Survivor: China (Episode 1513) The Jury Has Spoken!

*** WARNING: MANY SPOILERS ***

Unless there is some serious animosity among the final 4 competitors, the darkest of horses wins the final Individual Immunity Challenge, or there is a tie, Survivor finales tend to be among the most bloated and least exciting episodes of the season.

The standout for me is still without a doubt the very first edition, Survivor: Borneo, which ended with Richard Hatch, who many at the time called Reality TV’s first gay villain, taking the $1,000,000 prize. Not only was Hatch’s victory unexpected, but the finale pre-vote was dominated by the campy vitriol of a then 39-year old truck driver from Wisconsin named Susan Hawk. If you have not seen Susan’s downright Shakespearean closing (which was unscripted as she tossed what was given to her), just imagine Roseanne Barr channeling Helen Lawson from Valley of the Dolls talking about vultures, rats, snakes, and Mother Nature.

Tonight’s finale seemed very promising, with the possibility of cutie Todd Herzog, the 22–year openly gay Mormon, going all the way, thus becoming the first openly gay contestant to win since Hatch. Even if Todd did not make the final 3, there was potential for some serious fireworks at Tribal Council as some of the members of the Jury had already shown that they could be explosive, and Todd would not likely disappoint.

So how did Todd place? At this point all that I can tell you is that I have a horrible history of predicting winners, that there is no car challenge (for the first time in 14 seasons), and that this finale was probably even more bloated than any in recent history. It did include two elements that really stood out for me, the first being how many of the members of the jury were still very undecided about who to give their vote to at the end, and the other has to do with something that I would only be able to confirm by the end of the Reunion Show, which followed the 2-hour finale.

The Finale

After a surprisingly short summary of what happened from day 1 through the evening of day 36 (kudos to CBS), the show opens with Todd, Amanda, Denise, and Courtney returning from Tribal Council after having voted off Phei –Gee. Todd is very pumped as it looked like he could have been a goner yet again.

Day 37 begins with a really cool Reward Challenge that has the players building their own version of the Great Wall of China. They are playing for the most delicious looking pizza I’ve ever seen, beer, drinks, and even brownies. As is the case with last challenges, this one involved a combination of puzzles, balance, climbing, but for once no flags. Todd takes the early lead, but loses to Amanda yet again. At this point Todd still has not won a single Individual Reward Challenge or Individual Immunity, the latter of which is more problematic than the former.

Amanda has the choice of either stuffing her face alone or can share her reward with 1, 2, but not all 3 remaining players. Amanda is very nervous and puts her pageant experience to good use to try and figure out the best move for her as if she were in front of an audience. I would taken both Todd and Courtney, and certainly would have not eaten it alone, as that would have given the other 3 players too much time to be bitter and have an impact on the final vote as there was one remaining Immunity Challenge that was up for grabs. Amanda decides to only take Todd.

Our Toddie may not ever win anything, but that does not prevent him from possibly being the player who has gotten to share in more rewards that any other in the history of the game. It clearly shows that all players want to have Todd close by, not always because they love him but because they fear him. It will still means nothing in the big picture if Todd can’t earn Individual Immunity later on, as a victory by Denise will almost certainly send Todd home.

They eat, Amanda tells him that she feels that she can’t trust him, and Todd is amazing at trying to pacify her concerns. Possibly unbeknownst to him, only Amanda has seriously contemplated getting rid of Todd, not the other way around. She does a good job of using her time to get what she thinks she needs from Todd to make her next move. Things don’t look good at all. They come back to camp, and everyone is paranoid and looking for any signs of where things stand.

Day 38 arrives and the gang has to go through the obligatory and annoying ritual of paying homage to all the “fallen comrades,” most of whom we don’t even remember, on their way to the big bad final Individual Immunity Challenge. Major air time is spent lighting firecrackers at makeshift stands as the final 4 struggle to find one nice thing to remember about people who made no impression on them or us. It’s like the high school yearbook signing ritual when you find yourself being asked to sign the book of someone who looks vaguely familiar, but don’t know from where. As you look around for clues, other signatories or statements like “You seem really nice and I wish that I’d gotten to know you better. Have a nice summer. Don’t party too hard!”  don't help very much.

