Chat Survivor here! Come back later to read Eric’s recap
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It’s Wednesday and I can celebrate because MJ has renewed my status as a recapper for Fall 2013. I guess we can also celebrate that both Survivor and Amazing Race were renewed earlier today as well as a brand new episode of Survivor.
I didn’t have time to write up a precap this week so I’ll quickly let you guys know that almost half of the people who voted felt that Julia should have been voted off (over 46%) with the next closest being that someone should have flipped on the faves (33%). For the rest people preferred voting out Matt over Michael who was the most save among the fans.
And we begin with Julia expressing how she almost peed her pants at tribal. The rest of the tribe lament having to vote out Matt but the favorites say that it was a necessary move. Corinne says that she wants to keep Michael but needs the right time to turn on Phillip. The Specialist is upset about how Corinne keeps approaching Michael and never discloses what they talk about to him. He takes Cochran aside and tells him about how he wants Corinne out next but worst case he wants her out by the merge. For his part Cochran tries to quiet this thinking by saying that voting out one of their core six could hurt their status at the merge. Phillip is adamant that Corinne needs to go. Of course Cochran is right in this instance but is there really any chance of talking Phillip into anything he disagrees with.
Next we get some tree mail about needing to be strong and carry the weak. Everyone else is worried about the challenge but Phillip says that anything that needs upper or lower body strength he will win for the tribe. This leads to Phillip and Cochran having an arm wrestling match and Cochran playing Phillip by using his own weight while Phillip was able to keep his wrist off the ground. This all to build Phillip’s pride.
For the reward challenge it’s an old classic. Each castaway will be tethered to a rope and carrying 20lbs of weight. At any time a member can opt out and give their weight to someone else. First team to race around and catch the other tribe wins.
The reward is a coffee bar and various desserts on a remote beach. Since Gota has one extra member they sit Brenda. After some strategy talk. During the challenge Phillip orders his tribe to walk but they can’t walk faster than Gota does and they quickly. Even as they catch up Phillip will not let his team run. Bikal members start dropping out and eventually Phillip can’t walk and falls into the water as Gota closes in for the win and the reward.
Bikal looks miserable but Dawn looks at the bright side that the reward will just give them all diarrhea. She’s always classy one. But she is right in the fact that Phillip sees all his strengths but ignores his weaknesses when making decisions and trying to lead the tribe.
Gota heads off to Caramoan Coffee and Andrea likes the chance to bond with the fans so they remember the good times before they vote them out so they remember to give her a vote.
Malcolm learned from last season and knows that no one will really want to go to the end with him so while he has a smile on his face at the reward he is quietly going to start putting his pieces together to get to the end.
Over at Bikal Corinne is pissed at Phillip for blowing the challenge. She is putting on blame on him and wants him gone. Cochran knows there is a fraction in the faves on Bikal and at this point while he will be pushing for a fan to go it is not a certainty. He sees Michael getting close with Corinne and has the line of the night by saying Julia is so boring it would be a disservice comparing her to the flavor of Vanilla.
Phillip is the only one getting close with Julia and while Cochran is not sure why it is obvious that he is trying to play Boston Rob’s game by working with a weak castaway. Phillip tries instructing her to be a double agent at the merge but she is not intimidated by him and like Matt last week will just nod her head and agree if it gets her further in the game. Of course that worked out great for him last week.
At Gota most of the tribe is sleeping in the shelter. Malcolm knows that the four alpha males of himself, Reynold, Eddie, and Erik will be the first four targeted. He approaches Reynold with the idea of working together in a Alpha Male alliance and Reynold jumps throw hoops to prove his loyalty to it he lets Malcolm know he has an idol. Malcolm of course is too smart to let Reynold know that he also has one but likes that Reynold shared the info.
I do like this idea of the alpha males working together but I don’t think Erik is smart enough to follow through on any alliance with the others. I just don’t think Erik is a very smart player in the game and will not see the benefit of working with the guys.
Malcolm does make one of the fatal mistakes of Survivor by celebrating taking control of the game before actually taking control of the game. This is usually a recipe for being blindsided at some point.
