Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Juan del Sur” Finale: A Tale of Two Twinnies

After many trials, tribulations, and delays, I have finally managed to watch the “Survivor” finale and reunion show. Sadly, due to how long it took me to watch these, most of you will have already heard other thoughts, and as such, I may include slightly less detail than I normally do. Even so, I’ll try to hit all the points I normally hit with the finale blog, and this blog will still be overly long as-is, so let’s waste no more time on fancy introductions!

Remember what I said a blog or two ago about people this season not getting overly pissed over the outcome of a Tribal Council. The universe just HAD to give me a counter-example. Specifically, Jaclyn gets more than a little pissed over John’s eviction, though she doesn’t snap until it comes to Missy and Natalie questioning Jon’s loyalty. What results is fascinating unpleasantness that does Jaclyn no favors. I won’t address the argument itself here, as it has very little bearing on the outcome of the episode, but I will bring up that I’ve lately come to realize that I HATE it when people try to determine whether or not someone has been “loyal” in the game of “Survivor”. The trouble is that it’s a question that’s impossible to determine, as no one is loyal or traitorous all the time. Take Jon, for example. He betrayed Jeremy, and so you could argue he was traitorous. On the other hand, he was loyal to Missy to the point of ruining his own game, so in that way, he was a loyal person. Which one is he overall? I can’t tell you, but it’s something that is impossible to determine.

Evidently the episode also hates this unpleasantness, and gets to our reward challenge for the episode. That’s right, REWARD challenge. Evidently, the show is ahead of schedule, as they see fit to give us an extra reward challenge. Then again, perhaps they just understand how lackluster the strategy is overall this season, and so are giving us the only pleasant thing left. Today’s challenge is actually a pretty good one, though. Each contestant must unwind a bunch of rope from a fence. Once they have enough rope, they must assemble and cross over a bridge, before tossing beanbags at some blocks. The first person to knock over all their blocks gets reward. Technically a reused challenge, but one that combines a few disparate elements, so I’m going to let it pass in that regard. I do like the mind games of “Have I unwound enough rope?”, and the bridge building and crossing makes for some good-but-not-dangerous pratfalls. Sadly, this challenge is not without its problems. “Building the Bridge” just means putting sticks in holes. A bit simple, if you ask me. Better if they made the bridge a puzzle, so that you’d have to carefully choose which rungs you needed. On top of that, the climax of the challenge is a carnival game. I get that you want to make simple challenges that can be replicated at home, but come ON, give us an epic conclusion!

The reward itself is an advantage in the next immunity challenge, and I’m sure you’re all expecting my usual rant about immunity advantages this late in the game. If you are, then there’s a distinction I must bring up: I only hate advantages for the FINAL immunity challenges. It just seems like a sacrosanct challenge that needs to be an all-out brawl for who wants it most. Any OTHER challenge, however, I’m all for it, as it makes the reward challenge very high-stakes. So no, I don’t mind this one.

Keith wins the advantage, and sends Jaclyn to Exile Island for the last time. Probably, this is the best choice for Keith. You can’t send Missy or Baylor without offending the other, and as they’re likely to never vote for each other, they’ll probably need to be brought to the strategy table. An argument could be made for sending Natalie, as she’s the strongest woman left, but you’re also supposed to be somewhat allied with Natalie, so that looks bad. Jaclyn is a non-entity in almost all matters, so she’s the safe choice.

Jaclyn does get her own Exile Island scene, but it’s just a lot more complaining. Seriously, this better have an empowering point, or I’m going to be really pissed. Somewhat better of a watch is Keith, who gets his advantage a lot earlier than we’d expect. Basically, Keith gets a copy of the immunity challenge to practice on for the rest of the day, and it’s actually very original. Using a series of paddles, Keith must maneuver three balls, one at a time, though a series of obstacles to a finish goal. The first person to get all three balls in the goal will win immunity. Keith is allowed precisely one practice session, though it can be as long as he wants. Keith may be stupid, but even he can see that he’s in trouble, and so practices his heart out. Kind of fun to watch, but this gets into why I’m more ok with this immunity advantage more than others. Unlike previous immunity advantages, this one doesn’t make the challenge easier, it just makes your learning curve shorter. Still advantageous, but not game-breakingly so. Plus, it could, in theory, add a new dimension to the strategic game. Let’s assume, for the sake of argument, Natalie won that challenge and did the practice session. Natalie’s goal is not so much to win, but to prevent Keith, her main jury threat, from winning. Therefore, Natalie could spread information about the challenge to her allies, thus giving them a leg up in the challenge as well. True, they couldn’t practice like she could, but it would eliminate the element of surprise. The reward went to the person on the bottom, so we never got to see this dimension, but it’s a good one to consider, and as such I hope this type of advantage comes to pass.

At the start of the challenge itself, it looks as though Keith’s practice may not pay off, but it seems that it does, as he goes on to win handily. This might make it seem like Jaclyn is on the chopping block, and she is, but remember that “empowering point” I mentioned earlier. Jaclyn finally seems to have gotten off her pity pot and is actually doing something. She mentions to Natalie that Missy and Baylor have a great narrative for the end, and breaking them up might be desirable. She further says that if Natalie saves her, she won’t vote for Natalie at the next Tribal Council. Natalie considers the proposal when Baylor asks if Natalie could play her idol for her mom this time, as it’s the last chance for the idol to be played. Kind of a random request, but it gives Natalie a dilemma. Despite the fact that Natalie’s in a good situation with Missy and Baylor, and flipping again might mess things up, I actually think it’s in Natalie’s best interest to flip and vote out Missy. Bear in mind, Natalie wins against pretty much anyone else left. Keith is her only threat, but he can’t be voted out this episode. Therefore, it is in Natalie’s best interest to make it so that Keith is unlikely to win the next immunity challenge, which means keeping in the best competitors. Missy, bless her heart, will most likely not compete in the final immunity challenge, and is therefore not beneficial in this regard. Plus, the leg thing might get sympathy votes. True, you risk Baylor rebelling, but Baylor is not much of an entity in this game, and she’ll probably forgive you.

So, does Natalie do this at Tribal Council? Not exactly. She does flip, and actually plays her idol for Jaclyn because Keith was not clued in on the plan, but they vote for Baylor instead of Missy, thus sending Baylor home. While not a game-ending move, I’m less cool with this one. Unlike Baylor, Missy is likely to act out a revenge plot against you, and you get rid of one of your best competitors for a weak one. While Baylor seems cool with leaving, it’s still not a great move, Natalie, and certainly unnecessary in this regard. Did make for the most interesting Tribal Council of the night, though. Brace yourselves, folks, it’s all downhill from here.

Of course, you wouldn’t know this by talking to Missy, who is absolutely OK with Natalie’s move for no apparent reason. Well, she SAYS it’s because she herself didn’t have to vote her daughter out, which I guess makes sense, but the fact remains that you effectively lost an ally, Missy, and you could very well go next. I wouldn’t get that comfortable if I were you.

After our lack of a “Fallen Comrades” Tribute (am I the only one who misses that?), we head off to our final Immunity Challenge, and wouldn’t you know it, it’s a repeat. In fact, it’s a repeat of the FIRST “Survivor Blood vs. Water” final Immunity challenge, which somehow makes it even more repetitive. Basically, everybody must go down a series of obstacles to go through a series of obstacles to get bags of puzzle pieces to solve a puzzle to find the numbers to a combination lock to undo said lock to raise a flag to win immunity in the house that Jack built. Ok, perhaps that last bit wasn’t actually in there, but I’m not far off in how convoluted and generic this challenge is. The one saving grace is that the puzzle is actually a bit unique. A few pieces are missing, and these pieces will leave distinctly-shaped holes in the puzzle. One these shapes are found, the contestants must go back down the wall to look up what numbers correspond with the shapes to undo the lock, and then go back up the wall. This is actually a unique and clever way of working in the combination lock, and I’m a big fan of it. Sad to say, the rest of the challenge just leaves me cold. Perhaps I’m a traditionalist, but I prefer endurance challenges in these situations.

Still, the challenge is not without excitement. Jaclyn takes a leaf out of Kass McQuillen’s (“Survivor Cagayan”) playbook, and makes a come-from-behind victory on the immunity challenge puzzle portion. Much though I have ragged on Jaclyn this season, and even though it pales in comparison to Kass’ comeback, I must say that it was impressive. Jaclyn did a good job. Props.

Keith, once again realizing he’s in trouble, seems to make an effort to not be voted out. Unfortunately, that effort is half-assed, and just a “Missy will get sympathy votes” plea that pretty much falls on deaf ears. We’ll need to get our misdirection from another source. But then, that would require someone other than Natalie growing a brain.

This is where Jaclyn comes in. Somehow the thought occurs to her that, perhaps, it MIGHT be a good idea to vote out the person who’s been spinning the strategic narrative lately, namely Natalie. Missy seems to be on board, and we actually have some tension going into this Tribal Council Things seem even tenser when Natalie makes one of her rare slip-ups, and basically explains why she’s a big threat and deserves to win. This is great for winning over the jury, but VERY BAD FOR CONVINCING OTHERS TO KEEP YOU IN THE GAME! Fortunately for Natalie, brain acquisition is a temporary arrangement this season, and so everyone left votes out Keith. Not a bad move, per se, but voting out Natalie would have been better for your game. Then again, I’m much happier to see Keith go. Though smarter than he seemed, his humor did not do it for me, and I say good riddance. As a side note, this also makes the final 3 all women, an impressive feat when you consider that women were numerically disadvantaged this season. In a sea of bad gameplay and uninteresting characters, this was a nice touch.

I’d say let’s skip over the final 3 breakfast, and go to Final Tribal Council, since one is interesting and the other is not, but even this Final Tribal Council is lackluster. No one gives a weak opening speech (actually, I’d say Natalie’s was weakest due to having the fewest concrete examples), but no opening speech stands out either. In fact, none of the “questions” asked by the jurors stands out either, save for one that we’ll get to later. They’re all very blatantly broadcasting who they’re voting for, and if they ARE phrased as a question, it’s a very transparent question that’s really not worth discussing. This does bring up one point about a “Blood vs. Water” season that I’m not sure I’ve addressed, but even if I have, it’s so blatant here that it’s worth repeating. Even though this is not always the case, ideally the jury should be voting on who played the best game, or else who offended them the least. In any case, they shouldn’t have much of a vested interest in one person winning over another, except for reasons of being offended by that person in-game, which can make for great drama. If your loved one is on the jury, however, who do you THINK they’ll vote for? My problem here is that essentially a few of the jurors are rigged in a “Blood vs. Water” season. Not so much out of familial love (though it is a factor), but if their loved one wins, they get to reap some of the reward. That seems unfair to me, and in violation of the “No Conspiring to Share the Money” rule, and it’s just one of the snags that prevents me from liking the “Blood vs. Water” twist as much as other.

For how boring the jury was this season, they did at least end on a high note. Reed, of all people, provides our vitriol for this season, by being fairly nice to Natalie and Jaclyn, but then laying into Missy. He describes her as a “Wicked Stepmother” who coddled her alliance and treated everyone else like crap. On top of that, Reed says, she was entitled and pathetic, and he wishes her nothing but ill. I believe we have another inductee to the Order of Sue-Hawkabies! And a male example, too, that’s very rare! In all seriousness, Reed’s tongue-lashing was just the spice needed to prevent this jury being ENTIRELY forgettable (remember anything about the jury of “Survivor One World”? Neither do I.), but was not so ferocious that it felt mean or laying it on too thick. Just the right amount of vitriol. Still, I do wonder where it came from. Perhaps Reed was more upset about Missy’s dishing out the rice than we thought.

Not too surprisingly, since the jury broadcast that they liked good gameplay, Natalie wins in a landslide. Missy comes in third, with only Baylor voting for her (while crying), while Jaclyn managed to scrape second, getting both Jon’s and Reed’s votes. I have to wonder why Reed chose Jaclyn over Natalie, though. Perhaps he’s upset about Natalie calling out his plan to get rid of Jon a while back. Still, I’m very happy for Natalie. While she started playing later than I would have liked, she started earlier than most, and I think the main problem was that there was no time for good Natalie scenes. I would have felt more satisfied with a Josh or Jeremy victory, but this is a good consolation prize. If nothing else, it gives us a few “Survivor” firsts. We have our first “Celebrity” winner of “Survivor”. We have our first Sri Lankan winner of “Survivor”. And we have a great demonstration of the power of the situation on “Survivor”. You could make the argument that Natalie and Nadiya played (or in Nadiya’s case, would have played) very similar games. Very vocal, a bit of an alliance ringleader, bent on revenge against those who wronged them. Yet, purely based on what tribe they were on, the same game gets you voted out first and makes you the winner. This just goes to positively show the unpredictability of “Survivor”. You can be a strategic mastermind, but if you end up in a bad situation, it can screw you, through no fault of your own. As I’ve said, I like Natalie as a winner. In some ways, she reminds me a lot of one of my favorites: Sandra Diaz-Twine (“Survivor Pearl Islands”). Both were lippy women who were comfortable making friends with the enemy to get farther in the game, and both were willing to take revenge on the ejection of their allies. Admittedly, Natalie is a bit more willing to be a leader than Sandra is, but neither way is correct. I’d still give Sandra the edge strategy-wise, just because I feel I’ve seen more of Sandra, but both are excellent strategists who deserve respect.

The reunion show, while not particularly horrible, was not very good or memorable. Nothing to really talk about with the contestants, since most of them were boring, and Probst once again dissed the pre-merge boots by not acknowledging them (though they did at least get to sit up on stage, so I suppose that’s something). The main thing that bugs me is that Caleb Bankston (“Survivor Blood vs. Water”) did not get a tribute during the finale. Look, I’m all in favor of keeping the focus on the new players, but this is a likeable guy, connected closely to the show (especially since his season and this one share a twist), who died tragically young. At least acknowledge him in some way! Oh well, I suppose we had to give Probst time to gush over Reed. Seriously, this guy got the most screentime, when he did next to NOTHING in the game? Cut Caleb some slack, he sure as hell deserves it.

Despite the best efforts of the show, the finale kind of falls flat. The problem is that most everything that would happen was clearly telegraphed, and the most exciting part of the show was Baylor’s blindside. Admittedly, this was a great moment to discuss, but the trouble is that it happened so early. Everything afterwards felt like a letdown. Still, we had a satisfying winner, and nothing that completely wrecks this season. I’ll go into more detail on my specific thoughts on the season later, but first, it’s time for my traditional look back at how I thought people would do before the season started, and comparing them with what actually happened. Let’s begin with:

Keith: I called the “stereotypical redneck” part, but the guy was stronger and more long-lived that I would have guessed. I’ll call this one wrong.

Wes: Pretty flat out wrong. A redneck much like his dad, but nowhere near as smart or charming as I thought he might be. And given what I said about his smarts, that’s pretty bad.

Josh: Dead wrong. Guy was nowhere near as awkward as I though, and was a quite enjoyable strategic mastermind. Good for him.

Reed: He developed into what I thought near the end, but for the most part, I was wrong. Had almost no impact on the game whatsoever.

Missy: A bit wrong, on my part. She was savvier than I gave her credit for, but about as annoying as I thought, and made it farther than I expected.

Baylor: My first correct call of the game. A follower who found the right alliances to take her near the end, but no victory.

Natalie: Clearly wrong. While she showed some traits that I thought would do her in, she overcame those and proved to be a good-enough strategist to win the whole thing. Evidently her behavior is exacerbated by the presence of Nadiya. Speaking of whom…

Nadiya: Actually right. While I said Natalie would be first off, I did say either twin would do, and Nadiya fit right in with what I thought.

Jeremy: Right on personality and play style, wrong on his winning. He was robbed, in my opinion.

Val: In a flip-flop of Jeremy, right on time in the game (though I overestimated a bit), wrong on personality.

Jon: I’m going to say right on personality, though I didn’t predict he’d become a strategic center. Stayed a bit longer than I thought.

Jaclyn: Came very close to making me right on time in the game, but I was WAY off on her personality. Just a boring, non-threatening individual who will be quickly forgotten.

John: Dead right, for once.

Julie: As a thorough description of my thoughts on Julie would get me sued, I’m just going to say I was right, though I could not predict the manner of her exit, and move on.

Dale: I got his time in the game close to spot-on, but his personality was way off. In a good way, though.

Kelley: Wait, there was a Kelley in this game? Guess that means I was right.

Drew: Way off. He’s definitely not the smart one.

Alec: Again, wrong by a mile. Switch him and his brother, and I’m closer with regards to time in the game. Both are still idiots, though.

Sad to say, but the traditional final episode “Top 5 and Bottom 5” is getting axed here due to an underwhelming finale and time constraints. I did consider doing one for rewards, so I could talk about immunity advantages a bit more, but I’ll save it for another time. Instead, let’s take a look at the tease for next season. Just when you thought they couldn’t top “Survivor One World” for stupid titles, we have “Survivor Worlds Apart”. How far apart are these worlds? They’re corporate America, day laborers, and free spirits. It seems we’ll be getting three tribes, similar to how “Survivor Cagayan” worked, and we’ll see which wins out. Like with “Survivor Cagayan”, I think a lot of it is going to come down to the strength of the cast. The “Tribe Division by Class” thing is not a good gimmick in and of itself, and relates to the game very little. It doesn’t particularly make me want to watch the season, but nor does it ruin things for me. I think there are better twists they could have done, but this could work, if, like on “Survivor Cagayan”, it’s not emphasized to death. Point being, I’m reserving judgment.

What I CAN judge is this particular season, and it does not hold up well at all. They tried, they really did, they nearly succeeded in making this season interesting. There were too many duds in the cast, what good players there were did not show up for too long, and they eliminated a lot of the good players shortly after the merge. They tried to build up new people, but when a show axes its biggest assets, there’s not a lot you can do. The only suggestion I could make would have been to give Natalie, Jon, and a few of the later strategists more early-game strategic scenes, so that their sudden rise to power would have seemed more earned. As it stands, the location of Nicaragua has yet to produce a good season. Actually, this season has a lot of the same problems as “Survivor Nicaragua”: a lot of boring cast members, a slow start, and they get rid of the good players too early. With that said, I would hesitate to call “Survivor San Juan Del Sur” a “bad” season, because while nothing was really exemplary, there was also nothing cringe inducing like on “Survivor Nicaragua”. It’s at the VERY low end of average in my book, somewhere around “Survivor South Pacific”.

Still, no point complaining about the past, perhaps next season will be better! Now it’s time for my Christmas break, but I’ll see you in January for the announcement of the “Survivor Worlds Apart” cast.
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Juan Del Sur” Episode 12: Badass

Before it was known what the game of “Survivor” would become, the premise was assumed to be “survival of the fittest” in the classical sense of the term. Even after it was discovered that the show would focus more on “survival of the fittest” in the social sense of the term, the show still cast mainly hard-core survivalists, people who could withstand anything. At some point, it became less and less the case, and it wasn’t a bad thing. You don’t want the show to look too easy, and you generally want to go with the best characters, regardless of how much they may suck in the outdoors. However, this was a bit of a double-edged sword, as now quits and medical evacuations became much more common. Worst of all, some people were calling in medical and asking to leave for injuries that, at least to the audience, seem pretty minor (Dana Lambert from “Survivor Philippines” comes to mind). While it’s a tough game, and understandable that some people can’t hack it, to those of us who have tried and failed several times to get on the show, it seems really lame, if not insulting. Therefore, it’s very gratifying when we get a badass who tries everything in their power to prevent their exit, even if it means arguing with the medical team. The reason Russell Swan’s evacuation of “Survivor Samoa” is so memorable is not just because of how horrifying it was to see, but because of how hard the man thought not to be pulled from the game. Tonight, for better or for worse, we got another one of those moments. And it was glorious. Let’s dive right in.

So getting back from Tribal Council, there’s naturally a little bit of chaos over Natalie’s move to get out Alec instead of Keith, which I’m actually supportive now for reasons I’ll get into later. Regardless, at the time it still seems a bad move, but Jon’s alliance is now looking for every reason other than betrayal to figure out what went wrong. Jaclyn suggests that Alec might have voted for himself, proving once and for all that she knows nothing about the game, as voting for oneself is not allowed on the U.S. version of “Survivor”.

Quick interesting sidenote before we get back to gameplay analysis. Following the success of the U.S. “Survivor”, many other countries started producing their own versions of it, with their own twists. The gameplay and rules tend to be the same, with the notable exception of voting for yourself. Only in the U.S. version can a person not vote for themselves at Tribal Council. Every other version of the show allows people to vote for themselves, and very often, the first boot does vote for themselves. This has absolutely no bearing on the episode, just an odd disparity between versions. This concludes your quick, interesting sidenote.

No, the ACTUAL result from the last Tribal Council is that Natalie does the only sensible thing she can do to prevent her alliance from suspecting her betrayal: playing dumb. Now, I don’t mean this in a derogatory way, for once. Natalie turns things back on Jon and Jaclyn, lambasting them for not communicating enough with her, and claiming she thought she was supposed to vote for Alec in the first place. This is a fairly logical lie, and Natalie pulls it off beautifully, feigning confusion in the face of the vote very well. Baylor takes a potshot at Jon and Jaclyn for not recognizing Natalie’s lie, and while I do enjoy it when Jon and Jaclyn take potshots, I don’t think this is deserved. Natalie’s not going to be an Oscar nominee or anything, but she did a decent acting job, and coupled with a plausible lie, I’d call it a good one.

