Australian Survivor – Mon, Oct 10 – Hurry up and make a move

Please, for the love of the Survivor Gods, can someone make a move tonight! The promos say the alliance will be shattered but how many times have we heard about a big shakeup and then … crickets ….


My guess would be Brooke finally gets her posse to turn on Lee, before he can use his advantage. If it’s business as usual and Kristie is voted out instead it’s going to be sooo boring.
If you haven’t already, check out the Ponderosa (aka Jury Villa) clips for Nick, Kylie, Sue and JL at TenPlay

It’s night 43 and JL has just been voted out. Flick is getting a bit of camera time about wanting to make a big move so let’s hope it’s not just hype.
The next day she’s talking about how she thinks Brooke is a bit fake sometimes. Wow – 44 days in and we are just finding out they are not BFFs.
Brooke apparently still plans to get rid of threats Lee and El: “I would be stupid to let two months of friendship ruin my life.”

Challenge time
It’s another Survivor endurance classic – one that Cochran won in his second outing but only after he was given an advantage. They have to lean backwards over the water holding a rope, with the angle increasing over time.
There’s a lot of chatter among the castaways and a boys versus girls rivalry. “Awkies, this one,” says Lee. After 20 minutes everyone is still in but the next knot hold should knock a few people off. Magic Matt is first out. Then, surprisingly, Brooke. The final three turns out to be Flick (who did well given she’s not as wiry as the other girls), Lee and Sam. Sam wins and choose Lee to go on the reward, which is a night sleeping in a proper bed.


Back at camp the four poster canopy bed is waiting for Sam and Lee but even more exciting is a pile of Tim Tams. Sam kindly breathes on the girls so they can smell the chocolate. I don’t know how they refrained from killing him.
As the boys loll on the bed, Brooke whispers “bastards” and Flick replies “assholes”. More stuff you wouldn’t hear on US Survivor. They hatch a plan to vote Lee or likeable El because they reckon Kristie won’t win a challenge.
“I absolutely love these two people as human beings but I want $500,000,” Brooke tells the camera.
Now Brooke just has to convince Sam to vote for his bestie Lee but he’s a bit reluctant to do his mate before El.
But Flick is keen to make a big move and secretly tells El that Brooke and Sam are not on board the El train. El is stunned but soon the talk turns to them trying to blindside Brooke.
Hooray – people finally playing the game! If Flick buddies up with El to get Brooke out now, she must be hoping for a final three with Kristie and Matt.


But first, we get some lightheartedness from Lee doing his best Zoolander in the trunks he won on the reward challenge. But then Sam puts a downer on everything by telling the camera how hard it is to lie to Lee – and we get sad piano music to emphasise the point. And Lee makes it even harder by giving him the last Tim Tam.
But the next day El breaks the news to Lee that BFF Sam wants him gone and you can tell he’s hurt. Finally, someone talks to Kristie about using her as a number. Lee recruits her and, despite misgivings about Flick’s trustworthiness, Kristie couldn’t be happier.

Immunity challenge
They have to build a house of wooden cards while holding on the platform steady with a cord. As you’d expect, Lee is rather good at a challenge that requires such good hand-eye co-ordination. “F— off, wind,” he mutters. His structure has a definite wiggle in it; Kristie’s looks straighter. But Lee wins his first individual immunity – and I think is the first guy to win.

Back at camp Flick sees herself as in a strong place, as she has two alliances from which to choose. Both alliances are a bit worried she will turn on them.


Tribal council
Oh god – we are getting more of that booming music they play in movies when a mad monk is chasing someone through a castle waving a carving knife. There’s another 10 minutes of airtime so that means we will have to suffer through endless JLap questions about trust.
Actually, it’s not too bad. I just want to cut to the vote so I can see the jury’s reaction.
The vote: (Will Lee use his advantage?) Matt votes El “It’s time for a move; welcome to World War III”); Kristie votes Brooke: “It’s time for the Ice Queen to step off your self-proclaimed throne”.
JLap reads the votes: Brooke, El, Brooke (“Oh you bastard” she mutters at Lee with a smile, while Magic Matt looks confused and Nick sits mouth agape on the jury bench), El, Brooke, El and … it’s Brookey (which must be Flick’s vote).


