Hello all, welcome back to the Edit Bay! This weekly feature takes a dive into the edit of the latest Survivor episode, analyzing the key stories, main characters, and top winner contenders.
For those new to The Edit Bay, it is a condensed version of Edgic, highlighting some of the stand-out story beats from the most recent episode. It also includes my weekly Edgic ratings for each castaway at the end of the article.
OVERVIEW
Survivor is back, and it’s time to open up The Edit Bay for another season. This season kicked off with another two-hour premiere, but it didn’t feel as expansive as last season. Sure, we heard from all 18 castaways, but for many, it was the bare minimum. There were only a handful of players we really got a feel for in this episode.
What we did get, though, was another overarching theme courtesy of Jeff Probst’s opening statement. The word of the day was “community,” as Probst emphasized the importance of building a community and relying on one another to get through the experience.
You can read Probst’s full opening statement below:
“Take a look around! This will be your community for the next 26 days. The reason that community has always been the foundation of this social experiment we’ve been doing for 24 years is because humans have always craved community. And I get it, if you’re at home watching Survivor you could say it doesn’t fully jive. ‘I know they’re not really abandoned, they’re not really on their own.’ That’s true, there are cameras shooting you right now, but what you are now about to experience is that when you’re tired, and you’re hungry, or you feel left out, it’s gonna feel very real.
You’re gonna have those same cravings for community, and what truly sets Survivor apart from any other social experiment like this is the game that sits on top of it. A game that’s played with humans, the same humans that you’re forming your community with are your adversaries. So you have to build a community with people you can rely on, while you vote them out, and after you vote them out, you go back to them and persuade them to give you the vote for the million dollars. How do you pull off that magic trick?”
This idea of community came up throughout the episode, so it’s clearly a theme the producers are laying on thick this season. With that in mind, I’ll be paying particular attention to the characters displaying a sense of community or those who are able to balance the social game with the strategic component required to succeed.
INTRO
This season started with seven players receiving intro confessionals, three with full confessionals, and the rest with shorter ones. Four players also had voice-over lines before the confessionals began, but it’s hard to put as much emphasis on these as they were unattributed.
The seven players who received intros were Sam, Aysha, Kyle (with the longer confessionals), and Tiyana, Jon, Anika, and Sue (with the shorter confessionals).
As I’ve noted in the past, using the intro confessionals to determine winner contenders can be hit and miss. But these openings do usually help pinpoint some of the season’s most prominent characters.
For example, last season, Kenzie, Charlie, Tiffany, and Venus all received intro confessionals and were all major characters, including the winner in Kenzie. The others were Bhanu (a significant pre-merge character), Jess (an early boot), and Tevin and Hunter (who made the merge).
Taking the seven this season, we already know one was a pre-merge boot, Jon, who also had some celebrity name value. That leaves six remaining, and I bet on the majority of them making the merge, with at least half being key characters and perhaps one pre-merge boot among them.
This season also had a marooning mat chat, which was absent in Survivor 46. These moments can be important in determining winner contenders. In the new era, Erika, Maryanne, Gabler, and Yam Yam all received a question from Probst at the marooning. The four players who got the mat chat treatment in this episode were Gabe, Teeny, Andy, and Jon.
In addition, TK had a confessional during the marooning before the tribes reached their mats. Andy then got a confessional as Probst led the tribes to the opening challenge. And then Rome received a confessional after the challenge as the lead into the first commercial break.
All in all, we were introduced to 12 players before the first break, and that might be a more important element than the intro confessionals at this point. In the new era, every winner has been introduced before the first commercial. Obviously, patterns are there to be broken, so this fact won’t last forever, but right now, it’s a solid place to start.
So, we’ll pay close attention to these players:
Sam, Aysha, Kyle, Tyiana, Anika, and Sue – All received intro confessionals.
Andy, Rome, and TK – Received confessionals before the first break.
Gabe and Teeny – Received a Probst question on the mat.
Now, let’s get into each player’s first confessional.