The next morning, Natalie proves that she can learn from the mistakes of her predecessors, specifically Reed. As his downfall was pretty much entirely due to Keith not being told exactly how to behave, Natalie goes up to Keith early the next morning, explains what she did, and tells him things are still good. We’ll get an even better scene of this later, but suffice to say, it’s a good idea on her part. Now let’s get to the reward challenge.

Just when you think the show is going to start a streak of actual individual reward challenges, they of course give us another team challenge. Come on, guys, it’s the LAST REWARD CHALLENGE OF THE SEASON! Give us some individual action! As if that wasn’t bad enough, this challenge is yet another generic obstacle course. Divided into teams of three, the contestants will go through a hay pile, then through a series of hitching posts, pick up a bucket of water, go over a teeter-totter, and pour their water into a bigger bucket. Once the bucket is full, a gate will lower, and then they must solve a basic puzzle. First team to put the puzzle together gets a spa day with food. Nothing here is exciting, most of it is reused, none of it is really difficult, and to top it all off, it’s not all that epic to hear Probst saying “They’re onto the teeter-totter”. Oh, for the days of battering rams.

The blue team consists of Keith, Missy, and Jon, while the orange team consists of Baylor, Natalie, and Jaclyn. Gee, I wonder who’s going to win this competition? In fairness, though, it’s a very close race, due to some smarts and some luck on the parts of Baylor, Natalie, and Jaclyn. They go through the side of the hay pile, rather than the middle which is denser, and get lucky (in one sense of the word) in that Missy twists her ankle badly jumping off the childish teeter-totter. But even her needing to be carried through the rest of the challenge does not slow down the blue team enough to steal victory, mostly due to the ladies bickering at the puzzle. Over what, I’m not sure, but they lose regardless.

Keeping with the whole “reward sacrifice” thing, Jon gives up his reward to Baylor, to “help solidify their alliance”. Plus, massages and manicures are for, like, girls and stuff! Don’t they give you cooties? Actually, I think Jon just wanted some alone time with Jaclyn, and it was definitely a bad move to give up the reward. There’s only so much solidifying you can do, man, you need your strength. Yes, maybe massages aren’t your thing, but these are massages WITH FOOD! Maybe you don’t realize it, but you’re a big threat, immunity would be really nice right now. Go, keep up your strength. People are gonna vote you out regardless, so just go all out.

Natalie in a clever move volunteers for Exile Island, in case there’s a new idol (there isn’t), and also makes it seem like she’s being nice to Jon and Jaclyn. The topic of discussion now turns to Missy’s ankle. Despite Missy needing to be carried everywhere, she protests so loudly that she doesn’t want medical that even Probst can’t bring himself to call them in. This is odd, because in more recent seasons, Probst has been very willing to call in medical, and forceful about doing so. For Missy to protest so much that she overrides PROBST is a real feat, good for her! Still, we’ll be getting more into the Missy love a bit later.

The reward itself is fairly uneventful, mostly just everybody exclaiming about how nice it is, and Keith cracking unfunny jokes (evidently this is just my night to disagree with everything Baylor says). We do get another shot of Missy’s ankle, though, just to reassure us that, yes indeed, it is obscenely swollen.

Slightly more unpleasant is Jon and Jaclyn having the camp to themselves. Or at least that’s how I thought it’d be, given how they’ve been prone to public displays of affection in the past. Thankfully this is not the case, and Jaclyn gives us the one bit of strategy we’re going to get before the immunity challenge. Yes, Jaclyn of all people is the one to suggest that Natalie might have sinister motives. I really don’t know what to think of Jaclyn anymore. One minute she seems to know nothing about the game, and merely trails pathetically after Jon, the next minute she makes an astute observation that Jon does not, and seems to have equal influence, and then the minute after that she’s back to being dumb, rinse and repeat. Still, she’s definitely in the right and Jon in the wrong on this one. Jon has fallen prey to the doom of many a “Survivor”: becoming too comfortable with your alliance. He wants to believe the best of Natalie, he really does, but he’s also blinding himself to the possibilities, which will ultimately lead to his downfall. Yes, I am giving away the result of this episode. The show doesn’t try to hide it, why should I?

If you thought the people on the reward had nothing to do… you were right, but Natalie comes in a close second. We get a bit of her whining about being without Nadiya for so long, as they’ve never been apart this long, and it’s just so hard, and for all that I’m enjoying Natalie more and more, it’s a sore spot. Don’t get me wrong, I understand missing your loved one out there, and perhaps there’s something to this twin connection that I do not get, but I feel the same way I felt about Julie complaining after the merge: it’s not that long of a time! Suck it up, people! If anything, it hurts a little more coming from Natalie, if only because I expected more out of her. On the plus side, rather than quit, Natalie at least uses these feelings to fuel her drive to win, so I guess it’s not TOO bad, all things considered. Not her finest moment, though.

Heading off to the immunity challenge, we actually get a slightly touching scene where those from the camp bring Natalie a bowl of rice. More importantly, however, we see that Missy, who requires stick crutches to make it to the challenge, is not fit for this challenge, which is a needlessly complicated endurance challenge, with emphasis put on the feet. As such, even Missy’s protests can no longer dissuade Probst from calling in medical. The prognosis isn’t good. Missy has a least a severe sprain, if not a broken bone, but there’s no way to know for sure without pulling her from the game. Her condition deteriorating over the course of two days is also not good. But here’s where I give Missy major props. In the era of quitting at little provocation, in the era of recruits, in the era of, for want of a better term, “wimpy” contestants, here we have someone arguing at every possible opportunity to stay in the game, willing to sacrifice anything to stay in. For all that I lambast people who give up over injuries, I think this one is severe enough that I couldn’t really blame Missy if she said she wanted out over it. That she was determined to stay in, even being willing to not participate in the immunity challenge for it, speaks to a strength of character I’m happy to see. Missy, whatever else I say about you (and believe me, it’s going to be BAD), you are a badass, and I’m very impressed. Good for you.

Luckily for everybody, medical decides that Missy’s ankle will not get worse over just four more days, and as long as they brace it, she can stay. This is good both because I’m happy to see Missy’s determination rewarded, and because it plays with expectations. Rarely do they advertise medical coming out and someone doesn’t get medevaced. Plus, with all the strategy built up this episode, it would have been an anticlimax. As it stands, we head off to the challenge itself, sans Missy, so I guess I should explain what it is in more detail. Contestants stand on a wooden plank, which is connected by another wooden plank to a wooden pole, on top of which is a vase. Movement on any part shakes the whole. When the vase falls, you’re out, last one standing wins. I won’t deny that this is an interesting challenge, but a bit complex, for once. When it comes to endurance challenges, I’m a fan of “Keep It Simple, Stupid”, and this does not follow that. Another thing: while I’m a fan of endurance challenges, we’ve had a LOT of them this season, and it’s getting old. Yes, I will still be mad if the final immunity challenge is not an endurance challenge, but that’s tradition. We could have cut back on them earlier, is what I’m saying.

The challenge comes down to Natalie and Jon, and thankfully Natalie wins, because otherwise the episode would have been boring. Jon gets an interview over everyone leaving the challenge, saying that everything’s in place, and Keith will go home tonight, which I’m SURE means Jon has NOTHING to worry about, and is in NO WAY going home tonight.

Shock of all shocks, Natalie sets in motion a plan to grid of Jon that night. Once again she learns from Reed’s mistake and coaches Keith on EXACTLY how to behave and what to say at Tribal Council. She then confers with Baylor, and they agree that they need to make sure either Jon or Jaclyn goes home that night. As such, they’ll split the vote, with Natalie and Keith voting for Jon, and Missy and Baylor voting for Jaclyn. This is why I actually now support Natalie keeping Keith rather than Alec, despite the fact that it was a risky blindside that seemed to gain her little. I doubt that Alec would have been ok with this plan, just because he’s not that bright. Granted, Keith isn’t too bright either, but he’s at least willing to strategize, and can do ok when the strategy is shoved under his nose (though you’d think his moustache would obscure it). If Keith wasn’t around, the vote could not be split, and everything would be ruined, or at least more of a risk. So yeah, I was wrong, Natalie’s flip was totally justified.

Even though the split vote is a smart move, there’s a hitch in it named Missy. Remember when I said I was going to say bad stuff about her? Yeah, that time is now. When Baylor broaches the subject, Missy flat-out refuses, on the grounds that she made a deal with Jon, and she’s loyal to the end. While I admit Baylor was a bit blunt with the strategy, and could have used more nuance, this is REALLY bad strategy from Missy’s part. Missy, you’ve stated before that you want to get to the end with Baylor and Natalie. This is not a bad idea. However, for that idea to work, at some point, Jon has to go. As all of you know, Jon has an idol, therefore, if you don’t get rid of him tonight, he’s safe until the final four. Even in a best-case scenario, when it’s you, Baylor, Natalie, and Jon at the final challenge, Jon has a good chance at winning the challenge, and by extension the game. I would have sympathy for trying to build the “loyalty narrative” for the end, but you kind of axed Jeremy a few votes ago. I think that ship has sailed. Better to play the “strategist” card. Just when you think there might be a slight chance at Jon not going home, Missy admits that despite her protestations she’s thinking of going with voting off Jon, if only for Baylor’s sake, and the world rights itself. The episode has been building up a big Jon blindside, there’s only one way it can end now.

This is probably one of the better Tribals of the season. Keith doesn’t even wait for Probst to ask him what he’s supposed to do being outside the alliance of 5, and just jumps right in with his answer. It seems like he might give the game away, being a bit overdramatic in saying how tight the alliance is, and suggesting that people use him for his vote, but it’s vague enough that I let it pass. We then get some discussion from the alliance about what happens when they need to turn on each other, ending with Jon giving the required ironic statement about how safe he feels. Well, I’m SURE this means he’s actually safe, and DEFINITELY sticking around.

Actually, the only real misstep in Tribal is the reading of the votes. Missy’s was the only one really in question, but we know she was supposed to vote for Jaclyn. Reading out Jaclyn’s name before Jon’s kind of gave away the ending, even more than the rest of the episode did.

You’d think I’d hate this episode for how obvious the outcome is, but it’s one of the better episodes of the season. Doesn’t quite beat out Josh’s boot, just because that one had more doubt as to whether or not it would succeed, but this one comes close. Despite the fact that anyone with a brain could see the outcome coming a mile away, it was a big power shift, which is fun to watch if it’s been earned, and this one was definitely earned. Sometimes the journey can outweigh the destination, and this episode, it did. It was fascinating to watch the mechanism leading to Jon’s demise work itself out, and Jon’s ironic statements about being safe were an added bonus. While he was one of the few more strategic minds this season, I don’t really mind seeing him go. He would have been a boring winner, and there’s just something about him that rubs me the wrong way. Still, good effort!

Before signing off, I want to make a quick note of something: not counting “Survivor Retrospectives”, this is the 100th post of “Idol Speculation”. While I certainly can’t say that my readership has skyrocketed or anything since I started this blog during “Survivor South Pacific”, it has gained at least a few readers, and it’s been a fun ride thus far. We’ve been through the good seasons, the bad seasons, and made fun of them alike, with some critical analysis thrown in. I like to think my writing has gotten better, and I certainly appreciate the show even more for doing this blog. For the few who read me, thank you very much for taking the time out of your busy schedules to listen to my knee-jerk opinion that you are entitled to. Here’s to 100 more blogs!

With that said, I do have some sad news. I’m going to visit some friends next week, and will accordingly be out of internet access for the finale of the show. As such, for the first time this season, my blog will be delayed. I hope to see the episode Friday or Saturday, and get the blog out then, but I’m afraid you’ll have to wait. Despite my love of “Survivor”, there are a few things more important to me than watching the show as it airs, and visiting old friends is one of them. Forgive my schedule slip, but I will be back for the finale as soon as possible!
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Juan Del Sur” Episode 11: Twice the Episode, Half the Intrigue

Back when “Survivor” first started, it seemed like they’d hit the magic numbers with all the show’s logistics. 16 castaways voted out in 3 day increments over a 39 day period fit nicely into 13 episodes (with the last episode cramming in an extra vote or two, of course). Unfortunately, as the show progressed, “Survivor” found that more people were quitting and/or getting medevaced, and so they needed to up the number of contestants so they would effectively have a few “spares”. The trouble was when nobody quit or got injured, you messed up the magic number. The solution was the double Tribal Council, a fairly innovative concept in which the immunity challenge was removed for an episode, and both tribes went to Tribal Council (or, in the case of a post-merge double Tribal Council, two people booted in rapid succession, with no reward challenge in between.), which produced some new ideas and a fair bit of drama. Then the number had to be upped again to 20 contestants, and having more double Tribal Councils seemed extreme. The solution then was to have a final 3 instead of a final 2. To say this was a bad idea is an understatement, but I’ve gone over time and again why I think the final 3 is a bad idea, so I’ll save you that rant. Now, however, “Survivor” has a NEW solution for us, namely that it combines two whole episodes into one slot, giving us a two hour extravaganza that really benefits the show in no way, save for sparring us some obvious boots. Frankly, I’d have split this into two separate episodes, and just premiered the show a week earlier, but perhaps that’s why I don’t get paid the big bucks. My point in all this is that a double-length episode is a bad idea, if for no other reason than it gives me a lot to cover. My recap and analysis may not be as detailed as previously seen on this blog, but fortunately not a lot happens in this episode, so I’m not too up the creek without a paddle.

Not too surprisingly, we start off this episode by Reed being mad at Keith for spoiling the Jon blindside from last episode. Reed does an excellent job explaining how stupid Keith’s move was, but there’s an even better demonstration. Just how stupid WAS Keith’s move? So stupid that ALEC of all people comments on what a stupid move it was. You know you’re stupid when…

But it’s not only Keith who can get in on the stupid move train. Right off the bat, we get the seeds of the foreshadowed Jaclyn and Jon conflict with their post-Tribal discussion. Jaclyn makes an offhanded comment thanking Natalie for telling Jon to play his idol, basically giving Natalie the (rightful) credit for Jon’s butt still being in the game. Once Natalie has left their presence, Jon gets on Jaclyn’s case, telling her that it needs to be HIS move so he looks good in front of the jury. Jaclyn, not too surprisingly, is a bit upset at this, since she ALSO claims to be involved in telling Jon to use his idol. Frankly, I didn’t see her do jack squat on that front, so I’m not fully convinced, but I do understand Jaclyn’s outrage from a different perspective. Jon basically talks as though he’s the only one of the pair who needs to be framed in a good light, essentially doing what Wes, Keith, and Alec did to Jaclyn to get them to flip with Jeremy’s alliance so many episodes ago. Admittedly, Jon does have the better chance of winning of the pair, but there’s no need to frame it so bluntly, and certainly no need to order your ally around like that. This outrage causes Jaclyn to suggest that maybe now SHE’LL play for the final three, and I hang my head in shame that we’re back to seasons where everybody doesn’t play to win from the beginning. I’ve given Jaclyn bits of credit here and there, but this is just pathetic, and much though I sympathize with her current dislike of Jon, her only NOW starting to really play just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

It does bring up a crazy idea that’s been bandied about since the start of the “Blood vs. Water” twist, however, one that I think may have been in play, and we just didn’t see it at all. Despite playing with family, “Survivor” is still an individual game, and thus only one of a pair effectively wins (it’s assumed loved ones will share prize money to a degree, but not in a game-colluding way). However, the problem with going to the end with a loved one is that while it maximizes the pair’s chances of being voted for, it can easily backfire. The assumption is that pairs generally play similar games to one another, and so a person likely to vote for one is just as likely to vote for another. I’m not 100% convinced that would happen, because of how relationship-building in the game works, but it’s a possibility to consider, and a lot of people act under that assumption. But getting back on track, it’s been theorized, as a result, that the smartest thing would be for two couples to go to the end, and then have one couple sacrifice it’s other half to prevent a tie vote. This leaves the other half of the couple able to exploit the splitting of the votes between the other couple, and take the win for themselves, not to mention putting a valuable advocate on the jury. With Jaclyn’s comments, I can’t help but wonder if Jon and Jaclyn had something like this in mind, presumably paired up with Missy and Baylor. Maybe I’m reading too much into things and it’s just fanfiction, but it’s a possibility worth considering.

But of course, we can’t have semi-strategic talk this season, so let’s head over to the reward challenge! Oh, wait, this reward challenge actually has strategy to it! RUN AWAY!

In all serious, this is one of my more favorite challenges to reuse, and not just because it’s the first reward challenge that’s actually individual this season. Though that is a bonus. Basically, everyone answers a series of questions. If they get a question right, they get to chop the rope of another person’s effigy. Once three ropes are cut, the effigy is smashed, and that person is out of the game. Last person left standing wins reward, in this case a horseback ride to barbeque. Very nice. As an added bonus, rather than the traditional questions asked, where the answers are the most popular option from what amounts to a slam book made by the contestants, it’s the return of the “How Well Do You Know Each Other” challenge that “Survivor” used to be known for, last seen, believe it or not, on “Survivor Marquesas”. Man, that’s old-school. The overarching mechanic itself was last seen in “Survivor One World”, and I have missed it. Apart from the effigy smashing being fun (admitted, the skulls this season border on generic, but the blood-like paint inside is a nice touch), I like that this challenge reveals the pecking order so blatantly, and it’s fun to see who is out for whom. It also gives very useful insight to those on the outside and the bottom of the alliance, though admittedly it’s more insightful if it’s done much EARLIER! Still, I’m happy to see this challenge back.

One person who I’m sure ISN’T happy to see it, though, is Jeff Probst. Probst has made his disdain for this challenge well known in the past, and it’s why the challenge is so rare these days. Probst considers the winner of the challenge a foregone conclusion, due to colluding amongst the contestants, and thus finds it boring. I can understand his frustration, but at the same time, it can provide fascinating insight, as I mentioned above, and is still beneficial to those on the bottom, leading to more unpredictable seasons. I, for one, want more of that.

Probst’s dislike of this challenge comes to a head, however, when this season’s group breaks tradition. As I said, there’s often colluding on this particular challenge, but as a formality, it’s usually done before getting to the challenge. This group, however, forgets to, and so once Reed, Alec, and Keith are predictably eliminated, they discuss who they want to win. This so infuriates Probst (man, I am using the word “infuriate” a lot this evening) that he loses his professional cool, yells at the contestants to stop the challenge, and just declares Missy the winner, thus meaning we miss out on interesting inter-alliance dynamics. Shame, Probst, shame. For a man who’s normally very collected and professional, he really dropped the ball on this one.

Thankfully, we still get some dynamics in play here, that they TRY to convince us will affect the rest of the episode. Missy has to send someone to Exile Island, and pick 2 people to join her on reward. Jon volunteers for Exile Island, and he gets sent, a no-brainer. He’s strong, so he should be weakened, and there’s probably a new idol out there, which you want to keep in your alliance. As for those to go with her, Missy first picks Baylor and then Natalie, which are both good choices. Some would argue that Missy should have taken Jaclyn rather than Baylor, as Baylor is Missy’s most loyal ally, and so doesn’t need that bond reaffirmed via reward. This is true, but I don’t think it hurts Missy to take Baylor. As they’re mother and daughter, everyone assumes emotion will override gameplay, so Missy will take Baylor, and no one will begrudge her that. Besides, Missy would look like kind of an ass if she denied her own daughter reward. Natalie is also a good call, as, like we’ve seen, Jaclyn rarely makes a move without Jon, whereas Natalie is technically a free agent, and more likely to flip if you don’t keep her happy. Better to take her on reward.

Reed is still trying to have a place in this game, though, and so can’t let this move go untalked about. Jaclyn admits that she’s a bit upset at not getting to go on the reward, so Reed jumps on it and says Missy, Baylor, and Natalie are the final 3. This makes Baylor give a retort, which Reed, presumably fed up, calls Baylor a brat. This incites the wrath of Missy, who tells Reed not to call her daughter a brat. Um, oh no? Forgive me for being underwhelmed, Missy, but “brat” is not too much of an insult, and in this instance, Baylor was in a sense rubbing her superiority in Reed’s face, so I’d say it’s kind of deserved. I know it’s not a nice thing to hear about you kid, but seriously, it could be worse.

Probst sends everybody off before things get worse, and we see that sure enough, Natalie wants this as a final 3. She claims she has a good shot at beating Missy and Baylor, which I would say is correct, though I’m proud of her for admitting that her perspective is biased and she could be dead wrong. Missy has made a few moves in this game, but isn’t very well-liked by the jury. Baylor, in contrast, is better-liked, but hasn’t done much, and there’s some guilt by association. Natalie could very well beat either of them. To cement the alliance, Natalie and Baylor tell Missy about the idol they found. Normally, I’d be mad at this, but there is logic to it if you want to cement a final 3 alliance, particularly since Missy has been so much on the Jon train thus far. Actually, my one complaint is that Missy only credits Baylor with finding the idol. I know she didn’t see it, and so has no way of knowing who found it, and it’s natural for parents to be biased towards their kids, but if anything, Natalie exclusively found the idol.

The tree then realize that Jaclyn is probably getting sweet-talked by Reed, Alec, and Keith, and so they’ll need to do damage control later. Sure enough, back at the camp, Jaclyn admits that she’s pissed, and so is more amenable to the arguments of the other side, particularly since they target Missy, arguably the other strategic mastermind of Jon’s alliance. I… don’t buy this at all. Jaclyn’s just putting too many qualifiers on it about how her emotions are, and I don’t think she’s independent enough at this point to really go without Jon. Missy getting voted out is not happening this vote. Still, she gets a new flirt-buddy in Alec, who despite protestations that he’s not here to flirt or date with anyone, talks a lot about dating and flirting with Jaclyn. Yeah, I don’t care how casual the new generation thinks some of this behavior is, to me, the way they were talking, was flirting. If I was Jon, I’d be a bit suspicious, particularly in this game.

