OFFICIAL SURVIVOR FOUR VIDEO RELEASED!

GMA-7 signals “Survivor Philippines 4” (SP4) hype by launching a 30-second teaser video showcasing its host Richard Gutierrez.

In the video, Richard mirrored “Mission Impossible” stunts, implying that more difficult challenges will be faced by the castaways under harsher weather conditions in season 4.

In an interview with Bulletin Entertainment, a slimmed down but muscled-up Richard, who now wears skinhead top, said he tried every stunt and challenge of “SP4” for the complete grasp of the original reality show. (Recall that “Survivor” is the first reality program to have bank-rolled the TV trend globally.)

The CGI-charged teaser, linked through http://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?v=10150334381116312, takes Richard back to action star mode as he slides and leaps from one mountain to another, later revealed to be the letters forming “Survivor 4.”

GMA’s move to take to social networks the latest video has shades of the US franchise’s step of utilizing the web social-sphere to reach more viewers.

Known for a twist-laden reality franchise, “Survivor” US host Jeff Probst recently broke the social networking wall for the otherwise tight-lipped, spoiler-conscious show. Despite a reluctant CBS, Probst launched a “Survivor” Twitter page.

“Initially, CBS just didn’t have an opinion one way or another. They never said, ‘Don’t do it,’ but they were not convinced at all that it was really worth pursuing,” the host told TV Guide when he was asked to elaborate this Twitter post: “C’mon, guys, let’s prove to CBS how cool this (Twitter) is.”

The result was a live-tweeting, per episode routine. “After the first two weeks, I showed them a dozen people that said, ‘I used to DVR and now I watch it live.’ And that was all it took. I was actually shocked. I would never have even thought of asking them to do that. But they did quickly see that there was something happening here, and it encouraged me to ramp it up even more,” said Probst.

“I don’t have a lot of followers in terms of most celebrities, but my number grew about 400 percent, and I attribute almost all of that to live-tweeting during ‘Survivor’ episodes,” he said.

Source: Manila Bulitin