I know you want it in the game....but I really liked it when the Immunity Idols were much harder to find.

If people are able to find Idols without clues....then it is too easy.

Ozzy: "When you see a bunch of rocks laying in a tree, you know there's probably an immunity idol there."

Missed the first 20 minutes or so. Did someone find an idol? I only saw the girl who got voted off found a clue.

Production told Ozzy where the idol was, he now has one.

Ozzy found the idol without the clues.

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Production told Ozzy where the idol was, he now has one

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I'm beginning to think this is the case.

Seriously....this is getting comical. How many seasons is this now that they have found them without clues? Rob found one....Russell found 1,000,000....it's almost stupid to even have clues now if they're going to make it so easy or have production tell the players.

I doubt production's telling them where they are, but it's become obvious that they'll be hidden inside something that looks oddly placed. Once people know what to look for, it can't be that hard, especially since their camp can't be that big.

I wish they'd just bury it, and give clues as to where to dig. that way, it takes some skill finding the clues, and you have to be inconspicuous when digging for it. adds some strategy as to when/how you look for them.

What season was it where they had the idols hidden on the island and the clues took them all over the place and the survivor had to choose between looking for the idol or getting back to safety before dark.

They've had them on Exile Island before....is that what you're referring to?

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I wish they'd just bury it, and give clues as to where to dig. that way, it takes some skill finding the clues, and you have to be inconspicuous when digging for it. adds some strategy as to when/how you look for them.

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Great Point.

Remember the season with Yau Man and Earl and the great strategy the two had to lead the rest of the team away from camp while Yau Man stayed behind and found it.

Its just seems too easy nowadays.

They should hide several idols around but only one that is the real immunity idol. The clues wouldn't be about location but hints as to which one was real.

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Its just seems too easy nowadays

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there's no doubt the producers want the idol in play as early as possible. It shouldn't be impossible to find, but at least make them work for it.

I wondered why the teacher and mortician (can't remember names yet) didn't point to Brendan when they were being grilled about whether they wanted to vote out Mikayla. The best thing you can do when the targets on you is to put it on someone else. Saying something like "I've never said anything about voting you out, Mikayla, but you know who did? Brendan". That would have immediately turned the attention to him and outed him as a liar, if nothing else, and possibly worse, a snake. may not have made a difference in the vote, since that was probably set, but it still would have created some tension in the tribe and started pitting other people against each other. that may still happen now, but only because brendan was dumb enough to offer up that it was him.

that kid seriously does not need to be on tv. he has no idea who he is and being on survivor is not going to help that. also, never trust a guy who has "loco" tattooed on his neck. he might have matured, but being more mature than when you got "loco" tattooed to your neck isn't saying much. he needs to be the next to go.

I'm liking Sophie's game so far. She's very far down on the radar, but she obviously knows what's going on. she needs to sit back, keep her alliances with strong people and wait til the merge to make waves.

on ozzy's tribe, it certainly seems like there's gonna be a power struggle very soon. jim doesn't seem to have a good sense that he's not actually running things. I think he either needs to be more subtle or make sure he has enough real support before he starts going after the powerful people. I don't get the sense that he has that strong of an alliance right now with anyone.

cochran needs to put his head down and do as well as he can in the challenges and around camp while slowly building some relationships with the power alliance. I'm not sure he can do that, but if he can worm his way to the merge, he could also be dangerous. not sure he'll get there though.

I think Cochran's best chance is the merge....period. I don't think he'll be able to worm an alliance with this group, but with his lack of physical threat, but possibly being good at the strategy part of it he might work his way to a final 5/final 4 kind of thing and pull a rabbit out of the hat.

Brandon definitely is battling something from his past. His fear/anger towards mikayla was just odd.

Other Coach also impressed me this week at tribal, he could definitely be a formidable player.

Brandon has issues. No question about it.

He doesn't like Mikayla because it makes his privates feel funny, and he doesn't want to lust over her but he can't help it.

Oh, and you think they put the Idol in a tree because Ozzy was likely to look there?

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The Savaii tribe’s comeback in the immunity challenge during Wednesday’s episode of Survivor South Pacific happened because the tribe figured out the puzzle part of the challenge before the challenge even began.

First, some background: After Probst gives his brief introduction of a challenge, the cameras stop and he, challenge producer John Kirhoffer, and a CBS standards and practices representative walk through the challenge with each tribe separately; the CBS rep makes sure Probst says the same thing to each tribe so neither has an advantage. They can ask questions and have a lot of time to strategize, since they stand off to the side while the other tribe gets the tour.

