Ten Most Failed Alliances

There have been a lot of alliances on Survivor. Some have been good. Others have been bad. Then there’s everything in between. Having already done the best, I will get to my list of the worst. Obviously, there are criteria for this that have to be met. 1- If the alliance was successful in some way, even if it failed, then it will not be on the list. An example of such is the Three Amigos. 2- You cannot have an alliance that had a winner in it, provided that the winner stayed true to the alliance. 3- Just because some people in the alliance became finalists, doesn’t mean that their alliance was good. 4- I’m only going with only one alliance from each season. While others might have failed in the same season, one clearly would have done worse than the other. 5- How much it failed is how it gets on this list. As usual, before I get to the actual list, I will get to the honorable mentions.

The Younger Samburu alliance clearly failed because of the switch that season. For me, it failed to make the list because there were other choices that ranked higher. Maybe it could be number 11, but that’s not the point of a top TEN, now is it? The Timbira alliance isn’t on the list, although they did foolishly turn on themselves to the point that only one of them made the finale. You won’t find the Sook Jai alliance on here either since it was mostly the dumb fake merge more than anything else that ruined its chances at the game, although it was screwed either way. The Mogo Mogo alliance, while a good choice, probably wouldn’t work since they had no chance even if they hadn’t kept Amber in the game. The Rarotonga alliance never had much of a chance to be an alliance and there are enough like them on the list so you won’t see them here. The Lopevi alliance was bad, but someone in it won the game so it’s not as bad as it could be. Other bad alliances, I either can’t remember or am pretty sure are on the list. Also, any temporary alliance that didn’t see much life besides one tribal council, isn’t going to be chosen since it can’t even be proven to be an alliance in the first place. There were both successful and failed temporary alliances that lasted the same amount of time. Now, on to the list.

#10 Aparri Alliance (Cagayan): What happened to this alliance was pretty simple: it was formed to fight the other tribe at the merge, a member here flipped to the other side, it never recovered. Basically, it failed as soon as it started, which makes it bad. It may be a strange choice, but I stick by it.

#9 Barbeque Alliance (Borneo): This alliance was the first one made to oppose an already existing alliance. It failed mostly because by the time it was created, it was far too late for it to even work. There was a sliver of hope, but it didn’t work out for them. If only it was created right before the merge. They could have done what Joel had suggested, but they didn’t like the idea of alliances soon enough for this to even work. And that it way it made this list.

#8 Yasur Alliance (Vanuatu): It was so simple. There was so much it could do. So much greatness it could accomplish. But it failed at that goal. This is the first all female alliance and they could have easily gotten rid of all the men in the game before turning on themselves. But, they stopped one man short and he ended up winning the game. They crumbled on themselves by having members team up with Chris, the last man in the game, and seeing the people true to it voted out next. If only they had stayed true to its goal. Then, it would have been on the best alliance list.

#7 The Rotu Four (Marquesas): Never, before this alliance, was a group of people in control of the game, only to see it all slip past their fingers. They were supposed to be the final four. They entered the merge in control, but they made a fatal error. They didn’t release that they were actually the minority if the other players turned against them. They showed who of them was to be voted out next at a revealing challenge. The other players then quickly turned against them and they became the first four members of the jury instead of getting to the end together as they were supposed to be.

#6 Heroes Alliance (Heroes versus Villains): A lot of people probably wanted to see the heroes defeat the villains in the twentieth season simply because good people should beat the bad people. But the weakness of the heroes’ tribe gave the villains a lot of power. Most people probably weren’t disappointed that the heroes failed in this season. The villains were simply the better tribe. The heroes alliance was their last hope at trying to defeat the villains. But due to bad moves JT made before the merge and continuing at falling apart after the merge, this alliance was merely a pitiful attempt to avoid what ended up happening and did happen. The heroes fell apart to the surprise of no one, even those fortunate enough to not know spoilers about that season.

