Seventeen years ago today, I was a 10 year old who was allowed to stay past his bedtime to watch the conclusion to his new favorite show. Before then, I had watched every Survivor: Borneo episode after I did my homework on Thursdays thanks to the complex voodoo magic required to make VCRs function. That my parents allowed me to stay up for the finale was a special occasion but it was by no means unique. I was joined by nearly 52 million people who all watched Richard Hatch lay claim to the first ever title of sole Survivor.

Plenty of finales have come and by since and some may have been arguably better but none of them have held more room in my heart and I doubt any future finales could replace it. This was the conclusion to the most exciting season of television my young eyes had ever seen. It helped cement my love of reality television and send me down a course that would have me writing about it an astounding 17 years later.

Of course the big factor coming out of the finale was its winner, Rich. Throughout the season, he acted as the voice of strategy on a cast that was almost afraid to play the game. Many contestants realized that alliances and strategizing would be the key to victory but were too afraid to meddle in it. Nobody knew how people would react to players ganging up together to vote out specific people instead of voting out who was perceived as “least deserving”. The potential blowback in forming an alliance had scared a lot of people away from even trying it.

Not Rich though, he didn’t really worry about how he would be perceived. He figured he could take a stranglehold on the game and he did. While the Tagi alliance and Rich may not have been popular after Borneo, he eventually got his due as the founding father of Survivor strategy. Had he not created an alliance, someone would have eventually but the facts are that Rich engineered Survivor’s first successful alliance and made it the primary emerging strategy for all future players.

The finale had so much more than just Richard though because it was packed with some of the season’s most memorable moments. We got to see the first “Fallen Comrades” immunity challenge in play. Sue Hawk put up a surprisingly good fight but Kelly Wiglesworth’s immunity run kept going as she stayed alive one more round in the game. The Fallen Comrades challenge was fun but what was even better was the vote immediately following it.

A first in Survivor history, the final four in Borneo produced the show’s first tie vote. Rich and Rudy held through to their alliance and voted for Sue, Sue and Kelly aimed their target at Rich. In the first ever re-vote, Kelly flipped her vote to Sue in what seems like an incredibly bad move in retrospect. One that may have cost her the game. If she was going vote out Sue, she should have done it on the first vote. I suspect that the unknown of what may come had they tied again may have scared her into flipping.

As she is voted out, Sue seems to take it surprisingly well given her penchant for telling like it is. Even her final words are calm, measured and she seems to be in a good head space. I remember being shocked that she did not let Kelly have it then and there. Well, we can hold that thought for a few minutes.

After Sue’s vote comes the Rites of Passage. Now, unlike many Survivor purists, I have never been a big fan of the Rites of Passage. My opinion is that the good quotes we sometimes get from the ceremony are outnumbered by the larger amount of useless airtime. I understand that for the players, they get to realize the extent of their emotional journey but it has never done much for me on the screen.

Having said that, Borneo’s Rites of Passage is awesome and pretty emotional. They have the tribesmen chanting as the players pass by them. They walk on hot coals to reach their final immunity challenge. The former castaways don’t actually say anything, instead we see the torch with their name and a quick flashback to them on the island. It’s not time consuming, it still hits the mark emotionally and we get to remember those that left a long time ago. Though what was up with Sonja’s torch having her name misspelled? Being the first ever boot wasn’t enough humiliation?

The final immunity challenge is “hold this idol for a long ass time”. One of my favorite challenges because it’s purely mental will. How much do you want a chance at a million dollars? Here’s your chance to prove it. It’s also when Rich makes one of the gutsiest calls the franchise has ever seen by dropping out of the challenge early and basically forcing Kelly to vote out Rudy. Rich knew that he could never beat Rudy in a final two but couldn’t afford to lose his vote on jury by voting him out. He also figured there was no way Rudy was going to outlast Kelly and took a chance she would realize there was no way she was also beating Rudy in the final two.

Obviously, Kelly sees the logic and bites the bullet. A simple slip of Rudy’s hand as they switching positions on the idol costs Rudy a million dollars and he feels pretty unfortunate about it. Rudy is one of my absolute favorite characters and to honor him, I have listed my top five favorite Rudy moments from Borneo’s finale.