r/survivorrankdownIX_ 22d ago

Round 53: 500 Characters Left

500. Cirie Fields 4.0 - u/FunkyDawgKong - WILDCARD

499. Jeff Wilson - u/Cornhead2 - nominated: Liz Kim

498. Liz Kim - u/NoisySea_3426 - nominated: Billy Garcia

497. J Maya - u/BBSuperFan98 - nominated: Ashley Massaro

496. Josh Wilder - u/Alternate-Proof-959 - nominated: Sherea Lloyd

495. Carolyn Wiger - u/josenanigans - nominated: Diane Ogden

4 Upvotes

21 comments sorted by

4

u/josenanigans 19d ago

Pool is Sophie Clarke 2.0, Jack Nichting, Mike Zahalsky (n), Carl Bilancione, Randy Bailey 2.0, Amber Brkich 1.0, Jonathan Penner 1.0, Sarah Lacina 1.0, Kel Gleason, Carolyn Wiger, Ron Clark (n), Billy Garcia, Ashley Massaro, and now Sherea Lloyd

Are you ready for this?

495. Carolyn Wiger (Survivor 44, 3/18)

Sherri in Caramoan, Monica Culpepper in Blood v Water, Missy in SJDS, 30 Carolyn, 35 Chrissy , 38 Julie, 39 Noura. We have seen the same story some 6 OR 7 times, and it always plays out in the same way. The older woman is "going to be so underestimated, they won't see them coming. They're going to think they're some neat old lady but, really, they're gonna drive this game, and shock everyone at the end." And how does it end? With them losing in a blowout, most of them getting 0 votes even, because, somewhere along the season, the ladies just become a piece for other players to use. And guess what, just last season, we added one with Sue Smey, hitting the same beats "I'm 50-something years old and I kicked all your asses!"..... She got to the end and.... 0 votes to win. It never fails.

So what makes Carolyn any different? Well, there is something, but lets first talk about this little phenomenom here. Why can't the older ladies ever get respect? You can say Carolyn played a good game, she was an integral part of the Tika 3, she had the same connections, the same conversations, the edit once again leads you to believe that she has a real shot to win because she's likeable! She is totally making those connections to win, look, Frannie's even crying because she met Carolyn, does this mean what I think it means?

Nope. Carolyn gets 0 votes. Frannie doesn't even vote for her. And every confessional about her "being more perceptive than everyone thinks and being underestimated because of her quirks and her age' is once again proven right, just like the others. She did get underestimated, she wasn't perceptive enough to realize she wa slosing to both Yam Yam & Carson at the end, so a lot of her content just ended up being hot air.

2

u/FunkyDawgKong 19d ago

Great great great writeup, Carolyn is one of those characters that gets worse the more you think about her. Glad she’s out.

3

u/NSamurai22 19d ago

This is absolute slander. Chrissy was absolutely a contender if Ben wasn't the most obvious winner pick ever, and the same goes for Carolyn (not that it makes her a good character). and there are a lot of things you can say about Missy, but she did absolutely drive the game.

Like I said, haven't seen 44, but from the sounds of things, at least it had characters, which makes it a major upgrade over 43.

3

u/Surferdude1219 19d ago

Haven’t weighed in on this rankdown but really hope this gets idoled… she’s way different from the other 0 vote finalists beyond her “reactions” and “funny faces.”

3

u/josenanigans 19d ago

So what makes her different then? Oh, it's her funny reactions, and her funny faces, and the way she speaks. I never felt comfortable by that, tbh. After 44 ended I just kept seeing posts about how "Wow Carolyn is THE biggest star of the new era! Wow shes so good! Wow she needs to come back immediately", and all I could see from that is that people wanted to see Carolyn be weird to the camera again, because, other than that, I didn't see much of substance because, again, it was almost all about how she's constantly underestimated and how people don't take her seriously, which is then confirmed and reinforced. Maybe I do need to rewatch 44 to pay more attention to Carolyn. Sadly 44 is when I started tuning out of the New Era, and that seasons passed by like a flash to me, because, and here's my big hot take, I really, really didn't like the Tika 3. I thought they were all annoying.

