Survivor: Samoa, As I See It – Bitter Jury = Bad Vote

Normally on Survivor finale Sunday, when a football game goes over the time allotted, I get frustrated because I am waiting for Survivor to start. This last Sunday I hoped the game would go into overtime and the Bengals would come out of their doldrums. That being said, once the Bengals lost, the night of television went steadily downhill.

Last Thursday, we saw Shambo join the jury. You may or may not have liked Shambo – she was different, she was an oddball, but somehow she added that bit of spice to the program that made her funny to watch. I think “Shamblicious” is my favorite new word. Some may say that it is strange for a woman to have the same hairstyle for over 25 years, but it obviously works for her.

My complaint about Shambo and the game of Survivor is the one I have had all along. Even when she was sent packing, Shambo still did not understand the game at all. She still thought that those who worked the hardest deserved to be finalists. Although we all know that working around camp is a plus in Survivor, Shambo thought it was the only way to win the game.

I will say that Russell did the right thing when questioned about who was going home; his comment was something to the effect that sometimes you have to vote out a friend. I liked that Shambo went out gracefully; her parting comments were cool, calm, and collected, and she wasn’t mad at anyone. That in itself speaks for Shambo. She knew she had been beaten and took it like a champ. There was no thought of retribution, only kudos for those who had beaten her.

I wish I could say the same for the rest of the jury. While Russell was undoubtedly one of the best Survivor players ever, this was one of the worst juries ever. They were oddly reminiscent of the jury that voted to give Amber the prize instead of Boston Rob, even though he had outplayed and outwitted all of them.

Before I get started on my rant (and it will be a rant because I feel a severe injustice has happened), let’s look at the final five.

Who the heck is Brett and where did he come from, was a question viewers were asking for the past two weeks. Had he truly been “sandbagging” all along, and just staying in the background? We saw nothing at all of Brett during the whole season until the last three episodes. Were the producers trying to make us think a dark horse was going to come galloping along and take the whole thing? Whatever the reason may be, I was glad that Brett lost the final immunity challenge for the simple reason that he did not belong there.

Next we have Jaison, who moaned, complained, and bitched throughout the whole season. Several of the tribe(s) noted that Jaison had “checked out” early on. We viewers only saw a part of it, but I saw nothing that indicated Jaison was a contributing member of the cast. His annoyance with Russell at being voted out may have been justified in that he wanted to be informed that his days were numbered, but that wasn’t Russell’s way.

Mick was a non-contributor also during the whole season. If Mick had an original thought during his days on Samoa, we sure weren’t privy to it. At one time there was some discussion between Mick and Jaison regarding getting rid of Russell, however neither of them had any clue or “oomph” (instead of the word I’m thinking of) to do so. It was pointed out to Mick during the jury questioning that, although he was chosen as the leader of Foa Foa, he did no leading. Mick was almost as much of a non-entity as Brett. The only reason we knew he was there was because he was on the tribe that kept losing.

Natalie was Russell’s puppet from day one. Everything we saw Natalie do or not do was orchestrated by Russell. When he told her to make nice with the Galu women, she did; when he told her to plant the seed to get rid of Erik, she did. For her to claim to the jury that her strategy was to align with someone strong and let him take the bullet was, in Shambo’s vernacular, “B.S.”