Survivor: "I'm a Mental Giant" or "I'm the Beast Mode Cowboy"

The Survivor premiere. My favorite night of the year. Well, more like favorite 4 nights of the year because MAN is this show prolific. No complaining from this couch! Survivor is such a perfect show; a glorious combination of entertaining physical challenges, teamwork vs individual strength, secret alliances and back-stabbing, living in a foreign jungle, and pooping in the ocean. What more do you need? Like, I love this show so much, every time is new season starts I'm a little sad because I know it will end. Ok. Whatever. The Amazing Race is good too.

So, our heroes are introduced in a signature beautiful shot of ocean and jungle interspersed with various fauna.

Ah, Wednesday night boat rides.

Seriously, how have the cameramen on Survivor never won an Emmy? Or an Oscar? Is it called cinematography if it's on a TV show? Ok, the Interwebs have answered all of our questions. Well, many of them. Like, yes, it is called cinematography on TV. And Survivor has been nominated for multiple Emmys every year since its inception in 2001, including Outstanding Cinematography in a Reality-Based Competition (like, seriously, the need to be so specific? It's like a back-handed compliment) and Outstanding Picture Editing a bunch of times. It even won a couple times. Jeff has won 4 years in a row for being the host. Is it because they like how much he controls the game with his leading questions? Lastly, it won the first year in this category: Outstanding Non-Fiction Program (Special Class) (Area Award: Possibility of one, more than or no- 
Literally. Hm???

Ok! Stop distracting me with information!

So we start getting introduced to our three tribes of fresh meat. I was all, aww, three tribes again?! Boo! And my husband was like, yeah, it's Brains, Beauty, Brawn this season. I know. I'm making cookies paying attention.

Duh sauce.

So first up we have the super muscley brawny brawn tribe including an ex-pro basketball player, a bounty hunter, a professional lady body-builder, a postal worker, and a real estate agent. SCREEEEEECH. You heard right, folks, one of those legendary realtors with muscles of adamantium is here from the Amazon to fight for the right to become the one true Survivor. Or something like that.

Yes, that front guy and that blonde chick are on the same Brawn tribe.

Listen, though, she said she was basically an extreme thrill seeker and she does seem like a scrappy go-getter, so I'm willing to reserve judgement.

Next up are the gorges, the Beauty tribe.

They posed him just so.

They are boringly attractive; a personal trainer, a chick poker player, a bartender, an ex-military dude who now does something else I can't remember but called gave us the subtitle of this recap, and a tiny Asian guy with Harry Potter glasses. Yep. The tiny Asian guy is a gardener who loves all living things including trees and chickens. I was like, say what? No offense to him, but why is he in this tribe? Was there a beauty contest for tiny Asian gardeners and he got first place? Or, as I profoundly guessed, because I am a sensitive soul who understands that the words Brains, Beauty and Brawn mean more than the traditional definitions, was he there because he has a beautiful soul? We shall see.

Brainiac Convention, coming up.

Look at that impressive combined GPA.

There's an ER doctor who looks like a certain President of a certain country, a chemist who is lits crazy, a nervous girl who does data analysis, maybe? and an ice cream entrepreneur. And when you're on this tribe, you pronounce it enTREpreneur. They're going to use their smarts to win blah blah blah. No they won't. They'll find their inner well-rounded strength or they'll be booted like the last brains tribe.

Jeff, who apparently has been hiding on this boat the whole time in some neutral territory, not willing to box himself in to one favorable adjective, pops up and announces that it is scramble time; we're tossing the anchor and you all overboard, so grab what you can while you can! There is the general mad dash to grab whatever the first season of Survivors would have given their left hands to have access to, and someone jumps into the ocean after a chicken. Oh, it's the beast mode cowboy. That's how they do it in the country, ya'll!!

Success, at least!

"I think I'll have steak tonight. Maybe ribs. Definitely a massage. The first day is stressful."

The tribes get out to sea finally with their spoils, with Jeff gleefully sending them off, and they go to make their respective camps and friendships and early, overzealous alliances.

Here is the red team, or Brawn, or some vaguely Asian sounding name that I don't know because on these themed seasons the tribe names mean nothing, bonding over being so strong. Oh, their tribe name is To Tang. Interwebs 2, me 2 because I know more now.

Ah, they love each other.

