SURVIVOR: BLOOD VS WATER – 11/5/14

Finally, an immunity challenge to alleviate some of the tension in the air. As the tribe marches in, Jeff retrieves the Tribal Immunity idol from Baylor, and then reveals the new Individual Immunity necklace,

“This is what you covet…”

And I’m wondering if I’m coveting something else right now that involves Julie lying around in the buff… But I digress…

The challenge is rather simple. A combination of things we’ve seen before. Holding onto two ropes that hold up a wood disc, a ball must be balanced on top of the wood. At intervals, players have to move their hands back farther on the ropes to make it more difficult. If, after 25 minutes, anyone’s left, a second ball will be added. Strength will be helpful but balance and coordination is paramount. And right now, it looks like Julie and Josh need to win the most, but there’s a lot of show left…

Jeff says “go” and within 15 seconds, Jeremy is out. I guess strength means nothing! Everyone else seems to have the hang of it until the 9 minute mark (1 minute before the end of the 1st round) when Missy’s ball drops, and then Julie’s.

Round 2 begins and the thing I notice is how high Alec is keeping his arms. You think you’d want to keep your arms lower so you don’t work your biceps as much – maybe by leaning back a bit farther? – but who the hell am I to say how it’s done? We then say goodbye to Reed, Baylor, and then Alec. After a nice save, Jaclyn drops out as well. We’re down to 5 players (Jon, Keith, Natalie, Wes, Josh).

After a big gust of wind, Natalie falls and we’re at the 25 minute mark. Time to add a second ball. Should we even make a joke about who would be best at handling two balls? Should we go there? Okay, we’ll stay from it THIS TIME!

And I guess I was wrong about Josh’s ball handling skills because he just dropped out. 3 players remaining. Another gust of wind claims the next victim: Jon. Down to father and son…on his birthday. Both men have a bit of ball movement, and just as Keith’s are rolling closer to the edge, Wes loses his balls and daddy’s got a dadgum Immunity Necklace! I wonder if he’ll give his son a nice piece of Nicaraguan jewelry tonight?

Once they return to camp, the good vibrations celebrating Keith’s victory dissipates like a Brian Wilson weed cloud as the tribe is left with only broth to consume. Alec chimes in “I sure would love the trail mix,” which ruins the mood. Again, everyone is silent waiting for Julie to confess or for someone to confront her about it, but no one pipes up. Seriously, what is wrong with these people? Not that you need to have an argument about it, not that you need to do an intervention, but could someone say, “Hey Julie, what’s with you hiding the trail mix from us?”

She knows there’s tension in the air so she’s going to get away from camp. And she may be thinking of getting away permanently. She shares a conversation with Missy and reveals that she’s not doing too well being away from Big John for so long. Missy tells her to hang on for one more day but Julie’s smart enough to know they just want to use her for her vote, and she needs to figure out if that’s cool with her. Julie’s a savvy girl, and she ain’t gonna let these fools play the game with her as their pawn.

Jon and Jeremy then reaffirm their plan to take out Josh, who, in Jeremy’s opinion, is the “only one playing the game” in that alliance. Sounds like a DragonSlayer special: “Take out the head of the snake first…” but plans in Survivor are as fickle as a woman’s nail polish…

As Jeremy is taking a dip in the ocean, Jon is sitting with the “couples” alliance and it appears that Jon is willing to make the jump over to their side. He confirms this with Jaclyn a short time later, who actually seems to have her head on straight as she questions if this is their best move. Jon seems convinced that it is, but I’m not too sure of that. To turn on your core alliance now is tenuous, but everything in this game is tenuous. Let’s just see what the future holds…

While all this is going on, once again the question of the season comes up,

“Where’s Julie?”

And I know where she is. She’s running away from her tribe, the game, the jury, and everything else we fans love about this show. She has a long-winded conversation with Jeff about why she’s done playing, why she gets judged – “the boobs,” she says – and a bunch of other crap that just sounds like she’s not comfortable anymore and wants to get back to her codependent relationship. I’m not sure that’s entirely true, and I don’t care, YOU DON’T QUIT THE GAME! I’m now sorry I made all those boob jokes. No more. You’re dead to me, Julie!

Jeff makes it official by asking her one last time, but she’s had enough. The “one more day” of getting past this vote to help her alliance is not worth it to her. She’s done. Right now…

Jeff arrives at camp and gives them the lowdown. There’s a bunch of talk about “how this affects her alliance,” but we kind of already know who’s on what side of that fence. The real gist of the conversation comes out when it’s mentioned how lazy she was around camp, and more importantly, how she hid the trail mix theft from everyone and didn’t want to own up to it. Maybe that has more to do than any of this “I miss my boyfriend” bulls**t that she told Jeff. The truth is, according to Jon, she just didn’t want to face the reality that she’s a selfish bitch.

On the upside for the remaining players is there’s no Tribal Council. Thank god we don’t have to go through another Tribal where Keith doesn’t speak! Yay!

Next week looks to have a good dose of chauvinism and discussions of man caves. Alec, that good old boy, looks to be channeling one of the guys from Deliverance as he talks crap to Jaclyn. Oh-oh, this might not bode well for someone’s alliance! Jaclyn’s even considering not flipping over to the Couples Alliance and sticking to her Missy/Baylor/Jeremy/Natalie one. But Jon may not be down with that, so hold off on those engagement present purchases! Tune in next week for another episode of Total Drama Island!

So I guess the fallout of Julie leaving is that there’ll only be 8 or 9 members of the jury. It’s been discussed that once you quit the show, you lose the ability to participate in the jury. Heck, I think it’d be fair to boot her from the Reunion episode too! And I bet that would compel John Rocker to stay away, and OMG, what have you started, woman…?! In her final comments, Julie says she knows she’s going to get some s**t when she gets back, but she doesn’t care. She’s got her John-John and no one else matters.

Good for her. Thanks for taking the spot of a player – no, 2 players – that would have played until the end. For f**k’s sake, can the show make these a**holes sign waivers that they can’t quit? It really messes up the game. I’m done with this episode…

Another week, another The Walking Dead experience to look forward to. And holy crap, was last Sunday’s the worst one ever? Holy s**t, it was like watching an old American International Picture. Samuel Z. Arkoff presents, “Reform School Zombies!” All we needed was Beth walking naked in a shower scene and it’d be perfect.

And what’s up with Chris Rock on SNL? I honestly think that was one of the worst episodes I’ve ever seen, and I’ve been watching since 1977. I recall that last year they wanted to add some diversity so they added Sasheer Zamata. Great decision there, I have no problem with diversity, but last weekend I felt like I was watching “Weekend at the Apollo” rather than SNL. Something was very off last week… And I’m not the only one saying this…

I’m not going to discuss the election, but I am searching for a way to deduct all the vodka I drink as medicinal, considering marijuana is now legal in so many states…

Fish Out!

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