One Dumb Quitter, The End of Cops R Us, and A Tale of Two Beauties

Again with the late post. Forgive?

What a fun episode!  A girl fight and quitter AND a vote too! Yay! 

The Girl Fight & The Quitter:

We all know that Lindsie (I've never bothered to learn how to spell her name properly, since I didn't figure she'd last that long, and it's more convenient to just call her dreadlocks.) and Trish haven't gotten along since day one. Now, I'm not sure Trish would be the very first person I'd want to be stuck on an island with (can we discuss how many women this season have annoying voices? Sara's voice, for instance, is a bit of a higher-pitched Penny Marshall.) but I get Trish. Trish is Boston, so if you get Boston Rob, you get Trish. And to be (a little bit) fair, we never really got to know Dreadlocks (see above, re: name) except to see her hanging tight with Cliff and mean-girling Trish. Maybe she's a lovely person. Oh, except for the quitting. So, when they got back to camp after voting off Cliff, Trish tried to explain herself for flipping on the former Brawns. Dreads would have none of it. Pretty much told Trish she hated the following things:

• Trish's laugh
• Trish's voice
• Trish's face
• Trish's teeth
• Trish.

So, Trish says, "So... Lindsie, you don't like me then?"
Dreads: "No."
Trish: "Now ask me if I care."

Totally Boston. The application for Survivor should really state: "Thin skinned folks need not apply." But, what would be the fun in that, right? Anyway, Dreads apparently is of the thinner-skinned variety. She storms off and eventually the team notices that she hasn't come back for a while and it's dark and kinda cold. They're worried - even Trish.

Meanwhile, sitting on her own private beach is Dreads. Then Jeff magically appears out of the forest to have a chat.  How does this happen. This is new, right? We've seen Jeff show up for medical emergencies, but never for a heart-to-heart (though, I hope we see more of this.) (Also, while I know she probably just told her cameraman to go get Jeff, I secretly hope there's some sort of Jeff Probst bat-signal that can be used in cases of emergency.)  So Dreads tells Jeff that Trish is mean and that she has to leave before she says or does something she'll regret (ummm... like quitting?) and that she doesn't want her daughter to see her mum doing something stupid (ummm... like quitting?) and that.. surprise, it's cold and she's hungry and stuff (so, ummmm... the quitting is more about you being uncomfortable than it is about Trish. Gotcha.)  So Jeff asks her how she wants to deal with telling the tribe that she's quitting and she says something like, "I'd like to go tell them, but I think maybe it'll be best if you just do it, Jeff." (ummm... also the easy way out. Go figure.)

Later, at the reward challenge, it's fun to see how really no one cares that she quit - and in fact, most are pretty happy about it. Says Spencer, "Two people are gone and I didn't have to do anything!"  Says Woo, "Yay, now our group can rebuild and have a fresh start!"  Woo was buds with Dreads and Cliff, so Woo needs to work it hard.

Reward, Messing with Jeremiah & Tony Messes Up:

When Tony's team won the reward challenge, they got to go visit the other tribe and raid the camp. Tony got to go with Woo. They received instructions on what they could & couldn't take and they got a clue to the immunity idol at their own beach. Tony's big idea was to pretend like they were supposed to give the clue to one of the other team - then give it to Jeremiah in order to put a target on his back. Now, if Jeremiah was smart, or had seen any other seasons, he'd have either just shared the clue with his tribe on the spot or just declined it outright. Nope. He's... pretty. Tony, for his part, goes back to camp and brags about his plan (which is pretty great, actually) but then keeps it going and tells everyone that yeah, he's a cop not a construction worker. Tony's typical of a lot of players that do one thing well and then lose perspective and think they're more awesome than they are. As LJ noted, "OK, so you're trying to gain our trust by telling us you lied? OK."  Tony then goes on to mess up again after the immunity challenge by group-hugging his team & yelling, "Final five, baby!" which pretty much let the other team know what's going on over there, plus told Sara that he's no longer on board with Cops R Us.

