Survivor 50 Pre-Season

Survivor 50 Pre-season

so here we are! survivor 50 is finally right around the corner, and boy do i have some thoughts. way back when the cast leaked i posted on my instagram story (which was my yap outlet for many years until i made this website) that i would be sharing my thoughts as soon as i had time to gather them, and then i... never did it. i had some shit going on at the time and the moment kinda just passed, but i always meant to get around to it. so what better time and place then right here, where i can do it on a nice pretty page instead of across 13 super squished together story posts?

i'm gonna start with the cast thoughts, and we'll just go in order of their first appearance. i'll give my general thoughts on the player and their casting, and i'll also give my personal best case and worst case scenarios. those will be the best and worst case scenarios just for me personally as a viewer - the best case will basically just be a wishlist idea of how i would like them to do no matter how unrealistic it might be, whereas i'll try to make most of the worst case scenarios more realistic and things i think could actually happen. after going through the cast, i'll share both my predicted and my wish list boot order. and finally, general thoughts on the season as a whole, including my survivor 50 wish list and what i voted for during the pre-season voting, will be at the end!

Jenna Lewis

jenna!! okay look, i'm not gonna lie to you here and say that jenna was my borneo dream pick. yes, hatch should have been here, for the love of god not including him is one of the biggest blunders of this entire cast, and yes, colleen would have been a more exciting get, and absolutely, greg buis would have been one of the most legendary returns in the show's history. but i like jenna! i'd much rather have her back than gervase or wigles, and if we're being fr, there was a very real possibility that they might not have been able to get anyone from borneo to play, and that would have be genuinely tragic for a season like 50. so basically what i'm getting at is, anyone complaining about her being here is a bitch

she wasn't the most memorable player on her seasons for me, so i did go back and watch some clips to refresh my memory, and it was basically what i thought i remembered. she's just not as big of a character as a lot of her castmates, which is probably why i didn't remember her as well. she's very likeable (for a viewer at least, apparently the other players found her annoying) she probably won't end up doing anything too crazy or exciting, but she's a very welcome addition to this cast and i'm happy to see her again. maybe she can use her anti-winner bias (the one thing i remember booing her for, because i was rooting for hatch in all-stars) and use it for good this time by taking out three new era players

best case scenario jenna gets a reasonably sized edit (this may already be asking for too much considering who else is on the cast, but she does have borneo upside), hooking up with other old schoolers and making it well into the merge, where she gets voted out about mid-way. at some point, she successfully takes out the winners, completing the mission she started in all-stars

worst case scenario production fucks up the same way they fucked up with wiglesworth by treating her as "jenna, the girl from borneo" instead of "jenna, the 2-time returnee" and all we get are forced confessionals comparing the new era to borneo, which goes on for the first 2 episodes until she is unceremoniously voted out

Colby Donaldson

YES!!!!! oh my fucking god YES dude let's fucking go i am SO STOKED that colby is here!!! don't get me wrong, i am devastated - and slightly furious - that jerri got cut, but i love colby and there is no universe where i would ever turn my nose up at survivor bringing him back. i think he gets kind of overshadowed by larger personalities of his time, but colby was the first of his archetype and even as i went through more seasons and met some of the more popular "male survivor player who jeff developed a crush on" types, colby remained one of my favourites all the way through. there's nothing really major or crazy about him that keeps him so high on my list, in fact it's almost the opposite, colby remains one of my favourite players because he just feels classic. it's hard to describe other than that, but it's actually the same sort of vibe that caused australian outback to be in my top 3 seasons for a very, very long time. they're just perfect snapshots of this moment in time, right at the start of the 2000's with the show at it's prime, and i love that about them

what makes his casting even more exciting is the fact that colby is on a mission here. thanks to tina's appearance on colby's survivor 50 podcast on rhap, we have a vague idea of colby's headspace, and it's equally surprising and promising for his performance on 50. apparently he has kept up with the show after all these years, which is already more than i would have guessed, so that's a solid starting point. on top of that, he is not happy with how his survivor career ended, and he's coming back to prove himself. this man has been sitting, watching, waiting for his shot to fix the mistakes he made in HvV for 15 fucking years!! listen y'all, if that's not enough to make you hype for this season like it's fucking infinity war or whatever (i hate marvel movies), then i really don't know what would do it for you. maybe antidepressants

best case scenario i'm so serious when i say this - colby wins. colby might actually be my winner pick. it is so, so incredibly unlikely, but just imagine: colby hits the beach and he's out for blood. this man starts running game and playing it so smooth you start to wonder if the entire season was scripted. his classic personality is right there, we get all the levity and coolness that we know him for, but game face colby is for real. he's taking it seriously because he knows it's his final shot, and we watch him pull it off week after week like tony in cagayan. and then he fucking wins. that would genuinely be the most incredible survivor story out of the entire series

worst case scenario colby can't hang with new era survivor, his tribe wins the first couple challenges but gets voted out at his first tribal

