Survivor Episodes

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Episode 1: Quest for Fire

Challenge:
    A symbolic race for fire held on the Sand Spit, an s-shaped sand bar located one mile off Pulau Tiga. The object was to alternately float and carry a cauldron of fire from a position 50 yards offshore to the finish line, which was delineated by a 20-foot high Fire Spirit. In addition, teams had to light a succession of torches between start and finish, with the winner being the first to light all their torches and the Fire Spirit.
Winning Tribe Gets: Immunity and 50 waterproof matches
Winning Tribe: Pagong

The Vote:
    Sonja- Dirk, Rudy, Sean, Susan
    Rudy- Kelley, Sonja, Stacey
    Stacey- Richard

My comments:
From the time that the casts land on the shore you can already see people getting on each other’s nerves which is not good if one wants to stay the whole time. It seems that on both beaches that the young members are not getting along with the older members and this is shown with the kicking off of Sonja. For being a first episode of a new show this show is already showing the promise of being a great show.

What CBS had to say about the episode:
    No one said living 39 days on a deserted tropical island was going to be easy. But after three days in their new island home, the sixteen men and women of Survivor are experiencing a test beyond their imaginings. "Going in I thought this was going to be tough," notes Sue Hawk, a 38-year old truck driver from Wisconsin and member of Survivor's Tagi tribe. "But the hardest part, though, is the people. You gotta make them like you or they'll vote you off."
    Jenna Whitney, a single mom from New Hampshire and member of Survivor's Pagong tribe, seconded the notion. "We'll adapt to jungle living - it's hard but we have to. The real trick is proving to others that you belong on the island."
    Survivor's premise is simple: maroon sixteen normal Americans -- men and women chosen from all walks of life -- on the island of Pulau Tiga, twenty miles off the coast of Borneo. Once every three days the castaways gather to vote one of their own off the island. The last person left wins a million dollars.
    Over 6,000 applicants flooded CBS with videotapes explaining why they should be selected. That number was whittled to 800, then 48, then the final 16 (with two alternates). After medical and psychological testing, the Survivors were flown to the Bornean city of Kota Kinabalu. Then the fun began.
    The castaways were separated into two tribes named after their respective beaches, Tagi and Pagong. The tribes were marooned two miles off the coast of the island of Pulau Tiga. They used rafts to go ashore. On Pagong's raft, Gretchen Cordy, the 38-year old "soccer mom" from Tennessee did the lion's share of the paddling.
    Jenna, Pagong's cheerleader, wore a hot pink bikini. Forgetting that the world's highest concentration of sea snakes thrives in the water off Pulau Tiga, she breastroked behind the raft, singing "Welcome to the Jungle" at the top of her lungs.
Getting Acquainted
    Tagi hit the beach and immediately began working - all but Richard Hatch. The corporate trainer from Newport, Rhode Island, a Falstaffian figure who had already taken to going shirtless, sat in a tree while his fellow tribe members worked. (Kelly and Rudy about Richard) (Rich about himself)
    Sue called up to him in the tree, telling him to come down and work. It was hard to tell if she amused or angry with Richard. "Come on down, Richard." But he wouldn't move. Stacey, standing a few feet away, rolled her eyes at Richard.
    Pagong, on the other hand, spent little time working. Gretchen,who'd taught military survival training before leaving the service to have children, cringed when 62-year old BB Anderson chose an oceanfront location. "We're going to get really wet at high tide with this spot," she warned.
    Friendships were already forming. Gervase and Ramona, as the island's two African-Americans, agreed never to vote one another off. Greg Buis was winning the hearts of Jenna and Colleen with his irreverent antics. He was the island's counterculture hero, at least in his own eyes. He saw his job as keeping everything hip and flippant.
    As day turned to night, neither tribe was entirely settled (though Tagi had constructed a magnificent latrine) and neither had fire for cooking a hot meal. With rats and snakes beginning their nocturnal beach invasion, the sixteen brave men and women settled down for a night of fitful rest.
Immunity
    Pagong got fire on Day Two. Gretchen used BB's thick prescription lenses as a magnifying glass to start a flame. Tagi, though they tried several frantic methods, could not start a fire. (Gretchen and Sonja about their respective teams' efforts to start fire.)
    Thus the evening's Immunity Challenge (an intertribal competition to decide which tribe would vote a member off the following night at the first Tribal Council) carried heft. Fire, an easily accessible afterthought back home, was suddenly vital to life.
    The Challenge was held that night on a small sand spit just offshore. The castaways arrived to find a dual row of torches, starting thirty yards offshore, where two floating crucibles filled with flames bobbed. The torches wandered up onto the beach, ending at the base of the Fire Spirit, a fifteen foot tall scarecrow-like structure.
    Host Jeff Probst explained the rules: both teams would swim out to their raft. Every member must keep hold of the raft at all times. On his command they would light the torch in the crucible then, guiding their raft, light every torch. Once they reached the beach they would heave the raft to the burning man. First team to light the Fire Spirit won.
Pagong won.
    Tagi would march through the jungle to Tribal Council the following night. All of Pagong was safe for another three days.
The Vote:
    The Tribal Council fire pit is located in the middle of Pulau Tiga's fierce jungle. Tagi counted six yellow-lipped kraits on their mile-long trek to Tribal Council at the end of Day Three. "The snakes we can see aren't what scares me," Sean Kenniff joked. "It's the snakes we can't see that bother me, because I know they're out there."
    "I really think Stacey and Richard are this week's stories," Executive Producer Mark Burnett noted later. "The very essence of Survivor is adapting to one's surroundings, and Richard, who began his stay on the island as an object of ridicule for his attempts to hold a Tagi Beach group therapy session, demonstrated that brilliantly. He escaped being voted off. Stacey, on the other hand, attempted to organize a women's coalition to oust Rudy, but was double-crossed by Susan, who clearly does not like her. Richard voted against Stacey at the Tribal council. Stacey now has two of the more formidable castaways gunning for her. She is at risk unless she can adapt - and quickly."
    Susan's keen eye for the Survivor game's nuances empowered her to do two things: first, ignore Stacey. Rudy and Richard were overbearing and out of step at times, but their strength and endurance made them necessary for future Immunity Challenges. Second - and along the same lines – she decided to get rid of the tribe's weak link. A female coalition was a fine idea, but lacked common sense. Sue told Stacey she was voting one of the guys off, all the while gunning for one of the women.
    It was stumbling Sonja who received four votes and was told to leave Pulau Tiga. Her departure was setting the tone for Survivor - in less than three days the castaways were proving savvy and adaptable to island living. Sonja's departure signaled that Tagi now put a premium on competitive ability at Immunity Challenges. Warm and well-liked Sonja was a physical liability.



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