game cuz I think there was this long period Andre where no one could say anything negative about new era if you said something negative people be like no I'm not hearing it Survivor's in a great place everybody's loving it and clearly there's great characters like we are seeing now from the new era that's playing the game again I was not it was for me it wasn't never about the cast it was always about the creative it's always about the structure of the show the laziness around just you know bullying like I can even accept 26 days that Jeff has worn me down like fine we can do 26 days but just let's think about the dynamics eight person tribes three tribes maybe two tribes I don't know just mix it up give us maybe less boat rides bring other dynamics into the game be creative again in a in a in a in a different

46:07 Direction but I think if you want to build and get fans back do a couple of seasons do throwbacks like two seasons a lot of old school fans will come back I'm sure the ratings will reflect the fact that Colby's back it's going to bring old school people back to watch the game Cirie's back so did you see the fan reaction of Cirie not being voted out like I saw on Instagram >> people was celebrating like they were watching the Super Bowl you know and someone just won the Super Bowl like it was insane so that's the kind of hype you want to create for these players coming back and for the season and people will come back to the show and you'll get another 10 seasons Jeff instead of going in your own direction cuz I think at one point he said that there wasn't going to be one for a very long time but then I think CBS has come out and said no we will bring one back. Oh yeah I think I think CBS is putting down their foot and saying look we won't like if you want us to buy your show like please do some of this like we need a little bit more again I think this is a sky dance thing I think that there's some sort of there's some overlords there that are saying look we need this you know knock on wood until the rumors for 51 come out I'm hopeful because you know the new era would have been fine if it was 41 and 42 and just be like okay now let's do something else right like they fixed up the 41 issues with 42 somewhat and then it's like you run it as far as you can go we don't need any more

47:27 Of this stuff and then 43 came out and I was like really again and you know to your point on you know the game design game design very important but like the other problem with 41 was that the cast was so to me it was like it was diverse but it was the game play was very homogeneous like it was very similar type of game play it's like the only thing I remember about 42 really is Jonathan and the only reason I remember Jonathan is cuz he was so different from anyone else I guess Maryanne she was she was a very good player in my opinion. I think another thing it has been discussed a lot so I won't go on it too much but I also feel like Survivor and Jeff became cautious of controversy they became cautious of casting people that could be seen as seen as controversial right so therefore they kept casting people that were acting and thinking exactly the same way and it made for more boring casts for me overall like I think they got better as we went towards the end of the 40s like Rome was a good villain.

48:23 Yeah definitely and I think that we shouldn't be like if something controversial happens on the show there's no such thing as bad press in my mind if people are talking about it they're going to be like okay we need to check out the show what happened why did this like who was the guy who kicked one of the players in Samoa I forgot his name anyways Ben [laughter] wasn't yeah. Ben yeah like yeah people was like oh yeah there's this crazy hillbilly on the show that kicked another player and had to get like removed from a challenge people will watch that you know they'll flock to it and be like oh I need to see what happened on the show like it's one of the reasons the challenge I think still does well is they're not afraid of that controversy Yeah I mean they had one bad season with 39 and then they overcompensated it by far. Yeah and I agree I agree with Cookie on this one I'm not talking about that kind of bad press we definitely don't need that kind of bad press on the show but you know sometimes you're going to have like in 50 seasons we only had one Dan Spilo right so you don't be afraid because of one season where there was one bad apple to cast a little bit of controversial people but I agree like obviously there's a limit but more Johnny Fairplays more Russells I know that's not going to be a popular opinion more Russells less Dans just the you know and like there were some good villains in Q and Janine D I like Shan she was a good villain in my opinion.

