Flies, fire, fishing and fatigue. That pretty much sums up the first episode. But the SA survivors don’t whinge, they know how to build a shelter, and they get a braai going within hours. Welcome to the series.
Advertisement
The launch was very muted, compared with the Big Brother flair, which had contestants arriving in a fleet of limos, with police outriders and helicopters. Well, how exciting will this series be?
Possibly, though it hard to tell from any first episode, where there's so much to cram in - the contestants, where they are, how they got there, and so on. Click here for some videolinks to more footage.
Will there be a noticeably "African" feel about it? That also remains to be seen, though I get the impression that at least some of these contestants want to be more organised than the Americans have been. And generally that doesn’t take much.
Hardly a feather in her cap
I've already written about my initial impressions of the contestants, and nothing changed much in the first show.
Danielle was as snobby and fussy as I expected, and came very close to being voted out for this. Her fellow tribe-mates noticed her obvious disappointment on discovering which group she'd be with, and they understandably resented this.
Jude seems notably butch, and the model who keeps saying she wants to show she isn't a typical model, sounds so like a typical model. Vanessa, despite a nice deep voice, manages to sound grating, by uttering an elitist and kvetching set of comments. Zayne is chatty and tends to giggle, and seems thrilled to have ended up in the tribe with the most pretty girls.
Jacinda was even more obnoxious than expected, languidly reclining and making caustic comments about others. Danielle she denounced as a "cancer" needing to be cut out urgently, and nearly arranged for the perky fashionista with the crummy feather in her hat, to be dumped. Had Don not effectively committed series suicide, she'd have succeeded.
Nico, the restauranteur seems annoying, with his trivial comments, in which he has nothing to say, but says it, anyway. He made a bad culinary impression when he bragged about the non-existent "sizzle" when he fried green bananas. He reminds me of Daniel Day-Lewis, though not pleasantly, and the Day-Lewis of The Last of the Mohicans, which is not encouraging.
Mzi, whom I thought would be a promising figure, proved it by revealing his fishing skills. At first the others mocked his patience as he waited to catch something, but he came up trumps. What they don't seem to have realized, is that he has had a lifelong passion for fishing, to the extent that he had said his friends teased him about being so keen on it. He shows great confidence and assertiveness without being unpleasant. I suspect he’ll go far.
Old stone-face
I'm afraid I can't report any signs of improvement in Old Stone Face, the hapless presenter, Mark Bayly - he has less hap than anyone I've seen on TV for years. He's still so wooden, I think he must have been sponsored by Timber City.
Some of the women at MNet told me he has a lovely smile, but I expect a little more from the guy proclaimed as the hottest new Celebrity in Africa. He has told the Sunday Times, during a butch photo-shoot, that he feels the whole 35 years of his life was preparing him for this great moment. Shame.
There's a significant difference between being tough and being terminally rigid. Some like his voice, though he sounds at times like Henry Kissinger with a sore throat.
And so to the islands
It was a good start, when the group, apparently expecting another press conference, experienced a fake flight emergency and landed unexpectedly to find the game had already started.
There was much nervous scurrying about, and overlooking of the obvious, as they gathered petrol and raced to take the best island on offer. It was close, but the blue-scarved Aguila tribe won it, and got started with fire and shelter, while the near-miss Rana tribe set off for the second-rate island, arriving in the dark over three hours later.
This time they were lucky, starting off with a chest with spade, tarp, rice, hooks, and so on; and they were allowed to take some personal items in a back-pack, though we haven't been told what in the end they took.
Zanele had an unexpected problem when the group jumped off their boat and swam for the shore, developing a cramp and apparently was at some risk of drowning. Sam seemed to be the main saviour, though Gareth later joined in the rescue. Once both groups began to settle on their islands, Sam seems to be the most active in taking leadership. This doesn't seem to have stirred up the usual resentment so far, though he does seem over-eager to seem vitally needed.
Pipped at the post
The first immunity challenge involved the group hauling a wooden mast through a mangrove swamp. Both teams did well, with Rana slightly ahead much of the way, but pipped at the post, literally, at the very end, by Aguila. So Rana has to choose a sacrificial goat to send home.