“Well, that was a surprise,” says Brooke, but she leaves with a smile and a wave.

Afterwards: Brooke says she’ll forgive Flick but it will take a little time. Like, the time it takes between that moment and the final tribal vote, Brooke?

Well, finally we had an episode when something happened. Hallelujah. Flick has copped her share of criticism but she was smart enough to know she couldn’t win against Brooke. If she makes it to the end she could get Nick and JL’s votes purely because of this move. This all bodes well for Kristie as she’ll be able to play under the radar now while the bigger egos do battle.



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69 Comments

  1. I’m happy for a spoiler rather than sitting through the whole show to find out there is no enormous blindside and Kristie goes. Doesn’t start for another half hour here.

  2. Gosh, I hope something remotely interesting happens on tonight’s episode. Someone actually gets blind-sided. The alliance actually breaks. Lee and Sam make out. Anything!

    Anyway, it was a quiet day at work today, so I was randomly Googling (heehee) some of the castaways for this season. Sam actually has a couple of acting credits to his name (including a racy post-coital scene in a video titled, “Sex, Lies and Videotape”). Also the charity he runs is LIVIN, it’s about suicide prevention and mental health awareness for blokes. There’s a few big names actually attached (Chris Hemsworth, for one). Sam and one of his friends began running it after a third friend took his own life a few years ago (after suffering bipolar disorder, apparently). I can definitely get behind that.

    It’s like, dang it. If you put the castaways in context, you end up disliking them a lot less :).

  3. Well. They weren’t making out. But Sam chooses to share a bed with Lee?

    Hmm. Okay. Well, that *is* an interesting development. Gosh, Lee’s so good looking that he’s turned Sam. Hah!

  4. Lee and Sam making out – that I’d like to see!
    Big mistake to make them human.
    The look on Brooke’s face when Sam picked Lee for the reward – he needs to sleep with one eye open.

  5. Sam: “We might as well start to play the game that we all came here to play!”

    Good work dude. It only took you a month to get a clue.

    Meanwhile, wow. Brooke and Flick shred each within *seconds*. Brooke outrightly admits to Sam that she wants to be with Flick until the end (because Flick is horrible and nobody likes her), while Flick immediately throws Brooke under the bus to get El onside. The nasty cheerleaders turn on each other, there’s a twist.

    I’m kinda hoping Sam rats them out to Lee and they all end up voting Flick off. That’d be cool.

  6. I saw on yesterday’s thread the evil twins said that they would be viewed differently if they were males. No they would have been viewed differently if they hadn’t behaved as if they were the ‘in group’ in high school.

  7. The problem for Flick , should she be there at the end, is the jury will vote for any of them to win ahead of her.

  8. From the cherry pick moment everyone who wasn’t on Sanapu didn’t stand a chance. Firstly they were wiped out one by one because they were at tribal every week while Sanapu ate, drank & made merry. The ones taken to Sanapu remained canon fodder for later. Then when they merged Sanapu still held all the cards. It was a really bad idea by producers because it was like shooting fish in a barrel.

  9. For the first time the old Aganoa have an even chance. I initially liked Matt but honestly, tonight I just thought what a tosspot. For all his bragging about being able to read people he seems totally and utterly clueless.

    • Yeah, I’m with you on that. I liked Matt initially as well, but he’s an idiot. If he makes it to the end, it’ll be sheer luck. And the sad thing is, that’s even possible. But I really, really, really want to see the look on his face when someone votes him out.

        • You know what I’m thinking?

          After the blue tribe dominated *everything* (thanks in no small part to help from the producers), wouldn’t it be just lovely if the final three ended up being Lee, El and Kristie? That might actually salvage a lot of this season.

  10. So, tonight’s episode, in which …

    1. Even Jonathon gets suck of beating around the bush on all this alliance crap. I’m with you, JLap.

    2. The boys find their balls! Yay! It only took them sharing a bed with … each other. Hmm. Okay. But at least they’ve actually started winning stuff!

    3. Finally. FINALLY. This is the point of this game. When alliances start scattering and fraturing and reforming, and everybody’s cross-plotting against everybody else. Watching Brooke and Flick turn on each other, this is the reason why we’re here! And gosh, it was a little satisfying.

