Survivor: Cagayan continues this week with the eighth episode of the season! After an entertaining episode it’s time to recap it! Joining us, we have our resident recap expert, Jarryd, plus Ben and the Ozlets chime in with their thoughts as well! Oh, and we’ll even speak to a real experts in our good friend Marty Piombo from Survivor: Nicaragua!
(If you haven’t watched this weeks episode yet, clicking the link below will spoil the hell out of it, so if you don’t want to be spoiled then don’t click the link!)
This week on Cagayan ‘clue stealing’ leads to an Idol treasure hunt, two brand new challenges and one more castaway joins the Jury.
The tribe return to camp following the blindside of Sarah. Spencer confesses that the plan to vote out Jefra would have worked because they avoided Idols but because Kass flipped, they are now screwed. Spencer tells Kass he thinks she made a bad move before saying in a confessional that the entire game, Kass has made decisions based on “where her estrogen is going” and not using her brain.
Kass confesses that her alliance sent her to the bottom and weren’t worrying about her. Kass tells Spencer that nobody is going to win without pissing someone off. Spencer doesn’t want to hear what Kass has to say, as the pair go back and fourth with Spencer telling Kass not to talk strategy because “it’s an embarrassment”. Kass confesses that her move was a “hat trick” – she got rid of the person she wanted to and two Idols are out of the game. Kass continues, saying that the people who are pissed off at her will get over it because she is a free agent who is playing “my game”.
Kass and Spencer discuss Tribal Council. (Image Credit: CBS)
The following morning, everyone around game is working. Kass suggests that Morgan, (who is sleeping in the shelter), goes to get the water. Kass asks Tony to ask Morgan. Tony asks Morgan to get the water and she accepts the task but says that there is no need for Kass to be rude. Kass says that she hasn’t been rude then confesses that Morgan is like the old dog you have at home, you keep it around because you love it but it just sits in the corner doing nothing. Morgan comments that she isn’t being mean to Kass accept for the fact that she is ignoring her. She admits that Kass is a “bitter, ugly, old lady” who hates her because she is and always has been “cuter” than her. Morgan finishes, telling us that “Kass is stupid and needs to go”.
Morgan gives Kass the finger. (Image Credit: CBS)
The tribe arrives at the Reward Challenge. For the challenge, the tribe will break into two teams of five. Each team will start on a platform in the water. They will have to jump into the water, climb up and over a seesaw, then cross a balance beam to reach the beach. Once all five members are at the beach, they will have to untie five knots on a chest, then carry it up to the base of a tall tower. After attaching the chest to a rope, the five members have to pull themselves up the tower, then pull the chest to the top. At the top of the tower, two tribe members will have to complete a shrine puzzle, using the ten pieces at the top and the final piece in the chest to complete it. Up for grabs is an afternoon at a Survivor style Outback Steakhouse, complete to lunch, margaritas and dessert.
The orange team is made up of Jefra, Jeremiah, LJ, Morgan and Spencer.
Team Orange. (Image Credit: CBS)
Which leaves the purple team to consist of Kass, Tasha, Tony, Trish and Woo.
Team Purple. (Image Credit: CBS)
The challenge kicks off with both teams neck and neck across the seesaw. The balance beam doesn’t prove difficult at all, with Woo the only one falling off and costing his team a little bit of team. The orange team begin working on untying their chest first but it is the purple team who gain the lead and are first to place their chest at the bottom of the tower. Team orange aren’t far behind as both teams begin to scale their respective towers.
Team Purple and Team Orange make their way across the balance beams in the Day Twenty Reward Challenge. (Image Credit: CBS)
Woo is first up for team purple, with Spencer the first for team orange. Woo is followed by Trish, Tasha, Kass and Tony, as team purple hold a one person lead over team orange as Morgan, LJ, Jefra and Jeremiah make their way to the top.
Castaways compete in the Day Twenty Reward Challenge. (Image Credit: CBS)
Team purple has their chest up to the top first, with Kass and Woo working on the puzzle. LJ and Spencer begin working on their puzzle only a few minutes after and quickly jump back into the lead, with LJ once again showing his prowess for puzzles.
The teams work on their puzzles. (Image Credit: CBS)
The orange team makes light work of their puzzle, racing ahead to an eight-four lead before placing the final three pieces, to claim Reward.