Speaking of Jon, since the clue to the idol is once again so simple a five year old could solve it, Jon gets another idol. Moving on…

We head to the immunity challenge, and just to demonstrate how hard Exile Island was, Jon comes back with actual dirt lines on his face, the mere sight of which sends Mike Skupin (“Survivor The Australian Outback”) into conniptions. And speaking of Mike Skupin, the challenge today is one that he won on “Survivor Philippines”. Everybody was to roll a ball down a long paddle, and stick it in a notch at the end. The first person to stick all six balls wins. This is a reused challenge, but it’s not overdone, so I’m ok with it coming back every once in a while. As to the challenge itself, I loved it then, and I love it now. It’s difficult, but in a way that you don’t often see on “Survivor”, and it doesn’t naturally favor anyone. Add on to that an easy way to keep score and mess up with a lot of tension, and you’ve got what in my opinion is a good challenge.

Surprisingly, Keith of all people manages to pull out a victory, making him the only repeat immunity winner so far this season. I mean, I never though the guy was especially weak, but seriously, whodathunkit? Back at the camp, Jaclyn tries to fill Jon in on what happened at camp, and how they can flip the game again. Jon, however, is tired, and so rather rudely dismisses Jaclyn. This gets her pissed off at him, and so gives him the silent treatment for five hours straight. Jon tries a few times to make nice, but she’s not having it. Normally, I’d be on Jon to lay off in this scenario, but out on the island, five hours is a long time for the silent treatment between two allies, and so I actually completely understand his actions. Even worse, when Jaclyn tries to restart conversation, Jon is too pissed to talk to her, ruining any of Reed’s plans. So, maybe Jaclyn will vote without Jon! I… still don’t buy it. Yes, there is tension here, but really, this is just a couple’s spat, one that’s fairly easy to get over. People may need some time alone, but this was not nearly to the scale that was advertised, and I don’t for one second think that anyone but Reed is going home. Even when Reed tries to get Jon and Jaclyn talking again to propose his plan, and Jon winks at Reed when Natalie comes up, I don’t buy it. It would be a stupid move to flip anyway. While I admit for Jon and Jaclyn’s game, Missy probably needs to go at some point, Reed is more of a threat, and has been hanging on far too long. Much smarter to get rid of Reed.

Going into Tribal Council, there’s no doubt in my or anyone else’s mind that anyone but Reed is going home, particularly after Probst’s couple’s therapy at Tribal Council. As such, there’s no real need to discuss this Tribal Council, as it predictably ends in the death of Spider-Man. Despite my protestations, I am a bit sorry to see Reed go. By the end, he was an adequate strategist, and was one of the few people providing good strategy these past few episode. Shame he couldn’t have done so EARLIER IN THE SEASON!

Whew! Anyway, moving on to the next bit, I can’t help but get nostalgic for Natalie’s “Jeremy Revenge plotline she seemed to be starting after Jeremy’s boot. That was providing good strategy and drama as well. True, she’s still being strategic, and I admire how well she’s reassimilated into the alliance, but still, I can’t help but wonder where on earth that rage went.

Oh, wait, there it is, as Natalie admits that she hasn’t forgotten, and is instead waiting for the right moment to strike Jon. I approve of this. A good “Survivor” move is a good “Survivor” move, but you need to wait for the right moment to use it, or you’re pretty well doomed. This is a much better time to do it. Besides being an odd number, you’ve now got a solid sub alliance within a main alliance that can ensure you maintain power in a flip. No downside!

That will all have to wait, however, as we’ve got our second reward challenge to get to! It never ceases to amaze me how many different sadistic endurance challenges “Survivor” can come up with. In this one, people stand on a wooden block, so small they must put one foot on top of the other, while using a rolling pin to hold up a ball against a piece of wood. If the ball falls, they’re out, last person left wins a comfy bed for the night, along with an Italian meal. Not bad for this late in the game, if I do say so myself.

After a tough battle, Natalie wins, sends Alex to Exile Island, and picks Jaclyn and Jon to join her on reward. Missy and Baylor seem pissed, but they’re not THAT stupid. Surely they can see that Jon and Jaclyn need reassurance, and so it’s better to make them think Natalie favors them over you? Maybe I’m just asking too much this season.

On the reward, Natalie once again proposes strategy talk, but Jon shoots it down in favor of MORE reminiscing about his dad! Seriously, I sympathize with the guy, but it’s getting really old really fast. It’s especially bad for Natalie, who says Jon just LOVES to brag about how good he is with wine. One can only imagine. Natalie gets her strategic comeuppance, however, when Jon decides he trusts her enough to reveal that he has an idol (having revealed it to Missy earlier). Natalie is happy that he trusts her, but is still looking for a chance to get Jon out.

Her chance seems to come the next day. People are particularly pissed about this reward since it happened right in front of them, but Natalie seems to avoid the flak by being apologetic, and getting up promptly and working. Jon and Jaclyn, by contrast, sleep late, and then get up only to take a nap in the shelter again. This gets everyone talking about how lazy and entitled Jon and Jaclyn are, and I cheer that someone finally understands my pain. This makes Natalie bring up to Baylor the possibility of voting out Jon, which she seems on board with, though they agree not to involve Missy, since she’s so tight with Jon. Instead, they’ll get Keith and Alec on board. Like I said earlier, this is a good plan. It’s late enough that moves have to be made, once Jon is gone Missy will probably join back up, and Keith and Alec are not smart enough to be threats against you. No downside.

In this episode’s tradition of reusing challenges, we hearken back to the first “Survivor Blood vs Water”. The contestants must walk backwards while holding a rope to keep a platform level, placing blocks on that platform one at a time. Said blocks must be gotten from increasingly further away pedestals. Each time a block or blocks fall over, you must put back any block you were bringing and reset. First person to have all 10 blocks stacked wins immunity. While not the most visually interesting challenge, I like it. It has a nice dichotomy of precision and speed, and it’s fairly different from what you usually see. In fact, the only thing I dislike about it is that Jon wins, meaning that everything in the second half of the episode so far has been entirely pointless.

Well, now that the INTERESTING plan is off the table, we’ll have to look elsewhere for our misdirection for the episode. As usual, a split vote comes to the rescue. On the off-chance that Keith or Alec has an idol, Jon, Jaclyn, and Natalie will vote for Keith, and Missy and Baylor for Alec. With her main target gone, and it being foolish for Natalie to try and vote Jaclyn out (this would incur the wrath of Jon, who has an idol) we get our misdirection in Natalie talking to Keith, and agreeing that he’s a valuable ally, as he is the most likely person left to beat Jon at immunity. Thus, she might change her vote to Alec (Keith and Alec having given up, and are thus going to vote for one another). This is actually good misdirection, as I don’t know what the move will be, but the problem is it’s pointless. The outcome is roughly the same either way, and there will be no shakeup this episode, which is highly disappointing for a two-hour extravaganza. Admittedly, it is slightly better for Natalie to stick with the plan and vote Keith off, since disobeying Jon could make him suspicious, and thus harder to vote out, but overall, there’s not much of an outcome to be invested in.

Natalie actually makes a few slip-ups at Tribal Council, which seems out of character. She actually admits that there’s more to the alliance than straight elimination, and Jon and Jaclyn look suspicious. Still, Natalie says that for now the alliance will stick together, and everyone seems satisfied. But more importantly a RAT runs through Tribal Council, scaring everyone! And yet Probst STILL manages to make it a metaphor for the game! Come on, man, let a rat be a rat!

To make a long blog slightly shorter, Alec goes home, and nothing of value was lost. As I said earlier, I think it’s the wrong move, as it shocked Missy, Jaclyn, and Jon, but not game ending. Still, it can’t be denied that this episode was lackluster. Nothing really happened of any consequence, there was no misdirection to speak of in the first Tribal Council, and at the second one, it was irrelevant what happened. Not a good way to do your episodes.

Oh, well, every season needs to have a FEW episodes with predictable votes, I guess. Perhaps Jon can be eliminated next week.
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Juan Del Sur” Episode 10: SUGAAAAAR!

Welcome back to “Survivor: Masterpiece Theatre”, where we discuss the ins and outs of the greats of “Survivor”. On tonight’s very special episode, we will be discussing just what qualities a person needs to be a good “Survivor” strategist. Is it good insight? The ability to lie without remorse? Or is it simply intuitive? To help us in our quest to find the answer, we have, of course, invited several experts in the field to come and give us their input. Ah, and here comes our first guest now. It’s Master Keith Nale of “Survivor San Juan del Sur”. Good to have you on, sir. Now please, tell us what trait, in your opinion, is essential in any “Survivor” strategist?

KEITH: They’re good at the maths and stuff. Not like me.

And there you have it. No more debate is needed on the subject, it’s all math. Thank you, and good night.

In all seriousness, this is an interesting, albeit unintentionally hilarious/horrifying start to the episode. Upon arriving back at camp, Keith talks about the shock of the vote, since the last he’d heard was that Reed was going home. Keith, in a rare moment of astuteness, says that this proves what a good strategist Reed is. Not an unfair conclusion, but Keith’s justification for what makes Reed a good strategist, as mentioned above, is that Reed is good at math, which, Keith says, he is not. The hilarious part is obvious: it’s said in such a backwoodsy way, and is so self-deprecating, that you can’t help but laugh. The horrifying part? Well, Keith’s quote reminds me of a famous quote from the “Barbie” franchise that goes “Math is hard and stuff!” Incredibly demeaning towards women as the whole incident referenced above is, I’m more distracted by imagining Keith’s head atop a “Barbie” doll. Now, where did I put that brain bleach?

On a much smarter note, we get Natalie’s reaction to Jeremy’s blindside of the past episode. For once, this season breaks its streak of circumspect blindsided allies, as Natalie is clearly not too happy that Jeremy is gone, and that she was not told. To her credit, though, she does not have a major blowup like I would have thought. She’s pissed and lets you know it, to be sure, but she doesn’t come off as over the top in her rage, such that it would alienate allies, but rather like a woman scorned, which makes the group more feel guilty. Jon, perhaps having realized that alienating Natalie means that she’s free to turn on him and make it five against himself, Missy, Baylor, and Jaclyn, does swift damage control, justifying his vote-off of Jeremy by telling Natalie that he has an idol. Ok, I can see how that would make Natalie less likely to go against you, but it could also easily backfire, and make her more likely to go against you, as you’re now a bigger threat. More importantly, and this is my sticking point, Jon, IT IN NO WAY JUSTIFIES BLINDSIDING JEREMY, NOR DOES IT MAKE UP FOR THE FACT THAT IN BLINDSIDING JEREMY, YOU’VE ALSO BLINDSIDED NATALIE. Good effort, though.

In a good bit of politicking, Natalie makes nice with Jon and his alliance, but privately admits that she’s still pissed, and goes all Sandra Diaz-Twine (“Survivor Pearl Islands”) on this show, swearing vengeance for Jeremy whatever it takes. Frankly, I am very well pleased with this development. Apart from the fact that Sandra is actually a very cunning strategist, more so than she’s given credit for, Sandra types are people you can root for, and frankly, this season now desperately NEEDS someone you can root for. That’s really the big problem with Jeremy’s blindside this week: it got rid of the last likeable strategist. Granted, this season was always going to have problems finding likeable strategists to root for, or even just strategists to root for, but it has since compounded the problem by eliminating said strategists in rapid succession. First Dale, then Josh, and now Jeremy have left, with only a small Julie break in between. Don’t get me wrong, those made for exciting episodes, due to how high-stakes the votes were, but by eliminating EVERY person you can conceivably root for, you kind of ruin the outcome of the season, as people just stop caring. You can tell the editors know this because of the damage control they’re doing, trying to make people seem more likeable than they’ve been portrayed thus far (Jon), or by making them seem like more active strategists than they’ve been thus far (Reed). Natalie is about the only person left who you could argue has played the game since the very beginning, and even that’s a bit of a stretch. Plus, when it comes to likeability, she’s still got her “Amazing Race” baggage with her. Still, maybe she can overcome it, and at this point I’ll take ANYTHING to get me invested back in this season.

Just to demonstrate how little there actually is to the episode, we jump right to the TEAM reward challenge, which is actually pretty basic “Survivor” stuff. One at a time, each team member will run up a ramp, and jump to get a key. Having obtained a key, they swim out to retrieve puzzle pieces in the water, and bring them to a platform. Once every team member has gone, they must find the right key to unlock the puzzle pieces, and assemble a statue; first statue assembled wins. It bears a striking resemblance to “Smash and Grab” from “Survivor Cook Islands”, and while I don’t have much of anything against the reward challenge (apart from the whole team aspect of it), it’s just pretty basic and forgettable. The statue puzzle looked nice, I suppose.

Thankfully, the reward actually brings up something to talk about. Every so often, “Survivor” decides that rather than spend all its resources producing a kick-ass show, it ought to give back to the locations that temporarily donate land for the shows use (say, maybe THAT’S why this season sucks! Too much of the budget spent on the host country!), and so a reward is used to give charitable donations to an organization or local group that needs it. They’re always fairly touching to watch, and a nice break from the usual reward. The main benefit, though, is the humanitarian side of it. Not to say that “Survivor” is getting nothing by doing these acts, of course, but it’s always nice to give back to those less fortunate, and for a show that generally values multiculturalism, it’s a nice gesture that I normally applaud. And while I still applaud this one, I can’t help but be a bit concerned. You see, what’s given on these humanitarian rewards varies. It’s been everything from Textbooks to medical supplies, but it’s always been something of value, something to help the children (and occasionally adults) of the show’s host country have a better future. This time the reward is: sporting equipment. And don’t get me wrong, “Survivor” has given out sports supplies in the past, and the kids have fun, so I have no problem. But usually the sports supplies are accompanied with something else, something that can have a lasting benefit on the recipients. Unless all these kids are going to grow up to become pro-baseball players, how is this helpful? Don’t get me wrong, something is better than nothing, but could you have given some new school supplies in addition to these baseball uniforms, Probst? I feel like that might have been more useful. Perhaps a minor nitpick, but it still bothers me.

The teams are divided (we don’t see how) and the orange team consists of Reed, Jon, Alec, and Jaclyn, while the blue team consists of Missy, Baylor, Natalie, and Wes (Keith was not picked by either side). Gee, I wonder who’s going to win?

Despite the obvious outcome, some drama does unfold from the challenge. Upon losing, Baylor starts crying. When questioned by Probst, she claims she’s crying for her mom, who has won no rewards up until this point, to which, I call BULLSHIT! I mean, yeah, Baylor, it sucks that your mom hasn’t gone on a reward, but NO ONE on “Survivor” gets that teary-eyed over another. We all know you were crying for yourself, and just trying to save face. Still, the sob-story gets the attention of Reed, who volunteers to give up his reward to Missy. Like with Jeremy and Natalie last episode, there’s an ulterior motive, but for once, it’s not to curry favor with the person you switched with. In Reed’s case, it’s because he wants to firm up a plan to vote out Jon with Keith and Wes, and the best time to do that is when most of the others are gone. Also, Wes gets sent to Exile Island. Nothing comes of it, so no one cares. Moving on.

Oddly, we get to see the reward first, and despite all of my scathing comments earlier, it’s a pretty sweet scene to see. The contestants get some food, there’s some baseball that bears a very close resemblance to American Little League (some things do transcend cultures, I guess), and a lot of sweet moments of interacting with the kids. Special mention, though, goes to Jon and Jaclyn, who use the interaction with the kids to talk about Jaclyn’s condition. Basically, she can’t have biological children. When he found out, Jon was disappointed, as he’s “always wanted to have a kid”, but quickly got over it, and still stuck with Jaclyn. You can tell at this point that the producers are REALLY trying to push a Jon and Jaclyn sob-story, and… yeah, it kind of works here. I would point out to Jon that there are many people out there with a lot worse problems than having a model girlfriend who can’t have children (something I’m sure the citizens of Ferguson, Missouri can attest to), but given how vapid he can seem at times, I do give him credit for sticking with his girlfriend through the difficult times. Not every relationship survives that, and it’s always good to see when one does. Mind you, this still doesn’t make me like Jon overall, nor does it make me respect him as a strategist, but in a season of blandness, he gets one good mark.

Far more interesting is what goes on back at camp. Natalie is still determined to show Jon up, so when Baylor suggests they go get water, Natalie rather rudely shuts her down, and says they’re going to look for the idol. I would question the wisdom of making Baylor your main ally, as she really doesn’t move without her mom, but on the other hand, Natalie has little choice, and as Baylor is only one spot above Natalie in Jon’s alliance, I can see logic to it. After smartly grilling Natalie about what was and wasn’t at camp when they arrived, Natalie finds the idol buried under a tree root. Good for her. They may try and make Jon look like the good guy, but this is clearly Natalie’s episode. She’s taking charge, and making moves left and right, good for her. Perhaps there’s hope for her yet! Admittedly, having the idol does give her the confidence to say that maybe they should wait a few votes to get rid of Jon, which is disappointing, but as I said earlier, I’ll take what I can get.

Speaking of getting rid of Jon, Reed also takes this time to elaborate on his plan. Basically, he’s going to convince Jon’s alliance that he and Alec are with them, and in case Keith or Wes has an idol, they should split the votes 4 for Keith, 3 for Wes. In actuality, however, Reed and Alec will vote with Wes and Keith for Jon, making the votes 4 Jon, 3 Keith, 2 Wes. Not a bad plan, but why should they trust you? Still, with the right amount of subtlety on Reed’s part, combined with some gullibility, it could be pulled off. Reed has the makings of a decent strategist. Shame he waited until the LAST THIRD OF THE SEASON TO PULL IT OUT!

In fairness to Reed, he seems like a nice guy, and an ok strategist (his lack of having any of his strategies succeed means I can’t in good faith be more positive than that), it just frustrates me that we’re now supposed to latch onto the guy who barely spoke for 7 episodes as a main strategist. Not going to happen.

The immunity challenge today is only slightly better than the reward. It’s a play on the “Stand on the small thing while Jeff offers you food to get you to quit” challenge. In this one, you stand back to a pole, holding two handles above your head, and balancing on the heels of your feet (it’s usually the balls of the feet, last one standing wins. Makes you look a bit like Jesus (a fact that Alec comments on), but if it weren’t for the food temptations, it would be pretty standard.

Speaking of which, let’s see what people drop out for. Despite protesting that he’d be good at this, Jon drops out first for a small plate of candy (though not before Probst tauntingly eats some of it). When everyone mocks him for it, he defiantly screams “SUGAR!”, which is actually welded very well into the sound mix. Never has a cry for candy sounded so badass. Jaclyn and Baylor jointly fall out next for chocolate chip cookies and milk, followed not too long after by Wes for hot wings and beer. Missy also drops out due to tiredness, getting her nothing, leaving Natalie, Keith, Reed, and Alec still in the challenge. In a rare moment of insight, Keith points out that Natalie is hanging in for her alliance, but the rest of the minority are fighting for their lives. When Probst points out that Wes, who’s also on the outs, is gone, Keith just says maybe he’s stupid. Father of the year, everybody!

Keith and Alec drop out for nothing, so it comes down to a battle between Natalie and Reed. In the only low point for Natalie, she pretty much gives up after three hours. Determined to make the most of it, she demands of Probst a food reward including pizza, water, and a sampling of everything else from the previous temptations. Probst magically gets these things (I thought the temptations were predetermined?), and Natalie does indeed collapse, and Reed wins immunity, in the process making us all jealous by doing a full split. I don’t even want to THINK about the pain.

Following his win, Reed proposes his plan to Missy. Missy, despite previous editing leading us to believe that she’s smart, falls for this plan immediately. She tells Jon about it, but Jon is suspicious. Missy, however, assures him that Reed is definitely on the up-and-up, and we head off to Tribal with oddly no real misdirection for the episode. Jon is the only name that’s come up so far.

The reason for this odd choice quickly becomes clear at Tribal Council: it wasn’t needed until now. There’s only one topic of debate tonight: the fact that no idols have been played, and what it means for the game. This opens up a lot of questions, but it’s Keith’s comment of “stick to the plan” that brings out the chaos, as logically Keith shouldn’t have a plan. Way to spoil the blindside, Keith! This leads to everybody talking vaguely about whom they should go for. The crown jewel of all this, though, is Natalie urging Jon to play his idol, which he does, which leads to Keith playing his idol, which leads to Wes going home with only two votes against him. A bit of an anti-climax, but a bit of chaos strategy at Tribal Council is always welcome. Actually, I can’t deny that Wes’ exit has the same problem as Jeremy’s: it doesn’t feel earned. Wes had almost no scenes this episode, and he never really seemed to be a target. I’m not as put out because I wasn’t invested in Wes’ story as much, but it does feel like an unsatisfactory exit.

While the season as a whole still has the problem of having no one to root for, I can’t deny that this episode did an ok job of getting me back into it. While I still don’t like most of these strategists, and feel their places were unearned, my respect for Natalie grows a great deal, and the bits of chaos here and there were fun to watch. One other good thing I’ll say is that this season has been very unpredictable, which I always enjoy.

