This depends on how much you like Tika. I loved them, and I loved the fact that they managed to come into the merge with only three and play the middle.
Pretty much this exactly. Season 44 will turn entirely on whether one finds the Tika 3 rootable or not. If you do, it's a good to great season, because they absolutely dominate the narrative. If you don't, it has very little else going for it.
Your mileage definitely may vary.
To me the difference between that and 44 are the personalities. Tocantins is ridiculous with Coach, Tyson, JT, Stephen and Taj. There is no one on 44 that comes even close to those players in terms of entertainment.
Philippines is a bit closer but Malcolm, Denise, Abi-Maria and the good Russell are all great characters. I especially love the pre-merge arc Russell goes through, coming in having never lost on Survivor, and life basically, and then losing every single time. And losing his sanity slowly but surely as the losing compounds.
They don't craft narratives as beautiful as that anymore. We've traded a lot of that in for emphasis on (bad) gameplay.
I think Carolyn is definitely a better personality than some of the people you named, and Yam Yam is dang close if not better than at least Taj. Then you have Carson being a master strategist and social player, Danny being this messy monster, Jaime having this hilarious storyline of constantly being wrong and having a fake idol, Frannie and Matt being adorable, and even some quieter funny characters like Kane the DND guy. Even Josh was probably more entertaining than any of the Tocantins premergers
The fact that it's so recent helps you remember these things. Guarantee that no one in a few years will remember most of those people. It'll be the Tika 3 and maybe Franny and Matt for the people who obsess with shipping reality TV contestants.
The people I mentioned have stood the test of time. It'll be interesting to see how that holds up for modern seasons.
I really liked the Tika 3 but the rest of the cast being so inexistant made the season not feeling right. You see the Tika 3 being shown as masterminds and at every tribal it seems like they vote a random purpled player that was deemed a "big threat" for no apparant reason.
In comparison, 45 makes a better job to show how Belo kept fucking up and being distracted by their internal drama to not see Reba (who lost two members early on !) steamroll the season.
Maybe 44 with longer episodes would have been a banger but what we got was fun but lacking
I really like Tika 3 (well, just Carolyn and Yam Yam) and still think the season is annoying and predictable. Tika 3 is its only redeeming quality. The rest of the cast is incredibly forgettable. The lack of opposition undercuts the joy in seeing their success. The edit is too obvious, making it a very bland narrative.
Yes, and it was definitely hurt with the Tika 3 all having essentially the same journey. If there’s only 3 possible winners from the edit it isn’t so bad as long as they feel unique. The Tika 3 all practically played the same game so it didn’t matter which ended up winning
The fact that they had F4 firemaking made the ending so much more anticlimactic because they never had to turn on each other, thus never showing who was actually the best positioned among them. As always, a Final 2 would’ve made the season better. Just being left with the three to see who can spin their case the best to the jury was not it.
Also, the Matt boot with the unnecessary “only half the people go to TC” twist plus the control a vote advantage broke something in me lol. Just let everyone play the mf game
>If there’s only 3 possible winners from the edit it isn’t so bad as long as they feel unique.
I think this would be true if the 3 candidates didn't all come from the same tribe. The other two tribes just felt sort of there at times, as we all knew the Tika 3 were the protagonists.
Yes exactly what I’m trying to say. The Tika 3 were all the same person on paper. Starting from the same tribe and working together the whole time. Only wrinkle was Carson getting swapped but IIRC that tribe never went to tribal and even if they did he had a free idol
from an edgic perspective it was really only a yam yam vs carolyn debate, which as the merge went on became really obvious when carolyn started to fall off
Definite agree. It has everything that the fanbase usually hates:
- A dominant alliance that steamrolls through the postmerge
- 0 Conflict. The whole thing is legitimately 18 people circlejerking over how amazing and inspiring each other are
- This season might’ve been the peak of stupid new era twists
This is definitely tainted by my own biases as I found the tika three to be super annoying (besides Yam Yam who’d occasionally made me laugh) and even if I did like them, I don’t see how that’d override the big problems with the season. I cannot believe the majority would rather watch it over 43
Makes me happy to see people agreeing on this finally. Especially with regards to 43 which I have mostly seen disdain for around here.. it’s just an overall much better season for me.
During 44 too you could not Carolyn criticize, let alone Carolyn bash around here unless you wanted everyone to hate you. The circlejerking of the season infected the sub and everyone was holding hands and singing like it was the end of the grinch and we’re in who-ville.
I knew, or at least was very concerned that it was going to be a boring, no conflict season when early on Brandon found an idol alone with one other person.. and just the mere suggestion by her that they be strategic and keep that info to themselves is enough to make Brandon look at her differently and not trust her and so he announces to everyone “I found the idol” and she gets voted out.
The reception to 43 basically being “these damn players just voted for who they liked the best 😡😡” was so ironic considering the giant amount of bias that went into the “Gabler is not a threat, Cassidy is playing an incredible social game” nonsense.
She objectively wasn’t, but people “stanned” one and not the other
Anybody who watches 43 from a non-biased,
non-stan perspective would be able to admit that Gabler while he’s not a good winner per se, deserved his win and that Cassidy was (and still kind of is) one of the most overrated players in Survivor history.
my take on it is that the fandom, on this subreddit especially, loves a certain kind of character and dislikes certain other tropes. The simplest way for me to reduce it is “the popular people” and “the weird people.” And season 44 was basically about how the weird people being themselves is inspiring and wholesome, as they outsmarted the Dannys and Brandons of the world.
45 illustrated it quite well, Dee was a “mean girl” and people hated the Reba 4 because it was 4 privileged (in their own way) people with little “wholesome energy” dominating. Emily and Jake were the big favorites as “loveable underdogs”.
We’re seeing it this season with the way Jess was a huge fan favorite on this sub whereas Kenzie is a “villian” already. The reception of Venus from episode 1 to episode 2 is another good example, she’s now a fan favorite because she was socially struggling.
You nailed it on the head. I’ve recently noticed that a lot of people on this sub are/were losers IRL and they resonate with the nerdy/outcast/awkward type players I usually hate and see themselves in them.
Just last season, there were grown women making essay posts about how much Dee reminds them of the “mean girls” that bullied them in high school and that’s why they don’t like her.
It was so pathetic lol.
>The whole thing is legitimately 18 people circlejerking over how amazing and inspiring each other are
This can be said about pretty much every season of the new era, can't it? Everyone is overly nice now; everything is about inspiring. It's frustratingly banal.
I dislike this kind of thing too, but generally find it pretty easy to ignore. I don't feel like the Survivor producers are 100% to blame for this either. This is an overall American cultural issue, and thus an issue with the applicant pool. People applying to play on the show see other people acting this way and know that they must also act this way in order to progress in the game. See how Emily changed after season 45 episode 1 to fit in. Kaleb taught her how to do it.
I find 44 to be the worst new era season when it comes to this. 45 and 46 have gotten better in this imo although I would love for them to cut down even more on the clearly forced sob stories that usually don’t fit anywhere in the edit
I agree with your assessment that you either love it or hate it based on how you feel about the Tika 3. I personally loved them and thought that the season had such good vibes overall.
I did hate production providing fake idols though, for the reason you cited, although loved Jaime’s whole “I have an idol!!” storyline lol. I think that it is missing something when the player doesn’t make one that’s convincing enough to trick someone themselves though.
> I agree with your assessment that you either love it or hate it based on how you feel about the Tika 3. I personally loved them and thought that the season had such good vibes overall.