We do get to see some footage of sexy Aaron, boring Erik, and chiseled James in their underwear, so that kind of wakes me up. As they reach fallen Phei-Gee, one can see that they are reaching the giant statue Guan Yin, the truly breathtaking site of the final Individual Immunity Challenge, which generally involves some type of endurance. This one takes the cake as the least visually appealing ever and least imaginative in terms of the testing “endurance.” The survivors have to stack porcelain dishes on a long, wobbly balancing arm. So they have to keep stacking dishes and balancing them. The last one standing holding all their porcelain will breeze into the finals. I tell the people I am watching the show with that Todd will be the first one to be out of the competition, and I am unfortunately proven right.

My pain is not eased by not being able to get Rihanna’s smash single "Breakin’ Dishes" out of my head. Courtney’s porcelain smashes to bits next, thus leaving dangerous Denise still alive. She tries to make a deal with Amanda, but no go, which tells me that if Amanda manages to win, Todd may actually be safe. Amanda looks strong but makes one move that has the sound effects crew on the show hitting a new high in generating original suspenseful interludes. Alas it’s a tiny fake out and Denise’s dishes come tumbling down. Amanda wins again. The lesser of two evils for Todd as he at least has a fighting chance of not being booted.

The survivors head back to camp and Amanda starts whining again about something. The girl wins challenges, is masterful at looking all innocent at Tribal Council, and has pageant experience. She should be in heaven thinking of how she’s going to spend her winnings as in many ways it’s her game to lose. First we see Denise working Amanda by telling her that she all she’s got waiting for her at home (or so she thinks) is a $7.00/hour job as a lunch lady doing the same things day after day while she has her designs to look forward to and Todd has something in LA. Huh? “What you talking ‘bout Willis Lunch Lady?” And no mention of what Courtney has to look forward to. Is daddy Graham loaded?

Todd and Courtney start having girl talk and Court lets loose with one of her most lethal zingers, basically saying that Denise should not get the money as this is not welfare and does not deserve it just because “she sucks at life.” OMG. This one goes further than even my comfort zone, but might give the Reunion Show a little something to talk about. She does say: “I am the biggest bitch in the planet.”

A probably game-changing moment takes place at the 1:08 mark of the show as Denise continues working Amanda and it seems to have worked. It also feels like I've been watching this finale for 5 hours. Amanda says: “I will guarantee that I will not vote for you, but I cannot guarantee how they will vote.” With this being said, Todd is likely to be yesterday’s news unless Courtney votes with him to yield a  2 to 2 vote with Denise, and he manages to beat her in a tie-breaker, generally involving a fire starting challenge or something totally random.

Is Amanda’s game falling apart before our very eyes? It seems unlikely as she’s been very good at “managing people” who are about to be voted off (empathetic face and big hugs to all) so it would make no strategic sense to make such a huge and explicit promise to Denise unless she was going to keep it. Yikes!!!!! Anyway to make a really long story short, the remaining 4 go to Tribal Council and Denise becomes the final member of the Jury by a vote of 3 to1. This does not happen before Amanda gets busted in front of the members of Tribal Council for not being candid with Denise. She digs her own hole and Todd buries her with a simple smirk. Amanda is really upset at Todd, but must really be most upset with herself, as she made herself look really bad and that is a badge that, unlike Todd, she has not wanted to own.

They go back to camp. Amanda is night-vision camera bitter, does not want to celebrate with Court and Todd, and goes to sleep. They wake up next morning, find yummy breakfast food staple waiting to be used, Courtney lights Jean Robert’s $500 Louis Vuitton shoes on fire, and off they go to yet ANOTHER Tribal Council. Will this show start picking up some speed? The last three make opening statements, the Jury asks some non-threatening questions. A shocker is that dimwit Jamie (who must have gotten her question from the producers) is the only Jury member to ask questions that look to shake the remaining three and she does in a big way. All but Todd trip ovr themselves. 