As to whether or not this was a good move for Jon’s alliance, on the whole, I’d say yes. While Jon does need to go for anyone else to win, better that the revolution come from within your own alliance, to ensure that you maintain power.

If I’m not invested in the season, I feel no need to write an elaborate outro. See you guys next week for an oddly-placed two-hour special.
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Juan Del Sur” Episode 9: Talk without Action, Action without Talk

In many ways, “Survivor” is similar to the reward challenge of this evening, in and of that it is all about balance. You need to balance keeping in enough strong people to help with challenges early on, but also enough weak people so you can beat them later on. You need to balance how likeable you are, so people will want to vote for you in the end, with how unlikeable you are, so that people will actually want to take you to the end. The same is true of “Survivor” editing. While I always rail against episodes where I can see the outcome a mile away, even I admit that you need to post at least SOME evidence for the person going home, so that it feels earned. The trick is to balance it out with another plausible scenario, so that we don’t necessarily see the outcome coming. This episode does not do that. What this episode does do is keep us pretty much in the dark about the outcome the entire time. And while this may be better strategically, and it may make for a blindside of the person as well as the audience, it just leaves a bad taste in your mouth. Yeah, I’m not happy this blog. You guys are in for a treat.

One nice thing I will say about this episode, and this season overall, is that we haven’t had very much whining over the outcome of votes. We’ve had frustration, sure, that’s to be expected, but nobody’s having a pity party, and virtually nobody gives up. Reed, now having no Neil Patrick Harris to hide behind, continues this trend, and actually steps up for the first time in nine episodes. While he admits that he’s “furious” over the eviction of Neil Patrick Harris, and that his back is up against the wall, he’s not going down without a fight. Normally this heralds an exemplary episode, but as we’ll see, there are even ways to ruin the underdog. Jon, meanwhile, clarifies that the real reason he flipped was due to how the Neil Patrick Harris alliance was treating Jaclyn, a theme that will continue throughout the episode, or at least Tribal Council. It makes Jon look like more of an idiot than I was giving him credit for, and as I like looking for reasons to dislike Jon, I’m ok with this.

As I mentioned last blog, Keith seems to flip-flop between strategically ok, and downright stupid. From the get-go, we see that this is going to be an “ok Keith” episode, as he notes right away that he’s in trouble, and talks about how he might tell people to vote for himself, and accordingly use his idol. Not a bad strategy, and when you’re down by a slim, rarely tested majority, a blindside via idol can cause just the chaos you need to get back in the game. Mind you, I don’t think Keith is so smart that he can take advantage of such an opportunity, but it’s the genesis of a good idea, and on this season, I’ll take what I can get.

For some reason, this episode feels the need to be incredibly economical about its time, and so we jump straight to the reward challenge. Divided into teams of five, one person from each team at a time will square off on a swinging 2×4, attempting to push the other in the mud. Last person standing scores a point for their team, first team with five points wins a cruise with sandwiches and beverages of various sorts. This is an oldie but a goodie, hailing all the way back from “Survivor The Australian Outback”, and while it has seen some similar incarnations over the years, it’s physical, it’s a bit out there, it gets people messy, I like it a lot. Only one aspect sullies it for me: it’s ANOTHER damn team challenge! Look, I know I’ve said in the past that challenges after the merge suffer from a lack of scale, but that doesn’t mean you need to make EVERY reward challenge after the merge an arbitrary team challenge. Give people the opportunity to take who they want on reward, and thereby screw themselves over. Let us see who amongst the people is the strongest, that they might be targets. I’m not saying get rid of team challenges post-merge entirely, of course, but we need more individual challenges that are actually individual challenges, and find ways to give them the scale they deserve.

Anyway, as to the challenge teams themselves, the blue team consists of Wes, Keith, Jon, Jaclyn, and Missy, while the orange team (I refute Probst’s assertion that the color is “yellow”) consists of Jeremy, Natalie, Baylor, Alec, and Reed. A bit more evenly matched this time around, and it makes for an exciting challenge. I give the orange team the edge, if only due to Jaclyn not being on their team. Sure enough, it comes down to a 4-4 tie between the teams, but Baylor pulls it out for the orange team against her mother, which of course Probst just HAS to play up, since it’s a “Blood vs. Water” season, and it’s not like this is a competition where this sort of thing shouldn’t be a big deal.

However, for once it’s very easy to ignore Probst’s failed attempts at drama, because this cast gives us a moment of actual drama. Exploiting a rarely-used rule, Natalie volunteers as tribute… I mean gives up her reward to the other team. From her phrasing, I at first think she’s speaking for the entire orange team, and I think “What are you, NUTS? You’d piss off so many people with that.” Thankfully, Natalie clarifies that she’s more sensible than that, and merely wants to give up her own spot on the reward to Jon, as a reward for his loyalty. Jeremy quickly follows suit, and offers to give up his spot to Jaclyn. Both accept and seem grateful, and to Natalie’s credit (as she did it first, I consider it her move rather than Jeremy’s, though it may have been talked about beforehand), it seems like a good move overall. As I mentioned earlier, the alliance that dominates at the moment is still a bit shaky, and this is a good way to help firm up the bond. However, I would also point out that it’s a bit of a risk. Reed, the one member of the minority with a brain, is ALSO going on the reward, and you’re leaving Jon and Jaclyn alone with HIM? Alec and Baylor are there as well, it’s true, but Alec’s also in the minority, and Baylor has shown almost no incentive to make moves on her own. You think either of them will stop Reed planting ideas in their heads? Given how pissed Jon seemed about Jaclyn’s treatment, I’m still calling it a good move overall, but a bit risky.

Making this move also puts Jeremy and Natalie in the Exile Island pool, and sure enough, Jeremy gets sent, a move I am fairly positive about. While Jon and Jaclyn both know there’s no idol to be found, they don’t want to let on that they have it at this stage, so they need to seem like they’re trying to keep any idols in their alliance. If you include his strength as a factor, Jeremy is the perfect choice to send to Exile, and he seems to whether the decision well.

Back at camp, Keith and Wes both reaffirm that they’re pretty well up the creek without a paddle, but fortunately we do get a good bit of strategy out of it. Playing things more subtly than I would have thought possible for them, Keith and Wes both ask Natalie if they can just be told if it’s their time. It’s played off like a pity thing, but the implicit statement is that they’ll be grateful to Natalie if she does, and therefore they may be inclined to vote for her at the end. For Wes and Keith, however, it gives them more security with their idol, and this threat is why Natalie really shouldn’t tell them everything. Unfortunately, Natalie lets slip that Reed is the next target, and while it’s not a game-breaking move, it’s not the best. I understand why she wouldn’t suspect such a ruse, as Keith doesn’t seem capable of thinking like that, but still, better to play close to the chest if you can.

Jeremy’s first bit of stay at Exile Island is uneventful, pretty much reiterating Natalie’s strategic ideas. However, we do get a funny bit where the yacht Jeremy should have been on cruises right by Exile Island. Taking this as a transition, we switch over to said yacht, where sure enough, my fears at least seem to be realized. Reed points out via confessional that Natalie’s and Jeremy’s giving up of the reward wins them a lot of brownie points, jury-wise, and people need to consider that. Now, I’d argue that it’s less of the case as Jon and Jaclyn are the only ones who could be particularly happy with that move, but it’s not a bad argument to make, and done with the right wording and subtlety, could be a real intriguing game-moment. Let’s take a look at what I’m sure is a fascinating conversation between Reed, Jon, and Jaclyn.

Wait, there must be some mistake, we seem to be back at Exile Island. Where’s the great strategy we were promised from Reed? Look, I like Exile Island a lot more than other people seem to, but even I admit I’d rather have strategy talk than showing the obvious suffering that is Exile Island, which is all we’re getting from Jeremy. What’s the deal, show? You can’t just show talk and then have no action surrounding it. That’s not how good foreshadowing works. You need both the talk and the outcome to make for good strategy.

Whatever, here is where the shows problems begin. At least there’s more of a point to this Exile Island showing than previously indicated. Now we actually get evidence of Jeremy’s looking for the idol, and as he’s not an idiot, he too is drawn to the giant promontory of Exile Island. Finding nothing after two days of searching, he concludes correctly that Jon has the idol, and is not happy that Jon has not told him. At the same time, back at camp, Jon reaches the same conclusion, and discusses with Jaclyn how, since Jeremy is so trusted, he could easily blow their whole idol operation wide open. Once again, very fair strategy talk, and could make for some interesting choices. Do they discuss their options about what to do? You give this episode too much credit! No, we have an immunity challenge to get to!

While it’s not strategy talk, the challenge itself is very exciting, particularly given the fact that it’s AN ORIGINAL CHALLENGE THAT’S FUN TO WATCH! SERIOUSLY! Basically, each person has to untie a rope that’s holding a bundle of blocks to dump said blocks into a basket. Having done so, the blocks must be stacked into a three-tiered structure, and then a small flag must be placed in the middle. The first person to complete the structure, flag and all, wins immunity. Sounds pretty simple and boring, right? But there’s a catch. All these tasks must be done, using only the feet. A novel concept! And no, that’s not sarcasm, I’m all for that mechanic. Taking a simple task and making it complex with one small wrinkle, that’s a GREAT individual challenge idea. And while the structure itself is small, the focus on the intricacies of building it gets us focused on the challenge and gives us a great sense of scale. If you can’t go for the full big scale, go extremely small scale, that’s an excellent solution to the individual challenge scale problem I discussed earlier. And for once, Probst’s statement that this is a “Survivor” first is actually CORRECT! I know, right, who would have guessed? Figures the one time they DON’T play up a “Survivor” first, it’s actually legit.

Of course, being a person on the internet, I cannot be this positive, and I actually do have two nitpicks with this challenge. The first is the proper name, which is “The Game is Afoot”. Not that the name itself is bad, of course. No, I’m all for bad puns, and the name fits here. No, my problem is that Probst, during the challenge preview, attributes the quote to TarZAN of “Survivor One World”. Have you never heard of “Sherlock Holmes”, Probst? Is your cultural knowledge COMPLETELY limited to just the world of “Survivor”. So, instead of having your challenge name be attributed to one of the greatest sleuths of all time, you have it attributed to guy most well remembered for ranting about his soiled undergarments. Classy. My other problem is not with the challenge itself, but with the end result. As with most challenges, it comes down to a race between a few people, in this case Baylor and Reed. Now, this WOULD be a good buildup of tension, casting doubt about whether or not the main target of the evening would be safe or not, except that the previews already SHOWED us that Reed is going to do desperate things, things he wouldn’t do if he was safe. Thus, the outcome becomes a forgone conclusion.

Sure enough, Baylor wins, and so Reed resorts to his aforementioned desperate measures. Despite calling it “scummy”, he searches through Keith’s bag, and finds the list of rules relating to the idol. He then blows this news to Missy and Natalie, hoping they’ll go for Keith instead of him. There’s some talk about it, but Keith once again displays that he isn’t ALWAYS an idiot by realizing his bag was searched, and that people probably already know he has an idol, so he might play it tonight. Pretty ho-hum misdirection, and while we do get a mix of talk and action here, it’s downplayed from what we were promised, and so I feel disappointed.

Still, there’s one more small bit that needs to be addressed. Following what could liberally be called a confrontation between Jon and Jeremy, Jon decides he needs to do something about Jeremy and his knowledge of the idol. In what is a fairly smart move, he comes clean to Missy about it before Jeremy has a chance to make a liar out of him. Jon says this cements their trust, and that they need to take Jeremy out in the next council or two, before he does real damage. Missy seems to agree, but having been allied with Jeremy for so long, plus the idol being so powerful, makes her wary. Still, this is decent enough strategy on Jon’s part, I guess, and it’s good setup for the future. Of course, we’ve gotten almost no hints about this until the last second before Tribal Council, so there’s no way it’s going to amount to anything just yet. Mainly it’s planning for the future. Besides, if Jeremy WERE to leave this episode, this would make the first two-thirds of the episode pretty much entirely pointless. But, of course, the editors wouldn’t be so stupid as to do THAT, would they? HINT, HINT!

Admittedly, Tribal is actually a pretty contentious affair. It starts out calm, with Jeremy and Natalie discussing giving Jon and Jaclyn their reward, but quickly turns sour with Reed pointing out how there might have been an ulterior motive. This somehow segways into talk of where the idol might be, and how Wes and Keith are on the outs. Proving once again that Keith can’t be smart for the duration of a whole episode, he gets embroiled with a pointless argument about who comes to who for strategy with Jon and Jaclyn. Way to alienate the people who’re deciding when you go home, guys!

So, every bit of evidence at this point indicates nothing but an average Tribal. Now let’s see if Keith or Reed goes home. There’s benefits to both. Keith’s idol makes him a threat, not to mention the fact that people are underestimating him. However, Reed is overall more strategic and more physical. Take him away, and the minority has virtually no brain. Not sure if there’s a wrong move here. Ah, I see Probst has the results, and it looks like Jeremy is going home, just as we all… WAIT, WHAT?

Yep, say goodbye to good strategy, folks, our last hope has just had his torch snuffed. Jeremy has gone home, and I am INCREDIBLY unhappy. Apart from Jeremy being my personal favorite of the season, and apart from him being the only real exemplary strategist left in the game, this really just did not feel earned. I’ll admit I didn’t see it coming, but that’s because there was almost no evidence for it coming, and so it didn’t feel earned. One of the titans of the season was downed by players I consider to be on the low end of average at best, and it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Really, the only good strategy people left are Natalie, Missy, and Reed, and of these, Natalie doesn’t seem to have much of a chance at this point, and Missy and Reed haven’t been playing the game until recently. Not the sort of people you want to see go far.

Putting aside my personal feelings for the moment, however, I can’t deny that this was a good move. As it stood at the start of this episode, Jeremy was going to win everything. Anyone else needed to take him out, and now they’ve done so, thereby improving pretty much everyone’s chances at the win. For Missy, Baylor, Jon, and Jaclyn, a major threat is gone, while for Reed, Alec, Wes, and Keith, the dominant alliance is once again all shook up. Natalie is really the only one who suffers, which stinks, because she’s about the only person I can, in good conscience, root for at this point.

Yeah, this episode really rubs me the wrong way. Whereas you want to see at least a few strategists make it far, this season has the problem of “Survivor Nicaragua”, where we’re getting the strategic titans out far too early. This makes for unpredictable episodes, to be sure, and on some level I’m glad this won’t just be straight alliance lines voting for the next few episodes, but also makes for an unsatisfying conclusion, which every season really needs. Think about it: do you really want anyone left to win? Apart from Natalie, who is about the ONLY person left for whom the argument could be made that she played from the beginning (it’s possible Coyopa simply overshadowed her), not really.

But before I sign off completely, let’s talk about one person who I now think is getting the winner’s edit, and who sickens me to my core: Jon. Now, I’ll admit, Jon has made some decent strategic moves, getting out the power players and maintaining the swing vote position so he can be in charge. Why do I still not consider him a good strategist? He didn’t earn it. I’m not saying you have to play the game from the beginning, but Jon entered this game with no clue what to do, and no whole game plan. It was only by very lucky circumstances that he got in a power position. While I’m not trying to belittle that sort of circumstance, as it’s endemic to the game of “Survivor”, it really feels like Jon is just playing as he goes, and not in the entertaining way that Tony Vlachos (“Survivor Cagayan”) did. He comes off as a pretty boy who thinks he’s really smart, but is really only just average, and we had to sacrifice good players for HIM? Say what you will about Josh and Jeremy, they LOVED the game, and they studied it hard. Jon, from what I’ve seen, is someone they brought in as the good-looking guy, and largely by luck, is not in the lead. They’re playing him up so sympathetically, and so strategic, that I think he’ll win, and it will be a disaster. Jon is not a good winner. He’s a guy who just one day decided it would be good to play “Survivor”, and his continued existence, and especially his dominance, is an insult to all those who love the game. Not a Julie McGee level of insult, by any means, but an insult none the less. The best comparison I can make is to Benry from “Survivor Nicaragua”, a guy of limited intellect who somehow manages to continue his game existence while good players drop left and right. You know how many Benry fans there are out there? Neither do I, but it’s definitely a single-digit number. We don’t want this guy winning. Not at all.

Significantly less excited for this season now there’s really no one to watch, but I’ve been wrong before. We’ll see if next episode can prove me wrong again.

-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Juan Del Sur” Episode 8: Whoever Smelt It, Dealt It

Being obsessed with “Survivor”, and being a psychology major, it’s only natural that, thanks to my loving parents, I have acquired a book entitled The Psychology of “Survivor”. Said book is really a collection of psychological essays about “Survivor” (there’s a shock), which actually cover a broad scope of psychological topics. One of the earlier essays discusses why the show’s ratings took a steep decline following “Survivor The Amazon”, and proposes that it’s because this was the point where, thanks to Rob Cesternino, people no longer had to worry about the stigma of flip-flopping. In short, the morality is cut out of the show, and thus there are no more psychological dilemmas to get invested in. While I think they may have a point, I feel they overstate their case, and also that it’s not entirely gone. This episode is a prime example of such a time, as a good strategic move is caused, fairly directly, by morality. But this intro isn’t nearly long enough! There’s no “Top 5 and Bottom 5” list for this week, so how are we going to make this blog obscenely long? Why, with another rendition of…

MATT’S MESS-UP!

Yes, last week I was so caught up with dissecting just how horrible the new tribe name is that I forgot to comment on the OTHER new aesthetic aspect of the merge. Namely, I forgot to talk about the new Immunity Idol. It’s ok, I guess. I like the face it has on the front, and unlike a lot of past idols, I think I could remember it well, and connect it easily to the season. Really, the reason I don’t love it is all the holes. Maybe it’s just me, but the idols feel a lot grander when they’re larger. Small idols, or idols taken up with a lot of blank space like this one, don’t do it for me. Still, a solid effort, and I’ll happily let it pass.

This episode tries to get in my good graces from the beginning, by having everybody badmouth Julie, and deservedly so. Missy in particular is stung by Julie’s leaving, since Missy is one of the few people in this game who’s conscious about alliance numbers. Thankfully, Missy can do basic math, and realizes that her alliance still has the numbers, assuming Jon and Jaclyn are being truthful. Of course, this means we have to cut to Jon and Jaclyn talking about how they’re itching for a Tribal Council, because we didn’t just hear THAT from everyone else earlier! Actually, I should say we cut to Jon talking about how they were going to vote out Jeremy, since Jaclyn has shown time and again to have no agency and no brain in this pairing, and so she might just as well be counted as an extension of Jon…

Wait, did Jaclyn just make a point? And not just that, a point that’s well-thought-out and relevant to the game? I believe she did! Yes, in a pleasant surprise Jaclyn actually puts her oar into the strategic talk this time, and we find out she’s not half-bad at it, either. When Jon comments that it’s good to take out Jeremy since he’s the head of the alliance, Jaclyn rightly points out that Reed and Neil Patrick Harris are in the EXACT SAME POSITION on the other side. This episode was marketed as “people strategizing over social rather than strategic reasoning”, but here, out of the blue, and honest-to-goodness debate, counter arguments and everything. Jon does shut Jaclyn down fairly quickly, saying that Reed and Neil Patrick Harris don’t want them gone like Jeremy does. I would point out that while Jeremy may WANT you out, assuming alliances hold to the end, Reed and Neil Patrick Harris are the ones who have the MEANS to get you out, but that’s going to come later. Jaclyn takes the shutdown fairly well, and while I was pissed about it at the time, Jaclyn more than makes up for it later.

Challenge Time. Today’s reward challenge, much like the immunity challenge, is a reused one, but it’s actually one we don’t see too often. It basically takes the first half of the immunity challenge from “Survivor Redemption Island”, and makes it a challenge in and of itself. Divided into teams of five, the contestants load heavy puzzle pieces onto a platform, which they must then push to the other end of track. Once all the pieces are there and unloaded, the contestants must assemble a puzzle in the form of a pyramid. This pyramid is then used as a staircase to reach up and unlock a bust, which the contestants must then haul up a ramp. First group of contestants to get their bust to the top wins a taco smorgasbord, and sends one person to Exile Island. While I don’t like team challenges post-merge, it does solve the problem of a loss of scale in the individual phase of the game, and I cannot deny that it works here. It’s a big, memorable challenge with a lot of fun elements we haven’t seen in a while. I particularly like using the puzzle as a staircase, as it’s something we rarely see on this show, apart from, you know, the times where the puzzle actually IS a ladder or staircase.

The orange team is made up of Jeremy, Natalie, Reed, Wes, and Keith, while the blue team is made up of Jon, Alec, Jaclyn, Baylor, and Neil Patrick Harris. Missy is chosen to sit out, which seems odd to me. Yeah, she is older, but she’s shown to be decent in the challenges, more so than either Jaclyn or Baylor, I’d say. But in any case, with regards to the teams: One of these things is not like the other. One of these things just doesn’t belong. Yeah, nothing against the blue team, but in both brains and brawn, they’re way outclassed. They put in a nice effort, I’ll give them that. They did make it very close. However, the orange team wins, and ultimately decides to send Jon to Exile Island, on the grounds that he hasn’t been yet and that he’s strong enough to handle it. A fair justification, and Jon seems to take it well, so no harm done. What’s unspoken is the fact that Jon is the swing vote, and so both sides can claim sending him to Exile, and thereby the possibility of an immunity idol, was strategy.

