Survivor fans got hit with the ultimate tease this week after the show announced the return of a fan favorite wrinkle and then bizarrely decided not to show it. The moment in question happened immediately prior to the merge challenge. Host Jeff Probst announced that for the first time in the so-called New Era, the contestants would draw for captains and then do a schoolyard pick-em to figure out teams.
I was personally stoked to see what order the contestants were going to be chosen in, but then suddenly, the edit jumped forward to all the players in starting position without any reference to how they were picked or even who the captains were. I wasn’t happy and judging by social media, neither were a lot of other fans.
Annoyed reactions started pouring in immediately on X and other platforms with fans (and former players) wondering why they would announce a schoolyard pick’em and then not show us. After all, that sorta thing can provide really valuable insight into how the players perceive the strength of their competitors. Well, it turns out Jeff Probst agrees with everyone on that.
The longtime host and producer addressed the editing decision on this week’s episode of his podcast On Fire, but he defended the choice by saying there just wasn’t enough time in the episode because there was “so much gameplay happening.” You can read a portion of his quote below…
In this case, the why was we thought it would be interesting at this point in the game to force them to expose their thought process. And it was a fascinating thought process, especially seeing who was left at the end. And as we’ve talked about, if you’re going to do a schoolyard pick to see their thought process, you gotta allocate the time in the show so you can show it. And still, when we got to this episode with 90 minutes, there was so much gameplay happening that centered around the vote that we once again had to make some tough cuts. So, as fun as it was, we knew, ‘Well, look, the result doesn’t change even if we don’t show it. So, we won’t show it.'
Now, I get where Jeff is going with this. The episode included a pretty extended post-Immunity Challenge sequence in which we were shown the castaways repeatedly talking to each other about how they were voting for Rome. Those scenes were interspersed with others of Rome repeatedly talking to those same contestants and trying to organize a vote against Sol. We were also shown more contestants sharing the reasons they voted for Rome, which took up even more time. I would not have wanted to see any of those things cut. They were all great.
But that doesn’t mean there weren’t other moments from earlier in the episode that could have been cut. In my mind, we would have only needed about 30 seconds of time to show the schoolyard pick’em, which they clearly could have found, but I’m not sure Jeff sees it the same way. During his podcast, he also talked about what actually happened during the schoolyard pick’em, and he revealed an exchange that happened with Andy after he was picked last. Here’s a portion of that quote…
I will give you a little secret information from that pick, the last two players were Sue was the next to last pick and the last pick of all players (was) Andy. That’s why you want to include it in the episode because you had a moment where Andy was standing there and I got to ask him, ‘Andy, we’re going back to Day 1. This has been your story.’ And he goes, ‘This is always my story, but I’m still in the game.’
I think for Jeff, he feels like if you’re going to show the schoolyard pick’em, you need to really show it. You need to include the full sequence of all the players getting picked, as well as that conversation with Andy about being picked last. Perhaps there was an exchange with Sue, as well. There were also likely plenty of confessionals with players explaining their own feelings on what happened. I’m sure all of that was part of the initial package that was put together, and it was probably 3 or 4 minutes long, which was ultimately too much to be shown.
But I would have rather gotten a little taste of the proceedings than nothing at all. I would have taken 30 seconds to a minute. Or I would have taken never knowing it was a schoolyard pick’em. Since I got the tease and not any of the payoff, I’m left with many unanswered questions, which is just very frustrating as a viewer.
Fortunately, we’re starting to get answers to some of those questions. Jeff revealed the last two picks on the podcast. Teeny tweeted out that she was one of the captains, and in semi-related news, Sierra tweeted out that she got so sick during the challenge that she vomited off the high platform, which also wasn’t shown. At this rate, we should know every pick and in what order they happened in the next few days.
Survivor is a tough show to edit. The players are filmed constantly, and I can’t imagine how many things they say in their confessionals. There is a ton of footage to go through, and even in great seasons, fans are always going to complain about the edit. Even former players go public and complain about the edit sometimes. Some even call the show and complain directly. So, I get it. But that doesn’t change the fact that if they’re going to tease a school yard pick’em, fans are going to want to see the results. Hopefully Survivor takes notes for next time.
Regardless, Survivor is in the middle of Season 47, and it's already wild. You can catch new episodes on CBS on Wednesday evenings or via other streaming options.