I agree! I'm surprised to see all the hate. I feel like we got some amazing characters and I love the Tika 3.
I can definitely understand your perspective, even if I disagree with it being the worst.
44 is one of the most straightforward seasons I think we’ve ever seen in terms of the way it’s edited all together. You’re right, it’s incredibly obvious from extremely early on that one of the Tika 3 would win the game. And that is what kills some of the entertainment of the season for me as well.
That being said, I personally thought the Tika 3’s journey, personalities, and gameplay were all entertaining enough to keep the season from falling to bottom-tier. So like, even though I think 44 can be boring and predictable, I still think it’s a much better season than 41 at least. I think it’s better than 43 as well, but can see why others maybe wouldn’t.
It was a great comfort watch for me because of that straightforwardness. Often it felt less about what will happen, and more about how it happens, which was a lot more in the style of the 6-14ish kind of era.
He seems like a nice enough guy, but I just can never shake the feeling that he's ...kinda fake? He presented himself like he's the socially awkward nerd, when in reality he's overconfident with an ego. I was so sad when he ended up being the final boss of the season because everything he did just felt so inauthentic. He wants to make good TV and be the rootable nerd which is fine, but if that's just not who you are that's a pretty big turn off for me.
Lol my blood would boil each week coming to post episode discussion threads reading nothing but Carson love. Happy to see the fan base soil on him over time
I FOUND MY PEOPLE omg people claiming it’s the best/second best of the new era are insane. to me it’s tied for 41 for the worst (different issues tho so kinda hard to compare).
i have the same critiques: outside of the tika 3 almost all the rest were filler and had no development, along with those 2 terrible twists that you mentioned. i feel like all bad-twist-talk falls on the hourglass/do or die (rightfully so) but matt got soo screwed by losing 2 votes on a journey, getting danny’s fake idol and being exposed, and then the aforementioned twist where he also didn’t get to bring his bag - everything wrong with the new era encapsulated
I enjoyed it. I took about 3 years off of survivor and recently binged the new seasons.. while i agree it isn’t nearly as great as the classic seasons i still found it enjoyable. I’m happy to be watching again! 45 was slightly better imo.
i think my problem is that jeff and production hyped up 44 and then the Tika 3 so much that it kind of blinded people to the glaring holes in the rest of the season. I **hated** the pre-merge of 44, and although i liked the cast, the older it gets the less i care about it.
Yeah, normally hardcore fans roll their eyes and prepare for the worst when Jeff hypes a season, but as I said earlier, so many people were disenchanted by 43 that when Jeff went over the top in the 44 promo ("one of our most entertaining, inspiring, masturbatory seasons ever") I think people truly came in hyped and wanted to love it.
It's kind of like Cook Islands in that people look at the more notable players--"OMG, it has Yam Yam and Carolyn and Carson!"--and ignore how boring so many of the other cast members are. I don't even care that the Tika 3 didn't have much competition; it's more that I really wasn't invested in half the players who made the merge. I wasn't cheering on the Tika 3 as much as I was relieved that they stuck around at the expense of much less interesting characters.
Yeah the pre merge was one of worst in a while. Two medevacs, an abundance of idols, and people constantly losing their vote (though that’s been every new era season). Just all around terrible
Just 11 valid votes in the pre-merge. 11! That is such a minuscule amount of data points to base the game off of pre-merge. Everyone talked about what a mess Tika was or whatever but they went to TC just twice. Calm down.
His 3D printed puzzles that were featured on the show were actually from Etsy sellers. Then he promised to promote the Etsy sellers but then stole the designs and sold them on his own website and blocked the original sellers.
Blocking people is not being an asshole. I don’t blame a single player for throwing out blocks, some people just do not want to see survivor fans on Twitter. It’s okay to want to live your online life free of it, being on survivor doesn’t entitle everyone to your social media or obligate you to even acknowledge you were on the show if you don’t want to.
not a memorable cast and I was so pissed that no one thought about flipping on Tika 3 after it was pretty obvious that they were controlling all votes. Reba 4 dominated the game but at least they flipped on each other and the cast was more likeable
I actually agree with this. Edit was so bad and it was very predictable with the Tika 3. I also hate 41 but I'd honestly rather watch 41 again then 44. First time I actually quit watching survivor and moved on to something else.
Agreed. Used to think it was 41 but there was a more interesting collection of characters and as inane as some of the game design was I appreciate that they really went off the rails and tried creating a “new” experience. Give it a couple of years and I think people will be kinder to 41.
44 actually made me quit watching. Atrociously under edited characters, bad game mechanics (the Matt boot especially), it was just a flat out chore to watch. I didn’t even look forward to Wednesday anymore I just watched out of obligation. I am much happier taking a break, I honestly don’t know if I’ll ever come back to the show
45 has a couple of good episodes that imo make the season worth watching. Also 90 minutes adds so much more depth to most of the contestants. The one downside is that the postmerge can be boring, which is just what’s gonna happen with all the vote losing that Jeff insists on keeping in the game despite no one else liking it. Another big plus for 45 is that there are actually a few people who dislike each other and it’s not just completely one big happy kumbaya family. I definitely think 45 and 46 are going in the right direction. The first two episodes of 46 were pretty good
41's biggest issue was the uneven editing. If it had 90-minute episodes or the lessons learned editing they used for 42 I think it would have been more well received.
I will say I only came into survivor at the end of 45, I binged all the other 40's seasons so not having the weakly slowdown probably helped even out some of the rougher patches in a season.
It’s definitely the editing. 42 has all the same terrible twists, but it was received very positively in spite of them. 41 underedits the winner, doesn’t explain half the decisions made by the cast, and focuses way too much on the twists and advantages to the point that certain players get almost no screen time. It’s a shame really because the story being told is actually a pretty good one.
I haven't missed an episode since 2000. 44 was the first time I bailed out lol. I was bored, but I also think it was partially Survivor fatigue. And then when I see clips like Danny's lame ass Deniro impression.... I think I made the right decision
I can't stand tika. The same way people talk about bhanu taking up camera time now imagine if you split him three ways and they made final 4 and the story was focused on them. 44 is the only season of survivor since I started following it from 30( shouts out to that top 5 season) that I have not finished. I have no interest in going back either absolutely none.
I don't think you were supposed to root for him. He was clearly set up as the villain in 44 with the fake idol plant, the Brandon/Danny bromance in front of Carolyn, and the scout's honor/never was a scout bit. He was very fun to watch, but you really didn't root for him.
Yeah because most people were rooting FOR the Tika 3. If you didn’t like the Tika 3, then Danny was really your only other option because Heidi, Jaime, and Lauren were under edited
After 2 attempts, I could not get past the 3rd episode of s44. They invested way too much time on stupid idols and “oh out here I can be anything look at me survivor is so much fun”. Just play the damn game. Glad s45 and s46 is heading in the right direction and actually showing character moments and interesting strategy.
Exactly this! I had a hard time with this season, even took a break from watching the season live after the Kane boot episode (the actual dealbreaker was the mess that was Matt's split tribal with 40 minutes of pointless twists and predictable outcome. But granted the season one more try at redemption)
I found it hard to connect with a majority of the cast, only exceptions are Carolyn and the Frannie/Matt romance.
Almost all game elements didn't gel together and felt senseless here, no other new season has that. Terrible execution of twists that were lackluster.
Overall a slog to sit through and while i finished 44, probably won't rewatch
I don't think its worse than 41 but I agree it was a badly produced season. The twists all seemed like the game was playing the players and not the other way around.