Back at Bikal Julia lets Dawn know that about her conversation with Phillip and while Dawn promises to not let anyone know about the conversation she immediately tells Phillip who is ready to cut Julia loose now that he can’t trust her to follow the simple instructions he gave her to not tell anyone of their talks. I’m not really sure if Phillip realizes that you need to talk to play the game of Survivor cause he just expects everyone to be quiet which is hard when you are working with a guy like Phillip who can’t be taken seriously.
We are now off to Immunity. First three members will paddle out and then dive in to release and carry a statue to shore. They will then place the statue on a pedestal and the other three members will use a grappling hook to collect five keys. Once all five keys are collected they will unlock the statue and pull a rope that will raise the statue for immunity. Since Gota still has an extra member Sherri gets to sit out the challenge.
We start with Brenda, Eddie, and Erik quickly paddling out followed by Corinne, Michael, and Dawn for Bikal. Gota gets set the wrong way and Bikal catches up and both teams jump in to get the statue. Gota gets back to shore and jumps out to another lead as Bikal locks in their statue. Lucky for Gota Reynold has super powers at throwing just about anything and they get a huge lead and win immunity.
I read some people online suggesting that producers may have rigged the swap to make these tribes. I will continue to disagree because the producers know the show works best when there is some doubt on who will win a challage. That’s the reason they use the tribe swap to try to even out the teams and add some drama rather than letting one team rule the challenges like the faves were doing early and like Gota is doing now. This season it just didn’t work out that way and we are treated to a few episodes of predictable challenge results and tribals until the merge.
Back at Bikal spirits are down but Phillip continues to be delusional by telling Cochran that he threw the challenge so that they could vote out Julia. How this makes sense I will never know and Cochran agrees that there is no way Phillip threw the challenge when he could have had the opportunity to be the hero.
The faves sit to have a pow wow and they want to split the votes out of fear of the idol but Corinne says that they need to keep Michael feeling comfortable in case they need him in the merge. Phillip immediately says he will not need Michael and throws out how he can play because he played with Boston Rob. I will say it one more time: Phillip is no Boston Rob.
Phillip knows that Corinne is just trying to do what is best for her and he knows what Boston Rob would do. He would vote out Michael because Corinne wants to keep him.
Cochran correctly says that while it is a vote between Michael and Julia it is really Phillip vs. Corinne. Tribal starts out with Michael saying that things are tense with the losing atmosphere. Things are tense amongst everyone. Julia says that it is tense because of the argument on who to vote out. The talk about the conflict between Phillip and Corinne but they have the same end result in mind.
Phillip admits he lost the challenge for the tribe because he took on a star role again but somehow works it out that him carrying the statue on his own while the other tribe was smart enough to use three guys to carry it caused him to be weaker throwing the hook.
Michael says he feels like a cat just hanging on and wanted to get to the vote right after the challenge while Julia knows she can’t feel comfortable because that’s when you are sent home. After the first vote it is a 3-3 tie between Michael and Julia. We have the second revote of the season and this time Julia is voted out in a 4-0 vote.
Julia leaves with class as she bows to the remaining tribe and says it’s been fun and wishing everyone good luck. I am totally ok with Julia being voted out over Michael. She didn’t add much to the game and honestly I think she lasted longer than she should have. By the fall I probably won’t remember her as a player.
Next Week we have the merge already which means the producers knew that the differences between the two tribes was slowing the action down and the season needed a jolt to pick it back up. We also get a food eating challenge which is always entertaining. Usually I think merging at 12 is two early I am ok with it this season because I really don’t think Bikal would have won another challenge.
See you next week for the merge.
Just one more note. I have started writing at my blog again. It’s a blog about anything Pop Culture. I post songs I like and make up lists because I have little else to do with my time so why not. If you like reading lists and such as well as the occasional recap and opinion/review on Pop Culture come on over to http://ericspopcultureblog.blogspot.ca/ and check it out. I also can be followed on twitter @nericmitch if you want to follow as I post links to specific topics and you can pick and choose what to read.
