Suvivor 37.10 “Tribal Lines Are Blurred”

Hey, everyone.  Lisa’s on vacation so I’ll be covering Survivor this week and next.

At first, I thought last night’s episode of Survivor was going to be so easy to write about.  Nick found an idol and, at the end of the hour, the whole tribe voted out Alec because they thought he was too big of a challenge threat.  Alec knew he had to win immunity to stay but he didn’t because he ate so much at the reward challenge that he made himself sick and then Christian started telling one of his stories and Alec gave up.  Jeff snuffed Alec’s torch and he walked away.

But, after Alec left, the show didn’t end.  Instead, it kept going.

That’s when I discovered that last night’s episode was going to be two hours!

The second hour was all about the downfall of Carl.  Ever since using his nullifier to blindside Dan, Carl had been feeling pretty proud of himself.  He decided that he was the tribe’s “godfather” and that he was the one who would say who should be voted out next.  It worked when he wanted to target threats like Dan and Alec.  But then Carl decided that his next target would be Alison, it backfired on him.

 

After Davie won immunity, Carl thought he had a clear shot at Alison.  The problem is that Kara didn’t want to vote out Alison and both Christian and Gabby were tired of Carl acting like he was in charge. Angelina, Davie, and Nick all voted for Alison but Alison, Kara, Christian, and Gabby voted for Carl.  The swing vote came down to Mike and he decided to vote with the second group, so Carl ended up joining Elizabeth, John, Dan, and Alec on the jury.

Next episode, it looks like Gabby may finally be ready to turn against Christian and start playing for herself.  The same Gabby who can’t go a day without crying is planning on blindsiding the only person who has been keeping her in the game?  I wonder how that will work out for her?

We’ll find out next week!

Erin

Survivor 37.9 “Breadth-First Search”

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

So, today, let’s give thanks for an entertaining tribal council!  I have to admit that I was really worried that, despite John getting voted out last week, this season of Survivor was going to devolve into the Goliaths getting rid of the Davids one-by-one but last night, the Davids managed to pull off an amazing blindside and they got rid of one of the biggest threats on the Goliath tribe, Dan!

Admittedly, Dan was only a threat because he could win immunity challenges.  His social game, as we saw last night, sucked and I doubt he could have convinced the jury to give him the million dollars.  However, he was a part of the “Goliath Strong” alliance and getting rid of him certainly helps to make the tribal breakdown a bit less lopsided.

Last night’s episode really didn’t get that interesting until the tribal council.  I have to admit that, until it actually happened, I had the feeling that the Davids would make a mistake and Christian would end up going home.  (When Christian didn’t play the immunity idol that he found earlier in the episode, I nearly screamed.)

Going into tribal, Dan thought he had all of the Goliaths on board with getting rid of Christian.  However, he actually only had Alison, Angelina, and Mike on his side.  Alec and Kara had turned against him and they joined up with the Davids to blindside either Dan or Angelina.

So, here’s what happened at Tribal.  For once, all of those little powers and idols were used strategically to take out a worthy target:

At Tribal, right before the vote, Nick announced that he would be using his steal-a-vote power to take away Alison’s vote.  Why they took away Alison’s vote and not Dan’s, I’m not sure.  Maybe they were trying to make Dan waste his idol on the wrong person.

After the voting, Dan announced that he was using his second immunity idol to protect himself.  (Alison, who obviously believed herself to be the target, was not amused.)

Jeff accepted the idol and then announced that the idol nullifier had been used and, as a result, Dan’s immunity idol now had no power.

Angelina, Mike, and Dan all voted for Christian.

Alec and Kara both voted for Angelina.

Meanwhile, all of the Davids — Christian, Davie, Nick, Carl, and Gabby — all voted for Dan.  Nick used the vote that he stole from Alison to also vote for Dan.  So, as a result, the final vote was 6 for Dan, 3 for Christian, and 2 for Angelina.  If Carl hadn’t used his nullifier or had used it on the wrong person, none of the votes against Dan would have counted and Christian would have been sent to the jury.  Instead, Carl used the nullifier on Dan and Dan became the third member of the jury.

