Australian Survivor – Mon, Aug 29 – It’s all about chests

How long will it be before a tribe shake-up? Hard to know with such a huge cast. Chat here for Australian Survivor.

I just added some thoughts about last night’s (Sunday’s) episode to the previous Survivor post http://talkingtv.net/2016/08/australian-survivor-episode-3/

Monday Survivor

1. Doesn’t Phoebe know people who talk about how well they are positioned in the game always get their comeuppance?
2. When the yellow team credits rolled there was a blonde woman with a double barelled name who I swear must have just been helicoptered in to Samoa.
3. Nick is in trouble unless there is a tribe shakeup soon.
4. How frustrating was it when Kylie and Pete were wandering past the mud wall that so obviously is where the idol is hidden. What are they expecting: a brick wall? At least Pete has the excuse he’s unwell.
4a. Will Kate’s decision to be so frank with her tribe about her dreadful accident bite her down the track? She could be seen as a big threat to win due to her overcoming such adversity.
5. OMG – JLap is wearing a cap at the challenge, but it’s not a Probst-style two toner.
6. It’s another similar challenge of running, climbing, hauling and puzzling. I look forward to them whittling down the numbers so we can get to the more interesting balance and endurance challenges.
7. Even JLap calls Pete “Fiegsy”. Awesome.
8. JLap notes yellow are “half swimming, half running – like dolphins.” Hmm, running dolphins, JLap?
9. Lee was showing some Andrew Savage-like qualities with his super strength in the challenge.
10. It was a challenge of chests, both made of wood and muscle.
11. As long as every challenge ends in a puzzle, blue needs to keep magician Matt and yellow Nick.
12. Glad they changed the rules so the puzzlers can tap out. But it still doesn’t help red. Kate must be relieved they can’t point the finger at her
13. I like yellow asking JLap to make a deal so they can get flint, and thus fire (their flint broke). He must have been clued up before as, unlike Probst, he doesn’t get narky about it, but just says it’s a deal if they return all their comfort items and fishing gear. I wish he’d thrown in “and you’ll also be going to tribal council”, just to mix things up.
14. We haven’t seen much of formerly crazy Pigtails Kristy.
15. Lee comes across as not a big fan of the show. He’s not into strategy at all.
16. The girls need to blindside Rohan now while he would be reluctant to play the idol so early. Losing a physical player isn’t such a consideration with a tribe shakeup no doubt just around the corner; the loyalty of an alliance is more important. Being the underdog tribe going into a merge is actually an advantage, as you can become the swing vote for the stronger tribes.
17. But before we get to tribal, it’s over to blue beach, presumably for Pete to request a medevac. And here comes JLap on a speedboat. Please, please put your doctorin’ past to good use, JLap. Fiegsy says he’s barely eaten for 12 days, after picking up a bug before filming began. He’s quitting – and no physical from JLap.
18. “He’s a ripper bloke,” says Magician Matt – words you’d never here in US Survivor. So Pete is gone and we still don’t know why he was rocking a red suit.
19. The Aussies need to learn to be more circumspect at tribal. They should have studied Boston Rob tribal footage.
20. So no-one’s going home tonight from red because of Fiegsy quitting. I can’t recall US Survivor every waiting til another team got to the ready to vote stage before telling them they had a reprieve.
21. Looks like things are pretty awkward at red next week with Kat justifiably angry she was on the chopping block. They’d better hope they don’t merge before they can lose again and ditch her, or she’ll be throwing bombs at them.



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39 Comments

    • Yes, I’m curious about what that is. It wasn’t shown in the promo with the show but later during an ad break.

  1. My second Survivor episode tonight …

    Phoebe, you little minx, playing both allied groups off against each other to oust Evan. Nice work. And what leaves her in such a powerful position is that neither alliance has realised she’s playing them like fiddles.

    “Is it okay if I hold it?” Yeah Rohan, you’re really going to give it up if she says ‘no’. To be fair, I wouldn’t trust Phoebe, either.

    Rohan, hide the idol down the front of your pants. That works out so well.

    Does anyone else think that Phoebe is actually happy that Rohan has the idol, because she can use it prove to her other allied castaways that he’s untrustworthy and thusly deserving to be blind-sided and booted? If she really knew what she was doing, she’d totally already be thinking about that.

    Lee’s chest would be worth winning a challenge for … sorry, what?

    Wow, the red team just sucks at puzzles. Kat wasn’t even involved in this one, and they still fell apart. Damn it, Lee looks so disappointed. Somebody give him a hug. I volunteer.

