Board Thread:Season Rankings/@comment-24899664-20141222121159/@comment-26485526-20170502171320

No, you people are not seeing things. I did not completely forget about my list. This is just the first time in ages that I found the time to actually add to my season rankings.

10) Marquesas (4) -  Believe it or not, when I originally drafted these rankings, I had Marquesas slotted at number 18! But somehow, I just could not bring myself to cut this season until now because the more I thought about it, the more I realized just how amazing it really was, so I kept moving it up higher and higher. Story wise, it is really difficult to find a more perfect season. Maraamu was the original Ulong, and I don’t doubt for a second that they would have continued to lose if it was not for the tribe switch. Both in challenges and at camp, they turned out to be a complete mess, although they were so much fun to watch! They had so many great characters including Sean, Gina, Boston Rob 1.0, Hunter, Vecepia, SEAN (yes, I purposefully mentioned him twice), and even Sarah was great. The morning show on Maraamu was one of the greatest things ever in the show’s history, and I’m not even kidding! The editors really did a fantastic job at showing the personalities (for better or worse) of each person this season, especially from the original Maraamu. Anyway, even after the tribe switch, we see the original Rotu continuing to get more and more cocky, to the point of voting out Gabe, their strongest challenge performer, and no doubt someone that would have been completely loyal to them! The arrogance of the Rotu 4 got so bad that during one challenge, they actually full on revealed the pecking order of the tribe, and flat out said that once Sean and Vecepia were gone, that Kathy, Neleh, and Paschal would go home one after the other. This lead to the most iconic power shift in Survivor history when Kathy, Neleh, and Paschal (and technically Zoe too) all flipped to blindside John! From there, it was the Rotu four that got pagonged, and it lead to the first ever rock draw (which was an amazing Tribal Council), and an underrated winner in Vecepia! Considering the pre-merge, nobody would ever expect that someone like Vecepia would be able to pull out the win, especially considering she started on Maraamu! But it happened, and it was a great end to the season! Rotu also had a few good characters, I do admit. Kathy, John, and Tammy in particular were all amazing (especially Kathy and Tammy), and Zoe also had her moments (although they waited until after the merge to develop Zoe's and Tammy's characters). Speaking of Kathy, it was also amazing to see her start off appearing to be Rotu’s resident crazy cat lady, and finishing the season having ran the game and becoming an iconic strategist and heroine of the series! Lastly, watching Rob, Sean, and Vecepia bring the Maraamu morning show to Rotu in that one episode was hilarious as we see the perfect clash between the fun and light-heartedness of the original Maraamu, to the dead seriousness of the original Rotu. The thing that brings Marquesas down for me was Rotu, I hate to say it. Sure it had some good characters, but until the tribe switch, Rotu absolutely dragged the episode down because certain people on that tribe were so boring (hi Gabe, Rob, Paschal, invisible Zoe, and pre-merge Neleh!). It wasn’t until the merge for me that Tammy finally started to shine through as an amazing character either, and I do admit that it was great seeing her fight to stay alive as the Rotu 4 got pagonged. Not only that, but after the power shift, each episode got fairly boring and predictable as it was well documented that Kathy and Zoe didn’t like each other, so Zoe was obviously next, then Tammy for being a threat, then “The Generic” Robert DeBoring for being part of the Rotu 4. Even when the final five came and the alliance had to turn on each other, it was obvious to me that Sean was going because Kathy had a tighter bond with Paschal and Neleh. Speaking of Paschal, his relationship with Neleh was borderline creepy, just saying. Overall though, Marquesas was a great season that I am very happy to bring into my top 10. Unfortunaly, given the other amazing seasons left, I can’t push it any higher than I already have.

9) Panama - Exile Island (12) - Between Marquesas and Panama, it was fairly difficult for me to choose which one to move above the other because they were quite similar in my opinion. Both had a great story, each had one fun and exciting tribe (Maraamu & Casaya), one less than stellar tribe (Rotu & La Mina), the early merge included a pagonging (La Mina and the Rotu 4), and both finished with a tie vote at the final four, and had underappreciated winners (Vecepia & Aras). In the end, I decided to put Panama one spot above Marquesas because even though my issues with Panama were similar, they were not as apparent in this season. The "boring" tribe this season was obviously La Mina, but even though it's boring compared to Casaya, most things are boring compared to Casaya! Sure, we did have to put up with Terry pretty much the entire season, but other than him, the only other super uninteresting people on La Mina for me were Nick, and Ruth-Marie to an extent. Misty was completely and totally robbed! Dan and Austin had some good moments, and Sally was also great! So compared to Rotu, La Mina was actually somewhat better because we actually saw some personality from those people! Not only that, but while Nick, Austin, and Sally were pagonged during the merge, there was still at least had all of the fun personalities from Casaya to keep me entertained enough that it didn't feel like the episodes dragged at all.

Beyond that though, the positives of Panama are pretty clear in my opinion. Casaya, all of the time (both pre-and post tribe switch)! They were just the perfect clash of fun personalities and amazing characters, and literally every person that wore a Casaya buff that season brought something to the tribe that made it interesting! Another thing that I really enjoyed about Casaya was how Aras, of all people, ended up as essentially a father figure of that tribe, despite being either the youngest or second youngest person there!! Even post merge, I loved the Aras/Terry rivalry, and even though I grew to hate Terry more and more due to his blatant ageism (for example, gloating about how choosing who got to see their loved ones was so easy because Aras and Danielle were only 24 and it was "just their moms"), seeing him FINALLY an immunity challenge, the final immunity challenge no less, and get his comeuppance on day 38 made for a fantastic moment! The best moment of the Aras/Terry rivalry by far though was when Aras beat Terry in the final 4 reward challenge and Aras called Terry out because he was throwing a major pity party for himself right at the challenge site! <3

Not only did we see Aras vs. Terry, but everything between Shane and Courtney/Danielle was pure gold! Bobby's blindside was fantastic! Lastly, Cirie had the best growth story since Kathy in Marquesas and it was just amazing to watch her slowly learn the game and orchestrate several blindsides! Not only did Cirie control much of the game, but her confessionals were absolutely amazing and she became someone that you couldn't help but root for. As amazing as Casaya was though, the fact La Mina was not very interesting, as well as the pagonging at the beginning of the merge means that Panama just doesn't measure up against the top 8.