Winners are Grinners! (Image Credit: CBS)
Team purple go back to camp, with Kass asking the members of the Solana alliance if they are more worried about Jeremiah or Spencer. They agree that Spencer is more dangerous but press Kass for her opinion, claiming that she knows them better and her decision is what they will go with. Kass confesses that she doesn’t want to be the one making decisions. She explains that she isn’t a flipper, that it is assumed she is part of the alliance but in actual fact, she’s a free agent. Kass explains to Tony that she isn’t sure if she made the right move, with Tony telling her that if she is happy, then that’s all that matters. Tony reveals that Kass is very much like a stone and doesn’t express many emotions, making it difficult for him to tell whether or not she is lying to him. Worrying that Kass might not be being entirety truthful, Tony tells Woo that they need to start looking for the Idol. He explains in a confessional that he needs his “security blanket” back but trying to find it is like looking for a needle in a haystack.
Kass and Woo discuss Spencer. (Image Credit: CBS)
Meanwhile, the purple team are enjoying their Reward. Morgan explains the days events as we are shown snippets of everyone enjoying their lunch. Spencer admits that all rules went out the windows and he didn’t realise how dirty his hands were until he had finished eating. When he goes to use his napkin, a piece of paper falls out, which he quickly stuffs in his pocket which he reveals could be a “game changer”.
Fortune Napkin? (Image Credit: CBS)
A rain storm hits on the way back to camp forcing Spencer to abandon him plan to read his note. Complaining that “time is money”, he heads off for a ‘walk’ and reads his clue. Woo admits he is a big Survivor fan and knows there are generally Idol clues on Rewards so is immediately suspicious of Spencer’s behaviour. Woo decides to follow him, using his #ninjastealthmode (yet that was an actual hashtag), to see what Spencer is up to. He lurks in the shadows as Spencer strips off, placing the clue wrapped up in his pants as he enters the water to dig around the dirt wall on the other side.
Spencer reads an Idol clue. (Image Credit: CBS)
Woo guesses he’s looking for the Idol and as Spencer begins heading his way, he reveals himself. The boys have a brief discussion about going a “walks’” before the head off in opposite directions. Woo spots Spencer’s pants, holding them up and calling out that he left them behind; as he does this, the clue drops out. Noticing it, Woo picks it up and takes off like “Sonic the Hedgehog” with Spencer, realising what has happened, taking off after him. Spencer can’t catch Woo, with the former remarking that “pandemonium” is about to happen at camp.
Did you want your pants? (Image Credit: CBS)
Woo returns to camp, asking the tribe has a whole whether they knew about the clue on the Reward. Nobody is any the wiser, so Woo, who doesn’t overestimate the difficulty in searching for the Idol, recruits his alliance to help search for it by sharing the clue with them. The excitement pleases Tony, who is quick to get in on the treasure hunt after he states he “loves action”. Spencer gets back to camp and rallies his alliance to help him in the search for the Idol, resulting in two different alliances and ten people searching for it. Tony comments that you know a situation is serious when Morgan, who is more pillow than person, gets out of bed to help with the search.
Tony and LJ read the clue. (Image Credit: CBS)
As the mad search continues, Spencer confesses that stress is at its peak right now and that no matter who finds the Idol, they are likely to do so in plain sight of everyone. Woo instructs Kass to keep an eye on Spencer while he heads back to get LJ. Kass does so, with the pair exchanging words which lead to Spencer apologising to Kass for his actions the previous night. Whilst talking, Spencer has continued digging and come across the Idol. With Kass watching like a hawk, he pretends to keep digging, so she isn’t alerted to it’s presence. When Kass turns around, Spencer quickly removes it from the wall, stuffs it down his pants and heads off.
Kass keeps watch on Spencer. (Image Credit: CBS)
Spencer admits that Kass must be blind to not see what just happened as he is overwhelmed by shock on finding the Idol. He unwraps it and learns he has found the “normal one” and not the special powers Idol. He explains that with the Idol, he has created a “whole new game” by buying himself some time.
Spencer shows off his Idol. (Image Credit: CBS)
Day Twenty-two brings out the next Immunity Challenge. For the challenge, each castaway will have to balance on their toes on a plank of wood. They will then have to balance a block of wood between their head and the top of the frame. If they touch the frame or lose their balance and the block falls, they are out of the challenge with the last person left standing winning Immunity.
