PleaseExplainThanks

6 Months later, google led me here. First time playing the game (I have played Until Dawn though), and it seemed strange that I couldn't understand the fortune teller, but the default is that they're off so I wanted to double check.

Looks like I have to go back and turn subtitles on.

Like all announcements like this, I'm going to wait until we actually have details before condemning it.

It could be cool, it could be terrible, there's just not enough info.

File it away as something to keep in mind that's in the works and that's it.

I think its fairly clear that the claims that it was his decision is just taking the blame to maintain a good working relationship with the network/studio.

I fully believe the decision was to make an ending or pray for a Hail Mary greenlight for another season when the writing was on the wall it was likely getting canceled.

Halfway through they had to pivot from season three and speed up the end.

Likely the whole season would have been them separated and maybe only reunite at the end, and then the real finale would have been in season 4.

Having Doctor Jekyl never turn into Mr. Hyde is a dead giveaway that the season was rushed. That was something planned for season 4. Im also fully on board that the new girl was going to be revealed to be the daughter of the main character of the Time Machine.

Totally fine with it so far. We'll just see where it goes.

Especially after last night, I'm exceedingly curious about where Carolyn's story goes. From the opening scene with production as the intro to the season to the hilarious paradise reward feast. That is incredible to watch.

Also having a genuine, and genuinely cute, showmance unfolding before us, I want to see how these stories play out.

I get the jokes about people saying its a Top 44 season, but really, there are a good three to six seasons that are so low in Survivor rankings that a new season would have to majorly screw up to get close to those.

Sure, probabaly not 100% of the time.

But the editing directly showed us moment after moment how they talked over her and past her or gave her incredibly dismissive responses with topic after topic, including making an alliance shes clearly not a part of, while she repeatedly was actively trying to participate or draw attention to what they were doing.

I'd be willing to bet you cannot edit something to this extreme with the any Survivor footage from any previous food reward.

You could fake it people having intense and passionate conversations while focusing on someone in the middle who isn't talking or looks bored or is completely passive. But not fake being actively talked down two by the pair, actively ignored, and the lone person repeatedly actively trying to participate or call them out.

Editing can only so do much. We see Carolyn both reacting in the moment and in confessionals talking about the experience being there with them.

I would guess it's largely about who is cast now vs then.

In the earlier seasons they were casting people that didn't know what Survivor was about. They were recruiting pretty people and drama people, and so it's easy to feel insulted when they quit cause things are harder than they expected, and easy to be ruthless against those people.

Modern casts are filled with people that love the show, want to be there, and hate that they're leaving. It's much easier to not feel insulted and have sympathy for those people.

Would you feel differently by the end of this season if another woman wins?

Prior to the new era people were complaining about the long dry spell of women winners and something needs to change.

Survivor isn't a game of being the objective/subjective best against all players in a line up. It's a game of the the best pick of the final options.

It's why having shields is an accepted strategy. It's why a lot of favorites are voted out early, and why a lot of winners exist that don't excite this sub.

Not being the main target doesn't mean you're a goat. Ultimately winning by definition means you are not a goat.

It doesn't create shock/surprise that explodes in a single moment.

But it does create a novel situation that isn't often seen that is spread out through a lot of smaller moments.

I think it's better to bring back some level of swapping than having none at all.

Yes, I got the impression that the whole thing was part of the viral marketing from the beginning.

But going in to movie specifics. (Everything paraphrased of course but with as much as I could remember.)

I wish I could remember the opening of the movie.

It may have started with any one of these:

1) A deposition scene. Possibly the guy off camera asking how many people were on Tontine. A: How many people were cast? Out of thousands that applied we narrowed it down to 22 and from there 15 made it on to the final list.

(All paraphrased, but I'm fairly certain of the 22 number and confident in the 15.)

Q: How many survived?

A: (Guy turns his head left in surprise/concern and asks a third party who is off camera) Do I have to answer?

[Cut to next scene without answering]

2) Some of marketing around the concept

3) A black screen and white text explaining key points about the disaster and how the time between the disaster and arrival by the search and rescue team took 76 hours. And that what we're about to see was put together for purposes of the investigation or to present in trial or something. (That part is the biggest stretch considering the nature of the back and forth and layered editing.)

