Opening Statements

[HOST]

Tara, Tyreese, this is where you can post your opening statement to the jury. Feel free to do this in whatever way you please.

Jury members, when these are posted, please create a new thread for your questions.

You may only vote once both Tara and Tyreese have answered your question.

Good luck. Have fun.

[Tara]

I'm trying to think of a way to open this without sounded conceited. lol I guess I'll just say that before this game started, I pictured myself sitting in the finals. From there, I just needed to figure out exactly what I was going to do to get there.

I wanted to be active, make some close allies, and survive.

Right from the start, it was an uphill battle. A tribe that was so much less active than the other group. The losses kept piling up. But I would never give up and I'd always give 100%. And because I was one of the more active people, I was always pretty confident that I wasn't going anywhere. I always made sure that at least Maggie and I were on the same page. Of my original group, I wanted to see us and Hershel go as far as possible. Even though I had Maggie and Hershel on my side, camp life was kind of boring in the Prison. Nobody really talked and it was lonely at times. This didn't bode well for my future. So I knew that I'd have to start making connections with the people on the other side.

Once the swap came, and Michonne and I were given the task of dividing the remaining players into 2 new camps (I volunteered for this, because I wanted to have some control over what happened), I knew what I wanted to accomplish. And that was to snag Tyreese, and to make sure that Maggie stayed with me. Getting Glen was a bonus, and I didn't realize it at the time, but having Carl on my new tribe turned out to be very beneficial as well. I lucked out with my new tribe. I hit it off with the boys pretty well, so that even after Carol and Maggie were voted out in the merge, I was able to stick around, while Woodbury person after Woodbury person was voted out. I don't believe I ever received a single vote at any Camp Council!

To earn people's trust, I would give them bits of information (like what the Pit actually was), stuff that wasn't super valuable, but would help to strengthen our bond. One example is when I told Carl what went down during the tribe swap, which was simply that Michonne had chosen Andrea and Shane over him, essentially leaving him to whatever fate would befall him on the New Prison tribe. Which probably worked out better for him in the long run, but I wanted to try to use that to my advantage anyway.

I wasn't the best at challenges, but I did okay. When I defeated Michonne in the challenge that Carl ultimately won, I felt that I had won as well. That was a big deal. Michonne was a warrior, and we all knew she needed to go. I went on to win the next 2 immunity challenges, the second of which I believed I needed. At final 4, I knew getting rid of Tyreese was the best play if I wanted a shot at winning immunity at final 3. BUT since Glen and Carl considered Tyreese the bigger threat to win the game (or so they had said), so if Tyreese stayed in the game, and one of those other two guys or myself had won immunity at final 3, I knew that Tyreese would probably go then. When Tyreese offered me the deal that he did, I thought it was too good to be true. He'd take me to the finals if I voted for Carl, and help to at least give Ty a chance to stay in the game. There were pros to keeping Tyreese, like I had mentioned, so I took that chance. And it paid off for me.

I was active, social enough that I had made the right connections with the right people, and I didn't really have to backstab anyone to get what I wanted. And that was to be sitting here at the end to make a case for your votes.

I'm grateful to all of you along the way who helped me get here, especially to Tyreese. I wish him the best of luck in this final phase of the game.

I look forward to hearing from the members of the jury (zombified and all ) and to answering whatever questions you have!

[Tyreese]

I wish I had the confidence to say that I knew I was going to be in the final two, like Tara, but sadly I don't. The entire game I was certain that the bottom was going to fall out from under me and that my friends would at some point would decide they didn't need ol' Reezy any more. My solution at that point was to always have a safety net. If anyone approached me and said "Hey, let's work together" I was absolutely going to say YES. Little did I realize the sheer number of people that would ask me to work with them: Michonne, Glen, Carl, Andrea, Tara, Shane, and even The Governor ALL approached me at some point and offered me final 2/3/4/5 deals. I want to reiterate that: All of these people came to ME at some point. I think that fact alone tells you how good of a social player I was in this game.