OPENING CONFESSIONALS
SAM: I think I am dangerous in Survivor. I have what it takes physically, but I’m versatile enough to fit into different groups of people. You don’t find a guy who looks like me be super unsuspecting, right? It’s often the people that say, “Oh, I’m a… I’m a wolf in sheep’s clothing.” I’m a wolf in wolf’s clothing.
Sam had a strong premiere, leading things off with the first confessional of the season. He provided an immediate soundbite as to what type of player he would be, “The wolf in wolf’s clothing.” He told us he would be a dangerous player and explained why, noting his physical strength and versatility in fitting in with different groups of people.
Throughout the episode, Sam backed up these claims. We saw him fitting in with his tribe, quickly falling into an alliance with the girls while also still being trusted enough by Jon to be brought into a counter plan. He said he wanted to be the “glue guy,” not the best or the worst on the team, but the one in the middle keeping things together.
“But I think if you keep the glue guy around for too long in this game, you end up getting burned by him,” he said in a later confessional, perhaps pointing at his story arc this season. Will Sam end up burning his allies along the way?
He also gave a clear reason for voting out Jon, noting how he wanted Anika around (because he liked that she’d taken the leader role instead of him) and how Andy could provide more challenge strength than Jon. All of this affirmed Sam’s first confessional, putting him in good standing going forward.
AYSHA: I march to the beat of my own drum. And no matter how nerdy it is, those are the things I love in life. But I don’t do anything unless I’m gonna succeed at it. ‘Cause I just don’t like losing. I look like somebody who wouldn’t hurt a fly, but they don’t know, like, I have a flyswatter in my back pocket.
While Sam touted himself as the “wolf in wolf’s clothing,” Aysha presented the more typical wolf in sheep’s clothing approach. Despite looking like “somebody who wouldn’t hurt a fly,” she has come to Fiji armed with her flyswatter and is ready to “march to the beat of her own drum.”
Unfortunately, things didn’t get off to the greatest of starts for Aysha. Despite saying she doesn’t do anything unless she is “gonna succeed at it,” she immediately failed after volunteering for the first journey challenge. This also caught flack from Rome, who questioned Aysha’s decision to pass up the early social bonding in favor of the journey.
However, Aysha’s setback on the journey didn’t negatively impact her overall game. In fact, Rome’s assessment was proven wrong when Aysha returned to camp and quickly bonded with Teeny over their connection with Rob Has A Podcast. By the end of the episode, it very much looked like Aysha was part of the core group, while Rome had become the social pariah for his constant idol hunting.
This was a solid, if not spectacular, start for Aysha. She did get an early introduction, but that could have been down to her part in the journey. There was also some irony in her edit; she had one of the opening voice-over lines stating, “I am ready to forge my own path.” Yet, she lost the challenge because she got lost following the map, while TK won because he literally forged his own path through the jungle.
The way her edit was tied to Rome’s also suggests a butting of heads between the pair. Rome’s first confessional was him throwing shade on Aysha’s decision to go on the journey. Aysha then caught Rome idol hunting and said, “I have this huge fear of Rome having an idol. But now I feel like I have the numbers. If we do end up at the first Tribal Council, Rome is the first person I want to go.”
If the red tribe goes to tribal pre-merge, the set-up is there for an Aysha and Rome showdown.
KYLE: Growing up, life was a struggle, man. I spent five years in foster care, over 26 different homes I lived in before I would graduate high school. I could have just flipped over and laid on my back, but I didn’t. Life dealt me the recipe for disaster, and I baked a f****** brownie with it.
This was a weird one, as Kyle got a great, personal intro confessional and then completely disappeared for the rest of the episode. We got an insight into his background, his childhood in foster care, and how he’s able to persevere through tough times to succeed. But other than a quick “bros chat,” we learned nothing about Kyle as a player, his thoughts on his tribemates, or what his other tribemates thought of him.
I have to believe he received a full intro confessional because he’ll be an important figure down the line, perhaps someone who will end up in a tricky spot but fight through it—but having such a quiet premiere edit certainly impacts his winner contendership.
