Prepare for an extra-long blog, my readers. Normally, to get down from 20 contestants to the final three in time, and in the proper number of episodes, the show would have a double-elimination episode. These were usually pretty exciting, as they either showed the voting dynamics in each tribe, or forced a tribe to think on its feet with very little strategizing. However, along the way some idiot decided “That’s dumb. We’ll just show two episodes in one slot. That’s a MUCH better idea.” But my disdain for this format is getting in the way of valuable episode coverage, and believe me, there is a LOT to cover. Let me just say here, that since there’s one intro and one credit sequence, despite how this is listed as two separate episodes, I count it as only one episode. Frankly, it’s just easier for me to format my blogs that way, even if it’s not the most accurate depiction of episodes.
As one might expect, things are a bit upset following the blindside of Kelly. Surprisingly, it’s not Kimmi (who seemed the most upset at the blindside) who’s annoyed, but Tasha. Granted, Tasha is also a logical choice, but Kimmi’s look following the vote of the previous episode made it seem like she would be the focus early on. Instead, Jeremy tries to make good with Tasha, explaining why the vote went down the way it did, and why he couldn’t tell her. He then begins targeting Ciera as a troublemaker, which I admit is a pretty good tactic on his part. While people might be pissed at you for betraying them, the principle of “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” still applies on “Survivor”. By making it a case of us vs. them with the “three witches” against everyone else, you make it easier to get back into the good graces of everyone else. Tasha, however, is not buying it, saying that people only get to cross her once before she no longer trusts them. As evidenced by the eviction of Kass, she’s telling the truth.
Unsurprisingly, St. Joe is also unhappy about the situation, even going so far as to let loose a few swear words. Shame, on you, St. Joe! America’s darling should not have a potty mouth!
We come back to a very good bit of editing. We see cups laid out in the night, as it starts to rain. We cut back to the morning to see the cups completely filled up, a very effective visual way of demonstrating the rainfall and the harshness of this season. Up until this point, Cambodia has been a very mild location. Pretty and atmospheric, to be sure, but not a particularly harsh one. That’s going to change, though.
And who better to bring us into this new era of cruelty than America’s Favorite Idiot, Keith Nale? Actually, for all that I rag on Keith (and may possibly be Keith), I quite like this confessional from Keith. Not only does he admit to some determination and strategy on his part (saying he’d gladly get rid of Joe, and is here to win), but he actually provides both a good visual demonstration of the harshness of the weather (huddling pathetically under a cloak), but also a good verbal one, pointing out that “Survivor” is not fun. Fun, in the Keith Nale playbook, includes a cruise, going fishing, and playing golf, which I can’t argue with. Yeah, they’re kind of simple things, but they speak to a simple truth. Keith’s not an idiot in this scene, just an average guy, and that’s where he works best, as a simple, yet endearing, picture of the everyman. It’s when he deviates from this pattern that I become annoyed.
What’s simpler than a good, old-fashioned game of water basketball? NOTHING! So, that’s what our reward challenge is, hailing from “Survivor Tocantins”. The concept is so simple, I don’t need to explain it. This is always a challenge I’ve liked ok overall, but it became overused very fast, and I grew to hate it. It’s been a decently long while, so I suppose I can’t hate it too much, but that’s balanced out with my ire for yet ANOTHER team challenge post-merge! GRAGH! Can’t they just give us a simple individual reward challenge? In the next episode, perhaps?
Ah well. Just when you think Probst is going to go without reminding us that Stephen’s pride is on the line since his tribe won this challenge back in “Survivor Tocantins”, he does just that. Knew it was expecting too much of Probst. After a schoolyard pick, the purple team has Joe, Spencer, Tasha, Abi-Maria, and Ciera, while the green team has Kimmi, Kelley, Jeremy, Stephen, and Keith. Overall, I’d say it’s a pretty even match-up. The purple team has two of the heavy-hitters in terms of physical challenges this season (Joe and Tasha), but also has the two people who are effectively dead weight in a physical challenge (Abi-Maria and Ciera), while the other team is sort of middling. You’d expect it to be an even competition, and it’s certainly not a complete blowout, but ultimately, the purple teams runs away with the whole thing, getting a trip to see a Cambodian circus, and get warm under blankets, no small feat given the downpour.