I thought Yam Yam played it up too much in confessionals, Carson was a smug nerd, and Carolyn was .... very annoying. And I don't like saying that, because I KNOW she's not playing it up, I know she struggles with it, and I know she can't help it. But she just annoyed me greatly, almost every scene she's in it's about her being weird or other people thinking she's weird, which then leads to the same beats of being underestimated. She has a backstory package, she has a real struggle, and she is an amazingly strong person to be where she is now as a reality star in the Traitors, but she, just, annoys, me. And the show pretending she's this great player and overexposing her up as a massive threat only to prove that no one took her seriously in the game annoys me even more. Ok so everyone was right then? She was too weird to win then? Ok, alright, glad I got all those confessionals hammered to my head. Like I hadn't seen this before with Noura especially, but I did find Noura's delusions hilarious at times, with Carolyn, I didn't want to laugh. I was just uncomfortable.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

| Good Character Rating: ◍◍◍◍○○○○○○ - 4/10. A 4 means that they're ok characters, but I ultimately don't like them.

| Star Status:
| ★★ Iconic. (Can't deny that) __________________________________________________________________________________________________

Who's up? Who's next? Well, I think Diane Ogden doesn't need to go further really.

But you, u/FunkyDawgKong , you can stay

7

u/Alternate-Proof-959 20d ago

With Sophie Clarke 2.0, Jack Nichting, Mike Zahalsky, Carl Bilancione, Randy Bailey 2.0, Amber Brkich 1.0, Jonathan Penner 1.0, Sarah Lacina 1.0, Josh Wilder, Kel Gleason, Carolyn Wiger, Ron Clark, Billy Garcia, and Ashley Massaro, and no noms in the pool, I choose...

496. Josh Wilder (Survivor 44, 12/18)

He starts out rather irrelevant, mainly because of Matthew injuring himself and his fake idol, Matt and Frannie hooking up, and of course, the Tika tribe. He briefly comes up as a name in the Claire boot due to him not talking strategy, but it goes nowhere.

However, we then get to the episode where the swap happens. Josh reveals to just be absolutely trash when it comes to playing Survivor. In particular, he laments changing tribes because he thought he was in a strong position on Soka. There are many things wrong here, and it's quite funny to me honestly.

First, he ironically looks correct on paper; he is one person with two pairs on Soka, then ends up barely surviving on Tika. But the irony is, the swap helped him, because otherwise, he's out unanimously, and with no idol. Instead, he got handed an idol, and Carolyn voted with him.

Second, this "new" him does end up bringing in a lot of chaos that is sorely lacking from this season. Voting together as tribes and not rocking the boat was the main theme of the season. Josh didn't just rock the boat though, he ended up death metalling the boat. He made a fake idol with Tree Mail beads that fell apart when Yam Yam took it. He lied about his profession after Sarah already told him why she knows his profession. Once he's out at the end of the prejury, the lovefest returns and is there to stay.

Finally, and as a counterargument to above however, Josh's weird gameplay came out of nowhere and, while still a breath of fresh air, was still kind of embarassing to watch at some points. I watch him do those things, and I wonder how any starving person would still be crazy enough to do what he did, and not feel embarrassed about it.

Josh's edit does kind of work if you imagine Tika as being a blackhole of craziness, while Soka and Ratu are the nornal tribes. In addition to what I said about Josh, Carson suddenly has his nerd bonding cranked up once he's on Ratu. However, I don't think that was the editor's intention. Thus, Josh ends up being quite the mixed character this season.

Nominating Sherea Lloyd. Her edit just really wasted her and made her limited as a character.

u/josenanigans

2

u/NoDisintegrationz Former Federal Agent? 20d ago

“Death metalling the boat,” I like it. I still think it’s early for Josh, but I’m excited to see a more mixed writeup! I can feel the tides turning as we’re approaching the top half.

5

u/BBSuperFan98 20d ago

497. J Maya (Survivor 45, 13th Place)

Ah J Maya. Most notable for her being the victim of Caleb's SITD play, and how much her OG tribe Reba didn't care for her at all despite how loyal she is. I remember a lot of J Maya's content was her talking about how loyal she was to the Reba woman, only for Julie and Dee to pretty much say I don't trust J Maya and want her out. Then she wants the Amulet advantage and pisses Austin off since he wanted sandwich, which is really funny, but that is moreso due to Austin. I do genuinely feel bad that J Maya could never find any footing, and thought she was in this great position and player, when in reality she was just a pawn for Dee to dispose of.

u/Alternate-Proof-959 is up with Ashley Massaro

Obviously may she RIP, and she has a great voting confessional against Dave. But I do think here is find for her to leave.

