Survivor: Stealth R Us

Hi Gasmi.  As some of you may already know, I’ve been subbing in on some recaps lately while waiting for my next show to start.  This week Flipit is letting me take on Survivor.  I’m really excited about this one because Survivor has a special place in my heart, both as a show but also on this site.

From the show perspective, I have been watching from the very beginning.  Even when this show is pissing me off, I still love it.  For the site, well, the recaps for the show are what first brought me over here.  I had found that other site first and was reading their recaps and then I stumbled upon TVGasm and read the latest Survivor recap.  From there on out, I was hooked.  I stayed, I read other recappers’ stuff, I couldn’t get enough.

So here I am, writing the recap for a show I love that first brought me over to this site.  I feel sort of like a kid on Christmas morning.  So let’s get started, because I can’t wait to tear into my stocking and see what’s inside!

Previously on Survivor……

Never gets old.

Also?  Lisi fell.

Never gets old, part the second.

I don’t know what Mr. Dangerous has on Probst, but it must be something really juicy considering we’re STILL seeing flashbacks of Russell’s ouster.  We also see the more timely booting of Krista before heading over to Redemption Island for her first meeting with Matt.

Who appears to have been in the middle of some sort of kinky game with himself.

Krista’s not put off by that, telling him to move on over because she’s getting in there with.  Krista’s been excited to meet Matt because he has such a positive attitude.  Plus Jesus freaks can smell each other.  The talk turns immediately to prayer and Matt tells Krista that he really feels like God put him here.  Her too.  Here in the game or here on Redemption Island?  But now God will have to choose, dammit.  Oh!  We’ll get to see which of them is God’s favorite!

Meanwhile, Matt is trying to recreate the shroud of Turin.

Over at Zapatera Stephanie sits alone while the other members of her tribe give her dirty looks.  I’d feel sorry for her but she’s in her current position because she decided to join up with Russell.  Sympathy=Gone.

Steve’s not happy that his name got written down last night and goes over to Stephanie to find out why she wrote his name down.  She could be smart here and just say they had to write someone’s name down, she really wanted to write Sarita’s name but Krista wanted his name down.  She would have shifted the blame over to Krista while putting Sarita’s name out there as a possible boot.  Instead, she tells him…..

You have a really small penis, so you have to go.

No, she didn’t really say that.  Instead she tells him it’s about keeping the team with the strongest competitors.  Wow, telling him he has a small penis might have been a better strategy than that one too!  Of course Steve is not happy with her reasoning.

I think it’s hilarious that’s he’s so twisted about this.  Get over it dude, it’s not like you were even in danger of being the one to go!

Does anyone else miss the full opening credits?  No?  I miss hearing the whole o-we-o-we-ooo song.

Let’s head over to Ometepe and see what they’re up to.

Ewwwwwww.

Aside from being gross, that also seems like a rather stupid thing to be doing.  What if they accidentally cut themselves with those scissors?  Wouldn’t it be really dumb to have to leave because you nicked yourself cutting your armpit hairs?

While they create their own spa, Rob works on his plies for the ballet class they’ll be holding later.

Who knew he was so flexible?

Ashley comments that everyone else seems to be working hard but if you can relax and have a good time why not do it?  Ummmm, because you’ll never win this game sitting on your ass and clipping your armpit hair?  Anyway, she’s worked hard all twenty some years of her life; she was a basketball player, she was in pageants…….

Sooooo haaaaard

Later, everyone is hanging out and braiding their hair.  Well, everyone except Phillip.  He has a request for the girls: can they check on the fire like every half hour or so?  Just get up, go over and check on it?  You know, every half hour, twenty five minutes?  Maybe post a schedule or something.  A half hourly schedule?  To check on the fire?

Yeah, they’re definitely gonna get right on that one.  Phillip tells us that they do nothing.  Not only that, but they don’t even give him real credit for everything he does around the place.  He compares it to how someone pats a dog when they don’t really like dogs and pats a nearby drum (?) to illustrate for us.  “I’m their redheaded stepchild!” he proclaims.

Huh?  He doesn’t have any hair.  I don’t get it.

