As the season comes to a close this week’s Survivor was a live broadcast of the official reunion of all this season’s participants held in order to announce the winner of the season.
Natalie spoke about how she was proud of herself that even after her sister was eliminated from the competition she still managed to make it to the end of the game. She also stated that she wanted to show everyone why she should be the winner for the season.
Jeff told Natalie that he had gotten many questions from her from fans of the show through Twitter. One of the tweets he mentioned was a Twitter user asking Natalie if she thought she played the game better after her sister was voted off. Natalie said that though playing without her sister wasn’t easy she thought she played the game well because she was pushing herself to make her sister proud. She also said that when she gave up her immunity to Jaclyn she completely blacked out until Baylor won the immunity. Jaclyn admitted that Natalie had “played” her when she gave up immunity without being forced to.
Jeremy said that Keith wasn’t the survivor type because you never knew what he was going to do. He said that people who aren’t good at strategy can’t anticipate anything. Jeff then read a tweet that wanted to know why Natalie exploded on Rocker when the two previously hadn’t even interacted. Natalie explained that the reason she did so was because she was upset that her sister had gotten voted off. She said that Rocker said something about her sister to her. John then talked about how Natalie yelled at him through Skype.
Reed and Josh talked about how they have been receiving praise from gay fans all over the world for being a strong Christian couple and not hiding their sexual orientation from the world. Reed said that he heard from a man whose father would not talk to him due to the son being gay but upon seeing Reed and Josh’s relationship on Survivor the father and son are now talking and have realized it is ok to be both Christian and gay. One of the people in the live audience for the reunion show stated that she was proud to see Christians displaying love towards each other even though their church does not approve of it.
Jeff then brought up the fact that Jon and Jaclyn had argued on the show in front of the world and that led to couples who watch the show arguing over which one was right; Jon or Jaclyn. Jon then announced that after the show was over he and Jaclyn got engaged. He stated that he though the couple was under a lot of pressure on the show and that is why they argued the way they did. He also mentioned that they don’t usually argue over small things like they did when they were on the island. Jaclyn said that once they were off the island and she watched the footage of their argument she was stunned to see how much they argued over things that were ultimately unimportant. Jaclyn also jokingly expressed concern that certain relative of Jon’s, whom she hadn’t met yet, would not like her because their first impression of her was the way she acted on the show.
Missy stated that she was introduced at the beginning of the season as the contestant who got married and divorced three times and that this actual freed her of the guilt and embarrassment she felt over that. She even declared Survivor to be better than therapy. Baylor said that her relationship with her mother Missy didn’t change much until the end of the competition. She said the relationship they had on the show mirrors the one they have at home. Missy said that she felt if Reed knew her better he wouldn’t have taken verbal stabs at her during the show. Reed then stated that he would treat Missy’s character on the show different than he would have treated the real Missy. He then said that he stood by everything he said in the game but implied he never would have said those things in real life.
Jeff then announced he was going to give the audience a preview of what the next season of Survivor will be like. It will be called Survivor: Worlds Apart and will feature blue collar workers against white collar workers against no collar workers. Jeff pulled an audience member up to the front that is a lawyer and considers himself a white collar worker. Another audience member who works in construction was brought up to the front and considers himself a blue collar worker.
Jeff then pulled a young woman out of the audience that was considered a no collar worker. He did this to explain to people the type of contestants viewers will see on the show next season. The idea is to take people who are used to being in charge of situations and thrusting them into a situation where they are not in charge.
Jeff then presented Natalie with her $1 million check for winning the competition. He then ended the show by announcing that on the show’s website props from this season can be purchased, with the proceeds going to Stand Up For Cancer.
The next season of Survivor is beginning February 25, 2015. It will be very interesting to see this new twist on the competition. Taking people completely out of their element and making them struggle for probably the first time in their lives will likely be intriguing to viewers next season. This could create an interesting dynamic that the show has never experienced before. Only time will tell how compelling the next season of Survivor will be. A new crop of castaways will be presented in all their glory for viewers to follow and root for the ones they like.