There are good seasons of Survivor and there are great seasons.  The long-running CBS reality show just doesn't do sub-par seasons, and its amazing staying power is a testament to its unerring quality.  Eighteen seasons in, and fans may have just witnessed the greatest season yet.  Survivor: Gabon was unyielding in its twists and turns.  What was lost in a somewhat anti-climactic and boring finale was a series of incredible episodes, punctuated by blindsides and betrayal and intriguing human drama.  I've been a Survivor Kool-Aid drinker since almost day one, so feel free to take my slurping of Survivor with a grain of salt.  That being said, I don't know any long-time Survivor fans who would disagree with my overwhelmingly positive assessment of the latest season.  When anything series goes on for close to a decade, it starts being ignored, even if it does remain as popular as it ever was.  Survivor fails to get its just due.  It birthed the reality TV revolution, for better or worse, and remains its brightest light, an oasis in a desert filled with vacuous crap.  

I've thought a long time today about what more I could possibly say about Survivor: Gabon.  Even the above first paragraph, which I wrote hours before what you're reading now, is kind of a stock pro-Survivor introduction, an attempt to phrase my long-time, and oft-repeated, feelings about the show in a somewhat new manner.  I may have succeeded, but it's still recycled material.  Forgive me for this – it's inevitable.  With Survivor, eighteen seasons in, events and actions are bound to be repeated.  And, in related news – characters and personas are bound to be repeated.  The first season of Survivor was the only one that featured totally original characters.  Every cast since has been a derivation of the first.  As the seasons build up, the more personas there are to draw upon for a new cast.  

Which, for some crazy reason, is one of the reasons why Gabon's cast was so interesting to me.  I'm only realizing this now (and it may be just a desperate grasp at nothing by an author lacking material, but I doubt it.)  The personas chosen by reality contestants is a topic that has always interested me.  Few reality show contestants are truly genuine, reacting to their surroundings in a natural way – even then, the ones we assume to be genuine may just be excellent actors.  

Well, OK.  No reality show contestant can be really, truly genuine.  Just like, scientifically speaking, merely looking at something changes it, you can't film truth.  People change the way they act if they know they're being filmed.  Think about this – people act different when being filmed by a home video, don't they?  All of us do.  Multiply that by a thousand.  Of course you won't be act like yourself in a faraway land, playing a game for a million dollars, while being filmed for a show that will be watched by millions of people.  Anyway – I think Matty acted as close to his true self as anyone on Survivor this season.  Besides him, people were putting on some serious masks.

Sugar came into the game and she wanted to people to feel for her.  She wanted sympathy.  She played the part of the grieving daughter.  Please – I don't want to be accused of insensitivity.  It is awful, horrible that her father died.  But, she was outward with that part of her life, playing to it time and time again.  Even besides that, she played dumb, she played like she didn't care about the money, she played the mastermind role, etc.  I have no idea who Sugar really is, but that person wasn't in Gabon.

Randy Bailey is not that mean.  He's too smart to be that crotchety, and he enjoyed himself too much.  He chose to be the jerk.  Bob, even, who most would assume to be completely genuine, of course, wasn't.  How could he be?  He's a father, and a damn good one.  He's a teacher, and, presumably, a damn good one.  He had to act as if he was full of integrity, all the time, even if that integrity hurt him in a game that typically ails to reward integrity, but a game in which a lack of integrity is completely acceptable.  He had to show his children and his students what a father and a teacher is supposed to act like, even though Survivor is a game.  It all worked out for Bob, of course, but if he were playing that same game, only without cameras, you can bet he would have played it a lot more cutthroat. 

And I could go on.  The point is (at least the one I'm going to force here) is this – because Survivor has been on for so long, and because there have been so many cast members, every new season will feature castaways walking in with pre-determined personalities, likely not completely true to their own.  The interesting part comes when we see chinks in the mask, glimpses of truth amid their shrouded selves.  Why did this person decide to be this sort of contestant?  What were their motivations?  Survivor: Gabon succeeded not only because of the gameplay, but because of the people.  The fact that they all weren't totally likable or totally despicable actually helped, because for many of them, they chose a more flawed version of themselves.  And that, in itself, is a bizarre refection of human nature.  I don't know what it means, I just know that it's fun to watch.


-Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior Writer
(Image Courtesy of CBS)