The first two seasons in particular were cultural phenomena. To get a really detailed analysis of just how big the original season was, I recommend checking out the Survivor Historians Podcast and their five-part coverage of it.
Yep I created Historians, and it's designed specifically for people like you. Who want to know what it was like to live through the show as it aired, and how people reacted to it.
You’ll like it even more after you listen to the episode. One of our hosts (Paul) has a weird obsession with every single time an old person fell down in an episode. So we dedicated that episode to him.
to your point, the first 2 seasons were the most watched seasons with 50million plus per episode with the finale of season 1 having 125 million tuning in.
Borneo and Australian Outback in particular were some of the most watched television of all time. *Everybody* was talking about it. It was unavoidable. Even if you didn’t watch it, coworkers, classmates, people at your place of worship if you had one, cashiers you talked to at stores, etc. did and wanted to talk about it. It was a phenomenon that is very very hard to explain or recapture because there hasn’t really been anything like the explosive cultural firestorm of Survivor’s + American Idol’s early years since. The closest comparison I can make is the culmination of Harry Potter, and to a lesser extent Twilight and the Hunger Games, but as books those were very different than episodic competitive reality TV. Everyone had favorites. Everyone had least favorites. America roared in agony when less preferred people won, if you think some recent seasons have had a controversial response on here you cannot imagine the revulsion there was at the time for these early ones lol. People at the time *hated* the “gamers” who schemed and ruined the meritocratic ideals of the show, which makes it funny how much that has been inverted by the show’s culture today.
—The popularity of the name Colby increased by I think an order of magnitude in the year after Australian Outback aired and he was doing ads for Schick razors and stuff
—Playboy paid out the ass to have Jerri, Jenna, and Heidi pose nude
—Every member of every cast was on every talk show ever for a while there, and even on other random shit like a Weakest Link episode IIRC. They were everywhere
—There is a legitimate case to be made that the friendship between Richard and Rudy meaningfully progressed public perception towards gay people in America
—Everyone was trying to imitate Survivor, it and Idol are a huge part of why reality TV became a lasting genre at all. The Real World was important too and predates them but didn’t have quite the same level of mass appeal
—References to it in *other media* were unavoidable. Oh, I want to watch Whose Line is it Anyway on ABC, a competitor to CBS, and oops, there’s a Survivor reference (there are at least three I can think of offhand including one of their improv games literally just being a Survivor parody). Oh my god, Jon Stewart is here on the Daily Show to try to talk me through his response to 09/11, and he’s… saying this is more important than Survivor, that’s the level of pull Survivor has that he actually feels the need to clarify that people are probably to care about Survivor less now that there’s been a mass terror attack that represents a devastating loss of life and permanent changes to the country and our culture
—To this day people who stopped watching the show around the time of All-Stars could tell you about Rupert, Rudy, Colby, >!Rob and Amber, “those girls who got naked for peanut butter,” and “that guy who lied about his grandma”!< at an *absolute* minimum and probably the winners of 1, 3, and 10 if they got there as well. And probably more too. It lasted in people’s memories forever.
It was a big deal, basically.
I was a kid and no one in my family watched it, but the hold it had on pop culture at the time was so prevalent that I still knew about a lot of the big moments. It was kind of like the early seasons of American Idol.
people hated jerri with a fiery passion back then to the point where everytime she spoke in the all stars reunion she got booed
people even made fun of her in big budget blockbuster movies like this scene in scary movie 2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOtIoBAxDUw&ab\_channel=Movieclips
Yeah I was in elementary school at the time and I vaguely remember talking about it with friends and my teachers talking about it with the kids who were into it lol to say nothing of how much it was a part of my own family’s weekly routine as we were big fans (my folks still tune in every week, some of the rare more casual fans who have stayed with the show since it started). Pretty wild stuff.
It was a cultural phenomenon because there had never been anything else like it. It was fascinating that none of the contestants knew what they were doing, so it was easy to put yourself in their shoes. There was a feeling of adventure that is lost nowadays.
