Are you one of those ''rewind, play, rewind, play'' obsessives who desperately search for upcoming plot clues in ''Survivor'''s subtext? We feel your pain -- because we too have no friggin' idea what's gonna happen in any given episode. Still, after some in-depth analysis of the show's editing red herrings, we have managed to isolate five basic ''Survivor'' truisms. To wit:
1 When an entire episode focuses on a certain Survivor in the line of fire (e.g., episode 9's apparent Ogakor prey Elisabeth), he/ she isn't likely to be sent packing. (Sole exception to rule No. 1: the ouster of Michael ''They don't come more in the line of fire'' Skupin.)
2 Thanks to plenty of extended close-ups, every challenge between the two tribes just happens to be an ''edge of your seat'' nail-biter.
3 The apparent ratio of menacing animals/ bugs shown to viewers vs. menacing animals/ bugs seen by the competitors: at least 25 to 1.
4 Survivors are always dumb as dirt. (After Mitchell complains about the lack of fish, the camera pans down to show schools of cavorting poissons; when Jeff expresses skepticism about pigs in the outback, there's a shot of a swine waltzing across the plains.)
5 You can listen to the ''scenes from next week's 'Survivor''' preview for hints -- but don't even think about gleaning info from the accompanying images. (Say, what exactly did that crocodile rolling off the log into the water have to do with Michael's fire accident, anyway?)
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