Stephenie LaGrossa Kendrick

okay.... so, look, i know. a lot of people don't like this casting because stephenie plays the same every time she plays and we've already seen it three times and she was on snake in the grass recently and was terrible and blah blah blah. okay, fair. i'm still okay with it because i like stephenie LMAO

she's not the most exciting pick, she's not going to be the mastermind or pull off any mega-impressive moves, but stephenie is a solid old school pick and i don't mind her being here at all. would i have swapped her out for another old schooler if i had the choice? yeah, but just because she's not my #1 pick doesn't mean she's not a decent one. she makes up for what she lacks in strategy with her personality, she's tough and speaks her jersey mind, and that's a personality type that the new era has been sorely lacking in. that alone makes her a welcome addition

best case scenario let's be real, she's not gonna win. i'd like to see her come in, play a solid game pre-merge, and then try to make a big move at the start of the merge but get flagged as a threat and blindsided. i think that would be better for her legacy than to play another samey game, and would make for better tv

worst case scenario stephenie plays the same game for the fourth time in a row and doesn't bring any drama or jersey attitude

Cirie Fields

nope. bad, bad casting. this is by far the most frustrating old era pick on the entire cast - cirie has played five fucking times, i had to make a separate five-time player frame for this page just for her. we do not need to see her again!!! we know the game cirie plays, she comes in, sucks at challenges, runs circles around everyone socially and hypnotizes them into keeping her around, then gets tragically voted out right before the end. she's not going to do anything different, and personally while i like cirie as a person and appreciate her skill as a social player, i do find her a bit overrated. again, don't crucify me, i like cirie and i like her as a survivor player. she deserves all her flowers, i just don't find her exciting enough to want to see her for a sixth time

best case scenario nobody falls for the cirie hypnosis this time. her tribe inevitably loses an immunity challenge and the episode goes into super cheesey survivor sad mode (you know exactly what i'm talking about) while everyone is basically doing the "cirie we have to get rid of you you're too good but omg it's heartbreaking to vote out my hero" thing. unanimous vote off, dramatic exit, big swelling music. cirie's survivor career comes to a graceful end and all the "put cirie on every season" people are forced to accept that her time in the game is over. please

worst case scenario cirie runs circles around everyone as usual, makes it to final 4, goes out in fire, everyone continues to act like cirie is god, cirie gets cast on 6 more returnee seasons

Ozzy Lusth

this is a weird one for me, in that i didn't expect to be so indifferent about it. ozzy was a common name in the incessant "who do you want/expect to see on 50?" threads that dominated the subreddit for however many months were between jeff announcing that 50 was returnees and the cast leaking, and i was always so sure that they would never bring him back. he's played 4 times, first of all, and then on top of that you also have whole pornstar thing which survivor is very selectively opposed to, i just didn't even see it as a possibility. so naturally i kind of assumed that if the cast dropped and he was somehow on it, i'd have a pretty strong reaction. but ... nope! i kinda don't care LMAO

ozzy is the survivor player with the steepest dropoff in likeability for me by far. seriously, like everybody else, i loved the guy in cook islands. from the insane challenge performances, to effortlessly pulling off the provider role of early survivor, to that heartbreaking story about his dad at final tribal, i'd honestly be shocked if any given person watching that season alone didn't like ozzy. then he came into micronesia, and more or less did his same thing again, and i liked him during the game that season too. and then ... the micronesia jury speech 💀 this is when ozzy really fell apart for me dude, oh my god the CHEESE!!!! dude is corny as fuck standing up there professing his deep passionate love for a girl he played a game with for a few weeks ohhh my god i'm getting second hand embarrassed just thinking it. wild way to end what would have otherwise been another very nice season for ozzy. and it really set the tone for south pacific, where the ozzy of cook islands is long dead and gone. i guess micronesia did more for him than cook islands did, because the size of the ego this dude came dragging out of that helicopter with him could damn near dwarf the island they played on. it's almost shocking how different he seems this time around, he seems so full of himself, entitled, cocky. this was the season where he officially lost me, after micronesia i thought he was cringe but fine, until in SoPa when he just became straight up unlikeable

...... ok so maybe i felt a bit more strongly about it than i thought. or maybe it was just the big ol' bong rip i took before writing this one. the world may never know

best case scenario ozzy comes in with the ego in check, spends the pre-merge fishing for his tribe and winning them challenges, then gets voted out early merge. he gets a modest edit that offers us a glimpse into ozzy doing his survivor thing one last time, without taking too much time away from some of his castmates

worst case scenario ozzy comes in like he came into SoPa, ego mania, corny ass, immediately falling in love with the first girl with nice tits he sees on his tribe, and he runs the game like he was in SoPa except this time he actually pulls it off. ozzy dominates the edit, wins the season, jeff proceeds to glaze him for the rest of eternity