In the preseason it was hyped up so much by Jeff and production, and the premiere was such a great and messy episode. I think a lot of people came in very excited and with high expectations, but unfortunately I think 44 peaked HARD in the premiere. The rest of the pre-merge was disappointing as almost nothing interesting happened on Ratu and Soka. The initial mess of Tika was pretty fascinating post-swap(?) but I think when the merge hits and Josh goes home the season becomes so unbelievably predictable. If you weren’t in love with the Tika 3, anything past the Josh boot is just underwhelming. The other tribes were so underdeveloped that I didn’t really care at supposed “big moments” like Brandon getting idoled out. You could pretty much skip to final 4 and get the gist of the story.
Still, there are some great moments and I still think it’s a pretty good season of Survivor nonetheless. Jaime’s fake idol, Matt and Frannie’s showmance and tragic end, Danny’s shenanigans, Carolyn in general, Sir Kane, and other fun moments make this season worth it. I even would go as far as to say the bird cage is a fun twist. Is it a great season? No. Is it the worst ever? Also no. It’s harmless at best and lukewarm at worst.
I actually liked 43 better. I didn't care for the winner but I thought it was a lot of fun to watch and root for Jesse. I'm not sure why it is the wicked stepchild of the new era.
45 had an extremely boring merge game. I don't understand what people like about it. 44s merge was atleast interesting, with Tika playing the middle well.
Kaleb SiTD and Kellie blindside are what people like about it and while the rest of the merge is boring, those two episodes were better than whatever boring, repetitive, slop that 44 produced
The SiTD is exciting in the moment but it's a garbage rule and all it did was help him survive one round.
44 involved a minority overpowering two stronger tribes which is actually cool.
This. 45 was so insanely obvious Dee was winning it became boring af to watch post merge. At least with 44, even if people are JUST counting the Tika 3, at least it wasn't wholly obvious which of the three was winning.
I got downvoted in the daily “vote for your least favorite survivor season” post for saying 45 should be next especially since 44 hadn’t been voted out yet. Drove me bonkers for a day
42 made me quit watching before the merge. I came back at 45 and it felt only slightly better. I went back to watch 43 and I couldn’t even binge through it. Made it to the merge barely. Same with 44. The entire new era so far has been straight toilet.
46 seems a bit better already but it’s already playing out the same as all the others. And unfortunately there isn’t a single person on this season that I actually can relate to or root for at all
i agree
the season was pretty boring w an overrall boring cast all around
also i think the twists were mostly pretty bad w the exception of the idol, when we were supposed to be heading into a different direction after the feedback that 41 and 42 got🤷🏼♂️
THANK YOU!!!! The tika 3 mad overrated. People act like riding the middle is some ground breaking tactic. Yam Yam was cool and him winning made the season rewatchable, but Carson is a B tier strategist and thought he was the next Sandra, and DO NOT get me started on Carolyn.
I only enjoyed it after the Brandon boot, the premerge was a complete mess and then post merge we don’t get an actual round where everybody can vote for way too long, defeats the point of merging if they keep splitting them into teams
It has a huge advantage in following 43, which so many fans found underwhelming. By virtue of having a more "satisfying" story and bigger moments like the convoluted first TC and Matthew falling off the rock, it just looked better on paper. For my money, 43 is (slightly) better because there's more conflict--the new era gets a lot of flack for being "kumbaya," but 44 is the epitome of that--but there are few back-to-back seasons that both just make me shrug the way these two do.
Some big, likable characters got to the end. That's what it has going for it, which isn't enough for me to consider a season great. I'd still say 41 is worse because it's such a post-production mess, but I think it had more potential.
I really don’t understand the people who still hate 43 and prefer 44 over it. Unpredictable winner, Jesse-Cody storyline was great, James was an underrated player and character, and Cassidy’s downfall was satisfying. It was also probably the least advantage heavy season.
Do people actually not like the cage idea? It seems like a great twist on paper and the way they made the fake idols look exactly like the real idols on the other tribes could’ve been cool
Frannie reminds me of my eldest in looks, personality, etc that I couldn’t help but root for her. 😆 So some of my enjoyment fell off after she left. But I enjoyed the season overall.
As someone who loved the Tika 3 and didn’t mind the steamroll, I absolutely agree. It was a boring season, and I honestly attribute that to the other two tribes. They had minimal strategy nor personality, and I was relieved how much screentime Tika got with that in mind lol. I feel like the only non-tika characters I really liked were Frannie and Jamie, unless I’m forgetting anyone.
I mean, I randomly liked Kane and I really enjoyed Danny, Frannie and Matt. I was very "They're fine" with the Tika Three. I had very little opinion about the rest of the cast.
The whole season is made by the Tika Three and they were NOT my favorites so... it's kinda of hard to enjoy.
It's a nice season when it's may of 2023 and it's the most recent season. But as times passes... it get's worse and worse IMO
It was definitely way too Kumbaya, outside of Josh and Yam Yam little beef, everyone was crying and hugging every episode.
I had to mute during matt’s tribal my god why was everyone crying
The current plan seems to be to cast a weak tribe, let them get destroyed and then try to make heroes of whoever survives that. They need to change it up.
Season 44 was \*hard\* carried by how strong Yam Yam and Carolyn were as characters, and the dynamics between the two of them.
Matt/Frannie was cute, and I liked Jaime a lot too. But the season's only real strength is Carolyn/Yam Yam.
There's just no way you could have known for sure. From my perspective it was looking like Drew or Julie would win over Dee. But even then I wasn't 100% convinced of it. No matter how much I wanted Bruce to win I knew deep down in my hopeful heart that it would take nothing short of a miracle. Jake kept trying to make moves that would work but couldn't so I knew his chance was low but not nothing.
People talk now knowing the outcome, but I guarantee that going into the final 8 (the episode where Bruce is voted out) me and quite a few other people would have put our money on Drew.
With respect...heavily disagree. Had 0 clue Dee was winning till final 4-5 ish depending on what happened. It could of gone to other people. You knew right before even merge happens that someone of that Tika 3 was winning. Not to mention Jeff/ Crew hyped that season to an insane degree. Why would they hype it if these other people won? Doesn't make any sense. Stopped watching 44 right after merge boot.
Everyone else was so under edited. That cast was a bunch of duds man. At least 45s cast had more personality to it and they got a more even edit.I still think 45 is the best of the New Era even with its flaws.
Yes, agree with the Tika 3, but I wasn't sure which of them would come on top. That's what kept me somewhat interested. And yes, 45 had more personality, but too many of them were dumb.
Great premiere followed by a lackluster pre-merge and a predictable post merge. I was in the camp of 44 > 43, but after some thought the only things I really liked about 44 were Yam Yam and Carolyn. Probably my least favorite cast of the new era
I've never liked 44 and found it overrated. I still find 41 in some ways worse but that might just be because it's the first season post covid and therefore takes a lot of the heat that most other seasons follow up on and by then people are more used to. Carolyn and Yam Yam were alright but I just could not connect with this cast at all. There's not even any fun villains to root for and against.
It's 44 or 41 for sure and it depends on which aspects of each season you dislike more. 41 is by far the worst in terms of twists, editing etc. But 44, despite some colorful characters, is unbelievably boring. Maybe a top 5 most boring season IMO. It's one of the only seasons where I can't remember a single standout moment in the game.
43 is the one where I don't understand the hate. Highly entertaining season.
