@@thesuperfan2457 thats true, my point is more that essentially the 15 minutes per episode dedicated to Rob and Sandra shenanigans was pointless in a way and the twist was invalidated by its winner.
@@mackiahhenry6261 followed the house?? Whattt! You didn’t watch BB15 then 😂 Firstly, Amanda/McCrae Vs Helen. Helen getting Aaryn to keep her word when she saved her from eviction to take out Howard. Both double evictions were brutal blindsides with Judd and Elissa getting the rug pulled out. Andy pulling in Spencer and GM to dominate the end game and taking the power away from McCrae.
Yep, during the pre merge episodes I was genuinely surprised by how great it seemed. A lot of the gameplay and cast seemed pretty promising but then once the merge happened, everything sorta went downhill and made watching it pretty uncomfortable
I just started watching Survivor in S43 and decided to go back to Kaoh Rong and binge up to 42 (no real rhyme or reason, I just heard that season was good and kept going). I didn’t know about the issues with this season at all until I got to it and as I watched became SO CONFUSED as to how this was being handled. I really appreciate you all taking the space to talk about it and process it bc CBS really didn’t. Loved this chat and glad y’all celebrated the bright spots in this season.
I’m so glad that this season rankings is a thing! I’m missing all the Survivor content and this will hopefully hold me over until we get a season 😭😭 Thanks Rob!!!!
All these comments like “would have been great without Dan” are ignoring how poorly many of the other cast members handled the incident, including the eventual winner. It tainted the whole post-merge way beyond just one person.
The worst thing for me is that it took so long for them to kick Dan off. We saw in one of the first people episodes that Kelly was concerned and it only took him touching a producer for it to be fixed. In Thailand Ted admitted to it (kind of) and it really seemed like the tribe wanted to move on for the better or worse. It’s unfortunate that in the end Gandhia just got the boot but times were much different then, not to excuse either of them though.
I only watched Island of the Idols recently, shortly after Winners At War and had no clue about the controversy, the players etc. I can only agree with a lot that you have said in the video: The whole Dan situation aside, its actually in my opinion one of the better first time player seasons of the show. However, you really can't put the Dan situation aside entirely. It is so integral to the narrative of the entire season and how the season played out that even just from a gameplay perspective, it can't be ignored. And I also think it shouldn't be ignored, since it is important to learn from that experience for CBS, the players and the viewers. I can totally understand why a lot of people don't want to watch this season ever again or why they stopped watching at the time, it's ugly and has some really dark moments. That said, i do think that Island of the Idols does have one of the strongest first time player casts in a long time, maybe since Cagayan? Like you guys said, there is (aside from the one massive dud) almost nobody that doesnt contribute in some way to the season and that is pretty rare in my opinion. I would be thrilled to say a lot of them play again eventually and get a second chance, especially since i think a lot of their game is understandably overshadowed by everything surrounding Dan. But even aside from the Dan situation, the season also had its issues. I totally agree that the inconsistency of the risks/rewards at the Island of the Idol was a big issue, culmanating with the incredibly stupid coin toss that completely changed the game and not in a good way. The season also continued the issues of previous seasons, with having too many idols and advantages. There are just too many gimmicks flying around, that it actually hurts the gameplay a lot. I think idols are great, but only in moderation. Between season 16 und 31, they probably hit the spot with the amount of advantages and idols and it is noticable in the quality of seasons. By now the game of survivor devolved into a game of who can find the most gimmicks. You dont have to play a strong strategic, social or physical game, if you are able to just find idols for council after council. That takes a lot out of the game and ultimately sours the idols themselves as well. I like the idea of having idols only until the final 7 and maybe even a limit on how often they get reset. Overall, i dont think I would put Island of the Idols on Number 40 of my personal list, but I understand why a lot of people chose this spot for the season. Removing myself a little from the controversy and the mistakes production made in handling it, i think it would probably rank somewhere in the middle of a ranking between 20 & 25. Looking forward to the podcasts in the future!