TIYANA: I am the first native Hawaiian to play Survivor. I want to show that Hawaiʻi can roll with the big dogs. (howls)
Tiyana’s first confessional appeared in the intro and was short and sweet. It included a little bit of personal info, letting us know she’s from Hawaiʻi. It gave us a simple but understandable objective for her game — she wants to prove she can roll with the big dogs. And the “howl” at the end added a sense of fun.
While it doesn’t seem like a lot at first glance, it does follow a similar pattern to the first confessionals of the two previous winners, Dee and Kenzie. Like Tiyana, Dee and Kenzie also had shorter confessionals towards the end of the intro.
Dee: “I was made for this, and I’m gonna play like this is the only chance. And it is the only chance.”
Kenzie: “I’ve got my stilettos on, disco ball spinning. I’m just waiting for the club to open. Like, I’m ready to party!”
All three confessionals share the same vibe, that “I’m ready and here to play hard” attitude.
Now, the rest of Tiyana’s episode was nowhere near as strong as Kenzie’s first episode and probably a little under Dee’s, too. Of course, Kenzie went to the first tribal, so she received a lot more airtime than Tiyana (and Dee). Tiyana’s only other confessional was about losing the first challenge and needing to work on their puzzle skills. There wasn’t a lot to get our teeth stuck into — even Dee’s second confessional gave some personal stuff about being a fireball and having to hold her tongue.
The only other moment worth noting was the reaction shot post-Immunity challenge when the camera lingered on Tiyana telling Andy to “shush” when he started spilling all his plans. It was a strange moment to include, but perhaps it was foreshadowing something. Maybe a future relationship between Tiyana and Andy? Or perhaps to show Tiyana as an empathetic figure?
Regardless, I wouldn’t go crazy and declare Tiyana as the next Kenzie/Dee just yet. But the fact she received an intro confessional certainly means she is one worth keeping an eye on.
ANIKA: I’m gonna play hard. I might get a little evil. Who knows?
This was another confessional you could put into the same bracket as a Dee/Kenzie opener. Like Tiyana, Anika’s first confessional came towards the end of the intro. While she didn’t give us any personal info, she did state her intent to play hard and maybe get a little evil.
Unlike Tiyana, Anika went to the first tribal council and was afforded a little more content. However, she wasn’t presented as quite a central figure as Kenzie was in her first episode. She was even a decoy boot option put forward by Andy, yet most of the action revolved around Andy, Jon, and Rachel. So, that is somewhat of a red flag.
Anika was presented as the leader of her tribe, the person who took charge of camp life. That isn’t always the best position, but the edit didn’t highlight this as an outright negative. Jon complimented Anika’s resourcefulness, and Sam said he loved Anika taking a leadership role. Anika also acknowledged the potential pitfalls, noting how she told herself not to take the lead before coming out here but that her “project manager at heart” couldn’t be contained.
So, we got the sense that Anika is naturally a strong leader. However, this did come with a caveat. While Sam said he loved Anika taking the lead, he mostly liked it because it allowed him to take a more backseat approach to the game. He knows that being a leader can quickly put a target on your back, and, lo and behold, Anika’s name was brought up as a target before tribal council.
I also find it somewhat concerning that Anika appeared to be more on board with getting Andy out and didn’t really comment on Jon. In the pre-tribal scrambling, she pushed for Andy, calling him messy and “only brute force.” Earlier, in confessional, she touched on Andy’s meltdown, saying, “If you’re gonna have outbursts like this on day three… like, that is a huge concern.”
Yet, Anika ultimately voted out Jon and kept Andy. While I think Anika’s first episode was mostly solid, that does worry me a little, especially as Andy outright said his biggest target is Anika. Could keeping Andy around come back to haunt Anika later in the game?
SUE: When I win Survivor, my final words will be, “I’m 59, and I beat all your asses.”
An immediate winner quote right from the off? Sue put her stamp on the season immediately with this premiere episode. For an episode that started with the talk of community and social relationships, Sue was presented as a central figure in her tribe. She quickly fell into a strategic relationship with Gabe and a more emotional relationship with Caroline.