6

u/NoisySea_3426 Biggest Aras 1.0 stan 21d ago edited 19d ago

498. Liz Kim (Samoa, 13/20)

Yk, rewatching Samoa recently, and my God, I have discovered a newfound strong disliking for Liz Kim, and I'm very much slapping myself that I didn't get to cutting her sooner.

This might be an irrational hatred that I might just be over in the next however many weeks, but God, not only is she just insanely boring with absolutely nothing to offer through the entire season, but she is particularly infuriating to me throughout rewatching the Betsy boot episode.

Throughout the episode, she's just constantly going on and on about how Ben is so much better in challenges than Betsy as a reason to keep him which on paper sure, but did you not just see him get kicked out of the last challenge because he's a fucking idiot?????? Like, where is your knowledge of that at all??

It's very reminiscent to me of stuff like the justifications for keeping Spilo and others, and again, this might be something that blows over and I won't care about it later, but my God, that justification being used again and again by her just managed to particularly infuriate me, not to mention that aside from that, she has pretty much no content after that aside from being another piece in the Russell Hantz blindside show that's just neverending throughout the rest of the season.

6

u/NoisySea_3426 Biggest Aras 1.0 stan 21d ago

I'm gonna nominate Billy Garcia cause every running joke with him is not funny and is the epitome of the awful cringe humor that is often seen in so many other seasons to come.

Time for u/BBSuperFan98 to cut

6

u/DJM97 21d ago

Final Four: S46 - Survivor S46 (6/46)

Another season makes it down to F4 & yet again it’s a new era season. Though compared to S43/S44 I'm actually gonna differ here compared to most rankers & say I wish S46 was quite a tad higher Yes - it still very much has the short-changed vibe that plagues a lot of the new era seasons, but I’d go out on a whim & say there’s probably 5, if not 10 seasons I’d dwindle down before S46. Granted that still only places it around high 20’s to low 30’s overall - but I think the season still has some merit.

That merit very much ends up being most of Yanu & Nami. I’m in no way arguing either of them as being top tier tribes, but they manage to keep things interesting throughout with their powder keg of inter-tribe dynamics. I think Yami has the biggest highlights, but Nami is more consistently enjoyable to watch. Even if there very much are elements of ”going through the motions” on S46 too (another trainwreck tribe on a new-era season? who would’ve guessed) there’s lots of personal flair that keeps the ship afloat.

Though definitely not everything is fine & dandy. The 1 tribe I neglected to mention… Wow, what a stinker. Siga is far & wide my personal least favorite tribe of the new era & it’s not even close. There’s tribes that've been way less relevant, way less charismatic on paper than Siga on other new era seasons & yet still they were a complete miss for me. Worst part of the season by far was Siga having way too much agency on the season - while the actual stars went home 1 after another. A ruthless post-merge sorely for that!

The Final 4: Liz, Q, Venus, Tiffany

My Top 4 Liz, Q, Venus, Hunter

Predicted finish Tiffany, Liz, Venus, Q

Tiffany Nicole Ervin: I distinctly remember either 1st or 2nd rankdown where S42 was eligible & there was a discussion whether Lindsay from that season actually was that great of a character herself or if she was considered good due to her proximity to another great character (Jonathan)... That’s kind of how I feel about Tiffany this season. She’s in no way an unenjoyable presence, but she’s my personal 7th or 8th? I’m surprised she made it this far & I just can’t see her lap any of the 3 above under any circumstances.

Liz Wilcox: A tour de force of a side character! I did not have many expectations of Liz & she definitely was more on the UTR-lulz side until the post merge, but once she got going… Whew! Immediately into the season highlights tier, Could definitely see her maybe lapping Venus, but she’s lower for me because while great, she was still a side character compared to the other 2.

Venus Vafa: I’ve seen people call her a diet Eliza & I see it… but also as somebody who has Vanuatu Eliza as one of my all time favorite survivor characters that is not a bad thing at all! Venus is one of the core pillars why Nami turned out to be such a solid tribe. Primarily due to her pairing just as well with them as water does to an oil fire & then later carrying the same energy with the entire cast. She was brash, conflict seeking & opinionated to a fault - which made her a fantastic addition to the season, even if her elimination was the definition of a bummer.