    What was far more satisfying was actually watching Brooke get ousted. Good times! I liked the laughing realisation on Brooke’s face when she first realised she’d been targetted (but notice how her face fell a little). Conversely, El’s steadily-increasing grin was nice too. Matt looked shocked, Sam was just frozen in disbelief (you’ll just have to keep cuddling with Lee, big guy), and the look on Nick’s face was *great*.

    If Lee still has an ounce of smarts, you know what he’s gonna do next tribal council? Keep his alliance of himself, El and Kristy together, and use his vote-veto power to stop Sam or Matt from voting. Regardless of whatever Flick does from that point on, Lee/El/Kristy will be in control (because it’ll be 3/2 or 4/1).

    Still, one down. Let’s take out Flick next. Good work survivors. Good work.

    Juz, I think you mentioned in an earlier thread that it was like Brooke was the mastermind using Flick as a shield to get to the final two … and you know, I think both of them finally realised that tonight. And it ended badly. Aww.

    • I just read that Brooke still hasn’t forgiven Flick for the betrayal. This from the woman who said she’d take Flick to the end because the jury would vote for her over Flick. I know I’ve said it before but the sense of entitlement is just amazing.

      • Her attitude is definitely a little on-the-nose, given she spent most of the game knifing people all while telling them how much she liked them (all the people at the jury hotel, actually).

        Sorry sweet-heart. Live by the sword, etc etc.

  11. Recap is up. Full credit to Flick for masterminding the vote out of my winner pick. I didn’t think anyone would have the balls.

  12. Thanks for the great recap Juz.
    Well finally finally finally Brooke is gone. The look on Matt’s face was priceless. Next episode will be interesting.
    As usual the person they really wanted to vote for won immunity. I’m an hour behind here & saw on Twitter that Lee won immunity so when they were talking about voting him out next I knew it wasn’t going to happen.
    I remember both those challenges from the US version.
    I was hoping Lee would win the reward & take El.

  13. Well that makes the past few weeks worthwhile. You bloody bewdy.
    Did you hear me scream from over here in the west when Brooke was blindsighted? I loved watching her face when her name started popping up. Evil aren’t I.
    It was obvious for viewers that it was going to succeed as there was no value in Flick going to Elle unless she was going to follow through.

    Little observations:
    Lee should have realized what “the gloves are off now” convo in bed with Sam meant because they didn’t name who they were gunning for.
    Are we missing something in the edits? Is Matt really a mastermind because he’s there, or is he an idiot? He doesn’t realize he was almost gone.
    Loving Krazy Kristy. “Bwaaa aaa aaa aaahhh”.

    • Yeah, with Matt, I think you’re right. Either we’re missing out on a lot of things that are going on, on that beach, or Matt’s an idiot who just doesn’t realise his place here. Given everything that’s gone on, in the last few episodes, I’d more tempted to lean towards option (b), and that he’s just not as smart as he thinks he is.

      I can see Matt being taken to the end (because his attitude has probably pissed most of the jury off), but I really want to see the look on his face when he gets ousted. Personally, Flick is who I’d want to be sitting next to, at the end. She’s definitely not going to get a vote from Brooke, heh.

    • We didn’t want to spoil it for you.

      The looks on Brooke and Matt were worth the price of admission. Iggy and myself were going off.

      Matt is a deluded idiot. He’s being played like a violin. I don’t expect to see him again…unless it’s on TV Psychics.

      • Someone on FB made a screencap of Matt during tribal council, and added the caption, “The look on your face when you realise you’re not as smart as you thought you were.”

      • No problem for pple commenting on Eastern time. I just keep my peepers off comments until I have watched. I don’t want to hold others up on their fun.
        Bloody hell, I just got up …nearly 10.00am. Woh! And FINALLY some sunshine. Not predicted to last though. It’s been like Survivor for us with this bloody cold weather and rain.

  14. The only reason Brooke can get mad at Flick is because she thought it was high school.

    So we have Matt & Sam on one side and now Flip, I mean Flick, Lee, Elle and Kristy on the other. Any guesses who will be the final three. I hope Kristy, Elle and Lee now.