Coach

LET'S FUCKING GO!!!!!!!!!! oh my god dude, when they announced 50 would be returnees, i had three answers for "who is your #1 wishlist get for 50?" my "she's my #1 pick, but it'll never happen so i'm not even gonna bother getting my hopes up" pick was christy smith (BRING HER BACK!!!), my "he's my #1 pick, but he's a lock so i'm not even gonna bother worrying about it" pick was christian, and my "he's my #1 pick, but i don't know if he'll be on, but he could be, but maybe it would be too good to be true, but..." pick was coach. actually, those three picks might even be my top 3 favourite players, but i'd have to think about that more to say for sure

anyway, between the rumors and all the teasing and playin around about it he was doing online, i really didn't know what to expect and i was so worried that he wouldn't be on, so i'm over the fucking moon about this one. coach has been saying for years that he's got one more season left in him, and with all the time that's passed since he played his first winning game in SoPa, i could not be more intrigued wondering what flavor of coach we're going to see. the "classic" coach from tocantins and HvV, cult leader coach from SoPa, or something new? personally i love his SoPa game and find it extremely impressive, so if he was able to pull off some sort of a combination of the two, bringing the goofy coach we love while also having a game face to put on, i would be thrilled. sadly though, i don't think he'll be able to make it to final 3 again. he's just too iconic of a player and too on the radar, i pray that i'm wrong, but i'm not exactly predicting a coach win here. that said, i do think he has it in him to make a pretty deep run

best case scenario i would love to see coach win. but, if i'm being realistic, coach bringing the perfect blend of his tocantins/HvV and SoPa personalities and making it to the finale would be enough for me. actually, if he went out in fire as a massive threat it could be kind of a perfect bookend to his survivor story - the dragon slayer who ended up being the dragon slain. ok actually yeah, that's my answer because that would be so good. and he loses in fire to colby, who then wins. YEAH I'M WRITING FAN FIC AT THIS POINT I GUESS LMAO

worst case scenario coach just doesn't vibe well with his majority new era tribe, it's sad and uncomfortable, and he gets voted out at one of the first tribals

Aubry Bracco

honestly dude, i know she's polarizing, but i love aubry. every time i go to watch an aubry season after it's been a while, i go into it forgetting why i liked her and wondering if she was actually that good, and then i'm reminded of it very quickly. i do agree that they brought her back too many times too soon, but i can see why they did. she's so likeable and easy to root for, she's a great player, and as if her cochran style confidence journey wasn't enough on it's own, she got fuckin robbed out in kaoh rong on top of it. aubry was easily one of the best characters of the 30's

this one has a but though, and that but is... i'm a little confused as to why she's here. in terms of casting wanting her, i'd place her in the most middle of the road category. not a massive character like coach, not a #1 fan favourite like christian, but a solid pick that most people will at least be okay with. but in terms of aubry wanting the show... she literally doesn't even watch the show anymore. this was confirmed by tyson on his 50 cast reveal podcast, where he discussed how surprised he was to see her because he had just talked to her in the past year when he invited her to be a guest on his podcast for whatever season it was at the time and she told him she'd stopped watching the show. so like... it's certainly interesting from that perspective. doesn't really bother me though, i'm happy to see aubry again even if it's kinda weird

best case scenario aubry comes out full of confidence, EoE isn't weighing on her at all, and she plays a solid game. goes out midway through the merge having played a solid game up to that point. i really don't think aubry can top her kaoh rong performance, so let's just have one more good game under her belt and call it there

worst case scenario aubry is traumatized from EoE and is too rattled over it to hit the ground running on 50. meanwhile, q clocks aubry as the #1 threat in the game. he rallies the tribe, throws the first immunity challenge, and handily convinces everyone to unanimously vote her out

Chrissy Hofbeck

i'm ngl if i could remove one person from the cast it would be chrissy. i hate chrissy, no notes

best case scenario chrissy finishes #24/24

worst case scenario chrissy finishes #1/24

Christian Hubicki

PROFESSOR HUBICKI IS BACK ON THE ISLAND BITCHES!!!! ohhhh hell the fuck yeah brother, i am not surprised but i am pumped all the same. like i said in coach's section, christian was one of my top picks, but there was no doubt in my mind that he would be here. christian is by far the most highly demanded player from the 30's to return, and was even jeff's pick when he was asked who he would like to return from DvG, so this was bound to happen. some people were worried about him not being able to leave work, but those people were several years behind on their christian hubicki career lore. he's tenured y'all! he can do whatever the fuck he wants now!

genuinely though, i am so, so happy to see him here. christian was my first ever #1 favourite player, and he's still up there to this day. probably more importantly though is that christian was one of the things that made me fall in love with survivor. the whole story is on the hub page so i won't repeat it here, but DvG was my first season, and while that whole cast is fantastic, christian was my guy. i was literally pausing at least once per episode to clip something on my phone and send it to whichever one of my poor friends was online at the time, telling them to check out this guy who shouldn't be anywhere near a deserted island but is somehow absolutely killing it. christian is the fuckin man dude, end of story

best case scenario christian wins. yes, i know, i said this about colby too, and i stand by that. but i just can't think of a satisfying story for christian that doesn't involve him winning in the end. he was the chosen one !!! and i just got off the phone with the kastour.net rules commission and they said i can have 2 winner picks so it's cool

worst case scenario emily decides to "push back on that" and somehow griefs christian's entire game before it can even get started (christian's threat level is so astronomical that i fear this may actually come true, please pray for him)