RNO Roundtable: The Survivor Thailand Preview and Predictions

It's time once again for the article you've all been waiting for (well, at least the three of you who e-mailed me have been waiting for it) - the time when we poll the great minds here at RealityNewsOnline and see what we all have to say about the next edition of Survivor.

This year, we have less to go on than usual. No reliable spoilers as of yet as to who will be the first to go. Heck, we don't even know how the tribes will be divided! And you can be Mark Burnett has some additional twists and turns planned. Still, we are going to tackle this headfirst, and see where it takes us. As usual, we have opening comments, thoughts about each player, and then some final predictions. Not everybody contributed to every part, so you'll see some names pop up in one place but not another. And, as usual, those who did contribute often disagree. All total, we have contributions from (in alphabetical order): David Bloomberg, Jason Borelli, Jeffrey Clinard, Ken Kellam III, Peggy Keller, Phil Kural, Susan Schechter, and Andrea Shuman. Let's see what everybody has to say:

Andrea: Based solely on the info CBS has given us so far, I can't believe RealityNewsOnline's Grand Poo-Bahs want to know who I think will win Survivor Thailand. Let me state for the record that it takes a minimum of three episodes for me to differentiate between all the blondes in a new cast. Four, if there are any blonde men. And five if there are two guys with different variations of the name "Robert." By the sixth episode, I'm usually okay, unless someone's committed a particularly wince-worthy error in voting strategy. Then I turn off the TV and start pounding my head against the wall.

So, who's going to win Survivor Thailand? Beats the heck outta me. Do I look like a psychic? If I knew that, I'd be on my way Vegas where I'd bet my 401(k) fund, and retire to some island paradise.

Please don't force me answer questions that'll make me look like a fool in 16 weeks. My self-esteem is low enough as it is. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to the Survivor webpage to count the number of this season's Roberts and blondes.

Jeff: Well, they keep saying that there will be a twist from the start, so I'm not expecting anything other than the unexpected. My guess is that they'll shove them all into one tribe from the start and randomly, or according to a preset condition, such as their sex, force them to compete against each other for each challenge. The losing group goes off to tribal council to banish one of their group. My own logic behind this guess is that it would make alliances very tricky, particularly if one or two get separated by a challenge and are stuck with enemy alliances and independents at tribal council. They wouldn't be able to rely in the safety of numbers.

Susan: I am leery when they say this will be the best series yet. They said that about S3, which was the weakest of all Survivors. The rumor has it the twist will be the boys vs. the girls. If this comes out to be true, then everyone's predictions can get messed up. In past Survivors the golden rule was to cull the weakest members first, then at the merge, to cull the strongest ones. My views are based on this theory. If the twist turns out to be something absolutely brain numbingly brilliant that no one has foreseen, all these views except who will be in the final four are moot.

This group of players should be very savvy with the rules of play, and know about twists and double-twists. They also know what failed for other players, and what works. Hence, a Robfather isn't going to work here. A Gabe type personality may last a bit longer and get to the jury. Wearing your cards on your sleeve turned out to be Tammy's undoing, and I am sure people will be a bit more savvy regarding that - so the whole tribe doesn't do a 180 like in S4. People will be more observant of the Neleh personalities and the Vee types. And of course, I hope that a strategy like Kathy had, where she really had no entangling alliances, works to bring one to victory this time. She was so close, yet so far.

Peggy: I have no expectations of Survivor Thailand. I am looking forward to all new challenges and twists. Remember, all we are going on are the bios, so I expect to be very, very wrong.

Ken: There are an overwhelming number of contestants this time who are from or now live in warm-weather states, with Texas alone claiming connections to six of them. This may as well be called "Survivor Sunbelt." Now, since it looks like they will be one big feudin' family from day one, everyone will get a chance to get on everyone else's nerves from day one. If this had been done in the first edition, imagine the clashes between B.B. and Sue or Rich. Or in S2, maybe Jerri would've gone sooner, because she would've had the opportunity to annoy even more people from the get-go. Again, the producers have changed the game, hopefully for the better. Please feel free to forget about these predictions once the show starts. Does ANYTHING ever follow form in Survivor?

Phil: Well, I've been thinking a lot about S5 and the only real conclusion that I can come to is this: The only one I think it will be better than is Survivor: Africa. Why do I have these feelings? Oh, just call it a hunch because the people do not really look all that diverse this time. I could be wrong, and maybe they are the most intriguing people ever, but it does not look that way. The one thing that could make this Survivor interesting is the way the tribes start out, with the girls on one side and the guys on the other. If that's the case, and this is not a trick, then this game could get very interesting.