It’s a good thing to know a player’s alliances as early as possible, and we got that here with Sue referring to Gabe and Caroline as her “number ones.” But what I find interesting is that Sue didn’t specifically comment about Gabe, only Caroline. So I wouldn’t be so sure this is going to become a fearsome threesome.
Sue said Caroline was like her daughter and “the sweetest person in the world.” And we saw the pair bonding in camp, with Caroline asking about Sue’s daughter. Whereas the relationship with Gabe was all strategic, with Gabe leading the talks and bringing Sue into his idol-hunting plans. On top of that, Caroline grew suspicious of a bros alliance when TK returned to camp, putting her at potential odds with Gabe.
So, I suspect there could be some conflict within this trio in the weeks to come, particularly between Caroline and Gabe. Yet, I don’t think this will ultimately cause too much damage to Sue, whose edit suggested longevity.
TK: I would say, looking at my fellow contestants, uh, I see a million dollars, man. Like, I really don’t think I see anybody on here who can do anything with me, to be honest. So, I’m ready to go.
You could certainly perceive TK’s opening confessional as a potential winner quote. It mentioned the million dollars for a start. However, it also showed him underestimating his opponents. He doesn’t think there is anyone on the island who can outplay him, which sets up a possible rude awakening somewhere down the line.
But for now, TK has backed up his words. He won the journey challenge and earned supplies for his tribe. However, this only added to his cockiness. Back at camp, he said of his tribemates, “There’s no way, now, that you could look at me and say, ‘This guy needs to go first’ or ‘this guy needs to go’ at all.” Yet, this confessional was immediately followed by Caroline’s suspicions about a bro alliance forming between TK, Gabe, and Kyle.
Of course, there is no bro alliance, as we know Gabe’s number one is Sue. In addition, TK caught Gabe during his key search and figured out Gabe had lied to him about finding an advantage. So TK knows he doesn’t have the trust with Gabe that he initially thought he did. But all this goes to show that TK is perhaps underestimating his fellow tribemates.
Outside of that, we didn’t get a sense of who TK considers his closest ally nor his strategic plans for the game. Most of his content revolved around the journey, so it’s hard to get a firm grasp on where his story is heading. I feel like he could be a pretty strong character, regardless if he goes deep or is a pre-merge flame-out.
ANDY: Jeff walks us down the beach, turns a corner and takes us to… It could only be described as, like, a gladiator’s arena. Look, I’ve seen a lot of Survivor. There are opening challenges, but this one really takes the cake in terms of the grandness. And the pressure is on. Like, you have to perform or you’re gonna be in trouble immediately.
On its own, Andy’s first confessional wasn’t much. It was basically just challenge narration. However, he received a mat chat before this, so we already had our introduction to him. Plus, his final line about having to perform or being in trouble kind of summed up his first episode.
In his mat chat, Andy opened up about his life back home and how he grew up as an outsider because “he didn’t have an identity.” But later in life, he found himself, and it became “a super magnet” for everyone in his life now. This backstory would soon become Andy’s Survivor story, as his self-doubts raised their head throughout the episode, sending him spiraling into a fit of anxiety and paranoia.
He started to think nobody on his tribe liked him, even those he’d connected with, like Rachel. When he pulled Rachel aside on the first night, she sort of rebuffed him to protect her own spot in the game. And this only sent Andy further into his downward spiral until his epic blowup at the immunity challenge.
Returning to the theme of community and how one needs it to pull them through the game, Andy felt like he didn’t have that community around him. Even though his tribemates tried to reassure him, Andy continued to feel like the odd man out. However, he never called it quits, and he was ultimately spared due to his challenge strength.
This screams journey edit to me. He will probably continue to feel like an outsider for a while, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see him last a while and eventually grow in confidence and make some real allies/friends. Whether that can go as far as securing a win, I’m not so sure. As I said, it feels more like a journey edit than a winner edit.
There was also some foreshadowing, particularly in relation to Anika and Rachel. The main focus was on his relationship with Rachel. While they appeared to connect, Andy grew paranoid after Rachel didn’t give him the assurance he was looking for, even though she was simply protecting her own game. This led to Andy questioning his relationship with Rachel.
