Back at camp, the immediate feeling of “Good job, Woo” lasts as long as a heartbeat, and the Aparri 6 are excusing themselves to take a collective pee in the ocean. They need to know who to vote for now! When Spencer suggests Jefra, “Because she’s not a player nor has an idol” (makes perfect sense to me) Sarah is back to targeting Tony. She lets us know she’s still the fulcrum in this teeter-totter and she’d rather play with the weaker players (Aparri) than the stronger ones. She’s willing to sell out Cops-R-Us for a run at Top 6. Of course, what these fulcrum players never realize is that once you flip, you’re now on the bottom of THAT tribe. Duh.
So when hidden idols are discussed, Sarah promises the group that Tony doesn’t have one. Now I’m not so convinced that Sarah is playing with a full deck…OR…she’s making the biggest play in Survivor history and fooling her entire tribe into voting against her double-secret alliance. Who knows? But what I do know is that Sarah is getting fueled by that rum at camp, a point the show makes clear by how often she’s shown chugging from that bottle. Alcohol is bad, kids…!
While Aparri plots, the Solana 5 are beginning to get paranoid about the way things are looking. Tony still thinks he can pull Sarah back in, and Trish is wants to approach Kass to see if she’ll flip. Things are getting precarious and everyone’s radars are fine tuned to Paranoid.
Tony finally pulls Sarah aside and spells out what’s up. Go with them and finish sixth, or go with me to Top 3. Maybe the rum is clouding her judgment, because she’s reluctant to make the jump. The way she sees it, Tony is a huge threat, and he should take it as a complement that she wants to take him out. When all is said and done, Tony realizes he couldn’t pull Sarah on board, so he may have to play his idol.
We then see Trish having a conversation with Kass about the new pecking order and Kass mentions that she’s been replaced (by Sarah) as one of the ones leading the tribe. So Trish asks her who she’d take out if she had her choice.
“Sarah.”
And just like that, the fulcrum could become the first victim. Trish takes this information back to Tony and LJ, who are both more than happy to vote out Sarah. While this all depends on Kass flipping, or Tony and LJ playing idols, there’s some serious s**t about to go down at Tribal!
Jeff welcomes everyone in and takes the tribe’s temperature. LJ gives a phony “It’d be a compliment to go home at this stage” speech, which Tash agrees with. It’s also mentioned that alliances need to get rid of strong players so they can move on. Jeff asks if that means it’s a 5-on-5 with Sarah in the middle. This is validated. He then asks LJ how immunity idols may come into play. Funny how he always asks the ones with idols about idols… LJ says that since none have been played, it may just be a big Survivor joke, but Tony instantly offers up that he has one. When challenged by Spencer to show said idol, instead of playing it cool and letting them guess, he pulls it out and puts it around his neck, claiming the idol is a “community idol.”
As soon as Tony makes that move, the Aparri 6 begin scrambling to figure out who they’re going to vote for (we’ve seen this before at the old Brains tribe…)
“The other one,” Spencer says, meaning LJ, I presume…
Tony is taking pride in the chaos he just created telling Jeff to “look at their faces” to confirm he’s wrought the fury. Jeff says there’s no reason to delay,
“It’s time to vote…”
And after they do, Jeff asks the perfunctory “If anyone has an immunity idol and wants to play it…” and Tony happily gives his to LJ. So, if LJ’s a conniving man, he could simply sit there and feel safe that he’s not going home. But just before Jeff reads the first vote, LJ mans up and gives his idol to Tony, thinking he just may need it. And just when we think all the votes are going to go against LJ, surprise, surprise, the first vote is for Jefra. And then Sarah, and they alternate until it’s 5-5. Time for the last vote…
“The 7th person voted out of Survivor is…Sarah.”
Boom goes the dynamite. It’s an editor tell, I knew it!
As Sarah gets her torch snuffed and departs, the inquisition begins on who flipped. “I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t…” And as Spencer asks Kass. Silence. And with that, all is revealed. Spencer FINALLY shows that a**hole quality that Jeff alluded to before the season,
“Kass, 0% of winning the game…”
But we all know why she did it. She wasn’t thinking of winning the game. She was thinking of getting back at the person who was a total bi*ch to her the last few days. Isn’t that clear? Don’t f**k with an attorney! Besides, I’m sure she has plenty of money in the bank to go home to. What viewers seem to forget is that most people on this show CAN AFFORD TO BE ON THIS SHOW. How many people can take 7 weeks off from their jobs/lives/school and just…play a game?! I’m sure Kass was thinking, “I’m going to take out the bi*ch that tried to bully me. Well, f**k that. No one tells ME how to vote.”