Since Ciera is on this reward, you can be sure that talk will happen. I mentioned last week that the main drawback to the advantage that Stephen won is that it makes him more of a target, and since St. Joe, the obvious other target, is on reward, you can bet that Stephen’s name gets brought up. St. Joe, of course, immediately agrees to the plan, since Stephen’s been out to get him previously.
For once, though, the scheming is not as interesting as camp life. The remaining five are all huddled together and miserable. The only way to keep warm is to use the heat of hate. Hate specifically directed at St. Joe, whose perfect nature is getting on everyone’s nerves. After a good round of Joe-bashing, though, we see that Stephen is not doing too well. The cold and the damp are getting to everyone, but Stephen has a bunch of open sores on his feet that make it hard to walk, and is experiencing “gastro-intestinal disturbances” as he puts it. Makes sense, if you think about it. I wouldn’t really call anyone on this cast “chunky”, but Stephen had less body fat than any of them (save perhaps Abi-Maria), and so would be feeling the cold the hardest. And he breaks down. Big time. Thankfully, “Survivor” has learned not to put “#survivorbreakdown” up on the screen, because the moment really needed to just sit. I praised Stephens earlier breakdown about being unable to make a move, but this blows it out of the water. While I, and most other fans I know, watch “Survivor” for the strategy, the raw, utterly human moments are needed as well. Stephen looks on the point of quitting (and given the conditions, I could hardly blame him if he did), but still struggles through. It plays out beautifully on screen, and is a joy to watch, especially with his ultimate determination not to quit. When he says that, it’s clear he’s saying it to himself as much as he is to the producer he’s talking to, trying to talk himself back from the brink. Powerful. That’s really the only way to describe it.
Of course, a season of nothing but that would be boring to watch, so we get a twist at the immunity challenge. Probst hands everyone a white rock and a black rock, which normally heralds a “compete or eat?” twist, but as there’s no food available, it must be something else. Probst reveals that, due to the harshness, the crew of the show is offering to build Orkun a kick-ass shelter. Basically, Camp Koror from “Survivor Palau” will make a return. The catch? At least five people have to give up immunity by showing a white stone, and it’s a private decision. It could be considered a little cruel, since it’s obvious this group NEEDS that shelter, like it or not, but this is a FANTASTIC twist! It’s based somewhat on similar twists before it, like the aforementioned “eat or compete?” twist, but still manages to be unique and insightful. Basically, it’s a more complex version of the Prisoner’s Dilemma.
In case my readers are unfamiliar with the prisoner’s dilemma, allow me to briefly paraphrase it: In the classic model, two prisoners are being charged with a serious crime. However, most the evidence of their guilt is circumstantial, so to get a confession out of them, the police offer them a deal: If they confess, they go free, and only their partner is charged. The trick, though, is that if both confess, both will be charged with the crime. If they both stay silent, both get off with only a lesser charge that there is evidence for. The problem here is that, while the best OVERALL outcome is for both to stay silent, once one prisoner stays silent, the outcome for the INDIVIDUAL, is better to confess, since they get off completely scot-free. For a more succinct summary of the dilemma, see Spencer and Ciera’s confessionals. Usually, the model shows that both confess as a result, and get a worse outcome overall.
This is not the case here, however. Eight out of the ten contestants choose to sit out for shelter, with only Keith and St. Joe choosing to compete. A bit surprising to me, since if I were Abi-Maria, Ciera, or Kelley, despite appearing to be the swing vote this time around, I wouldn’t feel safe, and I’d compete. I can understand some of the others, but I feel like some of the competitors (Jeremy and Tasha specifically) were also at risk for playing. Frankly, this large a majority shocks me, and speaks to the conditions currently out there.