#5 Savaii Alliance (South Pacific): What made this alliance bad? Why is this alliance here? Well, a lot of people give John Cochran crap for flipping on this alliance. But, if they rewatched that season, then they’d notice that this alliance cared very little about him. They only used him when they need it and otherwise made no effort to keep him in the group. Because John was so mistreated by them, they pretty much had it coming when they were picked off one by one. They made no other real effort in the game than trying too little to repair the damage they had done to John. But by then, it was far too late. He flipped on them and they because the powerless group that they are.

#4 Galu Alliance (Samoa): I don’t know if there was an alliance before that had as high as number as they did and still fail as badly as they did. They should have been able to pick off the other tribe very quickly before turning on themselves. But, they turned on themselves immediately after the merge, pawns in the other tribe’s game. Members of this alliance quickly left this for the other one, only to be quickly tossed aside when they were of no further use to the game. Their fall was so huge that they deserve their rightful place on this list of bad alliances.

#3 La Mina Alliance (Panama): Never, before or since, has there been an alliance that failed so much due to a person in it who never turned on them. A lot of people remember Terry Dietz. Some call it a travesty that he didn’t win his season or that he hasn’t returned to play the game again. He would make a great returning player. But, he had a terrible game play in his season. He had an ultra powerful idol that he never used. Now the rules might have been strange about it, but he should have done something with his idol. Since he kept winning immunity challenges, he could have probably given his idol to an ally and they could have saved themselves with it. His stingy use of the idol is why his alliance failed. The idol would have been rehashed into the game. Even if someone else found it, he would have still saved an ally. Even if he couldn’t have given up the idol, he could have his immunity necklace to an ally and still had the idol. With any of those strategies, he could have made it to the finale with an ally by his side. But his failure to do any of that is why his alliance failed.

#2 Russell’s Zapatera Alliance (Redemption Island): There are some people that like Russell Hantz and will defend his game play to the death. Then there are people like me who are very glad that he’s never won and probably won’t play the game again. While he had success with alliances in the past, in Redemption Island, his ways fell short. He tried to do the same old tricks that he always did, but it was no longer any good to him. His alliance was in the minority immediately and was quickly picked off so that everyone in it was long gone before the merge happened.

Now, there’s one alliance that I think failed about all else. One of the honorable mentions from this list happened in the same season as the most failed alliance. I didn’t want to bring it up then as it might be a spoiler to this blog post when you went through the list and noticed that one wasn’t there. Thus, it would have to be number one and we’ve never seen one worst than this, in my mind. It was such a great idea. It could have worked, but failed miserably. The way it appeared hasn’t been in seasons before or since. I once heard someone describe it as the biggest fake out in Survivor history.

#1 Exile Alliance (Tocantins): Imagine that you could create an alliance full of members from both tribes before the merge happened. Sound good? Well, it wasn’t. It was a terrible alliance. They could have worked too. They might have been able to use members of both tribes with them until they were the only ones left. But then came the moment of truth: the first postmerge tribal council. And you know what happened? They instantaneously fell apart. What could have been the greatest alliance on the show turned out to be the very worst. They could never work together when they actually needed to be together. This alliance might have been why Exile Island disappeared for so long. This is my thought as to what the worst alliance in the show’s history was.

Well, that’s all for this blog post. Well, that and this last paragraph. If you ever have ideas for top tens for me to create, be sure to let me know by commenting here or sending a tweet to @IamAdamDecker. I can’t promise that I’ll do all of the suggestions that I get and I’ll only post any during the hiatus between seasons, meaning when Survivor isn’t airing new episodes. I’ll keep posting stuff here until the next season starts. I thought that this post would be a nice complement to the best alliances I mentioned before. I’ll continue posting here on Wednesdays and Sundays, although I could end up missing a day for one reason or another, in which case I’ll change things up for a while. The new season will start a week after Ash Wednesday, so expect Thursday posts once the new season starts until holy week happens. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.