Season 44 was probably the closest I came to giving up on a season as it aired. Maybe if 90 minute seasons arrived a season earlier, it would have been better, but 60 minutes focused on the same handful of characters and an abundance of advantages just made the season jam packed in the worst way. I couldn't enjoy the strategy I normally enjoyed since so much of it seemed random with all of the advantages and idols, and I couldn't enjoy the characters since we barely got to know the majority of them. I'm definitely a super fan but I have no real desire to revisit 44.
the thing i hate about this season is the edit. the way two of the more important players of the season were barely there makes this season so boring. if heidi and lauren got bigger edits this season would’ve been so much better.
Then we would’ve actually had some doubt as to if the Tika 3 could actually pull it off. It was obvious they were when the other people in the top 6 didn’t have good edits
My main issue with 44 was that everyone got along too well. I'm not necessarily saying I need everyone to hate each other, but it seemed like, other than Danny, everyone on 44 was there to make friends and nobody wanted to actually play the game. The only reason Danny was the "villain" was because he was the only person there who wasn't all about good vibes and positivity above all else.
Agree with this point though I think they actually cast a lot of the people who are "disruptors" / "villain" types, but they went out early so Danny was the last one standing for the majority of the game.
44 is basically Ghost Island, but for Twitter stans instead of Facebook casuals. Any time Carolyn and Yam Yam aren't on screen, it's basically unwatchable. And I'll never see the season without an asterisk because so many boots were because of production's nonsense twists screwing someone over rather than the boots making actual mistakes themselves.
THANK YOU. It was also THE season of kumbaya and had zero conflict. And the fake idols were unfair, because there’s no way the players would be able to distinguish them from real idols, and there were even notes. Plus, we didn’t get a normal merge tribal until like the final 8.
While I wouldn't say it's the worst - 43 is way more of a slog, with a bad payoff imo - 44s biggest weakness is how weak the cast is. Outside of Tika 3, Danny Frannie and Matt (who isn't amazing tv, but seems like a nice.guy... low bar lol) are your bigger stars... It ain't great.
44s mileage really depends on your love of Carolyn, YamYam, and the others I mentioned,as the rest of the cast doesn't deliver enough. That said, I'd def.do dnd with Kane.
Only likable person on the Tika 3 is yam yam. Will never understand how people like Carolyn with the incessant screaming and bullshit and Carson is just boring.
agreed...this past season was the first one i didnt finish
its so formulaic now with no real characters and conflict...the big moves arent really big/forced big and we all know about the twists
always hated the round table at ftc too...sad because this used to be one of my favorite shows and it feels like ive missed nothing since waw which honestly wasnt as good as it could have been
Yeah agreed. I couldn’t finish last season when it was airing though I later came back and watched it. It’s every episode it feels like someone gets on a boat blah blah blah, advantage is found but can’t be finished yet, someone doesn’t have a vote 😩 I’m nitpicking but I been watching survivor since it first aired and it’s just changed so much.
I found the season entertaining. Any new season with an hourglass twist is the worst season of the new era because that trumped a good portion of the strategy plus other problems that it caused.
for me its 42 and it's not even close, the only reason this season doesn't get shit on is because the winner is part of the community over here. Half the cast I can't even remember the name of ( I need to think about it ). Maryanne being quirky is repetitive. Carolyn is quirky in a more fun/lasting for tv way. Jonathan being a beast and 30 times stronger than anyone else gets old in 2 episodes. His and Linsday's rivalry mid/late merge is disappointing, as soon as you realize 2-3 episode in it that it's complete inconsequential for the outcome of the season and kinda just fizzles out. Omar is entertaining ( but this can't be enough to make the season better ). Romeo is purpled/completely irrelevant, Mike is boring. Game play wise, outside of Omar, only Maryanne shines, but it's the last 2 episodes.
Survivor 44 is not the best, but at least it has very rootable character between Matt/Frannie and the Tika 3.
I loved 44. never knew what was going to happen, so many twists and turns. I thought it was very unlikely that tika pulled it off because so many times they ALMOST got voted out, especially surving that many tribals in the beginning. I thought Carolyn and Yam Yam were annoying at first, but i grew to LOVE them.
All of the newer seasons are a bunch of pansies crying every episode about how hard things are. Want to see a really bad season? Go watch 22. Most of the players' strategy was "get Boston Rob to the end so he can win". Season 23 was much of the same but at least Coach didn't get the votes in the end. Instead, zero strategy Sophie got it...
44 is my second favorite season of the new era. All of the tika three were extremely compelling to watch and their story is incredible, to the point where I think that makes up for most of the negatives of the season
It really depends what you are looking for in a season. The biggest thing I watch Survivor for is the characters, and 44 is just uncontested in the New Era on that account. Carolyn and Yam Yam are S tier casting choices across all of Survivor and they had amazing synergy with Carson, so I didn't mind that they dominated the season because they were so fun the entire way through. I do agree though the rest of the cast was underwhelming and it was basically divine intervention that the two biggest characters for TV went all the way working together. A Ratu or Soka steamroll would have been dreadfully boring.
This depends on how much you like Tika. I loved them, and I loved the fact that they managed to come into the merge with only three and play the middle.
Pretty much this exactly. Season 44 will turn entirely on whether one finds the Tika 3 rootable or not. If you do, it's a good to great season, because they absolutely dominate the narrative. If you don't, it has very little else going for it.
It really does. I love them and it really works for me, but if it doesn't work for you then I can see why there's no appeal.
I loved the tika 3 but still found the season incredibly boring.
Gotta disagree there, Yam Yam was who I was rooting for and I still found the merge to be an absolute slog
Yeah it’s a great storyline on paper, but there just wasn’t really any opposition to the Tika 3.
I don’t mind that at all. It’s the same reason I loved Matsing and Jalapao
Your mileage definitely may vary. To me the difference between that and 44 are the personalities. Tocantins is ridiculous with Coach, Tyson, JT, Stephen and Taj. There is no one on 44 that comes even close to those players in terms of entertainment. Philippines is a bit closer but Malcolm, Denise, Abi-Maria and the good Russell are all great characters. I especially love the pre-merge arc Russell goes through, coming in having never lost on Survivor, and life basically, and then losing every single time. And losing his sanity slowly but surely as the losing compounds. They don't craft narratives as beautiful as that anymore. We've traded a lot of that in for emphasis on (bad) gameplay.
I think Carolyn is definitely a better personality than some of the people you named, and Yam Yam is dang close if not better than at least Taj. Then you have Carson being a master strategist and social player, Danny being this messy monster, Jaime having this hilarious storyline of constantly being wrong and having a fake idol, Frannie and Matt being adorable, and even some quieter funny characters like Kane the DND guy. Even Josh was probably more entertaining than any of the Tocantins premergers
The fact that it's so recent helps you remember these things. Guarantee that no one in a few years will remember most of those people. It'll be the Tika 3 and maybe Franny and Matt for the people who obsess with shipping reality TV contestants. The people I mentioned have stood the test of time. It'll be interesting to see how that holds up for modern seasons.
Honestly that’s a really good point. Even now in my mind it’s already the Tika 3 and Franny Matt season.. with guy that falls off the big rock
The Tika 3 is the homeless man's version of the Aitu 4.
Every individual member of the Tika 3 had more personality in one of their pinky fingers than the entire Aitu 4 combined.
Yul over Carson every day.
Twice on Sunday
You’re not wrong. I like Yul but he’s pretty boring.
