[Macie Lightfoot]

I like South Pacific a good amount! It definitely has its flaws (Redemption Island, two overbearing male returnees in Ozzy and Coach, Cochran also eats up a lot of airtime*, a dreadful Pagonging in the middle), but I think it has a pretty strong pre-merge and a superb end game. Savaii doesn't really do much for me as a tribe since the main power grouping is the pretty popular people and their lackeys, and it does the whole high school social dynamic in a very boring way. Upolu, however, I think is a fascinating tribe. They're tribal politics are all centered around religion and I find them to be great case study on how religion can be used as a manipulation tool. It's pretty grimy and gross, but very intriguing.

*The biggest surprise on my rewatch is how much I'm actually enjoying Cochran? I totally get the criticism because he does have a high-vis edit and the show doesn't really do "lol nerd" very well as an archetype, but he actually is charming and charismatic enough on his own and he does deliver good confessionals. It's kind of the David phenomenon from Millennials vs. Gen X, where I like him, just not for the reasons that the show wants me to like him. Cochran's self-aware enough and he knows what angle he was cast for, and he seems more embarrassed by it than anything.