49:38 >> Shauwn was good. Shauwn should have been back. Yeah. That's a miss. Yeah. So, obviously, you know, towards the end of this episode, Carolyn costs her tribe big time. How do you feel about that tribe, and do you think we see them going straight back there? They seem a bit dysfunctional. you know, Ozzy, Carolyn, Aaron and sort of a pocket of their own. You've got your Christian, your Devons. you know, you've got your Who's the other one there? Emily with them being the strategists. They seem to be the power that's going to determine ultimately where the votes are going to go. And I think Joe might latch onto them cuz clearly with Joe sees Ozzy and Carolyn as that Kyle and Carolyn type of relationship. So, they wouldn't have put that in the edit if that isn't going to blow up at some stage. I'm not feeling overly confident for Carolyn in this moment, especially because Ozzy does have two advantages.

50:32 How do you see that tribe dynamic shaking up? And are you as fearful as I am for that tribe as a whole? Because I feel like they seem to Every season there's a tribe that keeps going back to Tribal Council, and they could be that tribe from early indications. Maybe like on a on a game theory point of view, but on an editing point of view, I don't I see them all being going pretty far. I see that I feel like the Devons, Hubicki, and Emily alliance sort of being one of the alliances that control the season. I Like to me, that seems like a very sort of Cagayan San Juan del San Juan del Sur alliance from Second Chances. I feel like that's the group that's going to sort of carry. It's like that kind of like that alliance.

51:24 Then again, it's like they are planting the seeds of sort of Ozzy and Carolyn being a longer term storyline, and there's obviously going to be a coach element coming in from externally, the South Pacific connection. But who knows? Maybe that storyline's going to come to a head next week, and that storyline's going to be over. but yeah, I just I just don't I see other tribes going to Tribal Council before. I see other targets that they've made clear very early on have been targets. >> Aubry. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah, Aubry's probably And D's another one that Yeah, you know, she's coming in. And by the way, I laptoped those being I know it was for Savannah. It was Savannah who was caught in a lie. I know one person got caught in a lie, so we got some points for that. and it was Savannah. for some reason, I got them mixed up.

52:16 But D seems to be coming in hot, and that could be could definitely be a target on her back. And that tribe has >> with Carolyn and I'm blanking on the other. Carolyn and Tiffany. Tiffany, yeah. I don't see that alliance lasting very long for some reason. I don't know. There was something about it where they just sort of the it seemed like the editors just put that in just to say, "Okay, we need a point a target on them for somehow." The biggest target The biggest target on that one was between D and Chrissy, but I got the feeling that Chrissy was the one that's actually at the most risk of going home in that tribe, to be honest, from what people have said in the early stages. >> Chrissy seemed different. Her the her persona it was a very different vibe. She was very smiley. I don't know if she was being fake or if that's like maybe she's so happy to be back or something like that.

53:09 She might not do too badly, actually. She might be a target, but I just think on that tribe, I just think that the others have been more of a target on them for some reason. Yeah. I mean, that tribe's That tribe's an interesting one. I actually don't know where And like even Charlie seemed different very different from his normal season. Like it's a It's a theme of people like they've seemed a bit different. Jonathan's another Jonathan's the Who did Jonathan Was he the one who tried to target Chrissy? Like I can't remember. He threw a name out, didn't he? Like Jonathan prior to me before Maybe the Maybe the live audience will remember who cuz I It was a long episode, but I feel like Jonathan he came into this being like, "I'm going to take a bit more control of the game here." And like he put someone's name out there. It was a diff It was the most difficult tribe for me to read was the teal tribe. Like where are they?

54:00 Who are the alliances? I'm not too sure. Threw out D's name. That's it. >> Yeah, that's it. Yeah. Yeah, that's where the whole D targeting come like D is in so much trouble cuz her reputation precedes her. There's nothing that she did wrong in this season. It's just that her reputation is so big that she's sort of like the you know, the big lion of this of this season where it's like she's going to be targeted number one. and I don't think there's anything that she can really do about it, to be honest, especially with some of the people in her in her tribe. Well, yeah, exactly. And it looks like Chrissy's also throwing D's name out. So, that was the It was a tribe that I for some other reason I just couldn't remember where the votes were, but it seems like it's pushing for D. >> Mike is going to be the kingmaker in this in my opinion, like he was in his season. It's basically whoever Mike chooses. I think he has a lot of power. Yeah. Everybody wants that White Lotus cameo.