After the swap, it was 3-3 on the new Prison tribe. I was on decent terms with Carl and Glen, and we bonded over the new tribe setup. What they didn't know was that Tara and I had done a lot of talking prior to this, and that she was eager to finally be on what she perceived to be the winning side. If that friendship didn't already exist, things could've been a lot more rocky among the new Prisoners.

My social game was never more evident than in the Majority Rules challenge. Nobody seemed to pick up on the fact that I threw that challenge (so I wouldn't have to give anyone a strike), but I still managed to come in second simply because I was everyone's friend, and nobody wanted to get rid of me. After that challenge, even though people had bigger fish to fry, Glen and I managed to engineer a boot on Carol, one of the few people I DIDN'T have a close connection with, and we still had the majority 5-4.

At the auction, I won the vote nullification because I was apparently the only person who thought throwing $1 at every item was worthwhile. Once I had that, I realized that all I need was a group of four to get to the end. Somebody told me about the plan to idol Andrea and vote off Maggie, so I decided to let Maggie fall by the wayside, just to make that "Final 5" into a "Final 4".

Once that big "backstab" happened, I never tried to run from my decision. I faced Michonne, Shane, and Andrea head on and owned my decision. I may have backstabbed you, but I like to think I treated you with respect about the ordeal. I don't know if other people afforded you the same respect, but where I come from that at least counts for something.

Once we got to the final four and Tara won immunity, my head was finally on the chopping block for the first time. A few hours prior to the vote, I was absolutely on the wrong side of a 3-1 vote, and it looked like I was finally going to reap what I sowed. But using that social game I had been relying on, I managed to utilize Carl and turn his vote onto Glen. At that point, I made the only deal I initiated the entire game: I promised Tara I'd take her to the end if she didn't vote for me. And after that, Glen was gone. He was the only person with the killer instinct to gang up on me when he had the chance, and sadly that was his downfall.

At final three, I'm fairly sure that either Tara or Carl would have taken me to the final 2, but I didn't want to take that chance. I won the challenge, and although Carl and I had built a great deal of camaraderie after turning the tables on Glen, I had to stay true to the promise I made to Tara. Even though I think I'd have an easier time against Carl in this final 2, and even though I consider Carl a good friend, I had to abide by the word I'd given Tara the round before.

I know almost all of you feel I betrayed you at some point, but my hands were really tied. EVERYBODY asked me to be on their team, and I couldn't say "No, sorry, I really plan to get rid of you before the end" or else I'd be fucked, so I had to resign myself to voting out people that I genuinely liked. And make no mistake, it was not easy to vote out the people whose opinions and respect meant a lot to me in this game. I've already apologized to a bunch of you, but I'd like to reiterate: Shane, Michonne, Andrea, Glen, and Carl, I'm really sorry and I hope you don't think my friendship with any of you was anything but genuine. Daryl, I never really got to know you too well, but I'm still sorry I had to stab you in the back. Maggie ... Sorry it was you and not me? I didn't pick that one.

Pre-merge, I was the driving force behind a bunch of challenge wins, and I didn't actually lose a single challenge until the merge. Couple that with two post-merge immunities, plus winning a vote nullification and a challenge advantage in the auction, and I think I have a pretty decent challenge pedigree.

So yeah, that's my story. I think I was the best social player in the game. I think I might have been the best challenge competitor in the game. I think I played a good strategic game on top of all that. Maybe I played a little dishonorably, but I don't think anyone would have done any different in my position. I think I was the most important cog in Team Diversity in terms of getting us to the end, and I don't think a single thing happened in this game that wasn't according to my word, including having the final two be the "Watch Tower Alliance" as we named it a while ago. If you want to vote for me because I was a good player, great. If you still feel let down by the way I treated you, I understand. All I'm asking for is fair consideration.

Good luck Tara. Watch Tower for life!