Having competed in Big Brother and The Amazing Race, should Cody and Jessica complete the Triple Crown by doing a Survivor Blood vs. Water season?
Although we are a Survivor site, we offer this spoiler warning for The Amazing Race season 30, as the season finale aired last night.
CBS really has a stranglehold on reality competition programming excellence. Big Brother is a huge rating grab during the summer with its audience skewed to a younger audience, The Amazing Race offers a wide variety of vistas and culture while catering to an older audience and Survivor offers up something for everyone.
The most notable pair of players from the 2017 – 2018 slate of CBS reality competition has to be Cody Nickson and Jessica Graf, both who started out on Big Brother for season 19 last summer. As they found themselves in a showmance from week one and Cody, as Head of Household, targetting the season’s one returning player who happened to secure three weeks of immunity, found themselves on the outs and, after weeks of childish bullying from an entire house, were eventually evicted one after another.
Their underdog story as the only people to see through Paul Abrahamian’s masterminding of the entire house (he eventually lost ) had America cheering for them, leading to Jessica successfully campaigning for them to get on The Amazing Race. Cody Nickson had been removed from society for 92 days, had a week to reconnect with Jessica Graf, prepared to travel around the world and almost single-handedly carried the team to victory over 12 grueling legs.
They are just the second and third CBS reality competitors to start on one show, crossover to another and win after Natalie Anderson bested the rest of the Survivor San Juan del Sur competition. That leaves us with one question in mind; sometime down the line, when the two are ready, should Cody and Jessica compete in Survivor on a Blood vs. Water season?
For starters, one thing to note is that Cody Nickson started out as a Survivor applicant, eventually getting moved over to Big Brother due to just how comically out of place he was in the environment. He’s proven himself to be a fighter in any show, beasting out challenges as one of the most rounded competitors I’ve seen in modern reality television.
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Meanwhile, Jessica Graf serves as a social and strategic threat (when not placed in a house filled with puppets). Both Jessica and Cody together are able to be charming enough to draw in alliance members off the bat, but Jessica is the one who is able to weave the bigger picture and try to rein in Cody. The two together found themselves to be the most popular, well-liked players of The Amazing Race, and can definitely find an in early on with a Survivor Blood vs. Water cast of all newbie players.
Betsided
At this point, however, the biggest hurdle they have to overcome is their notoriety. Having just won The Amazing Race in compelling fashion, they would have the biggest targets on their back as winners and because of their notoriety. Cody Nickson, particularly, has said some awful things about marginalized minority groups, and will not back down from his beliefs. Considering John Rocker already played Survivor and has been undone by Natalie Anderson’s direct comments about his past, they do have another hurdle to climb. Plus, he talks (and acts) like a cyborg sometimes.
Another debilitating factor is that the two are incredibly loyal to each other, to a fault. Similar to how Rupert was willing to throw his game away immediately on season 27 to save Laura, Cody and Jessica have both proven themselves willing to go down with each others’ ships. Unlike Ciera, who VOTED OUT HER MOM, I doubt either would be willing to compete hard against each other, which makes it harder to navigate the social elements of a show like Survivor.
To the people who read the headline and instantly thought, “God, I hate this idea,” that is part of the draw to Cody and Jessica on Survivor. At best, they represent competitive players who are willing to make big moves in order to elevate competition as rootable underdogs. At worst, they represent pettiness, closemindedness who you want to root against.
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Survivor is about people from all walks of life, and them competing on the same season together would draw in a sizable core of people who equally want to cheer them on or boo them off the show. The show hasn’t seen compelling villains in a few seasons, and I believe based on their notoriety entering the game, they could be edited as the modern-era villains the twist-heavy show deserves.