The Vote:

Speaking of Sara, she smartly shut up over at her camp when it came to voting and let it be known she'd just go along with the majority.  The Brains are in full control over there, with Sara as a for sure vote and the Beauty Bunch all hating each other. And while no one seems to trust Jeremiah (is it the accent?) Alexis was well-read by Spencer as untrustworthy herself. She's been the one who's been dishing the most on her Beauty tribe mates and trying to push the Brains into voting out Jeremiah. In the end, it came down to who would be the most likely to flip once the merge happens and the Brains decided that Jeremiah could be trusted more than Alexis, who remember is buddies with Jefra. So, Alexis was voted out and left, sobbing. Poor girlie. I didn't trust her either. Spencer was right saying that she's smarter than she lets on (though, still unsure how chickens are made) and should own her intelligence rather than hide behind the beauty. I like Spencer. He should win. Or at least that's what I'm sticking with today.

Pilates > Basketball

Sorry for the late post.  Such a good episode, too!  Remember way back to last week?

There was a re-shuffling of tribes, which as always worked out good for some and less good for others.  It's good for the Brains who were down to three members and ended up once again on the same tribe. Turns out being a solid three is great once you're in a bigger group. The Brawn bunch also mostly stayed together with the sole exception of Sara, who's now going to have a bit of work to do. The Beauties got split up.  LJ and Jefra ended up with the mainly Brawn tribe, while the other three (Morgan, Alexis and Jeremiah) ended up on the other tribe. Even though they're three strong like the Brains, they don't get along and were super quick to let everyone know it, giving our Brainiacs even more power. 

Not surprisingly, the Brawny tribe won the reward challenge, which was awesome. It was a super physical one where two tribe members had to try to drag an opposite tribe member from a pole they're hanging onto.  It looked awful. Amazing that no one ended up hurt... or punching someone else in the face. Cliff was the best as he just sat there and giggled while the other team tried getting him to budge. Sara put up a tough fight on her side, but eventually lost.

Back at camp, Trish turned into a bit of a schoolgirl around LJ, who she's obviously got the hots for. Turns out they're both from Boston, so have lots to chat about.  Trish also knows she's on the bottom of her alliance, so doesn't mind at all forging a new alliance with LJ and Jefra. LJ has nothing to lose, so he's happy to play it up. 

The Brawny tribe then goes on to lose the immunity challenge, which they (and I) found pretty shocking. It's good for them to have a little humility though, non?  Plus I enjoyed seeing the Brains get to win something for a change and finally not have to go to Tribal Council.  The Brawns hadn't been there at all yet!  It's their turn. 

The great part of this episode was the fact that the vote couldn't be predicted. It looked at first like it was going to be an easy vote. The majority Brawn alliance would get rid of LJ, who they see as a threat, especially with his new 'relationship' with Trish. BUT, we know LJ has a hidden immunity idol.  Then, Trish goes to work.  She's got three votes and approaches Tony for a fourth, trying to convince him that now would be an excellent time to get rid of Cliff.  Her reasons: Cliff is lazy, he's super nice and would be impossible to beat (so actually more of a threat than LJ), he's got great relationships with Lindsey and Woo, he's already got lots of money, and he'd never see it coming.  Tony doesn't know which way to go - it seems like a stupid time to get rid of your strongest teammate, when you still need to win challenges.  But the alpha males like Tony are looking down the road and are happy to get rid of the threat. Who looks more necessary to the team once the strongest guy is gone than the NEXT strongest guy?  At any rate, it wasn't a predictable vote. I was yelling at LJ to play his idol & couldn't believe it when he didn't - that's when we knew Tony flipped.  Cliff was the one to go.  Sorry professional basketball guy, people don't want to see you win a(nother) million bucks. You know who needs a million bucks more?  Cops and Pilates instructors. And suddenly the strongest group isn't so strong any more. You can't predict this thing.

Which Came First? The Chicken or the Brain?

It's official. The Beauty Tribe is my favourite. The entire conversation about chickens and eggs made my life. More on that in a bit.

There was a reward challenge and an immunity challenge. For the reward challenge, Beauty won, followed by Brawn who were WAY behind Brains but came back due to guess whose complete ineptitude?  J'Tia. Correct. Without going too much into the challenge, the most entertaining part was the fact that it was one of those ones where the teammates are blindfolded and someone has to yell at them what directions to go, while all of the obstacles are pretty much at crotch height. Someone was working some serious slapstick on the Survivor design team here. It's possible that LJ may never have children after this challenge.

