LAST EDITED ON 12-27-01 AT 02:54 PM (EST)

As many of you know, SB poster "shakes the clown" is Michael from the Fox reality show "Love Cruise". Did we learn anything from watching him? I believe we did, or at least we should have. While shakes would express it better than I will, here's why I think this is relevant to our current debates.

In the past few days, I've seen a number of posts discussing why Lex would be an ideal final-two opponent, or why one or two players should defect from their current alliance, or why Lex's allegiance to Brandon wouldn't be viewed as a problem by Old Boran, or radadadada.

To each of these thoughts, my only answer is: really?

Let's look back on what shakes told us.

1. The original "alliance" was Melissa, Michael, Ralph and Toni. Michael seemed to be equally close to Melissa and Ralph, judging from his comments. Toni was Ralph's friend.

2. Michael liked Lisa but couldn't bring her into the alliance and ultimately participated in her demise. We can see that Michael actually cared (a lot!) about Lisa's feelings from how vigorously he has defended her on the message boards (those of you who saw his comments about Greg know what I mean). Nevertheless, he was part of the group that booted her, because he didn't want to stand out (and I think his spirited defenses of Lisa may result from some residual guilt, but I'm sure Michael would disagree with my quickie diagnosis).

3. When Toni defected, Michael acted to ensure his alliance's survival. The key move was switching Andrea out of the boat for Jeanette, which broke up the Andrea-Toni suballiance (and gave Melissa an ally among the women). Melissa didn't ostracize herself by taking Michael's side publicly (which is why we saw him isolated and alone), and (as a result) she and Jeanette retained enough credibility that they ended up saving him in the private vote.

4. Michael played for a vote against Melissa, even though he was likely to lose it, because the most important thing was staying in the game.

5. Jeanette didn't switch Michael out, even though doing so would clearly have helped her chances to win (and even though Michael told her it was OK). Ultimately, winning is important, but anyone with enough character to participate in a solid, trustworthy alliance will "go home with the one that brung you." No matter what Michael protests, I don't believe he would have swapped Jeanette out, either, were the tables reversed.

So, what are the lessons of all of these things? The same as the lessons we have learned from two seasons of Survivor! Betrayal of your core alliance is a very serious matter, even if the betrayal is inconsequential; ask Kelly W. People stay loyal to their alliance partners, even when "game logic" from us armchair speculators tells us that they shouldn't. Getting into a final matchup that you're likely to lose is MORE IMPORTANT that keeping someone around whom you would be more likely to beat, if doing so adds uncertainty to your own chances of survival.

Given all those principles, there are a few inescapable conclusions:

1. Lex has NO CHANCE of making the final two. When he allied himself with Brandon, he killed himself with the rest of Old Boran, even though it didn't hurt their dominance in the game. They no longer believe that he will side with them no matter what, and that's critical.

2. None of the Old Boran core will defect, now OR EVER. The final two will be part of this core, barring immunity, even though they may give the appearance of not siding together at times.

3. The Old Boran core will act against Lex without giving him any clue of what they are doing (the same way that Michael used the "switch card" unexpectedly to dump Andrea).

4. Even if Ethan would like to save Lex, he won't, because he doesn't want to stick his neck out against his alliance, and he knows that the best way to get there is to keep them together.

5. Mama Kim, Tom and Ethan are NOT worried about being in the finals against each other, even though Mama Kim has no chance of beating either of them and even though she would end up third if they make up the final three. The first goal is to REACH the finals; winning CANNOT be your focus at this stage.

Others may choose to draw different conclusions. But the point is the same. It doesn't matter whether it's Colby leaving $900K on the table by taking Tina into the finals instead of Keith or whether it's Kelly leaving $900K on the table by switching her boot vote from Richard to Susan -- or whether it's the "Love Cruise" gang above -- these people are more motivated by personal loyalties at this stage than by the scent of the money.

The Old Boran core are NOT going to backstab each other with victory FOR THEIR ALLIANCE within their grasp. If they were the type of people who would do that, they would already be out of the game. Shortly, perhaps tonight, Lex will learn this lesson about alliances himself.

Anyway, that's my take on it, for what it's worth.

• RE: What Did We Learn From "Love Cruise"?,kuchakor, 02:01 PM, 12-27-01
• Wonderful Analysis,Outfrontgirl, 02:07 PM, 12-27-01
  • RE: Wonderful Analysis,Bebo, 02:29 PM, 12-27-01
• RE: What Did We Learn From "Love Cruise"?,runningchicken, 02:18 PM, 12-27-01
• A flaw?,idiotcowboy, 03:54 PM, 12-27-01
  • RE: A flaw?,managerr, 04:20 PM, 12-27-01
• Furthering This Train of Thought,landruajm, 09:37 AM, 12-28-01
• the difference is...,shakes the clown, 12:58 PM, 12-28-01
  • Agree,AyaK, 02:26 PM, 12-28-01
• RE: What Did We Learn From "Love Cruise"?,zeako, 01:27 PM, 12-28-01
  • RE: What Did We Learn From "Love Cruise"?,Serendipity, 05:57 PM, 12-28-01
    • Outright lies,dangerkitty, 06:13 PM, 12-28-01
      • RE: Outright lies,kuchakor, 06:35 PM, 12-28-01

Beautiful theory, it's pure logic and I'm 99.99999% sure it'll happen. Teresa or Lil'Kim will go tonight if Lex wins immunity, if Lex doesn't he goes, and the Pagoning (Or Kuching) will continue.