    Totally picked it. Phoebe’s already planning on blind-siding Rohan to get rid of him.

    Wow, Phoebe’s threatening Rohan to his face. How goes that decision to oust Evan, than, eh Rohan?

    All this cross-plotting is a joy to behold, really, isn’t it? But at this point, I genuinely can’t tell whether Phoebe is going to break up the all-girls alliance by ousting Kat, or break up her Big Four alliance and oust Rohan? Both decisions put her in a better position, but could also bite her in the butt big-time.

    Hang on a minute … if Pete leaves, does that mean there’s no elimination tonight with the red team? Wait, they did Tribal council anyway, but nobody gets voted out? I’m very annoyed. I wanted to see Rohan get done over, just for the sheer beauty of it.

    Damn it Pete, you robbed us of what could’ve been an amazing vote. Hmmph.

    • I think you got it pretty well pegged there, Windsong. Rohan holding the idol has given Phoebe amunition to use against him. I am looking fd to others finding out that Phoebe is double dealing.
      As for Kate, who I like; if she was in the US version, she would shut up about her ripping back story. No one will want to sit next to her in a final 3. A nice Aussie girl with a powerful, moving story of survival and recovery. I don’t think so.

  2. I am available also for Lee consolation duty.
    Phoebe is the only player on that team – it’s definitely like Lee isn’t across the format at all and is trying to be a decent human being. He should go far – before being shafted by a scheming little minx…
    As a non student do the teams merge when one is decimated?

    • On the American seasons that I’ve watched (which isn’t all of them), the tribes generally merge at a set point in time (like, say, the point where there’s only 12 castaways in total left, or something like that). Sometimes they’re all quite even in the merged tribe, sometimes they’re not (and the small teams get picked off quickly. Or else, the smaller teams become a bargaining chip for the bigger teams to use against each other. Ah, ‘Survivor’).

    • Even I saw Shades of Grey when (is it Lee?) flopped on the beach, panting heavily, and I haven’t read the book and am usually just excited over a day at the beach. But it was a pretty sexy shot of his heaving chest.

      • The real “Shades of Grey” moment for Lee was, I think, episode 2? The challenge where he had to be carried through the obstacle course by his team-mates, with his hands handcuffed in front of him.

        Mmm hmm. Was not complaining about that.

        Am I over-sharing again? 😉

  3. Yeah, definitely cant recall them getting to voting stage then telling them they dont have too…certainly shook that group up….loved it!
    Kat is a liability..dont like her…in saying that, you need a bitch or two on the show and Phoebe seems to be doing nicely in that area too…
    And who the hell is Barry? Not a word again from him tonight…
    Thinking a group switch tomorrow night..look forward to them getting a bit rattled..

  4. The person I found interesting last night was Kristie (I think that is her name, long dark plaits sitting next to Kat at tribal). With al, the talk of the four-strong, she is obviously out of that group but seemingly in no danger yet of being voted out. She was genuinely surprised that Kat expected to go, so they must have fed her some other story. I don’t think the alleged girls’ alliance is anything more than a convenient vehicle for Phoebe to spin her plans – she has no genuine loyalty to them, just using them.

    I know the game needs nasty people to be watchable, but I will really enjoy the episode when Phoebe gets shafted.

    My current favourite is Kylie. Her story arc is following Aubry’s a little, so if she survives being on the outer, she could be a strong contender. She will need luck though. Of course, there are many others who are invisible at this stage, so the fav could change.

    Had to giggle at the running dolphins. Not surprised that Matt is good at puzzles, as being a mentalist/magician requires an eye for patterns and observation.

    I’m a bit the opposite to you, Juz, I love these sort of challenges with the running and puzzling. Not a fan of the balance ones, I find them a little boring. I haven’t watched a lot of seasons, but it seems to me that they are working hard to not copy past challenges. It must be hard to be inventive.

  5. How the hell can you break flint? I’ve never heard of that happening before. I actually thought they were going to do a trade & go to tribal in place of the losing team.
    I’ve been thinking the same thing Juz, they must be due to a tribe switch soon. Be good to see a new dynamic. So sick of the same tribe losing over & over again. What is it with the red tribe & puzzles? They were miles ahead & just couldn’t do it.
    Poor Pete, was a shame he got sick just before filming. Those harsh conditions wouldn’t be conducive to recovering from an illness.