So, the Beauty team won some chickens and a rooster, which prompted a discussion about whether the chicken and the rooster need to "get it on" in order for the eggs to be made. "What is the rooster for?" asks one of the girls. A whole bunch of speculation ensued at this point, making the pretty girls look.... well.... pretty. LJ, the HORSE TRAINER, and pretty much the only smart one, finally broke it to the girls how it works.
"You make eggs, right?"
"Oooooooooh."
Leading LJ to comment, "We all know that the egg came first because the dinosaurs came before the chickens and they laid eggs."  Ummm... ok. Sure.  I guess.

The other thing to mention in the Beauty tribe is that Morgan managed to cleverly throw Jeremiah under the bus for making another alliance with her & Brice in front of the whole group. Nice work, girl. It led one of the other girls (Jefra, I think?) to throw out this brilliant observation:

"I don't even know how Jeremiah got on the Beauty team. He's not even that good looking!"

Later to try to make it up to the team, hideous Jeremiah killed a chicken by tearing its head off!!!! Are we all ok with this? Did I need to hear the noise of a chicken's head coming off on TV?  Unsure.  I get it that it's Survivor (they are surviving...) and that yes, I also eat chicken. But... still, it messed with my ummm... delicate sensibilities. Or something. I did like how Jeremiah pretended like he knew how to go about killing a chicken, when really, "uh, I'm just a model."  Funny. I still didn't need to hear it.

 Meanwhile, the Brawn tribe considered throwing the immunity challenge in order to get rid of Cliff. Interesting how Cliff has unknowingly become the target - mostly because he's threatening to the other alpha male in the group, Tony. Remember how Tony fibbed to Sara about Cliff & Dreadlocks conspiring against her. Well now Sara's got a bee in her bonnet about Cliff... which is all good for Tony. Always good to have a bigger, richer alpha male around. 'Cause that's the other argument against Cliff - they all know he's a former NBA player and probably is quite comfortable.  Even Cliff's bro-bestie, Woo, is up for ousting his pal if it means someone younger and more financially deserving can win a million bucks. Cliff really needs to come up with a story soon about how he pissed his NBA fortune away on gambling debts... or gave away all his money to a sick relative... or something!  I'm rooting for Cliff.

Anyway, the challenge was to dive down, release buoys and then use them in a BASKETBALL challenge.  Yup, that's the one to try to throw when you have an NBA star on your team. Idiots. The bigger idiots? Ironically, Brains. That's right. Even trying to throw a challenge, Brawn still managed to come in second, ahead of the Brains team, who are saddled with J'Tia, who as you'll recall, is completely useless.  Not that Kass or Tasha were spectacular in the challenge either - Spencer pretty much kept them in the challenge at all & it was actually pretty close at the end between them and Brawn.  But as Sara noted - "The green team sucks. We were trying to give it to them and they still lost. They deserve to lose." Spencer honestly deserves a medal for not losing it on those girls, right?

Spencer made a good play going to Kass & Tasha and telling them that the only way they're going to ever win anything is to get rid of J'Tia. He also promised his loyalty. It worked. Barely. They finally sent J'Tia packing. She was an interesting character in how self-aware she was about how much she sucked at the challenges and how she knew she should have been voted out for the rice incident anyway.  It made me almost want to like her a little bit. I just never want to be on her team for anything, please.

Next week, the teams will switch up, which will be interesting. Will Spencer stick with Kass & Tasha after all?  Will Kass and Tasha just bring down whatever team they're on? Will the oust Cliff strategy come to pass? Will some of the partnerships like Tony/Sara get broken up?  Will Jefra be able to keep her food down having to be on a team with such ugly people? Where DO baby chickens come from?It remains to be seen!

Well, At Least You're Pretty

It was just an OK episode last night, non? As always, though, there was some gold.

