Survivor Winner and how they rank
I was instantly hooked on Survivor after watching Episode 4 of Pulau Tiga. By the time Survivor aired on ntv7, the rest of the world have already watched Richard Hatch won the million, everyone except us Malaysians, that is. Too ironic, considering that the show was shot on our very own Pulau Tiga in the first place. Anyway, that didn’t deter me from watching the show, because watching how the show unravels is more than half the fun (and sometimes, even more so than finding out who won the game). It’s been 9 seasons now and 9 different winners. It’s time for a quick ranking of the Survivor Winners before the 10th season starts in a couple of days.
9. Vecepia (Survivor Marquesas)
Perhaps the most boring reality show winner ever. Initially, I was furious to see Mark Burnett edit a winner in such a way. Boring. Quiet. No Drama. I mean, it’s one thing to misdirect viewers from a winner, but to make a winner seem so BLEH?? (There’s no other words to describe her). Okay, so perhaps editing played a big part in her ranking at the bottom of my list. Perhaps her best move in the game but keeping a journal that helped her win the crucial “Fallen Comrades” challenge, AND breaking her alliance with Kathy at the Final Three. Good move indeed. However, she quickly dropped to the bottom of my barrel in her post show interview where she defended her move by saying (paraphrasing) “it’s not okay to lie, but i lied and asked for forgiveness afterwards and now God has forgiven me”. She uses her religious beliefs according to her convenience, and I don’t care much for hyprocritical boring bitch who accidentally wins the million dollars.
8. Amber (Survivor All Stars)
Putting Amber near the bottom rank doesn’t mean I don’t like her. I like Amber. She’s super hot. Perhaps the most beautiful Survivor contestant ever to grace the show.. there’s no contest. Her natural beauty is just amazing (yeah, YOU try to look that good on a stranded island without makeup for 39 days). But we’re not here to talk about her attractiveness. As a Survivor player, she was Jerri’s little lamb in the Outback. And in All Stars, she was Boston Rob’s. Same diff. So what? Throughout the show, I fooled myself into thinking that Amber was stringing Boston Rob all along, which would make her a SUPERB strategist and player - playing the Good Cop Bad Cop angle would’ve been an awesome strategy. She could’ve easily ended up in my Top 3 Survivor Winners list. But it’s evident from post show interviews, that what Boston Rob and Amber had was real. They were truly in love, and that proved once and for all, that Amber has and always will be a lamb. In other words, she had no real game plan.
7. Ethan (Survivor Africa)
Ethan was a hot favourite among viewers in his season to win the game. And he did! For once, Mark Burnett gave the audience a huge treat. Ethan was a good player, not incredible, but good. His win was solely based on two factors : His likeability factor and his strong 4-way alliance that carried him all the way to the end. Ethan played a great game, or I think the more appropriate word to use is a “SAFE” game. He cruised easily to the end and possibly his most biggest mistake was his response to Brandon’s jury question. That was cocky. He could’ve won the game on a 6-1 vote.
6. Jenna (Survivor Amazon)
Yeah, I can’t believe Jenna is right up here at Number Six. When Jenna was announced as the winner (with a 6-1 vote at that!), I was furious and immediately dubbed the jury as the worst jury ever. However, I now firmly believe the editing team did some injustice to Jenna’s character to throw off Chill One’s spoiler going around at that time. Certainly, the outcome WAS unimaginable (especially with Christy voting for her evil stepsister). It dawned on me, there’s a reason why the jury didn’t vote for Matt and voted for Jenna. Jenna reminded me that Survivor was a social game. It doesn’t matter who anyone else thinks about your character, the people you have to impress to win the game are the seven people on the jury. And that’s exactly what Jenna did. She proved that the social aspects of the game is equally important to win the game, not just the strategizing and backstabbing.