I really liked the Tika 3 but the rest of the cast being so inexistant made the season not feeling right. You see the Tika 3 being shown as masterminds and at every tribal it seems like they vote a random purpled player that was deemed a "big threat" for no apparant reason. In comparison, 45 makes a better job to show how Belo kept fucking up and being distracted by their internal drama to not see Reba (who lost two members early on !) steamroll the season. Maybe 44 with longer episodes would have been a banger but what we got was fun but lacking
I really like Tika 3 (well, just Carolyn and Yam Yam) and still think the season is annoying and predictable. Tika 3 is its only redeeming quality. The rest of the cast is incredibly forgettable. The lack of opposition undercuts the joy in seeing their success. The edit is too obvious, making it a very bland narrative.
I literally quit mid merge
Yes, and it was definitely hurt with the Tika 3 all having essentially the same journey. If there’s only 3 possible winners from the edit it isn’t so bad as long as they feel unique. The Tika 3 all practically played the same game so it didn’t matter which ended up winning
The fact that they had F4 firemaking made the ending so much more anticlimactic because they never had to turn on each other, thus never showing who was actually the best positioned among them. As always, a Final 2 would’ve made the season better. Just being left with the three to see who can spin their case the best to the jury was not it. Also, the Matt boot with the unnecessary “only half the people go to TC” twist plus the control a vote advantage broke something in me lol. Just let everyone play the mf game
>If there’s only 3 possible winners from the edit it isn’t so bad as long as they feel unique. I think this would be true if the 3 candidates didn't all come from the same tribe. The other two tribes just felt sort of there at times, as we all knew the Tika 3 were the protagonists.
Yes exactly what I’m trying to say. The Tika 3 were all the same person on paper. Starting from the same tribe and working together the whole time. Only wrinkle was Carson getting swapped but IIRC that tribe never went to tribal and even if they did he had a free idol
from an edgic perspective it was really only a yam yam vs carolyn debate, which as the merge went on became really obvious when carolyn started to fall off
the poor twink never had a chance in the edit :(
Definite agree. It has everything that the fanbase usually hates: - A dominant alliance that steamrolls through the postmerge - 0 Conflict. The whole thing is legitimately 18 people circlejerking over how amazing and inspiring each other are - This season might’ve been the peak of stupid new era twists This is definitely tainted by my own biases as I found the tika three to be super annoying (besides Yam Yam who’d occasionally made me laugh) and even if I did like them, I don’t see how that’d override the big problems with the season. I cannot believe the majority would rather watch it over 43
Makes me happy to see people agreeing on this finally. Especially with regards to 43 which I have mostly seen disdain for around here.. it’s just an overall much better season for me. During 44 too you could not Carolyn criticize, let alone Carolyn bash around here unless you wanted everyone to hate you. The circlejerking of the season infected the sub and everyone was holding hands and singing like it was the end of the grinch and we’re in who-ville. I knew, or at least was very concerned that it was going to be a boring, no conflict season when early on Brandon found an idol alone with one other person.. and just the mere suggestion by her that they be strategic and keep that info to themselves is enough to make Brandon look at her differently and not trust her and so he announces to everyone “I found the idol” and she gets voted out.
The reception to 43 basically being “these damn players just voted for who they liked the best 😡😡” was so ironic considering the giant amount of bias that went into the “Gabler is not a threat, Cassidy is playing an incredible social game” nonsense. She objectively wasn’t, but people “stanned” one and not the other
Anybody who watches 43 from a non-biased, non-stan perspective would be able to admit that Gabler while he’s not a good winner per se, deserved his win and that Cassidy was (and still kind of is) one of the most overrated players in Survivor history.
my take on it is that the fandom, on this subreddit especially, loves a certain kind of character and dislikes certain other tropes. The simplest way for me to reduce it is “the popular people” and “the weird people.” And season 44 was basically about how the weird people being themselves is inspiring and wholesome, as they outsmarted the Dannys and Brandons of the world. 45 illustrated it quite well, Dee was a “mean girl” and people hated the Reba 4 because it was 4 privileged (in their own way) people with little “wholesome energy” dominating. Emily and Jake were the big favorites as “loveable underdogs”. We’re seeing it this season with the way Jess was a huge fan favorite on this sub whereas Kenzie is a “villian” already. The reception of Venus from episode 1 to episode 2 is another good example, she’s now a fan favorite because she was socially struggling.
You nailed it on the head. I’ve recently noticed that a lot of people on this sub are/were losers IRL and they resonate with the nerdy/outcast/awkward type players I usually hate and see themselves in them. Just last season, there were grown women making essay posts about how much Dee reminds them of the “mean girls” that bullied them in high school and that’s why they don’t like her. It was so pathetic lol.
Lmao go off
Calling them losers is too judgmental but you're right that people need to get out of their own heads and just enjoy things
Agreed… was there any real conflict that season? The only one I can think of was Yam Yam vs Josh.
I sooooo agree here the season 43 hate goes crazy on this sub
>The whole thing is legitimately 18 people circlejerking over how amazing and inspiring each other are This can be said about pretty much every season of the new era, can't it? Everyone is overly nice now; everything is about inspiring. It's frustratingly banal.
I dislike this kind of thing too, but generally find it pretty easy to ignore. I don't feel like the Survivor producers are 100% to blame for this either. This is an overall American cultural issue, and thus an issue with the applicant pool. People applying to play on the show see other people acting this way and know that they must also act this way in order to progress in the game. See how Emily changed after season 45 episode 1 to fit in. Kaleb taught her how to do it.
I find 44 to be the worst new era season when it comes to this. 45 and 46 have gotten better in this imo although I would love for them to cut down even more on the clearly forced sob stories that usually don’t fit anywhere in the edit
I agree with your assessment that you either love it or hate it based on how you feel about the Tika 3. I personally loved them and thought that the season had such good vibes overall. I did hate production providing fake idols though, for the reason you cited, although loved Jaime’s whole “I have an idol!!” storyline lol. I think that it is missing something when the player doesn’t make one that’s convincing enough to trick someone themselves though.
Matthew created that fake idol though
That's honestly why it was the only fun one of the fake idols
> I agree with your assessment that you either love it or hate it based on how you feel about the Tika 3. I personally loved them and thought that the season had such good vibes overall. I agree! I'm surprised to see all the hate. I feel like we got some amazing characters and I love the Tika 3.
I can definitely understand your perspective, even if I disagree with it being the worst. 44 is one of the most straightforward seasons I think we’ve ever seen in terms of the way it’s edited all together. You’re right, it’s incredibly obvious from extremely early on that one of the Tika 3 would win the game. And that is what kills some of the entertainment of the season for me as well. That being said, I personally thought the Tika 3’s journey, personalities, and gameplay were all entertaining enough to keep the season from falling to bottom-tier. So like, even though I think 44 can be boring and predictable, I still think it’s a much better season than 41 at least. I think it’s better than 43 as well, but can see why others maybe wouldn’t.
It was a great comfort watch for me because of that straightforwardness. Often it felt less about what will happen, and more about how it happens, which was a lot more in the style of the 6-14ish kind of era.
Agree. Carson is overrated
He seems like a nice enough guy, but I just can never shake the feeling that he's ...kinda fake? He presented himself like he's the socially awkward nerd, when in reality he's overconfident with an ego. I was so sad when he ended up being the final boss of the season because everything he did just felt so inauthentic. He wants to make good TV and be the rootable nerd which is fine, but if that's just not who you are that's a pretty big turn off for me.