  15. I find a few things tedious now (i wont go over the other stuff):
    * the need to label themselves as “really good friends” because they’ve been together just over a month. It’s weird and dishonest.
    * the interrogation at tribal council. the same shit on repeat for the past few weeks.
    * the editing and what they are leaving out – last week seemingly out of the blue, Lee talked about his promise to Kristie. What? when did this happen and is that the reason why kristie was happy to remain a floater?
    * I highly doubt that the days covered by the episode last night were the first time Flick raised concerns over Brook (or Brooky as Flick calls her UGH) in her to camera piece. But from the episode last night, she jsut woke up and said “hang on a minute..’ the statement that Brook was too powerful also seemed to come out of the nowhere.
    *in the challenges I now mute the TV – there is a balance between too much and tool little commentary. Jonathan hasn’t reached that balance yet.

  16. Wooohoooo!!
    All that strategy talk that aired before the immunity challenges usually means its not going to happen so it doesn’t surprise me that Lee won immunity.
    I’m so happy that they managed to pull off the blindside.
    Am confused as to why they all until now thought Lee and El would win with jury votes – this jury seem keen to award good game play – not just allow a “nice person” to win in the end.
    Am really hoping Lee uses his advantage next votes as Wingsong suggested earlier…
    I did notice after the reward challenge Brooke was hanging about the bed, even when most of the others had walked off, almost like she didn’t want to leave Sam and Lee alone for fear Sam might tell Lee the plan. Either that or she wanted to kick Lee out and get in with Sam! And i was so expecting their to be a idol clue or something in the package that had the tim tams!

    • Yes – I totally thought there would be an idol clue in that bed. Disappointing we are not getting any clues and no footage of castaways searching.

      • I can only assume there are people looking for them since the past few votes (other than last night), have included splitting the votes.

      • As a newbie to survivor I am not sure what to expect from
        HII play. Are there like random ones around? Ie Is it worth searching hard instead of just de-lousing your fellow survivors and eating rice?

        • Our Survivor isn’t playing by the rules but there should be at least one idol out there. It’s possible they are looking but it’s not shown. Clues are often hidden at reward challenges: in serviettes, under bread etc.

    • I also noticed El coming over first thing in the morning when Lee woke up, and asking if he slept well. Actually thought it was quite sweet, and the first time I can remember her giving a real hint of the attraction between them.

  17. Out of the remainders, it would be interesting to see who would win a jury vote. Clearly they all think Lee. I suspect most will think they are voting for prom king or queen. JL might vote for who played well.

    • As I said below, I think Flick will be credited with last night’s effort, unjustly IMO. Which means she might get votes from those admiring good play.

      I think if Kristie makes it to the final two, she will get some votes for surviving so many occasions when it seemed obvious that she was going. I think she should get some kudos for her role in ousting Phoebe (way back, back) but I don’t know if there is anyone left who witnessed that?

      Lee and El will do well if they make some moves from now on, especially if they continue to outwit Sam and Matt. If they can get Flick out, they will be seen as the powerhouses.

  18. I should have been ecstatic at the results last night, but I wasn’t. Just mildly pleased.

    Then I realised it is because the blindside I wanted to see, was blindsiding both the evil twins, not one of them turning on the other. I wanted the other five to realise how dangerous their alliance was, to gang up to vote one of them, and leave the other dangling in no-man’s-land on her own. I wanted to see Flick’s face (or Brooke’s) when she realised that everyone else had turned on Brooke (or Flick).

    Now we are left with a very, very smug Flick who thinks that because she was the swing vote, that it was all her idea. Even Brooke credited her with it, where it was actually El and Lee backed up by Kristie.

    Can’t help but feel that we have exchanged one alliance controlled by Flick for another.

    • Thanks for the recap/review Juz
      Happy there was an individual reward, but would like to see the winners going outside of camp to allow for additional scheming….
      @Fijane I somewhat credit Flip for this, since she took initiative and told El about the situation. Flip could’ve happily said nothing to El and stuck with the Sanaapu alliance. I am happy with the result nonetheless since now the outcome seems a bit more unpredictable. A smug Flip is also a good setup for a downfall perhaps??

    • Although I disliked Flick more, was happy for “Brookie” to go….even if it was only to no longer hear anyone say Brookie. Not a fan of “chippies”, “birdies” cutesy guff.

    • That would’ve been nice, and for that very same reason, I agree with you.