Everyone takes their places and we begin. Straight away, Kass drops out of the challenge and is followed soon after by Jeremiah, Trish and Tony. We jump ahead to the twenty-five minute mark were Spencer pulls off a nice save but it’s curtains for Morgan and Woo. At the one hour mark, Jefra drops out of the challenge, struggling to stand afterwards as the pain in her legs hits her. Tasha manages to pull off a successful recovery but LJ can’t hang on and drops out of the challenge, leaving only Tasha and Spencer remaining.
Solarrion during the Day Twenty-two Immunity Challenge. (Image Credit: CBS)
At the one our, thirty minute mark, Spencer is struggling big time, just managing to hang on as Jeff gives him plenty of encouragement, then as a bit of an afterthought, gives Tasha one or two encouraging words. (Classic Jeff… always rooting for the guys). The camera focuses in on both as Spencer does all he can to hang on and it pays off as Tasha surprisingly drops her block out of the blue, gifting Spencer Immunity, a moment he says he’s “been dreaming about for a long time”.
Jeff hands over Immunity to Spencer. (Image Credit: CBS)
Once back at camp, the Solana alliance get together to make their plan for Tribal Council. Tony asks Kass whether anyone from the other alliance has an Idol. Kass doesn’t believe they do. LJ says that they should have two plans incase something crazy happens and Plan A should be to target Morgan or Tasha. Tony says that Morgan will be the least likely to have an Idol or have an Idol played for her and that she “doesn’t deserve to be here”. The alliance agree that Plan A will be to vote for Morgan and Plan B is to vote for Tasha. Tony confesses that they are in a power position with six against four but that “it’s not as easy as it sounds”. He claims that if Spencer has an Idol it makes it tricky who to vote for. The other difficult situation is if Spencer doesn’t play an Idol and Kass flips to lock things up at five-five, they will be drawing rocks.
The Solana alliance discuss their plans for Tribal Council. (Image Credit: CBS)
Meanwhile, the Aparri alliance consider their target. Morgan says that it should be Kass because she doesn’t like her and she flipped. Spencer says that’s a bad option because Kass is the only person who can flip again and so they should target Tony because he is likely to do something at Tribal that might make Kass think twice. Spencer confesses that if Kass or someone was to flip, he would be able to successfully play the Idol and change the game up again.
The Aparri alliance discuss voting out Tony. (Image Credit: CBS)
Spencer speaks to Kass about potentially making a big move. He explains that if she flipped back, their alliance would go all the way to the end and she wouldn’t lose their Jury votes because she’s be sitting next to them at the Final Tribal Council or they would be less bitter Jury members. Kass admits that when she flipped she was banking on the people she double crossed to come crawling back and that’s why she did it. She tells Spencer she considers herself a free agent and will therefore weigh up all her options. Spencer reveals to her that they will be targeting Tony at Tribal Council. As the tribe prepares for Tribal, a confessional with Kass plays as she speaks about the pros and cons of Spencer’s plan against the other alliance’s plan to vote out the “annoying extra luggage” that is Morgan. She claims her strategy in Survivor is to “ambush” which what she does as a lawyer. She remarks that this strategy won’t be well received but she “loves an ambush and a blindside”.
Kass contemplates Spencer’s plan. (Image Credit: CBS)
Tribal begins with Tony stating that there was a power shift in the game. Kass explains that she was part of that and because of her actions, she received the “cold shoulder” for several days. Spencer comments that he respects big moves and that his behaviour got a little out of hand followed the last Tribal Council but that’s because he “plays to win”. Jeff asks Tony how their target for the vote was decided. Tony says that they looked at all options and came up with a consensus as an alliance. Morgan speaks up, pointing out that she isn’t a physical threat and that people generally don’t like her so she won’t get many Jury votes. Trish backs this information up, saying that on top of this Morgan is also unhelpful around camp and that she could further add to this list. Morgan replies, saying that she got used to being taken care of when she was a member of the Beauty tribe. Jeff asks her if she’s used to that back home. Morgan says that she is because and that it’s because of her looks, doing her best to rival Angie’s cookie quote as she says, “If any person in the world could you know, decide to be ugly or cute, most would pick cute”. She says that from now on she will work harder around camp.
