SURVIVOR: HEROES VS HEALERS VS HUSTLERS – 10/4/17

Day 5 at the Heroes tribe and J.P. is out fishing. He knows he needs to put the “Power Couple” talk on the back burner, and one way to do that is to provide food. He succeeds in skewering a good-sized lobster, and the tribe is thankful to be eating some high-class fixins…

Later, Chrissy and J.P. head out for a chat, and what we’re about to see is how the show is setting up Chrissy’s season. Methinks they’re setting her up for a deep run in the game. We see her systematically chat with each member of the tribe, producing the following:

-even though no one would suspect her of aligning with J.P., she says he’s too dumb to work with (nice, how’s that Reunion Show gonna go?)
-Ashley is smart, but Chrissy doesn’t believe that she’s not in a Power Couple alliance with J.P.
-Alan could be loyal, but after his blow-up at Tribal, he’s a loose cannon.
-leaving Ben, which makes perfect sense to Chrissy. She’s smart, he’s social, no one would suspect it, and they both have great teeth. And based on this camera angle, I’m beginning to wonder if Chrissy has fake boobs. I think she just moved up a few notches on the Fish boner scale…

We then get a little comic relief as cracks are starting to form over at the Hustler casino. Or more accurately, Patrick is starting to show his cracks…

Besides the “getting pinched by a crab” scene, he’s also asking crazy questions, jumping around, dancing, dropping sh*t, and just being an all-around pain in everyone’s ass. Lauren, in particular, is bugged by the ginger’s antics, and with the age differential between her and everyone else, she’s beginning to think she needs to do some damage control.

She takes an exfoliating break with Ali and drops the hint that Patrick might need to be the first to go. This puts Ali in an odd place, as she reminds us she intended to work with Patrick. But if he’s gonna play the fool around camp, she may need to re-evaluate her alliance. Or…she’s just saying that to misdirect us and she’ll vote out Lauren the first time they go to Tribal. We’ll see…

The next day (Day 6) we fly into our first challenge and the tribes are standing on platforms on the ocean. The other tribes discover Katrina went home (natch, they probably thought…) and Ryan confesses he’d like the opportunity to work with Chrissy at some point down the line because of their SuperIdol connection. Probst takes the boobie idols back and describes the challenge.

In it, 3 players will jump into the water and push a floating ring to an area where they’ll need to dive down and push puzzle pieces out of a cage. Once all the bundles are collected, the remaining 2 players will use the pieces to solve a sign-post puzzle. In addition to Immunity, the tribes are playing for Reward, which is a deluxe fishing kit for the winning tribe and a minimal version for the runner-up. Sitting out will be Joe for the Healers and Lauren for the Hustlers. Time to get ‘er done!

No need to detail who’s doing what, but I will say the Hustlers get to their cage first. And with all dives being done by Devon, they collect their 3 pieces first and make their way to the puzzle platform. Meanwhile, the other tribes are experiencing some trouble, but with J.P. and Cole’s multiple dives, both tribes eventually collect their pieces.

The Hustlers have Simone and Ali solving their puzzle, while the Heroes chose Chrissy and Alan to solve. When the Healers finally arrive on the platform, it’s Desi and Mike handling the puzzle. But with the varying lengths of pieces that need to be placed at three different heights, then spun around to see if they’ll clear some metal frames, it’s anyone’s game still. As Jeff says,

“If it was easy, it wouldn’t be Survivor,”

…and we can see that as multiple pieces need to be removed and swapped with other pieces to see if they’ll make a better fit. Out of the blue, the Healers tribe seems to have found a groove, and place their final piece to spin the sign-post, and all the pieces clear the brackets…the Healers win Immunity!

But second place is still up for grabs and with the lead the Hustlers had, they’d better not lose. But…they do, as the personal assistant and the diversity advocate (whatever that is…) are no match for the actuary and NFL player. Well, for the actuary, as Alan was only there to place the pieces on the top tier…

After collecting their idols, the tribes break for camp and the decision of who needs to be voted out is settled by Devon. It’s Simone, since she can’t do puzzles. And is anyone else thinking it may not be Simone now because Devon says it will be? I’m thinking Patrick’s put a target on his back, and I’m thinking Lauren has already labeled herself an outsider. So, who did you think is going home? Let me know who your prediction was in a comment…

When the Hustlers return to their beach, we’re shown two snakes slithering in a tree, so I’m wondering if that’s foreboding something about to happen. The three women take a walk to the well and Simone brings up that Patrick should go since he’s been getting on everyone’s nerves, to which Lauren agrees, but even she knows the idea of taking out a strong player may not be in their best interest.

Not in their best interest?!

Ya think? I’m not sure how long I’ve typed this sentence, but…

“Keep your tribe strong at the beginning.”

I don’t care if one of your players is a serial killer, if he’s strong, you keep Ted Bundy around for a few votes until you reach the tribe swap, or the merge, or the next time there’s a major shake-up. Why would you get rid of Patrick when you can dump Simone? Or Lauren (who sat out a water challenge for fishing gear, mind you), or Ryan, who’s probably the only one weaker than Simone on this tribe. I’m mean, seriously, the idea of taking out Patrick first is the dumbest thing I’ve heard this season, aside from the dumb things earlier this episode and last week.

I don’t wanna go out on a limb here and say this season is already doomed to fail, but I think we can agree this crop of idiots is not showing us much. And we’re not blind superfans who love EVERYTHING ABOUT SURVIVOR. We demand a lot, and damn it, we’d better be rewarded with some keen players… Come on, Casting, do your damn job!

But, Lauren is smart enough to know they shouldn’t spend too much time away from the boys, so the girls head back to camp. However, the guys have already discussed getting rid of Simone, that is, until Ali and Patrick take a walk, and then Ryan has conversations with Ali, Simone and others. He’s most concerned with who he can trust moving forward, and with all the clips of Patrick acting like an idiot, it almost looks like the show is setting the ginger up to fall. Or, setting us up to make it look like Patrick’s the fool, but Simone will take the fall.

It’s still too early in the game to play these kinds of editorial games, and frankly, I’m surprised the game/show has evolved into this monster where tribes are thinking themselves out of existence. Here’s a reality check, Hustlers. If you keep Patrick around, you strengthen the chances that you don’t have to return to Tribal. Period. Moving on…

I can’t believe I had to type that, but the stupidity of the current cast doesn’t cease to surprise me. And I hate to admit it, but it seems like the last few SEASONS of Survivor have fallen prey to this same level of ineptitude, so I’m beginning to wonder if the show is getting dangerously close to jumping the shark. All these idiots come onto the show with a load of preconceived notions of how to play the game, but they’re wasting their time. The game is simple:

-Early on, keep your tribe strong.

-Early on, make alliances and stick to them.

-Later, establish multi-tiered alliances: a core 2, a couple more who are loyal, and then see what happens.

-After the merge, scramble to stay alive and always keep your eyes and ears open.

-Hopefully, reunite with your core alliance and keep the alliances fluid.

-Do your best to do well in challenges, but not too well…

-And then scramble, scramble, scramble…

-And at some point, you’re gonna have to lie to someone and break their heart, but that’s part of the game.

But these fools obviously wanna come back to Tribal as much as possible because that’s where their résumé is made, so they’re discussing taking out their strongest player.

Or, their weakest one.

Or, Dick Butkus. Because the one thing the show likes to do is surprise us, and there’s been not one mention of taking out our softball captain. And if I may remind you of something I wrote last week, “Frankly, I think [Lauren will] be the first out of the Hustlers, just because she’s got a funky accent.”