Survivor is a reality television game show format produced in many countries throughout the world. In the show, contestants are isolated in the wilderness and compete for cash and other prizes. The show uses a system of progressive elimination, allowing the contestants to vote off other tribe members until only one final contestant remains and wins the title of "Sole Survivor". The format for Survivor was created in 1992 by Charlie Parsons. The show is credited for making reality television a popular television genre.
Concept history
The concept is credited to Charlie Parsons who co-owns Castaway Television Productions with Waheed Alli and Bob Geldof, and appeared first on the Swedish public service network SVT in 1997 as Expedition Robinson . Castaway Television Productions is the company that now manages the format for Survivor and Celebrity Survivor. Castaway Television was developed after the sale of Planet 24, a previous venture. The initial US series was a huge ratings success in 2000 and along with ABC's prime time franchise of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire sparked a reality-television revolution in the US. The popularity of these shows prompted networks to push sitcoms and conventional drama series aside and rush more reality shows into development. Even the Fox Network, which had vowed never to air a reality show again just months earlier following media outrage surrounding its Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire? program broke its promise and launched several competitors of its own. Survivor's second season in the winter/spring of 2001 drew even larger audiences. Subsequent US versions have attracted smaller but still substantial audiences. There have also been British and Australian versions of the show in 2001 and 2002 respectively. Both were considered ratings failures. Indeed in Britain, Survivor's failure was a national joke (though ratings for the UK series were considerably lower than ITV had hoped for, it still regularly attracted six to eight million viewers, a decent rather than huge audience, but enough for ITV to commission a second series which appeared a year later). TF1 France has produced nine seasons of Koh-Lanta, a French version of Survivor, and a Japanese version was also produced for four seasons (namely Survivor Japan: Palau, Survivor Japan: Hokkaido, Survivor Japan: Philippines, Survivor Japan: Rota) which achieved some success. Broadcast rights for the American version have been sold to various broadcasters and is viewed in many countries around the world. The first ever Celebrity Survivor, made in Australia, attained moderate ratings.
Format
The following description of the show is based primarily on the American version of Survivor , though the general format applies to all international versions.
Tribes
The show strands between sixteen to twenty strangers in a remote location divided into two to four teams called tribes. According to Jeff Probst, while they preferentially favor using sixteen contests which makes it easier to distribute genders across tribes and gives the viewers fewer contestants to remember, they have used eighteen and twenty-player seasons to allow for "wiggle room" in case of players quitting or being removed due to injury. Depending on the season, tribes are usually given a minimal number of tools with which to survive: commonly, this has included a machete, a pot, and water canteens to hold water from sources that vary each season. Tribes are encouraged to build shelters to protect themselves from the elements and to forage on the local flora and fauna for nourishment. In some seasons, tribes have started with food supplies (typically rice) provided by the show, while other seasons have given the tribes no additional help at the start of the game. Earlier seasons allowed players to carry one luxury item with them. Several seasons have brought the players into the game without preparation, making them start with only the clothes on their back along with whatever tools are provided, though they will often be given their running shoes for safety concerns for the players.
Initial tribe divisions have been made in several ways over the years. Early seasons tended to feature tribes divided based on a roughly equal distribution of age and gender within each tribe. Several seasons have featured tribes split by gender, age, and/or racial background. Divisions are generally made in advance by production, however, some seasons have had the tribes selected in various manners by one or more contestants after the game starts.
Tribes are given unique names and identifying colors which are used on tribe flags, challenge courses, on-screen text and various other items. Each player is given a buff, an elastic ring of material generally patterned with the logo for the current season, that can be worn as an armband, headband, tube top, mini skirt or a bow tie. Players are required to wear a buff with the color of their tribe in a visible location at all times, allowing the audience to identify tribal affiliation. Upon switching tribes (due to a merge or tribe switch), players are required to give up their old buff and obtain a new one in the new tribe's color.
The producers have generally made sure that all players will not back out prior to being stranded, and will generally have backup players on hand if they believe, from psychological profiles, that one or more will drop out. In the case of Survivor: Fiji , one contestant backed out the night before day one of the game. Since producers were not prepared for this turn of events, Fiji was the first season to feature an odd number of players, and subsequently required the production team to alter how the tribes would initially be divided.
Challenges
During the course of the game, players compete as tribes or individually in contests called challenges. Challenges consist of endurance, problem solving, teamwork, dexterity, and/or willpower, and are usually designed to fit the theme of the current season. A common style of challenge is a race through a series of obstacles to collect puzzle pieces which then must be assembled after all pieces have been collected. Challenges have also included disgusting food challenges (including foods eaten by the local population), and knowledge quizzes about the locale or players. Many seasons also include during individual challenges: a 'loved one' challenge where a family member, friend or significant other of each player participates or is part of the challenge reward; the 'Survivor Auction' in which contestants bid against each other on luxury items and strategic advantages; a challenge in which the winning contestant receives a car; and a challenge that includes components of previous challenges from that season. Endurance challenges typically require tribe members to stay balanced on a small perch or support their own weight in a precarious position for as long as possible. The degree of difficulty may be progressively increased during the course of an endurance challenge in order to arrive at a winner faster. Some challenges have had the tribes compete at their own beaches by constructing a shelter or an SOS signal. The results are then judged by an expert and the winning tribe notified by the receipt of a package dropped from a plane or delivered by boat.
Players are notified of when and where challenges are to take place via special messages left at a location near camp, dubbed treemail (a play on the word "email") by competitors, due to the fact that the messages were delivered to a basket hanging from a tree in Survivor: Borneo . In Survivor: Pearl Islands it was also called "seamail". These messages nearly always include a rhyme which gives hints to the nature of the challenge and sometimes include props that may be useful for the upcoming challenge, allowing tribes and players to attempt to form a strategy prior to the challenge. In some cases, the tribes have been given equipment to practice with or information they need to memorize prior to the challenge.
There are two types of Challenges: Reward Challenges and Immunity Challenges.
- In Reward Challenges, the contestants compete for luxuries that are not essential for survival but make their lives easier and/or more enjoyable. Examples of rewards have included food, flint, matches, rain gear, and even short trips away from camp.
- In Immunity Challenges, the contestants compete for immunity from an elimination ceremony known as Tribal Council. When the game is in its tribal stage, the tribe that wins immunity does not take part in Tribal Council. Following the merger of the two tribes, the individual who wins immunity cannot have votes cast against him or her. ( see Tribal Council for more details )
There have been several combined Reward/Immunity challenges. These have come in two approaches:
- A tribe can be given both a reward and immunity for winning. This usually occurs in the first immunity challenge, as there is usually no reward challenge during the premiere episode. Usually flint or matches are given to the tribe which wins Immunity.
- In cases where there are more than two tribes, t
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