I’d also like to say that I feel like there’s a few missed opportunities here. The first would be to take the “prisoner’s dilemma “ aspect to the next level. It’s present here, but there’s less risk, as one person making a selfish decision can’t screw over everyone else. I say, why not take it all the way. Rather than at least five have to give up immunity, why not have it be that EVERYONE has to give up immunity to get the new shelter? Then the dilemma becomes much more pronounced. One person can screw everyone over for their personal gain, MUCH more easily than they can in this scenario. Plus, it would add the relatively new situation of NO ONE having immunity post-merge. True, this was done once on “Survivor Pearl Islands”, but it’s an interesting concept I’d like to see explored more. Now, I get that there’s incentive not to do the twist this way. After all, they want the challenges to be run, and forcing everyone to give up immunity makes for no challenge. I do, however, have a proposal that could have really changed up how everything went. You see, assuming I’m out there, but am not St. Joe, Abi-Maria, Ciera, or Kelley, I don’t want any of them to win, due to St. Joe being a challenge beast who needs to go away soon, and the other three still being targets. Therefore, if I’m there, before we reveal, I call these facts out. State the obvious truth: that everyone wants this new shelter, but we’ve already got four people guaranteed to compete, that leaves very little wiggle room for everybody else, which doesn’t seem fair, but does seem fairly risky. As such, I say out loud that I will give up immunity, but only if those four agree to do it with me. If they agree, they don’t get immunity, but if they don’t, they run the risk of the shelter not being got, and looking like jerks for not getting it. Win-win for me. I guess there might have been a moratorium on talking beforehand, but given Probst’s love of showmanship, I bet he would have let it slide.
But, none of that happened, so let’s talk about the challenge itself. I hate it. It’s a repeat from “Survivor San Juan del Sur”, wherein people stand on a block, while holding a ball against a pole with a rolling pin. Last one with a ball left wins. Look, I’ve said in the past that I like endurance challenges, but this is just TOO MANY! We need SOME variety in out individual immunity challenges! Plus, this just seems like another excuse for Probst to make “ball” innuendos. Add to that the fact that the challenge is just underwhelming and funny-looking in general, and you’ve got one that is decidedly NOT my favorite.
In the time it has taken me to describe the challenge, St. Joe has won it. Shock, horror!
We get our first look at the new Camp Koror… and frankly it’s underwhelming. C’mon! I mean, I wasn’t expecting the shelter equivalent of Angkor Wat here or anything, but I expected SOMETHING extravagent! As the nickname might imply, I expected the second coming of Camp Koror. Instead, we basically got some food and a waterproof roof. Hardly bad things to have, but not quite the elaborate spectacle Probst built it up as. I feel had.
As Stephen notes, though, a better shelter means drier people means time to strategize. Surprisingly, our strategizing for this first Tribal Council is fairly simple. Joe is still high on the Anti-Stephen wagon, and while it seems like Jeremy has managed to pull Tasha back in, as she says she wants Ciera gone (way to stick to that “everyone only betrays me once” thing, Tasha), Joe and his crew have pulled in Kelley (as you might expect, since she’s so tight with Ciera and Abi-Maria) and Keith, so it’s probable that Stephen’s going home tonight. We do get lip service to the fact that Ciera is the bond that keeps Kelley and Abi-Maria from becoming free agents, and certainly Ciera’s had enough screen time to merit an exit, but we’ve just seen so much more setup for the fall of Stephen. Add to that his ouster seeming like the more cohesive plan, and Stephen’s confessional that he has no plans to use his advantage, and you’ve got a pretty much guaranteed Stephen ouster this go-round.
Of course, Jeremy is the big “Keep Stephen” advocate, and he does have two immunity idols, but he hasn’t talked about them at all this episode, so what are the chances he’ll play one to save Stephen tonight.
If this is Stephen’s time to go, we got a great Tribal Council for it! Again, it’s not “Jeff Varner” exit level of good, but it’s up there! We dive once again into the dilemma of the immunity challenge, where people once again explain the idea of the Prisoner’s Dilemma much better than I can. Since this leads to a lot of “People playing are selfish.” level talk, St. Joe wisely steps in, pointing out that had he given up immunity, he’d be gone tonight, which is a fair assessment. this then brings us around to why Keith competed, and whether this makes him a target. Spencer assures Probst that Keith isn’t getting blamed, and so talk turns around to how bad it would feel to go home after effectively saying “I don’t need immunity.” Sure, we’ve heard that kind of talk from Tribal Councils after the “eat or compete?” twist, but here it takes on an added measure of hurt, since at least eating food rather than playing a challenge gives some personal benefit. Here, you basically sacrificed your chance in the game to make those still in the game more comfortable, which stings extra. Great sound-bytes, great debates, just an all-around awesome Tribal Council.