Morgan does her best to be credited with the “quote of the season” award. (Image Credit: CBS)
Jeff asks Jefra who is on the bottom of the alliance. Jefra explains that nobody is because they are all even and are part of a link in a chain. Spencer questions that somebody has to be on the bottom, with Tony stating that the alliance was “handpicked” and they are therefore, all equal. Jefra says that someone might eventually be on the bottom but that isn’t the case now. Tony admits he hopes Kass sticks to her word as Jeff asks how unpredictable she is. Trish admits aligning with her is a risk incase she flips again but they are treating her as a member of the alliance. Kass wraps things up, suggesting that she isn’t part of any alliances and hasn’t has any guarantees’ because she is playing her own game. She remarks that if she goes to Vegas with a friend, she “doesn’t mind beating them”.
The votes are then cast. Jeff asks for Idols, none and played and he reads the votes. The first four are for Tony, with the next six for Morgan as Kass sticks to her word. Morgan’s torch is snuffed and she becomes the second member of the Jury.
Morgan… the tribe has spoken. (Image Credit: CBS)
In her final words, she explains she is proud of herself and that the experience was fantastic. She comments that she “couldn’t care less” what the others thought of her and that “Kass is a child” who “needs to grow up… you’re forty, get over it”. Harsh words Ms McLeod!
Next week, paranoia begins to set in as Tony wants to target his own.
Plus, don’t forget to catch the latest Ponderosa video! I doubt Morgan will hold back dishing the dirt on her former tribe mates!
Survivor Oz Sweep
Inappropriate Probst!
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Ben’s Opinion
I’m f**king done with Survivor. This show is cancelled. No more Survivor Oz. It’s all done. No more. Ever.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Not Morgan!
Words cannot express how sad I am right now. I don’t think I’ve been this sad since Russell got the boot in Redemption Island. Or since Jerri missed out on the FTC in Heroes vs. Villains. Or since Elisabeth didn’t win Australia. It’s terrible! Sad! Heartbreaking! AND I lose money too! Damn $10, that’s my lunch gone tomorrow. Ugh.
Anyway, guess I should talk serious about this episode right? Another decent episode, quite enjoyable and really a typical episode after the Merge episode. Was fun to see the scrambling for the Idol and a bit of banter between Kass and Morgan. All in all was fun to watch. The Reward Challenge was great (despite the puzzle aspect) and the Reward? Having an Australian flavour, (literally and figuratively), was just the icing on the cake. Loved the way Spencer handled the clue and was surprising that nobody saw it. But it didn’t really matter in the end did it? Because then EVERYONE saw it and it was on for young and old! Probably the most entertaining Idol hunt in the history of Survivor, but it was a bit disappointing not to see the ‘Tyler Perry idol’ be found. THAT would’ve been even more fun to see!
Immunity Challenge was a let down, another ‘stand and wait’ challenge although it did go for over an hour which was a plus. Spencer winning opened the door up for a potential big move from him, possibly using his Idol to save Morgan or Tash and bring this game into an interesting point with nine remaining. But he didn’t even seem to contemplate that. Besides my obvious bias for all things in a purple bikini, (Jefra the mantle goes over to you now, despite it being blue), WHY WOULDN’T YOU SIMPLY GIVE IT A SHOT!? The logic of the move I see as this: you blindside Tony, numbers are at four-four with Kass still a potential floater. With Tony gone, Kass has to turn to someone like Trish or LJ for guidance and that isn’t exactly something that would work too well, and Spencer can swoop back in on Kass and take her on board. That gives Spencer a pretty good shot at winning considering who his remaining competition would be, and could’ve been a ticket to winning a million dollars. Will be interesting to eventually hear from Spencer to see if he thought about that or if it was talked about, but right now I just feel as though a massive oversight has had there from him in this game.
Next week is another interesting looking episode, so as always, BRING IT ON!
Jarryd’s Opinion
Another solid episode in a great season.
Whilst this episode wasn’t fantastic, every season has those “filler” episodes where the dramas turns down and we get a predicable vote. As soon as Morgan got the confessional about the Reward I knew her time was up. She hasn’t spoken for a few weeks so it was a dead giveaway.
Loved the Reward Challenge purely because it was something different. I love the “big” challenges in Survivor where you have to climb stuff etc. so enjoyed watching that. The Immunity Challenge… I liked that they tried something different for a challenge like that but it wasn’t that crash hot. Not the worse idea they have had but definitely not the best.
