In this episode, Kass gets character development, Abi-Maria annoys the shit out of everybody, Jeff strategizes faster than necessary, and Joe gets declared the patron saint of Bayon. Wait, this WAS a new episode, right?
In all seriousness, this episode was a bit of an odd beast, but an enjoyable one. I say an “odd beast” in that we got the rare 1-episode story arc, specifically, the downfall of one particular person. I won’t say who just yet, due to spoilers, but it is glorious to watch. Is it the most subtle of arcs? No, but it’s still a fun watch, and played just low-key enough to keep SOME tension at Tribal Council. Plus the downfall is just glorious to watch. I feel bad for the downfall, but it’s a blaze of glory, a fantastic conflagration of unravelling alliances.
So, how does this great denouement for a castaway begin? Why, pretty much the same was as the last episode did for Ta Keo. It’s the old school vs. the new school, with the new school being in control. Not too surprising, since part of the reason the new school developed was because it could get the better of the old school, and should make for a predictable season. Or it would, but thankfully, this season did not cast any morons (well, perhaps Abi-Maria, but we’ll get to that). Hell, the first person we here from is Kelly, who freely admits that things aren’t going her way, and that something’s going to have to change strategically, or she’s out. Notice how, unlike last episode, Kelly isn’t saying that she’ll have to keep working hard to be kept around. No, she’s going the strategy route, and that’s why this season may not go down predictable lines. While I’d argue the old school may be at a disadvantage, they’re also quick studies. This is still anyone’s game.
And then you have people like Jeff Varner, who time and again is proving my assertion that he’s a blend of old school and new school play styles. His time in the game puts him firmly in the old school. These are the people he’s had the most contact with, has the most in common with, and is arguably the closest to. Yet, Jeff always struck me in terms of play style as being more new school. Of Kucha, he was the most alliance-conscious, the one who new how to manipulate people, the one who started fights just to further his own game. That, to me, is much more like how modern “Survivor” is played. And because of that blend, Jeff is arguably the most dangerous person in this game. I’m starting to see a potential pitfall building for him (which I’ll be discussing later), but as I’ve said many a season, on “Survivor” it’s the person with the best balance who wins. Not in terms of crossing any balance beams, of course, but in terms of balancing personalities. It’s the one who has something with every group, with every person, who can take the best parts of each play style and work, that wins. So far, Jeff is proving me correct.
Much like Agent Smith in “The Matrix Trilogy”, Jeff is also very good at converting people to his way of thinking. Case in point, he talks with Terry on the way to check tree-mail. Here, Jeff outlines his strategy in more detail. Basically, he’d rather work with the old school crowd, for familiarity, but knew that if he just allied himself with them and left it at that, he’d be out before the end, since old school play values loyalty and physical strength, two areas where Jeff is lacking. Therefore, he blindsided Vytas both to get out a threat later in the game, and to force the old schoolers to play. Actually a pretty smart plan, though in fairness to Terry, I don’t think he took much convincing. Terry always struck me as one of the savvier “Old School” players. A bit too big on the “Captain America” persona, perhaps, but I always thought Terry had a fair amount going on mentally as well. We’ll see that more in a little bit, though.
And then Jeff makes a “spy shack” joke. Give the guy credit, he’s funny.
After our abbreviated intro, we check in with… OH MY GOD, THE BABY MONKEY! They brought back the baby monkey! Oh, my “Survivor” episode is now complete!