Jacinda makes over-dramatic pronouncements about how Danielle is the cancer which must be excised, denouncing her as being far too headstrong and outspoken, while she herself is melodramatically headstrong and outspoken. Danielle, her feather drooping in the rain, announces that "I don't like this game". And the game doesn't seem all that fond of her, either.
But Don is looking very vulnerable, too. He's seen sitting around doing nothing, and though he seems sick, he doesn't appear to explain this, nor do the others on his tribe seem to really appreciate this. He separates himself from the others, and is seen cutting his nails.
Later one of the girls, rather sulky, says they tried to help him, and he just ought to be better, as if it's his fault for not recovering rapidly enough for her. There's no sign of the doctor taking any interest in the sick old man, which troubles me somewhat.
Don commits Survivor suicide
Tribal council takes place, we are told, in a Mayan sacrificial temple, and there are several shots of an apparently nearby skeleton. We learn that they've had plentiful fruits - bananas, pawpaw, coconuts, and so on, so they shouldn't be starving yet.
Asked about his tribe's loss in the Challenge, Don seals his fate, saying that their main mistake was in putting a woman as their lead player. Now, even if that was true, it was a profoundly unwise comment, coming from a vulnerable old man, especially in a tribe where women hold the voting majority.
But the final vote is close, with Don being ousted by just one vote, and Danielle revealing the extent of her unpopularity. Apparently she was told that they intended to vote her out, and scored some points for herself by nonetheless working hard round camp even after being told she was due for departure. But will this be enough to save her next time?
Don on the Cybershrink couch
Meeting Don yesterday, it's hard at first to understand how completely he folded in the first day. He explained, and the producers confirmed, that he became rapidly ill, apparently a mild delirium related to dehydration and electrolyte imbalance.
He reminded us that it was 40 degrees Celsius and with 100% humidity, the water was bad, and he was unable to eat or sleep much. At one stage he became paranoid, sure that he was the only real or sane person there, and that all the others were actors. He also found he was forgetting people's names.
The insects, including sand-flies or fleas were very troublesome, and he says some hatched out in his skin days later, causing a severe itch. As far as he can recall, they were provided with sprays of insect-repellent, which he thinks was called "Mybugga"! In his experience, it seemed to attract rather than repel the insects.
He recognises that his age was a handicap, not only with regard to his success in tasks and challenges, but in not appealing to other tribe members. Asked why he put his foot in it so comprehensively in blaming a woman leader for the loss, he says, "I‘m honest. I really felt that this was the only problem for us".
He was impressed by Jacinda and Nico. As for his own family, his adult children seem to have been most concerned that he shouldn't do anything that would reflect badly on them. He also emphasises that watching previous series, he thought it all looked very much easier than it in fact proved to be.
He also revealed that he had formed an alliance with Liesl and Gareth, even while they were on the plane en route. He thought the alliance was safe, and that Danielle was sure to be evicted. But he had picked up an odd vibe from Gareth. The first time he asked him if the alliance was still in place, Gareth wouldn't meet his eyes and was evasive. After Don asked Liesl to check on this, he says Gareth came back, looked him square in the eyes, and assured Don that he wouldn't vote against him. And yet he did.
What about the Hippocratic Oath?
Though he thinks he had a combination of heat stroke, dehydration and electrolyte imbalance, he was deeply disappointed that Gareth, the doctor, apparently made no attempt to check on him or help him. Someone else offered him some salt to help, but not the doc.
After eviction, when the crew gave him some electrolytes to drink, he began to feel much better. He kept saying that one automatically looks up to doctors, and he never expected Gareth to stab him in the back so unnecessarily, or to fail to help him with at least some medical advice. Plaintively, he asked us, "Don't doctors sign a Hippocratic oath?". Maybe that should read “Hypocratic Oath”. He says he holds no grudges, but "it should be in your nature to help someone in need, but he didn't".
I think this is an extremely important point. We have seen various professionals enter such reality shows in recent years (remember the oddly fey little doctor in Big Brother?). But they need to always remember that they cannot leave their professional obligations, oaths and duties on their desk when they’re in front of the cameras.
A doctor would always have an absolute and binding duty to try to help other competitors who were in any sort of medical need or with any sort of health problem, even rivals or members of an opposing team. We'll need to keep our eye on Doc Gareth from here on, to see if he redeems himself from this rather seedy response to the sick older man.
Bookmark with:
What are social bookmarks?