Survivor 43, Ep. 2: Lovable Curmudgeon
With me covering Survivor via blog and Amazing Race via podcast back-to-back I am going to keep blogging live diary style and try some other ideas hopefully along the way. Anyway, on with the live diary blog…
Episode 2, Survivors ready?… GO!
8:02 - Owen was ready to poop his pants when his name got thrown out at BAKA’s 1st Tribal via Morriah’s vote. Get used to it Owen. Also, pooping your pants on Survivor would be 100x worse than getting voted out or having a vote cast against you. Perspective Owen. Welcome to Survivor.
8:03 - The rain pours down. Gabler is running out of steam and is nauseous. Owen is ready to cut bait with the 52 year old “discount at Denny’s guy” this season on the BAKA tribe. So, you have Gabler doing nothing around camp and he’s clearly a disadvantage for the BAKA tribe. What do you do? Short term, I say you keep him around and if Tribal is where you’re headed, then you burn the weak link and survive for the next day. Any reason is a good reason to vote somebody off, especially the older guy. However, I think the longer term thinking player would build trust in Gabler because he’s likely a loyal guy, but would only be using him. Gabler knows he’s the old guy and so you know he’s looking for an alliance to stay loyal to. Long term, he’s likely to stay loyal like Mike in 42 did with his relationship with Jonathan. I say use that to have numbers in the early stages with the tribe numbers being so small and know that Gabler isn’t a strategic wizard that you’d have to worry about as the game progresses.
VESI Tribe (Day 4)
8:06 - Jesse and Dwight are building a relationship. Jesse is looking to put a “ring” on his “island wife” with Dwight. I like Jesse. I like how he thinks.
8:07 - Dwight is a talker and a politician. We learn about his social strengths of his past with pictures of him with Hilary Clinton, Mitch McConnell and other prominent political players. If Dwight shared that with me, I would become highly suspicious about him. We know Survivor is a game of social politics, but to know he has rubbed elbows with actual politicians would raise red flags all over to me.
8:09 - LIVIN! Jesse isn't worried about Cody. Dwight is worried about Cody. Having lived in Hawaii for a period of time, I think I get who Cody is. It seems like he is “loose cannony” but I think he’s just not afraid to take a risk as much as the average person would be. It wouldn’t worry me because I would know that about him just based on his aloha spirit and cliff jumping into the ocean.
Jesse isn't meshing with Justine and her bug-phobia and complaints of how her nails look. I’m picking up what Jesse is putting down. To me, the “Justine” type is one that I would ALWAYS be weary of and would have to really fake it to mesh with. Especially after the storm and 4 days of living on the island, nobody wants to hear about your nails. Sorry not sorry.
At the first commercial I’m more intrigued by VESI than BAKA at this point. VESI has the widest range of personalities and character types. Cody the Hawaiian bruddah with his hang loose attitude and jumping off things, Dwight the politician, Justine the prissy girl, and Noelle who has become close with Justine. I’m thinking the alliances and partnerships on VESI have taken form. Attack the partnerships always, split them up, form your own partnerships with everyone. I’m liking how Jesse is positioning himself at this point.
8:14 - Ryan is leading a… yoga session???… while Karla shares she’s building her alliance with the girls and James. She is weary of Geo and Ryan getting close. A lot of strategy thinking coming from Karla, not much else.
8:16 - Geo shares his story of being gay and coming out to his parents. He describes his parents “dreams coming crashing down” and his fear of his family not loving him because of he was gay. His parents told him if he didn’t change who he was then he had to leave the house and go. Despite that and being homeless, Geo has found the good in life and used him story to motivate him to keep going in life and on Survivor.
Can’t imagine the challenges that Geo faced. If I’m on COCO tribe and learn a story like that, I feel like it would be the true test of being able to compartmentalize how I feel about the person versus I’m playing Survivor. Tough for sure, but we can be friends after I win the million.
8:18 - Cody’s Back Story
Cody connects with Noelle’s missing a leg to his back story of a friend he lost years ago to cancer. Cody is clearly making the most of life and the opportunities that he is presented like the one on Survivor because his friend past and doesn’t have those opportunities. Love Cody but more interested in seeing him play Survivor than his background. Again, he will be a risk taker, and I like that trait in Survivor players.
8:21 - The Loveable Curmudgeon
Twenty one minutes in we learn who the episode title aka the lovable curmudgeon is, and it’s Owen. While Owen is in his own head, Elie and Jeanine are searching for idols and talking strategy of who to bring into their plans.
Elie, the top strategy player from episode 1 is picking up where she left off. Her ideas of Owen and Sami aren’t much. She’s underestimating the guys heavily, and trying to make sure that her and Jeanine are running this tribe.
