The following contains spoilers for Episode 2 of Survivor Season 43.Season 43 of Survivor is still in the stage of setting its tone, and it appears to be similar to what fans have seen in the previous two seasons (such as Survivor tried a bit of a refresh after season 40). It’s still very character oriented, the ‘characters’ in question are this season’s cast of players, who are very varied in personality and background. There’s still a lot of gameplay, of course, but in these early episodes it takes a bit of a backseat (as usual) to give the audience time to get to know the people on their screens a little better.
The show also begins to set up relationships between the players. Building relationships and trust with fellow tribesmen is such an integral part of the game, and it’s usually one of the first things players focus on. Of course, many of these alliances change as the game progresses and players take the course that will help them most with their own interests, but it’s always interesting to see which players click right away.
The episode starts with a classic Survivor storm, bringing with it a night so wet and rainy that no one can sleep. Storms like this are a constant on the show, happening at least once a season and always reminding audiences of the kind of natural elements these players are dealing with. Focusing on the elements this way feels like classic Survivorwhere the goal was to survive as much as to play a good social game and win the prize money, and it’s a welcome reminder in more recent seasons of what the show has always been about.
The episode then spends a lot of time establishing the backstories of some players, as well as their relationships with each other. Jesse talks about his goal of making connections with as many of his fellow Vesi tribesmen as possible. Jesse gets a lot of screen time (and narration time) on the show so far, seems like a smart player and has a compelling backstory, making him a perfect candidate to be one of the final players, and his edit on the show makes it seem like to give a signal to the public that he is someone to watch.
Jesse mentions that Justine is the only member of his tribe that he just doesn’t click with (which foreshadows what happens later in the episode). At this point, the editors decide to interrupt Jesse by saying this with clips of Justine being grossed out by a spider and commenting on how dirty her nails are. This particular edit choice is disappointing, as it just portrays Justine as some sort of superficial girly-girl archetype when the audience doesn’t know much about her and will take that away as their main impression of her. Even if she behaved like that in those cases, it’s annoying to see Survivor tap into these tropes, making it seem like that was Justine’s entire personality.
Again, while there are plenty of gameplay elements to be found, the episode focuses mainly on setting up the players as characters, so fans who aren’t that interested in that kind of table setting might not be that interested in this episode. That said, the show does a good job of balancing these elements and still making the backstory sequences interesting. The audience learns about Geo’s struggles to come out to his family and gives him space to highlight the high suicide and depression rates in the LGBTQIA+ community, and Cody talks about the loss of a friend cancer at a young age and how it shaped his outlook on life. Not only do these sequences give fans more insight into the players themselves, but they also provide moments of emotional impact to the show that remind audiences that these are complex people they are watching on screen, not fictional characters.
After an exhausting immunity challenge, Vesi tries to come up with a game plan, as they lost the challenge and therefore go to the Tribal Council. The obvious choice seems to be to vote Nneka out, as she was a hindrance during the challenge, but Jesse thinks Justine could be a big threat as she seems to be good at lying. They begin to work out a solid plan, until Cody goes into the jungle and finds a Beware Perk that he decides to open immediately, perhaps forgetting for a moment that these perks take away your voice until you complete the task, which is a very risky move right before stem. The advantage is that he has to buy special beads from everyone’s bags (and they have to be given voluntarily, not stolen) to get an immunity idol.
This is actually a really nice perk as it requires the players to use their social skills to get what they need. Cody was a great person to get this benefit because of his general outgoing personality and his relationship with the tribe, and he manages to convince almost everyone to give him their beads to decorate the hat he previously made from palm leaves. The montage explains the sequence of events beautifully as he confides his problem to Jesse and Nneka, who try to help him get all the beads into a great show of acting from all of them. Only Noelle is reluctant to give up hers, having turned it into a keepsake bracelet that she doesn’t seem to want to part with.
Vesi loses two voters on the Tribal Council, as Cody lost his due to the Beware Advantage and Dwight lost to him in the “Risk or No Risk” game during the final episode. That is, until Survivor reveals the tricky montage they’ve used this episode with, showing that Noelle eventually gave Cody her beads, and he proudly wears the hat he brought to Tribal. Hilariously, it seems like all the beads have to be there for Cody to use them as an idol, and it would look suspicious if he took them off the hat now – meaning he now effectively has an immunity idol hat that he has to take to Tribal with it.
Justine is eventually voted out, as the tribe clearly mistrusts her. It’s easy to say who will be the big players of the season as they are the ones who get the most attention, and unfortunately Justine was not one of them. This is of course typical of any reality show; the people most important to the story get the most screen time. As it continues to set up the early game, it looks like Survivor still commits to letting the audience get to know the people on screen first, which is smart because it makes fans more likely to be invested in the outcome of the game in general when they can identify with at least one person in this colorful cast of characters.
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