AyaK. I wholly agree from all I have seen that this group follows the principals you lay out.

My only question is whether they take Lex out tonight or next time... I guess if they are really rock solid they're not worried about leaving the two Samburus roaming the boma seeking a new alliance...

I guess the impetus to act now would be that Lex has won 2 IC's, demonstrating he may be hard to shake if they pass by an opportunity.

>I guess the impetus to act
>now would be that Lex
>has won 2 IC's, demonstrating
>he may be hard to
>shake if they pass by
>an opportunity.

I think you're right, OFG. MK/E/T have watched Lex start an immunity run a la Kelly and Colby and saw those two ride into the finals in the first two series. Since they now have the numerical advantage over KP/T, they will want to take Lex out at the first opportunity, just in case a second one doesn't roll around.

I'm hoping it's next week, though, because I'm doing the E12 summary and wanna write about Lex going bye-bye.

I completely agree. One thing that's been true in all three survivors is that people can't change who they are in essence. Not over the course of 40 days anyway. You may be able to pretend your a nice guy when in fact your an asshole for a day or two, but after a while your true nature will show itself. That's why Colby lost - he couldn't bring himself to betray Tina because he's not that kind of person. Rich won not because he's likable obviously, but because he was in a sense honest. He didn't try to hide the fact that he was a pompous annoying wanker. In the end people respected him for that. They respected that he got as far as he did by being just that. I don't believe for a moment that Old Boran will fall apart except for maybe Lex. However I'm not convinced he's a goner. He's had too little face time and his story doesn't seem to be finished. I think only Teresa and Little Kim are in that position now.

Excellent analysis, but I think there is one flaw in the logic. Lex IMO has not acted in a rational manner, meaning how he operates is a wild-card that can not really follow the normal patterns. If Theresa or KimP see this they might be able to manipulate him into doing something else that defies the normal voting patterns we have seen over the past couple of reality series. All in all though I do like the analysis, and expect it is close to being correct barring another Lex faulty GUT moment.

-ICB

I agree. Normally this principle would be correct and logical--but I don't agree that this crew has been acting this way. They're paranoid, quick judging, tempermental--all that contributes to all of them making rash decisions.

We also saw that in Love Cruise--one little thing can erupt into some huge drama and get you booted. That's all it takes in this case--one minor mistake by any of the players and they will quickly turn against you and take you out.

LAST EDITED ON 12-28-01 AT 10:03 AM (EST)

LAST EDITED ON 12-28-01 AT 10:03 AM (EST)

Dead on, AyaK, although I didn't see this until after last night's episode proved your essential point.

Another lesson I draw from LC and from all our experience with Survivor is that we, as outsiders, apply a different set of logical principles to these TV games than do the participants. For instance, it is counterintuitive that Colby was more interested in being a good person than he was in winning a million bucks. I hesitate to bring in LC examples because the LC producers' constant and significant interference with the game rules fatally handcuffed anyone's attempts (including the players') to apply logic, reason, or strategy to that sack o'... something. No personal offense intended, Michael (I haven't read a word that Shakes posted about LC).

+++
(Edited to add this bit of bashing, and again because I accidentally inserted a smiley right here)

Lex's infuriating survival last night also proves AyaK's point. How DUMB can players be, collectively? ACK!
+++

Our logic stems from three presumptions:

-that players always view "winning" as capturing the prize;
-that players are working from the same data that we are; and
-that players will act in their "best interest"

Time and again, we have fallen down collectively in analyzing short- and long-term game situations, in large part because we get focused on some data that causes us not to adjust for variances from these presumptions.

Collectively, how do we fix this? Beats the snot outta me. I've just been crystalizing this throughout S2 and S3, especially with our disappointing group record in S3.

It's all the more frustrating because of the level of spoiling-related metagaming that Burnett is doing with S3. He has now established the principle that he will, occasionally--even twice in a row--do the obvious. His introduction of THAT little problem has a lot of potential to leave us hopelessly twisted up in our own underwear.

As does my effort to give us three more underliers to look at as we twist...

So much more than a sentient computer

...that at least on LC we provided REAL drama (psycho Toni, bribery attempts, betrayal) and actual plot twists (broken alliances, the switch) as opposed to Survivor, where the story is so innane and predictable that Burn-it has to continually resort to flat out lying and completely making up plot lines that don't exist just to keep his audience around. Last night's show was the worst episode of reality TV I've ever seen and completely insulting to even the dumbest of viewers.