Ahem, anyway…
Abi-Maria,unsurprisingly, is not happy about having gotten some votes at the last Tribal Council. Still, Abi-Maria thinks she’s learned a lot, due to not exploding at getting said votes. Judging by everyone comparing Abi-Maria to a soap opera, though, she’s not succeeding very well. The worst of it all is her going up and interrupting conversations between Terry, Woo, and Jeff, basically to make sure they’re not talking about her. Now, I’m not faulting her strategy here, far from it. If you believe you may be on the chopping block (which Abi-Maria certainly has good reason to suspect), going up to people to stop them talking about you can actually be a fairly effective tactic. The problem here is that this strategy needs to be executed subtly. you need to make it look like you just strolled up on accident, so that the group will look like assholes if they ask you to leave. Abi-Maria, to put it mildly, is not subtle. Her strategy backfires, annoying the crap out of everybody. And the smart players realize it, and are using it to their advantage. After all, the more annoying Abi-Maria is, the better she is to take to the end. Case in point, notice how Spencer, with a flower in his hair for some reason, eggs her on to go and interrupt the aforementioned group conversation. The only thing funnier in that scene than Spencer’s flower is Peih-Gee’s “What the hell?” look to Spencer immediately after he does this. And, lest you think that this “People want Abi-Maria to be annoying so that she’s easily beat at the end” thing is mere fan fiction, Jeff spells that strategy out in the next confessional, so HA!
Over at Bayon, the Joe-worship continues. This time, St. Joe has cut up some of the fish netting to build hammocks for the tribe. Seems to me that’s a waste of a perfectly good fishing net, but since they keep part of it to still use for fishing, and those hammocks are mighty well-made, I can’t complain too much. Plus, this scene sees Stephen dub Joe “‘Survivor’ MacGyver”, so I guess it gets a pass. It adds absolutely NOTHING to the episode, but it’s still a fun scene.
Night falls on Ta Keo, and arguments are afoot. While Abi-Maria sits on the beach, Peih-Gee and Shirin discuss just how annoying she is. A topic of many hours, I’m sure. To make a long story short, their volume level gets a bit out of control,and Abi-Maria overhears. Peih-Gee and Abi-Maria, the two people on Ta Keo known for arguing with their tribemates on past seasons, start to argue. I never would have guessed! Sharon slips away during this time, which, while it backfires later, I actually think was a pretty good move. It’s very Jeff Varner-esque: get a fight started between two people, then slip away so that you’re not involved. Actually not a bad technique. It’s how Shirin follows it up that’s the problem. While the argument between Peih-Gee and Abi-Maria isn’t fun, it’s not exactly the worst argument either of them have had on their previous seasons. Still, Abi-Maria goes back to the beach to sulk, while Peih-Gee returns to the shelter to get sympathetic ears. None too surprisingly, everybody starts badmouthing Abi-Maria, which understandably upsets her a little. Now, I will be the FIRST to admit that I do not like Abi-Maria. I think she’s annoying, hypocritical, and generally hard to live with. But even I think this is harsh. To be left completely alone after that big blow-up, it must hurt a great deal. Were I out there, if I didn’t think it was social suicide, I would go up an comfort her.
It seems Terry agrees with me, as he goes out and has a nice long conversation with Abi-Maria. Now, this is definitely strategic on Terry’s part, as we’ll soon see, but I like to think it’s also somewhat because Terry is just a nice guy who doesn’t like to see social isolation. And Abi-Maria begins to feel better. But sure enough, Terry, savvy player that he is (except where Spencer is concerned), also manages to twist it into an alliance deal. You see, Abi-Maria is particularly upset that Shirin isn’t out there comforting her, since Abi-Maria, not without reason, saw their respective “Survivor” histories as being similar. Both were sort of picked on by their tribes, and never had too firm of an alliance. The difference, I’d say, is that Abi-Maria EARNED her being picked on, to some degree, whereas Shirin kind of got the shaft for no reason, but that’s starting to split hairs. Point is, Abi-Maria now has a grudge against Shirin, and Terry uses this, drawing on what Jeff said earlier about wanting Shirin or Spencer gone. Jeff later confirms this the next morning, and thus a new alliance is born.
Smooth move on the parts of Terry and Jeff, but this also brings up what might be Jeff’s fatal flaw in this game. Namely, he’s playing a Jonathan Penner game. No, not the second or third times around where Penner actually kind of knew what he was doing, I’m talking about “Survivor Cook Islands” Jonathan Penner. You know, where he flipped and flopped so many times that he ended up pissing off just about everybody? Yeah, Jeff Varner is starting to go down the same road. It’s all fine and good if you want to work with someone other than Spencer or Shirin, Jeff, but be careful how you do it. Eventually, people will catch on to your flip-flopping and manipulation, and you may be out of a win because of it.
