Survivor 51 Episode 4: Why Did Jeff Go Back to 3 Tribes?

0:00 Body is in consensus and wide agreement that the new era of Survivor was the worst era of Survivor and he's just like, we're going to ignore all of that. We're going to go back to it. But if you talk about a purely newbie cast, I can't think of a better start to a season than this than the season. And we had so much momentum going into episode four for all of it just to be I get gets turned upside down to some degree. And this is what I think my problem with new era was for a long time is do we really know if any of the people who go to the end and win or play quote unquote a smart game is actually playing a smart game or is it just luck? Is luck just becoming more and more of a thing in Survivor? Because we've got Will E in the live saying, I hate that they went back to the three tribes. So much for the first three episodes being good. I think Will E, we definitely share your sentiment here on the podcast.

0:53 Jay is saying the swap to three tribes would have been better if they made it a schoolyard pick. It's the open era. Like come on now, try something new. I'm totally in agreement. Totally in agreement. >> they did another one where they had to break everybody? That would have been good. >> Yeah. Camilla, welcome back to the live as well saying, going back to the three tribes felt unnecessary. The two tribe dynamics were getting interesting. And that is the truth. Like this was two very messy tribes, splintered tribes to a large degree at this stage. Andre, like we had this big power of the Fab Five alliance getting broken up by the underdogs. We didn't know if we were talking about this last week if Lewis and Carter was going to swing back to the Fab Five and work with the four there. Kilby felt in control like he just made a big move. The end is somebody that is rising.

1:45 Like the one thing about this episode at least is that we got to see a lot more of Thien An and I actually quite like how her mind works in the game and is someone that I'm keeping an eye on. But you know, she got into a power position. She's someone that potentially could get screwed by the fact that they went into three tribes here. There was lots for us to see in that tribe and even in the original purple tribe, there was a lot of fractures there because who were they going to vote out next with Carter leaving? Like there was so many tantalizing sweet story lines developing here that you just look at it and you're like, "What are you guys doing?" Like production just can't help but get in their own way. >> It's like sitting down for a nice Italian meal and having a nice like a nice bolognese or lasagna and then having a nice tiramisu at the very end and you'd be like, "You know what? Let's just mix them together. Let's just mix the tiramisu and the pasta together and just eat it all." It's terrible.

2:37 It's like why would you do it? It's like you've got something good if you've got a Faberge egg, you don't touch it. Just let it play out. Stop >> Yeah. >> Stop putting your fingers into everything. Stop trying to play God. Just let it play out cuz I was so excited to see what the dynamics would have happened on both tribes. Like it was going to be a really Even the Even the one world twist where Jeff is like, "Oh, we're going to do the one world twist." And he knows that all the fans want to see the one world twist. I think ever since one world aired, people have been saying, "This is the one twist that we want to see back." And I think even in our predictions that we did like three or four months ago, we're like, "We'd love to see the one world twist come back." for him to be like, "Nah, no, we're not going to do that. We're just going to do what we did the last 10 seasons." Like just like, "Why?" >> Yeah, we're going to go back to predictable.

3:30 We're going to go back to predictable and we're going to go back to an era that nobody liked. Is there a way for Jeff at this stage to redeem himself? Like I mean, I agree with you. He was definitely, you know, he was stirring when he was saying, "Oh, we'll do that one day, maybe in a future season, but it's not going to be this season." Like you know, he knows what he's doing, Jeff. But you know, what do you reckon can happen at this point? Like if we were to go back and swap back into two tribes, do you think that's a possible Well, I guess if you think about it, let's think about it. Let's take ourselves out of the upset angry fan angle here, right? Because we obviously don't like this. If we put ourselves under the production hat here, this is a large season with 21 players. They've lost what, five players now with Rob quit and the four that were voted out. So, it's five players. There's still a lot of players left in this game and not that many days in a 26-day game. We already know that next week two tribes will be going to Tribal Council.

4:24 So, I feel like with the 26 days that and the larger cast, they kind of always had to go down this path at some stage unless they wanted to make it both tribes go to Tribal Council, which we've had in the past. But, you can't do that for a couple of rounds, but you can do it in three tribes. You could say, "Let's have two rounds of two losing tribes going for instance." I feel like they've kind of backed themselves in the corner. >> You can do that. There've been countless seasons where you had two tribes had to go to tribe Like the very famous one Heroes vs. Villains, right? Where it was Robin who Robin Candace won the immunity. And that was one of the greatest episodes of all time. Just do that. Just have it Okay, well, two tribes and then they get to compete for immunity. And then like individual immunity and just go and then have one of the tribes sit in to the other tribe's Tribal Council.