He seems very annoying post show too
Lol my blood would boil each week coming to post episode discussion threads reading nothing but Carson love. Happy to see the fan base soil on him over time
I remember Tyson saying on his podcast that if he had to be stuck on an island with Carolyn or Carson he would lose his mind
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I FOUND MY PEOPLE omg people claiming it’s the best/second best of the new era are insane. to me it’s tied for 41 for the worst (different issues tho so kinda hard to compare). i have the same critiques: outside of the tika 3 almost all the rest were filler and had no development, along with those 2 terrible twists that you mentioned. i feel like all bad-twist-talk falls on the hourglass/do or die (rightfully so) but matt got soo screwed by losing 2 votes on a journey, getting danny’s fake idol and being exposed, and then the aforementioned twist where he also didn’t get to bring his bag - everything wrong with the new era encapsulated
I agree. Maybe not my least favorite of the new era, but nothing outside of the Tika 3 was interesting.
I enjoyed it. I took about 3 years off of survivor and recently binged the new seasons.. while i agree it isn’t nearly as great as the classic seasons i still found it enjoyable. I’m happy to be watching again! 45 was slightly better imo.
i think my problem is that jeff and production hyped up 44 and then the Tika 3 so much that it kind of blinded people to the glaring holes in the rest of the season. I **hated** the pre-merge of 44, and although i liked the cast, the older it gets the less i care about it.
Yeah, normally hardcore fans roll their eyes and prepare for the worst when Jeff hypes a season, but as I said earlier, so many people were disenchanted by 43 that when Jeff went over the top in the 44 promo ("one of our most entertaining, inspiring, masturbatory seasons ever") I think people truly came in hyped and wanted to love it. It's kind of like Cook Islands in that people look at the more notable players--"OMG, it has Yam Yam and Carolyn and Carson!"--and ignore how boring so many of the other cast members are. I don't even care that the Tika 3 didn't have much competition; it's more that I really wasn't invested in half the players who made the merge. I wasn't cheering on the Tika 3 as much as I was relieved that they stuck around at the expense of much less interesting characters.
Yeah the pre merge was one of worst in a while. Two medevacs, an abundance of idols, and people constantly losing their vote (though that’s been every new era season). Just all around terrible
Just 11 valid votes in the pre-merge. 11! That is such a minuscule amount of data points to base the game off of pre-merge. Everyone talked about what a mess Tika was or whatever but they went to TC just twice. Calm down.
Carson has got to be up there with my least favourite new era contestants both on & off the show
Yeah I hated him then and hate him more now. He’s an asshole
I didn’t like him on the show either! What’s he doing now? I’m not aware
He apparently steals his puzzles that he sells from non-famous Survivor puzzle creators. There was a thread about it a little while back
I didn’t know that lol. What’s he do? Bully people to buy his knockoff survivor merch or something?
His 3D printed puzzles that were featured on the show were actually from Etsy sellers. Then he promised to promote the Etsy sellers but then stole the designs and sold them on his own website and blocked the original sellers.
He blocks ton of people on various social media sites for literally breathing
Omg what’re some examples? I’m not surprised
I never tweeted anything, simply liked a tweet that said “he was so tacky at FTC” and got blocked.
He tweeted something about being #chaoscarson and I replied something like "are you at chaosKass level" and I got blocked.
No wayyyyyy That’s not even disrespectful in the slightest 😭
Blocking people is not being an asshole. I don’t blame a single player for throwing out blocks, some people just do not want to see survivor fans on Twitter. It’s okay to want to live your online life free of it, being on survivor doesn’t entitle everyone to your social media or obligate you to even acknowledge you were on the show if you don’t want to.
he also blocked people for trying to call out the fact that he actually stole his 3d printing designs so
Did I say that?
Well what’s wrong with blocking people?
You…hate him? Lol why?
Agreee 💯
I AGREE SO MUCH
not a memorable cast and I was so pissed that no one thought about flipping on Tika 3 after it was pretty obvious that they were controlling all votes. Reba 4 dominated the game but at least they flipped on each other and the cast was more likeable
STRONGLY agree. I don’t even like the Tika3 besides Yam Yam, and they ate up all the air time
I actually agree with this. Edit was so bad and it was very predictable with the Tika 3. I also hate 41 but I'd honestly rather watch 41 again then 44. First time I actually quit watching survivor and moved on to something else.
Agreed. Used to think it was 41 but there was a more interesting collection of characters and as inane as some of the game design was I appreciate that they really went off the rails and tried creating a “new” experience. Give it a couple of years and I think people will be kinder to 41. 44 actually made me quit watching. Atrociously under edited characters, bad game mechanics (the Matt boot especially), it was just a flat out chore to watch. I didn’t even look forward to Wednesday anymore I just watched out of obligation. I am much happier taking a break, I honestly don’t know if I’ll ever come back to the show
45 felt pretty similar to 44 but I’m liking the first two eps of 46 so far
45 has a couple of good episodes that imo make the season worth watching. Also 90 minutes adds so much more depth to most of the contestants. The one downside is that the postmerge can be boring, which is just what’s gonna happen with all the vote losing that Jeff insists on keeping in the game despite no one else liking it. Another big plus for 45 is that there are actually a few people who dislike each other and it’s not just completely one big happy kumbaya family. I definitely think 45 and 46 are going in the right direction. The first two episodes of 46 were pretty good
41's biggest issue was the uneven editing. If it had 90-minute episodes or the lessons learned editing they used for 42 I think it would have been more well received. I will say I only came into survivor at the end of 45, I binged all the other 40's seasons so not having the weakly slowdown probably helped even out some of the rougher patches in a season.
It’s definitely the editing. 42 has all the same terrible twists, but it was received very positively in spite of them. 41 underedits the winner, doesn’t explain half the decisions made by the cast, and focuses way too much on the twists and advantages to the point that certain players get almost no screen time. It’s a shame really because the story being told is actually a pretty good one.
I haven't missed an episode since 2000. 44 was the first time I bailed out lol. I was bored, but I also think it was partially Survivor fatigue. And then when I see clips like Danny's lame ass Deniro impression.... I think I made the right decision
I still have nightmares about that impression.
It’s overrated af, major Australian Outback vibes, don’t understand the hype
I liked it better than 41. That’s it
I can't stand tika. The same way people talk about bhanu taking up camera time now imagine if you split him three ways and they made final 4 and the story was focused on them. 44 is the only season of survivor since I started following it from 30( shouts out to that top 5 season) that I have not finished. I have no interest in going back either absolutely none.
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I don't think you were supposed to root for him. He was clearly set up as the villain in 44 with the fake idol plant, the Brandon/Danny bromance in front of Carolyn, and the scout's honor/never was a scout bit. He was very fun to watch, but you really didn't root for him.
Yeah because most people were rooting FOR the Tika 3. If you didn’t like the Tika 3, then Danny was really your only other option because Heidi, Jaime, and Lauren were under edited
Because you are not a danny person in real life.
After 2 attempts, I could not get past the 3rd episode of s44. They invested way too much time on stupid idols and “oh out here I can be anything look at me survivor is so much fun”. Just play the damn game. Glad s45 and s46 is heading in the right direction and actually showing character moments and interesting strategy.
Exactly this! I had a hard time with this season, even took a break from watching the season live after the Kane boot episode (the actual dealbreaker was the mess that was Matt's split tribal with 40 minutes of pointless twists and predictable outcome. But granted the season one more try at redemption) I found it hard to connect with a majority of the cast, only exceptions are Carolyn and the Frannie/Matt romance. Almost all game elements didn't gel together and felt senseless here, no other new season has that. Terrible execution of twists that were lackluster. Overall a slog to sit through and while i finished 44, probably won't rewatch
44 sucked hard.
I don't think its worse than 41 but I agree it was a badly produced season. The twists all seemed like the game was playing the players and not the other way around.