Why can't Burn-it just admit that nothing interesting happened in Africa and that in his game, alliances NEVER fall apart...and then instead of wasting everyone's time with all this bullshit misdirectional editing he could actually show us things taht ACTUALLY HAPPENED in the game.

For instance, instead of wasting our time with all this crap about how the girls are forming an alliance and how LEx is getting voted out how about showing us instead the plotting and scheming of the OB-4..is it really that boring? Why must we constantly be shown things that clearly never happened?

Just like S2, when this thing is over we are going to have no idea what happened until we piece together clues long after the
show has ended. And unlike S2, this show is soooo boring I don't think anyone is gonna care enough to bother once this thing is over.

With every episode this show becomes more and more a complete work of fiction.

shakes, I completely agree with you. I believe that Survivor started on the downhill trend when the dull-as-dishwater Tina won S2 -- and I believe that Burnett did NOT know Tina won; the lockbox worked. To prevent us from finding out about the Colby-Tina alliance, Burnett decided to make Tina invisible. If it hadn't been for Mitchell's talk in South Dakota, we wouldn't have had a clue about what was actually happening in Ogakor until E14. Could the discussions about dumping Jerri and Amber REALLY have been that boring? I doubt it -- and at the same time, those discussions could have shown us Tina's true character.

Of course, I still believe that MB edited S2 the way he did because he thought COLBY won, and he was probably shocked when that turned out not to be the case.

In S3, the whole show has focused on obfuscating what's going on. One of the things that we always relied upon in spoiling the show was that Burnett told the truth to the "casual watcher", even if he tried to mislead us Web spoilers. But in S3, even the mass audience stuff has been false; would anyone call last night a "knock-down, drag-out tribal council"? As a result, we sit here at E12 with no clear picture of Teresa or Kim J, and a very blurry picture of Ethan -- and I believe that those are the final three!

By contrast, BMP got as much mileage out of your plans as they could, and it made for very interesting TV.

Good points Ayak.
Bad points, Shakes.

They are good points. I think Mark Burnett and CBS have been so paranoid about spoilers that they have gone too far the other way. I think MB underestimated how being able to spoil a plot (or at least make a good attempt at it) really added to the interest AND enjoyment in Survivors.

Both MB and CBS have stooped to absolute falsehoods in order to protect the plot, very probably assuming it would stimulate greater interest. In my case, however, it has been quite the reverse. I feel taken by both parties and am less interested in the show.

Many people have blamed the cast of his show for the lack of real interest, but again, this is not the case for me. I like or dislike these people as much or more than any of the other casts. Actually, except for Rudy, I universally hated the cast of Survivor1. It is simply the cover up of personalities and the plotting or interaction that they have with each other that has caused more disinterest on my part.

In my opinion, if MB wishes to keep Survivor an interesting show, he should play to our attempts to spoil. I expect him to make it hard and that's the fun. But these outright exaggerations and falsehoods just backfire.

Yes. It's not just the previews, and the selective editing. I was so annoyed at the very start of Ep 11, when Probst does the voice over of what happened last week. He says more or less "Frank spouts off in camp on TC day. Frank pays for his opinions by being voted out of the tribe. Even Teresa voted for him." The message was clearly stating the Frank was voted out because of his unpopular opinions, and that is why Teresa voted for him as well. Is that what the think we believe? That on a whim, because he irritated them, on the day of TC everyone votes out Frank, including Teresa? And I don't know, maybe the "casual viewer" does believe that! Or is that just what they think they have to do to make it seem more exciting - Frank was voted out because he was controversial, it had nothing to do with pagonging and alliances! Jeesh.

dangerkitty

Yes, the review of EP10 was very confusing and stupid. MB is trying to hide the obvious Boran alliance with things like that. I wonder what he'll give as the reason of Kim getting booted? That she was Alliance-Less???? Well, Teresa didn't vote for Kim, she must have had some friendship. I know several people who watch this show who have no clue what "Spoiling" and the internet sites are, and it's obvious to them that there is a Boran alliance. Jiffy P and MB are desperately trying to "Save" Survivor. I think Survivor will save itself, just because it isn't winning in ratings doesn't mean that it isn't a winner. I think Survivor should be on Thursday nights still, don't change it to Wednesday. That's what ruined great shows like "All in the Family", just changing nights. Friends is having a particuarly good season, if MB gets the right setting (Back on an island), and hopefully the right people, he won't be dissapointed in the end result. I think he has a great cast right now in S3, it's just that changing the way the game is played is going to confuse the fans. Next season, he can't have the switch after 4 TC's, because then everyone will expect it. That is why his original plan for S2 and S1 was fine, he just had the wrong cast in S2. What he needs to do is get the casual fans interested once again. He should get some contraversial personalities, I think he figured that Tom and Lex wouldn't be friendly towards each other, but alot of the opposites have happened. Just work on casting and stay on Thursdays, changing nights is a big sign of weakness. You have two more Survivors in your contract to convince CBS that Survivor should continue on, so make the best of what you have, MB!!!!!