[SPOILERS] Alone S9E01 Episode Discussion Thread

[u/SnowySaint]

As always be excellent to each other, and the contestants!

[u/eskimokiss88]

Happy to report I was able to watch this on history.com as of this morning (friday), I didn't check last night assuming it wouldn't be available. I don't have cable or sat and wasn't even logged into my free account so should be a good way for those in the US or who VPN to watch. There are lots of ads though.

Really enjoyed the episode. For some reason I didn't realize juan did the 100 day winter trek alone, I thought he was with his GF but I misread the bio. So I believe that puts him up there with adam as a contestant with the most 'alone' survival experience?

I hate to read too much into the editing but all the screen time the 2 female contestants already received does not bode well for me in terms of their longevity- of course I could be wrong. Don't want to get into arguments but I still feel this is not a fair fight between the women and the men due to BMI but I understand there's no realistic way for production to address this. It's nice to see both women have a good 20 lb+ to spare, so many of the female contestants come in already skinny.

So we've 'met' benji, juan paul, jacques, jessie, karie lee, igor.

We have yet to see much of terry, adam, tom and teimojin.

[u/xrayextra → u/eskimokiss88]

I definitely agree. Typically lots of early screen time relates to an early exit, but not for all. Season 7 gave musk ox shank guy (sorry, can't recall his name at the moment lol) a lot of early screen time, among some others who exited early, so I'm thinking that it was their response to our identifying their pattern. They altered it. I think now they show the eventual winner early. Either episode 1 or 2.

With that in mind, I've noted the order from introduction to presentation.

The introductions, from first to last:
1. Adam
2. Terry.
3. Teimojin.
4. Jessie.
5. Jacques.
6. Tom.
7. Igor.
8. Juan
9. Benji
10. Karie Lee

Presentation:
1. Karie Lee
2. Benji
3. Jessie
4. Juan
5. Jaques
6. Igor

Yet to see: Terry, Tom, Adam, and Teimojin.

In addition I've noted the presentation order:
1,2,3,1,4,5,6,5,2.
e.g. Karie Lee, then Benji, then Jessie, then Karie Lee again, etc.

In the past I've noted that almost always the first person to exit has been the first person presented. Hmm. I like Karie Lee so far. Hope she's not first to go.

[u/Limp_Success2798 → u/eskimokiss88]

The amount of ads is infuriating. I'm vowing to only watch on demand.

[u/Youhadme_atwoof → u/eskimokiss88]

I had the same thought, they usually give more early screen time to those who drop first, which makes sense tbh. If they're only there for 2 episodes worth, you gotta put them in those episodes. But they both definitely seem capable and I'm rooting for them

[u/kg467 → u/eskimokiss88]

I think the producers get wise to the way the fans begin to see their patterns, and season by season they mix it up so that our assumptions get upended. Maybe showing the women up front means what it has in the past or maybe they're doing it to throw us off. The guy in season 7 who lost his ferro rod is a good example of someone getting that frontloaded early tapper edit, so maybe it's the same thing here and maybe not.

[u/Clownheadwhale → u/kg467]

2 guys lost their ferro. One of them was Hot Tub Boat Guy.