After his breakdown at the challenge, Rachel referred to Andy as a “ticking time bomb and you don’t know when it’s gonna explode.” Anika and Sierra echoed this sentiment. Anika called him “messy,” and Sierra said he was a liability.” And yet, in the end, all three women voted out Jon over Andy. That seems like something that will blow up in at least one of their faces in the weeks to come.
ROME: Aysha chose to go on this journey, which… props to you, but big mistake. The social game is the biggest aspect of the game of Survivor, and I am not gonna miss out on those first few hours of strategizing. It’s so important. That’s exactly how I’m gonna win the million dollars at the end of the day.
Rome received the final confessional before the first commercial break, and he ended it off with a potential winner’s quote. However, I wouldn’t be so quick to hitch my wagon to Rome winner’s train. While I definitely think Rome will be a huge character, his edit was full of red flags and ironic foreshadowing.
In his first confessional, he spoke about the importance of the social game, especially those first few hours of strategizing. And yet, the majority of Rome’s edit revolved around him searching for idols away from the rest of his tribe. He even pointed out the potential dangers of doing this, and yet he did it anyway. Now, it did pay off in the sense that he found the beware advantage, but his tribemates also caught him.
Ironically, the person Rome shaded for taking the journey and missing out on social time, Aysha, ended up taking his spot in the majority alliance. When she returned to camp, she quickly bonded with Teeny and was later part of the group scoping out Rome during his idol hunt. So, while Rome recognized the importance of the social game and “community,” he failed to follow his own words.
Now, he formed one ally, Genevieve, who said she liked him and his enthusiasm. However, she also wanted to form an alliance with Teeny, who appeared to gravitate more towards Aysha than Rome. So the odds of this duo making it deep together seem slim right now.
All that said, Rome is clearly a gamer, and he was presented in a way that makes you feel he’ll be a big-time player. I fully expect him to make some crazy moves and be at the center of some of the season’s biggest moments. Whether he can translate that into a win remains to be seen.
RACHEL: This is the best moment of my life. I love competition and I love to win. We solved that puzzle, 100%, because of good communication. Like, it was a community effort, like, full stop.
If any player were to break the “winner has a confessional before the first commercial” rule, I’d say it would be Rachel. Her first confessional came a bit later than others, but it was the one that hit on Probst’s community theme the most directly. She got right in there about how she “loves competition” and “loves to win,” followed by citing the “community effort” for her tribe’s early success.
From there, Rachel had a very solid premiere episode. While we might not have learned a lot about her personally, we got a strong sense of her approach to the game. A lot of her content centered on Andy, but I don’t necessarily think that was a bad thing. Andy was the main focus of this episode due to his meltdown, so Rachel being such a vital part of that story makes her stand out as a person to pay attention to.
Everything Rachel said about Andy was accurate and backed up in the edit. She was proven right to be cautious about Andy’s eagerness and lack of strategic skill. She didn’t want her game to be dragged down with his, which was a fair concern, given that Jon very much got brought down by his association with Andy.
Rachel also received the final confessional of the episode, where she weighed up the pros and cons of voting out Andy or Jon. She gave logical reasons for both and ultimately explained why she decided to boot Jon over Andy. Of course, her statement about Andy being a “ticking time bomb” could eventually blow up in her face now that she chose to keep him.
I suspect Rachel’s relationship with Andy will continue to be a central plot point moving forward, with the question being whether they can come together or end up going after one another.
GABE: Coming into this game, I want to work with an older person. I want to work with somebody who’s a little more mature because I got a bit of an old soul in me, right? In my opinion, an older person… they know how to operate without getting caught up in the social games of it all. That’s somebody who I want my day one, number one alliance member to be. Let these kids gossip and clique up among themselves. We’ll run things in the shadows.
This was a big episode for Gabe, who took up the majority of the screen time on the blue tribe. While the above was his first confessional, he did receive a marooning mat introduction. He referred to himself as a “grinder,” the guy that keeps going no matter what. We saw examples of that throughout the episode as he set off on his idol hunt adventure, even if he ultimately called it quits at the second hurdle.