This reward hits a lot of sour notes, both figuratively and literally. In terms of the figurative, it’s just boring. As Reed rightly points out, the team is split right down the middle in terms of alliances, so there’s no strategic talk that could have made everything more interesting. Keith tries to work some deception, saying that had they gone to Tribal Council after Julie’s departure, he doesn’t know how they’d have voted, but nobody buys it. I particularly like Jeremy’s look of “I’m SURROUNDED by idiots.” during the whole thing. The other figurative sour note is the fact that the spirit of Sabrina Thompson (“Survivor One World”) lives on in this game, as they insist upon calling their victory a “W”. Is this just something I’ve never heard of? To me, calling a win a “W” just sounds stupid and forcefully hip. I could go the rest of my like without hearing that colloquialism and never miss anything. As to the LITERAL sour notes, well, the producers needed to fill the time with SOMETHING, so we get to hear about Wes’ gastrointestinal difficulties. We also get to HEAR said gastrointestinal difficulties, as the influx of beans has Wes burping and farting all over the place, somewhat to the embarrassment of Keith. This, instead of good strategy. That last bit of episode I’ve been building up better be worth it.

Thankfully, things are a little more strategic back at the camp. Neil Patrick Harris is sad, because evidently he really likes tacos, but admits that now he can have the strategy talk that he wanted. Despite the utter failure of this line of argument last episode, Neil Patrick Harris is still not ready to give up on getting Baylor on his side, and so once again lays the guilt trip card on her. Ok, while Neil Patrick Harris is in the top echelon of strategists this season, he does have a major flaw: he makes the same arguments over and over, and expects them to have different results each time. That’s no how it works. You can restate your old arguments, certainly, but you ought to have some new ones as well, or at least have a new spin on the old arguments. But no, Neil Patrick Harris gives Baylor the same argument, almost word-for-word, and, shock of all shocks, gets the same result. In fact, this may even have been a net LOSS for him, as Baylor is now really on board with voting him off. “I think he might be blackmailing me.” she says. NO! Really? Surely not! Neil Patrick Harris says that now Baylor has moved up on the elimination list, though of course Jeremy is still the number one target. This means that either plotlines are being set up for later, in which case the episode itself is a bit of a bore, or else that Jeremy becomes unavailable as a target, making the interview relevant to the episode, but also eliminating all tension from the immunity challenge.

Well, perhaps something more interesting is happening at Exile Island. Jon arrives, and talks about how he doesn’t want people to think he’s controlling Jaclyn, and that people should know they’re an equal partnership. And you’re doing a bang up job of it thus far, Jon! Ok, I know that he does get a lot better about this later, and doesn’t just strongarm Jaclyn like he has in the past, but at the time, Jaclyn really seemed to have no agency, one counterargument that she didn’t argue too strongly notwithstanding. Also, if you’re trying to win the game, wouldn’t you WANT the person with you at the end to seem like a tagalong? I’m just saying, it makes it easier to beat them.

Interviews to avoid looking like a sexist jerk out of the way, Jon moves on to the idol clue, which, since it does not say “Back at your camp” indicates that the idol is somewhere on Exile Island. The clues indicate it’s somewhere near the waterline, and a “double-edged sword” line tells Jon it’s probably somewhere on the promontory of Exile Island. That, and the fact that idols are nearly always hidden by some major landmark so that people actually have a chance at finding them. Still, I’ll give Jon credit where credit is due, he did do a good job of figuring out the clues, and after a decently long while searching, manages to find the idol.

For once, this season DOESN’T give us the promised scenes all of 10 seconds into the show. No, they’ve waited until now, at about the halfway mark, to finally get to the sexism story line. With everyone back from reward (though Jon is still on Exile Island), we get to see Alec, Wes, and Keith generally living high on the hog, as well as Wes continuing his gaseous emissions from earlier. However, Jeremy says that while he understands their behavior, there’s a time and place for it. And evidently, a deserted island off the coast of Nicaragua is not such a place. While I think that the reaction to these guy’s behavior is a bit overblown, as a lot of it comes from Alec, and could just be seen as easygoing teasing, it can’t be denied that they’re kind of being jerks, overall leaving the women out of the conversation, and telling them to go do things in an impolite manner. Baylor in particular is on the receiving end of the jerkish behavior, as she seems to do the least around camp. To be fair, we don’t see her working all that hard, but still, guys, there’s a polite way to do these things.

The whole “sexism” storyline comes to a head when Keith and Alec ask the women to watch the fire, and quip loudly as they leave that Natalie will do it, but they’re not sure about Baylor and Jaclyn. Evidently, the guys think the women won’t care about these sorts of comments. Unfortunately for the guys, they do care, and Jaclyn in particular realizes that without Jon around, the alliance will not take her seriously, and gives her more doubts as whether this is the right alliance. Not the most strategic of reasons to question one’s alliance, but it is logical, and if it makes Jon and Jaclyn make the right move, I’m all for it.

Last season, Probst, questioning whether memory challenges were really hard enough, asked people via twitter whether they wanted to see such challenges stick around. Unfortunately, people said yes, and so this immunity challenge is a boring “remember the symbols one at a time in the proper order” challenge, that’s way too easy, no fun to watch, and just needs to go away forever. The one upside in all this is that the challenge comes down to Jeremy and Neil Patrick Harris, the two people who are up for elimination today. This adds a bit of drama, but overall the challenge falls flat, particularly when Jeremy’s eventual victory was so obviously foreshadowed earlier with the Baylor talk.

After the challenge, the Neil Patrick Harris alliance wastes no time in agreeing that Baylor needs to go. They tip Jon off, assuming he’ll tip Jaclyn off, and Jon seems on board. Jaclyn, however, greatly steps up in my estimation by actually standing up and trying to be an equal partner in the alliance. She brings up how she was treated while Jon was away, and while I’m sad that she frames it more emotionally than strategically, she does make a fair point, and it does rattle Jon on a visceral level. Jon, however, is trying to play with his head rather than his heart, but this time Jaclyn is ready for his counters with one of her own, pointing out that overall, the Neil Patrick Harris alliance is physically stronger, and therefore more threatening to Jon as an alliance. When Jon points out the Jeremy is both a challenge and a finals threat, Jaclyn argues, rightly, that Jeremy is only one man, versus the five men (apart from Jon) in the Neil Patrick Harris alliance. Jon seems unconvinced, though his confessionals are more unsure than they are now. While it’s not Jaclyn being particularly assertive, she is working herself into the strategy, and pretty decent strategy to boot. While I doubt she’ll be a stand-out character of the season, I am happy that Jaclyn’s now rising to give us something.

Still, Jon’s probably going to need some extra push to go against the Neil Patrick Harris alliance. Enter Keith Nale. I’m not sure what to make of the man. Sometimes he’s fairly smart, sometimes he’s stupid. He made a good point early after the challenge about checking up with Jon and Jaclyn, but then does stupid things like what we see here. As he goes to the well with Missy and Jeremy, he comments on how Baylor is doing nothing, needs to be voted out, and just badmouths her in general. This is not a bad idea if you’re trying to get people on your side, but at this point, you have the majority, so there’s no need, and you only arouse the anger of Missy by talking bad about her daughter. Case in point, after Missy relays this information, and after it becomes clear that Jon and Jaclyn are known by everyone to be the swing votes but no one can do anything about it, Baylor orders her mom to talk to Jon again. One small negative point on this episode: Baylor really comes off as useless. She’s honestly not taking any strategic reins for herself, and just letting her Mom do all the work. I understand the temptation, of course, but it just isn’t fun to watch. I mean, this particular episode, Jon and Jaclyn have more of a conversation than they do. Baylor’s just coming off as whiny at this point. In any case, Keith’s tirade has made Missy go back and talk to Jon again, putting the arguments for voting out Josh fresh in his head as they head off to Tribal Council.

I have to say, this is one of the most straightforward Tribal Councils I’ve ever seen. Wes, ever the brains behind everything, openly reveals the alliances to Probst, and Jeremy, despite trying to remain noncommittal, agrees. This leads to a discussion about the pros and cons of both sides for Jon and Jaclyn, and while I do miss the subtle politicking, there’s something fascination about two sides duking it out so openly for the swing votes. In particular, I like how Natalie subtly brought up the men’s behavior, knowing that it would get a rise out of Jaclyn, and potentially shift things in her alliance’s favor. One small sentence out of her, and Jaclyn’s on the warpath. Reed, seeing that things are quickly spiraling out of control, appeals to Probst for time to make a counterargument for why his and Neil Patrick Harris’ alliance is better, pointing out the singles/couples divide. Unfortunately for him, Jeremy is on the scene, and calls out Reed, saying that the Neil Patrick Harris alliance will simply discard Jon and Jaclyn once their votes no longer matter. Reed denies this, pretty convincingly, but the damage is done, and the idea is in Jon and Jaclyn’s heads.

Despite the foreshadowing we got earlier, with just how much Josh seemed to be in control (an obvious set-up for an ironic vote-off), this episode does a good job of misdirection, by giving Baylor a lot of screentime, and by having Jon fight so hard against Jaclyn’s arguments. Still, in the end the couple make the right decision, and Neil Patrick Harris is sent home. While this is a major loss for the season, as Jeremy is now pretty much the sole strategic game in town (though I’m not giving up on Natalie and Missy just yet), and he was fun to watch, this was the proper move. As I said last week, Jaclyn has no ties to pretty much anyone at this point, and Jon doesn’t really have ties to anyone in the Neil Patrick Harris alliance at this point. That, plus the fact that Jon can make a majority a lot more ways in the Jeremy/Natalie/Missy alliance than he can in the Neil Patrick Harris alliance, makes it pretty much a no-brainer. So clearly, this means Jon has no brain, since he resisted the idea for so long.

This episode teetered on the edge of being simply awful, but the ending pulled it all together. Had Baylor been voted out, this episode would have been the alliance we all thought was in control staying in control, a defeat of independent thought from Jaclyn, and a pretty disgusting and pointless sexism subplot. Instead, it ended up being relevant to the episode, and we had a major alliance shift. Sure, we lost a pretty good strategic player, and the rest of the season may suffer for it, but all the same, this episode is currently the highlight of the season. Some underdogs rising up to do well, good strategy, and excellent misdirection with only one or two awkward moments make this episode a highlight.

Now, before I sign off, there’s one question this episode raises that needs to be addressed: Is it good strategy if you make the right move for the wrong reasons? At least, that’s what the episode wants to ask, with Jaclyn seemingly making moves based on emotion rather than strategy, but I don’t think it does. For both Jaclyn and Jon, I think it was strategy based on logic. The most you can say about the influence of the sexism subplot is that it made Jaclyn a bit stronger in her convictions. The strategy, however, still came from her, and was not, I think, born out of the sexism alone, but also what she’d been thinking about. So, why did they flip back? Well, apart from Jaclyn’s arguments, I think it’s all about the idols. Jeremy’s winning immunity was a big hindrance to the plans of the Neil Patrick Harris alliance, as now, even if they had the majority, they’d have to deal with a desperate Jeremy, which is not something to be trifled with. Further, despite how little screentime it got, I think Jon’s finding an idol had a huge impact on the vote. Bear in mind, Jon is still convinced Jeremy is out to get him, hence his hesitation in joining Jeremy’s alliance. However, with the idol in his pocket, he can prevent a lot of Jeremy’s strategizing, and give himself and Jaclyn a continued power position beyond the first Tribal Council. If that’s so, good for them, that’s all sound reasoning.

While I’m not convinced that future episodes will live up to this one, this was still a fantastic episode. And don’t mourn Neil Patrick Harris too much. He’s on the jury, so he’ll still be around. Perhaps that will liven up next week.
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Jual Del Sur” Episode 7: #hashtagsarestupidandshouldgodieforever

Ah, the “Survivor” merge. A time of infinite possibility. A time where strategy comes to a head. A time when, depending how things are handled, you can either get one of the best episodes of the season, or else a thrilling anticlimax. This is a case of the latter. While not the WORST merge episode I’ve ever seen, this one falls pretty low on the list. Admittedly, what good moments it DID have were highlights for the season thus far, but man, the lows were pretty cringe-inducing. Let’s take a closer look.

In an odd twist, we start not immediately after Tribal Council, but the next day. Keith, not too surprisingly, is fairly annoyed that he got unexpected votes at said Tribal Council, and is particularly unhappy with Missy, as he correctly assumes that she orchestrated the vote. Missy protests, not unfairly, that they were paranoid about Dale’s idol, and had to hide the vote to protect themselves. Keith, however, is too offended to consider this argument, and I don’t blame him. When supposed allies vote for you, you drop those allies. That’s pretty basic “Survivor”. Admittedly, this doesn’t tell us much more than we already knew, as the merge was heavily publicized for this episode, and one assumes that couples will stick together. All this did was firm up that idea in the minds of the audience.

Hunah Poo-Poo wastes no time in hitting our plot points, as they get Tree Mail telling them to pack their belongings and march to a designated location. They correctly assume that this is a merge. Admittedly, another tribe shuffle is also a possibility, but the belongings bit makes it unlikely.

As Hunah Poo-Poo packs, we find out that Jeremy’s paranoia may actually have been justified. Our requisite “I had everything set, and now have to start over.” confessional comes courtesy of Neil Patrick Harris, where we find out, yes, he DID have Reed, and wanted to take Jeremy out. This actually makes me rescind a few of the negative things I said about Jeremy. He read the situation 100% correctly, and we just never got to see evidence of it. On a related note, Jeremy is also the one to give us our requisite “Now I’ve got a new start.” Confessional. I don’t hold it against this merge that we’ve got a bunch of generic, token confessionals before it. That’s traditional “Survivor”, and it’s understandable that a lot of the same emotions would run through the contestants each season. That’s part of the charm of the show. What can make or break a merge is how people handle those emotions, and incorporate them into their strategies. This season is a bit of an odd duck, in that this isn’t the case, and the strategy overall is quite good. However, we’ll get to something later that makes my teeth curl.

Coyopa also gets Tree Mail telling them about the merge, but not much comes of it, apart from Jon regrettably reminding us of the existence of Kat “What’s an appendix?” Eddorson of “Survivor One World”, by quoting the now infamous “No one wants to date someone who didn’t make the merge.” Line, which I could have gone the rest of my life without hearing. As such, we’ll skip right to the feast. Sure enough, the tribes are merging, though I can only assume that they’re going to keep the Hunah Poo-Poo name, since the buffs are pretty much exactly the same color. No, this is actually one of the more jovial feasts, as the tribes save the strategy for later, too busy finding out that they’ll be at the Coyopa camp from now on. The only sour note is Julie, who claims to be the only one without a loved one still there (Jeremy and Natalie claiming to be “each other’s loved one”, and Alec being tightly bonded with Neil Patrick Harris). Unfortunately, you have to remember this point, it’s INCREDIBLY important later.

BUT WAIT! This episode just keeps getting better! Once at the old Coyopa camp, they have to decide on a new tribe name. And oh, what a tribe name it is. I put it in quote marks, because otherwise no one will believe me.

The new tribe name is “#Huyopa”.

If, by some miracle, you haven’t keeled over and died at the mere sight of this awful, awful name, allow me to go into detail as to WHY it sucks. Hashtags are an annoying, pointless social media phenomenon that much to my and much of the world’s irritation, keep getting put on everything. I’ve accepted that they’re pretty much here to stay, and that I have to get used to them popping up on my favorite tv shows from now on. But putting them in actual proper names, is just insane! It’s pretentious, stupid-looking, and just lowers the intelligence of anyone asked to take it seriously. And don’t try to tell me that they were just joking, and that the real name is simply “Huyopa”. They put the hashtag on the actual tribe flag. It’s official. Join me at the bottom of this blog post for another round of good bashing of this incredibly awful name.

Fortunately, we’re saved from the horror that is the new merged tribe name (I refuse to type it again), by the airing of a new reality show: WORLD’S GREATEST DAD! Each week, a new father will attempt to demonstrate his love for his child in whatever way he deems most fit. Our contestant tonight is Keith Nale from Louisiana. We hear it’s his son’s birthday. He must have something special planned! Let’s see what he does…

KEITH: “Honestly, I just forgot.”

Wow. That sounded cold and heartless. What little love there was for Keith Nale is now gone. And the ratings are plummeting. WORLD’S GREATEST DAD will never be seen again. Please, try to scrub this awfulness from your minds, along with the new tribe name.

Seriously, though, there actually is some good stuff to this episode. Unfortunately, it all comes in one big block. If you couldn’t have guessed, I’m referring to that clash of titans, Jeremy and Neil Patrick Harris, the only two people on this season who seem to have brains, though Natalie and Missy are putting up strong contention. Our opening gambit comes from Jeremy, who correctly surmises that he does not need to talk to everybody, given how many pairs there are. By talking to just one member of the pair, he gets them both. Accordingly, he talks to Jon and Missy, and gets the best news he can hear. The two are still tight, and want to work with himself, Natalie, and Julie. Bringing along Jaclyn and Baylor, this gives them seven out of twelve, which is a majority.

However, on “Survivor”, making the first move is not always the best. Neil Patrick Harris has seen what Jeremy is doing, and uses it in his own arguments against him. Specifically, he talks to Baylor in the hopes that she can sway Missy to her side. Baylor tries valiantly to play up that she’s thinking about siding with him, but both he and Reed admit later that they see right through it. Baylor talks with her mom, and agrees that staying with Jeremy is the best thing, but she feels bad for betraying Neil Patrick Harris, since he was the one who apparently “saved her” several times. A couple thoughts on this. First off, in Baylor’s case it’s NOT the best to stick with Jeremy. True, as a whole for the PAIRS of Jon and Jaclyn and Missy and Baylor, it’s best to stick with Jeremy and his alliance. The reason couple’s alliances don’t work is simple game theory. True, the outcome is better for couples as a whole to keep each other round, but a single couple can get much farther using the swing votes of individuals. In short, couples are too dangerous to other couples. They can’t help but eat each other. However, the alliance with Jeremy works out well. True, only two couples will remain, but out of that alliance, they’ll have the majority. They can pick off the individuals when they want, or even use the individuals to get rid of the other couple. Despite this, however, Baylor is at one major disadvantage in this alliance: she knows nobody. True, Jaclyn doesn’t really know anybody either, but to be fair, she was on the bottom of Coyopa whichever way you swung it, so she’s no worse off following Jon. Baylor, however, DOES have relationships with the Neil Patrick Harris alliance, and so she could work a little harder at maybe convincing Missy to go with them. Secondly, “all the times he saved you”? Correct me if I’m wrong, here, but didn’t he vote AGAINST you in the first Tribal Council? Didn’t you say you weren’t going to trust Neil Patrick Harris as much anymore? Does that count for nothing?

Evidently, it DOES count for nothing, as Missy basically tells Baylor “No”, and Baylor goes along with it. Say what you will about Laura Morett and Ciera Eastin on the first “Survivor Blood vs. Water”, but whether or not their strategies were good, they at least TALKED about it, debated, and seemed like equals. Here, Mommy tells Daughter what to do, and daughter agrees. Not to say that’s unrealistic, of course. In a way, I’m GLAD to see it, since it helps differentiate this season from that other “Blood vs. Water” season. However, there’s a REASON people generally liked the original “Blood vs. Water”: it was ENTERTAINING! While not necessarily “boring”, this dynamic is far less engaging.

Missy’s ultimate advice to Baylor is to put on a fake looking smile and just answer “I need to talk with my mom.” when asked about other alliances. Unfortunately for Missy, she talks a bit too loud, and thus signals to Neil Patrick Harris that he needs to look elsewhere for allies. With few avenues left to explore, he turns to Jon and Jaclyn, saying they’ll go to the top 6 as couples and then duke it out. Jon does give it fair consideration, but ultimately seems to be leaning towards sticking with Jeremy. Personally, I think that’s the right move. While the couple’s thing is tempting, as I said before, it just doesn’t make sense strategy-wise, particularly in an individual game. Further, while Jeremy WAS trying to get you out at one point, you at least built SOME relationships with the old Hunah Poo-Poo. Jaclyn, conversely, built no relationships with anyone in the Neil Patrick Harris alliance. As such, you don’t know if you can really trust them. Better to stick with Jeremy.

Jon’s mind may be changed, however, by the turning point of the episode. It starts innocently enough, someone asking for some of the trail mix from the merge feast. Unfortunately, it’s nowhere to be found. We quickly learn that Julie, having no bonds with the new tribe, had taken it for herself, and doesn’t plan to share. A stupid maneuver with no rhyme or reason to it, and indicates that this point that Julie has simply given up. She’s found out by everyone else during a mandated bag search, and they all feast on it while she’s gone. Things seem to be kept calm, but feelings are hurt in general, and you can tell that Jon in particular is not pleased with the deception. He even goes so far as to say that he “Can’t trust Julie.” or her alliance anymore. Julie I understand, but the alliance? That’s a bit of a stretch.

In keeping with the theme of disappointing outcomes, the immunity challenge is possibly the worst of the season thus far. Basically, each contestant takes hold of two ropes. Suspended between these ropes is a disc, and on said disc is a ball. If your ball falls off, you’re out. Once you pass a certain amount of time, you move further back on the ropes, and once you pass further time beyond that, an extra ball is added. What makes this challenge pathetic is that it’s a combination of two types of challenges that were already pretty lame to begin with: the “Hold up the thing with ropes” challenge from “Survivor Samoa”, and the ball on disc balancing challenge from “Survivor Redemption Island”. Multiplying mediocre and mediocre gives you mediocre squared, and it just feels really weak, particularly for a first immunity challenge. Only two moments of hilarity: Jeremy being the first one out, for which he pretty hilariously berates himself, and the battle between father of the year Keith and son Wes. When Wes loses, there’s a lot of good-natured ribbing. That’s always pretty fun to watch.