So, this leads us to a very interesting point in the game.  The tribe is now made up of 5 former Davids and 5 former Goliaths.  If Alec and Kara continue to vote with the Davids, they could easily pick off the 3 remaining members of “Goliath Strong,” Angelina, Mike, and Alison.  After the past two tribal councils, almost all of the special advantages have been used.  As of right now, Christian is the only person in the game who has an immunity idol.

So, these upcoming few weeks should be very interesting!  It all depends on whether Alec and Kara stick with Davids and whether Mike, Angelina, and Alison can pick up some immunity wins (or find an idol) when they need to.

Speaking of the new few weeks, I’m currently on vacation so my sister, Erin, will be filling in for the next two weeks!  And then I’ll be back for the final two episodes of Survivor: David vs. Goliath!

Happy holidays!

Lisa Marie 

Survivor 37.8 “You Get What You Give”

So, here we are!  We’re 8 episodes into this season of Survivor and I still really can’t say that anyone’s really a front-runner to win.  Unlike previous seasons, no one is really dominating the game.  I guess you could argue that Dan is coming on strong but he has absolutely no social game.  Many of the castaways also view Christian as being a threat to win but it seems to me that Christian’s success has been due more to luck than strong game play.  Angelina is also coming on strong but, if she does make it to the end, the jury is going to hate her.  If I try hard enough, I can imagine either Nick or Davie making a good case for themselves if they make it to the end of the game but still, it’s even easier to imagine them getting voted out over the next couple of weeks.

If there’s anything that is clear after last night’s episode, it is that were back to the game being David vs. Goliath.  Remember the secret, 6-person alliance that looked like it might change the game?  Thanks to Mike, that’s pretty much dead.  Fearful that Gabby couldn’t be trusted, Mike returned to the Goliath side.  While I loved Mike on The Amazing Race, I haven’t been a huge fan of his gameplay on Survivor.  He is just so wishy-washy!  Pick a side and stick with it, Mike.

So now, we’re back to it being the old Goliath Tribe vs the old David Tribe, with only Alec expressing any real reservations about it.  We’re also down two immunity idols.  Davie used his immunity idol last night and then Dan used his.  What’s interesting is that neither immunity idol was used to protect the people who had them.  The Goliaths were planning on blindsiding Christian by saying that they were all going to vote for Angelina.  However, the Goliaths really overplayed their hand in the hours leading up to tribal council and the Davids quickly figured out what their plan actually was.  So, Davie used his idol to save Christian.  Then Angelina, realizing that she now actually was at risk, begged Dan to use one of his immunity idols on her.  In fact, she looked right at him and said, “Dan, please.”  That put Dan in a bad position because it revealed to everyone that he had at least one immunity idol and, naturally enough, that’s the sort of thing that could make him a target of a future blindside.  So, Dan went ahead and played one of his idols for Angelina.

And the end result was that John was voted out.  Arrogantly assuming that the Davids didn’t have any idols, the Goliaths cast all of their votes for Christian.  Unlike the Goliaths, the Davids were smart enough to split their votes between two targets.  Two voted for Angelina and three voted for John.  As a result, John was sent to the jury and both Christian and Angelina get to stay for at least another three days.

Personally, I think Dan and Davie might be miss those immunity idols over the next few tribal councils.

Lisa Marie

The 2nd member of the jury, John

Survivor 37.7 “There’s Gonna Be Tears Shed”

Hi y’all!

Well, last night was the merge.  Three tribes are now one big tribe.  Tribal immunity is dead and now, it’s all about the individual game.

Still, there are alliances.  As soon as the tribes came together, all of the former Goliaths pretty much got back together while all of the former Davids found themselves on the bottom of the new tribe.  There were 7 Goliaths and 6 Davids on this new tribe and many Goliaths — especially Dan and Kara — assumed that they would pick the Davids off one-by-one.

