Survivor: Water Sports

Man, this season is a chore.  Sigh.  Well, at least we’re all in this together.  Back at Espada after the double tribal last week, Dan tells the group that he feels like John Gotti, who was called “the Teflon Don” because they could never nab him.  Yeah, until they eventually caught him and he went to prison.

Then he sits with his crotch blurred out while everyone discusses what a tool he is.

“Yep.  Take a good look, ladies.”

Back at La Flor, Marty is flabbergasted by what just happened.  Yeah, so were the rest of us, buddy.  “Can I just say WOW?” he repeats on a continuous loop.  He asks Sash for an explanation, and Sash tells him that they wanted to flush the idol, which of course answers nothing.  Marty, no dummy, has put together that Jane voted for him too.  “She turned on me, she’s the desperate one and she’s got to go,” he tells us in confessional.  She turned on you?  You were three seconds from voting for her too until Brenda opened her mouth, so maybe quit with the righteous indignation.

Marty decides to confront Jane the next morning.  “I can tell you three things,” he begins, with a condescending tone in his vote.  “I’ve never lied to you, I’ve never misrepresented myself to you, and I’ve never written your name down.”  Maybe she doesn’t like that you’re talking to her like she’s your valet, jerk.  “I think you voted for me last night,” he continues, and she laughs uncomfortably and in the most obvious manner ever.  Not a good liar, that woman.

Reward Challenge.  There’s a pool dug into the dirt with a diving board at one end and a goal at the other; a perch is situated in the middle between the two.  One member of each tribe will be the guard, and they’ll try to block as members of the other team run off the diving board and toss a ball into the net.  The first tribe to score five points wins a “Nicaraguan farm experience”, which means they’ll get to go on a horseback ride and enjoy a home cooked meal.

Fabio and Chase will be guarding for their respective teams.  Na Onka goes first, throwing a speedy softball pitch right past Fabio and into the net.  Jill the Badass nails hers too, tying it up. At one point, Marty biffs it and nails Chase right in the crotch.

Yep.

When Dan goes, it’s even more pathetic than you would imagine.  He literally waddles up like a penguin and then tosses the ball halfheartedly at Fabio before falling face first into the pool.

“This is not the ball I normally expose.”

At one point, Fabio takes a break from the competition to pee in the water.  Yes, you read that correctly.  No biggie, just peeing here in this standing water!

There’s a metaphor for this season in here somewhere, but I can’t find it.

Jeff, never one to let an opportunity like this pass him by, calls Fabio out and embarasses him in front of everyone.  “Anyone have a problem with Fabio peeing in the pool?” Jeff asks.  Judge for yourself:

Even though totally awesome Jill scores not once, but twice, Espada’s a bit too good at this and wins the reward in a 5-3 rout.  And then: Purple Kelly gets a confessional! In case you are wondering why we have not seen her yet, here is your answer:  “The reward was going to be cool, you got to milk your own milk?  I guess?”  Enlightening commentary, that.

At La Flor after the reward challenge, Jane works diligently setting out fishing nets and gathering wood while the rest of the team lounges about in the shelter.  “The word quit’s not in my vocabulary.  I can do a lot more than Marty and Jill thought I could,”  she says.  You know, I don’t remember Marty and Jill being particularly mean to her; she just ended up on the opposite side of things because she was so tight with the two Jimmys.  Either way, homegirl is bitter.

Over at their “Nicaraguan Farm Experience” (coming soon to Universal Theme Parks in 2012), the Espada tribe saunters through the countryside on horseback.  They arrive at a barn, where the farmer/tourguide tries to teach them how to milk a cow.  “I think I used to date her,” Dan says while staring at the cow’s nether regions.  I love how all of Dan’s jokes are taken directly from 1963.  Even Na Onka takes a shot at milking the cow!

“I don’t like the way this cow is looking at me.” (punches cow)

Meanwhile, Jane is staying busy over at La Flor: she’s caught a bunch of fish in her net, and she does not intend on sharing them with the lazy asses on her tribe.  “I’ve been working all day, so I’m gonna eat one of these bad boys, so I’ll have to go hide in the woods,” she says.  She sneaks up into the forest, finds a secluded spot away from the rest of her team, grills up a fish and digs in, all by herself, laughing the whole time.  Good for her.

“Damn, five minutes ago I was swimming and now I’m a castmember on a shoddy season of Survivor.  Worst day ever.”

Back at the Nicaraguan!  Farm! Expeeeeeeerience! an authentic Nicaraguan woman cooks up a nice breakfast for the Espada tribe, which includes tasty (non-pasteurized) homemade cheese, a big bowl of rice, and some fresh slices of watermelon.  It looks entirely too tasty for its own good.  All of a sudden Alina starts to cry, because she hasn’t sat down to a meal in a long time, or she misses her family, or it’s all so nice, or something or other.  I don’t know, I’m having trouble with this whole thing.  Meanwhile, Na Onka stares her down like Alina just punched a kitten.

“Don’t you know that I’m supposed to be the crazy one?  QUIT CRYING.”