5. Sandra (Survivor Pearl Islands)
Initially, I wasn’t convinced of her “As long as it ain’t me” strategy. But that truly seemed like her real strategy. During the first few days, she can be seen in Rupert’s ‘groupie’ and was touted as coasting her way through the game. But one of her response to a jury question brilliantly questioned back the validity of that theory: (paraphrasing) “Rupert was voted out several Tribal Councils ago. Who’s coat tail am I riding on now (to reach the Final Two)?”. Sandra’s brutally honest, speaks her mind, switched alliances and lied when she had to. I didn’t think such an aggressive personality could win this game, but she did. (And on the topic of her lie, she lied to Johnny Fairplay - a scumbag - when she was provoked, which I personally think was dismissable, unlike Twila’s lie which she ‘volunteered’ to Leann and Ami).
4. Brian (Survivor Thailand)
Brian was Richard Hatch incarnate. People viewed this season as boring, and I can’t blame them because of the straight Pagonging of the Sook Jai tribe. However, I think Brian carefully studied for this game, using Richard’s strategy and refined it in such a way that he really played his remaining 4 alliance members like a fiddle, and none of them knew what hit them. He’s a good strategist, he’s deceptive and he’s a good liar. Did you have any doubt that a used car salesman was gonna win this game? I surely didn’t.
3. Chris (Survivor Vanuatu)
Chris was an awesome player. Awesome. He understood the core key to winning the game. It’s all about adaptability. Chris reminds me of Charlotte from the first season of Survivor UK. They were both in the minority coming into the merge, and they both won by a landslide. Talk about the ultimate underdog (and we all have a soft spot for this group of players). Chris worked his way against the odds by adapting to his current situation. What made me put Chris this high up in the ranking is his superb performance during the Final Tribal Council. Facing the jruy, you have to say what the jury want to hear, because that’s all that matters in the end. AND more importantly, Chris was a superb player to me because he never stopped playing the game, even on his last day on the island with his final two opponent. If you’ve seen previous seasons, at the Final Two stage, everyone was laid back and ‘tried to enjoy their last day on the island without worrying about the game cause they’ve made it that far’. All 17 final two contestants. All except for Chris. He played Twila even on the last day, where he drilled her, and riled her up knowing that Twila’s mouth was goint to ruin her chances at winning the game. Chris never stopped playing till the very end, and that was beyong excellent.
2. Tina (Survivor Outback)
Well, what can I say? Tina’s always been a pet favourite of mine ever since I wrote the “Will The Real Outback Villain, Please Stand Up” article just after Kucha and Ogakor merged. I sensed that Tina was not what she seems to be, and I was right. Behind her warm and friendly Southern soccer mom image, Tina really was a cutthroat player. Tina’s brilliance was to achieve a great balance between the two - devious gameplay laced with her warm Southern personality. I do not for a second believe that she was lucky that Colby brought her to the Final Two. Fake or not, her friendship with Colby was the secret hidden alliance that was never shown on air and Jerri’s final comments summed it up perfectly (paraphrasing) : “Tina, your best move in the game was convincing Colby to bring you to the Final Two”. I like both Colby and Tina, but I was ecstatic when Tina won. She took Hatch’s gameplay and refined it, making her the real outback witch that got away with the million.
1. Richard (Survivor Borneo)
Richard Hatch. DO I even have to elaborate? In all fairness, Richard probably would’ve been third or fourth on my list, but it’s kinda hard not to rank Richard at Number One, simply because he set the course of the show. He showed viewers why Survivor is so deliciously evil. Richard Hatch made Survivor what it is today. I wouldn’t go as far as to praise him for coming up with the concept of ‘alliances; in the game (He didn’t. Joel was aware of the impending Pagonging, but the stupid morons on Pagong just laughed in his face), but RIchard played a brilliant game considering their batch were the pioneers. And if Kelly had won the game, instead of him - signalling the ‘good guys always win’ message’ - Survivor won’t be nowhere near deliciously fun as it is today.
So where will the Survivor Palau winner end up in my rank? Only time will tell.
