Survivor

Anyone who has worked in an office can identify with the tribalists' permanent state of exhaustion and paranoid mistrust, so Survivor's chief goal in the upcoming weeks is to make distinctive some of the initially rather bland-seeming participants.

The show's aura of jungle mysticism is so overblown it's hilarious. I love how the castaways have to kill rats for food and make fire with sticks, but the tribal council meetings take place on a lavish, obviously prefab jungle village set that looks like the Ewok treehouse city in "Return of the Jedi." (The million-dollar grand prize is sitting over in one corner of the set - a pile of cash in an open treasure chest. Very Scrooge McDuck.)...Asinine stuff - and intensely addictive. [2 June 2000, p.37]

Even if the supply of waterproof matches ran low, these 16 abrasive Americans can be counted on to generate sparks merely by arguing with one another. If drama equals tension, Survivor is drama distilled - and addictive. [1 June 2000, p.100]

The first episode of Survivor felt closer in spirit to a summer camp color war than "Lord of the Flies." [2 June 2000, p.E25]