  6. Usually when they do a three-tribe format (in the old days they started with two) they wait a while, then do a “switch” to create two tribes, usually be people selecting an object at random that then reveals the colour of their new tribe. And then one the tribes are whittled down again they “merge” into one big tribe. There was one season, Palau, where one tribe sucked so badly yet the producers let them be whittled away to just one person, Steph, because everyone was willing her to pull through. She didn’t win but went on to play two more times.

    • Palau was actually my favourite season out of any version of ‘Survivor’. Badass fireman Tom, it was all about him.

      • Fireman Tom, Ozzie, Malcom; they are the Survivors I like; ones who actually could survive in the wild, not the wimpy, weezel connivors.

  7. Man, what is *with* the contestants in this series? Nobody can keep an alliance for longer than 30 seconds without getting angsty.

    On the blue team … “Matt, we need to do something about Kylie.”
    “Flick, Kylie might or might not have the idol.”
    “Then let’s get rid of Conner.”
    “I don’t know.”
    Five minutes later … “Let’s get rid of Matt.”

    This is when tribes self-destruct and become easy pickings for the other tribes when things go pear-shaped. Seriously, none of these people have any idea about long-term strategy.

  8. Oh Conner, I adore you right now. I also love how Flick is telling us that no, she’s never ever said that she wanted to oust Conner … even though she was saying exactly that to Matt about four hours ago.

    Yeah, Flick, it’s “Survivor”, and sometimes you have to lie to people. The trick that you’ve forgotten is that you have to lie *well* to people.

    • Twist upon twist. I loved how filthy Matt was with Kylie at tribal. And Barry and his silly strategy. I hate when people go on and act like Season 1.

      • Honestly, Nick’s reaction was my favourite part of the whole thing. “****ing snakes.” Hah!

        Conner, bless his beautiful self, but he really screwed up a lot of things tonight. He could’ve (and would’ve) easily aligned everybody to vote out Flick (he’d already gotten Sam and Kylie onboard, and Matt was already doubtful of Flick’s honesty), if he’d just done so quietly. But he went and confronted her, and everything fell apart from there. I definitely think he was right to confront her over her game-play (Flick spent fifteen minutes of *this* episode bouncing back and forth between eliminating Matt and eliminated Conner, two of her close alliance buddies), but his youthful enthusiasm got in the way of good strategy.

        And then I thought, actually, the tie gave the blue team an advantage that the other team didn’t have … they knew what was happening (that the tribes were simply swapping members), so on the re-vote, they could adjust their strategy accordingly. I can’t wait until merge when Nick gets to face his old tribe-mates.

        I’m not sure Conner’s best decision was to bring Sam with him (I would’ve brought Kylie. She has the idol, and showed it off to everybody). Plus, given that Matt voted for Flick and Kylie continued to side with Conner … Sam probably changed his vote from Flick to Conner in round “Two”, but he still would’ve known that Conner was reasaonably safe.

        Meanwhile, Nick brought Tegan, didn’t he? That’s interesting as well, because they’re the only ones from Yellow who know where their idol was hidden … and neither of them had found it before they had to relocate. So once merge happens, there’s still gonna be an idol in the wild.

        I agreed with Yellow on Barry. You can’t go on this show with *zero* strategy and hope for the best (not with this cast, who are thinking and rethinking strategies every few seconds). Plus, who in their right mind would want him around, later on in the game, when he’s basically a giant wild card? Post-merge, you want to be relying on as little luck as possible, which mean he was both (a) dangerous to any existing plotting, and (b) useless to any existing plotting. They’d be mad to keep him around. I don’t see him lasting.

        This was a dramatic episode, but I loved it.

  9. Barry really is a dick head…why go on the show if thats how you going to carry on…! I dont get it!
    Nick should have chosen Craig to take to new tribe, he would have been spewing…he is such a bitch!
    Connor should have also broken up the brooke/flick alliance…they seem to have picked a few too many young ones on this series…

    • Nick taking Craig would’ve been *hilarious*. I’m not really caring much for Craig either.

      As for Conner, I was thinking, the best thing he could’ve done would’ve been to take Brooke. That way he might stand a chance of convincing her that Flick’s intentions are not as honourable as Flick has said … but more to the point, he’d totally destroy the Brooke/Flick alliance (that even Bianca pointed out a couple of episodes ago).

    • They should require contestants to sign in their own blood that they will not pick names out of a hat, or (worse) ask for people to pick a number at the final tribal.

      • Can we add something to that, to sign in their own blood that they will *never* swear on the life of a friend or family member who isn’t there competing alongside them? Can we make it a rule that anybody who does that instantly gets eliminated?