 Starting from the left, we have Cydney, a professional body-builder and shade-thrower, as we will see later in this episode. Darnell, a postal worker who grew up in Chicago who may or may not be really good at diving. Jason, a tatted bounty hunter who I think used to be in the military. Alecia, an extreme real estate agent. Scot, a "former NBA champion". Jen, a construction worker. They all stomp around camp breaking things and chopping things down and getting sunburned and not being good at counting and calling Alecia "blondie", while she contributes very little to the preparation of camp except for the location suggestion. It's not looking good for her. Good try expanding definitions, Survivor. This happens for a while, and then something else happens. E Online called it "The Actual Most Disturbing Thing Ever Happened in the Survivor 32 Premiere" and they're not wrong. So Jen the hammerer is complaining about a bug having crawled in her ear, and it feels weird and it hurts. It hurts more and she thinks her ear is bleeding. Then she starts having to cry out in pain because she feels it burrowing in more and she can hear it's little legs crawling around in there. I want to be totally grossed out and also sympathetic, but I also kind of think she's a loon. Maybe she just got an ear infection from the water or maybe she's already going crazy from this situation. Why isn't medical coming? Why aren't her other team mates pouring water in her ear to flush away Mr. Creepy Crawly? What is happening? She spends a night like this and I am so confused. Then, in an unexplainedly perfect shot, we see a little clear worm with what looks like blood in it inch out from her ear and start traversing around the edge. Her team mates come over and whip out the microscope and talk about it for a while before grabbing the thing off her and squishing the little spelunker to oblivion. She's like, I feel totally better let's run a marathon. Or at least win the challenge. So....WHAT THE CRAP???!?!!? Was there for real a tiny worm/bug in her ear all day and night????? And where the heck was medical? Seriously, that is not ok. I feel like I could take most of what Survivor offers, even the relentless rain, but bugs burrowing around in my ear is not on the menu. AUGH!!!!!!! However, she and all her team mates are just pumped up, like, yeah, you feel better! Good! Weirdos.

Then there was the Brains, or blue, or Chan Loh tribe.

"What's your regression analysis of Survivor, then?"

We've got Aubry, a social media marketer. Joe, a former hostage negotiator for the FBI (say what?!). Barely pictured: Neal, an ice cream store/brand owner who seems like he is so done with all these nerds already. Obama  Peter, an ER doctor, who can hopefully MacGyver some splints for his teammates out of bamboo later on in the season. Debbie, a chemist and certifiable crazy. Liz, a quantitative strategist, who, surprisingly, has not already done a regression analysis of Survivor. They wander around being fairly nerdy but getting their shelter started. When Debbie first interviewed on the boat, I knew even before this sentence that she was doomed: "The challenges will lay down before me like lovers." And THEN she started babbling to the FBI guy that she's a survival expert and makes fire without flint like a boss. Then in the next scene she's telling the ice cream guy how to make fire and he's doing the grunt work. This will be interesting. Also, people say things like "We can't show up as the Brains team and we haven't made fire, like, from an evolutionary standpoint." *blank stare emoji* Later, there's a pan over of three tribe mates weaving palm frond things together down by the beach in the hot hot heat, and the Bostonian social media marketer gets heatstroke/panic attacked and has to lay down in the shelter. Like, do people actually not understand that the sun is hot? I didn't grow up in the snow but I wouldn't wander around doing crafts in a blizzard with a shorts and t-shirt. Whatever. She kept saying "I wish you guys would have met me at home. I wish you guys would have met me...." and patting their legs. Neal Ice Cream is staring at her and all he's hearing is Jeff saying "Brains tribe, I've got nothing for you. I'll see you at tribal." However, the best part of this is Crazy Debbie is actually super nice and sympathetic to Aubry and takes care of her in the shelter. Maybe she'll be like Holly from Nicaragua who threw Dan's shoes in the ocean and then magically stayed around to repent and make friends.  Have crazy, will vote with you in this show.

Lastly, there are adventures with the beauty tribe.

A little more of the wind machine, please?

This is the best group shot I could get of these fools. We have the yellow beautiful Gondol tribe. I looked up everybody's names and stuff and couldn't remember who goes with whom. Anna, a professional poker player is who is not about using her lady assets to win at things. Caleb, an army veteran and an expert chicken-catcher. He should go on America's Got Talent if he doesn't win this million dollars. Julia, a college student. Snooze. Michelle, a bartender. Nick, a personal trainer who looks like he had a small part in an 80's movie as the rival team's quarterback or something. Tai, a gardener who is already my favorite person on any of the three beaches and climbs a tree to get coconuts like a little Vietnamese tree frog. Seriously, he's awesome. Throughout the afternoon, the girls weave palm fronds and the men chop things. Then Tai goes to look for an idol and everyone freaks out and says he's untrustworthy. I'm not sure if any of them have ever seen Survivor before, because the fact that he didn't pretend he was just checking out the scenery probably means he's more trustworthy than anyone else on the tribe. And everyone should be looking for idols at ALL TIMES. Calm down, everyone.

