Grid Effect

Great episode of Survivor last night. A couple twists, a few betrayals, one innovative challenge and plenty of questionable decision making.

In the pre-credits scene, Candice is discontent with her current tribe, and wants to realign herself with Adam and Parvati. Essentially she wants to rejoin with the white people (That makes since, being that she is from the south. Sorry) except Johnathan. Who, for reasons unkown, has entirely too much trust in her. Blinded by lust I imagine, even though there is no indication of that. As for Candice, she is #3 in the pecking order of the alliance within the alliance alongside Yul and Becky, clearly she doesn’t realize this.

Over at Raro, the entire tribe is still holding contempt for Brad. Sensing the negative vibe he is getting from his team, he at one point stands up and says in a menacing tone, “After the merge, it is every man for himself”. Which is honest, but ill-advised. Especially with Nate, who manages to apply the worst connotation to every out of the ordinary comment, like he did with Stephannie. If this guy was around in the 50’s I am pretty sure the Red Scare would still be going on. The way Brad’s tribe has been treating him, I can understand his hostility. They are still holding him accountable because Rebecca cannot swim.

Amazingly enough, they have added a legitimate twist to this season. Before the Reward Challenge, Jeff offers every contestant the opportunity to switch teams. Candice almost immediately steps forward, and Johnathan follows suit at the next second. And I am somewhat perplexed by both decisions, well not so much Candice. Clearly she didn’t realize what a great position she was in with Yul and Becky, they might have been too discrete. And she clearly is smitten with Adam. But Johnathan, talk about paranoia. He was sort of on the chopping block on Aitu, but his position isn’t any stronger on a brand new squad. It sounds like he did it because of his trust in Candice, which is comically misplaced. Ultimately, I am not sure what either of them are thinking, why would anyone leave a team with Ozzy, Yul and Becky on it. That is by far the strongest alliance going into any merge. And Candice and Johnathan just made it easy for the four of them.

Onto reward challenge, since Aitu now only has four contestants to Raro’s eight, four people must sit out for Raro. They decide on Parvati, Candice, Nate and Adam going against Aitu’s Yul Sundra, Becky and Ozzy. The challenge consists of loading two girls into a barrel rolling them across this apparatus, then putting Booey’s into it swimming out to grab someflags, placing the flags in chronological order, digging a hole to retrieve an axe and chopping some inanimate object. Long story short, what’sleft of Aitu destroys them. Its a joke, really, the disparity between the two teams in terms of talent for randomly contrived challenges.

Ozzy, who is taking the abandonment of Johnathan and Candace particularly hard, screams something in the direction of Raro along the lines of, “Mutineers are the first to die”. I am unsure what he is so upset about, if they had stayed and Aitu lost, it was his head on the chopping block. Now, instead, he is possibly the strongest member of the strongest alliance. He should be exuberant, not bitter.

After winning the challenge, Sundra is reduced to tears. When Jeff asks what has her so distraught, she just mutters something about loyalty. Apparently sitting in a barrel was really trying on her. The are really melodramatic at the house they are sent to for reward, which entails lodging, pastries assorted beverages and family photos from home. Everyone cries every season when presented with any semblance of their home life, this season is no exception.

Candice is sent to exile island and has nothing interesting to say.

Unsurprsingly, Jon is somewhat isolated in his own right with the Raro tribe. I cannot tell if he is surprised. I really hope not though. They all kind of resent him being there. Even Parvati doesn’t take too kindly to him. He said his one mistake may have been trusting Candice too much, and she must be considerably duplicitous for him to just be grasping this concept. Ummm, u are following around a 22 year-old girl. That’s never a wise move. Nate, as expected, takes Johnathan’s decision to switch teams personally. Looks like Brad is off the hook as resident whipping boy for Aitu.

Adam is the only one welcoming to Johnathan, they speak of reforming whats left of the old Caucasian squad. They both welcome the idea.

At Immunity Challenge, the four who did not participate in the Reward Challenge for Raro are now the default participants, which leaves Jenny, Brad, Jon and Rebecca. so it seems obvious they will lose. Luckily though, the challenge is not physical. It consists of dropping cannonballs out the bottom of a boat and sending booeys to the surface of the water. It is much, much slower paced than your average challenge from Survivor. Amazingly, Raro hits their first two cannonballs before Aitu hits one. Regardless, Aitu ends up winning, as Raro utterly implodes trying to hit the third traget. Its like watching The Dallas Mavericks in last seasons finals, or The Colts in any playoff game.

After Immunity Challenge, Candice confines to Parvati that she does not find Johnathan trustworthy nor does she want to align with him, despite what Johnathan led everyone at Raro to believe. I am not really understanding Candice’s reasoning here. He blindly followed her to another tribe, told everyone on said tribe that the two of them were “tight”, and she still deems him untrustowrthy? As far as Survivor goes, he has demonstarted undying loyalty to this girl. You know, It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that they used to date, and Johnathan screwed her best friend or something. Because nothing else should provoke such skepticism from Candice.

Plenty of scheming in this episode. Nate and adam agree to vote off Brad first, because Johnathan is working hard to earn his keep. However, Candice tells Adam that Johnathan was “talking trash” about him, which if memory serves, is completely unfounded. But Adam, like one would assume a kid with a Virginia Tech had on would do, completely takes the bait proclaims he wants to “kick his ass”.

Nate and Adam have this pathetic conversation about what a “punk” Johnathan is, and Adam is so enraged he wants to now give Johnathan his walking papers. Nate reassures him that this will all happen in due time, and to just stick to the original plan.

At Tribal Council, everyone is waffling and making a lot of vague suggestions. Nate always talks like he is auditioning for The Wire, he describes Candace as someone who is “very lethal”, and says “Johnathan has a tendency to be a leader, and we don’t dig that around here”.

Brad is the most genuine person at TC. He flat out says he does not trust anyone, and says he likes Johnathan and Candice seems pleasant in the six hours he has known her for. Give it time Brad, give it time. I have known her for eight hours of selective footage, and cannot stand the girl. They vote, one for Johnathan, the next five are for brad. Nate, amazingly enough, is dictating the pace of this game for Raro, which is odd because he is like a fake alpha male.

So long Brad, people will say your Candor got you booted, but I personally don’t think it would have made any difference.