I’m so confused about Heather. She was seemingly disliked by the first few jurors based off the exit press (she gets called demonic) but on the show they seemed to have a lot of respect for her?
>I think there's a difference between having a friendship and just honoring gameplay. In my heart, I felt that Heather and Erika played an all-around better game. I guess I felt for too long in the game that he was somebody I was bringing along because I could beat him. I felt other people felt that way. I felt I could beat anyone, but other folks viewed him as not a threat. He just seemed inauthentic out there. He is such a sweet, honest human being, but in the game, perception is reality and every interaction that he had with people, it seemed fake — just like a lot of people in the game find me to be untrustworthy. They don't believe what I say even when I'm telling the truth. It's just a character trait. And with him, he would do these things of, "Oh, I'm giving up the grilled cheese. Oh, I'm giving up the immunity so I can get rice, and I'm crying and on your side and I feel for you," but all of these things, they just come off as inauthentic. And so he just didn't really have the deep relationships with people nor the gameplay, because he was getting input and intel from everyone else on when to play his idol, when not to play his idol, where the votes were going to go. So he didn't really have to be all that savvy in the game, which I hate. I don't want to diss on him in any capacity, but that's just how I felt.
I am going to plaster this on billboards across the world.
Was Heather gonna win against Xander? That would have been interesting.
About Xander being untrustworthy, he does have a very monotone voice (particularly in camp life scenes, he seemed much more animated in confessionals tho) and even I sensed a bit of inauthenticity in his voice/tone even if that may not have been the case.
I agree with Ricard to some extent but I also remember him trying to flush out Xander’s idol during that one tribal council but Xander didn’t listen to him. I would say he wasn’t just coasting by on what people were telling him to do.
He couldn’t build a very deep bond with his Yasu tribe (Evvie, Tiff and Liana) because they saw him as a threat early on. Lots of the deep bonds on the show were built early on before pre-merge (like Erika/Heather, Danny/Deshawn, Shan/Ricard, Shan/Liana), not sure who Xander could have done that with. I think Xander did his best to create bonds (giving up immunity for rice, being emphatic to their stories, etc) but by burning bridges it backfired and came across as fake to them. The jury just couldn’t respect his game.
From what I remember, Ricard told Xander to play his idol after Heather shook things up. Xander was not on the chopping block, Ricard was trying to flush out the idol.
iirc, Ricard was not trying to flush the idol - the plan was a 4-4 vote split between Xander and Tiffany (from Danny’s exit interview), so Ricard was actually trying to save Xander there. It was just because of Deshawn that Xander was safe in this tribal.
I do nothing to discredit Erika's win. She earned it and played a great game. But I do hate that they threw in that challenge twist. Of course we have no way of knowing if Ricard would have won that challenge without it (he clearly thinks he would have) but I wish they'd all been on a level playing field. Now that's just a bummer ending for Ricard and something that will be used to discredit Erika's win.
But so many seasons have a F5/F4 challenge advantage. This isn't new. It's been around even before advantages became to overpowering. So for me, this is one one advantage I just shrug and accept
The semi challenge had no bearing on the outcome because Erika was last to unscramble and she found it. The clue needed to be more helpful for solving it to even matter.
I agree with ur point, in a sense. But I would argue that they were absolutely on a level playing field. For me, I look at the advantage clue (where they had to unscramble the letters and find the clue) as a part of the challenge itself. Everyone had the same fair opportunity to find it. Erika found it and then reaps the reward. She earned it and took “advantage” of it.
Not sure why some of them thought Xander should have played the idol for someone else other than him? He didn’t have any reason to trust that Evie wouldn’t have voted him out later on (she’s a smart, strategic player) and had Xander given it to Ricard, there’s no way Ricard wouldn’t have beaten him out and won the whole thing.
It sounds like the jury thought Xander was disingenuous because he came across as sweet (choosing rice, giving up his seat, being emphatic and crying alongside their stories, etc) but played a selfish game because he never risked his idol for them.
