Survivor 34 Episode 8 “There’s A New Sheriff In Town”

Tonight’s episode of Survivor was a two-hour episode.  I’m not sure why.  Perhaps there’s some sort of sporting event next week, since The Amazing Race is doing a two-hour episode tomorrow as well.

One thing about these double-sized episodes is that, because they’re longer than usual and feature twice as money comps and councils as usual, there’s always a tendency to think that they’re more dramatic than they actually are.  To be honest, nothing unexpected really happened tonight.  No one expected Hali to be a major force in the game and she wasn’t.  Everyone knew Ozzy would probably end up blindsided and he was.

First Hali was voted out.  I’m not totally sure why everyone suddenly turned against Hali.  To be honest, I’m still not totally sure how she came to be the one who was voted out.  Maybe it was because she didn’t really have any close allies and no one felt guilty for voting for her.  I know that Sierra was apparently worried that Hali had an idol, because Hali was acting too confident after the merge.

Of course, the original target was Michaela who, like Hali, didn’t have any close allies and was seen as being an “easy” vote.  But then Michaela and Cirie teamed up and, when Sierra started talking about splitting the votes between Hali and Michaela, Cirie saw an opportunity to convince everyone to just vote for Hali instead.

After spending much of this season in the background, Cirie really stepped up and proved herself tonight.  Cirie’s smartest move was to go ahead and vote for Michaela, even though she had convinced enough people to vote for Hali.  That way, if Cirie’s plan hadn’t worked, she could have claimed to have been targeting Michaela from the beginning.  It was a risky move but it paid off for her.

Here’s how that first vote went:

Andrea — Michaela

Aubry — Hali

Brad — Hali

Ciriie — Michaela

Debbie — Hali

Michaela — Zeke

Sara — Michaela

Sierra — Hali

Tai — Hali

Troyzan — Hali

Zeke — Michaela

Ozzy — Hali

Hali — Zeke

As I said, it was a messy tribal and I’m still not totally sure why everyone voted the way that they did.  But the important thing is that Hali was evicted with 4 votes and became the first member of the jury.

As for Ozzy — well, we all knew Ozzy wasn’t going to last.  What’s amazing is that, for all the times that Ozzy has been on the show, he still doesn’t seem to understand the importance of having a good social game.  Just being the “provider” and bragging about catching fish is not enough, especially after the merge.  The minute that Ozzy started bragging on himself while holding onto the pole during the immunity challenge, I knew he was doomed.

And I was sorry to see Ozzy go.  I like Ozzy.  I wanted Ozzy to finally win this season.  But Ozzy has got to learn from his mistakes or he’s going to get blindsided every time he appears on Survivor.

The second tribal vote was, in many ways, just as confusing as the first.  A lot of people received just one vote, which would seem to indicate that none of the alliances (if you can call them that) are particularly solid.  Personally, I think that it would have made more sense to get rid of Zeke, who is actually more of a threat to win than Ozzy.  But, at the last minute, Sierra and Debbie decided to go after Ozzy.  Debbie even wasted her extra vote on him.

(By the way, if I have to listen to Debbie talk about how difficult Exile was one more time…)

Here’s how the vote went:

Andrea — Zeke

Aubry — Zeke

Brad — Ozzy

Cirie — Sierra

Debbie — Two votes for Ozzy

Michaela — Zeke

Sarah — Ozzy

Sierrra — Ozzy

Tai — Ozzy

Troyzan — Ozzy

Zeke — Aubry

Ozzy — Zeke

By seven votes, Ozzy was voted out.

So, after tonight’s episode, here’s who is left in the newly formed Maku Maku Tribe:

Andrea

Aubry

Brad

Cirie

Debbie

Michaela

Sarah

Sierra

Tai

Troyzan

Zeke

Right now, Cirie seems to be playing the best game.  Zeke is also a threat to win, though he’s starting to get a little bit cocky.  (The same thing proved to be his downfall last season.)  As for who is playing the worst game, both Sierra and Debbie are coming on way too strong and getting rid of Ozzy is only going to make them worse.  I’m predicting blindsides for both of them.

That’s it for now!

Lisa Marie