54:52 You can't blame them. >> [laughter] >> I kind of felt for you know, I kind of felt for Mike a little bit. I'm going to be honest when he said that, you know, working on the White Lotus, the amount of mental toll that it puts on him to be able to operate at that level. Like, you know, he just needed this break almost. So, like he's escaping from his real life to come and play this game to go >> to Survivor, yeah. To go to Survivor to have fun, you know, type of thing. And I was like, "I can relate." Cuz, you know, you and me both know like we're both quite busy in our own work. It's like, yeah, sometimes things can get overwhelming, right? So, it's like I just saw >> I just saw Australian Survivor's casting underway as well. Like they're casting for the next season. So, All right. We'll see. >> [laughter] >> We'll both be in a We'll both be making an alliance now. The TNT alliance will probably make it to the edit, and then we're in trouble, mate. Like it's like, "Don't trust these two. They're in opposing tribes." No, so that seems to I'm interested to see what Carolyn's reaction's going to be when she sees that Kyle's no longer there, Joe's reaction in the next episode cuz obviously we didn't get to see that.

55:53 Is there anything you feel like we haven't discussed like that we should bring up from this first episode? I feel like we talked about all of it. >> to Mike, I found it was hilarious how Chrissy was like, "Yeah, no, I love the first two seasons. I haven't seen the last one, though." >> [laughter] >> Don't have I don't have HBO. Sorry. Yeah, that was hilarious. That was hilarious. Is there anything on the live here that people want to What about the journeys? Yeah. Yeah, so >> no journeys. Well, not >> Yeah. Proper journeys. Just the reward. >> Not technically. >> okay. Actually, with the journey with the one with Colby and Savannah, was Colby allowed to hold the puzzle up? Or like what was the deal there? Yeah, I feel like he left it, and then it started going, and he grabbed it again. So, I think at that point he should have been out. Disqualified. >> still putting If you're still putting the block on it, and you've still got your hands on it, I think it's fine to hold it.

56:48 But clearly when her back was turned to him, he left, and then grabbed it again. So, I think the production team would have probably had But they didn't call him out. Like you'd imagine they would have called him out. It's kind of difficult cuz Jeff's not there to call the challenge like he would normally do to say, "Hey, no, you clearly left You're out, you know?" So, I don't know how they would have handled that, to be honest. But luckily, it worked out. >> been a producer in the back end saying, "Hey, like Colby, like you're disqualified. Sorry." Yeah. Yeah, 100%. We also need to talk about the other thing about the journeys that I really liked, just while we're on the journeys, actually, is the fact that there were different components to it where people didn't actually have all the information. Cuz one of the things I don't like about the normal journeys is that when you go out, everybody knows what the advantages are. Everybody knows there's clearly something you're going to get. But in this one, even when coach left, there was another portion to get the additional vote.

57:42 I like that coach doesn't know about that. for instance, Q apparently has told no one about that as well, because Kyle was the person that he spoke to. but he's kept that a secret. So, I think that could build a bridge between Q and Ozzy potentially where he could be like, "Hey, I've kept your secret if you still got that extra vote." And then he also >> telling anybody that he lost his vote? I feel like he told someone. Yeah, he did. He did. But he didn't Ozzy or Kyle? Kyle. So, Kyle was the No, this is >> Yeah. Colby, sorry. This is how I know. So, this is how I know about it because in Kyle's one of his exit interviews, I watched a couple of those, he spoke about the fact that Q came clean about the fact that he lost the vote and that he had to purchase the pot and everything. But he said he was not aware of Nobody was aware of Ozzy's extra vote. He didn't talk about that when he came back. >> Oh, okay.

