The response to the first episode of Survivor 49 was not the strongest. Many fans felt it was yet another cast full of enthusiastic, happy-to-be-there superfans and that it was yet another example of New Era tribes of six desperately trying to form a quick majority four alliance based on nothing but shared desires not to be voted out first. The second episode was received a little more positively in the community, especially a key change to how the journey worked, but even so, many fans still described the episode using the dreaded b-word: boring.
I’ve been a little more positive, but I get it. Thus far this season, we’ve gotten two boots that felt really obvious before Tribal Council started. We’ve also gotten our one hundredth camp story about the families of various players overcoming hardships, and of course, what feels like every single castaway sharing how freakin’ amazing it is to be on Survivor (or “inside the TV” as one put it). I get why a lot of viewers haven’t been blown away, but I don’t love the proposed solution going around.