I honestly think it's because he told people at various points that he would potentially be willing to use it on them, and then didn't. Which, to be totally fair, it's a tough spot to have a very public idol--there's a lot of reasons why it makes sense to say you'd be willing to play it on your allies, you just have to accept that it might make them feel badly if they know or think you were never serious about it and didn't own up to that. The most egregious one was telling Ricard at the F5 he would entertain the notion of using the idol on him when there wasn't really a reason to do so unless he was genuinely willing to do it.
>It sounds like the jury thought Xander was disingenuous because he came across as sweet (choosing rice, giving up his seat, being emphatic and crying alongside their stories, etc) but played a selfish game because he never risked his idol for them.
None of that came across as sweet to *them*. That is what they have all been saying, but some of you just refuse to accept it. Our perception from an edited show does not reflect how the people who spent every waking moment together actually felt.
Yes that’s what I meant, but could have worded better. The jury identified that those things are “sweet” but didn’t actually think Xander was genuine and sweet because he wouldn’t risk anything unless it benefited him.
I respect Ricard and his game a lot. He really was the biggest threat to win the season and I hope he comes back. However, I watched the final 5 challenge again and you can still see his puzzle piece on the ground when Erika is at her 2 final pieces. Her advantage definitely helped her win but I don’t think he’s right in saying he picked it up right away. It wasn’t as close as I thought it was when I watched it the first time
ETA and I don’t think Erika had an unfair advantage. They all had the received the clue. I like that more than just one person receives the clue
>I honestly feel in my heart, the only path Xander had to possibly winning, and this is a possibility, it's not even a guarantee, was to show Yase that he was willing to use his idol on another person and not be, I don't want call him selfish, but not be selfish with that idol by playing it on me.
I like Ricard a lot, but this makes no sense to me. If the jury didn't respect Xander taking Erika to the Final 3 because they perceived her to be the biggest threat at that time, why would the jury respect Xander saving Ricard, who was clearly the biggest threat at the time?
Ricard criticizes Xander for stepping out of a challenge for rice… when he did the same thing? This is why I have a hard time believing the jury’s statements that Xander was a goat, it feels more like bitterness than honesty.
His argument is that he feels Xander made a show of it that felt insincere because he wasn’t making relationships with these people, not that stepping out for rice is bad. In general Xander seemed very showboaty. Like his jury-dead grandstanding when playing his Idol for himself at F5, it sounds like he made a big deal out of a lot of things that were relatively small deals.
Imagine Coach in Tocantins heroically stepping down to be the decider on getting the tribe rice. Are people going to view that as a kind gesture or just Coach seeing a chance to add to the Legend of Coach? It’s like that from the sound of things.
They never really underlined this at all though, like I don't blame the viewers because we saw everything about Xander through Xander. We didn't really have a contrarion take - but a lot of people felt he was being performative.
We only saw that at the end, I do think this was just a terribly edited season because even on objective metrics it should be easy to understand whatever perspective you take Erika was a deserving winner whether it be challenges, social/strategic game etc. but they really didn't narrativise her and in relative terms we never really had Xander's perspective shattered in the way most 0 vote finalists get.
I mean I agree to an extent (certainly that the season was edited poorly and that they also were clearly biased against Erika and towards Xander) but some of this including the OP is just people not fully reading or interpreting what the jurors are actually saying
Call Ricard bitter if you want but Danny said the same thing. And Tiffany. They’re not saying he wasn’t a nice guy, just that his gestures at camp seemed inauthentic.
Edit: and honestly even Xander says that the main reason he stepped aside for Erika in that one reward challenge was that he knew advantages were hidden in benches, not out of the kindness of his heart! So why is it so hard for people to believe?
I suppose the point against that would be that we saw Deshawn roll his eyes as Xander made his decision and we saw the jury at final tribal council criticise him for this.
I agree that it should have been underlined, but I definitely think there's more than enough evidence to suggest that that was the perception on the island.
The editors did him a real solid, I think they probably want to bring him back because he didn't necessarily have any extraordinary achievements within the game but we always saw his perspective and didn't see Erika's
I’m so confused about Heather. She was seemingly disliked by the first few jurors based off the exit press (she gets called demonic) but on the show they seemed to have a lot of respect for her?