His first proper confessional explained his strategy; he wanted to work with an older person, so he immediately formed a bond with Sue. It’s good to get alliance content early on, but it should be noted we didn’t get a whole lot of Sue’s feelings on Gabe. We know she was surprised to be brought in and did refer to him (and Caroline) as her “number ones,” but she gave a far more personal comment on Caroline.
Now, the rest of Gabe’s content was primarily centered on the beware advantage and his various tasks. There isn’t much we can take away from that, given it was mostly circumstantial. However, we did get to see Sue helping him out as his eyes back at camp, so there is a sign their alliance is on solid footing, for now, at least.
I’d like to see Gabe’s edit in an episode without all the idol stuff to get a true sense of his part in this narrative. There is certainly potential here for him to be a big, dominant character. But some moments give me pause. For example, he said he wanted to “run things in the shadows” but spent the whole episode idol hunting, to the point he got caught by TK. So I’m not quite sure what to make of Gabe just yet.
KISHAN: Losing that first challenge… it sucks. We’re not the tallest tribe. We didn’t look to be the strongest, but Lavo… we’re-we’re resourceful. We just have to trust our instincts and kind of fall back onto our training and our, like, gut. So, that’s what we’re doing. I’m an emergency room doctor. I love the chaos. You’re just constantly surrounded by the unknown, and I’m so ready for that ’cause that’s what I do every single day for a living, and I’m really good at it, and I’m gonna be good at it on Survivor, too.
If this confessional came earlier in the episode, I’d be feeling much better about Kishan’s chances. He had some great content here, where he commented on his tribe and introduced himself with some personal info about his job and how he can apply those skills to the game. On top of that, he made an immediate connection with Teeny, so he has the alliance content, too.
That said, this confessional came rather late into the episode, and it was Kishan’s only confessional across the two hours. He very much felt like a secondary character, as following his confessional, Teeny took charge as the strategic narrator of the red tribe. It’s still early, though, so there is always a chance for Kishan to break out later, but that was my initial impression based on the premiere.
TEENY: Playing Survivor is about the social relationships you make. In school, the one thing that I really excelled at was being able to make friends and talk to people. And so I’m gonna play this game by being every single person’s number one. Kishan and I bonded almost immediately. So, I mean, he’s an ER doctor. He has an ability to work under pressure. And I feel like he’s a bit more introverted to my extrovert, so I felt like he was a cool yin to my yang.
Overall, I think Teeny had the best edit of the premiere. While their first confessional came late, they were introduced at the marooning when Probst asked them a question. And it was a fun introduction, memorable and full of personality, which is what you want when an audience is trying to get to know 18 new players. Teeny instantly stood out.
Then, this first confessional only raised Teeny’s stock. They hit on Probst’s community theme with the talk about how Survivor “is about the social relationships,” and they excelled at school by being able to make friends. And we saw Teeny bonding with Kishan, Genevieve, and Aysha throughout the episode. Teeny was kind of the counterpoint to Andy, who struggled to make connections and melted down.
They also explained their strategy of “being every single person’s number one.” This is a risky plan that could backfire, but it could also tie back to Probst’s comments about how you have to build a community with people and then vote them out while still getting their vote in the end. “How do you pull off that magic trick?” Probst asked. Perhaps Teeny will show us how.
GENEVIEVE: The new era of Survivor is a very fast-paced game, and right now, I just really like Rome. I like him. I get along with him so well. He’s so enthusiastic. I just feel happy when I talk to him. I’m also trying to solidify something with Teeny. I would love to have her as my ally.
This wasn’t a strong first episode for Genevieve. Her first confessional came fairly late into the episode, and it felt like set up for the potential Rome/Teeny/Aysha conflict rather than anything to do with herself.
Yes, Genevieve did share a little insight into her plans, letting us know she gets along with Rome and wants to solidify something with Teeny. But that was basically it, other than her “I am either gonna blaze my own path out here or I’m gonna burn down this island” uncredited voice-over at the very start of the episode.