Not to defend you know who but this season gets a lot of bad rap. The premerge is excellent and I actually thought the IoI itself was a better version of Ghost Island because at least stuff happened week to week. The merge episode is what ruins the season, but there are some highlights post merge. I am not going to say this is a top 10 season or anything, but I'd rather watch the first 6 episodes of this season than the entirety of One World.
I am in agreement. I think 95% of the cast is very good TV and that marks a good season. As far as people not liking the twists/themes, I don't fault Survivor for trying new things. It's ok to try something new as long as you don't repeat the bad ideas! IoI is not close to the worst in my rankings.
100% agree. I actually overall like IOI. Yes, those who see it last due to what happened are completely valid. But for me, when rewatching the package as a whole, there's far more good than bad. I have it at 21 on my list.
Yeah exactly. I’ve heard rumblings that Dan has received death threats from fans, and that’s not okay I can’t defend what Dan was doing this season but that doesn’t mean I wish him any ill will
However we need to talk about the fact that the female cast of this season was absolutely top-tier. Noura, Janet, Lauren, Kellee, Karishma, Elaine (and even Missy) were all interesting and dynamic characters/players and i would love to see them all back.
Missy and Elisabeth telling Kellee that Dan also made them feel uncomfortable just so they could blindside her has to be one of the darkest moves ever pulled on the show can’t imagine Missy will be back
"The name for the tribe was originally suggested by Jack Nichting before his elimination, and was brought up again after the merge by Jamal Shipman and Janet Carbin, explaining that "LUMUWAKU" was an acronym that Jack's late father would tell his family before deployment". From Survivor Wiki
There’s so many people I like in this season that I want to see play again despite everything that happened: 1: Lauren 2: Janet 3: Kellee 4: Tommy 5: Jamal
This season had a top 10, maybe even top 5 pre-merge, but the Dan situation, combined with an idol nullifier being introduced on Day 37 because of a freaking coin flip, just soured the season
I think this season landed right where it should have. My wife and I watched Survivor every week, but this season had such a bad run of episodes that made us feel ashamed of the world that we started delaying our watching. Winners at War was a five episodes at a time season, because this season disrupted our enjoyment of the show SO MUCH.
I’m just thinking about the Rob and Sandra sitcom. Both of their families in that two story hut trying to co-parent their collective 6 children like full house
This season ranked #35 for me personally. The pre-merge had some decent moments but too much focus on people who weren't going to go far in the season. The merge is not very good because you have everything that happened with Dan combined with all the focus on Karishma and Noura, who we all knew weren't going to win. After the ejection, you basically knew Tommy was most likely going to win because Laura didn't have a good enough edit. The cast wasn't very memorable for me outside of Janet, Elaine, or even Jason (dude deserves another shot someday). Tommy was a solid winner for the season, however, all the twists just make the season more boring and predictable and overall, I just felt like the season just had too much happen where the edit focused too much on the bad parts of the season.
I DEFINITELY think, if it weren't for Dan, this season would absolutely be higher up the list. There were quite a few players I really enjoyed this season. I LOVE Elaine. I thought Lauren had a great concept of strategy. Tommy was decent and entertaining. I love Janet she's such a sweetheart. I really liked Karishma too. I liked Jamal from what I remember. Noura annoyed me but was good tv and was good for fcking up the game. Gotta love when a player is basically a perpetual twist throughout the game lmao
@@bc5163 one of the worst edited casts and I can't stand Russhole. Maybe would've been ok with a balanced edit but samoa has got to be the most biased and poorly edited season of the show, only caramoan could rival it
This obviously shouldn't have been last. I rank this season 15th. So much good about the season. The bad stuff is awful and apparent, but there's tons of good here.
I don't underestimate why so many people hate.. like everything about the show lmao advantages are fcking awesome. They give it's a FAIR twist that can change anyone's game (if used correctly ofc). Like anyone can get an advantage. It gives the real underdogs a chance. Same with tribe swaps. The point of this game is that you can't know what to expect. That's why its so hard. You can't plan the whole thing out ahead of time. And as far as the big Rob and Sandra heads.. I love that sht lmao like ghost island as a concept was probably my favorite of all bc I love the corny gimmicks and the constant nostalgia like everything about that season was right up my alley lol I don't understand why everyone hated it. I feel like people hated ghost island before even seeing it.
