Among the things I hear that people like the most about Survivor: the drama stemming from character dynamics and seeing good strategists work their craft. I can agree that both things are high on the list of things I want from a season but putting them together is almost an idiosyncrasy. Outside of rare cases, you won’t find many seasons that have a master strategist wading through drama because of the rest of their cast.

Think about some of the more dominant winning performances. Kim Spradlin in Survivor: One World, Boston Rob in Survivor: Redemption Island, John Cochran in Survivor: Caramoan, Brian Heidik in Survivor: Thailand. All of those winners are universally considered as completely dominating their season. All of their seasons are considered by most to be at the bottom of the totem pole. This isn’t by simple coincidence.

Oh you wanted conflict? Sorry that goes against my million dollar ideas.

Above all else, a good strategist wants control. They want to be able to know at every turn what is going on, make sure that everybody is calm and in the loop and that there is rarely more than one or two target at any given time. Making people feel included in the majority and like a key part in an alliance keeps them happy. When they are happy they don’t rock the boat and when people don’t rock the boat, you get a boring season.

Keeping an alliance together, especially a larger one, is a certifiable Survivor skill. It’s essential to winning the game and the players who do it best are considered as legends by the fans. It’s also the most boring way to go through a season. We all say we want to see good strategy but when it happens in front of our eyes, we see the boredom it can bring.

Of course, dominant players can remedy that a bit simply by being entertaining. Boston Rob has his flaws and certainly a number of detractors but I don’t think many would argue that he isn’t a charismatic presence on camera. It doesn’t propel Redemption Island all the way up people’s season rankings but having Boston Rob being the primary narrator over someone like Sarah Lacina makes a huge difference to me.

Insert biting confessional here.

Bringing up Sarah, she is the most recent example of this very argument. Sarah played a dominant game in Survivor: Game Changers. She maintained amazing personal relationships with both sides of the game and flipped between them at will. It was an impressive display that should have been entertaining to watch. Unfortunately, Sarah was so dry and business-like that it took away any joy I might have had watching her march to victory.

It’s funny because it became very obvious the longer Game Changers went on that Sarah was copying her original season’s winner’s strategy. Sarah was doing her best Tony Vlachos with all the flipping and flopping between alliances and buying back into people’s trust. Tony is one of the most entertaining winners Survivor has ever had. Sarah’s game is not all that different from Tony’s but she is one of the least entertaining winners, in my opinion. What’s the difference?

Some of it has to do with the cleanliness of Sarah’s game in comparison to Tony’s hot mess of a season. 99 times out of 100, Tony should not have won Cagayan. It was a miracle that it happened and the result is a big part of why that season is so highly regarded. Still, I would argue that the biggest difference in enjoyment is because Tony is such a character. The way he talks and acts around camp, his ability to show emotion in confessionals and just the whole Tony Vlachos experiment, it’s miles above what Sarah offered to Game Changers.

Might have copied Tony’s game but you can’t copy his personality.

This is the same problem that plagues Cook Islands for me. Yul Kwon is a brilliant person and a great strategist. He figured out the best way to use his idol to manufacture a win that should never have been possible for him. Yul is an all-time Survivor great. He is also a really great guy in real life. All that said, lord help me he is boring to watch. All of his confessionals are even-keeled and well thought out. Everything he does or say is measured and planned out. Yul doesn’t allow for anything crazy to happen and his alliance follows his lead. While the Aitu 4 comeback may be exciting in the moment, Cook Islands is brutal to get through more than once because Yul does not let it ever become too fun.

The best seasons are those with tribes that just can’t seem to get along. Infighting and drama at camp makes for unpredictable votes and high tension. Think about how Survivor: Pearl Islands plays out because of how much the Drake eventually come to dislike each other. Sandra Diaz-Twine is a Survivor legend but she did not hold an iron grip on her alliance. If she had, the season would have been way less interesting. In fact, Sandra is an interesting winner in both of her seasons because she cockroaches her way to the end when she shouldn’t have been able to.

That perfect shit-eating grin.

Another good example is Survivor: China. It is considered by a lot of people as the cream of the crop for Survivor. It has a dominant alliance that is spear-headed by Todd Herzog and Amanda Kimmel. In theory it should have been sort of boring because they have the numbers and manage to hold on. Instead it gets interesting because Todd’s alliance hates each other and can’t help but cannibalize themselves before they absolutely need to. Todd isn’t able to completely control his minions in the way the Rob or Kim could and it makes for more exciting results.

As well, a potentially boring and predictable season can be saved by its cast. Both Pearl Islands and China have fantastic casts that make you want to tune in just to see them interact. For me, a season like Survivor: Fiji’s post-merge falls into that category. I will give you that the pre-merge is a bit of a slog but once you hit that merge, there is some amazing Survivor footage to be found. Fiji’s winner is fairly obvious simply from how it is edited and how Earl Cole controls his alliance. Still, there is much stuff to unpack as the game goes on that even if you know that Earl is going to win, you want to keep watching.

I can also think back to Survivor: Blood vs Water where Tyson Apostol finally puts it all together and gets his win. It’s a fairly clean and dominant game and Tyson is almost never in hot water. His ability to crack jokes as well as talk game makes the control he has on the season feel a little less daunting. Tyson is also helped by having legitimate opponents like Aras Baskauskas and Hayden Moss who do challenge him as the season plays out. His game is one I like to point to that is both very strategic but also maintains the entertainment factor we all want.

To me, the holy grail of Survivor seasons is Survivor: Tocantins. That season also happens to feature the first perfect game from J.T. Thomas. By looking at it simply on paper, it’s clear that J.T. is an elite player who exhibits great control on the game. In theory, shouldn’t that mean that the season was sort of a bore? That’s why Tocantins is such a rare commodity. J.T. goes into the merge with only four people and loses one immediately to a medevac. For much of the season, he plays from behind in order to get his win and does so masterfully.

It doesn’t hurt that Tocantins is full to the brim with personality, 90% of which comes from Coach Wade alone. Tocantins is the perfect ratio of dominant gameplay to dramatic camp arguments and at the center of all that is J.T. putting on a Survivor social game clinic. It is the unicorn of Survivor seasons. One that came together through pure circumstances and that could never be replicated and it stays close to my heart.