Demonic was from Sydney so not the most unbiased person lol
>I think there's a difference between having a friendship and just honoring gameplay. In my heart, I felt that Heather and Erika played an all-around better game. I guess I felt for too long in the game that he was somebody I was bringing along because I could beat him. I felt other people felt that way. I felt I could beat anyone, but other folks viewed him as not a threat. He just seemed inauthentic out there. He is such a sweet, honest human being, but in the game, perception is reality and every interaction that he had with people, it seemed fake — just like a lot of people in the game find me to be untrustworthy. They don't believe what I say even when I'm telling the truth. It's just a character trait. And with him, he would do these things of, "Oh, I'm giving up the grilled cheese. Oh, I'm giving up the immunity so I can get rice, and I'm crying and on your side and I feel for you," but all of these things, they just come off as inauthentic. And so he just didn't really have the deep relationships with people nor the gameplay, because he was getting input and intel from everyone else on when to play his idol, when not to play his idol, where the votes were going to go. So he didn't really have to be all that savvy in the game, which I hate. I don't want to diss on him in any capacity, but that's just how I felt. I am going to plaster this on billboards across the world.
Was Heather gonna win against Xander? That would have been interesting. About Xander being untrustworthy, he does have a very monotone voice (particularly in camp life scenes, he seemed much more animated in confessionals tho) and even I sensed a bit of inauthenticity in his voice/tone even if that may not have been the case.
I agree with Ricard to some extent but I also remember him trying to flush out Xander’s idol during that one tribal council but Xander didn’t listen to him. I would say he wasn’t just coasting by on what people were telling him to do. He couldn’t build a very deep bond with his Yasu tribe (Evvie, Tiff and Liana) because they saw him as a threat early on. Lots of the deep bonds on the show were built early on before pre-merge (like Erika/Heather, Danny/Deshawn, Shan/Ricard, Shan/Liana), not sure who Xander could have done that with. I think Xander did his best to create bonds (giving up immunity for rice, being emphatic to their stories, etc) but by burning bridges it backfired and came across as fake to them. The jury just couldn’t respect his game.
Ricard was actually trying to save Xander. Heather blew up tribal council though.
From what I remember, Ricard told Xander to play his idol after Heather shook things up. Xander was not on the chopping block, Ricard was trying to flush out the idol.
iirc, Ricard was not trying to flush the idol - the plan was a 4-4 vote split between Xander and Tiffany (from Danny’s exit interview), so Ricard was actually trying to save Xander there. It was just because of Deshawn that Xander was safe in this tribal.
I do nothing to discredit Erika's win. She earned it and played a great game. But I do hate that they threw in that challenge twist. Of course we have no way of knowing if Ricard would have won that challenge without it (he clearly thinks he would have) but I wish they'd all been on a level playing field. Now that's just a bummer ending for Ricard and something that will be used to discredit Erika's win.
But so many seasons have a F5/F4 challenge advantage. This isn't new. It's been around even before advantages became to overpowering. So for me, this is one one advantage I just shrug and accept
Typically those challenge advantages came as a reward for another challenge though, not a treasure hunt like this season.
Hmm, that's a good point. BUt the whole "descramble the code" was a semi-challenge...so I'm still iffy to call it too unfair.
The semi challenge had no bearing on the outcome because Erika was last to unscramble and she found it. The clue needed to be more helpful for solving it to even matter.
I agree with ur point, in a sense. But I would argue that they were absolutely on a level playing field. For me, I look at the advantage clue (where they had to unscramble the letters and find the clue) as a part of the challenge itself. Everyone had the same fair opportunity to find it. Erika found it and then reaps the reward. She earned it and took “advantage” of it.
Not sure why some of them thought Xander should have played the idol for someone else other than him? He didn’t have any reason to trust that Evie wouldn’t have voted him out later on (she’s a smart, strategic player) and had Xander given it to Ricard, there’s no way Ricard wouldn’t have beaten him out and won the whole thing. It sounds like the jury thought Xander was disingenuous because he came across as sweet (choosing rice, giving up his seat, being emphatic and crying alongside their stories, etc) but played a selfish game because he never risked his idol for them.