Brains started to pull it together now that Garrett is gone. Mind you, they're still full of super smart, dysfunctional weirdos. Spencer, who's now on the bottom of the totem pole, seems actually like he's got the best head on his shoulders. I really want to like Kass but am not convinced she gets the subtlety of this game... like not being honest all the time. And Tasha is turning out to be bossier than J'Tia, who, well... is a complete human train wreck. It was delightful watching Tasha bully everyone into practicing catching water with coconuts (which didn't really help them in the challenge... or maybe they would have been even worse without the practice? Shudder.). She bossed her teammates around figuring she knew exactly the best way to do it. "Nooooo, too high." "Nooooo, too much arc!" "Noooo, not in my FACE!" "Nooooooo, like THIS," as she holds the coconut shell up against her boobs and really leans into it while really, all the water just splashes all over her front. It was.... errrr... rather... ummm.... like she was entering a wet t-shirt contest rather than a Survivor challenge. (And...is there a difference all the time? Discuss.)

The challenge would win the top two teams a tarp, which everyone really wanted given that it's monsoon season and they'd all just been sitting in the rain for a few days straight. Now, I'm not saying I'd enjoy it either, but I really did enjoy the difference between the way some contestants handle the monsoon vs. others. This, my friends, is how you can tell who will do well on this show. While Jefra was whining about how cold and wet she was ("It's a nightmare!"), LJ went out for a rainy walk and found the immunity idol that Boobs McGee couldn't find on the first day (and hasn't - as far as we know - gone back to look for since.) While we're on that topic... I pray that girl sees herself on TV and goes out and buys some supportive bras and bathing suit tops or she's in for a later life of back pain and then boobs down to her knees. I can barely stand to watch her walk anywhere, let alone run for heaven's sakes. 

Where was I? Right. LJ went and found an idol... and on Team Brawn, Woo found the rain somewhat invigorating. "This is what Survivor's all about!" he said.  Right?  Jefra, it's called SURVIVOR. It's not called SPRING BREAK. Sigh. Also, I think Woo will be one of my favourites.

Meanwhile, at Brawn-town, Tony decided to come clean to Sarah that he's actually a cop. "I knew it!" says Sarah, and they bond over shared blue blood. Sarah trusts Tony completely while Tony tells us, "I don't trust anyone here."  I'm foreseeing a disaster... you?  Also, Tony - who let's not forget LIED to her in the first place, is now lying some more by telling her stories about NBA and Dreadlocks talking about her behind her back. Untrue, but good game play.  (Have we discussed yet how much I hate dreadlocks?  Unless you're a Jamaican reggae star, you shouldn't have them. Discuss.) 

So back to the challenge. The Brains team started out waaaaay behind the other teams, mostly because J'Tia is useless and dropped everything or threw the buckets on the ground, etc. Useless. But somehow, eventually, they caught up to the other teams, who were at the puzzle phase.  Brawn, all great competitors, excelled throughout the challenge and pulled off a win.  Brains finally did a good job at a puzzle (because J'Tia was not doing it - it was Spencer & Kass) and won second place.  The beautiful people were confounded by the puzzle.

Which brings us to Tribal Council.  I haven't even mentioned Jeremiah yet. (Ummm... and do all of the pretty people have southern accents and does it make them seem dumber? Discuss.) Jeremiah fancied himself in the middle of two alliances, but ended up siding with Alexis, Jefra and LJ against Brice. The obvious choice, since Morgan and Brice didn't have a fourth. And Brice was a sneaky threat - probably one of the smarter lovelies... and I use that term lightly, because I believe he also used the word 'strategics' at one point... but I think he might have actually used those strategics to get a lot further in the game.  I also very much enjoyed Jeff, whose face was once again priceless as he listened to the answers given by the Beautiful Tribe. Almost every single question was not actually answered, but referenced instead how thrilled they were to be around other beautiful people.
Brice: "Beauty is also inside and I have transformed from a caterpillar to a beautiful butterfly."
Jefra: "It's like a big party full of beautiful people over here, Jeff." (ummm... or a nightmare.)

And so on. 

And then when Brice went home, his final words were bitchy and great. "They knew I was the cutest and best looking, so I had to go." Or something like that. Such a relief from all those people who get voted out 'cause they're a threat in the game, right?