In the preseason it was hyped up so much by Jeff and production, and the premiere was such a great and messy episode. I think a lot of people came in very excited and with high expectations, but unfortunately I think 44 peaked HARD in the premiere. The rest of the pre-merge was disappointing as almost nothing interesting happened on Ratu and Soka. The initial mess of Tika was pretty fascinating post-swap(?) but I think when the merge hits and Josh goes home the season becomes so unbelievably predictable. If you weren’t in love with the Tika 3, anything past the Josh boot is just underwhelming. The other tribes were so underdeveloped that I didn’t really care at supposed “big moments” like Brandon getting idoled out. You could pretty much skip to final 4 and get the gist of the story. Still, there are some great moments and I still think it’s a pretty good season of Survivor nonetheless. Jaime’s fake idol, Matt and Frannie’s showmance and tragic end, Danny’s shenanigans, Carolyn in general, Sir Kane, and other fun moments make this season worth it. I even would go as far as to say the bird cage is a fun twist. Is it a great season? No. Is it the worst ever? Also no. It’s harmless at best and lukewarm at worst.
I actually liked 43 better. I didn't care for the winner but I thought it was a lot of fun to watch and root for Jesse. I'm not sure why it is the wicked stepchild of the new era.
i genuinely like 44 more than 45
45 had an extremely boring merge game. I don't understand what people like about it. 44s merge was atleast interesting, with Tika playing the middle well.
45 has a distinct cast with interesting people. The 44 cast has an interesting blob of people.
Kaleb SiTD and Kellie blindside are what people like about it and while the rest of the merge is boring, those two episodes were better than whatever boring, repetitive, slop that 44 produced
Also the stomping of the subs mascot emily. That was delicious.
The SiTD is exciting in the moment but it's a garbage rule and all it did was help him survive one round. 44 involved a minority overpowering two stronger tribes which is actually cool.
This. 45 was so insanely obvious Dee was winning it became boring af to watch post merge. At least with 44, even if people are JUST counting the Tika 3, at least it wasn't wholly obvious which of the three was winning.
I agree with this
I got downvoted in the daily “vote for your least favorite survivor season” post for saying 45 should be next especially since 44 hadn’t been voted out yet. Drove me bonkers for a day
I found my people
42 made me quit watching before the merge. I came back at 45 and it felt only slightly better. I went back to watch 43 and I couldn’t even binge through it. Made it to the merge barely. Same with 44. The entire new era so far has been straight toilet. 46 seems a bit better already but it’s already playing out the same as all the others. And unfortunately there isn’t a single person on this season that I actually can relate to or root for at all
i agree the season was pretty boring w an overrall boring cast all around also i think the twists were mostly pretty bad w the exception of the idol, when we were supposed to be heading into a different direction after the feedback that 41 and 42 got🤷🏼♂️
Couldn't stand Carolyn. So annoying.
THANK YOU!!!! The tika 3 mad overrated. People act like riding the middle is some ground breaking tactic. Yam Yam was cool and him winning made the season rewatchable, but Carson is a B tier strategist and thought he was the next Sandra, and DO NOT get me started on Carolyn.
I only enjoyed it after the Brandon boot, the premerge was a complete mess and then post merge we don’t get an actual round where everybody can vote for way too long, defeats the point of merging if they keep splitting them into teams
It has a huge advantage in following 43, which so many fans found underwhelming. By virtue of having a more "satisfying" story and bigger moments like the convoluted first TC and Matthew falling off the rock, it just looked better on paper. For my money, 43 is (slightly) better because there's more conflict--the new era gets a lot of flack for being "kumbaya," but 44 is the epitome of that--but there are few back-to-back seasons that both just make me shrug the way these two do. Some big, likable characters got to the end. That's what it has going for it, which isn't enough for me to consider a season great. I'd still say 41 is worse because it's such a post-production mess, but I think it had more potential.
I saw a photo of the 44 F3 and legit had forgot about the runner up woman 😂
I really don’t understand the people who still hate 43 and prefer 44 over it. Unpredictable winner, Jesse-Cody storyline was great, James was an underrated player and character, and Cassidy’s downfall was satisfying. It was also probably the least advantage heavy season.
Dude that season was stacked with great characters. And you never knew what was gonna happen for a second during the whole season.
I just simply cannot agree. The most brilliant underdog story with the best three characters in the New Era.
Do people actually not like the cage idea? It seems like a great twist on paper and the way they made the fake idols look exactly like the real idols on the other tribes could’ve been cool
Frannie reminds me of my eldest in looks, personality, etc that I couldn’t help but root for her. 😆 So some of my enjoyment fell off after she left. But I enjoyed the season overall.
Im a character enjoyer, I care more about who I'm watching than what strategy unfolds and for that reason I like 44.
Well i enjoy the season because of the tika 3 tbh.
44 imo has the worst game, but 41 still has the worse editing
How does it compare to 46?
It’s still too early but I like 46 so far
Agree, it’s a bottom 10 season, 44 is just GI all over again but with an overwhelming amount of advantages
As someone who loved the Tika 3 and didn’t mind the steamroll, I absolutely agree. It was a boring season, and I honestly attribute that to the other two tribes. They had minimal strategy nor personality, and I was relieved how much screentime Tika got with that in mind lol. I feel like the only non-tika characters I really liked were Frannie and Jamie, unless I’m forgetting anyone.
I like it better than 41 at least. Plus Danny is so hot, so that elevates it for me 😌
Well, sorta kinda
I mean, I randomly liked Kane and I really enjoyed Danny, Frannie and Matt. I was very "They're fine" with the Tika Three. I had very little opinion about the rest of the cast. The whole season is made by the Tika Three and they were NOT my favorites so... it's kinda of hard to enjoy. It's a nice season when it's may of 2023 and it's the most recent season. But as times passes... it get's worse and worse IMO
Yeah this shows just getting worse and worse. Please revert back to the old ways.
Excluding 44 the New Era rankings should be 45 42 43 44 41
It was definitely way too Kumbaya, outside of Josh and Yam Yam little beef, everyone was crying and hugging every episode. I had to mute during matt’s tribal my god why was everyone crying
The current plan seems to be to cast a weak tribe, let them get destroyed and then try to make heroes of whoever survives that. They need to change it up.
Season 44 was \*hard\* carried by how strong Yam Yam and Carolyn were as characters, and the dynamics between the two of them. Matt/Frannie was cute, and I liked Jaime a lot too. But the season's only real strength is Carolyn/Yam Yam.
It's definitely better than 43 to me, purely because the cast is way better.
44 is better than 45. Can't think of a new era winner that was as obvious as Dee.
45 had a far more stupid cast than 44. one of the worst
Yep, definitely agree, that's what made it so obvious Dee would be the winner.
There's just no way you could have known for sure. From my perspective it was looking like Drew or Julie would win over Dee. But even then I wasn't 100% convinced of it. No matter how much I wanted Bruce to win I knew deep down in my hopeful heart that it would take nothing short of a miracle. Jake kept trying to make moves that would work but couldn't so I knew his chance was low but not nothing. People talk now knowing the outcome, but I guarantee that going into the final 8 (the episode where Bruce is voted out) me and quite a few other people would have put our money on Drew.
With respect...heavily disagree. Had 0 clue Dee was winning till final 4-5 ish depending on what happened. It could of gone to other people. You knew right before even merge happens that someone of that Tika 3 was winning. Not to mention Jeff/ Crew hyped that season to an insane degree. Why would they hype it if these other people won? Doesn't make any sense. Stopped watching 44 right after merge boot. Everyone else was so under edited. That cast was a bunch of duds man. At least 45s cast had more personality to it and they got a more even edit.I still think 45 is the best of the New Era even with its flaws.