58:32 >> that information. So, Ozzy is in the clear with that, which makes sense because I don't know And we haven't actually spoken about this. I don't know if they would have given Ozzy the boomerang idol if they knew he also had an extra vote. Cuz Ozzy now technically is the person with the most advantages in the game. He's very powerful. And for some other reason, I don't think Like, do you think Ozzy gets voted out and this boomerang idol goes back to Genevieve? Or do you think that he's going to play it on her? >> only if they merge onto the same tribe or like swap onto the same tribe. Because if you've got Genevieve and Ozzy on the same tribe or somebody that knows about the boomerang idol on the same tribe as Ozzy, you can cozy up to him and then have a blindside. So, I could imagine Genevieve getting And you know, we've seen her edit. We know that she's probably going to win out against Aubry, and she's probably going to get to a stage where, you know, if Ozzy makes it that far, they might be on the same tribe.

59:23 That could be a major storyline going forward. And I could actually see that happening. I would have actually gone the other direction and actually given the boomerang idol to somebody that I wanted to work with and just not vote them out, right? But I think that they could do both. I think they I think Ozzy is the kind of player that if you go in there and if Genevieve was smart about it, they get swapped onto a tribe together and they have to work together. She could go there and be like, "Hey, I gave you the idol, you know? And I want to work with you." And I think he'll work with her. I don't think Ozzy is the kind of guy he's going to look at that as a positive thing. But and it's also you know why it's the smartest thing to give it to Ozzy? Cuz Ozzy's probably not smart enough strategically in the game to put two and two together that why can't I give this idol to anyone else? Like anybody else if you gave it to Christian, if you gave it to Devons, they would have been like, "This is weird. These idols never work this way. Something's up." Yeah, well, Ozzy's going to be very powerful this season because not but just because of his idols, but he's got the best advantage of all and that's an alliance with Cirie.

1:00:19 Cirie's going to be the brains of the operation. Was did this happen before Australian Survivor or after Australian Survivor? Do we know? After. After. Yeah, so I mean, Cirie has had like Cirie's going to know. Like she's played this all like this new season this new school type of Survivor before. If Ozzy can be the brawn and Cirie can be the brains of the operations, it's going to be very hard to get them out especially since Gen on missed her first shot, right? Like you let you let Cirie go. What happens when the knowledge is power comes into play? Can someone steal Ozzy's idol if they know about it? Ooh, that's a good question. I would think so. That is a that is absolutely a advantage. I would say yes because knowledge is power is any advantage, right?

1:01:14 Or idol. Yeah. But the question is you would have to ask if it's an idol not an advantage, right? And then you could get it from him. Yes. It's not technically an advantage. Would you would you be able to steal if you had knowledge of power and you told Genevieve, do you have an advantage? Technically she does have an advantage, right? She does. She does. So you could steal the boomerang from her if you wanted to. Is that like how does that work in the game design? That would that would be an interesting situation. Probably not going to happen, but They don't tell us all the rules. I'm sure the players have got like all the rules on there. They don't they just give us like the abbreviated version. Well, I kind of interesting here from Lil Smurf saying, "I have a feeling Ozzy could betray Cirie considering he's thinking to play the differently this time, you know? He wants to play that more strategic game." love that question.

1:02:04 Good question. Ozzy has an extra vote and an idol. Wait, could Genevieve steal it back? so yeah, so basically the way that the boomerang idol works, if that is what you're asking Isabel, is that if he gets voted out with the idol in his pocket, the idol goes back to Genevieve. And I think it becomes like a full-fledged normal idol if she gets it back. >> probably the best advantage in the last 10 seasons. Let's be honest. I can't think of a better one. >> Yeah. We were all down on the fact that it was the Billie Eilish boomerang idol and people were so fixated on the fact that Billie Eilish got a shout-out in Survivor, but the actual boomerang idol is actually genius. I actually kind of like it. It's devious. I'm sure Billie Eilish like paid for that promotion. It's just like it's the Sprint boomerang idol or something like that. I mean, like I mean, we've always had that. Verizon boomerang idol. Like it's the same stuff.