Following Jeremy’s self-effacing tirade (he lost JULIE! Heaven forbid!), we once again size up the clash of the titans. Jeremy thinks he’s safe, but Neil Patrick Harris hasn’t given up hope. He tries the same arguments on Jon and Jaclyn again… and it works. Jon now says he’s 100% behind the Neil Patrick Harris alliance. What exactly possessed him to change his mind is beyond me. The only thing I can figure is that the Julie-hiding-trail-mix thing pissed him off to the point that he doesn’t want to work with her, and even that’s pretty flimsy. Admittedly, from the beginning Jon’s been a fan of the “Couples alliance” thing, but I refer you to my earlier arguments as to why that’s not a smart move. Jon also completes the douchebaggery by pulling a Drew, and shutting down any counterargument from Jaclyn.

However, there’s a monkey wrench in the works, and that is Missy talking to Julie. Julie’s having one of her hard times again, after Alec makes a thinly-veiled comment about the trail mix. Missy pulls a Jeremy, and tries to keep her head in the game, but she isn’t as good at it as Jeremy. Julie goes off, sulks, and then calls in Probst. She wants to quit. The elements were “Not what she signed up for.” and people are being mean and coupley and stuff. She also claims that people don’t mean anything they say to her, and are just using her. WECOME TO “SURVIOR”! What did you think you were signing up for? This is the low point of the episode for me. All this buildup for an epic clash, and we get instead what feels like a wimping-out of a contestant nobody cared for anyway. All the good stuff delayed so that a spoiled brat can complain and leave when the going gets tough. My God, this is so incredibly frustrating and irritating, that I CAN HARDLY STAND IT! RATS!

I hypothesized at the beginning of this season, during the cast assessment, that Julie was here purely to fill out the “Hot Girl in Bikini” quotient, and that I would dislike her amongst those ranks. I was wrong. Julie is an INSULT to those ranks, along with being one of the worst people ever brought on! The fact that she gave up after very little provocation makes it clear to me that she was cast only because they really wanted John Rocker (who, I would point out, was RECRUITED, and so we could have AVOIDED this mess very easily) and needed someone to go with him. She has no identity of her own, is tied only to him, and wimped out at what can at best be called a season of average difficulty. How does this make her an insult to other people brought on to fill the “Hot Girl in Bikini” quotient? Say what you will about the Kat Eddorssons (“Survivor One World”) and Morgan McLeods (“Survivor Cagayan”), they at least tried. They may have been awful, overly emotional players. They may have had next to no impact whatsoever. Their lack of intelligence may have been such a vacuum that it drained the I.Q. of everyone watching, but they at least TRIED! They put in effort, not much but a lot, and when the going got rough, they stuck it out long enough to be voted out with dignity. It’s small, but this means I can have an IOTA of respect for them. Not so with Julie. Good riddance to her, and may she never return.

The one GOOD thing to be said about this is that it does at least prolong the battle of the masterminds. Jeremy and Neil Patrick Harris were gunning for each other, and as they’re really the only strategists, when one of them leaves, the season gets much worse. At least this way, they stick around for one more episode. Apart from that, however, this is a pretty bad merge episode. When it was good, it was REALLY good. As I say, the strategizing from Neil Patrick Harris and Jeremy was a joy to watch. Everything else, however, sucked. Bad strategy, stupid moves, and unpleasant people all around. I’m hopeful that next episode can improve, but we’ll see. And the final outcome of this episode: Whereas before I was willing to be neutral about Julie, I now HATE her with a fiery passion.
Surprisingly, however, there’s one thing I hate more than Julie. It’s the new merged tribe name, which means it’s time for another:

TOP 5 AND BOTTOM 5!

I’m aware I did one last week, but this name needs to be maligned some more. Still, let’s look back at the goodness of the past first, with…

TOP 5:

5. Dabu (“Survivor Micronesia”): The first entry in the top five merged tribe names is one that’s a bit of an oddity, hence why it’s only at number 5. I normally hate simple tribe names, four letters or less, and I particularly hate it when people pick up on simple, harmonious native words for it. True, I like the appreciation for culture, but the tribe name should inspire respect and fear, not cooperation and harmony. That’s not why people watch this show! However, Dabu is a bit different, in that it was a word made up by Erik Reichenbach to fool everyone, and that’s just hilarious to me. The one guy who’s remembered for being an idiot is the guy who fools everyone with a made-up word. Props, good sir!

4. Xhakum (“Survivor Guatemala”): Apparently the low entries on this list are the ones that are something I technically hate done right. Another popular thing to do with merged tribes is to combine the old tribe names, and it drives me nuts. It’s obvious, unoriginal, and sounds stupid more often than not. Xhakum is one of these, but I let it on this list for being a bit cleverer than other combination names. Rather than just slap the two together, as previously done, they actually took the suffixes of the tribe names, and made a new one. This creates a name that sounds original, and while it does pay respect to the old tribes, it is not obviously connected, so I give it a plus.

3. Barramundi (“Survivor The Australian Outback”: Probably the most basic entry on this list. It pays homage to the local fauna, sounds really menacing, and is just a lot of fun to say.

2. Alinta (“Survivor Vanuatu”): I love it when the name can relate to the culture in some way. And while the names the contestants come up with tend to be obvious and basic, I find this one works on multiple levels. Literally meaning “People of the Fire”, this name worked well for a season subtitled “Islands of Fire”. On top of that, it just sounded cool, and was about the right length: not too short and not too long. I don’t put it at the top because it wasn’t actually the local language, but in fairness to Scout Cloud Lee, with the number of languages in Vanuatu, it’d be hard to tell what the “Local Language” is.

1. Gitanos (“Survivor Exile Island”): Whenever I hear this name, I get shivers. It sounds ominous, it bears no relation to the former tribe names, and it’s actual Spanish. All plusses! Some would argue it’s inappropriate, as the word means “gypsies” in English, but given that this was a very disunited tribe, and had Aras Baskauskas as one of the founding members, I think it fits perfectly.

Honorable Mention: Dangrayne (“Survivor Philippines”): In hindsight, I love this name. Nothing better than a big “Fuck you!” to the elements that have been giving the contestants so much trouble. Oddly, though, it doesn’t make the list proper for being TOO clever. My more astute readers may recall that I didn’t get the joke when I first heard the name, splitting the syllables between the “N” and the “G”, instead of the “G” and the “R”. Because of this, I can’t really call this one a favorite. A joke that’s too hard to get is a bad joke. Still, puns of this caliber deserve to be acknowledged, and nowadays, it’s one of my favorites.

BOTTOM 5:

5. Nobag (“Survivor Gabon”): This name is possibly one of the simplest ever created. It’s the location name, spelled backwards. Clever, I’ll grant you, but also a bit boring to say. What makes it bad, as opposed to just average, is the negative connotations the name might have. Maybe it’s just the middle-schooler in me, but I can’t help but separate this name into “No Bag”. It sounds like an insult boys hurl at each other in the locker room, which is not really a pleasant way to think about your merged tribe. Good effort though.

4. Forza (“Survivor Tocantins”): You want a name that’s culturally relevant to your season? Well, this is NOT the one you’re looking for. I’m not sure what possessed these people to give a Latin name to a tribe on a season set in Brazil, but it REALLY didn’t work. It just felt awkward and unwieldy on an otherwise good season. Bet anything this was a Benjamin “Coach” Wade brainchild.

3. Aitutonga (“Survivor Cook Islands”): I had a hard time deciding which generic old tribe name combination should make the list. Aitutonga gets it because it’s just unwieldy. I know I said I don’t like short names, but I don’t like overly-long names either. Admittedly, this one is shorter than “Barramundi”, which I liked, but something about “Aitutonga” just doesn’t flow well with me. It looks stupid, it sounds stupid, it IS stupid. At least Chaboga Mogo on “Survivor All-Stars” had a catchy song to go with it.

2. Chuay Jai (“Survivor Thailand”): I said “Aitutonga” was a placeholder for all combined tribe names for a merged tribe, and it is. But this one deserves particular mention for failing on multiple counts. On top of being an INCREDIBLY simplistic name, the words actually MEAN something in Thai language. Normally, this would be fine by me, except that by combining the names, you make an entirely new word that makes almost no sense, and sounds really stupid to boot. Do you want to know what Chuay Jai translates as? “Helpful Heart”. You took parts of the two least-threatening tribe names ever, and somehow made them less threatening. I’m not sure how you did it, but kudos.

1. #Huyopa (“Survivor San Juan del Sur”): I thought nothing could top the stupidity of “Chuay Jai”. I was wrong. At least “Chuay Jai” stuck purely to English letters. This is a stupid combined name that dates itself considerably, and somehow makes hashtags, a stupid concept to begin with, even more stupid. May this name rot in the halls of infamy for all eternity.

Honorable Mention: Murlonio (“Survivor Redemption Island”): Another made-up name that has nothing to do with the culture it’s representing. How people thought this was Spanish was beyond me. However, I keep it off the list proper because, in a strange way, it does fit the season. Let’s face it, the theme was not “Redemption” or the local culture, but instead was “Boston Rob Wins Everything”. It’s oddly appropriate, therefore, that the merged tribe name was an incredibly stupid name he came up with out of vanity. Have to admire the commitment to a theme.

Geez, several long blogs in a row, this is wearing on me. Here’s hoping next week will be interesting, pleasant, but shorter.
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Jan Del Sur” Episode 6: Go Directly to Exile Island

Time for a little insider’s tip in entertainment blog writing: develop a theme. Especially when blogging a tv show, each season tends to develop a tone to it. Whether that season is remarkable, miserable, or somewhere in between, generally each season will not deviate from that tone. This makes them easy to blog, as you can keep that tone throughout the introduction to each episode, making life a lot easier for you, the blogger. However, in the rare event that an episode deviates from said tone, you’re screwed, and have to resort to some gimmicky trick to segway into the episode, such as giving your fellow bloggers a lesson in how to write introductions to each episode’s blog. Before I can give you an example of such a segway, though, we must pause for another edition of:

MATT’S MESS-UP!

Actually a relatively minor one this time around. Last episode, I listed several reasons why Jon and Jaclyn allying with Missy and Baylor over Kelley and Dale was a bad idea. However, I failed to list one of the biggest reasons why this was a bad idea, apart from the ones given last episode. Specifically, the number of times Baylor had voted the opposite way from Jaclyn. True, neither Missy nor Kelley had ever particularly voted WITH Jon, but there was nothing to indicate they eventually wanted him out. It was made VERY clear during Jaclyn’s time on the original Coyopa that Baylor was against Jaclyn. True, Baylor did vote with Jaclyn at their last Tribal Council, but that was due to the uniting factor of Neil Patrick Harris, and you’ll also recall that while he used her vote, he INTENTIONALLY excluded Jaclyn from that alliance. Call me crazy, but maybe you don’t want to ally long-term with the person who voted against you at multiple Tribal Councils! Now, I have heard via the internet that Jon’s justification was apparently that Kelley had been campaigning to get him out first, and by that I mean even before Drew. This does change things a bit, if true, but I have to ask, if that was true, why was it NEVER shown? I get that there’s limited time in the episodes, but I think you could take 30 seconds to get a clip of Kelley saying “Jon’s a threat. We should get him off.” Changes the whole tone of the conversation. And even if that is true, that was only talk. Baylor’s actions showed that she was against Jaclyn, and as with the rest of the world, actions speak louder than words. Still going with the “Bad Idea” side here.

But anyway, the actual episode starts, predictably enough, with Dale getting fairly emotional about the loss of Kelley. I’ll cut him a lot more slack than I usually do, as the parent/child bond is fairly strong, and one of the consequences of a “Blood vs. Water” twist is that things are going to be more emotional than normal. However, I draw the line at his continued gushing about how “proud” he is of Kelley. Yes Dale, be proud of your daughter. Be proud of how she coasted for 12 days making absolutely no impact on the game whatsoever, before getting surprisingly and unceremoniously voted out.

Snarking aside, Dale quickly gets back on his feet, and starts formulating a plan to save himself. “I’m not out until I hear my name read four times” he says, and I have to admire the upbeat attitude. It would be so easy to just roll over die, game wise, in this scenario. Dale, however, decides to pull out all his cards, and show Jon his “idol” that he found back in episode one. What’s this? Setting up plot points early in the season and then ignoring them? This is NOT the “Survivor” I am used to! In all seriousness, I LOVE the fact that this was set up so early, and the point of it was not driven into the ground. Point being, it assumes intelligence on the part of the viewer, and as an intelligent viewer, this pleases me. To make matters even better, Dale plays it up very well, pointing out to Jon that he’s safe for at least one vote. Predictably, this makes Jon want to turn on Keith (though regretfully, as he informs us), and thus greatly improves Dale’s chances of survival. One should not discount Dale’s acting ability either. He pulls this off just about perfectly, and he really jumps up in my estimation. The one nitpick I could have here is that he maybe played this card a bit too early. With a few days to think it over, it’s easier for them to figure out that Dale’s idol is a fake. Better to save it for the day of, when there’s less opportunity for others to figure out the lie. Still, Keith probably won’t be in on such discussions, and he’s the primary person who could call “shenanigans”, so it’s a minor nitpick (I would also call out Dale not parlaying this into a long-term deal, as there’s no point in not parlaying a fake idol, as opposed to a real one, but Dale does this later, so I let it slide).

Determined to get ALL the advertised plot-points out of the way early, we cut over to Hunah Poo-Poo, who are all bemoaning the lack of rice, and what they’ll have to trade for it. Jeremy in particular is complaining, but not about the lack of food. His argument, not unfairly, is that Jeff’s price will be fairly high, and you can live without food. Besides, they could win a reward challenge and get food, which would make the trade pointless. Hate to say it, but I pretty categorically disagree with Jeremy on this point. Unless the trade is that you have to go to Tribal Council (which is unlikely), Jeff can’t take anything from you that you can’t make some facsimile of yourselves (i.e. shelter). By contrast, you can’t live without food, and as Jeff himself points out, their large eating habits are part of the reason they were winning. A food reward, if one comes, might help, but as Kalabaw demonstrated on “Survivor Philippines”, a temporary boost is not as helpful as one expects. I cut Jeremy a bit of slack, as it sounds like he’s been listening to a lot of complaining lately, and I don’t think he takes it well, and he does at least confine his opinion largely to private confessionals, meaning this opinion probably won’t hurt him. I also give him credit for not making the “We’re close to the merge.” argument, which while a fair argument, always annoys me. Predictable as the merge has become (and, in fact, Jeremy WOULD have been right with the “merge is around the corner” argument), you can’t assume anything on “Survivor” and playing for the merge is a strategy that can easily backfire.

Probst shows up before too long, and gives Hunah Poo-Poo a stern talking-to about their patheticness, comparing them unfavorably to the Barramundi Tribe of “Survivor The Australian Outback”. They accept this, but Reed goes on the “Blame the people who aren’t here” game, though given what we’ve seen of Missy’s serving habits, he may be telling the truth. He does bring up a good point, though, as to why no one wanted to speak up against this plan: that early on it would give people too much of a target. The explanation seems logical, so I’ll take it as true, barring further evidence.

As predicted, Probst says he’ll give Hunah Poo-Poo another supply of rice, but they have to give him their comfort reward, as well as a pot, hatchet, hammer, and one of their flints. This will leave Hunah Poo-Poo with only their new rice, one pot, their shelter, a flint, a machete, and the remaining pot. A bit steeper than what was predicted, but pretty fair. The only real losses Hunah Poo-Poo suffers from this trade are the tarp and the hatchet, and in each case you can come up with a substitute. The machete can do what the hatchet can do, and while not as good as a tarp, thickly layered palm fronds can do wonders for keeping you dry. Even so, Probst can be haggled with, and so it’s worth Hunah Poo-Poo’s while to discuss the deal. Hence, they get up, seem to congregate and… immediately start tearing down their camp. Oh well, like I said, it’s not a bad deal, although Jeremy is still fairly unhappy with it. At least he knew enough to just go along with the plan and not make waves, one small outburst at Alec notwithstanding.

“Hope it doesn’t rain!” Probst calls out ironically, as he drags away the comfort of Hunah Poo-Poo. It’s moments like these that Probst lives for, and you know it. It’s “Survivor”. There’s always going to be rain. He’s just tormenting them.

We head over to the reward challenge, where Natalie and Julie do a poor job at hiding how upset they are that Kelley is gone, as she was their ally. We don’t dwell on it for very long, though, presumably because there are fewer intense emotions that can be wrung out of it from Probst’s standpoint. As to the reward challenge itself, it’s a repeat through and through, but at least it’s one we haven’t seen in a while. One person from each tribe will navigate through a wood tunnel, blindfolded, to untie three bags of puzzle pieces. While doing so, they also feel a raised demonstration puzzle at the end. Once they have all three bags back, they must then reassemble the puzzle purely by feel. This challenge was first seen in “Survivor Gabon”, and has been rarely seen since, so it’s been long enough that I’m ok with it. Helping this challenge is just how tough it is. Admittedly, the tunnel is kind of lackluster, evidenced by how fast and relatively injury-free the people running the challenge get through it, but these puzzles are incredibly difficult, particularly given that there are “dummy pieces” that fit the puzzle, but aren’t exactly right, and the tribe cannot call out help on this challenge. The reward this time is not a choice, unfortunately, but is a pretty good one. A grill with steak and chicken kebabs, just the stuff that Jeremy was foreshadowing. I sarcastically say “Didn’t see that one coming!”

With only one pair of loved ones separated by tribe, Ancient Mayan Rock-Paper-Scissors goes the way of the Ancient Maya, and each tribe not puts up whomever they think would run the challenge the best. Reed goes up for Hunah Poo-Poo, while Baylor takes the stand for Coyopa, and I really can’t complain about any of these choices. Baylor is small and limber, so will fit through the challenge easily. Reed, meanwhile, is Spider-Man, and is therefore flexible. Also, he’s been the main “Puzzle Guy” of the season, so it makes sense to put him in the challenge.
Even so, it’s a close race, which Reed pulls out by giving a fantastic performance on the puzzle, getting only one piece wrong, and then correcting it before calling it to Probst. Seriously, that was a godly performance, and the man deserves all the credit in the world for doing so. During the challenge, we also see that Probst is on a tormenting role, reminding Reed and Baylor how EASY the puzzle would be if only they could see the pieces, due to the wrong ones being colored red.

With Reed’s win, Baylor is going to go to Exile Island, and now Reed must choose someone from his own tribe to go with her. He starts to say Julie, justifying it as another “Fuck You” to John Rocker, by proving that his wife is ok alone, before Natalie states that she was going to volunteer. Probst, hearing this info, give Reed the opportunity to make a definitive call, which he switches to Natalie. Frankly, this was a good call on Reed’s part. Unless you have reason to suspect ulterior motives to “I can handle it.”, which Reed does not at this point, if someone wants to go to Exile Island, you let them. It makes for less bad blood later. On top of that, from Reed’s perspective, you don’t want any of the former Coyopa going to Exile Island, as they could potentially reconnect with Baylor. Admittedly, if he is with Wes, Alec, and Neil Patrick Harris, this could be a bad move, but he can justify it by saying he didn’t want her around messing up their strategy. Good play, my man.

As they leave, and back at Coyopa, Missy comments on how she now KNOWS that Natalie is on her side, and will be allied with them until the end. I CRINGED when I first heard this, and it doesn’t sit very well with me even now. You don’t want to have that degree of certainty in an alliance across tribes. Such alliances are far too fragile. However, my initial reaction is tempered somewhat by remembering that Missy and Natalie were initially both Hunah Poo-Poo, and that they were allied via Jeremy. While I still say the certainty is too high, this conclusion does at least make more sense now.

Missy’s position is supported by the scene we get at Exile Island. As it turned out, Natalie DID have an ulterior motive for going to Exile Island, and it WAS to make a bond with Baylor and Missy. This way, come the merge, the two will be inclined to protect her, thus helping her chances in the game. She parlays this trip further when Baylor ends up with the clue, shares it with Natalie, and she talks about how she and Jeremy can totally find it together. In other words, Natalie has used going to Exile Island as a means to get better protection for both herself and her ally, and possibly set up a new alliance for the future. I have to admit, this is some pretty impressive gameplay. Natalie is doing much, much better than I expected, and I’m now loving watching her. Plus, this gives us a good woman strategist, something this season has been sorely lacking in.

Hunah Poo-Poo, meanwhile, celebrates their reward and their food, Jeremy enjoying himself, but giving a bit of an “I told you so.” confessional. I still like the guy, I’m still rooting for him, and I still think he’s a good strategist, but I have to admit, he is fairly negative. Along with this rant is complaining about how lovey-dovey Reed and Neil Patrick Harris are over each other, and how they act like they run the place. I don’t think Jeremy is taking well to not being in charge. Enough with the negativity, though, let’s get some positive thoughts here, with our resident nice dumb guy, Alec:

“I’m a meat lover!”

Truly, more erudite thoughts were never before expressed. So glad we kept him around.

The prophecies of Jeremy come true, however, as a torrential rainstorm bombards the camp later that day, and despite their having an adequate shelter, Hunah Poo-Poo still gets soaked. Presumably Coyopa does as well, but there’s no dramatic irony in that, so we don’t see it. Plus, it leads to another breakdown, though thankfully with no #survivorbreakdown attached. Julie finally betrays her true colors, complaining about how much this sucks after but one night of rain, and threatening to quit the game. Jeremy, in his best move of the evening, manages to talk her out of it, in a very socially sensitive and smart way. He acknowledges her feelings, but tries to impress on her how it’ll get better, and he needs her. Julie seems down even so, but no longer wants to quit, so score one for Jeremy this time.

