Survivor Gabon

“Want to know what you’re playing for?” Emmy award winning host Jeff Probst uttered that famous phrase twice as Survivor kicked off it’s 17th season last night. True to form, producer Mark Burnett introduced a twist to go along with the Survivor standards we have grown to love.

Burnett has an uncanny ability to change things just enough to keep you interested and wondering what’s next. But don’t worry; the old Survivor classics are still there, the traditional elements that have kept the show on the air since the year 2000.

Set in Gabon, Africa, the usual beautiful people make up a large portion of this season’s cast. The 18-contestantt troupe has no less than 6 “babes” and 4 “hunks”. 13 competitors are less than 30 years old. The eye candy is definitely there.

Of course there is the ubiquitous wise old sage, the quirky gay guy, the high-strung black diva and the pretty girl with the weird first name. Who can forget Parvati?

Yup, all of the traditional elements are back. The first new twist Burnett gives us is a 2-hour season opener. Perhaps it was done to combat Fox throwing 120 minutes of Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares at us, put I prefer to think it was just Burnett giving things a new look.

Episode 1 Recap - The two tribes are named Kota and Fang (pronounced to rhyme with thong. Hmm…). Despite Kota having 5 of the babes in their tribe, it totally dominated Fang in all three of the challenges. Oops, was that a chauvinistic remark? Maybe so, but the fact remains Kota knocked the snot out of Fang and looked good doing it.

With that being said, obviously the first two contestants eliminated were both from Fang. First ousted was Michelle, a whiney babe with an ample collection of tattoos. She made the classic blunder of referring to her teammates as “dorks”. Not a good move, Michelle.

Next off was Gillian; the 61-year-old retired nurse. She was the “mom-type” that seems to show up each season. Her problem was that her attitude was too much rah-rah, while her performances in the challenges were blah, blah. See ya Ma!

Survivor is back and that is a good thing. Next week’s coming attractions teased us with the babes and hunks wrestling in the mud! I can hardly wait, but I have to. Until next week…From Gabon.