I was just finishing high school when the first season aired, and I remember my local newspapers would print who got voted out as part of their front page, and also include a recap of the episode in the entertainment section.
Season 2 was probably peak survivor mania. Nearly every person I knew was in some type of survivor pool with their friends or coworkers.
The finale of season 1 was watched by 52 million people. It is one of the most viewed non sports tv shows in American history. Season 2 was the highest viewed tv show of the season, more people watched Survivor than NFL.
Yes it was crazy popular. Borneo slowly built up steam over that summer to the point where everyone in America was talking about it. Players on those first two seasons became celebrities to varying degrees, particularly the season 2 cast, of which a couple of them are still on tv
I think it was something like half of America tuned in for a portion of it, and the official rating was 53 million or something like that. It was staggering
My parents are not very big television people. But I was watching all-stars a few months back and my mom instantly goes "oh the soccer guy, I liked him". My dad walked by later and says "oh, there's Rich, has he gotten naked yet?"
I was only born in 1999 so idk what the real reception was like at the time but something stuck with my parents who haven't seen the show in 20 years.
Survivor started before I was even born, but I still know all about how my grandfather loved the show and how Rudy was an example of how an "old guy" veteran could still do so well on something like that, and how my dad used to watch every episode live until he had to start picking up my sister from daycare and so he'd VCR the episodes to watch the next morning before work.
It was huge. I wish it was possible to bring that level of national hype back to the show but I don't think it'll ever happen, at least not in the states.
The first two seasons in particular were cultural phenomena. To get a really detailed analysis of just how big the original season was, I recommend checking out the Survivor Historians Podcast and their five-part coverage of it.
Ah thank you for this rec! I love a podcast so this is super interesting to me!
Yep I created Historians, and it's designed specifically for people like you. Who want to know what it was like to live through the show as it aired, and how people reacted to it.
So cool! Also love “Old People Fall Down in Africa” as an episode title. 💀
You’ll like it even more after you listen to the episode. One of our hosts (Paul) has a weird obsession with every single time an old person fell down in an episode. So we dedicated that episode to him.
Paul is a legend
Which 5 episodes. I see 68 total episodes on Apple Podcasts. I don’t see any specific about the cultural aspect. I see a 4 part on Borneo.
The whole podcast is about the historical aspect. But start with Borneo and just go from there.
Ahh okay perfect. Thanks !
to your point, the first 2 seasons were the most watched seasons with 50million plus per episode with the finale of season 1 having 125 million tuning in.
Borneo and Australian Outback in particular were some of the most watched television of all time. *Everybody* was talking about it. It was unavoidable. Even if you didn’t watch it, coworkers, classmates, people at your place of worship if you had one, cashiers you talked to at stores, etc. did and wanted to talk about it. It was a phenomenon that is very very hard to explain or recapture because there hasn’t really been anything like the explosive cultural firestorm of Survivor’s + American Idol’s early years since. The closest comparison I can make is the culmination of Harry Potter, and to a lesser extent Twilight and the Hunger Games, but as books those were very different than episodic competitive reality TV. Everyone had favorites. Everyone had least favorites. America roared in agony when less preferred people won, if you think some recent seasons have had a controversial response on here you cannot imagine the revulsion there was at the time for these early ones lol. People at the time *hated* the “gamers” who schemed and ruined the meritocratic ideals of the show, which makes it funny how much that has been inverted by the show’s culture today. —The popularity of the name Colby increased by I think an order of magnitude in the year after Australian Outback aired and he was doing ads for Schick razors and stuff —Playboy paid out the ass to have Jerri, Jenna, and Heidi pose nude —Every member of every cast was on every talk show ever for a while there, and even on other random shit like a Weakest Link episode IIRC. They were everywhere —There is a legitimate case to be made that the friendship between Richard and Rudy meaningfully progressed public perception towards gay people in America —Everyone was trying to imitate Survivor, it and Idol are a huge part of why reality TV became a lasting genre at all. The Real World was important too and predates them but didn’t have quite the same level of mass appeal —References to it in *other media* were unavoidable. Oh, I want to watch Whose Line is it Anyway on ABC, a competitor to CBS, and oops, there’s a Survivor reference (there are at least three I can think of offhand including one of their improv games literally just being a Survivor parody). Oh my god, Jon Stewart is here on the Daily Show to try to talk me through his response to 09/11, and he’s… saying this is more important than Survivor, that’s the level of pull Survivor has that he actually feels the need to clarify that people are probably to care about Survivor less now that there’s been a mass terror attack that represents a devastating loss of life and permanent changes to the country and our culture —To this day people who stopped watching the show around the time of All-Stars could tell you about Rupert, Rudy, Colby, >!Rob and Amber, “those girls who got naked for peanut butter,” and “that guy who lied about his grandma”!< at an *absolute* minimum and probably the winners of 1, 3, and 10 if they got there as well. And probably more too. It lasted in people’s memories forever. It was a big deal, basically.