The votes are case, but just before we get to that, Jeremy decides to make use of Val’s idol. Or, as I suppose it must be called now, Stephen’s idol, since Stephen is the one Jeremy plays it on. Since Jeremy correctly guessed that Stephen was the target, the seven votes for Stephen get nullified, so Ciera goes home. An awesome idol play, and certainly made for an exciting finish, but much like Jeremy’s own exit on “Survivor San Juan del Sur” I don’t entirely feel it was earned. Sure, the Ciera vote was a blindside of both her and the audience, but I feel like it wasn’t earned, since we never got a HINT that Jeremy would use his idol. Granted, that’s more the sort of thing you NEED to keep hidden, rather than a counter alliance like the one that got rid of Jeremy, but even with Kelley’s idol play two episodes ago, we got at least a hint that it was a POSSIBILITY! Here, it comes out of nowhere. Not an unsatisfying exit, but one that doesn’t feel earned.
All that said, I’m not too sorry to see Ciera go. True, she played hard, which I respect, and was certainly an interesting character, but she was getting pretty repetitive after Kass left, just urging people to make big moves, but nothing much beyond that. It was probably about her time. As to whether this was the smart move? NO! Much as I love Stephen, everyone made a good point that his advantage makes him a threat, certainly more so than Ciera. Granted, you don’t want to give Ciera too much ground, else she’ll run away with the game, but she wasn’t at the point of overtaking you just yet, and Stephen is therefore the more immediate threat. You could say that it was in Jeremy’s best interest to save Stephen, since Jeremy has made it clear that he wants Stephen with him at the end as a goat. I would argue, though, that by being so inflexible, Jeremy cuts himself off from potential other alliances, and should probably have just gone with the majority on this one.
Oh, and Stephen’s look when the idol is played on him? Priceless.
While it’s better that Stephen stays in the game, one thing this idol play does is ruin Stephen’s chances at the end. He can’t really say he got to the end and did stuff without the aid of an alpha male anymore, since he’d be out of the game at this point if not for the protection of an alpha male. Not that you’d think Stephen knows that, as he swears up and down to Jeremy that he owes Jeremy his life. Don’t get me wrong, Stephen, you’re right to be grateful, but this is taking it a step too far. You’ve been doing some stuff more overtly this time around, but if you want to win at the end, you’ll have to ax off Jeremy at some point. Giving him all this life-swearing is only going to make that hurt more, and lose you his vote in the end.
But who cares about that because we’ve got to talk about THE MOST KICK-ASS REWARD CHALLENGE OF THE SEASON! It’s definitely a reused challenge, but this one has been long-forgotten, and deserves better. This is the challenge where Probst tells the contestants some local history or legend (in this case history), and then send people off into the woods to booths to pick an answer to a question about the story. If they get it right, they hang something (in this case, medallions) at their station, if not, they go back and try a different question. First one to get five right answers wins. This challenge is an amazing one, and I always looked forward to it back in the old days. It really gives a feel to the local culture, is easy to play along with at home, and is one of the most deceptively difficult challenges out there, since a lot of the questions are pretty tricky, and require finer knowledge than one might be able to remember after a month in the elements. Plus, while it is a reused challenge, it’s been FOREVER since we’ve seen it. There were challenges on “Survivor Cook Islands” and “Survivor China”, but the last time we really saw this challenge was on “Survivor Guatemala”, 10 years ago. That’s far too long for a challenge this cool. And, to add on to all of that, this one is at night, with everyone carrying torches, making it all super atmospheric.
Determined to impress, the challenge gives us a lot of fun moments. There’s Keith being our resident “Guy who’s bad at the questions”, and getting a number wrong, a fire duel between Stephen and Spencer at the end, and (my personal favorite moment), Stephen and Abi-Maria ending up at the same station, only to have Stephen trick the undecided Abi-Maria by picking up the wrong answer lid, letting her take the wrong medallion, and then grabbing the correct answer for himself. Comedy GOLD!