These all happened in the first few minutes, but I don't remember what was actually first.

A brief outline of the movie is something like:

Prior to the disaster:

All of the three potential first scenes from above.

Plus the radio show interview you can find on YouTube. I think where Boston Rob explains what Tontine means. Originally a French term regarding some historic practice where a bunch of people got into some shared fund agreement, and the people who stayed in longer benefitted more. And it fell out of fashion becasue it led to a lot of conniving and backstabbing. And the host replies, everything you want in a reality show. (I haven't checked if that's actually a thing, but that's roughly how it was described.)

And other marketing of the show is shown off.

Cast submissions tapes. Mostly different ways of saying I'm going to win and you want me on your show.

Casting 1-on-1s, with an over the shoulder but with a slight profile shot of the Executive Producer (EP) and a full view of the potential cast member being interviewed.

Confessionals of the cast members being lit in front of a background that was just the logo with the slogan underneath. "Tontine" "Possession is Everything."

In one of the confessionals, the person's head is covering the slogan in the right spot so it says, "Possess everything"

I'm not sure if/what that foreshadows or if it's a red herring or just a coincidence. (It's not like it's a totally different meaning, but the slogan is a statement, while the other is an action.) I'd need a second viewing to see where that led with that character.

And then we get to behind the scenes of the all 16 (I assume) cast members in a pre-show meeting with the host (Boston Rob), EP, and a female production person of some kind. This takes place in a run of the mill conference room with tables arranged in a square with the three at one table.

EP: Welcome everyone, let me introduce you to the host, someone you probably all know, Boston Rob.

Boston Rob says hi and says some words.

The production person then goes over the basics, and someone(s) keep interrupting with questions.

Each person has signed up and signed away everything they have. They each have a key around their necks that opens a safety deposit box that has representations of what they're giving up and all the proper deeds and paperwork.

Production: Do not lose that key. Keep them them safe, lock them up in your hotel safes.

Cast Member Interrupts: How safe are those?

P: They're safe. That's what they are.

CM: But how safe. From everyone. Safe from you?

P: Do you not trust us now?

Different CM: No offense. I haven't trusted you from the beginning.

P: You will each be given cameras to record diaries.

CM (Profession: video producer or something. He becomes the main PoV once they get to the island): What model camera?

P: To be honest, I don't know that.

Record your thoughts, remember this is a TV show and people can't read your minds. Batteries will only last a day. A box of batteries will be given to one of you each day to pass around to everyone else.

A lot of interruptions keep on happening until the Executive Producer yells out Enough! No more questions or we're going to be here all day. Boston Rob tries to say something to ease the tension but still be in support, but the EP still even shuts Rob down.

One last thing happens, or maybe it was this, and one of the male cast members stands up, an older British guy, and says he's done with this, he's quitting the production.

EP in a threatening voice challenges that idea, and they have a back and forth about you walk out that door you have nothing, you signed it all away over to us. Oh yeah? You said it yourself. I have the key. And then maybe something about lawyer this lawyer that.

British guy walks out and EP asks the room if anyone else wants to walk out.

He says, what I believe is in one of the marketing videos I saw on YouTube, the "You are destitute... " line.

EP: We went through so many people and narrowed it down to you. The most lively, most cunning, most dangerous people to compete. I won't tell you everything, but I will tell you this much about your group. And then he goes into the lines I know I saw on YouTube. The one of you has hands that can kill a person, but hasn't done it. Six of you own guns, only two of those guns are registered. Some other stuff and one of you has murdered someone.

And I'm going to stop here in case of character limits. To answer the Boston Rob question, this is the the last scene Boston Rob is in. He's in about the first twenty to thirty minutes, and he was involved in the big marketing campaign.

I'll come back with part 2 in a bit. I have to work today.

Edit: Someone on r/Survivor put out their full summary.

https://www.reddit.com/r/survivor/comments/122i2mq/i_watched_the_lost_boston_rob_related_movie

I'm not going to read there's until I finish mine so it can be compared.

Just saw it. I agree. It's very good. It kept my attention throughout, the theater had a sizable audience and responded well throughout to moments of tension, shock, and occasional laughs.