1:02:54 Yeah. Not Andre Chris B strategic. I love it. Yeah, I know. It's like sometimes we get sometimes, you know, we talk strategy on this podcast. The rest of it we just enjoy the characters. But yeah, I think it's been a solid episode. I really loved it. We do need to have a look at the actual fantasy draft here to see where we landed. I know you probably don't want to look at it at this stage. It wasn't a wasn't the most solid of a start for you losing two players in Jenna Louise and also Kyle early on here. I still like my team though, so. It's a solid team. Like in your team currently Christian new dad not telling anybody about it very much like Jeremy. Could it work again? Could he go to the end? Could he make a case like to win the game based on that? Like I think he's got a compelling story and he's such a great narrator of the show.

1:03:46 >> Yeah. My whole team I think is sort of in a good position apart from I guess Savannah, but I think everyone else have had good episodes, so happy about that. And I think Christian still is my is my winner pick here. Like he had one he had probably the best first episode of anybody in my opinion. I can't think of anybody that had a better first episode to be honest. Yeah. I think I think yeah, and I like Q. I just I don't know why. I just think Q came in like he was a strong pick at number two. Like not just a character pick, but he's started extremely strong. It's early days. There's no Banu to you know, drive him up the wall. And his tribe's won the first challenge which is a different thing for him to be out there. But Devons has played a good game, so he's doing well. Mike White's doing well. Genevieve like I said, solid tribe across the board. I looked at my tribe and I was like, "Absolutely love it." Like Coach clearly the one of the biggest characters for the first I think Coach and Ozzy kind of dominated and maybe Colby to a degree.

1:04:42 Some of these legacy characters dominated a lot of the screen time. Got everything that I wanted from Coach in episode one. I don't know where it's going to land with him. Like I feel like he's got a complex edit. Like I'm very I don't know if he's going to win cuz there's again this honor thing versus integrity and the people trying to steal me my name. some people are saying, you know, like Jonathan saying Coach needs to be the hero so play up to that. So I don't know if he's got the respect yet to win it, but clearly he is still the nucleus of that tribe at this stage. So like that. Dee coming in hot. I don't know where she's going to end up. Ozzy being a big character, Colby, Steph. Like I've just got a few people in the same alliance. We haven't I don't think we've said the word Angelina once this podcast. Where is she? Like but is that a good thing? No, I don't think I don't think it's a good thing.

1:05:33 What? Well, in the sense that she could she might be she might go for a deep run. Sometimes these invisible characters go deep. But she's a big character, so but it's 24 players though, Andre. She could get idol or something. I'm not sure. Like I feel like you want to be you want to be at least a bit of a character in the first in the first episode I feel if you're going to win or do well. Yeah, so when you look at the TNT community, they've got Cirie's definitely in with a shot. Like Cirie's either if Cirie makes it to the merge, she's final four. She's getting there. She's getting final four final five. Like she's just she's a great player. >> get to the final four though? Like You shouldn't let her. >> Everyone knows. Everyone knows. Yeah. But yet nobody ever votes her out and she goes deep. Like Heroes vs. Villains was the exception where she got taken out and >> by some of the best in the game like what Tom and I mean, JT I think JT was a good player that season to be honest.

1:06:31 Ah, well, we spoke about it in our draft. JT if things worked out differently for him with that idol play to Russell and things like that and he didn't know about the unknown, he could have he we could have talked about JT as one of the best. Like he only came back for me once and kind of lost the plot in Game Changers. I would still I would still go out and say that JT is one of the better players of all time because >> He's swingy. Like even his last season like his last season was like not to derail for a JT talk, but wasn't the greatest season in the world. We didn't see much of the it was a very biased edit in my opinion. Yeah. Yeah, so him having that scalp of Cirie definitely also puts it up there. But Cirie yeah, definitely she's looking good. Chrissy, I'm not sure about Chrissy honestly. I feel like she's an early like if she feels like an early target. Tiff seems pretty solid with her alliance. You're saying you don't think that alliance is going to go deep. I think it's got some longevity. >> she was too she was too invisible.