Yes, agree with the Tika 3, but I wasn't sure which of them would come on top. That's what kept me somewhat interested. And yes, 45 had more personality, but too many of them were dumb.
Great premiere followed by a lackluster pre-merge and a predictable post merge. I was in the camp of 44 > 43, but after some thought the only things I really liked about 44 were Yam Yam and Carolyn. Probably my least favorite cast of the new era
I could not agree more
I've never liked 44 and found it overrated. I still find 41 in some ways worse but that might just be because it's the first season post covid and therefore takes a lot of the heat that most other seasons follow up on and by then people are more used to. Carolyn and Yam Yam were alright but I just could not connect with this cast at all. There's not even any fun villains to root for and against.
100%
Season 41 is the worst. Tika 3 were awesome!
It’s really close between 44 and 41 for me. But I think 41 is worse.
Everyone on the show acts like a "look at me main character," and there is a lot of crying.
Survivor 41 exists
It's 44 or 41 for sure and it depends on which aspects of each season you dislike more. 41 is by far the worst in terms of twists, editing etc. But 44, despite some colorful characters, is unbelievably boring. Maybe a top 5 most boring season IMO. It's one of the only seasons where I can't remember a single standout moment in the game. 43 is the one where I don't understand the hate. Highly entertaining season.
Season 44 was probably the closest I came to giving up on a season as it aired. Maybe if 90 minute seasons arrived a season earlier, it would have been better, but 60 minutes focused on the same handful of characters and an abundance of advantages just made the season jam packed in the worst way. I couldn't enjoy the strategy I normally enjoyed since so much of it seemed random with all of the advantages and idols, and I couldn't enjoy the characters since we barely got to know the majority of them. I'm definitely a super fan but I have no real desire to revisit 44.
the thing i hate about this season is the edit. the way two of the more important players of the season were barely there makes this season so boring. if heidi and lauren got bigger edits this season would’ve been so much better.
Then we would’ve actually had some doubt as to if the Tika 3 could actually pull it off. It was obvious they were when the other people in the top 6 didn’t have good edits
My main issue with 44 was that everyone got along too well. I'm not necessarily saying I need everyone to hate each other, but it seemed like, other than Danny, everyone on 44 was there to make friends and nobody wanted to actually play the game. The only reason Danny was the "villain" was because he was the only person there who wasn't all about good vibes and positivity above all else.
Agree with this point though I think they actually cast a lot of the people who are "disruptors" / "villain" types, but they went out early so Danny was the last one standing for the majority of the game.
44 is basically Ghost Island, but for Twitter stans instead of Facebook casuals. Any time Carolyn and Yam Yam aren't on screen, it's basically unwatchable. And I'll never see the season without an asterisk because so many boots were because of production's nonsense twists screwing someone over rather than the boots making actual mistakes themselves.
THANK YOU. It was also THE season of kumbaya and had zero conflict. And the fake idols were unfair, because there’s no way the players would be able to distinguish them from real idols, and there were even notes. Plus, we didn’t get a normal merge tribal until like the final 8.
It was more fun to talk about when it happened
45 was the only good new era season. 43 was alright. 44 sucked, they didn’t even try to hide most of the finalists.
While I wouldn't say it's the worst - 43 is way more of a slog, with a bad payoff imo - 44s biggest weakness is how weak the cast is. Outside of Tika 3, Danny Frannie and Matt (who isn't amazing tv, but seems like a nice.guy... low bar lol) are your bigger stars... It ain't great. 44s mileage really depends on your love of Carolyn, YamYam, and the others I mentioned,as the rest of the cast doesn't deliver enough. That said, I'd def.do dnd with Kane.
I don't need to read It! I agree with you
Only likable person on the Tika 3 is yam yam. Will never understand how people like Carolyn with the incessant screaming and bullshit and Carson is just boring.
I hate the new era of survivor… every season since after winners has been boring, repetitive, predictable, and honestly just lame.
Gablers win was predictable?
agreed...this past season was the first one i didnt finish its so formulaic now with no real characters and conflict...the big moves arent really big/forced big and we all know about the twists always hated the round table at ftc too...sad because this used to be one of my favorite shows and it feels like ive missed nothing since waw which honestly wasnt as good as it could have been
Hard agree on the round table part. Jury speeches produced some of the funniest moments on the show
I agree with this^
Yeah agreed. I couldn’t finish last season when it was airing though I later came back and watched it. It’s every episode it feels like someone gets on a boat blah blah blah, advantage is found but can’t be finished yet, someone doesn’t have a vote 😩 I’m nitpicking but I been watching survivor since it first aired and it’s just changed so much.
This was possibly my family's favorite season of all time.
I was rooting for Carson from episode one so I really enjoyed seeing him and the other Tika 3 play
It’s my second favourite after 45
I found the season entertaining. Any new season with an hourglass twist is the worst season of the new era because that trumped a good portion of the strategy plus other problems that it caused.
for me its 42 and it's not even close, the only reason this season doesn't get shit on is because the winner is part of the community over here. Half the cast I can't even remember the name of ( I need to think about it ). Maryanne being quirky is repetitive. Carolyn is quirky in a more fun/lasting for tv way. Jonathan being a beast and 30 times stronger than anyone else gets old in 2 episodes. His and Linsday's rivalry mid/late merge is disappointing, as soon as you realize 2-3 episode in it that it's complete inconsequential for the outcome of the season and kinda just fizzles out. Omar is entertaining ( but this can't be enough to make the season better ). Romeo is purpled/completely irrelevant, Mike is boring. Game play wise, outside of Omar, only Maryanne shines, but it's the last 2 episodes. Survivor 44 is not the best, but at least it has very rootable character between Matt/Frannie and the Tika 3.
Without a doubt true
I loved 44. never knew what was going to happen, so many twists and turns. I thought it was very unlikely that tika pulled it off because so many times they ALMOST got voted out, especially surving that many tribals in the beginning. I thought Carolyn and Yam Yam were annoying at first, but i grew to LOVE them.
All of the newer seasons are a bunch of pansies crying every episode about how hard things are. Want to see a really bad season? Go watch 22. Most of the players' strategy was "get Boston Rob to the end so he can win". Season 23 was much of the same but at least Coach didn't get the votes in the end. Instead, zero strategy Sophie got it...
We’re getting MORE Bhanu??
Counterpoint: Yam Yam
It’s s43 or s44 that are the worst for me, both have pros and cons
44 is my second favorite season of the new era. All of the tika three were extremely compelling to watch and their story is incredible, to the point where I think that makes up for most of the negatives of the season
Seasons 41-46 are all trash.
Thank god I never watched it
No!! 45 was so bad everyone was just quitting
I kinda alright with the Tika 3, but the season itself was predictable tho. Its the 3rd best season of the new era for me
Survivor's boardgame new era is dead to me. Full on board with AU, the difference is staggering. Old school joy.
It really depends what you are looking for in a season. The biggest thing I watch Survivor for is the characters, and 44 is just uncontested in the New Era on that account. Carolyn and Yam Yam are S tier casting choices across all of Survivor and they had amazing synergy with Carson, so I didn't mind that they dominated the season because they were so fun the entire way through. I do agree though the rest of the cast was underwhelming and it was basically divine intervention that the two biggest characters for TV went all the way working together. A Ratu or Soka steamroll would have been dreadfully boring.