I definitely agree with Rob more on Tommy. He played a great game but doesn’t make the most interesting TV. I can respect Chantele’s opinion of Lauren deserving the win more. I do think it’s a little extreme like with the “I’d need to see Lauren win if she came back” but I can understand the sentiment. Personally though my perspective on Lauren and Tommy is they both could play an amazing game on their own but together they do far better, I kinda think of Lauren as the Steven to Tommy’s JT. Both of them were valuable to controlling the game, but Tommy just turns on the charm and undermines his partner at the very end to take the win. I do appreciate both of their games though for making it to where they were, and I think anyone who positions themselves to win going into the last few eliminations deserve to have their games be appreciated (this is to say they know their path to victory and can make it).
I think recency bias has something to do with it. I started watching Borneo in 2017 and watched all the way through sequentially. IoI is much more palatable than several other seasons.
Watching this podcast and remembering everything about this season has made me absolutely positively sure that this should be nowhere near the last place season, so much good!!
It's a shame this season was scarred by Dan because besides that it did have a lot of good players to root for. I think Elaine, Janet and Lauren all deserve to be brought back at some point to play again.
One thing I really hated about this season was that Jeff wasn’t there to start the show off and give the Survivors a proper marooning. Kellee was already speaking up about the inappropriate touching in the first episode before we even see Jeff!! It didn’t start the show off on the right foot. The Survivors in the season (except for the obvious) really got ripped off.
I feel like without Dan though stuff completely changes. Kellee makes it much farther, especially since she had two idols, and everyone’s endgame is different since they all planned on dragging dan to the end. Missy and Elizabeth are much more enjoyable characters when they don’t have the opportunity to use someone’s sexual harassment as a strategy. Hopefully this would affect the editing somehow in a positive way, like less virtue signaling at tribal to try and make up for the fact that a molester is on the show, and a more even edit for the power players.
@@TheMurrmursonbottle Tommy and Lauren have both said that the Dan stuff in no way effected both Kellee and Jamal going home. So if the Dan stuff didn’t happened nothing would have changed other than him being pulled at final 6
@@jareddye9883 I think that rings true for Tommy and Lauren, but without Dan in the game, Kellee isn’t so confident that he’s going home in her spot, and when people aren’t using her harassment to manipulate her into thinking she’s safe, she’s much more likely to play an idol
@@TheMurrmursonbottle Maybe so, but I believe most people believe she was voted out because of the Dan controversy, not because she made some obvious blunders in the game. Which is what Tommy and Lauren said she was targeted for.
@@TheMurrmursonbottle Nah, as much as i like Kellee, she still would of been booted around early merge because she was playing too hard and not many really trusted her.
I personally believe it’s not the absolute worst season of all time, I liked a lot of the characters and the gameplay. The premise and side missions players had to complete for advantages was an awesome idea. That being said, there is no doing damage control over the Dan Spilo situation. Things got too ugly too fast. I personally have it at 36 but I can see how people despise the season even more.
Yes, the Dan situation was bad but I don't think that it should put a cloud over the whole season. I think last is too low. It's not a super strong season but not last
The most unpopular seasons are ones where the winner could be seen a mile out... and IOI joins, RI, One World and Caramoan on that score too (somehow WAW avoids this rap because the cast was such high quality?). The ugly Dan stuff here as the sole reason to mark it last is probably a bit harsh (Brandon in Caramoan, Varner, Hatch on All Stars i would say on par). And the cringeworthy teachable moment overreaching was as offputting as the religious rubbish throughout South Pacific (saved by Sophie and maybe Ozzie). A lot of shared factors, kinda makes sense to have this at the bottom... was bad, but not orders of magnitude worse than 3-4 other seasons mentioned above?
