One of Survivor’s winners and another of its first boots actually got their start on The Amazing Race: San Juan Del Sur’s Natalie and Nadiya Anderson.
Way back when,Rob and Amberproved that CBS could cross-pollinate its casts forThe Amazing RacefromSurvivor. After that, though, things went dormant for theTARandSurvivorconnection for quite some time. (There was, of course, aBig Brotherinterlude with Hayden Mears going on the firstBlood vs. Waterwith Kat Edorsson ofOne World.) But then came the “twinnies.”
And they used the word “twinnie” a lot, so let’s face it: Natalie and Nadiya Anderson sparked opinions when they first appeared onThe Amazing Race‘s 21st season, whether you liked how competitive they were or not.
In season 21, Natalie and Nadiya played a game that had a lot of strategy — but also showed them playing a pretty social game, too. They picked up money that had been lost by another team. They convinced other teams to help them engineer a near-certain elimination in a game where, as we noted when we talked about Rob and Amber, you can’t actually vote anyone out. (The only guaranteed way to survive the raceis to not come in last ever, barring any injuries.) But at the same time, they got along with other teams.
In terms of airing, the twins’ second run atThe Amazing Raceaired ahead ofSurvivor: San Juan del Sur. Their all-star appearance onTARdidn’t end well — they didn’t even make it to episode 2 of the series. But those opinions kept rolling, and so it seemed natural that they made it ontoSan Juan del Sur,which had the Blood vs. Water theme again. (It helped make up for the fact thatSurvivorrepeated the theme in season 29 after first using it in season 27.)
If you’ve seenSan Juan del Sur, you know that theSurvivorproduction probably lost its collective mind when they realized that Nadiya was the first boot and Natalie went on to win. Even thoughSurvivorhas told all kinds of storiessince the very beginning, that’s the kind of storyline you can’t engineer. You can only hope to just capture it accurately.
Fortunately, since she made it to12th place on our list of bestSurvivorwinners, the production seems to have done its job. As my colleague wrote:
"“Natalie Anderson took to heart the modern gameplay style of making friends early, keeping low and turning it up with subtle moves…”"
Subtle moves, you say? Like the one she pulled onTAR? Yup. Natalie Anderson might have gotten her start on that side of the CBS reality world, but we’d like to submit the argument that she’s an even betterSurvivorplayer, as evidenced by the fact that she won a million-dollar check from that and not the other. Can you imagine howGame Changerswould have turned out with her on the cast, as shewas supposed to be?
Next: Survivor and TAR: Rob and Amber
If there ever is an all-winners season, Natalie needs a spot. And ifSurvivorever gets really weird and does a season of first eliminations, Nadiya should get a second chance of her own. We know we recommended you watch Rob and Amber’s debut season ofTARto get into the series as aSurvivorfan, but if you can’t stand standard definition, season 21 ofTARmight just be your best bet.
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