Still, as soon as the merge happened, other sub-alliances started to form and old dramas continued to play out.  Carl continued to get annoyed with Elizabeth.  Dan was so happy to be reunited with Kara that he promptly revealed that he now has two immunity idols.  Angelina decided that she was the new head of the Goliath alliance and started trying to give orders about who should be targeted, much to the annoyance of Dan.  Meanwhile, Alec, Christian, Mike, Gabby, Alison, and Nick formed a 6-person alliance.

The immunity challenge was a good one and one that I don’t think the show has ever done before.  The castaways had to swing a long pendulum through a frame around a statue while standing on a beam.  If the pendulum ever stopped swinging or if the statue fell off the frame, you were out of the competition.  The challenge ultimately came down to Elizabeth and Alison, with Alison holding on long enough to pull out the win.  In fact, Alison looked so strong in the challenge that I’m starting to think that I may have underestimated her during the first few episodes of this season.  Based on last night, she’s looking like she could be a strong enough player to make it to the final three.

After the challenge, Angelina decided that the Goliaths should target Christian.  However, back when they were divided into three tribes, Christian previously bonded with all of the men on the Goliath Tribe and Dan decided that he didn’t want to vote out Christian.  (As well, Dan resented Angelina telling him what to do.)  So, Dan changed the target to Elizabeth.  Angelina got mad because she wasn’t consulted so she promptly went to Elizabeth and told her that the Goliaths were targeting her.

Elizabeth decided that her best bet would be to blow up Angelina’s game at tribal council.  Elizabeth not only revealed that Angelina had told her that she was the target but she also encouraged all the members of the Goliath Tribe to punish Angelina by voting her out of the game.  Of course, it didn’t work.  Every member of the Goliath Tribe voted for Angelina.  Oddly, so do every other David.  I mean, the Davids really had nothing to lose by at least voting with Elizabeth.  If one member of the Goliath Tribe — like Alec, for instance — had flipped, they could have voted Angelina out.  So, I’m a little bit surprised that none of the Davids, with the exception of Elizabeth, were willing to at least make the effort to pull off a blindside.

Then again, when Lyrsa was voted out, Elizabeth lost her only strong ally in the game.  Much like Natalie, she just seemed to rub people the wrong way.  Traditionally, the first person voted out after the merge is usually someone who hasn’t bonded with any of the members of the new tribe.  This season, that person was Elizabeth.

So, Elizabeth becomes our first juror but, judging from the preview of next week’s episode, it appears that she has succeeded in putting a target on Angelina’s back.

We’ll see what happens!

Lisa Marie

The first member of the jury, Elizabeth Olsen

Survivor 37.6 “Aren’t Brochachos Just Adorable?”

Hi y’all!

So, next week is the Merge and it really can’t come a minute too soon!  From the start of this game, one tribe has always been obviously weaker than the other tribe.  The members of the David Tribe may have been more likable than the Goliath Tribe but, when it came to immunity challenges, the Davids were pretty much helpless.  Then, after the two big tribes were split into three small tribes, the Tiva Tribe emerged as being essentially unbeatable while the Jabeni Tribe has emerged as clearly the weakest of the new tribes.

Last night, for the second time in a row, Jabeni was sent to Tribal Council.  Though Mike would have personally preferred to have voted out Angelina, he decided to vote for Lyrsa instead.  Mike apparently figured out that, after the Merge, he could justify voting out Natalie to the other former Goliaths but that he wouldn’t be able to justify voting out a second Goliath as well.  Realizing that it would either be him or Lyrsa going home, Nick joined in with Angelina and Mike and Lyrsa was voted out by a vote of 3-1.

While the Jabeni Tribe was suffering through their own drama, there was conflict on the Vuku Tribe as Carl and Davie both got annoyed with Elizabeth and her determination to rebuild the shelter.