The Idol fiasco was fantastic. Woo accidently stealing the clue and then telling the entire tribe, (not just his alliance), about it was pure gold. I have never been a fan of Kass because I don’t think she’s very game smart and Spencer getting the Idol in front of her whilst she was on watch was laughable. Is she serious or what? She might be some flashy lawyer who uses big words but she has no idea when it comes to other things. I even found myself shamelessly agreeing with some of Morgan’s opinions about her.
Speaking of Morgan… that Tribal Council was just painful. I felt for her because she went from bad to worse. Although Jefra description of the alliance was up there as well.
It’s going to be a fantastic second half of the season, there’s so much that could happen! Spencer not playing the Idol was a smart move. Why attempt to save someone else when you can use it for yourself? If he had found the Tyler Perry Idol that would have been an incredible Tribal but it wasn’t to be. Woo is slowly creeping up onto my radar… look out for Sonic the Ninja in weeks to come.
My man LJ remains in a great spot!
Nick’s Opinion
Well instead of dissecting the episode I’m going to leave that to my fellow Ozlets who do a far better job of it than me. Plus I’m all out of terrible puns and still disappointed that the “mad treasure hunt” turned out to be for a normal Idol!! So we still have a protracted search for the “Tyler Perry” god-mode Idol to come. God forbid we stop hiding Idols and actually focus on the game and the people playing it.
Anyway, I wanted to talk about the edit and who would have a reasonable shot to win based on what we have seen. In terms of days played and players left, we are pretty much at the halfway stage now so the edit should be giving us fairly good clues on who is likely to be in the running and who isn’t.
I think it’s fair to say Kass can’t win. She burned her bridges last week and just seems disliked by anyone. We can count her out. By all means, she could be there at the end, and the edit seems to suggest she will be, but probably as a losing finalist. She could be joining Dreamz, Stephen and Sash (along with many others) in the “zero Jury votes” club.
Jeffra, and Jeremiah – no reason to dislike them, but if they were the winner, I would have expected to see more of them. It is a stretch to consider them winner candidates now.
Tasha has had some solid moments, but they haven’t been consistent. Much like the two beauties above, I can’t see it happening.
Woo is an interesting one. He has been compared to Fabio, but I have to say that Fabio had some good moments that showed his strategy and why he ended up winning. Woo may have his #ninjastealthmode but it doesn’t seem to be leading to a million dollar payoff.
Last week, lots of people talked up Trish as a possible winner. It could happen, but she pops in and out of the action. A winner is normally given at least a couple of confessionals each episode to give them a consistent storyline, and I think Trish’s edit has been too patchy to consider her a winner. I could very easily see her as the season’s runner up though.
LJ is another one who people seem to think is a winner candidate. For an alpha male who had an Immunity Idol, I am surprised we have had more than one episode now where he hasn’t had a confessional. I was really surprised that we heard nothing from him after his close call at Cliff’s boot, and then nothing again tonight. It seems odd if he were the winner.
Tony is a possibility. I still get the feeling his game will come crashing down around him at some point. I think a big theme this season is that playing too hard comes back to bite you. See David, Garrett, Brice, Sarah as examples of this and I think Tony is being set up for a big fall.
So that leaves Spencer. Maybe it’s just because he is my pool pick in the Survivor Oz draw, but he just screams out as the winner to me. We have had a consistent story from him and we have been shown he learns from his mistakes. He is patient. Most importantly, I think we have been shown that when things don’t go well for him, it’s because of the bad moves of others, (Kass, Garrett, Sarah), and not anything he is doing. The editors have been very careful to make sure we are invested in his story more than any other, (I’m sure I wasn’t the only one punching the air when he found that Idol). They want us to like and care about Spencer. That’s why I’m sticking by him as the winner, even as the numbers look bad for him.
Now watch my theory come crashing down as Spencer gets blindsided with an Idol in his pocket next week. Thanks for reading – I’m off to have a pineapple margarita from Outback Steakhouse – the only steakhouse approved by Sandra Diaz Twine.
Jimmy’s Opinion
After last week’s shocking Tribal Council, Spencer is quite disappointed in Kass saying that she goes “wherever her estrogen takes her, not her brain” and thinks she made a bad move. Kass responds by saying that Spencer and the rest of the Aparri tribe violated the number one rule in Survivor. That is that you don’t cater to the person on top of the alliance, but you cater for the person on the bottom. I am not quite sure if I agree with Kass, as she was guaranteed to sit at the Final Three with Spencer and Tasha had she stuck with the ‘Aparri six.
