Over the past six months I have been re-watching the first eight seasons of Survivor. Many consider these seasons to be part of the glory days, when the show was at its peek of popularity. I wanted to put some thoughts together about certain aspects of the show, and its evolution, so here it is.

BORNEO
The Pagong tribe was a mess from the start. All over the place. Even though Gretchen was a great leader, she didn’t have much of a team to lead. B.B. wouldn’t listen to anyone. Ramona was sick, or just wouldn’t eat the food, and couldn’t do much. Gervase thought he could win the whole game by playing cards with people. Jenna was crazy, and Colleen and Greg were always going off on island dating adventures. No wonder they messed up the merge vote.

People may complain about Borneo from a production point of view, but the challenges were good for a show with a summer budget in the first year of the millennium. Yeah, simple, but at least it wasn’t swimming for puzzle pieces every week. And some of these challenges set the basis for what the show would become over the next four years.

Dr. Sean was smarter than you think. The alphabet strategy meant that he would vote for all of the Pagong tribe, before having to write a former Tagi’s name down.

What if moment: Pagong don’t lose the Immunity before merge, and goes in 6-4.

Player that should return: Richard

AUSTRALIA
This is still to this day on the shows best casts. Even the first two to go, Debb and Kel, were memorable.

It only made me hate the Kucha’s more whenever they brought up how they would of been in power if Mike didn’t fall into the fire, but there was a 50-50 chance Ogakor might of won, and I sense Mike would of been voted out anyway if it had to come to it.

Can we all take a moment to think about the moment Colby dumped Jerri on her ass in the reward challenge. And can we just remember how funny the guy was. All they say is five immunities in a row, or how he had a great bod(as Jerri put it), but he was always cracking me up. Hersey bar. Ha!

What if moment: Kimmi didn’t reveal Jeff got a vote at their first tribal.

Players that should return: Jeff and Alicia.

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