        It’s just so annoying, so transparent, and it makes everybody involved look like a total ass-hat.

        • It’s especially unfair to swear on the life of a family member who is already dead.

          When people prefix something with “trust me” ~ I never do.

          “Three people can keep a secret if two of them are dead” ~ Oscar Wilde.

          • Like when the census ad says, “…and remember, your information is safe”, makes me immediately think it’s not.

        • Am I a horrible person for pondering whether Nick was telling the truth when reminiscing about his late mother … I thought he’d taken a leaf out of the Jonny Fairplay “dead grandma” playbook for a minute.

          • Honestly? I briefly thought that as well. I think too much “Survivor” makes you very cynical about the human condition. Or maybe that’s reality TV in general …

  10. What a fantastic episode. Even if they had kept the eliminations, it was a great idea to let two tribes see each other and get some first impressions on the people that they will later be merging with. Now everyone will go to the next merge with ‘baggage’, and everyone knows who was going to be eliminated and heard some of the accusations and discussion.

    The red tribe are now really at a disadvantage, having been kept out of all this. I, too, thought Conner would take Kylie, but I suppose he thought Sam was the only one of his alliance who had shown no disloyalty. Nick’s bitterness (and showing it) will have done him no favours with his new tribe. Conner is much more likely to make new friends, with his gentlemanly behaviour, but his tendency to spill the beans everywhere is a definite liability.

    Really liked the cage challenge. I liked the fact that you could influence the outcome with the way you blocked the opponents cage, as well as how well you dismantled your own. It was more team against team, rather than team against the course. And a big win to get yellow team’s lost items too.

    I could have told them not to put Chester in the cage with the other girls. Where do they think the term ‘pecking order’ came from?

    • It was such a fabulous episode. When we got to the twist, my jaw just dropped. I loved it.

      I absolutely love Conner, but yeah. His inability to keep a secret is definitely not a good thing, not in this game. Things wouldn’t have gone so pear-shaped if he hadn’t confronted Flick, but not many people here seem to know what they’re doing yet (Phoebe’s about the only castaway who’s doing a good job at strategising, everybody else is crashing in flames). Of course, next week, the second that the blue or yellow teams start losing challenge, we know who’s going home next …

      I liked the cage challenge too, I thought that was clever.

      • It seems fan Conner came into the game wanting to put strategy first, but when it came to the reality of living with people full-time in an adverse situation he cracked – no surprise given his youth – and just wanted everyone to like him. Those guys really dished the dirt on each other in front of the other tribe – not a cool move. I’m hoping Nick and Matt will team up – imagine them smashing the puzzles together. I reckon Conner just put a big target on Sam’s back taking him to the other tribe, but I can understand he’d want to take the one person he was sure was a friend.

        • I have to give props to the editors for doing a marvelous job with the tribal council. We spend a long time focusing on Flick telling JLap about how the blue team is just one big happy family … and then an equally long time with, “YOU’RE LYING AND I HATE YOU.” If I was on the yellow team, I would’ve asked for a bucket of popcorn or something, I’m not even joking.

          • I agree. The editing is a bit loose at the camps, but the TC was so engrossing that three-quarters of an hour disappeared without realising. I’ve had a bit of fun watching the other members of the family watching the recording of the TCmover the last day – my very own gogglebox moment, as I have seen the shock cross their faces as the twists are revealed.

  11. Just a random thought re: who to take to the other side, Matt would have been good for puzzling abilities seeing as yellows master puzzler Nick was gone… Although he too would be spewing to be separated from Chester :p

    • I wondered if Conner was thinking to take a burly male across would leave the other team weaker for challenges.

      • I assumed that was the idea. Conner should have been evil and taken Chester, I confess I have no idea what Mental Matt was thinking when he complained bitterly about Conner’s performance at tribal council.

  12. How pissed off are the red team going to be when they find out they finally won immunity & no one got voted out. I’d be spewing.
    Poor yellow team badly wanted to win their stuff back but missed out. It doesn’t really matter, they’ll probably have a tribe switch soon so will probably get it back anyway.

  13. Surely a proper shakeup can’t be far away anyway. Bianca could go far as Flick is making herself the target of the pair. I find it interesting that Andrew is sitting out a lot of challenges (yellow businessman dude). I wonder if he’s injured or if it’s strategy on his part, so there can be no finger pointing if his performance sucks.

    • I think it is Brooke who is riding on Flick’s coattails, Bianca was eliminated.

      I can’t see either of them lasting too long. It is not a good thing to be seen as having a strong friendship so early.

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