Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-24261369-20140222150538/@comment-1827503-20140222215646

I'll be ranking these seasons from a "realism" standpoint from a hosting perspective.

One of my big pet peeves is overuse of the post-merge double boot twist, especially in seasons that could have easily just used a Day 37 tribal council instead. I reference that pet peeve a fair number of times here.

1. - This was easily the most realistic of the early seasons, sharing several similarities with Survivor: Caramoan, which was airing at the time. The surprise final two is not something I'd like to see repeated, but aside from that this season was perfect.

2. - This season was intentionally played as close to the real thing as possible. I have no problems with the day layout, but I would have preferred if no one was immune at the day 25 double boot.

3. - This is how Survivor: One World should have been. I think the hosts (myself included) went a bit too far with alternating three- and two-day cycles, we should have thrown a double tribal council in there before the merge. There is one issue, though - had Quanz not quit, we would have held tribals on three straight days.

4. - Aside from the double quit forcing Will and Maxwell back onto the jury, this was an excellently-run season. However, while the circumstances beyond the hosts' control forced an odd day layout to be run at the end of the season, the hosts should have considered the possibility of a quit screwing with the layout. Beyond that problem, Alfons, Yaniv, and Ali were excellent hosts for this season... Bailey, not so much.

5. - Cote had one big issue with the day layout. While I have no problem with the post-merge double boot this time, the way it was held broke the three-day cycle. It should have been held on Day 33 in order to allow the final four tribal council to be held on Day 37. That said, I like the Cook Islands-esque Day 21 double boot, even though the hosts ruined the surprise by announcing it at the start of the season.

6. - A real season of Survivor would never run for seventeen episodes, but that's kind of what you get when you have 24 people... The first-episode double boot and the triple boot immediately after a switch would never be allowed in the real show because it would be editing hell. Also, we ran into "unnecessary post-merge double boot" territory again.

7. - This season was promoted as back to basics, which it clearly wasn't. TWISTS GALORE AND ONLY FIVE PRE-JURY BOOTS!!!!!

8. - Five tribes? Seriously? That gave a good portion of the cast a free ride to the final 14. Nothing else needs to be said... except, of course, for the unnecessary post-merge double boot.

9. - Holding a switch immediately after an abduction ruins it for me. It unnecessarily wasted one of Tuamotu's two abductions and would never happen in real Survivor. The abduction twist itself is somewhat realistic, though with 9-person tribes the hosts ran the risk of a split vote at a tribe's first Tribal Council.

10. - Was it really necessary to bring two people back in the Redemption Battle? The hosts apparently wanted to preserve the post-merge double boot. And to make things worse, the second person who came back was a sockpuppet themselves.

11. - I seriously doubt the hosts planned ahead in this one. Had I not mutinied, Vuelta would have had 11 members to Regreso's 4. Also, the episode six tiebreaker was a bit unfair. You all know what I'm talking about. And if you didn't know, I'd... reuse an overused catchphrase.

12. - Starting the jury early was a bit unnecessary, but the Chris situation fixed that for us. This season also had most of the problems Revival had, but even worse: by having 14 people still in the game on Day 16, the hosts ran into two day cycle hell and still had to put a post-merge double boot in there.

13. - Should have been Season 0. It's more like a test of the concept than a real season, which is why everyone except Clove has come back. At least there weren't any post-merge double boots.