      Be fair, though. It’s not like Flick and Brooke weren’t already pretty smug beforehand :). They controlled the game for so long, it was nice to see a little bit of karma land in Brooke’s lap. Even if Flick feels like she controls a different alliance, she’s lost her major partner in crime. Like I said above, it would be very easy for Lee, Kristie and El to manipulate the voting (with Lee’s veto power) to either get rid of her, or aim for her eventually.

      But having said all that … I think they’d be mad if they didn’t keep her around. I think everybody’s best bet at the jury is to have Flick beside them.

      I still can’t pick a winner. I’m not game to. With the six players left, and the main alliance in ashes at the moment, I think the winner could be any of them. Flick and Matt are the only ones I actively *don’t* want to win. Flick, because it would be rewarding her arrogance, and Matt because he’s patently a moron.

  19. I can’t help thinking that it was a stupid, short sided move by Flick. She has no chance now. She has no chance with either of the alliances and no chance with the jury. At least with Brooke(y) she had a chance of making it to the final two. And a jury has been know to reward a good strategy rather than like-ability.

    • I thought the same. She just guarranteed herself minus 4 jury votes, and since her clique kept others out, she hasn’t been winning hearts anywhere else. But the suggestion was that JL had rattled her into thinking she was on the bottom of her alliance.
      Lee, wisely kept Kristie in his side pocket using a bit of “good guy” charm.

    • “I can’t help thinking that it was a stupid, short sided move by Flick. She has no chance now.”

      I can’t help thinking that Flick *never* had a chance. Brooke seemed to be the far more likeable of the two, and I think Flick must’ve realised that Brooke was deliberately cultivating that relationship just so Flick would look bad sitting beside Brooke in front of the jury.

      Forgive the French, but honestly, I think Flick’s screwed from this point on either way. She chokes on all the challenges, her social game wasn’t that good (it didn’t need to be, she had Brooke for that) and there would probably be a lot of bad feeling on the jury towards her. She didn’t even really play the game that much, she was just in a strong alliance from start to finish, and didn’t even need to do much beyond that. I agree with what was said upthread … at least Flick made a move in this episode. At least she actively did something, and the players who appreciate game play (like Nick or Jenna) would give her credit for that.

  20. I laughed and laughed ….. and laughed. Who knew schadenfreude could taste so good – better than anything dreamt up on MasterChef. That “HUH???!!!” expression on Matt’s face is still hilarious, even after repeat viewings.

    If I was going on Survivor, I wouldn’t be getting on my high-horse because the more you bang on about “morals and ethics”, honesty, integrity, the more hypocritical you look when you succumb to the lure of money. I find these soft-soap rationalizations from Sam and Lee (eg Lee says his conscience is eased since Sam did it to him first) a bit lame. No-one’s forcing them to turn on each other.

    I suspect the reason Brooksies still hasn’t forgiven Flick is because Flick had the temerity to knife her before she could knife Flick. The gall of her!

    In honour of Brooksies’ demise, I’m changing my name.

    PS: Love reading the comments – you guys are on fire.

    • Thanks for the link, Daisy.

      “The “mean girls” terms has led to trolls on social media and even in the street. One woman chased her down the street last week throwing food at her.”

      I know I should be more sympathetic, but maybe the woman realised they were starving and needed more food. As long as she wasn’t throwing a bag of rice and beans.

      • I thought the same thing. She was on The Project tonight & said someone threw chips at her & I though well maybe they thought she was starving.
        But this bullshit that people would idolise them if they were men. They obviously don’t read the recaps of the US version. There have been a few bullies & we’ve condemned them.

    • “One woman chased her down the street last week throwing food at her.”

      … oh c’mon, Australian public. That’s not okay. Really that’s just a waste of good food. And I totally didn’t laugh at the mental picture that brought on, honestly.

  21. Brooke said at Tribal “… use the alliance to get as far as we possibly can, AND THEN RIP EACH OTHERS’ HEADS OFF if we have to”. I immediately thought of a female praying mantis devouring her mate during coitus, even as he’s still trying to impregnate her. I wonder what Sam was thinking?

    • He was probably glad to have spent the last night sleeping next to Lee as opposed to Brooke, I’d imagine :).

    • I thought he took Lee as a consolation prize for coming second in the challenge, but maybe his sense of self-preservation is more acute than it seems.

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