Post #59308 by Formikahini on Mon, Nov 10, 2003 10:13 AM

For Survivor, I know that there's a.) what they hope will happen, b.) what does happen, and c.) what they edit to make look like happened (which is back to a.). An old friend of mine was on Survivor Africa, and realized while there that they were trying to goad him into being a jerk. He is, in fact, Mr. Nice Guy, but they edited him to be the asshole that they'd hired him to be. (Lex has multiple tattoos, piercings, etc, and plays drums for punk bands.) He was vindicated, however, on the last episode, when the penultimate finalist explained how she'd not picked him to go into the final round with her, because she was afraid he'd win, so well-liked was he by the still current survivors and the already-gones.

In retrospect, he was kicking himself for having thought that they'd picked him to be himself. He'd obviously been chosen to be The Scary Mean Guy by his looks. When he didn't turn out to be so, they had to edit him thusly. Gotta have a conflict!

You're comPLETEly at the mercy of the editors. I watch the Bachelor and Millionnaire shows really just to enjoy the editing - how they grab an out-of-context yawn or sour face, and juxtapose it to the speech of another contestant. Voilá - instant bitch! Any contestant can be The Bitch, and any one can be The Princess.