The winner of most likely to screw up Elie and Jeanine’s plans is Sami. The 19 year old Patrick Mahomes doppelgänger, though he’s showing his age, is my bet for which guy at BAKA will either lead the charge of the tribe’s direction heading to the merge, or the women will get the best of him, because he’s the only guy at BAKA with a strategic pulse.
At the commercial I am happy to see Elie and Jeanine at BAKA and Jesse and Dwight at VESI lead the charge of strategy/gameplay conversations. But, the headline of the episode so far is clearly the back stories of Cody and Geo. Each of them have conveyed a compelling back story with challenges buried deep within them that have impacted their life, yet also have inspired them to flip the script and take control of their lives and the direction they take them. I love learning the back stories in episode 1 and 2 of everyone, and hoping that those two will be around a while. Rooting for them.
8:30 - Immunity Challenge
Once again immunity is back up for grabs. Dive in, swim to a cage, climb up and over, untie/release the heavy snake, drag the snake up and out of the cage to shore, unlock number tiles, solve number lock, and solve a giant Survivor puzzle.
1st Place Reward - Large Fishing Gear
2nd Place Reward - Small Fishing Gear
3rd Place LOSER - Tribal Council
8:33 - Snake is 400 pounds?!?!!??!
How the hell is that possible? It’s basically dragging a dead body up and over. Seems soooooo hard. BAKA is first to get the snake over, followed by COCO. VESI close behind. I’m enjoying how awkward the snake is. People are hanging from it, using their body weight to get it up and out and now up the beach. AWKWARD AS HELL and I feel fatigued just watching it.
8:35 - BAKA gets number tiles first, COCO close behind. People are EXHAUSTED! There is a huge relief on everyone to be done with the snake. I don’t blame them.
8:36 - 43 Puzzle
The puzzle is a HUGE logo of Survivor 43. The puzzle pieces are double sided and all sorts of weird shapes. Combine that with the exhaustion and this puzzle is definitely a test of focus and grit. I love this puzzle. Right balance of difficult and easy. Like baby bear’s poridge, just right.
Elie and Jeanine lead the charge for BAKA to a 1st place win with Lindsay and Cayla helping COCO finish 2nd, sending VESI to Tribal. BAKA also wins back their flint. As a viewer, I love the penalty of losing the flint. I think the loss of it is bigger than the viewer can comprehend.
8:40 - The Pre-Tribal Scramble Begins
Going into this commercial I’m thinking about who will be voted out at VESI. The breadcrumbs that have been laid so far at VESI is that Jesse is out on Justine, Dwight is weary of Cody, Noelle is targeting Nneka for screwing up the puzzle aka Noelle didn't compete and Nneka was in charge of the puzzle, so Nneka is an easy typical target to aim at. Last, Nneka hasn’t shared any disdain or target she’s thinking, and Justine is close with Noelle.
Prediction: Nneka or Justine will be voted out. Either Jesse and Dwight will convince Nneka and Cody to vote out Justine OR Justine and Noelle will convince Jesse and Dwight to vote out Nneka.
8:45 - SCRAMBLE
Cody likes Nneka and wants to keep her in his “Ohana”. Noelle and Justine are PISSED at Nneka and are using the failure at the challenge to target Nneka. Totally get it, but it’s not a great new era of Survivor strategy. Nneka is hip to the disappointment of the tribe in her performance, BUT her only shot is to rely on her relationship with Cody.
Prediction: Nneka is going home.
If I was Jesse or Dwight, any reason to get rid of someone else is a positive, plus it eliminates the possibility of the women having the numbers advantage. On a tribe of 6, that has to be on your mind and at least considered to be in play.
8:48 - Elie has ADHD and Dyslexia
As a special education teacher, it crushes me to hear that Elie had a negative experience as a student in her youth. Like other stories we’ve learned this episode, Elie was able to use her disadvantages in life to motivate her and overcome them. Elie is going to be a force this season.
8:51 - Gabler’s Idol Expires?
Sneaky, sneaky, sneaky. Jeanine is the real “snake” of the episode at BAKA. She is ready and willing to dig through Gabler’s bag to check on the rules and small print for Gabler’s idol. She finds the info she was digging for, Gabler’s idol is good for “your next two Tribals” and so Jeanine’s worry and panic for the next Tribal begins. Jeanine is a house of cards, lot of panic, thinking too far ahead. Live in the IS. I think I would be targeting her if I’m on the BAKA tribe.
8:53 - Back to the SCRAMBLING
The tide is turning. Like I predicted earlier, it will come down to either Justine or Nneka and Cody and Jesse are ready to make it happen. I agree. Justine is the larger game threat short term and long term.
8:55 - “Pineapple Zone”
Jesse shares with Dwight, his desired Survivor wife, the truth that Justine shared she was a good liar to him. Buuuuut, the arranged marriage might not be what Jesse thought. Dwight likes the girls but Jesse is not on that page. Dwight clearly isn’t married and it doesn’t look like he wants to listen to his husband Jesse. Tide is turning.