5:15 Is that not better TV than seeing like I don't know. There's probably going to be a like next episode's probably going to be four people and it's like going to be three helicopter lines and one Alexis on the side. It's like, "Well, you know what's going to happen." It's just >> It's boring. >> That's not It's Yeah, it's not compelling TV at all. Whereas even if you had like two tribes and it's like you see Brady sort of on the outs and then him hit him sort of somehow able to sort of pull something over on someone else. That's like exciting TV cuz it's like nine people playing in that Tribal Council. It's just straight If I'm production, I honestly think that just by looking at everything that Jeff has been saying and doing, I get this feeling that he has a certain amount of disdain for us as fans. He's like, "I'm going to do the opposite." Yeah, it's like a toxic relationship. And I it feels like he's doing this on purpose as well.

6:05 Cuz he had that rant on the first ever I just feel like maybe there's going back to our theory about sort of Sky Dan sort of maybe you know, putting their fingers into things a little bit. Maybe it's just Jeff lashing out. I think that's that must be what it is. I do know that next season or at least I have had rumors that next season is going to be three tribes as well. So this is why? I just don't understand it. Maybe this will show production that But I feel like production knows. >> Well, but you know, just sort of finishing off on your thinking here around production knowing. This is the problem when a show becomes so big that it's hard to fail. You know, like and also because there's so many fans that just continue to show up year after year, watch the slop that they give us, you know, and we just put up with it to a certain degree. So yes, it Survivor's been on a slow decline and for a long time people were saying that isn't a thing.

7:01 Like yes, everybody doesn't watch it live, they watch it afterwards and things like that. But the numbers are not where it used to be. They used to be what? 50 million people watch it in the first season? We're down to 20 million people. Then for the longest period of time it was around the 7 or 8 million and I think we're down to like 4. 5. Like Big Brother's catching up to Survivor. There shouldn't be any world where Big Brother becomes the premier reality TV show compared to Survivor. >> Survivor Like Survivor has really great cinematography. It has really good editing, I feel. Like it's still pretty >> It's got such a rich legacy, like history. You know, too. >> The game design is lacking. They need to hire a game designer. They need to I mean, they've done a lot really good this season. Like the new music has been really good. You know, the new you know, intro music has been amazing. First three episodes were really good. I feel like the editing has been very on point. >> So, fans absolutely hyped the twist of three tribes.

7:54 I think it's no surprise for both me and you. We spoke about it at length here on the podcast. They're saying did production just ruin its own seasons season? Fans love the return of two tribes. Moving back to three smaller tribes has attracted strong criticism online with viewers blaming the change for production to make it a production elimination. A highly supported Reddit community has called this the worst twist ever. Options and >> Do you think we're going to have three more episodes of three tribes? Because it's like you get time to find final 16 and then >> Yeah, my call My call is that we go two rounds of two tribes going to tribal. So, we lose four players in the next two episodes. That's what I would imagine and then we go into like a potential merge situation at that point. And then rather not speed the game up to the same degree that we did. Like if that is what we need to sacrifice at this stage in the game Andre to have a great post-merge sort of part of the game, then I'm okay with it.

8:52 >> I'll take it. >> Yeah. >> Not ideal. >> Yeah. >> But we can we can we can put up with it. I do think Survivor needs to go back to the drawing board. They need to revisit the longer days. I know people have asked me they DM'd me privately, put comments on some of our previous episodes saying what do you think about the shorter version of the game. I think both me and Andre will always be purists. We would always want the 39 days to come back. We would always want to >> Yeah. I got one of my mates into Survivor a few years ago. He's been watching all the all the greats, you know. He and I've shown him a few of the new era seasons as well. I said, "Mate, you need to get into season 51. I think you're going to like it." Like the first three episodes have been fantastic. And the first thing he said to me is like, "Oh, have they gone back to 39 days?" I'm like, "No." He's like, "Well, I'm not interested." It's like, well, I mean, and he's like he's a casual. Like, he doesn't watch it live. He doesn't watch He just He's just gone back and watched on Netflix with his family.

9:45 >> Yeah. >> so, it's it you know, people like I feel like casuals know about this and like even fans don't like it. It's like just I know it's a little bit like why do you have to give people like $2 million instead of $1 million? Just spend that million dollars to add a few more days to production. You know, maybe give the million dollars to production to pay them a little bit more so they can stay >> I personally I just believe personally that And this is my take and I really don't like being negative about Jeff all the time, but I just think he's lazy. I just think he's lazy. I don't think he wants to do the 39 days. I think it there's additional logistics involved in keeping a crew together for that long. He needs to be out on the island for longer away from his family and things like that, too. >> But it's just it's worth it on that end. >> I just want to do Jeff like 20 years ago. >> Yeah, Married to I hear says Jeff, great host, horrible executive pro