Ok, that's enough making friends. It's time for this:

First challenge time!

"Come on in, guys." The sounds of Jeff saying his same lines over and over could lull me to sleep. But I wouldn't want it to, because that would be creepy.

So the teams have to dive off a platform to untie knots to release a boat, row the boat to shore and dock it on a ramp, and then either do a puzzle or shoot something at something. Spoiler, no one chose to shoot something at something, so I didn't pay attention to it. The teams divide up the tasks. Over at Brawn, Darnell the postal worker says he's a good diver. Are you sure? Yeah yeah I can do it. Dunh dunh dunh. Alecia is designated to do the puzzle, she says she's no good at puzzles. Not with that attitude you can't, is what she's told. Dunh dunh dunh. Blue jumps in, yellow jumps in, red jumps in, all madness is happening as the teams try to do stuff. Darnell jumps in and immediately loses the goggles that the entire team has to use. They fall behind as they struggle to untie knots underwater. Beauty and Brains pull ahead and are rowing their boats to shore. Brawn finally finishes and are rowing like crazy. Alecia doesn't have an oar but is heroically scooping water behind her with her bare hands. The other two teams reach the shore but have trouble pushing their boats up the ramp to dock. Red catches up; Jason the tatted bounty hunter jumps out of the boat and pulls the boat the last bit to shore. Brawn manages to live up to their name and get their boat docked before the other two teams, teasing a comeback. They get to the puzzle first. Jen the bug lady and Alecia "Blondie" start if off. And by that I mean, Jen starts putting puzzle pieces in and Alecia watches. Her team tells her to tag out and she runs back saying, "I said I was no good at puzzles." Sigh. Aubry and Liz are on the puzzle for Brains, Julia and Anna for Beauty. The censoring team at CBS fails us they pan over the two of them. There's cheering, jeering, puzzling and - Brains wins immunity!

When I win on Hollywood Game Night, I want Jeff to pop out doing this.

It's neck and neck between yellow and red, piece after piece going in. They're so close, they've almost done it - Beauty wins by a hair! According to the editing. Brawn is sent a-packing to discuss who to get the boot.

Back at red camp, people immediately start apologizing. Alecia says she's sorry she sucks at puzzles, Darnell says he basically lost the challenge for them by not understanding the physics of water hitting a pair of goggles. Pretty much everyone is ready to write Darnell, but Cydney, the lady-muscle, says she wants Darnell around because they bonded earlier over being the same color. RED. Geez. Pretty much everyone says either Darnell or Alecia and they'll probably decide at Tribal Council. Which is always a good idea.

"Welcome to your first Tribal council in this game fire represents your life blah blah" is pretty much verbatim from Probst. He questions them with pointed questions and people say Darnell's dumb and Alecia had a defeatist attitude. She defends, saying she's not super strong but she's a mental giant and the game won't beat her down. For some reason, Cydney is looking annoyed and shaking her head. Probst calls her out because he loves making people feel uncomfortable and I don't even remember what she says, except it's something like "I'm writing Alecia." Darnell says he's sorry, he used to be a lifeguard but he forgot about goggles and he grew up poor in Chicago and then he starts crying. Alecia is like, Are we already supposed to cry?! Bug-Jen says when Darnell talks about starting with nothing, she understands and it hits her hard. I'm nervous about the direction things are taking. "It's time to vote." Alicia tries to write Darnell but forgets to take the cap off the pen. Cydney votes for "Allicia" and says she is starting to irk her soul, a lot. Geez, Cyd. Let's read the votes. Alecia. Darnell. Allicia. Darnell. Allychia. Darnell. It's a tie! In our very first Tribal Council! Yay! Make them solve differential equations! They just revote. This time one person changes their vote to -

Good appropriately solemn face, Probst.

Aw. I actually kind of like Darnell. Even though generally I hate when people take responsibility for losing, it was basically his fault and he was owning up and the first week is so nit-picky it really says nothing about him as a player. If he dropped the goggles 15 days later it wouldn't even matter. But someone had to go out the first week and it was Darnell, signing off.

Whew. That was epic. Extra runtime plus lots of introductions plus the phrase "Brown trout!" made for a very long first recap. However, next week promises even more shad via Cydney, more starving, more looking for idols, and Asian gardeners trying to kiss Beast Mode Cowboys. Tune in next time!