But now, it’s Bayon time, and I’m sure something interesting is happening over there. Oh, wait, Savage is just talking about how much he misses his wife, and talks about how they met. Um… Ok?
Look, I’ll say up front that I get that the scene is emotionally touching and that “Survivor”, as Kass says (oh, we’ll be coming back to Kass, don’t you worry) is just as much about emotion as it is about strategy, but I can’t help but feel like it fell a bit flat. Why? Well, I hear Savage talk about this “Hot Brunetter South African Supermodel” that he married, and all I can think is “Oh dear, poor you! So sorry you have to be away from your SUPERMODEL wife for a month!”. Basically, it’s reminding me a lot of the game “Bait Blake” from back in “Survivor Guatemala”. Yeah, remember that? How the brilliant Brian Corridan got Blake to talk about how great his life back home was? Yeah, this strikes me like that. Now I get it, the romantic thing about the story is that she came back from South Africa to be with him, and that’s very nice. But I feel like there was maybe just a BIT too much emphasis on the whole “South African Supermodel” thing, that it was almost as much bragging as it was emotional breakdown.
Apparently I’m alone, however, as pretty much the rest of Bayon falls in love with the story. Jeremy can’t even handle the emotion, going off to have a good cry by himself. See, THIS seems like a more touching display of emotion, since Jeremy doesn’t brag about Val too much. Oh, and Jeremy has a legitimate reason beyond just being apart from his wife to be emotional. In the year since “Survivor San Juan del Sur”, it seems that Val has gotten pregnant. First off, if either of them is reading this, let me say “congratulations”. Second of all, for me, it makes much more sense for Jeremy to be emotional about being away from home than for Savage to be, because Jeremy’s actually missing something he can’t get back. Val would probably LOVE to have him home to help out right now, but he can’t be there. It’s heartbreaking.
Heartbreak doesn’t stop Stephen from trying to twist it to his advantage, though, as he speculates that Jeremy may be out looking for the idol. Again, not a bad idea, especially since the rest of Bayon correctly deduced that Stephen was looking for the idol earlier, but like with Abi-Maria’s going up to groups to stop them talking about her, it’s not exactly subtle. Look, the man’s desperate, I get it, but Stephen, as someone who’s a big fan of yours, please be better at it. In any case, Savage is not pleased. THIS, he says, is why Stephen needs to go. His head’s always in the game, and he’s always looking for a better angle. While I can’t deny that there’s some logic to Savage’s game, I have two problems with this statement. One, Savage, it’s not a crime to strategize against you. After all, as the alpha male, if people don’t strategize against you, you win. It’s not a crime to want to win “Survivor”. Not that you should condone people strategizing against you, but lighten up a little. Second, and this is the one that I find really irksome, Stephen’s only doing this BECAUSE you put him in that position. Look at “Survivor Tocantins”. Stephen, at many points, displayed emotion over strategy on that season. Look at how he went to help Coach after the final five immunity challenge. That was pretty selfless. the only reason he’s acting this way is because you’ve cornered him. Again, not saying that Savage is in the wrong for saying that Stephen needs to go for being too strategic. I’m saying that Savage is treating Stephen like he’s the biggest scumbag ever, and he could lighten up on the rhetoric a bit.
But now we come to the REAL star of this scene: Kass McQuillen.
Stop that booing! I’m being serious.
Once again, we have Kass getting a little interview in the emotional scene, and once again, it’s her talking about how she needs to change her game, adding in emotion as a factor where it wasn’t before. Admitting ones mistakes and (so far) successfully correcting them? Sounds like a winners edit to me!