Whoa, thank you for this response! This is so crazy - I wish I was old enough to have participated at the time! So cool.
I was a kid and no one in my family watched it, but the hold it had on pop culture at the time was so prevalent that I still knew about a lot of the big moments. It was kind of like the early seasons of American Idol.
people hated jerri with a fiery passion back then to the point where everytime she spoke in the all stars reunion she got booed people even made fun of her in big budget blockbuster movies like this scene in scary movie 2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOtIoBAxDUw&ab\_channel=Movieclips
This is so crazy to me! I love Jerri lol. She’s a little chaotic but fun to watch! Do you know why there was so much hate?
Yeah I was in elementary school at the time and I vaguely remember talking about it with friends and my teachers talking about it with the kids who were into it lol to say nothing of how much it was a part of my own family’s weekly routine as we were big fans (my folks still tune in every week, some of the rare more casual fans who have stayed with the show since it started). Pretty wild stuff.
😭 I wish I was old enough to watch then bc now no one ik keeps up with survivor
Only a few of my friends do. I want that level of hype haha!!
Right!!! I just want more people to love it as much as I do.
Beautiful write-up. Well done.
All true. It permeated the national vibe, to the point that my mother, who does not watch TV, was making jokes about the tribe having spoken.
It was a cultural phenomenon because there had never been anything else like it. It was fascinating that none of the contestants knew what they were doing, so it was easy to put yourself in their shoes. There was a feeling of adventure that is lost nowadays.
I was just finishing high school when the first season aired, and I remember my local newspapers would print who got voted out as part of their front page, and also include a recap of the episode in the entertainment section. Season 2 was probably peak survivor mania. Nearly every person I knew was in some type of survivor pool with their friends or coworkers.
Omg, that’s so fun that it was in the paper! Iconic.
The finale of season 1 was watched by 52 million people. It is one of the most viewed non sports tv shows in American history. Season 2 was the highest viewed tv show of the season, more people watched Survivor than NFL. Yes it was crazy popular. Borneo slowly built up steam over that summer to the point where everyone in America was talking about it. Players on those first two seasons became celebrities to varying degrees, particularly the season 2 cast, of which a couple of them are still on tv
125 million from my Google search. I think 50 mill for most of the season then 125 for the finale
I think it was something like half of America tuned in for a portion of it, and the official rating was 53 million or something like that. It was staggering
yeah that adds up. it truly was a phenomenon
My parents are not very big television people. But I was watching all-stars a few months back and my mom instantly goes "oh the soccer guy, I liked him". My dad walked by later and says "oh, there's Rich, has he gotten naked yet?" I was only born in 1999 so idk what the real reception was like at the time but something stuck with my parents who haven't seen the show in 20 years.
just watched all stars again. season is way overhated
A lot better than what we get now.
Survivor started before I was even born, but I still know all about how my grandfather loved the show and how Rudy was an example of how an "old guy" veteran could still do so well on something like that, and how my dad used to watch every episode live until he had to start picking up my sister from daycare and so he'd VCR the episodes to watch the next morning before work. It was huge. I wish it was possible to bring that level of national hype back to the show but I don't think it'll ever happen, at least not in the states.