Because no episode is complete without Na Onka being weird and gross, she calls Alina “grimy”.  “I can play a role, just like her!” Na Onka sasses.  What role is that?  Does that even make sense?  I think she might be trying to cry too or something, I’m not sure.  It’s all very confusing and odd, and this whole sequence never would have been shown if these people, you know, did stuff.

Whatever.  Anyway: Immunity Challenge!  The tribes are back to competing for team immunity.  Today, two members of each tribe will be breaking tiles by rolling cannonballs down a chute directed and held up by the other tribe members.  The tribes will be taking turns, so there’s no element of speed to this challenge; it’s all about strategy and teamwork, which is a nice change.  The first team to break all the tiles wins.

Also, it should be noted that this is one of those challenges that is just impossible to recap.  There’s, um, cannonball dropping?  And chute adjusting?  I mean, it’s actually really fun to watch because the teams are strategizing on chute placement, cannonball size and speed, and all of the other variables that go into a challenge like this, but there’s not a lot of play-by-play to be had.  Espada figures out the key to the challenge first, though, which is that you have to drop the larger cannonballs further down the shoot to keep them from completely missing.  Espada uses this piece of information to get themselves out to a four to one lead, and with only one tile left to break, it’s a matter of time before they win and send La Flor to Tribal Council.

“I really enjoy this giant game of Mouse Trap, but it takes FOREVER to set up.”

When La Flor returns to camp, Marty hangs the immunity idol on the branch again, just to show off like a big, giant show off.  Brenda and Sash ask Fabio what he wants to do about the vote (?), and even he’s smart enough to know that they send three votes to Marty and two to Jill to make Marty play the idol, and then the tie Marty and Jill cause with their two votes will result in a revote,and then they can send Jill home.  This plan requires Jane to vote for Marty or Jill, and you will be unsurprised to hear that she it totally fine with that.  “What goes around comes around,” she says with a serious tone.  Again, what did they do to her beside choosing not to align with her?  Did they push her into the mud or stuff her into a locker and I just missed it?

This is just a guess, but I think it’s mostly that Marty is a successful executive and Jill is a doctor, and Jane is a dog trainer and maybe has a little bit of an inferiority complex.  Just saying.

Sash and Brenda come up with another dastardly idea.  They’ll tell Marty about their plan, and use it to force him into giving his idol to them in exchange for a stay of execution, and then vote his ass out anyway.  Sash takes Marty to the side and does just that: “You’re going to have to use your idol tonight.  There’s another option: you can hand your idol over to me and we’ll get rid of Jill.”  Marty is hesitant, knowing that he’s going to be screwed on the next go-round either way.  Essentially, there’s nothing in it for him.  That’s when Sash sweetens the deal: “If we lose the next immunity challenge, I’ll give it back to you.”  Now, why the hell would Sash do that?  He won’t, of course.

“How does your hair just stay like that all the time?  It defies physics.”

Marty, to his credit, knows that he’s powerless.  “If I keep the idol, I’m going to have to use it tonight, so I’m gonna have to give it to somebody.” And you know what?  He fucking hands it over.  On one hand, he may as well, because what’s the difference between going this week or next week?  But on the other hand: completely stupid, because what if next week is the merge?  That changes everything.

Anyway, now Sash has the idol, which he stashes in his pants, a pair of which I also own.  Completely irrelevant, I know, but: Hey, I have those pants!

Tribal Council.  There’s more boring discussion about how some people are old and some people are young, and how the old people sometimes feel left out.  In the process, Marty ends up calling Jane out for being a flipper.  Jane’s response:  “Well, when we became yellow I became yellow, and that’s the way I looked at it.”  Like, yellow as in the team color, or yellow as in cowardly?  I’m confused.

Brenda tells Jeff that Jill never really tried to align with them, it just evolved out of a natural friendship.  And a desire to be lazy and sleep all day.

“…and then I found five dollars.”

Marty explains that either way, he still feels on the outs, so he had to take a chance with the idol to try and stay in the game.  Sash explains to Probst that the idol is in his pocket, which surprises Jeff even though he totally knew already.  “Either way, we have the idol, so we come out on top,” Fabio says.  “Just out of curiousity, then, because you have it as a group, Sash, maybe you want to give it to Brenda?”  Yo Probst, you’re stepping over the line, son.

Sash tries to respond, but makes a slip of the tongue.  Now this is not word for word, but what he means to say: “I’ll keep the idol for now, and give it away to them later to get these guys to trust me.”  What he actually says: “I’ll keep the idol for now, and only give it away if these guys don’t trust me.” It’s something like that.  Whatever it is, it’s an honest mistake that Probst tries to blow out of proportion, because he has nothing to hold onto since these people are BORING.

Time to vote.  Marty votes for Jane, and we see Fabio vote for Marty.  When the votes are read, the first two are for Jane, then there are two for Marty and two for Jill, so it comes down to the last vote, which is for…Jill, sadly.  What’s the point of keeping Marty around again?  Dude is the luckiest person in history after these past two Tribal Councils.   She gives Marty a hug and then has her torch extinguished.

Awww.  Who am I going to root for now?  Boooooooo, this season.