S I G H T S

 

For Pete’s Sake

Survivor: Marquesas
Preview

Caution: Potential spoilers ahead.

For all his infamous trickery and secrecy about the plotlines of his show, Survivor executive producer Mark Burnett apparently still screws up on occasion. Online fans think they’ve already determined who is voted off on the debut of Survivor: Marquesas — almost three weeks before the episode airs.

And although the series has gone from pop-culture sensation to ‘mere” top-five hit since its debut (the finale of the original Survivor scored more than 50 million viewers in August 2000, whereas last month’s Survivor: Africa finish was watched by about 27 million), it remains an online phenomenon. Internet message board SurvivorSucks, for instance, received some 35,000 visits and 1,400 posts per day during the final month of Survivor: Africa’s airing. 

Most of the board’s registered members have one motivation: Spoil the show by figuring out what will happen in advance. A key way of doing this is by scrutinizing preview footage that airs in CBS teasers and on entertainment news programs such as Access Hollywood.

The online fans’ latest find points to Maraamu tribe member Peter Hawkey being the first Tribal Council victim. This deduction — arrived at Feb. 7, only a day after CBS announced the new castaways — demonstrates once more how these Internet sleuths take seemingly innocuous publicity footage and transform it into a smoking gun. 

Photo captured by Bungler

The inference was based on footage from the Survivor set that aired on Entertainment Tonight. In one video, we see eight castaways arriving at an apparent reward or immunity challenge. These eight can be positively ID”ed as the full Rotu tribe, Maraamu’s rival in the early going. Male members sport facial hair, suggesting this is several days into the game, most likely during the show’s second episode. The corresponding footage of Maraamu, however, only shows seven contestants (see picture at right). The identities of six of these — Sarah, Vecepia, Sean, Rob, Hunter and Patricia — are clear. But the last person’s face is obscured by a camera. We see a pair of khaki pants, a light blue/gray shirt, and some hands clapping, but that’s it. The big question is whether this last person is contestant Gina or Peter.

This footage became a lightning rod as soon as it was posted to SurvivorSucks, just after it aired. “Note that there are a full eight members from the Rotu tribe, but only seven members from the arriving Maraamu tribe and Gina’s the one who’s missing,” wrote a SurvivorSucks member known online only as Bungler.

Hours later, however, the arguing began: “Is it really Gina that is missing?” asked MarquesanHunter in a post. “Maybe it’s Peter. The waist-to-hip ratio [of the seventh person] looks more like a woman’s then a man’s. Also, the waist height is about level to Patricia’s. Peter is much taller.”

Yes, that’s right, on SurvivorSucks even contestants’ measurements are fair game. Other factors considered included the mystery person’s height relative to those around them, their gait, the apparent thickness of their legs, the location of their tribal bandana, and the way they clapped their hands. The clincher came, however, when posters matched the mystery person’s shirt to one worn by Gina in other promotional footage.

The general conclusion: This is footage from an Episode 2 challenge, and Peter’s absence means his tribe lost the first immunity challenge (some kind of canoe race, based on other footage), and he was voted out. All this, determined not two days after fans learned who the contestants were.

It’s surprising that CBS continually shoots itself in the foot with such “photographic evidence.” The networks’ goofs during the original Survivor were chronicled here last month. And many fans knew well in advance that Debb and Kel would be the first castaways tossed off Survivor: The Australian Outback after entertainment news programs aired sneak previews of a reward challenge showing only 14 contestants present. And now it seems CBS has allowed those same programs to give away the outcome of the first episode of Survivor: Marquesas.

Of course, it’s possible that Burnett is merely toying with his online fan base. Perhaps the footage is from another time period and Peter is merely off-camera. Or maybe Burnett’s throwing out some puzzle pieces: “It is almost like Burnett picked this picture because the cameraman’s hand is in the way,” Macowden wrote in a post on Surviiivor.com, which also has a spoiler message board. “Maybe he thought we would not catch it. I hardly doubt he selects the pictures with that much thought, though.”

The producer may also be trying to generate publicity. Survivor’s buzz has obviously faded, even if it remains a big success. NBC’s Friends overtook it in the Thursday-night ratings battle last fall, and many critics began to dismiss it, citing the African edition’s boring backdrop and unexciting contestants, not to mention post-Sept. 11 irrelevance.

Survivor: Marquesas seems more promising. The locale is much more beautiful than the last and is reminiscent of the original season’s Palau Tiga island, and there’s the added twist of the contestants being given no food or water rations — they’re completely on their own in that department. It probably won’t top Friends, but the race may be closer. (Although NBC smartly ended last week’s Friends with a cliffhanger, which will be resolved — you guessed it — opposite Survivor: Marquesas’ premiere.) By releasing footage that seems to reveal Peter as the victim of host Jeff Probst’s first torch-snuffing, perhaps Burnett is hoping to add to the hype.

So while someone else may get the boot come Feb. 28, when Survivor: Marquesas premieres, for now it appears that Peter, a bowling alley owner from Millis, Mass., will wind up rolling a gutter ball on CBS.

But hey, maybe he’ll get to do a guest spot on Ed.