Now, I’ll admit that, even as a die-hard Kass fan (note how I’ve brought her up in BOTH blogs for this season when she really hasn’t been a major factor in any episode thus far), a “Kass wins” scenario is a bit hard to swallow. She’s got a major bad reputation to overcome, deserved or no. And it’s true, these interviews are so generic, they might just be a way to give an early boot some screen-time, and I may be completely wrong. But let me ask you this: what benefit is it to CBS to show Kass in a good light? I’m serious, CBS LOVES to milk their “Survivor” villains for all they’re worth, and “Chaos Kass” is arguably the biggest “villain” to come out of recent seasons. It’s much to CBS’ benefit to show every confessional where Kass is snarky, or berates someone, or annoys someone, particularly if she’s an early boot, and they need to do the marketing early. Instead, what they’re doing is ruining her villain persona. Kass has done practically NOTHING of note these first two episodes, other than talk about what she’s learned. Nice enough confessionals, but they’re generic, and undermine the perception of her as a villain, which CBS has a stake in keeping. One could argue that Kass simply hasn’t given any such confessionals yet, but I find that hard to believe. After 6 days, you say something bad about someone. No, the only logical reason I can think of for CBS painting Kass in any sort of positive light is if she wins. After all, many people love or at least love to hate “Chaos Kass”, but does anyone want to see her win? Probably very few. But Kass McQuillen, the nice older lady who’s actually a pretty good strategist? The audience would eat up that winner! And that’s the Kass edit we’re getting so far. I may be completely wrong (I’ve certainly been before), but I just don’t see a lot of other options for this edit.
Ok, ok enough Kass fanboying, onto the challenge. Since this season is taking challenges from seasons past, as well as going out of its way to do challenges that the people on this season have participated in it’s no surprise that today’s challenge is the first immunity challenge from “Survivor Samoa”. Carting along ropes, the tribes run over a series of A-Frames before getting to a long track with a crate at the end. Tying together the aforementioned ropes, the tribe members must drag said crate along the track. Once the crate reaches the end, two tribe members must solve a puzzle using pieces from said crate. The first tribe to solve said puzzle wins immunity. Now, normally I’m against copying anything from “Survivor Samoa”, but if you must, this challenge is actually a pretty good one to copy. It’s exciting to look at, it’s physical, it’s just a lot of fun.
Oh, a couple of Probst notes before starting. You’ll notice, like with Savage and the “Jailbreak” section of the challenge last episode, Probst didn’t bring up what Monica, who has done this challenge before, has riding on it. Presumably, this is because Monica actually won that challenge with her tribe. Yes, I’m sure there’s a person named Monica on this season. Still, my point stand that I think Probst has greater influence on these challenges than he may realize. Also, Probst forgets to take the idol back from Bayon. Hilarious.
I’ll give this immunity challenge this: it was more tense than the last one. True, I still thought Ta Keo would lose, since the “Fall of Shirin” has been very clearly set up by now, but there was enough Anti-Stephen talk that I could see Bayon losing as well. Couple that with a very back-and-forth puzzle finish, and you’ve got a tense, heart-racing challenge! Always a plus! In the end, predictably, Bayon wins, and Ta Keo is sent back to Tribal Council, Jeff Varner noting the irony of Spencer and Shirin being the last puzzle-solvers, since they’re the ones on the chopping block tonight.
Jeff helps to get himself out of what I’m dubbing the “Penner Pitfall” by including Peih-Gee and Kelley in the plan to get rid of either Spencer or Shirin, which isn’t a bad stopgap. That way you have at least a FEW people you haven’t backstabbed. Still, watch yourself, Jeff, you’re on thin ice. Peih-Gee and Kelley both admit they’re not too happy with this plan, since they wanted to work with one or both of the people left, but that they’re not willing to rock the boat for their sakes. Why they don’t try to organize a counter-alliance with Spencer and Shirin is beyond me, but perhaps the new “Old School” alliance is just too tight. In any case, I can’t fault the pair too much for not rocking the boat. With a couple of ironic confessionals from Spencer and Shirin about how safe they feel, the stage is set for the tragic downfall of one of them, presumably Shirin, since she was at the center of the whole “Abi-Maria is upset.” thing.
