Survivor 34 Episode 4 “The Tables Have Turned”

Okay, having watched tonight’s episode of Survivor, I have one question:

WHAT EXACTLY DOES THIS SEASON HAVE AGAINST PHYSICALLY ATTRACTIVE PEOPLE!?

Seriously!  First Caleb and now Malcolm.  (And I know that some of my male friends have said they thought that Ciera was hot, too.  I personally don’t see it but hey, whatever.)  If I was Ozzy, Troyzan, Hali, or Sierra, I would be really paranoid because it appears that the better looking you are, the more likely it is that you’re going to get voted off.  What’s especially bad is that all of these attractive people are getting voted off so early that they won’t even be on the jury.  We are potentially looking at the ugliest finale in Survivor history.

Okay, rant over.  Let’s talk about tonight’s episode of Survivor.

Up until that terrible moment when Malcolm’s torch was extinguished, this episode was shaping up to be one of the best in Survivor history.  The producers threw in an interesting twist during the immunity challenge.  Jeff Probst announced that, even though three tribes were competing, only one would win immunity.  Both of the tribes that lost would have to go to tribal council.

The immunity challenge was one of those challenges that drives me crazy because I know I wouldn’t be any good at it.  It was one of those things where each tribe picked a caller and that caller had to shout out directions while the rest of their blindfolded tribe tried to make their way through an obstacle course.  I have a hard time following directions and I get frustrated easily.  If I was on Survivor, I would be totally worthless in that challenge and I’d probably voted out afterward.

The challenge was won by Tavau, which means that Ozzy got a night off from worrying about being blindsided and Troyzan got to hold onto his immunity idol.  As I watched the other two tribes deal with their loss, I was pretty sure I knew what would happen.  Mana would vote out Hali.  Nuku would probably vote out JT.

But then — another twist!  Jeff announced that there would be only one tribal council.  Mana and Nuku would both go to tribal council at the same time and they would vote out one person!

Here’s where things got complicated.  Over on the Nuku Tribe, Sandra wanted to target Sierra because she was the biggest physical threat.  JT said he would go along with whatever the rest of the tribe did but, secretly, he was thinking that maybe he and Malcolm could somehow convince Culpepper and the rest of the Mana Tribe to vote for Sandra.  While Malcolm knew that he might be a target, he also felt that he and Culpepper, a fellow alpha males, had a connection.

Over on the Mana Tribe, Culpepper actually was thinking of targeting Malcolm, though he also seemed to be willing to go after Sandra.  However, in typical Brad Culpepper fashion, he overplayed his hand by trying to bully Hali into voting with her new tribe and against her old tribe.

Then, Tai went off and did some searching and found the immunity idol!  Now, if Tai was smart, he would have kept it for himself.  Instead, he decided to let the entire Mana tribe know.  The Mana Tribe now had an immunity idol but it wouldn’t do them much good unless they figured out who Nuku was going to vote for.  If they played the idol for the wrong person, it wouldn’t matter.  Nuku, with their one person advantage, would still have the numbers to vote out a member of Mana.

When everyone finally arrived for Tribal Council, the scene was complete chaos.  If not for the fact that it led to Malcolm getting voted out, this would have been one of my favorite tribal councils of all time.  Sandra was her usual snarky self, literally taunting Mana with the fact that JT was going to vote with his new tribe.  Meanwhile, Culpepper said that Hali would be in trouble if she didn’t vote for with Mana.  Both Sandra and Culpepper overreached and it backfired on them.

JT suddenly walked over to Culpepper and whispered in his ear, telling Culpepper that he was the target.  Hali whispered to Sandra.  Soon, everyone was whispering to everyone else.  Jeff Probst could only watch in shock as literally everyone scrambled about,  When he finally said that it was time to vote, no one seemed to know what was going to happen.

However, as so often happens when people are suddenly uncertain about what to do in Tribal, everyone stuck to the original plan.  Nuke voted for Sierra.  Mana voted for Malcolm.  Tai gave the immunity idol to Sierra who played it.  None of the votes for Sierra counted.  Malcolm was the fourth person voted out and he was definitely not happy about it.  I wasn’t happy about it either.

So, what does the future hold?  We’re four episodes in and it’s obvious that the show has been edited to emphasize the fact that three people are feeling very confident right now: Ozzy, Sandra, and Culpepper.  Usually, when someone gets the overconfident edit, that means that they’re going to be blindsided at some point in the future.  I’ll hate to see Ozzy go but I’m about done with Sandra and Culpepper.

One final note: for someone who has actually won the game in the past, JT seems to be absolutely terrible when it comes to strategizing.

Anyway — bye, Malcolm!  You and your amazing hair will be missed.

Lisa Marie

P.S. The Amazing Race stars next week!  Yay!  And yes, I will be covering the new season. 🙂