Agreed.  Albert and Sophie will be the first ones gone once a couple of Savaii get taken out.  Which is why this play is great for Cochran (though he may not have realized it).  Albert, Sophie, and Cochran will hopefully pick up a couple remaining Savaii votes for a tribal council or two to take out the block of four…

Cochran is not a weasel, he made the only reasonable play in his situation.  My problem with his gameplay is that if he was going to flip, he should have done it earlier and kept the idol.

Exactly.  Here's the play (if you are Cochran, Albert, and Sophie).  Vote out two more Savaii, preferably Jim and Ozzy.  At that point hopefully the remaining two Savaii will be so desperate to stay alive that they will be willing to go with Cochran and take down the block of four (Coach, Brandon, Rick, and Edna).…

That part was driving me insane as well.  I may or may not have been shouting "You all have free will!  You could have voted for Cochran!"

Early in the episode Finn was just hanging around in the background of scenes making strange faces.  Even though I knew it wouldn't happen, I kind of hoped he would continue to silently do this for the rest of the episode.

Great show and it's great to have these reviews back!

Just don't start in with the complisults.

Two Twin Peaks moments that stick out for me are Josie Packard's fate and the ending of the last episode.  So. Damn. Creepy.

Little flaw in your logic there - whether they reveal the final vote on the island or live in studio, the votes are cast (and able to be read by the producers) at the same time. The change doesn't affect the edit at all.

Yeah, I saw this was about to expire and knew that this Carpenter primer was coming so I watched it a couple nights ago.  I have to admit that I was disappointed. The idea is a great one and the score is magnificent, but the editing and acting are generally subpar. Also, the inciting incident (the father's attack on…

Yeah, that scene bothered me a bit too.  Defenses and kickers are so low rated that you would never get five defenses, though it would be possible to get two (and autodraft forces you to fill all positions, so you would have at least one QB, he just might be crappy).

Thanks for the recommendations, whataworkout!   I will have to take a look at those.

No Self if all you've seen of Dargis is bashing movies lacking women then you need to read more.  She is one of my faves and will rave where she sees greatness (her review of I Heart Huckabees is one of my favorites).

I flat out love Reloaded, but Revolutions is a drag.  I recently rewatched them both but fastforwarded through the parts in Zion (primarily the ones from Revolutions).  Makes the whole thing work better.

I was just about to draw that connection to Gladwell.  They are both really good writers who care only marginally about facts.  They both write books that are compelling and easy to read with interesting theories that they never bother to prove.  Even though the lack of follow through frustrates me, I am glad to see a…

"there was very little egregiously awful about this episode"!

Breaking Bad is the prequel?  I guess you are expecting some very interesting twists in the next 16 episodes.

One caveat to this - these are all just reviews of the pilot, where everyone was hoping for promise.  I would be interested to see what these critics now think of the show, four episodes in.

I enjoy the addition of games to the already great podcast, but I would like to make one small request - please repeat the correct answer after everyone shouts it out.  The chaos of the shouting does not always allow the listener to hear whatever the correct answer was.

Racism