Finally, on the Tiva Tribe, Christian continued to bond with the boys (the brochachos, as they called themselves for some reason) while Gabby continued to freak out over practically everything.  Gabby finally approached Alison and tried to get an alliance going with her.  Alison seemed receptive to the idea but, honestly, I don’t trust her.  Alison comes across as being very cold, despite her claim of being the most empathetic person in the world.  And Gabby came across as being way too neurotic to pull off the big move that she was thinking about making.

In the end, it’s probably not going to matter that Elizabeth got into a fight with two former Davids and or Gabby tried to start an alliance with Alison.  Next week is the merge, which means that the entire game is going to reset once again.

Here’s who will be on the new, merged tribe:

Carl (Former David, Former Vuku) — I still don’t feel that I know Carl but he does have one potentially huge advantage.  After going to Exile Island, he has the power to cancel out an immunity idol.

John (Former Goliath, former Tiva) — John is this year’s wrestler.  He’s a charismatic and athletic guy.  He’s the type of guy who always does better before the merge than after because, once it becomes an individual game, he’s going to have a huge target on his back.

Christian (Former David, Former Tiva) — Everyone loves Christian, which could be his downfall.  No one wants to sit next to him in a final three situation.  Christian has got an alliance with Gabby and he had one with Nick before the tribal shakeup.  After the merge, we’ll find out if that alliance still exists.

Kara (Former Goliath, Former Vuku) — Kara was close to Dan before the tribal shakeup and I imagine that, after the merge, she’ll go back to being a strong member of the Goliath alliance.

Angelina (Former Goliath, Former Jabeni) — Will Angelina ever get a jacket?  Angelina’s problem is that she thinks that she’s a lot more clever than she thinks she is.  If anyone’s going to try to betray their alliance and get voted out as a result, it’ll probably be Angelina.

Alec (Former Goliath, former Vuku) — Alec is a wildcard.  He was a member in good standing of the Goliath Tribe but, right after the tribal shakeup, he teamed up with two members of the David Tribe and voted out Natalia.  It’s hard to say where he’ll end up after the merge.

Elizabeth (Former David, former Vuku) — Elizabeth may be in trouble.  Not only was her closest ally, Lyrsa, voted out of the game but she’s also gotten on the nerves of both Davie and Carl.  I have a hard time imagining Elizabeth lasting much longer.  She’s just not very good at the social aspect of this game.

Gabby (Former David, former Tiva) — Gabby managed to make it to the merge!  Gabby needs to calm down a little.  She’s got a strong ally in Christian but her insecurities are her worst enemy.

Alison (Former Goliath, former Tiva) — Last night, Alison assured us that she’s the most empathetic person on the planet but I don’t buy it.  Gabby tried to stat an alliance with Alison so we’ll have to see if that actually happens or if Alison just goes back to her former Goliath tribemates.

Dan (Former Goliath, former Tiva) — Dan has got two immunity idols and an incredibly cocky attitude.  I could easily see him getting blindsided and going home with those two idols still in his pockets.

Davie (Former David, former Vuku) — Davie has got one immunity idol but he may need to work on his social game a little.  His argument with Elizabeth last night was a good example of how not to maintain an alliance.

Mike (Former Goliath, former Jabeni) — We all remember Mike from The Amazing Race.  To be honest, I’m a little surprised that Mike hasn’t really been much of a factor this season.  He’s not good at challenges and he really doesn’t seem to have a good head for strategy, either.  He’s got an alliance going with Nick but will it survive the merge?

Nick (Former David, former Jabeni) — Nick seems like he could be a strong player but I worry that he sometimes comes on a bit too strong.  Before the tribal shakeup, he had the Mason-Dixon alliance with Christian.  After the shakeup, he formed the Rock Star alliance with Mike.  If he can bring Christian and Mike into an alliance with him, he could be in a good spot.  If he can’t, he’s going to struggle after the merge because it’s usually the obvious schemers that are the first ones voted out of a new tribe.

We’ll see what happens next week!

Lisa Marie