EXPOSING OBSESSIONS WITH SURVIVAL STORIES
By Cami Robles Ruiz
Over quarantine, like many others, I have turned to Netflix as my main source of entertainment – and comfort. Around Thanksgiving time Netflix added two seasons of the hit reality show Survivor, and it probably took me about three days to finish all 29 episodes, each of which are about 45 minutes long. Insane – I know – but I’m also the girl who watched all ten seasons of Friends in one month, so… not surprising. I was, however, surprised at how much I loved seeing people suffer. I know, I know, I know that sounds really messed up, but hear me out. There’s something about survival stories that is just so enticing and exciting.
Before we get into the nitty gritty of my super messed up mind, let me introduce what actually happens on Survivor. Each season there are about 16-20 contestants, referred to as “castaways”, all of which spend up to 39 days competing for the title of “Sole Survivor”, but even more so for the $1 million prize. The castaways arrive on an island in Fiji where they’re split into two or three different tribes (depending on the season and number of contestants) and are completely stripped from any luxuries they may have had back home. When they arrive at their campsites they have to build shelter from scratch, account for their own food, and account for their own bathroom and waste. They also never get a change of clothes or any hygiene products, so these people are literally in the same underwear and don’t brush their teeth for a total of 39 days or up to however long they last. And to top it all off, they’re playing a ruthless game of intellectual survival filled with deceit, lies, and paranoia. And yet, for the audience, it’s absolutely thrilling.
Twice every three days, the contestants meet for challenges, some of which are physical while others are more mental, but most of the time they’re both. There are two types of challenges: Reward Challenges and Immunity Challenges. The first ends in a reward for the winning tribe which usually amounts to some type of food like an Outback Steakhouse meal or equipment like tarps to protect themselves from rain. Sometimes the rewards are more personal and can be letters, visits, or videos from loved ones – keeping the emotional motivation strong throughout the show. Immunity Challenges, on the other hand, keep the tribe safe from the oh so dreaded Tribal Council. The tribe that loses the Immunity Challenge arrives at Tribal Council that night where they must cast secret votes to determine who from their tribe will be sent home and lose their chance at winning the $1 million. But, before then, the contestants are in store for an afternoon of full-blown manipulation and betrayal.
Before arriving at Tribal Council the castaways begin to discuss who they’re going to vote out while they’re back at camp and this is when we see the formation, as well as the destruction, of alliances. Starting the very first day, the castaways begin to form different alliances within their tribes to ensure their safety at Tribal Council, but slowly these alliances dwindle and the castaways become blindsided left and right, one after another. There’s almost always a mastermind that spearheads these blindsides and acts as a sort of puppeteer, completely manipulating the rest of the castaways in the tribe. Day by day the game becomes more intense and more serious, and eventually the two tribes combine to become one – and this is when it gets good, really really good.
When the tribes combine, everyone is placed in the same campsite rather than two separate ones, and the paranoia truly begins to set in, not only with the players, but with the audience as well. Typically, those in the minority (meaning those that aren’t in the main alliance) get voted off one by one, BUT every once in a while plans to vote certain people off fail due to Immunity Idols that individual contestants can win during the challenges, and Hidden Immunity Idols that contestants can find buried around camp. So, at this point, the castaways really begin to scramble to either join the main alliance or to find hidden immunity idols, all of which will protect them and their chances at becoming the Sole Survivor. There have been instances when contestants have straight up stolen immunity idols from other contestants, displaying completely ruthless tactics ensuring to protect themselves over the others. Not everyone’s this sneaky or evil, though. There’s always the nice guy or girl that everyone falls in love with, but the less conniving you are the lower your chances are of making it to the end. This game of deceit, blindsiding, and backstabbing continues throughout 39 days, and at the end the final three plead their case as to why they should win $1 million in front of the jury (made up of previously eliminated contestants) at the final Tribal Council. The winner, chosen by the jury, is then revealed at a live show after the final episode.
So far, I have basically categorized Survivor as a deceitful game filled with suffering and betrayal. Which is true, but it’s actually so much more complex than that. First of all, why would anyone want to watch people suffer both physically and mentally for 45 minutes nonstop? Strangely enough, even though the game is real, with real people in a real place, it does have some fantastical elements to it that keep drawing you in. It’s almost like a fairy tale, not the happy, magical Disney-like fairy tales, but more like the original stories of survival that are filled with both good and evil, and an overwhelming sense of justice.
Survivor is exactly that: a tale of survival. Fairy tales are just the same. Both manage to tap into our greatest fear as humans: complete isolation. There truly is no greater threat in life than the thought of being completely deserted. When contestants enter the game of Survivor, they leave behind their families, their jobs, their friends, and their lives. They basically have to start from scratch as they develop a new shelter and are surrounded by strangers that they have to befriend. If you’re in the minority alliance, without any way of saving yourself, even though you’re still physically surrounded by people, you have no one to fight for you or to fight with you. Isolation doesn’t have to be just physical, but it can also be completely mental and emotional, and Survivor is an expert at creating that mental isolation within the contestants – you never know who’s going to flip and blindside you or who’s going to leave next, so you’re truly on your own and left to fend for yourself. You cannot trust anyone because the second you start to, you’re out of the game. We see this same fear of isolation appear in various fairy tales throughout time. In stories like Rapunzel, the titular character is essentially abandoned by her parents when they choose food over her. She’s just a baby when this happens, so she doesn’t necessarily know, but still, as a child reading this story imagine the fear that sets at the thought of your parents, the people meant to protect you for the rest of eternity, willingly abandoning you. Hansel and Gretel shares a similar sentiment when the father chooses his wife over his children and leaves them in the middle of a forest to starve. What these children must do is find a way to survive these evils, just like the contestants on Survivor and just like we do in daily life.