Back on Redemption Island Matt and Krista head over to tree mail and Krista gets her luxury item.  A hot pink bible.  Oh Lord.  They immediately head off to thump it.

After bonding over the bible and some rice it’s time for them to head over to the challenge site.  There to bear witness are Julie and Mike from Zapatera and Andrea and Natalie from Ometepe.  This is another recycled challenge: they have to use a grappling hook to retrieve three bags, one of which will contain a ball.  Then they have to use the ball to navigate a table maze.  First one finished stays!

Krista takes an early lead, snagging each one of her bags on the first try.  It seems like she’s going to be the one to send Matt on his way, but then her ball falls through one of the holes in the table and so, Matt wins again.

They share a brief hug while Andrea watches intensely.  Krista asks if she can give Matt something before she leaves.  A big sloppy kiss?  The handshake of peace?  Nope, she is giving him her bible.  Awwwww, how sw-blarf.

Andrea no likey.

Krista burns her buff and heads out.  Before she’s gone she tells us that she and Matt agreed that whatever happened today would be God’s will.  So I guess that means God like Matt better.  Buh bye, Krista!

As everyone heads back to their respective camps, Andrea tells us that her image of Matt has changed.  Yes, she is jealous over the bible gift and how they seem to have bonded so quickly.  She’s not sure if he can be trusted.  Bwahahahaha!

Uh oh!  There’s a medical emergency over at Zapatera!  Poor Sarita was poking around in her mouth with a dirty stick and now she thinks she has an infection.  Julie thinks she’s a drama queen princess.  Hee!  But it reeeeally huuurts.

She asks Ralph if it looks swollen.  Nope.  That wasn’t the answer she was hoping for.  Meanwhile, Ralph tells us he doesn’t understand why you’d go poking around in your mouth with a dirty stick.  I mean, who worries about their BACK teeth?  The way he said that cracked me up.

Since David doesn’t like Sarita ever since she dared to put someone else in as a puzzle solver, he is now all about getting Stephanie in good with the others so that they can work on getting Sarita out.  I think he’s also realized he’s at the bottom of the alliance, so once Stephanie’s gone; he’ll be the next one to go.  He tells Stephanie to go play nice with everyone.

Stephanie laments that no one has ever taught her to suck up to people she hates.  Poor baby.  But wait.  Isn’t she a waitress?  Then I call bullshit on that one.  Anyone who has ever waited tables knows that part of the job is being nice to assholes and idiots.  Just suck it up and get to ass kissing, Stephanie!

Over at Ometepe Phillip returns from a wood gathering expedition with the news that a storm is gathering.  They have to do some stockpiling.  Gather some wood.  Ashley is immediately aggravated that he didn’t ask them, he dictated at them.  So while Rob, Grant and Andrea get up to gather said wood, Ashley and Natalie stand around, doing nothing.

As Rob and Grant are gathering, Rob says to Grant that they are nineteen or twenty year old girls, what does Phillip want them to do?  Grant’s no dummy, saying he’s not going to be the one to tell them they have to go pick up wood.  Nope, I think they know they can leave that particular chore to Phillip who happily takes it up once again.

I’m just sayin’, pick up some fucking wood.

You’re not my DAAAAD, MantiePants.

He’s just sick of it, okay?  So tomorrow he is going to be fire free.  He’s not doing anything fire related.  So there.  Nyah, nyah.  He doesn’t have to remind the boys because they pull their weight.  And so does Andrayuh.  It’s ANDREA, Ashley corrects him.  Okay, Andrea, point is she HELPS; she doesn’t lay around like a beauty queen.  “I am tired of being the red stepchild to you two!”

The gift that never stops giving.

This continues on for a while and then after Rob pull Phillip aside to try and talk to him.

Dude.  Bitches be crazy.

Basically Rob tells him that at this point they should try and keep the tribe unified.  He should have also pointed out that no one likes to give the million dollars to a lazy brat that sat on her ass the entire time, but he keeps that one to himself.  He tells us Phillip is right, the girls don’t do anything, but the less they do the happier he is; why give anyone a reason to vote to give them the money.  See?  Rob is wicked smaht.

