Survivor Season 41 Recap: Week 5 Live Blog

A new episode of Survivor airs tonight on CBS. Read a live recap here.

The episode begins at the Ua tribe on the morning of Day 10. Genie is glad she trusted her instincts to go with Shan and Ricard. She feels solid with the three of them. She finds and shows them the Beware Advantage. The three of them discuss whether or not to open the advantage. Shan says not to open it, and Ricard and Genie agree. However, while Genie is out in the water, Ricard and Shan discuss opening the Beware Advantage themselves. They don’t want Genie to have the power, so Shan opens the advantage. It’s the three-way Idol that only activates when one person on each tribe recites a secret phrase. Shan also loses her vote until the idol is activated, so she gives Ricard the extra vote advantage. Ricard is glad he and Shan are running the tribe. He calls Genie the spare tire of the tribe.

On the Luvu tribe, Sydney impresses her tribe with her fishing skills. Deshawn and Danny are worried about the women outnumbering the men in the game, so they discuss trying to throw the challenge again to vote out Erika. Naseer disagrees with throwing the challenge. He reasons that they shouldn’t willingly lose their flint as punishment. On the Yase tribe, Xander is on the outs of the tribe. Evvie is trying to lull Xander into a false sense of security, so she keeps playing both sides. However, Tiffany is concerned about Evvie’s close bond with Xander. Tiffany keeps watch as Liana looks through Xander’s bag while Xander and Evvie are away from camp. They find Xander’s advantages and read the details on the parchment. Afterwards, Xander confesses about the idol to Tiffany to build trust with her. He doesn’t know Tiffany and Liana already know about his advantages. However, he lies and says he only found the idol today. Tiffany calls him out on his lie since he uttered one of the secret phrases at a challenge days ago. Xander comes clean and tries to do damage control, and Tiffany tells him it’s okay. However, she doesn’t trust him at all.

It’s time for the immunity challenge. Before the challenge, Shan and Xander recite two of the secret phrases. Afterwards, Naseer utters one of the secret phrases too. We see a flashback of Naseer finding the three-way Idol at the Luvu beach. The three-way hidden immunity idol is now activated. The challenge begins. For this challenge, they must go through a series of obstacles and release sand bags. They must then fire the sand bags at targets. Xander hits the final target for Yase and Naseer hits the final target for Luvu. Yase and Luvu win immunity! Ua will go to tribal council tonight. Since they won immunity, Yase gets to pick two people to go to the summit. They choose Shan and Liana.

Shan and Liana share information about their games, and they agree to work together if they end up on the same tribe down the line. They share personal details of their life too, and Shan opens up about losing her mom two years ago. Shan hasn’t opened up about this to Ricard or Genie. Shan also tells Liana that Ricard is her #1 ally, but he cannot be trusted. Afterwards, they face another prisoner’s dilemma. Shan agree to let Liana get the advantage. Liana chooses to risk her vote while Shan chooses to protect it. Liana receives her advantage when she returns to camp. The advantage allows her to steal the advantage of another player. She is allowed to ask one player if he or she has an advantage. The person cannot lie to her. If that person does have an advantage, then he or she must give her the advantage. If the person does not have an advantage, then her advantage has no more power. Liana already knows about Xander’s advantages, so she plans to use this advantage against him.

While Shan is away, Ricard tries to sway Genie into targeting Shan. Ricard’s true plan is to vote out Genie, but he doesn’t want her to know that. However, Genie admits in a confessional that Ricard doesn’t seem trustworthy. Shan returns to camp, and she shares with Ricard and Genie details about her trip to the summit. She tells them that she didn’t risk her vote. Shan is worried the two of them have contemplated blindsiding her, and Genie confirms these suspicions when she talks to Shan alone. Genie tells Shan that Ricard came up with a plan to vote her out tonight. Shan is unsure if she can trust Ricard, so she wants to try to get the extra vote advantage back from Ricard. Ricard and Shan have a tense conversation about the advantage. Shan wants the advantage back in her possession to have Ricard’s trust, but Ricard says Shan has no incentive to keep him in the game if he gives the advantage back to her. Ricard knows Shan got the extra vote advantage after convincing JD to give it to her. Ricard tells Shan he will give her the extra vote advantage tomorrow. Shan is unhappy the way the conversation went with Ricard and says that the extra vote advantage is rightfully hers. Shan is torn who to vote out tonight. She calls Ricard a strategist and Genie a loyalist. She is unsure which of the two she wants to move forward with in the game.

It’s time for tribal council. Jeff asks what happened between Ricard and Genie while Shan was away. Genie says Shan and Ricard are a pair, but she pitched her case to Ricard. Ricard takes credit for coming up with strategies, but he calls Shan the closer that can make his plans come to fruition. Ricard says it’s a dilemma on who to side with between Genie and Shan. Shan says she gave a pitch to both Genie and Ricard when she returned to camp. Jeff is amused that Shan admitted to giving the same pitch to both Genie and Ricard. Genie agrees Shan is in the power position tonight. Ricard says he and Shan have been together for every single vote. Shan says she is always thinking since there is no pause in the game. Jeff says there is no consequence to the vote since they haven’t reached the jury stage yet, but Ricard says there is a consequence. The last two standing on the Ua tribe were capable of getting rid of their entire tribe. He says the other players on Luvu and Yase are not at their caliber. He says everyone else will be targeting them after a swap or a merge. Jeff asks about advantages or if anyone will roll a die tonight. Shan doesn’t think the die will come into play until someone knows they are on the bottom. She thinks everyone tonight has some sort of faith in the vote tonight. Afterwards, it’s time for the vote. No advantages are played before the votes are read.

The first vote is for…

Genie

Ricard

Genie

Genie is the sixth person voted out of Survivor: 41. Genie is blindsided, and she wishes them luck before walking away.

And that wraps up tonight’s episode of Survivor. Thanks for reading and come back next week for another live recap.

About Steven Curtis 538 Articles
Steven is a graduate of the University of West Florida with a bachelor's degree in communication arts. He enjoys watching reality competition shows, such as American Idol, Survivor, Big Brother, and The Amazing Race.