1:07:22 She was too much of a unknown. Even in the context of the like she out of everybody she is I think she has the low the lowest legacy cuz she got out pretty early. She's relatively new. Nobody really knows their game that much. Maybe she can if she can hook up back with Q later on, maybe that might be interesting. But I think that barring that, I don't see her story going that much longer unfortunately for Tiffany. Yeah. Yeah, fair enough. And if you look at that tribe, like who would you say is the frontrunner right now? Like who's the who's the person that is sort of carrying the torch? Who's the got the highest winning upside for the TNT community? Give them some hope here because you're kind of like you're bagging them at the moment here. Did you not like >> Strategically no. No, Emily's doing well. I think Emily is in a in a very strong strategic position.

1:08:13 Yeah. Blue chip pick. Blue chip pick. Going last round but having one of the best edits in the first episode. >> it's Emily. Kamilla actually isn't doing too badly either. And actually the last picks from the community have been all been pretty good. Like Rizo, Emily, Kamilla, they were really good and I think Jonathan is you know, maybe his game sense isn't the greatest, but I think that he's in a fairly good position. I think he'll do pretty well. Yeah, so I'm going to give the community something else to be happy about here because we're going to talk about the points. But before we talk about the points, I need to confirm with you do you think cuz I had caught in a lie for Savannah, right? because she clearly was caught in a lie. Yeah. Coach. Do we have Coach as caught in a lie? Yeah, okay, cool.

1:09:04 I just want to make sure we agree on that one. So the points here to remind everybody is that we were giving points away for surviving the episode, for winning the immunity outright. So you had to be the first team to win it. If you found or played an advantage, so and then gets voted out, you get a minus five on that. If you say something iconic. What was the most iconic thing in this episode? Is there anything specific that you feel like there was probably The challenge quotes, let's be honest. >> [laughter] >> So, let's give that to Coach then as well. >> It's got to be Coach, yeah. Okay, let's give Coach the iconic and then if you make a big move, we put it on there. I put to be honest and this is where the audience were disagreeing with me and I'm going to give the audience the for you the ability to talk me through this if you agree with the audience or not. I kind of gave Ozzy the big move because he stepped up and went to bat for Cirie in this moment.

1:09:59 I still think I know Christian and Devon ultimately were the decision-makers, but they looked at it and they said, "We're going to come back and someone's going to be upset at us and we just don't want that to be Ozzy this early in the game. We need him." So, I think Ozzy put his game on the line. Yeah, I feel like Ozzy was the one who deserves the points on that one. The rest was a consensus vote, to be honest. >> Yes. Yeah, he put his game on the line on that one. But I also want a clarification. You said it might be a minus five for being voted out. Does a medevac count as being voted off? Ooh. Yeah. No, it's a good it's a good point and I think I did put Kyle as a minus five, but I'm not going to do that because you're right, he wasn't voted out. Yeah, it should be like a minus two or something. Yeah, okay. Yeah, no, that's No, I'm not even going to give you a minus on that cuz that's just that's an unfortunate thing. Yeah. I think I think I think you deserve not to get a Okay, so I'm going to give you the standings at the moment between the three teams based on all the points.

1:10:57 You are in third place with 12 points overall. Obviously, losing Jenna hurt your points somewhat. You did get points You did get points for Genevieve finding the advantage. So, I didn't give it to Ozzy cuz he didn't find it. So, you got the points for that one. You also got some points for Savannah on the advantage front. Yeah. And then what else did you get? Let me see here. Gets caught in a lie for Savannah, you got some points for that one as well. So, that gave you a total of 12 and quite a few of your players survived the vote. In second place is currently myself on 21. So, the TNT community is spanking us I've got 21 points. All my players survived. Coach and D was a part of the tribe who won immunity outright.