Maybe Sarah should have played her cards a bit closer and just went along with the safe vote from the get go. Get rid of Jefra first, because that’s an easy vote. Then take out the other tribe, one-by-one, until it’s just your tribe. It’s happened before. But every fricking season, people seem to get wrapped up in over thinking every vote. “We need to take out the strongest player. We need to take out the biggest threats.”
No, you need to take out one person at a time. Sometimes it’s a weak player. Just make your hit and move on. Now, the entire game is thrown upside down again, and all because Sarah was insisting on who to vote out. How’s that guarantee that Tony doesn’t have an idol look now…?
Cops-R-Bust…!
Next week’s tease shows us that Kass is now having a tiff with Morgan, so it looks like she’s not winning any popularity polls anytime soon. And the mad scramble for the idol with “different powers” will be in full effect. Can’t wait to see what those powers will be. Immunity for 2? Power to vote out someone? Power to vote someone back in the game? Oohh, that would be interesting…
Oh well, a week to ponder as we get to endure all the tweets about how that was the “most dramatic rose ceremony ever.” Ooops, wrong show. But I do know the season is just about to take off. Can’t wait to see how this all is going to play out. Hope you stick it out with me.
I’m already dealing with the trauma of no Walking Dead for 7 months. Seriously!? You’re just going to leave them in a train car! It’s like that was the first hour in a 2-hour season finale. Where’s the rest of the show? Where’s the resolution!? I guess it’s just a big ploy to keep me interested until October. Not sure I can hang on that long, but something tells me I’ll be back as a fan when it returns. So now it’s Idol, Revolution, and Amazing Race until next Wednesday.
And just wanted to mention that I really love the Amazing Race, but it’d be just too much to recap that show as well (a few have asked). I know there are some others who can recap practically every show on television, but I actually have a job, and family, and a life, so I can’t devote that much time to writing about television. Maybe if things changed, sure, but for now, I’ll do Survivor and be happy to be a small part of the Survivorverse…
Hey now Brian, what’s with all the lawyer hating. Some of us aren’t all that bad! While I know nothing about Kass (and still can’t figure out if she bugs me or not), she may be loaded, but not all attys are rich. Yes, she could work for a big firm or corporation and be well off. Or she could be a public sector lawyer and really not make more than the average college grad. Plus, lots of those people on the show don’t seem rich (though I agree some are). The cops aren’t rich, the hair dresser certainly can’t be (just look at her hair-haha). A rich yoga teacher??? As an attorney, I feel it necessary to point out the counter argument (throat clearing sound) that you could also say losers go on the show bc they have no job to go back to???? Anyway, you get my point.
But here’s what really bugs me….Woo and the shoes? Did that seem fair? I noticed they hardly showed his feet yet Jeff never addressed it. I guess they all could have worn their sneakers? Yet in the demo shots, everyone was bare foot. And then, the one guy with special shoes wins. Something seemed out of sync for me. What do you think?
Finally, back to Kass. I am not 100% sure that we can disparage her vote for Sara. Again, I’m not nec. a Kass fan but you could argue (haha) that she knew Sara didn’t like her and that was prob. not going to change. If she didn’t get sara out, Sara would have been gunning for her (possibly) at some point down the road. In addition, Sarah wasn’t too savvy in her assessments about idols. She swore LJ and Tony didn’t have them. Hillbilly pretty boy Jethro was totally right in fact. Finally, by voting Sarah out, she now makes allies in the other half of the tribe and beats her dorky brains to the punch. Totally agree with you about Spencer-I’ve really started liking him until that bitchy comment at the end.
Anyway, I loved your recap as always. 🙂
-KinBville Esq.
KinB! Thanks for writing. I always like a comment with a lot packed in it…
Firstly, I don’t mean to hate on attorneys. I have a few friends and family that are in the Legal industry and they are lovely people. I think I (and others, perhaps) have some notion that all attorneys are like the characters on LA Law (dating myself much…?). Sinister, vile, self absorbed people… But, we know that’s not the case.