EW’s Dalton Ross asked Probst about Savaii’s comeback, and Probst acknowledged that “The pre-challenge walk through is critical because if you are aware you can pick up clues to how the challenge is going to play and also who should do which portion,” but he also says, “As for studying a puzzle, we don’t give them enough time to figure out anything truly significant, but in terms of gaining an edge? Absolutely.”

But the Savaii tribe had enough time to figure out something very significant: how to solve the puzzle. That’s according to Jim Rice, who wrote on Twitter, “We had that puzzle figured out before Probst said go, knew what to do, 0 hesitation, 0 wrong moves.”

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http://www.realityblurred.com/realitytv/archives/survivor_south_pacific/2011_Sep_23_puzzle-solving

Interesting. Good for them. Not an unfair advantage.

Bump for tonight

Has Brandon moved into the top 10 weirdos/loose canons of all time?

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Brandon Hantz said, "I just let my flesh get a hold of me"; maybe if he got a hold of his flesh more frequently this wouldn't be a problem?

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He's not very smart, at all.

He's exposed more about himself in 2 episodes than Russel did in 2+seasons.

Why is it that when someone tells another person they have the idol, that person doesn't immediately stage a coup to vote their a$$ off? They know Ozzie is dumb enough to not play it, why not eliminate the biggest physical threat?

Because it's a team game right now and Ozzy is great at challenges.

I'm already sick of 'Lil Hantz constantly referencing his Christianity. His point to the heavens on the ride back on the body board made me want to dropkick my TV.

He is so over the top....could it possibly be a bit? He's making himself just weird enough to keep around and be "the other guy" that everybody wants to take to the finals with them.

One hole in my own argument is anytime you get caught lying (the whole vote for Machayla thing) it can lead to an automatic exit. I don't know...it just seems so goofy that I'm having a hard time registering it as being real.

Another question is; did casting just automatically say yes to him because of the Russell connection? He's making for good TV at the moment but there's just something telling me that he wouldn't have been cast if that relation wasn't there.

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...it just seems so goofy that I'm having a hard time registering it as being real.

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Have you seen his tattoos? Those are a giveaway sign that he is a complete dumbass and this is real.

Re Ozzy/immunity idol- it's obvious why you keep Ozzy in the fold at this point (idol or not), but those things can be an asset for team use at an even merge. Ozzy has shared that he has an idol, which indicates he might be willing to use it beyond personal use only to get his alliance, and thus himself farther in the game. Rob did not share the same with anyone on his time last season, right? If not, huge difference. Also huge difference in Keith running to tell someone immediately- Rob had those kids under such lockdown last year each would have kept it to themselves if he told.

Weird as it seems, I'm digging Coach's game right now. Playing peacemaker, not going on too many bizarro rants (at least none televised) and he really did kick some ass at the last challenge.

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EW: Do you ever want to exercise any sort of veto power over self-appointed nicknames? For example, I have to imagine you felt a tad awkward having to say, “Papa Bear, the tribe has spoken.”

JP: Dalton, you’re a funny dude and pretty aware. I think Papa Bear was the toughest of all the nicknames we’ve had on the show. Something about it just felt slightly wrong, or like I was saying something that was not quite appropriate for Survivor.

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Is Probst not doing a blog this year?

He's doing some kind of "interactive living room" video blog bullsh that is probably being mostly ignored. Too bad, I always really liked his post-ep blog at EW. He got pretty dooooshy last season though by getting all defensive about RI and the Rob/Russell return, so it's probably for the best that he quit it anyway.

From the "where there's smoke, there might be fire" files...

Internet rumor is that next season, the initial tribes are men vs. women, but they are living on the same beach. Would set up a lot of post-merge drama early, since people are interacting and able to make side alliances with the opposite tribe early, rather than bunkering down and sticking to tribal alliances post-merge. RI dumped for the return of reward challenges, to increase the tension of the two tribes living on the same beach.

Any thoughts? I think it amps up the social aspect significantly. The only downside I see is boring challenges to create fairness between men and women, similar to what we saw in the young vs. old concept.

I like the men vs women idea. The challenges are fun to watch, but they aren't the main reason I tune in. (I rarely rewind to watch a challenge, but will for the plotting/drama). So even if they have more mental and less physical challenges, that would be fine with me.


As an aside, I'm impressed with how flexible Survivor is and how it continues to try new idea 10 years in (even if they don't work like RI)