The contestants’ ability to navigate through these evils of starvation, isolation, and paranoia makes it easy to forget that they are just normal people, like us, that come from normal places with different backgrounds. As I watched those two seasons of the show on Netflix, I found myself looking up to the castaways as if they were heroes completing these seemingly impossible tasks. Former Survivor contestant, Stephen Fishbach even agrees his capabilities were beyond his comprehension: “My second season, as my body gave out in the Cambodian monsoon, I saw that even when I was at my lowest, still by force of will I could continue forward.” Personally, I know I wouldn’t survive a day on Survivor! No food or shelter for over a month? Yeah, no thanks, I’d rather just watch from the comfort of my own home, snacking on some popcorn. But as I’m sitting on my couch, I watch these contestants rise above us mortals as they live in this fantasy land of survival and I find myself transported into the wondrous and foreign world that is Survivor. I find myself feeling for the contestants, imagining what it would be like to be them, thanking the universe that I’m not one of them, but still, I begin to identify with the characters in the same way a child would with fairy tale characters. In these tales there’s usually two main character types: the one that gives into despair, that sits there crying until a magical helper arrives to guide them, and the one that takes matters into their own hands and attempts to escape their terrible fate. The contestants in Survivor are no different. The ones that go hunting for hidden immunity idols without any clues are typically the ones that make it far in the game while the ones who sit around and do nothing are voted off fairly quickly. What fairy tales and Survivor both do is expose human behavior – both the good and the bad that we carry. They present characters that are kind and contrast them with the evil character that, from my perspective, must be avenged. Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains is a perfect example of this.
Throughout the Heroes vs. Villains season, we see Russell Hantz become the mastermind puppeteer of the game. He tricks people left and right to give him immunity idols and manages to blindside some of the most beloved Survivor contestants of all time. He’s the villain of the season, and he makes it to the final three. The other two castaways in the final three are Parvati Shallow and Sandra Diaz-Twine, two women that may not have been the nicest of people through the entirety of the game, but were nowhere near as betraying and disloyal as Russell. When the jury votes for the winner, absolutely no one casts a vote for Russell, and for the second time in a row, he loses the $1 million. While the villain doesn’t always lose on Survivor and the “good guy” or “not fully the bad guy” sometimes wins, there’s an overwhelming feeling of justice that arises when the villain does lose because, to me at least, rewarding the villain just seems wrong. In The Uses of Enchantment, Bruno Bettleheim notes that “children are innocent and love justice, while most of us [adults] are wicked and naturally prefer mercy.” I find there to be some truth to this statement. The beauty of Survivor, or at least in my own experience, is that it transports you back into a mesmerized, childlike state, engulfed in those feelings of unmanageable chaos that we experience when we’re young and unaware of how to control or work through our emotions. But the villains of the show, they’re like the adults in the real world and in fairy tales. They prefer mercy over justice and allow their wickedness to guide them and foster their desire to win. So, yes, it’s upsetting to those of us that tap into our childlike states while we watch the show when the villain wins because we feel a sense of loss and a lack of justice. But, I think I keep going back to the show because of those instances when the heroes do win, validating my hopes and feelings, and creating a sense of comfort. At the end of the day, Survivor follows the same process as many fairy tales: fantasy, recovery, escape, and consolation. The contestants are placed in this survival fantasy island in Fiji, they have to recover from feelings of complete despair, they have to escape from the villains’ traps, and in the end there’s typically a consolation of justice being achieved. But what if the villain wins? How does consolation present itself then?
Here’s the thing… it all ends, eventually. IT ENDS. Even if the villain wins, the game has to end. That’s our ultimate consolation. That’s my consolation. That’s my comfort. That’s why I keep coming back to Survivor and the reason why I can live peacefully with my obsession. I know that the game doesn’t last forever and I realize it’s not me who has to physically experience the game. The fact that the game ends and that a new season starts soon after also gives me hope that the nice guy will beat the villain next time. I feel comfort in knowing that there’s another chance for good to beat evil. Rather than having to undergo those terrifying feelings of isolation and starvation, I can simply just live vicariously through the contestants. In fairy tales, children are consoled by the instances of justice – like Little Red killing the wolf and Cinderella’s step sisters getting their eyes pecked out by birds – but also by the fact that they’re transported back to reality once the story ends. They’re not the ones in the story, but they manage to identify with the characters and the storyline by living vicariously through them to work out their chaos and fears. Children, through fairy tales, and I, through watching Survivor, can finally come to realize that we aren’t actually deserted and won’t be anytime soon, because oftentimes there’s going to be a happy ending with these characters managing to make it one more day. At the end of the day, that’s all we can do too: survive.