But what’s that? This is not enough awesomeness, you say? Very well, how about AN IDOL CLUE HIDDEN AT THE CHALLENGE?! Yes, as they show us before the game begins, tied to one of the medallions is a clue to a new hidden immunity idol (presumably the one that Jeremy used last Tribal Council). I complained last episode about how idols were being hidden post-merge, and wished for something better. I got just that. This is about the fairest way to change up how idols are hidden for the merge. After all, no one has a particular advantage or disadvantage in finding the clue at the challenge, it’s just luck. This would be bad if it was the IDOL that was hidden at the challenge, since it would reward luck rather than skill, but just a clue is ok. The idol is hidden at camp, and while it’s hiding spot is tricky, as we’ll see, theoretically, anyone can still find it. And regardless of all that, it’s just a nice, innovative way to hide the clue, while simultaneously adding a new layer to the game.
About the only complaint I have about all this is that, while it gave an opportunity for new people to get idols, Kelley ends up being the lucky contestant to get that particular edge. Don’t get me wrong, I quite like Kelley. I’d just rather see idols in new hands than old.
With Stephen’s win, we get the first instance of someone picking their reward-mates. Stating that he wants to mend broken fences, Stephen chooses Tasha. This makes since, as Tasha voted against him last time, and she’s usually open to talking. Then comes his second spot, which causes a bit more controversy. Stephen picks Jeremy, but Spencer insists that it should have been him, since Stephen also needs to mend fences with him. Definitely a fair point, but I think Stephen here was in a lose-lose situation. Strategically, Spencer might have made the right choice, but after that last Tribal Council, and given the death glare Jeremy was giving him, I think Stephen would have looked like a huge ass if he didn’t take Jeremy. Plus, there was still reason for Stephen to suspect that Spencer would be amenable to Stephen’s case regardless of going on the reward or not, so I can’t fault Stephen’s decision.
Nor, for that matter, can I fault what he does on reward. Bonding more with Jeremy and Tasha, he shares what his advantage is with them. Frankly, I think this is a great idea. At the moment, what’s making Stephen a threat is the mystery surrounding his advantage. Taking that mystery away makes allies feel safer. My only quarrel here is that he didn’t do it sooner, and with Spencer, since Stephen purports to being close to Spencer.
New plots are hatching back at camp, though. Once Kimmi, who seems to still be tight with Stephen regardless of the Kelly vote earlier, leaves the shelter, St. Joe works his charms on everyone there, once again beating the drum of “Stephen’s Advantage” which everyone seems to just eat up. I mean, I’m all for having that as a fallback plan if St. Joe wins immunity, but do any of you remember that St. Joe is HUGE immunity threat? And yet, everyone he talks to seems to be swearing eternal loyalty to him. Everyone except Abi-Maria. Yes, after several episodes of relative silence, she speaks once again, to tell us that St. Joe is shady. And all without his ever writing her name down. How do you do it, sir? Might this be foreshadowing? We’ll find out later.
Right now, we turn our focus to St. Joe sycophant #3, Kelley. While she’s now loyally in St. Joe’s corner (despite saying she wanted him gone earlier), she still wants that immunity idol, and reads the note to find that it’s hidden under the floor of her shelter. This is a MUCH better hiding spot that before, with a lot more risk than Jeremy’s night walk into the jungle. Fortunately for Kelley, it’s a sunny day while Stephen, Jeremy, and Tasha are off at their spa day reward, so most everybody leaves the shelter. Save for Abi-Maria, who picks today of all days to just stick around for no reason. Kelley just lies around, hoping for Abi-Maria to go away on her own, but to no avail. Um, Kelley, here’s a thought. Tell Abi-Maria that, since Jeremy played his idol, there’s probably a new one out there, and suggest you both split up and look for it. Once you’r both out in the jungle, double back and grab the one from under the shelter. Abi-Maria’d buy it, and you’d be much less stressed. Well, brilliant plan aside, Abi-Maria does eventually leave, and Kelley manages to get her next idol, having a cute little celebration along the way. Good for her!