The next morning, we find Morgan and Kass having a ‘high-school’ type of argument, as Kass feels Morgan has been rude to her. I can honestly say that I haven’t seen any footage of Kass and Morgan having a conversation with each other in any of the earlier episodes. Kass even admitted at the previous Tribal Council that she and Morgan don’t really talk to each other.
At the Reward Challenge, the team of Spencer, Jefra, Morgan, LJ and Jeremiah win a feast at a Survivor-themed Outback Steakhouse. By luck, Spencer finds a clue to the Hidden Immunity Idol hidden in his napkin. When he returns to camp, he sneaks away from camp and tries to find it. This is where all hell breaks loose as Woo, with his ‘ninja stealth skills’ decides to follow Spencer. He doesn’t know Woo is there and what was Spencer thinking leaving the clue lying on his trousers. Woo finds the clue and shares it with the Solana tribe. Spencer, what were you thinking! From there, the mad scramble is on for the Hidden Immunity idol. Luckily, for Spencer, he redeems himself by finding the Idol first. Phew! That was close.
Just as I said last week, it’s the beginning of the end of the underdog Aparri tribe with Morgan voted out this week. But it looks as though, the Solana alliance will be turning on themselves in the next episode. This is going to get quite interesting. There’s been so many twists and turns this season, i can’t pick the winner. But, I am hoping for Spencer to make it all the way to the Final tribal Council. Go Spencer!
Ferdinand’s Opinion
Another great episode, although the boot was pretty predictable!
The one thing that I wasn’t a big fan of with this episode was the horrid distribution of confessionals. Only Tony, Spencer, Kass, Woo and Morgan got any confessionals. The fact that Morgan who has barley spoken since the first episode suddenly got a massive jump in screen-time was a clear indicator that there was a huge possibility of her going home, which she, (unfortunately?), did.
To be honest I am not too sad to see Morgan go, she didn’t really contribute much to, well, anything except for being a “non-conceited” mean girl, who wasn’t really that mean. Disappointing.
Woo also for the first time received some substantial airtime, which I surprisingly liked! He went from being one of my least favorites to someone I really like in one episode, good job NinjaBoy! He still has the least amount of confessionals of everyone though, even less than first boot Garrett, which is not good for his winning chances.
#ChaosKass got a pretty solid edit as well, which actually wasn’t all that negative. Nobody, except for HotGirlWithAGrudge, lashed out on her. She continued to have complex and funny confessionals and she was also shown to be both patients in regards to other contestants forgiving her. This was a good episode for Kass as she was not edited to be some kind of villain lunatic.
Kass also mentioned that Tony was charming and likeable, maybe too likeable to bring to the Final Tribal Council. My view on Tony has changed over the last episodes, I thought he was going to be a villain because of his lying and sneaking around; however I am seeing him more and more as a hero. A fun and hard-playing hero.
Spencer is a puzzle for me. He is this season’s main narrator, and has received a ton of confessionals, but few of them have been particularly deep in regards to personality or background. He also hasn’t really done much up until this episode. This episode was probably the first episode he has been given a negative edit by being sexist towards Kass. However, he later said that he had overacted towards Kass at Tribal Council, which improved my view on him. The fact that he has been an underdog more or less since day one who has been given a lot of airtime and now won an Immunity Challenge and found the Hidden Immunity Idol makes me think he is a lock-in for fan favourite award this season.
Trish and Jefra were almost invisible this episode. I still think both of them have the chance to go far though, but not much to say about them at this time.
LJ and Tasha also had a very weak episode, second weak in a row. I see that there are many out there thinking that LJ will win, even wants him to win, I personally think that ship has sailed. He has had a couple of good episodes, but not getting any airtime in the Merge or the episode after doesn’t bode to well for him. I thought got a long time that Tasha had the chance to win, great early edit, strong in challenges, fun and likeable. However, same as LJ she had a couple of very weak episodes. Then again, there have been a lot of under-the-radar female winners, Natalie and Sandra went seven episodes each without having a confessional.
Oh and Jeremiah was there I think?