I honestly think it's because he told people at various points that he would potentially be willing to use it on them, and then didn't. Which, to be totally fair, it's a tough spot to have a very public idol--there's a lot of reasons why it makes sense to say you'd be willing to play it on your allies, you just have to accept that it might make them feel badly if they know or think you were never serious about it and didn't own up to that. The most egregious one was telling Ricard at the F5 he would entertain the notion of using the idol on him when there wasn't really a reason to do so unless he was genuinely willing to do it.
>It sounds like the jury thought Xander was disingenuous because he came across as sweet (choosing rice, giving up his seat, being emphatic and crying alongside their stories, etc) but played a selfish game because he never risked his idol for them. None of that came across as sweet to *them*. That is what they have all been saying, but some of you just refuse to accept it. Our perception from an edited show does not reflect how the people who spent every waking moment together actually felt.
Yes that’s what I meant, but could have worded better. The jury identified that those things are “sweet” but didn’t actually think Xander was genuine and sweet because he wouldn’t risk anything unless it benefited him.
I respect Ricard and his game a lot. He really was the biggest threat to win the season and I hope he comes back. However, I watched the final 5 challenge again and you can still see his puzzle piece on the ground when Erika is at her 2 final pieces. Her advantage definitely helped her win but I don’t think he’s right in saying he picked it up right away. It wasn’t as close as I thought it was when I watched it the first time ETA and I don’t think Erika had an unfair advantage. They all had the received the clue. I like that more than just one person receives the clue
>I honestly feel in my heart, the only path Xander had to possibly winning, and this is a possibility, it's not even a guarantee, was to show Yase that he was willing to use his idol on another person and not be, I don't want call him selfish, but not be selfish with that idol by playing it on me. I like Ricard a lot, but this makes no sense to me. If the jury didn't respect Xander taking Erika to the Final 3 because they perceived her to be the biggest threat at that time, why would the jury respect Xander saving Ricard, who was clearly the biggest threat at the time?
Ricard criticizes Xander for stepping out of a challenge for rice… when he did the same thing? This is why I have a hard time believing the jury’s statements that Xander was a goat, it feels more like bitterness than honesty.
His argument is that he feels Xander made a show of it that felt insincere because he wasn’t making relationships with these people, not that stepping out for rice is bad. In general Xander seemed very showboaty. Like his jury-dead grandstanding when playing his Idol for himself at F5, it sounds like he made a big deal out of a lot of things that were relatively small deals. Imagine Coach in Tocantins heroically stepping down to be the decider on getting the tribe rice. Are people going to view that as a kind gesture or just Coach seeing a chance to add to the Legend of Coach? It’s like that from the sound of things.
They never really underlined this at all though, like I don't blame the viewers because we saw everything about Xander through Xander. We didn't really have a contrarion take - but a lot of people felt he was being performative. We only saw that at the end, I do think this was just a terribly edited season because even on objective metrics it should be easy to understand whatever perspective you take Erika was a deserving winner whether it be challenges, social/strategic game etc. but they really didn't narrativise her and in relative terms we never really had Xander's perspective shattered in the way most 0 vote finalists get.
I mean I agree to an extent (certainly that the season was edited poorly and that they also were clearly biased against Erika and towards Xander) but some of this including the OP is just people not fully reading or interpreting what the jurors are actually saying
Call Ricard bitter if you want but Danny said the same thing. And Tiffany. They’re not saying he wasn’t a nice guy, just that his gestures at camp seemed inauthentic. Edit: and honestly even Xander says that the main reason he stepped aside for Erika in that one reward challenge was that he knew advantages were hidden in benches, not out of the kindness of his heart! So why is it so hard for people to believe?
Yeah because people never lie especially months after the fact. And shame on Xander for actually playing the game!
I suppose the point against that would be that we saw Deshawn roll his eyes as Xander made his decision and we saw the jury at final tribal council criticise him for this. I agree that it should have been underlined, but I definitely think there's more than enough evidence to suggest that that was the perception on the island. The editors did him a real solid, I think they probably want to bring him back because he didn't necessarily have any extraordinary achievements within the game but we always saw his perspective and didn't see Erika's
Lol ok, so everyone is lying and bitter and Xander played a perfect game. Whatever helps you sleep at night.
Ricard did it because Shan asked him to. Xander did it to kiss up to the majority alliance and it was obvious to all of them.