Once the conflict dies down, Rob pokes fun at Phillip (not when he’s there of course), saying that the fire’s not the way he likes it.  See what he does there?  This is one of the many reasons I love Rob.  He knows how to play people like the fiddles they are.

You can pluck my strings anytime, fella.

Time to check in with Zapatera.  Stephanie’s ready to make her move and try to get back into the good graces of her tribemates.

You kinda remind me of my grandpa.  Do all old people smell like mothballs?

Such a charmer.  She apologizes for voting for him, and since Steve always likes to believe in people (until they stomp on him) it seems like he might be willing to give her another chance.  Can she be honest with him?  Sure. She really wanted to vote for Sarita, but didn’t, but really wanted to.  Steve also thinks Sarita is weaker than Stephanie so it seems like there might be some hope for her.

After a quick break it’s time for the immunity/reward challenge.  Is anyone else sick of this combined challenge crap?  Another reason Redemption Island bites.

Anyway, as they come in Jeff asks Mike where the animosity level is between the two tribes.  Well Jeff, there’s a little clash going on right now.  They’re in the middle of the competition and both tribes desperately want to win, so…..

Why are the cute ones always so dumb?

Over to MantiePants, can he really feel that rivalry?  Absolutely.  Jeff wants to know which animal Phillip is using today.  BOTH.  BOTH?!? Yep, BOTH.  Is Steve concerned about him using the gorilla AND the lion?

So…….that’s a no?

Let’s get to the challenge.  Today two of each tribe will be ball launchers, the rest will have what look like oversized lacrosse sticks.  The ball launchers will launch balls while the others will be paired with someone from the other tribe and try to catch the ball.  Doesn’t matter which ball they catch.  First to five wins.

Wanna know what they’re playing for?  Well, aside from immunity the winning tribe will get to go eat lunch in a beautiful setting, high up on a mountain.  Worth playing for?  God how I wish someone would say no just one time when he asks them that.  But they never do.  Sigh.

Zapatera has to sit one person out, wh-Sarita’s hand pops up.  Wow, didn’t even think about that one, Jeff points out.  Go sit your pansy ass down.

So the ball launchers for Zapatera are Stephanie and David, and Phillip and Natalie have ball duty for Ometepe.  The match ups in the sand are as follows:  Grant v. Mike, Rob v. Steve, Andrea v. Julie, and Ashley v. Ralph.  And….go!

Point one for Grant.

Followed by an in and out catch from Julie which doesn’t count.  Then another miss, followed by another catch from Grant.  Ralph is effectively blocked by Ashley, and Mike tries to hold Grant back by his shirt.  He rips it, but fails to stop Grant from scoring again.

Since the strategy worked so well for him last time, Mike continues to try and rip Grant’s shirt off.  This time Grants misses, but….

Boston Rob scores!

Grant rips the rest of his shirt off.

And offers it to Mike since he seems to really want it.  This time around both Grant and Rob come close, but both end up missing the balls.  No one from Zapatera comes close to catching one of them.  On the next launch, Rob comes soooooo close but no cigar.

And Grant seals the deal for Ometepe!  Wow!  They got smoked.  And Grant was a fucking beast in this challenge.  Ometepe heads off to enjoy their feast while Zapatera trudge home to try and decide who they will vote off next.

For some reason the scenic view for the reward lunch is located right next to a huge statue of Jesus.

Quick, pull my finger.

Oh that Jesus, such a joker.  Poor Matt will be so sad he missed Lunch with the Lord.  Within minutes of sitting down to eat Rob spots the HII clue.  He weaves back and forth in his seat trying to figure out how he can snatch while calling as much attention to himself as possible.  Luckily for him, he is playing with a bunch of idiots.  I can’t believe none of them noticed him doing that.

Grant spots the clue and makes a grab for it and then Rob says they should go look at the view.  Again, no one pays them any mind.  They look at the clue and I wonder if Grant will notice that there seem to be more clues than there should be if this is only the second clue as he’s been led to believe.  He doesn’t seem to notice.

But Phillip noticed something fishy was going on, so he’s gotten up to come and see what the guys are doing.  He announces as he approaches, “I saw it, what’s it say?”  Way to keep it on the downlow, Phillip.  Rob tells him back “Back at camp.”