Sure enough, when Shirin does the standard “Check up on my alliance.” rounds that afternoon, Abi-Maria, ever the subtle player, admits to Shirin that she’s offended, and that either Shirin or Spencer is going home. My sympathy for Abi-Maria wanes a little bit when I see how much joy she’s taking in gloating about Shirin’s imminent exit, but perhaps that’s because it’s shifting to Shirin and even Spencer. I’ll admit it, this episode got me. Here’s where the emotional drama gets to me. Say what you will about Shirin and Spencer, they’re both superfans who try hard, however successful or unsuccessful they may be. Their confessionals, where they just seems so completely defeated, so out of gas, it just gets to me. I’m no fan of Spencer, and overall lukewarm about Shirin, but this exit for them is just so beautiful, and yet so depressing. The kicker is that, when they approach young, impressionable Woo to try and work some magic, Woo doesn’t even give them the pretense of entertaining their idea. He berates Shirin for not talking to him until she needed his vote, and Shirin and Spencer are forced to admit that they may have to vote against each other, for their own sakes.
Look at me, I’m tearing up! And this is for people I’m not huge fans of. Heck, I’ve declared a dislike of Spencer several times, and here I am feeling sorry for him! Please believe me when I say that this is one of the best edited sequences I’ve ever seen on the show. The episode was ok up until now, but man, between how the confessionals were used, how everything shook out, and how emotional both Shirin and Spencer got in their confessionals… this is the most emotional I’ve gotten over an episode of “Survivor”. And it’s entirely down to this post-challenge, pre-tribal sequence. Well done, my friends, well done.
Speaking of Tribal Council, It’s also an interesting beast. We get a pretty apt recap of how events shook out to get where Ta Keo is, and Probst points out how history is, in some ways, repeating itself. Shirin is in the midst of person conflict, and Spencer is once again unable to find a solid ally in the losing tribe. I’d argue that Probst is stretching things a BIT since Shirin is now arguably on the sending end of the conflict rather than the receiving end, but it is an odd parallel in Spencer’s case, and there are similarities to Shirin’s first time playing. The big moment, though, is when Shirin and Spencer each argue why they should stay. Shirin, the more emotional one, takes an emotional tack, citing unfinished business and feeling like she has more to offer. Spencer, again paralleling his time on “Survivor Cagayan”, makes a logical argument, that regardless of people turning against him, he’s willing to work with whomever’s left, should he survive the night. Two very different arguments that help round out the episode beautifully. Shirin’s plea is so impassioned that I even have a bit of doubt that it’s Spencer over her tonight.
A five-four vote does arouse some tension, but in the end, Shirin does go. Not a huge surprise. This whole episode had been building up to it, with us seeing Shirin’s mistakes, and her speeches making for a brilliant, blazing downfall. And yet, I am sad. For all that I consider myself “lukewarm” about Shirin, and for all that she did make some mistakes this time around, I felt like, especially in the first episode, we got to see the non-quirky, strategist Shirin that she wanted us to see, and grew to like her. Shirin, brilliant though your downfall was, you will be missed.
Moving on to a more strategic note, I’ll also say that I think getting rid of Shirin over Spencer was completely the wrong move. Purely from a historical perspective, Spencer is very good at being the underdog, and surviving far longer than he should as a result. When she was on the bottom, there was little Shirin could do. When he was on the bottom, Spencer found a way to survive. He’s far more dangerous the longer you leave him in the game. Plus, as a Kass fan, I enjoy seeing Spencer suffer.
This was a great “Survivor” episode, but not for the reasons I usually say. There was some strategy, it’s true. It’s not as though this episode is devoid of what I usually love. But this episode really nailed the emotion of the show, and while Shirin’s boot could be seen coming, it was glorious to watch.
Next week, we get a variant on a twist I’ve been advocating for pretty much since this blog began: dividing into more tribes rather than less. Let’s see if it’s as good as I’ve hoped!
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.
idolspeculation 