As with Kishan, it’s early days, so there is a chance for Genevieve’s edit to grow from here. But right now, we don’t really know anything about her, and she feels secondary to others in her tribe.
SIERRA: I’m always looked at as like, “Oh, just the pretty blonde with, like, a cute little smile.” I was a pageant queen. I competed at Miss USA. But my dad always wanted a boy, and I just ended up being my dad’s little boy. I’m gonna try to make fire. And this is why winning the first challenge was so important. Hot flint and a machete… that’s everything. We wouldn’t be able to build our community without that stuff. We’re off to a hot start. We are killing it out here. There’s no better feeling.
Similar to Kishan, if Sierra’s first confessional came earlier in the episode, I’d feel much more positive about her chances. As it stands, she was one of the last castaways to be properly introduced in the premiere. But putting that aside for a second, this was a very strong opening confessional.
Straight away, Sierra gave us some personal info about being a former pageant queen and how people often underestimate her as just “the pretty blonde.” But she made it clear she was not to be overlooked, and she proved that by starting fire. On top of that, she tied this back to building a community, hitting on the season’s major theme.
In addition, Sierra commented on the boot, noting how the tribe needed strength so it might be better to vote out Jon instead of Andy. Given that this is what ultimately happened, Sierra appeared to be a competent player with a solid reading of the tribe’s dynamics.
Again, if her intro came just a little sooner, I’d be much higher on her chances. Right now, I need to see more, but I do think this first episode suggested longevity for Sierra.
CAROLINE: Oh, my gosh, when TK arrived at camp, the guys flocked to him. The guys fell in love with each other the moment that they saw each other. I’m not an idiot. I can tell. It’s a bromance
Caroline’s first confessional came very late in the episode, and it wasn’t the best content for her, seeing as it was all about TK and the assumed bromance alliance. It didn’t give Caroline any agency, especially as there were no real indications that a guys’ alliance even existed.
The saving grace for Caroline is that we did get a small introduction to her earlier in the episode via her scene with Sue. In the blue tribe’s first camp scene, we saw Caroline and Sue bonding in a mother-daughter kind of way. And Sue even gave Caroline positive comments in confessional. So, even though it would have been nice to hear Caroline’s thoughts on Sue, the fact we have a potential alliance here is a good thing.
But that was pretty much it for Caroline in the premiere. Is there enough of a foundation there to grow from? Just about. But she’s going to need a couple of strong following episodes to push up the rankings.
SOL: Rome is playing amateur hour. He’s searching for idols, and he’s a complete liability. Rome is off his rocker.
Sadly for Sol, he easily had the worst edit of the premiere. His opening confessional came the latest, and when it appeared, it was short and all about Rome. There was nothing about Sol as a person or a player. All we have is that he’s a potential antagonist for Rome. This doesn’t spell great things for Sol’s future in this season.
EARLY CONTENDERS
Top Tier: Teeny, Sam, Sue
Second Tier: Rachel, Anika
EDGIC CHART
| Name | EP 1 | EP 2 | EP 3 | EP 4 | EP 5 | EP 6 | EP 7 | EP 8 | EP 9 | EP 10 | EP 11 | EP 12 | EP 13 | EP 14 |
 Andy |
OTTN5 | |||||||||||||
 Anika |
MOR2 | |||||||||||||
 Aysha |
MOR4 | |||||||||||||
 Caroline |
UTRP1 | |||||||||||||
 Gabe |
CP5 | |||||||||||||
 Genevieve |
UTR1 | |||||||||||||
 Kishan |
UTR1 | |||||||||||||
 Kyle |
UTR1 | |||||||||||||
 Rachel |
MOR4 | |||||||||||||
 Rome |
OTTM4 | |||||||||||||
 Sam |
CP3 | |||||||||||||
 Sierra |
UTRP2 | |||||||||||||
 Sol |
UTR1 | |||||||||||||
 Sue |
MOR2 | |||||||||||||
 Teeny |
CP3 | |||||||||||||
 TK |
MOR4 | |||||||||||||
 Tiyana |
UTR2 | |||||||||||||
 Jon |
CP5 |
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