Since Survivor premiered, the show has featured several seasons that fans quickly grew to love. Sadly, Survivor 49 hasn't fallen into that category. Instead, many of the reality show's biggest fans have complained that the currently airing season has been boring so far.
While the criticisms of Survivor 49 are perfectly valid, it is important to note that there are some great elements of the season. Unfortunately, some of the season's most remarkable moments seem to have mostly flown under the radar. One perfect example of that is the fact that a certain Survivor 49 moment was incredibly refreshing.
A Survivor 49 player calling out a reward was hilarious and refreshing
During the fourth episode of Survivor 49, there was a joint immunity and reward challenge for the tribes to fight to win. When it became time for Jeff Probst to reveal what the reward was, he unveiled that the winning tribe would get a huge amount of fresh fruit. Clearly excited, Probst spoke about how it was the first food reward of the season before he asked Sophie Segreti to explain why that would be so exciting for the players.
“Sophie, give me some perspective because I think one thing that gets lost unless you’re out here, is the appreciation you develop or are reminded of something like a banana," Probst said.
Instead of following Probst's lead, however, Segreti completely disagreed that the fruit was an exciting reward. Instead, Segreti argued that the fruit reward was disappointing because that isn't the kind of food that she was craving.
“This is diet food," Sophie said. "This is what I eat when I’m trying to lose weight. I wanted to see a carb or a protein because it looks beautiful, but this is snack food. This is not going to give us that extra umph that we’ve been dying for."
As the other players began disagreeing with Segreti and stating they were excited for the reward, Probst admitted how surprised he was by Segreti's remarks.
“Sophie, I’m just going to speak for the group," Probst said. "You took this a very different way than I was taking it."
At that point, Kristina Mills spoke about how excited she was for the reward, which resulted in Probst prompting all the other players to exclaim their appreciation for the fruit. This interaction was hilarious and refreshing for two reasons.
Since he is Survivor's boss and longstanding host, it has always seemed like most players want to tell Jeff Probst what he wants to hear. As a result, it was truly special to see a player get prompted by Probst to praise a reward and rip it apart instead. That aspect of the situation was only made better by the fact that Probst seemed genuinely surprised.
Just as importantly, the moment was great because a fruit reward was pretty lame for viewers to see. There is nothing compelling about the idea of watching players gorge themselves on fruit. Instead, Survivor should be giving the players the kind of food that viewers will find it entertaining to see them enjoy. After all, it is hard to imagine Liz Wilcox freaking out of a fruit reward like she did over Applebee's.