Survivor: All-Stars – Why Colby Lost

This past week, I was working on the Reality TV Hall of Fame induction for Tina Wesson, Colby’s old alliance partner from their days in the Australian Outback. In doing so, I was revisiting some of what went on back then – how Colby was annoyed by Keith but kept him around, how he won so many individual challenges, and of course, how he lost and was recognized with a Reality TV Hall of Shame Moment for deciding to bring Tina into the Final 2 rather than Keith. It was easy to explain how he lost back then – he made the wrong choice, and Tina won over the jury for her strategy and personality. Is it as easy to explain his loss this time, on All-Stars? There’s only one way to find out, so let’s get to it.

As always, we will be basing our discussion on What All-Star Survivors Definitely Should Have Learned, which, of course, starts by telling players about scheming and plotting. Colby definitely knew how to do this – he did it in Australia and he did it on All-Stars. In fact, he even plotted the demise of the master, Rich Hatch. He formed a power-bloc of himself, Ethan (who he had saved from being voted off), and Lex. At least, he thought he had done that. As it turned out, Lex – a grand schemer in his own right – doubled back on him.

So what else might Colby have been able to do to outscheme Lex? Well, for one thing he shouldn’t have simply assumed Lex was in, which he did when talking to Ethan. He also should not have essentially shut the door on Shii Ann, leaving Lex as the one to talk to her. He was acting in too much of a kingly mode, sending Lackey Lex around to inform the serfs how the vote would go. He did it for Rich’s ouster, and the women commented then about how they didn’t like it. He did it again this time and it left him vulnerable to the scheming of his underlings. Maybe if he had gone to talk to them face to face, things might have turned out differently, maybe not. But for one thing, Lex might not have found it so easy to go off alone with Jerri and then Shii Ann. As it stood, he had the excuse that Colby had sent him. And maybe a direct conversation would have shown a bit of respect for Jerri and Shii Ann – even if he didn’t feel it – that would have caused them to reconsider voting him out. Certainly we don’t know for sure, for he made it easy for the others to scheme against him.

What about plotting and scheming too much? Well, we just noted how he switched the vote from Ethan to Rich earlier on. I would suggest that if he had kept Rich and stuck by the original plan, he would still be around. They would have voted off Ethan first. Then Ethan wouldn’t have been able to screw up the challenge. But even if they had still lost, Jerri would have been the next obvious target. Sure, it’s possible that Lex might have still tried something, but I think it’s less likely with Rich still there. Also, as mentioned above, Colby wouldn’t have seemed as much like a King sending out a decree, but rather like a team player. Obviously it’s impossible to say for certain what would have happened, but I think if Colby had just stuck to the original plan rather than stabbing Rich in the back before he needed to, he’d have been better off. He certainly couldn’t have been worse off.

Colby managed to have a problem with the third rule as well. Mostly, Colby is a nice guy. But he allowed his annoyance to show through several times. The times that mattered were when he made it obvious that he still had no use for Jerri and when he attacked Shii Ann’s method of play. This set up a situation where both knew they were on the outs with him and had no reason to go along with his plans.

Everybody knows that Colby doesn’t like Jerri. The feeling is apparently mutual. But just as Jerri made a change in her behavior (at least what we saw – Colby felt differently about it), Colby could have also made a change to hide his feelings about her. And as for what he said to Shii Ann, well, he obviously truly believed it, but why open himself up like that and tell her? There was simply no reason.

Where Colby really failed was in the one area he couldn’t do anything about: Don’t be too much of a threat. To date, most of the threats who have been voted off were strategic threats, such as Rich Hatch and Rob Cesternino. But with individual challenges looming near in the minds of his tribemates, Colby was a different type of threat. Indeed, he actually could be considered a double-threat, since he did work some good strategy his first time around, though whether it was his own or Tina’s may never really be answered. But the point here is that Colby’s past came back to haunt him. Nobody could forget the fact that he won so many challenges in the Outback, and was likely to do so again. It’s like Lex said, this was the perfect opportunity to get rid of him before he became unstoppable.

Colby did succeed in the sixth rule, which is to avoid being lazy. I don’t think Colby has a lazy bone in his body. So we’ll move on.

Seventh, we look at flexibility. Giving credit where it’s due, Colby did think flexibly when Ethan showed up – perhaps too flexibly, as we’ve discussed above. But whether we agree with his decision or not, at least he wasn’t locked in to a single alliance, but was trying to better his position and roll with the twists.

Finally, let’s look at whether his tribe made the right decision. Normally, you’d want to still aim for the weak at this point since the merge has not yet occurred. That said, I really can’t fault them for taking out the strong. They figure that the merge will be coming soon, and they had a chance to take out Colby, the individual challenge king. They took that opportunity. If they lose one more challenge, they can take out Ethan next, so they have a buffer. Or maybe Shii Ann can get her way and get rid of Jerri. But either way, new leader Lex and his main cohorts Kathy and Shii Ann should be safe until the merge. And who knows what might happen then. If I were in Lex’s shoes (or Shii Ann’s or Jerri’s), I would have done the same thing.

Once again, we come to the end of an article looking at why somebody lost and once again we arrive at a similar reason: Colby was a threat. But that’s not the only reason. Colby was a threat who might have been able to make it to the merge if he hadn’t acted like King of Mogo Mogo. He schemed and plotted too much for his own good, and to make it worse, he didn’t go about it in the right way. When you add those reasons as side dishes to the main entrée of being a huge threat, and add in the dessert that he made at least two people in his tribe feel like outsiders, you have a menu for why Colby lost.

David Bloomberg is the Editor of RealityNewsOnline and can be reached at RNO@pobox.com.

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