Countdown to "Survivor 2" Finale

Now that's entertainment.

CBS figures about 40 million people will tune in Thursday night between 8 and 10 p.m. ET/PT to watch Texas auto customizer Colby Donaldson, 27, Detroit chef Keith Famie, 41, and Tennessee nurse and mother Tina Wesson, 40, compete in the final two Tribal Councils.

According to the network, the show will get down to business right away with the final immunity challenge that will ultimately lead to the ouster of one more contestant. If last year's finale is any clue, the interim hour-plus will be full of flashbacks, strategy-spewing and other filler leading up to the final Tribal Council, in which the seven most recently snuffed Outbackers listen to arguments from the two would-be Survivors.

Then at about 9:45 p.m., the action cuts to CBS' Los Angeles studios where the votes will be tallied live and the Survivor: The Australian Outback winner crowned.

While self-styled spies have turned up in the media in recent weeks to supposedly spoil the surprise, not even Survivor mastermind Mark Burnett claims to know the outcome (wink, wink).

And just when you think the tribe has spoken for the last time, think again. Immediately following, CBS will convene a one-hour town hall-style postgame show featuring all 16 Survivors and host Jeff Probst, with Bryant Gumbel presiding. This is when we get our first preview of Survivor 3, which will air in the fall. (Sources say the next installment will take place in Kenya, although South America has also been mentioned as a possibility.)

For those of you who still haven't OD'd on the Outbackers, the Survivors will work their way through the CBS publicity machine, with stops on The Late Show with David Letterman, The Early Show (where the winner and runner-up will be presented with their checks and The Late Late Show, in addition to meet-and-greets with news outlets, magazines and newspapers and entertainment shows (including E!). And next Thursday, CBS will milk Survivor 2 one more time with a special called Back from the Outback focusing on how the castaways adjust to life back in the real world.

But wait, there's more.

The second batch of Survivors are already inking deals to cash in on their 15 minutes. Colby, Keith and Tina donned milk mustaches for a print ad that was unveiled Thursday. Outback villainess Jerri Manthey, who has already appeared in a Los Angeles stage production of Lady Macbeth Gets a Divorce, will appear (as herself) on CBS' The Young and the Restless. She and her sidekick, Amber Brkich, are also considering doing a Playboy spread. And Kel Mitchell says he's been offered an ad--for beef jerky. Keith has cookbook that he'll be hawking. Expect a behind-the-scenes video by the summer.

For those of you making last-minute calls to your bookie, oddmakers at Las Vegas' Caesars Palace say Colby's the 7-5 favorite, followed by Tina at 9-5 and Keith at 2-1. For what it's worth, a scan of Survivor sites reveals Tina is the one most cyberfans are pulling for.

Even if they win, Tina, Colby and Keith won't be scoring nearly as much as CBS. The network stands to make more than $100 million from a show that cost under $20 million to produce. Sponsors like Target, Pontiac, Anheuser-Busch, Reebok and Frito-Lay's have gotten ample product placement for their multimillion-dollar investment. And Reebok is treating tonight's finale like the Super Bowl, premiering a new sumo-themed commercial titled "Defy Convention."

So far this season, Survivor 2 has outwitted, outlasted, outplayed and outdrawn its competition, averaging nearly 29 million viewers per its 14 episodes, passing ER as the most-watched program on the boob tube and ranking ahead of last summer's ratings. It has also crushed NBC's Thursday night "Must-See" lineup, dropping Friends way down the Nielsen chart.

Too bad it's ending so soon. We'll just have to grab our Rudy doll, a Bud Light and some Doritos and wait until the fall.