1:11:49 We decided Coach did say something iconic. He also got caught in a lie. And then Ozzy made the big move. So, those were the bonus points that I got into my tribe on top of the fact that he survived. So, Coach in total for first episode he's got nine points. He's actually the highest point getter for the first episode based on the structure. Our second highest point getter at this stage is Savannah because Savannah found the advantage and got caught in a lie, which is amazing. Like you we wouldn't have thought This is why I like this point structure cuz it's very unpredictable. And then TNT community, they are in first place with 23 points. So, two points difference between us. All of their players survived, but they had the majority of the tribe who won. They had Chrissy, Jeff, Jonathan, Charlie, and Kimmi all on the winning tribe.

1:12:40 They didn't get any bonus points, but they did get all those sweet three points per win for the immunity one. So, it's off to a really interesting start. We're very close between the three teams. I'm excited. You got the hit up front, but you know like you said, still many great players in your in your tribe on your on your on your draft that can go here. >> Yeah, it was a rough start, but you know, it's a slow start, but I think that I back my players. I think that I think we're going to go along here. You know, it's a it's a marathon, not a sprint. It's a marathon with 24 players. It's a marathon. I'm very interested to see how the vote outs are going to happen. Like we're probably going to have a couple of rounds where there'll be two tribes going to the tribal council for instance to get voted out. I don't know how they're going to do it, but they got They're getting 90 minutes or two-hour long episodes this season usually.

1:13:31 Maybe they might I think it's I think it's 90 minutes, but we can definitely ask the community if they know anything different on that. Let's read a couple of comments before we sort of close things off here. Jay saying, "Yeah, let's go TNT community doing really well. First place. You guys are killing it. You guys are actually showing us up." Lilly is saying or Lil Smurf is saying, "I wonder who will win the most non-tribe challenges cuz Coach and Savannah are tied with one right now." It's true. Devon Jonathan if he makes it that far. They said Boston Rob has been training Jonathan. I can kind of see that a little bit. He's got a different approach to this game as well. It feels like he's going to try and be more that strate and it's going to either work really well for him cuz you know, Jonathan being the strate like not on the strategic, the physical beast that he is, being strategic on top of being physical it's going to be it's going to be tough.

1:14:24 It's going to be like his target is already ginormous. Like people are calling him Yeah, he could play a Rob Bentele type game, you know, you never know. Well, maybe not maybe not in his second season though. >> [laughter] >> I don't think I don't Yeah, well, again, I think Rob had the right read Rob Bentele in the second season. I know no one else that's tuning out that's Survivor world, but you know, Rob Bentele the biggest difference between Rob Bentele and Jonathan is I think Rob Bentele has got very high EQ and I don't think Jonathan's not bad, but I just like I've spoken to Rob a few times. Like I've done an interview with him and stuff like that. He is a very smart guy. Like he's very in tune. Okay, so what do we say here? Kind of wish we chose Mike, but we got Jonathan, which is still good. I will see if there's anything else. I wonder who Okay, nothing else. I think that's it, Andre. First episode done and dusted. Great start to the season. Can't wait for next week.

1:15:15 We will be back around the same time next week. We'll do it unless anything changes, but we'll update you if it does. We're going to try and keep to the slot as much as we can. If you're new to the channel and you just sort of stumbled across us or you're returning, subscribe to the channel for more content and put a like on this video. If you can't watch the live or you're watching it later, I do go and read the comments afterwards and normally respond to them as well. So, just leave us a comment below and let us know what was your favorite parts of this season so far and who are you shouting for? Who's your favorite going into the season? Who's your favorite, Andre? Like if you had to choose if you had to choose one, gun to the head, you can't choose more than one. Let's be tough here. Who are you shouting for? Christian, for sure. He's my boy. >> Okay. Yeah, Coach for me. So, we both go for our number one pick here. I'm all in on Coach Wade. You're all in on Christian. The TNT community is all in on Cirie, I'm sure.

1:16:05 So, >> [laughter] >> we'll stick with our number one picks for the season. All right, everybody, it's been so much fun. Enjoy your weekend. Enjoy your week and we will see you next week. Bye. Bye.