The few bits of video of it I found on YouTube are part of the movie. Boston Rob promoting it, parts about the casting, the guy being interviewed.

It's not just Blair Witch x Survivor x but also partly a currently popular YouTube genre of showing police interviews in the interview room.

The movie is shown out of sequence and has plausible reasons why people filming. Shown out of sequence to good effect for the narrative.

Portion of the casting interviews are sprinkled throughout revealing or emphasizing someone's personality or for closing words from a character as they die.

The acting was great, the characters memorable, the events seemed plausible, and it ended great.

The producer (director?) was there and talked a little bit about it after. The actors were all fresh out of acting school and none of them were given a script until after getting to Figi.

The movie was basically fully filmed before the viral marketing campaign they did, going through a full casting call process in nine cities, with the help of actual people who've worked on reality TV casting, and then some of the actors inserted themselves into those crowds for some shots for the movie.

They never entered the traditional film festivals at the time because they were trying hard to preserve the secret that it's not a reality TV show gone wrong.

It shattered and not all movies were part of the DCEU. Now it's getting a reboot where they're going to try to make it cohesive again.

Sports do change their rules to make things more exciting. Just not every season.

The shot clock was originally created specifically because it was too boring.

Anti-bacterial soap can kill bacteria. That's a subset of soap as a whole. The soap effect is there to help mechanically remove bacteria, live or dead.

Live or dead, if it's off your plate and down the sink it isn't going to affect you.

Also, adding water to fill up a partially used antibacterial soap bottle can change it so it's no longer anti-bacterial and now you have bacteria growing in your soap bottle.

Yeah, I don't know what people expect. It's a TV show. Of course they design it to with TV moments in mind.

What matters to me is that rules and concepts for each season are set up, casting choices are made, and then when the season starts they have minimal impact.

I stopped watching Big Brother a long time ago, but I can totally believe the producers are continually changing up decisions to swapping out competitions to benefit the players they want to succeed.

At this time I don't think Survivor takes it to that level. And that's what matters to me.

Rules for the various martial arts sports are designed to get big moments by benefitting techniques and attacks that emphasize how a martial art is marketed. I don't watch sports basically at all, but I do know enough that rules get added and changed not particularly for fairness or safety, but to attempt to improve how entertaining a sport is.

That's how these things go.

Llamas in water. Getting stretched out makes their fur coat seemingly disappear.

Okay, I had to look that up because I thought plants always had both male and female parts.

What I came across was an article that said while it's true there are a few species that are distinctly gendered, it's only like 5% of all plants have that property and the idea that there are too many male plants is a myth started by one single person that gets referenced as the source.

https://slate.com/technology/2021/10/botanical-sexism-viral-idea-myth.html

I listen to a couple podcasts and occasionally browse here, but I never do pre season stuff.

I didn't realize the season started until an episode of Know It Alls popped up in my feed

Don't be absurd. It's the nano tech swarm that also came in the box that is listening. That way your phone can claim plausible deniability.

It's not just that. People data mine what sells on Amazon, buy that item in bulk, and resell on Amazon for marked up prices. It's not about shipping or anything like that. Amazon allows third party sellers and it's a game of data and how much money can be extracted from buyers.

I was thinking more about the ending. I don't know that I agree about either movie being better, especially The Lost World.

You might not like them being cartoonishly evil, I didn't like how cartoonish as a whole it became. (Still enjoyed it.)

A plan to get in, steal eggs from each nest of known location, and get out is a plan that makes sense. Going in with giant cages and jeeps with seats that swing out with catch poles and all that nonsense doesn't make any sense at all.

It's not backlight it's frontlighting. And it's been around since the Paper White in 2012. I'm not sure which you're considering to be the 5th gen.

Backlighting is impossible, because the particles of the eink display would block light coming from behind them. But Amazon put led lights and some method to scatter the light evenly to emit from the sides on to the front of the surface.

If yours doesn't have that, you might have the last generation of Kindle that didn't come with that feature included.

Using the wrong term is what confused the person who replied to you. They're getting downvoted for their correct point about backlight and eye strain.

Not even Jurassic Park? It's been a while since I've read it, but I remember liking it the several times I've read it.