A simple internet search showed me that Kass’s law firm is very…simple. So, while she may be giving off confrontational vibes, it could be for a variety of other reasons. I think she may also be somewhat of a big fish in a small pond at home (this is all speculation, mind you) which she’s exhibiting on the show. Who knows? What I do know is that she’s not playing a very smart game, IMHO, because she just sold old her super-strong alliance of 3, which is crazy to me…
Hard to say about how well off contestants are. Lindsey revealed in a post-show interview that she OWNED the salon, so she wasn’t JUST a hairstylist. The cops may not be rich, per se, but I think they’re comfortable enough. My perspective may be off, since I’m not rich, and hold deep seeded grudges against the wealthy… 😉
And while I get the feeling a LOT of the contestants are living comfortably, I know there are students, farmers, and every other profession under the sun. Truthfully, when I think of a cross-section of America, I think there’s a higher percentage of struggling families/individuals than those who aren’t. But, we don’t get to see those folks on Survivor. Sure, no one wants to see Martha, who’s on food stamps back home, play the game, because she’d be playing for blood. And we’d also hate to think who’s taking care of Mary’s kids back home while she’s away. What I have noticed is that there are lot more “interesting people” on the show now than before. We don’t get the “I’m a contestant in beauty pageant’s back home” girls. We get, “I am a former Miss Tennessee 2011 and I competed in the Miss America pageant.” I think this is one place that Survivor has to be careful. Fans of the show want to identify, somewhat, with the “characters” we see, and if everyone’s a rock star, we’ll soon tune out…
I get it, there’s a fine line these shows have to walk between casting interesting people and some possible trainwrecks. I think other shows lean more toward the trainwrecks than Survivor does, but you gotta think that SOMEONE on the show saw trainwreck potential in Brandon Hantz and didn’t raise a flag. Oops, that almost backfired… Personally, I don’t understand how some people haven’t snapped when some of that BS is pulled in camp. I would have thrown Colton in the fire for what he said to Christina…
RE: the shoes. I guess it may be as simple as the show says, “Do you wanna wear shoes or not?” and leaves it up to the contestants. I know there are a lot of challenges that would seem to favor shoes/no shoes, but it’s just one of those things that doesn’t make the edit. Since they had to swim out to their perches, maybe everyone chose to keep their shoes dry, except for Woo who was wearing the aqua-shoes…?
We’ll see how tomorrow’s episode affects Kass’s standing in the game. She either made a good move or a very bad one. I think it was a bad one, but who knows? I always say that playing Survivor is like a poker game. No two hands are similar. What worked one season has no bearing on another because the players are all different. One day I hope to go back and review how each winner did it, and come up with a formula for winning the game: if this happens, you do this, and you should do well. If THAT happens, you do something else. Again, there’s never a definable path because of the various twists, turns, flops, and blindsides. You just gotta take each day as it comes and stay active… Like life.
I wish someone who’s played the game successfully would chime in with some honest assessment of how they did it, and not just what they think we wanna hear…
Wow, that’s a long response…
Hey B,
I was really just teasing you about atty hating. I don’t mind the jokes and mostly agree with them. My husband and I met in law school and probably got along because we both agreed that most of our classmates were obnoxious dorks with an attitude. Don’t know why law school (and I’d say medical school as well) does that to people, but its true. Interesting about Kass. Often the big fish in little ponds are the worst! Its funny. She looks so much like an old neighbor of mine, a total separated at birth! I often wonder too about how these people walk away from jobs, whatever they are, to do this show. It would be an interesting question to ask all the contestants and if it had negative consequences after. I still think the thing with Woo’s shoes (haha I rhymed) is annoying. I wonder if more people will bring those type in later shows? Back to Kass’ vote….you are probably right that it won’t be the best decision. She def. broke the trust. Will be fun to see how it plays out. Looking forward to your next update too!
All I am reading is what a stupid decision that was for Kass . . . and it very well might be. I was wondering if she will go back to her original tribe (in the new one she is obviously at the bottom), tell them that she saw the writing on the wall with Sarah, but she is definitely ‘one of them’. I don’t think they will trust her – however, I have been surprised before at how easily things turn around. If she votes with them and helps eliminate the other group (Tony, et al) and ingratiates herself back in with Spencer and Tash, she may be able to survive. OR she just screwed herself royally – lol.
Kinbville – I noticed those shoes also. I thought it must be OK in the Survivor rules, but I also thought they gave him an advantage. And I think that Kass realized that Sarah would be after her – so she made it into a ‘who gets who first’ situation.