Terrific post, FP!

>>> The way I see this entire season is that it has always been either Ozzy or Coach. From the very start it was Ozzy that spoke his quest, I need redemption. He is either going to get it or he's not. Coach didn't start off so well, but by the end of the first episode, he had things going quite smoothly.

It has been presented that way, absolutely.

What you noted about Ep 1 -- I had a whole long post that I was going to write, took all the notes, and then didn't have time. I want to do a shorthand version here.

IF the first episode could be seen as a microcosm of the season, and even the first day of the first episode
&
IF, the key quote is: It's not how you start, it's how you finish

Then Coach wins over Ozzy.

Ep 1 began with the triumph of Ozzy and the rejection of Coach.
The tribe wanted one and not the other. Coach lost the first challenge.
At the first challenge, we saw Ozzy benefit from teamwork, while Coach's tribe was a mess. In the element where they had to dig under the sand, Coach got stuck "in a hole" and Ozzy zoomed through.

Christine made it clear she was out to get Coach off ASAP.
Rick said he didn't believe in Dragons or Dragonslayers.
Cochran Superfan, OTOH, was over the moon to be with Ozzy.

This is how they started. Then they hit the beach.

We were then shown Ozzy making a series of mistakes.

He called the tribe into the water in underwear, which set a division between the body-modest Cochran, Dawn) and the young show-offs and Jim who lusted after them.

He didn't think they needed a shelter, not realizing that his tribe did need one, and that they could bond over it.

He let his eye get caught by Semhar, after he swore he was done with showmances. His interest in Semhar directly led to a tribal division for the very first vote, and set up Jim's later decision to rally the others to take out Elyse.

Ozzy's tribe lost the challenge in the closest contest ever. Arguably if he had stepped up and assigned positions, and not Semhar for shooting, they would have won.

At the end of the first night, Savai'i is shelterless and Dawn is cued for a breakdown.

On Upolu, Coach immediately made a friend, Edna.
He showed the tribe survival tricks.
When he was pontificating and Christine interrupted him, he immediately backed down.
When Brandon started to go off about Delilah, Coach put a kibosh on the idea.
He realized Christine was looking for the HII, and he told the others, which got most of the tribe paranoid about Christine.

At the end of the first day, he had formed the alliance that would dominate the end game. His new allies were shown listening to his promises of success under the stars, while over on Savai'i, the tribe was sleeping on the sand because Ozzy had gone with the Bob Marley carefree attitude.

Coach came off that helicopter and played the game right out of the gate.
Ozzy came into the game thinking about strong tribe, ducking the leader role, hooking up with beautiful girl -- same old same old.
Coach told us he was Coach v.3.0 and there to win, and it wasn't hot air, he really turned a bad start into a good finish.

So the question this left me with is, was Episode 1's (especially Day 1), a story arc fashioned by editing to show us how it all works out?

Or is the story more based on whole episodes, such that Coach started off well (looking at Ep 1 as a whole), but then proceeded to lose his way to the finish?

Editing A: Coach wins.
Editing B: Coach loses.

BUT, if Ozzy doesn't get to the F3, how does Editing B make any sense, if Coach loses to Sophie? She was never portrayed as starting badly or really making any kind of progress or decline in her game. She was steady, clinical, conservative, no major errors.

So what is the point of putting all this emphasis on the arc, on redemption, on passion? None of those elements applied to her.