Phillip then goes on to tell us that he is in an alliance with himself, Rob and Grant; he calls them Stealth R Us.  Bwahahahahahahaha! But wait!  There’s more.

I’m the Specialist, Rob is the Mentalist, and Grant is the Assassin.

Yeah, you are special, Phillip, there is no denying that one.  He tells them to remember, Stealth.  And then tells us that when they found the clue they were trying to hide it.  But how does he really know that I mean, WE know that, but does he really know that?  Couldn’t they have been just using their Stealth?

Well, Phillip tells us, hell hath no furry like a lion and a gorilla when he thinks he’s been provoked.  So…..the lorilla is angry?  Well, when you’re in an alliance with him you better stick with it because he is all about integrity.  He served his country for four years, eleven months and thirteen days…..

And then they gave me a section eight, which I think is an award for integrity.

I wouldn’t mess with the lorilla if I was them.

Duty, honor and country mean something to him, mmmkay?  If you try to trash on that Phillip and the United States got something for you when you try that, my baby.

I don’t got nothing.

But he’s not going to get all nuts about what just happened.  He’s going to smile, and when the times comes, he going to

Kick

A little ass around here!  Oh Phillip, I hope you stay for a long, long time.

Back in the Zapatera camp, Dave is trying to make the argument for keeping Stephanie over Sarita.  Sarita is aware of what is happening and trusts that her alliance will stick with her.  She knows they know just how loyal she is.

Stephanie tries to remind everyone about how much stronger she is than Sarita and you know, the trust thing can come later.  Like maybe when she switches to the other side after the merge.  I mean, don’t you think they’re all aware she’ll jump ship as fast as she can?  She’s not that good of an actress.

The guys and Julie stand around talking about how they’re sick of losing and that Stephanie is stronger in the challenges while Sarita is more trustworthy.  Dave makes a hard push for Sarita going so who knows, maybe that will work.

Tribal Council.

Jeff brings up again that they threw a challenge to get rid of Russell, are they sorry now, are they, ARE THEY?  Dave admits that giving the Ometepe tribe a little taste of victory may have been a mistake; things could be much different if they hadn’t done that.

Hey, how bout that ass whooping you took at the challenge?

You Probst, are an asshole.

Ralph thinks he could have done better if the ball launcher had launched those balls better.  Eye roll from Stephanie.  Jeff moves over to Sarita, why’d she choose to sit out?  She starts to say she would have like to have been out there and Stephanie cuts her off saying she was ready to shit a brick just thinking about playing a contact sport.

Well, Sarita didn’t want to say she could do it and then lose it for her tribe.  Well, Stephanie’s just ready to go and give it her all.  Dave jumps in saying she’s the worst, she knows she’s the worst and that’s why she sat out.

You know what else?  Sarita complains ALL THE TIME, says Stephanie.  Nu uh.  Uh huh.  Being who he is, Probst can’t resist getting a guy’s opinion about this whole thing.  Steve?  Stephanie’s a warrior with lots of heart; Sarita’s trustworthy even if she doesn’t do much around camp or challenges.

Dave thinks this tribe is too obsessed with trust when they should worry first about winning.  Time for the vote.  Sarita votes for Stephanie, Dave and Stephanie vote for Sarita.  Jeff goes to tally the votes.

Once the votes are read, the decision is final.  Jeff will read the votes.  Sarita, Stephanie, Sarita, Stephanie, Stifinie.  Sixth person voted out of Survivor: Redemption Island……Stephanie.

Off she goes to Redemption Island.  I’m sort of hoping she kicks Matt’s bible thumping ass.  Wouldn’t it be fun to see their faces if she came back into the game?  She wastes no time in shit talking her tribe as soon as she sees Matt and tells us (in case we’re stupid) that she has no intention of going back with her tribe if she gets back in the game.  DUH.

So, what did you think of this episode, Gasmi?  Does Phillip amuse you as much as he does me?  Do you think Zapatera did the right thing, voting Stephanie out?  And why would anyone clean their teeth with a dirty stick?

Thanks for reading, and thanks to Flipit for letting me sub in.  I’ve had a great time.  Until next time….

SWAK, PottyMouth