As best as I can recall, the Mine Five alliance was the first long term alliance, especially of that size, they’ve ever had on TAR. Point number one. Teams that were in that area of the mine back in leg 2 was as far as I can tell, happenstance, but those there took advantage of the time and circumstances and most importantly, it wasn’t against any rules. It just happened these were mostly the strongest teams this season and they made it work and are the Final Five teams.
Sometimes great gameplay is boring. (BB 22 is an example of that.) Sometimes alliance members generally keep their word. With the Final Five being all but secured, it would make sense that three of them would make a successor alliance. Again, not against the rules. The common element of all of this is that Will and James did a precise job on studying the rules and seeing what they could do with it. It may be different than other seasons, but pulling this off within the game rules is within the rules, so I have to reward the ingenuity involved. (Not any different than some of the stuff Boston Rob pulled in season 7 especially with being known outside the US during filming and using that.) It wasn’t against the rules.
This is not a terrible season, it was well casted, the locations and tasks have been excellent IMHO, and it is the second consecutive excellent season in a row, especially with rolling the game back to a much earlier era.