Oh, by the way did I mention that Todd wins $1,000,000? 

How does he do that? By doing exactly what I had predicted and hoped that he would do as a serious student of the game. He was candid about how he played the game, reminded all who’d listen that this is a game, disclosed step-by-step details of his strategy, and told the Jury how pumped he was about playing the game and living out a dream of his. Todd even takes on Jean Robert in away that the Jury seems to love. Unlike most amateurs who put themselves between a rock and a hard place trying to rationalize their lies with false emotions, by blaming others, or frantically apologizing (all of which Amanda does during Tribal), Todd and even Courtney (who had never even watched the game before) breeze through the questioning. Todd wins with 4 votes (Jean Robert, James, Jaime, and Phei-Gee), Courtney surprises with 2 votes (Denise and Frosti) and, somewhat surprisingly Amanda gets only 1 vote (Erik). While it was not very exciting, Todd's answers and Amanda's misteps solidified my predicition that Todd would win with at least 4 votes from the Jury no matter who was in the final 3. The danger always was that he would not make the top 3 as, unlike Amanda, Todd's advacement had to be entirely based on his success at the social level. 

Jean Robert, Jamie, and Phei-Gee announced that their votes were up for grabs prior to Tribal Council. Who got all of those votes? Todd Herzog: Our newest million dollar man and Survivor’s second gay male winner in 15 cycles. I was highly impressed by Phei-Gee as she did not vote based on emotion and I think was the case with Denise and Frosti. Phei-Gee also looked way hot.

Reunion Show: Highlights were next to none, but the few are the following reveals...

Virgin Erik and ditzy Jaime are dating and he's still a virgin;

Phei-Gee looks beyond stunning (who knew);

Frosti has gained 100 pounds;

Courtney (who I continue to find hilarious after despising her on first sight) looks almost unrecognizable with an emo/punk look that covers her entire face and heavier eye liner than Pete (don’t even think of calling me “Peter”) Wentz from Fall Out Boy;

Poor Denise has been canned from her job as a lunch lady for being too popular so now even earns less than what she made before going on the show and is working off-hours cleaning toilets;

The show announces that Phei-Gee, Denise, and James were voted as the most popular players by viewers during the past 4 days, and that the most popular will get $100,000. Not surprisingly the cash goes to charismatic James;

Super stud host Jeff P. announces that Mark Burnett is hearing Denise’s story live and offers her $50,000 to help her land on her feet;

The 16th Edition of Survivor will be called Survivor: Micronesia and for the first time will pit tribes of hardcore Survivor fans versus fan favorites from past seasons, so it will be an all-star light edition. No word yet on whether there are any gay contestants. Jeff P. only revealed that one of the players sitting there was going to be part of the cast of favorites from the past. The 15th cyle is already the past.... I looks pretty clear who that player is. I made reference earlier to something that I was noticing during the entire run of this Survivor cycle and would only be able to confirm as the reunion show ended.

Todd is an out gay man and has been so since high school. This is clearly highlighted on the show’s website and was mentioned in the first episode of the show. Ever since that initial show, Todd’s sexual orientation has gone unmentioned. Not even one gay-centric question by Jeff. P after Todd wins the big money. They even show a bunch of people in Todd’s hometown of Pleasant Grove, Utah, going nuts as his name is announced as the winner. Business as usual. CBS’s press release highlights Todd's win by making reference to his age, where he lives, and what he does for a living. The gay part is gone. 

I am not suggesting that there is a cover-up as the information is readily available all over the cbs.com website. It seems that Todd's sexuality did play a significant role during Todd’s stay in China. If the winner had been African American or of Latin American descent, I would imagine press release would not mention the winner's race/ethnicity either.

Is the fact that Todd is gay not the big deal that it was when Richard Hatch won the game in 2000? If not, what (if anything) has anything changed since then? I was just reading an interview that Hatch gave to The Advocate upon his victory, and it reminded me of what a significant role Hatch’s sexual orientation played during his cycle. Something to think about as 2007 ends and a new crop of reality competitions gear up for next season.