A buff yet ugly bunch, they've been hatching so many plots that Survivor I is starting to look like a Club Med party. This week the Kucha and Ogakor tribes will merge and a countdown to the final-four showdown will get progressively vicious. The crocs might hold their own, but no chicken, wild pig or species of Outback fish will be safe. More accidents, like the one that put the blood-thirsty Mike under heavy sedation and aboard a rescue chopper, could happen. Millions will tune in.
Stars get wrinkles.
Actors are everywhere. They can also be replaced by action figures, animation or good-looking faces plucked from the crowd. All it takes is wilderness, some of your more hardy neighbours, a lot of cameras, a dopey host and crafty editors to cut miles of footage into a thrilling tale. The stuff has to be written anew each time, creating the necessary nuisance of the kept writer, invariably a malcontent dealing in stereotypes or cliched situations, like the current strike threat. An irresistible combo of Beverly Hills 90210 and a cinema-verite social laboratory, Survivor's storytelling technique is developing before our eyes.