Ivan’s Opinion
Guys who like hot girls with big boobs, especially when they are put on a show where they get a lot of screen time in bikinis, will be lamenting the departure of Morgan McLeod, especially since they were hoping that Morgan would be seen as the least threatening of the minority alliance which would, on paper, guarantee her top seven finish and at least a few more episodes. But no, Morgan was taught the lesson Natalie Tenerelli and Ashley Underwood were never taught, (regardless of what Phillip said in his voting confessional, he was voting for Ashley because Boston Rob told him to, same as usual): you don’t get to slack off when you get to the Merge, you still have to do shit around camp, otherwise you can still piss people off and get voted out.
I’m glad Spencer didn’t play his Idol because despite him being a smart guy and a fan of the show, I’m not sure he would’ve used it on the right player. If Spencer can keep winning Immunity and since he only has a normal Idol not the powered up one, (so he’s not entirely in the same spot as Terry Deitz), I think he’s waiting until there’s only one possible options for the majority to vote for before playing his Idol, to ensure he guesses right and the blindside is a success. If that’s the case, the disadvantage is that waiting too long could cause the numbers gap to be too empathic for the game to change with a single Idol play, but who knows? I definitely don’t think Eddie would’ve gotten as far as he did in Caramoan if Phillip wasn’t blindsided.
Kass broke her trend of “making a move every time she felt she could get into a better position”. She did so in Garrett and Sarah’s vote offs but this time she stuck with her alliance. Maybe it’s because she knew if she flipped it would only be a five-five tie and she didn’t want to risk drawing a rock, especially since she knew it was unlikely she’d be exempt from the drawing at all, (either by winning Immunity, playing an Idol, or being one of the two targets in the deadlocked vote). Maybe she believes she can win the game or get farther than fifth in her alliance, but I think Kass is too smart to buy what Jefra was selling at Tribal Council. Also, for a southern person, Jefra needs to work on her similes and metaphors. “We’re like a chain”. When I think of chain I think of Chain Chomp from Super Mario and other linear chains, such as food chains. There are orders to chains Jefra! Unless you meant like a keychain ring? Whatever.
I was a bit shocked the Idol Spencer found wasn’t the Tyler Perry Idol because I thought this would be like the Philippines where regular Idols wouldn’t be replanted after they were played since there were already three of them before the Merge. But bad move from Spencer, although at this point I don’t think it’ll matter much since he got the Idol. He’s a super fan, so didn’t he remember Lisa finding Malcolm’s Idol in his pants? You always have to have that stuff well hidden or on you. You definitely don’t leave your pants out in the open with a clue in the pockets. This is Survivor, he has nothing but time and no where to be so he couldn’t have been rushed and then forgot. Oh well. Also I wonder if this means that there won’t be any clues about the Tyler Perry Idol? That would actually be a good idea to make it harder to find since this Idol really is powerful. I know not everyone likes scenes where people are looking for the Idol but the scenes we were given this episode are better than your typical Idol hunt scenes. We had some good confessionals, we had Woo using his ninja stealth mode, and thankfully the person who found the Idol is currently out of the numbers, so I’m hoping this changes the game, at least for one Tribal Council.
Being a video game fan, I’m glad Woo mentioned Sonic in one of his confessionals and any mention of Sonic or any other SSB character gets me excited for the next Super Smash Bros game. The “next time on Survivor” segment hints that there will be a divide in the majority alliance. We’ve been there, we’ve done that, it hasn’t always been the case, we know they can be misleading, but logically I know I wouldn’t want someone like LJ getting a free ride to the final five or six. Now the the numbers advantage is higher than two, the next few episodes could possibly be predictable ones but I hope for the best, since this season has been great so far.
Finally, congratulations Kass on being the first person to describe a police officer from Jersey as a charming person who everyone likes. First time for everything.
Survivor Re-cappers: Marty Piombo
Each week we’ll bring you the viewpoint of a former Survivor contestant to hear what they think of the episode and their thoughts for the rest of the season!
Our seventh recap features Marty Piombo from Nicaragua, as he discuss his thoughts on the episode, why he thought Kass and her move didn’t make sense, his thoughts on the idol hunt, how close he was to coming back to Blood vs Water as well as being close to Spencer and his real thoughts on Morgan. Marty then answers our final set of 5 questions as follows:
TIP TO WIN: Spencer
DARK HORSE: Woo
NEXT TO GO: Kass
TRIBE THEY WOULD BE ON: Brains
PLAYER MOST SIMILAR TO: Spencer
Join us next week as we are joined by Marquesas winner Vecepia Towery to help us recap the ninth episode of Cagayan!