Dwight is thinking to “keep the tribe strong”. Huge eye roll. It’s so short sighted and makes me feel like the vote is going to go Cody, Jesse, and Nneka vote for Justine and Justine, Noelle, and Dwight vote Nneka.
BUT, DWIGHT LOST HIS VOTE!
I forgot about this unbelievably important piece of information and tribe dynamics. I like the game having this wrinkle in the early stages of the 3 tribe format. With only 6 or 5 on a tribe and someone losing a vote, there just aren’t many votes to go around. Drama!
8:58 - BEWARE ADVANTAGE IS BACK!!!
Cody finds the Beware Advantage. The advantage has no power unless he is able to complete a task. In order for Cody to gain the power of the advantage he has to get a bead from everyone’s personal bag. The catch is he can’t steal them and they have to be willingly given to him before Tribal.
If he gets everyone’s bead, he gets the power of the advantage.
If not, he can’t vote. If Cody can’t vote, he can’t vote for Justine. If Cody can’t vote for Justine then the likely vote will be
2 votes for Nneka (Noelle and Justine)
2 votes for Justine (Jesse and Nneka)
No vote (Dwight and Cody)
This is a MUCH BETTER BEWARE ADVANTAGE CHALLENGE THEN SAYING A RANDOM PHRASE before a challenge. The phrases was silly and fun, but too obvious and kind of stupid. Beads is better.
9:05 - Cody Thinks opening the Beware Advantage was a mistake.
Of course it was Cody, hence the whole “beware” part of it. Cody shows he doesn’t have as much savvy as I’d hoped, but he enlists the help of Jesse. Jesse, aka the best thinker and strategy player on the team, immediately says “what about your hat”. Brilliant right? Well, if Jesse was in charge.
9:08 - Wait a minute…
Cody might actually pull this off…
9:09 - Noelle has it as a bracelet!!!!!
Hahahahahaha. It’s amazing. The drama is unbelievable. Something as innocent and easy to overlook or think nothing of aka the beads, becomes this HUGE PIECE OF THE GAME!!!
Heart rate is racing from the Cody bead haggling with assists from Nneka and Jesse. It’s like watching the scene in a movie where the spy has snuck into the house, taken the necessary pictures he was after, puts everything back the way he found it and then the door opens and now someone is in the room with him. How will the spy escape??!!?!?!
How the hell will Cody get the now bead turned bracelet from Noelle without blowing his cover???
Prediction: Using the pressure of Tribal Council and completing the hat to impress Jeff will pressure Noelle to give it up, even if for the Tribal only. Use Probst to your advantage.
9:14 - Tribal Council
Cody is rocking his hat, minus one bead, and Jeff gives him the opening. But, the real story of Tribal we see is Justine laying the case out of her being a pair with Noelle, Cody and Nneka, and Jesse and Dwight. Justine is up front with the social game and Dwight told the tribe exactly what happened when he got on the boat and lost his vote. Amazing that she will just lay all the cards out there like that. Not sure what her angle is.
9:17 - Trust is the only currency
I understand this and know that if I was on the show and put in Dwight’s situation, it would be very difficult to come back and make up a story like JD did in 41 and then get caught lying. That gets you a one way ticket out of the game and then for the rest of your life wondering what if… and was it worth the risk.
Is it worth it? Is it not?
For me, I think because it’s so early in the game and the tribe is only 6 people, it’s not about keeping your mouth shut, instead, it’s about the timing of the game and weighing whether it’s worth it or not at this INFANT stage of the game to risk being caught in a lie. Giving people a reason to vote you out doesn’t take much on a 6 person tribe. I think if push came to shove, I would do what Dwight did, and it kills me. Live to fight another day.
Also, Cody wasn’t able to get all the beads and lost his vote. His secret will come out to everyone in the tribe after the votes are read. He almost pulled it off. Now, the move for him is…
9:25 - VOTES
Justine 3
Nneka 1
Cody 1
9:26 - CODY DID PULL IT OFF!!!
Those tricky, tricky editors. I love a little editing deception or maybe a better way to put it is not sharing the WHOLE TRUTH until the time is right. Like a great comedian, it’s all about the delivery of the punch line. The time was right when the votes were being read because it reminded us with a visual of the task for Cody to complete in order to cast his vote. The “punch” landed and Justine is done!
He only had to get a specific bead from everyone’s string of beads, NOT THE WHOLE STRING OF BEADS. That key detail likely enabled Cody, with major boosts from Jesse and Nneka to get only the needed bead from Noelle and let her wear her bracelet without pushing too much.
Brilliant move by Cody right?, NO!!! This was all choreographed by Jesse and his ability to think quickly through the problem Cody was faced with and enlist the help of Nneka.
9:59 - I think I have a new favorite player…Jesse
The blog has spoken!
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