Ok, the reward challenge could get away with being a rehash, but I draw the line at the immunity challenge. It. Just. Sucks. Basically, the tribes go over a wall (not even a sheer wall, it has rungs), before pushing a hollow cube along a straight road, stopping periodically to climb on top and retrieve bags containing flag parts from what look like gallows. Once they have all three bags, two members of each tribe race to put together a flag, the first tribe to put their flag entirely together wins immunity. This challenge, is simple, boring, and a combination of several challenges from the past. Climbing walls originated on “Survivor Borneo”, the cube (which I would add is much easier to push in this version) comes from “Survivor Tocantins”, the gallows originated in “Survivor Fiji”, and the puzzle is from “Survivor Philippines”. There’s just no good way to look at this one. I guess we’ll have to rely on the tension about who will win to make this challenge exciting.

Oh, wait, scratch that, it was totally ruined by a shot of Jon clapping Keith on the shoulders around the words “Wins Immunity”, which they’d only show us if Keith was in danger after the outcome of this challenge, meaning Coyopa is going to lose. AGAIN! Seriously, this plot line is getting old. Oh well, at least they give us some tension by having Hunah Poo-Poo fall behind early due to Jeremy getting one of the bags tangled, while Jon turns out to be a master at tossing bags around springs. However, this challenge involves a puzzle, and now that both Reed and Josh are on Hunah Poo-Poo, Coyopa is pretty well screwed in the realm of puzzles. Sure enough, they lose, big surprise.

Back at Coyopa, Dale realizes what I realized earlier, which is that with a fake idol, you really need to parlay to a long-term alliance, as simply splitting the vote may not be enough. As such, Dale promises that if he’s spared and put in a long-term alliance, he’ll give Jon his idol after the vote. This is a PHENOMENAL move by Dale, as it loses him nothing and potentially gains him an alliance. He frames it really well, saying that he’d rather have it be used for the good of all come the merge. Jon agrees, and tells him they’ll vote off Missy. However, he also tells Missy and Baylor that Dale has an idol. This gets them to split their votes. Keith, Jon, and Jaclyn will keep on Dale, in case he doesn’t play his idol, while Missy and Baylor will switch to Keith, in case he does. This gives Jon and Jaclyn all the power, as they can now vote for either Missy or Dale, and they’ll go home. I’ll admit, it’s a tough choice. Of course we, the audience, know the obvious choice is to go for Dale, since he’s outside the alliance, a shrewd player, and his main draw, the hidden immunity idol, is a fake, and therefore there is no benefit to going with Dale. Thanks to Dale’s forward thinking, though, it’s a convincing immunity idol, and so there is debate. Overall, though, even not knowing Dale’s idol is fake, I still think it’s better to stick with Missy and Baylor. While Missy’s connections on the other side are worrisome, particularly as the merge is probably soon (while making definitive statements about the merge is bad, I’ll admit there’s a time to start thinking and making moves based on it, and thus I’m ok with that thinking here), you’d alienate a bunch of potential allies by betraying two alliances in as many Tribal Councils. Plus, you’d leave a LOT more singles in the game, which is bad if you want to stick together.

I hesitate to say that this Tribal Council is boring, but I also can’t say that it’s particularly memorable. They touch upon the hardships of having a loved one voted out, and the strategy of this vote. While the misdirection has been pretty lackluster this episode, this is one area where it succeeds. There’s reasons for each side to go home, so it’s good. Ultimately, for once, sense wins out, and Dale is sent home. I’ll admit, unlike a lot of other votes this season, something of value was lost. Dale was a pretty shrewd player, and always fun to watch, and so I’ll miss him. Have to say, though, if I was in Jon’s shoes, I would have done the same thing. Why did I not say Jaclyn’s shoes as well? Frankly, given what I’ve seen this episode, I have no illusions as to Jaclyn having any agency in the alliance. It’s all Jon, all the way.

Still, if I haven’t been quite clear, this is my favorite episode of the season thus far. Sub-par challenges aside, there was a LOT of brilliant strategy this episode, and it managed to pay off old storylines as well as setting up ones for the future. Why, I’d dare say an episode of this caliber deserves a

TOP 3 AND BOTTOM 3!

In honor of the regrettable exit of Dale, I’m going to talk about fake idols this week. They’ve been a staple of “Survivor” pretty much since the hidden immunity idol was introduced. Points will be given both for the creativity of the idol/how convincing it is, and how it was used. Now, you may ask why it is that this is “Top 3and Bottom 3” as opposed to the usual “Top 5 and Bottom 5”. The answer is simply that, despite how much of a staple it is, there have actually only been 8 fake idols of note, and as such, a list of 10 is not feasible. Instead, this will be a list of 6, with no Honorable Mentions. As per usual, we begin with the:

TOP 3:

3. “Survivor Heroes vs. Villains”: Stretching the definition of “Fake Idol” just a little bit, I award the first top spot to Rupert Boneham’s rock from the season. While not used like the traditional fake idol, in that it was not a facsimile created by the finder of a true idol, it does count. If you’ve forgotten, Rupert, in an attempt to save himself as the Heroes were getting decimated post-merge, looked for an idol after Probst announced its existence after a challenge. Failing to find it, he put a rock in his pocket, hoping the extra weight would make it look like he had an idol, and thus get the votes off of him. The plan worked, to an extreme that even Rupert could not have anticipated. Paranoid Russell Hantz fell for it hook, line, and sinker, causing the votes to be split between Rupert and Candice Woodcock. Then, Rupert and Colby Donaldson turned their votes on Candice, securing Rupert another three days. A masterful play in how underplayed it was, and I particularly love that it was the supposedly “stupid” Rupert who pulled on over on the supposedly “smart” Russell Hantz. Makes me laugh every time. It misses being higher only due its plainness, and the fact that it could be argued that it’s not actually a fake idol, for the reasons given earlier.

2. “Survivor China”: Again, not one that was made, but one that was found. This season had the idol be an object in plain sight at camp, but there happened to be two such objects. One, which had writing on the back, was the real one, and one had only plain wood, denoting it a fake. James Clement had found both real ones, but Jamie Dugan found a wrong one James had discarded. Finding herself in trouble come the merge, she played it, marking the first instance a fake idol was ever actually played. In contrast to Rupert, this idol looks cool, but served little purpose to the game, apart from a bit of hilarity at Tribal Council. Even so, I remember that Tribal Council fondly, enough to give this idol the number 2 spot.

1. “Survivor Gabon”: Was this ever really a contest? Out of practically nothing, Bob Crowley managed to create an idol that was incredibly convincing, and used it not once, but twice, to split votes, get himself further, and humiliate Randy Bailey. All worthy goals, given how much of a jackass Randy was, so it’s not even much of a contest.

BOTTOM 3:

3. “Survivor San Juan Del Sur”; I wanted to put this one on the “Top” list, I really did. But space was limited, and frankly, although this one looked good, and was theoretically used correctly, it technically has to go on the bottom. This is a game about results, and while Dale did his best, ultimately the idol came to nothing. While it does look incredibly convincing, almost no effort was put into it, so I can’t really call it a “Top 3” fake idol. Still, props to Dale for effort. A few more spaces, and this definitely would have been on the “Top” list.

2. “Survivor Micronesia”: In the immortal words of Eliza Orlins, “It can’t be the idol. IT’S A FREAKING STICK!” Literally just a stick with a smiley face carved onto it, this idol displayed little effort, and served no purpose other than to draw out the real idol at Tribal Council. That might strike someone as a good use, but consider that the idol was drawn out of THE PERSON WHO MADE THE FAKE! Not something you want revealed. On the other hand, the stick was wrapped in paper, which makes a difference, and could have been seen as a sort of “Swiss Family Robinson” type idol. In either case, it’s more effort than was given to the number one worst fake idol.

1. “Survivor Fiji”: What’s lazier than a stick with a smiley face carved into it? Half a coconut with a smiley face and the words “Hidden Immunity Idol” painted on it. An idol so ludicrous, I can’t believe anyone would play it. Which they didn’t. Because it was never found. It looks lame, it came to nothing, this is clearly the worst fake idol. Plus, “Survivor Fiji” was an awful season, and I like blaming it for things.
Short thought that list was, I hope you enjoyed it! Next week looks to be chaotically strategic, so this season may turn around just yet!
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Juan Del Sur” Episode 5: Wednesday, Bloody Wednesday

This will be a hard episode to blog, and not because anything happened that makes me sad, nor has so much happened that it’s going to be overly complicated to explain. Indeed, this may be one of my shortest blogs of the season, due to how little there is to go over, and how little in depth I need to cover it. No, the problem is that, love or hate an episode, I usually have a good reason for my feelings. The intensity of said feelings can change, to be sure, but there’s always a reason. This episode, however, is an enigma. If I didn’t make it clear, very little happens this episode, and so there’s not a lot for me to commentate on/snark at. The trouble is, I still can’t help but like it, at least on some level.

Perhaps starting from the beginning will bring some clarity. Down one member, Hunah Poo-Poo hopes to get their numbers back by resuscitating the word “gnarly”. Frankly I’m surprised this wasn’t the work of Woo from “Survivor Cagayan”. In any case, it does nothing towards earning them another member, and now Jon finds himself on the outs, explaining that while he was Drew’s friend, he saw his shortcomings, and says that he’d have been on board for voting him out. I’ll say this much for Jon, while he talks a bigger game than he has (though not, admittedly to the extent of Drew), when he IS forced to play he plays halfway decently. His reaction to the vote-off is just about right, and while he’s a bit unsteady in the tribe, he’s doing a good job at getting back in their good books.

Not that this matters to Jeremy, as it’s once again time for IRONIC CONFESSIONALS! Jeremy states that he has no intention of letting Jon into the fold again, and that Jon is the next to go, which I find surprisingly shortsighted for Jeremy. While I admit that Jon is outside your alliance, and more of a threat to your game than the other people out there, he’s also really strong. After the demise of John Rocker, you can afford to lose SOME strength, but this might be a bit much. In any case, I’d say wild card Keith is more of a liability at this point, and it might be more worth it to target him. Or, at the very least, hear what Jon has to say (and I mean actually hear what Jon has to say, not just pretend to listen to him). Dear lord, this is almost EXACTLY the same mistake Drew made in the last episode (Jeremy is at least more polite about it). All this culminates in the one accurate statement of Jeremy’s, though it is also the most ironic. He states that he is in control of Hunah Poo-Poo at the moment. And I’m SURE this doesn’t mean a tribe swap is around the corner!

Coyopa, however, is not immune from the ironic confessionals either. Alec decides to soliloquize about how STRONG his brother is, and there’s no way that Hunah Poo-Poo would vote him out first. Cut to the tribes meeting up at what SHOULD be the reward challenge, and we see that Hunah Poo-Poo has voted out Drew first. Mouths drop on Coyopa, as all state that Drew was strong, and they can’t believe he was voted out. To me, this is bullshit. Apart from the fact that, like Jeff and Neil Patrick Harris point out, the Coyopans have no idea what’s going on at Hunah Poo-Poo, you guys voted out John Rocker, so obviously voting out strength wasn’t an issue for you either, and also, Drew was kind of an idiot. Yeah, a lot of it happened at the camp you couldn’t see, but there’ve been a few incidents at challenges where he’s demonstrated his idiocy. I think you could probably guess as much.

Well, the promised tribe swap happens, and now the tribes stack up as follows. Hunah Poo-Poo retains Jeremy, Natalie, Julie, and Reed, and gains Neil Patrick Harris (always a plus), Alec, and Wes. Coyopa, meanwhile, retains Jaclyn, Baylor, and Dale, while gaining Jon, Missy, Kelley, and Keith. There are a couple of insights one can see from this tribe breakdown. Hunah Poo-Poo would appear to have an advantage, having four members on each tribe, always a majority, but given how put off Jon was, it’s no guarantee that that will happen. As so often happens in a tribe swap, the tribes are uneven in terms of challenge ability, with Hunah Poo-Poo once again appearing to have the upper hand in challenges. But the big one, the one the show focusses on, and the one that is ultimately the most relevant to the outcome, is the pairs of loved ones. The tribe swap on the first “Blood vs. Water” was a bit later in the game, and due to how that one fell out, only one pair ended up united on a tribe (Tina Wesson and Katie Collins). In this case, there are a lot more pairs left, and one tribe is full of them, while the other tribe has comparatively few. Coyopa has the pairs of Missy and Baylor, Jon and Jaclyn, and Dale and Kelley, with only Keith as a singleton. Conversely, Hunah Poo-Poo only has the pair of Spider-Man and Neil Patrick Harris, while Alec, Natalie, Wes, Julie, and Jeremy are all singles. Probst questions the tribes about being with their pairs, but apart from Jeremy raising a slight red flag by saying that pairs are powerful (which does make sense, as he himself is without a pair), nobody goofs.

The tribes head back to their new respective camps, and here I must complain. While I know that challenges are not the biggest part of the game, I’ve stated before that I still enjoy them. Now, if an episode wants to skip a reward challenge in favor of a tribe swap, I’m fine with that. Tribe swaps take time, and there’s only so much footage you can put into an hour. However, if you’re going to do things that way, then DON’T SHOW ARIAL VIEWS OF A CHALLENGE ALONG WITH YOUR TRIBE SWAP! It just makes us feel denied of something awesome. If you’re doing a swap, why even have a challenge there? To fool the tribes? I’m sure there’s another way you could do that. And if they DID run a challenge, and just didn’t show it, then I feel cheated. I know the show’s supposed to be “real”, but you could edit out the missed challenge bits, and we wouldn’t mind, guys.

We get to see Hunah Poo-Poo first, where Neil Patrick Harris laments their lack of a food basket. I don’t blame him. Often, after a swap, tribes get some sort of food basket to ease the transition, and with how low Hunah Poo-Poo’s food levels are at the moment, they really can’t afford to not have food. The old Coyopans especially complain, as they both rationed their rice, and apparently had more abundant food supplies at their old camp. Jeremy, however, has greater concerns. Despite Hunah Poo-Poo having the majority, he doesn’t feel safe. Paranoid, he is certain that Reed has turned against him, and that he’ll be targeted first. Not an unfounded fear, I suppose, as of himself, Natalie, and Julie, he’s clearly the biggest threat, but I must object. From what was shown, there’s NO evidence of such an alliance, and even if there is (since it’s not an unfounded suspicion), there’s no guarantee they won’t go the “vote off the weak” strategy, meaning that Jeremy is the safest of the three. It’s a shame to see Jeremy not playing an optimal game, because while he’s not one of the greats, he’s certainly a pretty good player when it comes to strategy and building alliances, and for this season, easily outclasses most everyone else. Paranoia really seems to be his problem. While he does come up with good strategy, he doesn’t necessarily need to, and seems to overreact to threats that aren’t really there. This seems like it could be a real hindrance to his game, and I hope he starts playing better in future episodes.

As a quick aside, I’ll also say that I’m sad that we didn’t really hear any strategy from Neil Patrick Harris this episode. Like Jeremy, he’s the other good player of this season (random vote-switching aside), and it would have been a joy to watch the two smart people of the season go toe-to-toe. Granted, it would probably have resulted in one of their losses, which would have been a disappointment, but you can’t deny, it would have been a HELL of an episode.

But whatever, let’s say, for the sake of argument, that Jeremy is correct in assuming that the tribe dynamics are the way he thinks. At the very least, it can be agreed upon that he is no longer in control. Assuming that Reed has indeed betrayed him, the strategy he and Natalie come up with is actually a pretty good one. They decide, since they and Julie make a threesome, that pulling in one of the old Coyopans is a good idea. The zero in on Alec, for two reasons. First, he’s an idiot, like his brother. I’d say he’s less arrogant that his brother, but otherwise about the same. Second, and most important, he’s the other person without a loved one still in the game, and they start making this point to him. This strategy seems based on logic, and their arguments for who to draw in do make sense, so that’s a bright spot in the episode. Whether it works remains to be seen, as Alec never weighs in on the subject. Perhaps they were a bit too subtle for him. In any case, it’s too early to say, but I feel like Alec isn’t thinking enough to consider flipping from his original alliance. Besides, for him, it’s a bad move. Yes, you’re alone, but only one person wins this game, and better to go with the devils you know versus the ones you don’t. Either way, I expect he’ll be played for a sap, so maybe it’s six of one, a half-dozen of the other.

One wrong I should right, though, is Natalie. While she still has some of the negative qualities that I mentioned would hinder her in the game (note the blowout with John Rocker when she personally was not slighted by him), she’s proving, outside of the influence of her sister, to be a pretty good strategist (she and Jeremy seem to be the big brains for the original Hunah Poo-Poo), and much less annoying that I thought. Good for her!

Meanwhile, at Coyopa… Ooh… I’m sorry, Jon and Jaclyn, do you need a room? I mean, I get that EVERYTHING gets filmed, but this is a bit much! Put it this way, we don’t need FIVE FULL MINUTES of footage of Jon and Jaclyn snogging. Shame. We go from the best part of the episode (Jeremy and Natalie strategizing) to the worst part of the episode (pointless kissy face). Just when I think Baylor will share my disgust, she states that she’s jealous, as she’s 20 and single. OH NO! POOR YOU! Twenty and still haven’t found your soulmate? You HAG! You’re doomed to a life of celibacy now!

Still, Jon and Jaclyn break their liplock long enough for Jon to talk about how he’s taking over the tribe. Sure Jon, I’ll believe it when I see it. Keith, meanwhile, does appear to be on the outs with the new tribe, as there’s a telling show of them gossiping, while he’s about 50 feet down the beach fishing. Keith says he isn’t worried, due to his having an idol, and I suppose that makes sense. On the other hand, Keith, wouldn’t it make more sense to try and make friends/get in an alliance so you don’t HAVE to play the idol? Just seems like it might be a better strategy. I guess, though, that we’re talking to Keith, the man who doesn’t understand the concept of the “two-person alliance”, so we can’t expect too much.

Back at Hunah Poo-Poo, we get another short scene lamenting the rice situation. Wes informs us that they have maybe another three days’ worth of rice left. But more importantly SPIDER-MAN SPEAKS! True, it’s just to inform us that Hunah Poo-Poo is indeed low on rice, but it’s more words than we’ve gotten out of him so far, so hurray! Alec also takes this time to inform us that this was what caused Drew’s idiot behavior. Evidently, he needs three square meals a day, or he doesn’t function. Personally, I think he’s just an idiot through and through, but that’s just me. Spider-Man also comes up with a spider-plan to offer Jeff another deal at the challenge, though in a way that won’t make them “look like idiots”. More on that later.

Rice is also a problem at Coyopa. Specifically, Missy apparently brought over Hunah Poo-Poo’s eating habits, and makes what Dale considers a “double batch” of rice, destroying the rationing system. He cautions her in a slightly harsh tone, but manages to avoid an all-out tribal row, which is good. Still, it alienates him and Kelley from the rest of their tribe a bit, and it doesn’t help that Dale is still fuming. This is bad for them. Keeping conflict like this bottled in is not the way to tribe harmony. Granted, it’s a hard situation to handle, and I don’t think Dale is the most socially cogniscent guy, nor do I think he’d be good at having a polite discussion with someone he doesn’t consider an equal. On the other hand, most anything is better than how it’s being handled so far.

CHALLENGE TIME! Once again, it’s a bit of a stretch, but I’m calling it original and good. It’s another obstacle course, starting with the tribes digging up a pair of keys. Once they have them, the tribes move through a mud crawl to a gated pen. Using the keys, they must unlock the pen, and then shake a giant pole with a basket on top. The basket contains dirt, but also twenty beanbags. Once all the beanbags are out, the two tribes toss the bas onto a swinging platform, the first tribe to ten wins. While not as epic in scale as some of the challenges we’ve seen this season, it’s still pretty good. While digging, keys, and mud-crawls are “Survivor” staples, the platform is wobbly enough to be nicely difficult, and I just love the concept of swinging the basket. Hope they bring that one back. All that, plus the fact that the contestants get dirty (always a plus), give this challenge a thumbs up in my book.

Going into it, it’s a bit unclear who will win. True, the new Hunah Poo-Poo has the edge in challenges, it would seem, but I feel like we’ve gotten more strategy talk from them. Any thought that they might lose, however, is shattered in the first part of the challenge. Hunah Poo-Poo goes all-out with the digging, while Coyopa seems timid. This gives them a lead, which Coyopa cannot come back from, particularly when their timidity keeps up when shaking the basket. I thought Coyopa might have a chance since the beanbag throwing looked tough, but Jeremy and Wes manage to make it look easy. Hunah Poo-Poo’s victory was a predictable outcome, but I do like that Probst, usually so attentive at saying how far ahead a tribe is in a challenge, got so caught up in encouraging Coyopa that Hunah Poo-Poo has to call out their own score. One point for hilarity.