I get that you kind of have to rank this season last because of what happened but objectively it’s not that bad of a season at all. Wasn’t too psyched about the Tommy win but I’m never very satisfied with the winner anyways because I root for the underdogs😂😭
They should’ve gone the Drag Race route of editing Dan out of the season. Don’t give him screentime, don’t give him confessionals, don’t let him speak at tribal. Make him a non-factor in the actual aired show. I mean, they should’ve ejected him right away regardless but if that wasn’t in the cards (which makes no sense, the dude literally broke the law and violated multiple women on your show, it shouldn’t even be up for debate what to do in that situation), then the next best thing is to try to salvage the rest of the season.
The aggressions goat strategy so man people used and so few people caught onto really soured me on this season. I hated the way Karishma was treated. It would have been poetic to see her win. It really disgusted me that there was talk about Noura and Karishma not deserving to make it further than some others, but it was okay for Dan to make it further. If there is another Heroes vs Villians, put Jamal and Janet there, they area heroes. I wonder about how some of Tommy’s female students will think of him dragging Dan along, then screwing over Janet and Lauren? Too bade Janet, Lauren, and Elaine didn’t see the writing on the wall and band together. That would have been a great ending to the season.
Imo, with one obvious MAJOR exception, this is one of my top 5 newbie casts of all time easily. I absolutely loved the women this season, and if Dan wasn’t on the cast, I could see this being in the top half of the seasons. All that being did... it does have Dan, and he absolutely ruins the season.
The whole reason I bought the season was to see the whole thing with Dan I heard it was a bad season so I wasn't going to buy it and then when I found out how big of a deal it was at the time I was like okay now I kind of am curious
I came up with a very fun way to make the idol nullifier twist work. If day one for both tribes they had a blindfolded immunity challenge where everyone is holding a rock and if they are the first to open their hand and reveal the rock they will have the idol nullifier put into their bag but also if 3 people reveal their rock on the tribe their tribe gets nothing, if 2 you get flint, 1 you get fishing gear, and if you reveal none your tribe is immune for the tribal council if both tribes reveal there is a double tribal if no one reveals no one is voted for an extra round. Either way the idol nullifier becomes something you need to keep secret as if you have if you have betrayed your tribe and will absolutely lose respect, but at the same time it gives you an advantage in the game, and even better everyone in the game know exactly how many nullifiers will be in play for the entire season. I think this as a 1 time twist would be very entertaining and lead to so very good strategy.
I'm not surprised this came in last and it's understandable, but if I'm thinking about how good some of those episodes were, there's no way I would ever put it behind some of the older more boring seasons or like a One World that others have mentioned. I think I had it around 30, although there are some seasons I have not watched.
Lauren Missy and Elizabeth can't come back. No one involved in lying about sexual assault should be allowed back. Missy and Liz did it and Lauren said to do it. Drop the hell out of them.
@@SurvivorIce Missy and Elizabeth (with Lauren suggesting they do it) Told Kellee that they were in the same situation as her and that he did the same things to them as her. They then used that to vote her off while telling us that it isn't true. They turned it into a game move
32.71% of the voters had this as the last place?! 😵 Clearly, I did not watch the same season as everyone else. I had IoI @ 15. EOE is THE WORST for me!!! Hearing what's coming next, EoE is ranked TOO HIGH!!!!! Can we see the average rankings? Like IOI is on average place 39.75? Wait. You never said if the audience ranked Tommy's win high or low. I listened to this part like 3x for this.
Omg I am shocked this came in last place lmao I liked this season. Then again I guess I like every season lol Edit: I am the biggest fcking ldiot I forgot about... Dan.. Edit: oh you know what.. I was confusing it with Ghost Island lol that's why I didn't think about Dan at first
It may just be me BUT I feel there is some recency bias only HURTS this season. The strategy of this season is quite decent (especially compared to MOST if not ALL of the last 6 seasons). I do NOT condone the actions of Dan whatsoever. However, I think if you give this season more time to "marinate" (I know... interesting choice in word) I think the season can honestly move up in the rankings in like 4-6 years from now.
@@bc5163 agree when they split the tribes it could completely ruin someone’s game. I agree eoe had some good players I liked the wentworth tribe a lot but I thot Aubrys tribe was more boring. And Chris winning makes it a bottom tier season for me even tho premerge was good