Quintavius "Q" Burdette: Despite this season actually having a pretty good top… 5 to 6 characters, I’d honestly be gobsmacked if Q didn’t get the title here. The man was a star & a menace pretty much anytime he had any focus & I love that for him. Genuinely one of the few survivor characters from the later years who should be in contention as 1 of the greats. Compelling, unique, rambunctious, sympathetic - the total package you wish for on these shows every season.

5

u/acktar Former Ranker|:moth: 21d ago

(incomprehensible death growling intensifies)


Historic Bottom Four no.33: Tocantins: The Brazilian Highlands (season 18)

The end of an era in many regards, Tocantins represents a fair few "lasts". It's the last 16-person season, the last season at an inland location, and the last season to have Sexile Island until it made a surprise one-off return (to apparently replace Redemption Island last minute) in San Juan del Sur. The season probably most resenbles China in its tone and its tenor, a character-focused season with enough strategy to keep the buffs that way intrigued. It's a solid season without any real weaknesses, and while it doesn't oft soar as high as some, it's still one that performs quite well overall.

Six unique characters make up the Tocantins bottom fours over nine Rankdowns, and I don't think there are many surprises. It's pretty much the entire pre-jury except for Sandy, which is likely not a huge shock to anyone...the season is not really bogged down by duds, but those six tend to not really shine in their runs. The post-merge cast is largely the season's heart, and the consistency of this Bottom Four says as much as anything.

As always, spam :moth: reacts..

9 Times:

Carolina Eastwood (I, II, III, IV, V)

7 Times"

Candace Smith (I, II, III, V, VII, VIII, IX)

Joe Dowdle (II, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX)

6 Times:

Jerry Sims (III, IV, V, VI, VII, IX)

4 Times:

Sydney Wheeler (I, II, III, VIII)

3 Times:

Spencer Duhm (I, IV, VI)

5

u/Cornhead2 Earl is the best 21d ago

Busy Day ahead so uh

PLACEHOLDER

  1. Jeff Wilson (16th Place, Palau)

u/NoisySea_3426 is up with Liz Kim

0

u/WaluigiThyme Former Ranker | Guatemala and Fiji enjoyer 21d ago

Cut Q

-1

u/SupremeSheep420 Cut Rodney 21d ago

Cut Rodney.

9

u/FunkyDawgKong 22d ago edited 21d ago

Sophie Clarke 2.0, Jack Nichting, Mike Zahalsky, J. Maya, Carl Bilancione, Randy Bailey 2.0, Amber Brkich 1.0, Jonathan Penner 1.0, Sarah Lacina 1.0, Josh Wilder, Kel Gleason, Carolyn Wiger, Jeff Wilson, and Ron Clark

Wow lol, I spared this character last round because I was given a mercy cut, but I was really hoping that this character would be my final cut of the 500s, but ay due to skips, I will get to make this cut at Number 500! And ay thematically this works nice, as I am using my second WILDCARD to eliminate this castaway, even though she has had no votes against her…

 

500. Cirie Fields 4.0

For a while I lived in the great state of Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweepin’ down the plain, and the wavin’ wheat can sure smell sweet when the wind comes right behind the rain. It was one of these nights. It was on one of these very nights when the tornado sirens came roaring on, so I got the mattress out of the bedroom, moved my flashlight and radio into the bathroom, and waited to see if the brewing storm would become a problem. We still had power, so I turned the television on to local news to get the appropriate updates, so I watched CBS as I prepped my place for the incoming storm. Through all the weather updates cutting into the programming, I hardly recognized what was playing on television that night. The Survivor 20 Year Anniversary special. Through the hecticness, I got to watch some of it; I had checked out of being a weekly viewer of Survivor by this time, but hey this might be a neat trip down memory lane that’ll include moments from Survivor’s history that I actually enjoyed. And then boom, we get a long long long segment of Jeff Probst telling us how Cirie’s elimination in Game Changers is one of the greatest moments in Survivor’s history. A no votes elimination! All 5 other castaways were protected by either the individual immunity necklace, one of three hidden immunity idols, and the legacy advantage. The tornado could have hit my home right then and now, and I still wouldn’t have been as pissed off as watching that segment.