The aforementioned deal does come up, but after Coyopa has left, evidently so as to avoid embarrassment. I have to admit, my heart dropped, as I worried they would give up immunity for food. Thankfully, they aren’t that dumb, wanting to make just about any deal other than that, and Probst puts the deal on hold, as that little bit of rice means they won’t starve. These deals are starting to frustrate me. For all that Hunah Poo-Poo is overall the smarter tribe, they keep doing dumb things, and need to compensate. Also, when did this show turn into “Deal or No Deal”? Granted, the image of Probst with a shaved head is pretty awesome, but it’s not what I came here to watch. As to the “mystery” of what the deal will be… C’mon guys, they’re not going to trade their flint back, so Probst will want the shelter reward they have. Besides the same deal was made in “Survivor The Australian Outback”, and we all know how much “Survivor” loves to rest on its laurels of late.

Debate begins at Coyopa, and surprisingly, Jon’s prediction of being the kingpin comes true. Missy hates Dale, Dale hates Missy, and their loved ones feel compelled to come along. Since they need a four-person majority, they decide to try and recruit the remaining pair, meaning Jon and Jaclyn have all the power, God help us. A bit of a tough decision, but I’d say siding with Dale and Kelley is the smarter move. Missy and Baylor seem uncommonly tight, while Kelley, at least to the camera, has indicated limited infatuation with her dad. True, they might be harder to beat later on, but there are other ways to get a majority, and they’ll help more in the short term. What also amazes me is that NO ONE is concerned about Keith. I’ll grant you, he’s the odd man out, but Missy and Baylor are talking about splitting the vote. If you don’t pull him in, he could screw everything up. Better to get him on your side if you can.

Sadly, another bummer of the episode is that this is one of the more boring Tribal Councils this season. Missy snipes at Dale a little bit, but apart from that, it’s just the usual talk about how the alliances formed. The Dale/Missy conflict is brought up, and Keith rightly calls out Jon and Jaclyn as being the swing votes, after establishing that he’s integrated better than we saw. Still, it is a real mystery as to who goes home, and the answer is: Kelley.

Drew has his wish. I don’t know what the deal was, but I get the feeling there must have been something about Kelley that we weren’t seeing, because EVERYONE was out to get her, when from our perspective, nothing of value was lost. In any case, if you’re going to side with Missy and Baylor, why go for her rather than Dale? Dale’s the bigger threat, less help in challenges, and the one causing the most conflict, so yeah, I don’t get this one, but I think it was the wrong move.

While maybe not the worst episode on the surface, it still had some problems. The kissy face, the relative lack of strategy, and being denied a reward challenges. Parts of the episode were a toss-up, but the outcome in each case was pretty even regardless, and a few things were spoiled. On those merits, I’d call this episode slightly below average. Not horrible, but definitely not good. Why, then, do I love it so? It goes back to something pointed out in Tribal Council that I did not touch on to save it for this dramatic reveal: How to handle living with someone whose loved one you voted out. Due to how the tribe fell out, you had pairs going up against pairs. Now, we’ve seen the drama of one half of a pair remaining before, but we’ve always had it be on opposite tribes, or after the merge. Here, you’re now splintering you tribe, and thereby creating drama, in a way that DOESN’T ruin a relationship. This is something that the first “Blood vs. Water” never did, and it’s FASCINATING to watch.
Admittedly, you did have something similar after the merge on “Survivor Blood vs. Water”, but that was individuals taking out pairs, which somehow makes it less personal. Here, it’s pairs against pairs, which, for whatever reason, amps up the drama. My major gripe with this season, apart from lackluster strategy, is how much the show has tried to tie itself to the first “Blood vs. Water”. I said the concept could work twice, but something new needed to happen. By tying it to the old “Blood vs. Water”, you hinder that. Here, you have the season striking out on its own, trying something new, and it working. This was a good episode to watch. Here’s hoping they can keep it up.
-Matt
Title Credit to Jean Storrs.

Idol Speculation: “Survivor San Juan Del Sur” Episode 4: Confirming Stereotypes

Rednecks and Surfer Dudes: Two segments of the American population that are generally considered to be “Not that bright”. While “Survivor” does love to play up stereotypes, one of the reasons I love this show is that it can, and has, deconstructed such stereotypes, showing that while a person may speak and behave a certain way, this is not a guarantee that they do not have hidden depths. Sadly, tonight is not one such occasion, and this confirming of stereotypes, while not being quite as cringe-worthy as some other castaways from seasons past, does give us some of the worst strategy ever seen on the show. But does it completely ruin the episode? A question worth exploring, so let the expedition begin.

Back from Tribal Council, Coyopa is thankfully fairly circumspect. Baylor has a moment of celebration, which she admittedly did earn due to being the target that evening, but everyone is just saddened by their three straight immunity losses. The only one who displays any emotion besides this is Dale, who, too his credit, is quick to admit his mistakes. He rightly proclaims to the cameras that he got comfortable in his alliance, didn’t socialize as much as he should have, and now is paying the price for doing so. Then Dale further goes up in my estimation by taking what is accordingly the best course of action: badmouthing John Rocker, throwing out some lies about his occupation. This helps reintegrate Dale, and only makes me like him all the more. We haven’t seen as much of him as I would like, but what we do see is good. Coyopa doesn’t seem to hold anything against him, at any rate, and so all is right with the world at the moment.

Hunah Poo-Poo is also experiencing a surplus, though not, as we’ll see, of bonding. Instead, they have a surplus of flint, as Natalie found the flint they had lost covered in the sand. In fairness, it looked like it was hard to find. Still, this confirms my earlier ruling that Hunah Poo-Poo ought to have taken the fishing gear at that first reward challenge. Despite my being right, I would not go proclaiming it to the camp in a pompous manner, however. Proving once and for all that I am not Drew, this is exactly what Drew does, much to the annoyance of everyone else. In a rare moment for this evening, however, I will agree with Drew in one respect. Drew suggests that they try and do a take-back with Probst, offering brand-new flint for some fishing gear. Most of the tribe laughs him off, and says they don’t want to look stupid in front of the other tribe. They’re probably right, Probst won’t take that as a fair trade, but why not try, in my opinion. The worst that can happen is that you look stupid in front of Coyopa, and frankly, who gives a damn what they think of you? They’re the opposing tribe, they’re not going to think the best of you in any case, and I doubt anyone will not align with you later on just because you failed at trading with Probst. Even if they don’t like that, you can always pin the blame on Drew. Granted, that doesn’t work out so well for Drew, but he’s kind of a moron, so we don’t care.

Sure enough, Drew offers Probst his deal, and Probst throws it on the ground like he’s Brandon Hantz (“Survivor South Pacific”), and the deal is a pot of rice. That little bit of overplayed uncomfortableness over with, we get on to something much better, namely the challenge. While not technically original, the mechanism through which it works is cool-looking enough that I’ll call it original enough for me. That said, original does not equal good. Basically, one person from each tribe will use a grappling hook to retrieve three bags, because that challenge mechanic was just too good to only be used in the first reward challenge this season. Once all the bags are retrieved, they’ll be opened to reveal five balls. One at a time, these will be sent down a chute, which the tribe member can step on to launch the balls towards one of five baskets. The first person to get a ball in each basket wins. A fairly well-balanced challenge, but just kind of unimpressive. We’ve seen a lot of these mechanics before, the contraption for launching being the only one I really like, and for some reason “Survivor” has had a love for launching things into baskets lately, such that I’m tired of it. Still, I’m happy with the reward. It seems that my wish for the choice of reward has been granted, and so the winners can choose between the blankets, pillows, and tarp of last week, or what Probst refers to as “Picnic Food”, meaning sausages, popcorn, and s’mores. Unlike last week, this choice is more cut-and-dried. While both tribes seem to be hurting for food, none of the food offered really has any nutritional value. Only the sausages could be considered useful in this environment, and without a way to refrigerate them, you’d have to cook them up immediately, thus limiting their value. Conversely, the tarp will last the whole time you’re on the show, and a good night’s rest is always helpful. Tarp all the way.

Hunah Poo-Poo breaks their losing streak at Ancient Mayan Rock-Paper-Scissors, and picks Jon to go up against girlfriend Jaclyn, which seems like a wise choice to me. There’s no clear type of person who would be good at this challenge, but Jon and Jaclyn are amongst the most mismatched pairs this season, so it’s a good bet on their part. Still, the challenge is a lot closer than I thought it would be, with a single basket separating the tribes. The odds play out like one would expect, however, and Jon wins, sending Jaclyn to Exile Island. When asked by Probst how he feels about sending his girlfriend to Exile Island, Jon replies in a very good way. He says that though she doesn’t look it, she’s tough, and can take care of herself. This, he claims, only makes him love her all the more. Jon may not be amongst the smartest people out here, but he does seem like a nice guy. That was a very classy answer he put forth, and I think he genuinely means it. He chooses Drew to go with her, due to his having a bond with Drew, which is a fairly sensible answer, although it would have been funny to see him justify it as “punishment for the deal.” Hunah Poo-Poo as a whole chooses the tarp-based reward, which as I mentioned before is the sensible choice, so no complaints there. Alec laments that Coyopa may be the worst tribe in “Survivor” history. Don’t worry Alec. You win the occasional challenge, and watching your tribe interact isn’t the visual equivalent of pulling teeth. I think you’re in the clear.

While they enjoy their reward, only Jon is worried (Julie having done the smart thing and not shed a tear over John Rocker’s exit). He’s not so much for Jaclyn’s safety, but for her workload. Despite being the only person who’s really “close” to Drew, even he has no delusions about Drew’s work ethic, and he admits that Jaclyn might be doing most of the firewood gathering. Naturally, the edit must jump to Exile Island. Drew gets the clue, but makes no pretense about sharing it with Jaclyn. Jaclyn then admits that she was wrong about him, as Alec had evidently been spreading the rumor that Drew was a ladies’ man. This is a rumor that Drew confirms, though he says that flirting is not his focus out here. He then goes on to say the stupidest thing of the evening, which is to tell Jaclyn that she needn’t worry about never winning an immunity challenge, as he plans to throw the next immunity challenge. I pray for a minute that this is just him being hypocritical and flirting with Jaclyn, but nope, he genuinely means to throw the challenge, to “Get out the snakes.” as he puts it.

Dissecting how bad of a plan this is going to take its own paragraph. This is the move of someone in power who knows for a fact that people are conspiring against him. Drew BELIEVES he has power, despite being the laughingstock of the tribe, and only thinks there are plots against him. Some would argue that Natalie’s obvious dislike of him would lead to that conclusion, but as I’ll discuss later, this isn’t what Drew means. Now, while I accept that historically, tribes who avoid Tribal Council until the merge, and thus don’t have a chance to “practice” the game don’t do too well, this does not mean that one should intentionally lose the challenge. Throwing a challenge, though there are rare situations where it ought to be done, is something of a last resort, and if it is to be done, ought to be done via tribe consensus. One person doing so of their own free will is only going to cause chaos in the tribe, and lead to mistrust on their part. Furthermore, Coyopa still has six members. Unless you merge at twelve, you need to win at least one more immunity challenge to do better than a guaranteed tie. Finally, and most importantly, throwing a challenge gives away momentum to the other tribe, particularly when Coyopa seemed to be down for the count at this point. The LAST thing you want to do is breathe life into them. To add insult to all this injury, all this “strategy talk”, and I do use the term loosely, comes with Drew talking about how much of a “badass” he is, and how he’s actually the leader of Hunah Poo-Poo. Please spare me.

But it seems we don’t even need Drew to cause chaos at Hunah Poo-Poo. No, Keith will take care of that on his own. After looking for half an hour for the immunity idol and being unsuccessful, Keith comes to the conclusion that Jeremy must have the idol. Given the thoroughness of his search, I think Iraq will ask for him to be their next nuclear weapons inspector. Send him to a schwarma place for half an hour with no nukes in it, and he’ll be satisfied. Still, Keith and Jeremy are allies, so the first thing he does is spill the beans to everyone but Jeremy that Jeremy has an idol, and that they ought to be wary of him. Oh, sorry, that was an excerpt from the “Moron’s Guide to Bad Strategy”. That’s actually the LAST thing you want to do to your ally. What Keith did not count on is that everyone likes Jeremy more than him, and so they go spilling the beans to Jeremy. In particular, Reed seems concerned about this, which is odd since we haven’t seen much of Reed this season, when I thought he’d be more into the strategy of the tribe. Still, the fact that he’s keeping his head down is a good thing, and the fact that he seems to want to side with Jeremy implies that he knows who to be in good with. Jeremy, naturally, is none too happy with the fact that a supposed “ally” is effectively telling people to vote him off, and now puts Keith at the top of his hit list. While his reaction seemed very emotionally driven, and it’s usually not best to break up such a nebulous alliance so early, I can’t deny that Jeremy’s logic is sound. If somebody is spilling potential secrets or lies to other people, and they claim to be your ally, you really can’t trust them. Granted, I think Keith’s spilling of the beans here is more due to ignorance that malice, but the fact remains that it’s not good to have around. Not sure Keith should be the first target, but one should definitely be suspicious.

To compound the stupidity of Keith’s spilling the beans, he then figures he might need to put in a bit more effort to finding the immunity idol, rather than assuming it’s gone, Keith sets out looking again, and manages to find the idol. I understand why he doesn’t retract his story, as doing so would make him look like a schemer, but it’s still really stupid. At the very least, he could apologize to Jeremy in private.

After a long dry spell, we FINALLY get some info from Coyopa. They’re here to tell us… that there’s an immunity challenge this episode. Well THANK YOU Coyopa! We could never have figured that out on our own! In all seriousness, there is actually a bit of a point to this. Baylor and Alec have a bit of a moment in which they debate who gets to read tree mail by stealing it from one another. Baylor says that the two are like siblings, and are just playing with one another. Alec does not. He sees it as Baylor being annoying, and because this is a “Blood vs. Water” season, he has to tie it into how Drew apparently gets everything, and he gets nothing. This comparison is so forced that even Obi-Wan Kenobi would say “Take a break.” It all comes to a head when Baylor suggests boiling a pot of rice, and Alec declares that the rice pot is not clean enough, and Baylor should go do a better job of it. The two seem to resolve their differences amicably enough, but remember this for later.
I guess it was too much to ask for good, original challenges to be a constant throughout the season. This is your standard “run out and retrieve rings from the water, then throw them at a target” challenge that we’ve seen a million times and is generic. I’ll give this one a bit of credit. It has a ramp. The ramp looks nice. Yeah, despite being in the water, which is usually a plus, this challenge just kind of sucks.

Drew and Jaclyn return from Exile Island, with Drew giving us a confessional about his dilemma of throwing the challenge. This does a GREAT job at misdirecting us about whether or not he will throw it! I mean, it’s not like we’ve spent almost the ENTIRE EPISODE with Hunah Poo-Poo! No, the tribe whom we’ve seen next to nothing of this episode definitely has a shot at going to Tribal Council. In fairness to Drew, however, despite his valiant effort at throwing the rings far away from their target, I’m not sure he’s the only one throwing the challenge. Hunah Poo-Poo has to sit out three people, and while Kelley seems a logical choice, I can’t understand why Jeremy and Jon sit out, unless they WANT to lose.

As I said, the challenge is thrown and is overall uneventful, though it was fairly funny to see Keith dive into the water still wearing his hat. I have no idea how this is supposed to aid his swimming ability. Perhaps his hat is magical. Less fun, however, is the fact that Drew takes throwing the challenge as another symbol of his “leadership” and can’t stop bragging about it.

So, now we finally get to see Hunah Poo-Poo strategize, and with little exception, it’s not pleasant to watch. It starts out logically enough, with Jon opining to a few others that Julie needs to go. His reasoning is actually quite sound: when too many people are left without loved ones, they overpower those who do. To nip this in the bud, they need to start eliminating the other half of eliminated loved ones. As Julie overall contributes the least, she’s a logical target. While I normally don’t like this strategy, due to this being an individual game, the logic does make sense, as such an uprising would need to be taken care of now, before the numbers get overpowering. Why he discusses this with Natalie, who would probably be the next target after Julie, is a mystery to me, but hey, it’s better than I thought he’d do.

Drew, however, is having none of it, displaying his “leadership” by shutting down Jon before he can even explain his reasoning. Drew now says that it’s time to take off the head of the snake, the mastermind who’s been plotting against him since the first day. And who, exactly, does he think is running this malicious plot?

Kelley. He believes that Kelley is the mastermind behind everything. The only person whose screentime rivals that of Reeds, who hasn’t had an original thought in this game yet, is, according to Drew, the brains behind the whole operation. Not Jeremy, who would be the logical choice, nor Natalie, the woman who’s been exceedingly vocal about her dislike of him, but Kelley. Just let that sink in a moment. Relish in the stupidity of the logic. Now, if Drew had accused her of being everyone’s friend and unassuming, and he didn’t want to give such people a free pass to the merge, I would understand it. But he specifically uses the word “mastermind”, and I just can’t grasp this leap of logic.

Since everyone loves Jeremy, Drew fills him in on this plan. Jeremy does not take kindly to it, and once again goes on the warpath against Keith. Drew’s “leadership” rears its ugly head again, as he dismisses Jeremy’s arguments as emotional. Which they are, to a degree, but they’re more logical than yours, and simply dismissing the opinions of the people you want to align with is generally not a smart idea. To compound this idiocy, Drew then talks loudly about getting rid of Kelley RIGHT IN FRONT OF KELLEY! We’ve been seeing this mistake a lot over the past few seasons. Is doing a 360 to see if anyone’s around just no longer a “thing”? Have we REALLY reached the point of stupidity that nobody can think to do a simple spot check? Perhaps they need to play more tabletop RPGS.

This lack of strategy has riled Natalie, however, and she talks to Jeremy about getting the girls and herself together to vote off Drew, since he’s so hell-bent against them. Jeremy isn’t too fond of this, still on his “Get rid of Keith” plan, but it’s pointed out to him that Keith can be gotten rid of at any time, and Drew is really becoming a nuisance.

I’ll give this episode credit, it definitely has the most memorable Tribal Council thus far. It’s quickly admitted that there’s chaos at camp, and Jeremy wastes no time in spilling the beans on Keith’s lie. Keith retaliates that if you don’t have the idol, the best thing to do is out it, but Jeremy rightly points out that the two were in an alliance, and so they could have kept it between them. Keith scoffs at this, saying that there is no such thing as a two person alliance, and that the secret would have gotten out. Jeremy corrects Keith in that the word doesn’t get out unless someone breaks, but I think Keith may have had a point on the “No Two-Person Alliance” point. I MEAN, just look at the horrible track-record of two-person alliances, like Boston Rob and Amber on “Survivor All-Stars”, Stephen and J.T. on “Survivor Tocantins”, and Yau-Man and Earl on “Survivor Fiji”. Losers all! No, Jeremy makes this point as well, though with less referencing of past seasons. I don’t hold that against him, however. Keith admits defeat, and once again shows how sometimes those stereotypes turn out to be completely true.

Probably hoping to calm things down a bit, Probst goes to Drew for his voting philosophy. Drew comments that he wants the people disrupting things gone, but this sets off another eruption, from Kelley this time, who admits she heard Drew talking about her. A few more people admitting to the chaos, and some sniping at Drew and Keith, and the votes go in. In perhaps one of the most diverse voting pools since “Survivor Borneo”, when people still “voted their conscience”, Kelley and Keith each receive one vote, Julie receives two, and Drew the other five. “I knew there was a women’s alliance.” he says upon leaving. Drew, that my friend is what is known as a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Then the winter came, and Drew’s stupidity was consumed. And there was much rejoicing. Seriously, Drew was a major load on this game. Constantly talking a bigger game than he had, and making a bunch of dumb moves, he was absolutely the right choice. While he was probably the strongest in challenges of the choices tonight, Hunah Poo-Poo still has Jeremy, Jon, and Reed, so they’ll be ok. Plus, Coyopa lost John last week, so if nothing else, they’re back to even on strength. Drew was just an element of chaos, and hopefully Huanh Poo-Poo will be better off without him.

If nothing else, going to Tribal Council did one good thing for Hunah Poo-Poo: it solidified alliances. In the preview for next week, we saw that a tribe switch is imminent. Had Hunah Poo-Poo won, and nothing solidified before the switch, they would have been in trouble. As only Jon seems to be not totally ok with Drew going, and even he doesn’t seem too put out, Hunah Poo-Poo will now be a lot harder to break, even split up. Some would argue that Coyopa is even more united, but again, I’d say they’re about equal. Recall that Baylor and Alec had some problems, Dale hasn’t integrated well, and Jaclyn is still on the outs. I’d say each tribe has a bit of room to maneuver, though Hunah Poo-Poo still has the advantage overall.

“Hot Mess” is the official title of this episode, and it couldn’t be a better descriptor for it. While there were some good bits of strategy here and there (Jeremy was not so caught up in the Keith thing as to vote for him, and so voted for Drew), overall it was just chaos for the sake of chaos. Now, that can be fascinating, in the same way that watching a car wreck is fascinating, but this one was colored with the unpleasant and unfounded cockiness that was Drew, which made it a lot less fun to watch. On top of these problems, the challenges were boring, and the misdirection rarely worked. I say “Rarely” because one good thing the episode did was the “Previously On…” segment. Basically, it talked about how good Keith’s game had been to that point, clearly indicating that he would be a target. Had he gone, I would have said it would be too obvious. However, in hindsight, it NEEDED to be that obvious, as Drew was making such an ass of himself that nothing less could have put in any doubt that he was going home. Mind you, he was still the odds-on favorite, and I still guessed the outcome, but there were a few doubts, so props there.

Not a very fun episode in my opinion, but with one or two redeeming points. Chaos for chaos’ sake is not fun, but let’s see if next week’s mix-up can give us some of that good chaos.
-Matt
Title credit to Jean Storrs.