After establishing that yes, the weather in Cambodia does still suck, we get to our immunity challenge, once again from “Survivor San Juan del Sur”. This time, however, it’s not an endurance challenge, and much better overall. This challenge requires contestants to stack blocks using only their feet, with the first to place the flag in a complete structure wins. I’ve criticized this challenge before for not being epic enough, but looking back, it’s clever. Challenging in a different way than usual, leads to a lot of fun spills; I quite enjoyed it. Then again, perhaps I’m just riding the buzz of “Not another endurance immunity challenge.” again.
One nice thing about this challenge is that there’s a lot of back and forth with who’s in the lead. Nearly everyone’s in the running, save for Stephen, who’s feet are still in bad shape, or “Prehistoric” as Probst calls them. It comes down to a battle between Spencer and St. Joe, and Spencer dethrones the challenge king. Good for him. It was getting kind of old, seeing St. Joe be always immune.
You’d expect everyone to go for big threat St. Joe, but evidently the man’s more than just a pretty face and good muscles. To his great credit, he’s done a good job of convincing everyone that Stephen, of all people, is the bigger threat. They seem to have eaten it up hook, line, and sinker. It’s not a guarantee that St. Joe is going home tonight, which is what it should be. good for him, he’s developed a strategic game!
Whereas the first half of the episode seemed to have very little, understated misdirection, this one goes all-out with it. At first it seems like there’s going to be a 5-4 split against Stephen, but then there’s the question of Abi-Maria’s loyalties, especially given that Anti-St. Joe foreshadowing we had earlier. But THEN it seems like Stephen might split the vote, thereby dooming himself. But THEN it seems that he’s going to use his advantage tonight, meaning all the numbers are basically out the window, and everything’s hard to predict. He even tells Spencer about his advantage. As we see, it’s a bit late to bring Spencer in on the plan, but points for trying. At least it confuses Spencer, though that seems to be happening a lot this season. For a supposed strategic mastermind, he doesn’t seem to be able to quite wrap his head around the numbers a lot of the time.
Despite not being nearly as exciting as the earlier Tribal Council, this one still has its good points. We get some good discussion about the threat St. Joe poses, and Tasha brings up how we’re now moving into a more solid alliance phase from the previous voting blocks, and here I must once again express my objection to the whole “This season has been different” thing. the main difference I see is that people are using the term “voting bloc” rather than “alliance”, which I consider a distinction without a difference. True, one could argue that “voting bloc” has fewer connotations of permanence, but I point you to the innumerable examples of impermanent alliances, with “Survivor The Amazon” giving us many prime examples.
But, for all that this Tribal Council might be the lesser of the two, it makes up for it in that the advantage is finally played. Stephen uses it to steal one of St. Joe’s votes, which is a smart move, as St. Joe is likely to go tonight, and therefore the most solid vote against you. This also makes for the first canonical instance of someone voting for themselves, as Stephen uses Joe’s stolen vote to vote for Joe. Once again, hilarious. Stephen, as per his role this season, is providing comedy gold, though intentional comedy gold this time.
And, for all that, it doesn’t matter. Splitting the vote between Joe and Abi-Maria does him in, as the four remaining votes he did not steal send him home. As you might expect, I’m sorry to see him go. While he was the goober of the season, and really had very little shot at winning, Stephen was improving and was certainly entertaining. Also, while it’s better that Stephen go out having played his twist, like with Dan Foley on “Survivor Worlds Apart”, it ended up not making a difference, and that’s disappointing. I’d like to see the twist brought back again, if only so that it would make a difference.
As with the first half of the episode, I must once again express the fact that this was the wrong person to vote out. Yes, Stephen and his advantage are a threat, but St. Joe is a bigger one! You can’t give him any ground once he loses immunity! Plus, once Stephen played his advantage, his threat level goes down significantly less. Definitely would have been better to get rid of St. Joe. Like I said earlier, though, credit to St. Joe for convincing people that he was not that big of a threat, such that they went out of their way to keep him around. Kelley even volunteered to play her idol for him, meaning that we got more talk about the idol from the person who DIDN’T play it than the person who did.
If it isn’t clear right now, these were two fantastic episodes. We’re back up to the bar set by the start of the season, and I love it. Excellent strategy, new innovations, fantastic blindsides, and a lot of unpredictability. If this season can keep that going until the end, you’ll have one fantastic season!
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.
idolspeculation 
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