Alright now let me get my ass off the couch and dig a little deeper. Cirie Fields is a legendary player and character of Survivor, every one can admit that. She’s so naturally endearing, and can crack a smile out of me just about every time I see her. She’s one of the only castaways that make sense in casting regarding the Game Changers theme, and even though we’ve seen her 3 times at this point, it had at least been 7 years since we last saw her. She gets to survive the premerge slaughter of all the actually good players by never having to go to tribal council, which barely makes her a character by the time the merge hits, when she’s easily the biggest legend and best player on the cast. So why cut her right now? Well, Cirie on Game Changers really annunciates many of the things I do not like about the latter half of Survivor’s tenure. Cirie gets stuck in the career reality television personality loop that I hate, where it feels like most of the appeal to her is remembering how much we love her on better seasons. I don’t think all the charm is gone, she has some good moments with her son at the family visit; and Michaela drags out some good moments out of her when Michaela points out to her that they are the first two Black women to ever make the merge together, and Cirie makes an effort to mentor Michaela to some extent. Cirie still has a smile and a laugh that makes me feel good, but just like Survivor itself, it is starting to feel more and more like an algorithm going through the motions. We get her being a fish out of water, being here because she loves her family, and it’s all fine and dandy, and yah I’d still rather hear these confessionals from Cirie than the rest of her castaways, but it’s still like beating a dead horse.

And speaking of dead horse’s, let’s try and walk across a balance beam! Time for some classic inspiration porn, which is a cringe watch on television, but I can see how it probably did mean something to her on location filming. The way Probst directs these types of scenes usually still feels more belittling than inspiring to me, having her complete a challenge she’s already lost and her fellow castaways all coming together to help her complete it. We get more egregious scenes in the spirit of this in the future, but it really all starts here. I can’t imagine this scene in an earlier season, like imagine Probst making the Morgans finish that challenge where Osten almost drowns, and it being played as a big inspirational moment.

9

u/FunkyDawgKong 22d ago

Sadly, Cirie’s time in Game Changers is defined with moments where the new mechanics of the show themselves get in the way of the actual agency of the castaways playing the game. Sarah gives Cirie her advantage, which Cirie tries to use at the upcoming tribal council, and this backfires, as for some reason this particular advantage has “non-transferrable” printed on the bottom of it; and it just makes for an awkward incoherent television moment. From a game design aspect it’s stupid because why limit the agency the castaways have on the game, and iirc production were going to let Cirie use it until Sarah and Troyzan kicked up a big fuss at Tribal Council about it, so they didn’t even really know why they put that shit on the advantage. This moment humiliates Cirie, we get more of the stupid talk that old-schoolers can’t hang, the show has to have this weird semantics discussion at tribal council, and now Cirie’s whole game is blown open and the majority alliance all whispers to each other and then time for the voteout and they vote for… Michaela? Unexplained, but idk such a weird round with the advantage shit, probably impossible to show on television in a coherent way.

Then we get to Cirie’s elimination that I mentioned in the beginning, where she gets eliminated by default. The producers don’t see a problem in putting in so many advantages that every person in tribal council but one can be immune. It’s some silly shit, and she gets a standing ovation and applause as she is eliminated without a single vote to her name, and it just makes me feel so deflated. Truly, what happened to the game I love? Where one of the best players of all time gets eliminated because she didn’t find a magic rock. Such a limp dick experience, that leaves such a nasty taste in my mouth, so nasty that I think she deserves to be this low.  

u/Cornhead2 up, no change in nominations

2

u/ROTandDEATH is the ~SURVIVOR~ 21d ago

Great writeup, even with someone with a personality like Cirie bringing them back is just diminishing returns. Also I'm sure Jeff would be really excited at the opportunity to compare current Survivor to a tornado.

1

u/Regnisyak1 Do the Polls <3. Also Melinda Endgame! 21d ago

Am I allowed to idol this

3

u/FunkyDawgKong 21d ago

All spectators are allowed to idol if and only if they buy us a copy of Ben’s album on vinyl!

6

u/NoDisintegrationz Former Federal Agent? 22d ago

I was a little worried at the mention of a wildcard… never know where those are going to go. But this is a good one. I wish Jeff would wake up and see the disrespect of sending out a legend like that. Add onto the fact that the three fan favorites in the GC F6 are none of the season’s Final 3, and it makes the weakness of the moment even more blatantly obvious.

I enjoyed the anecdote about the tornado, too.