Episode Report Card Sara M: A- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT History Repeats Itself
By Sara M | Season 19 | Episode 8 | Aired on 11.05.2009
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.The tribes merge and name the new tribe Aiga, after the Samoan word for "extended family." And what a great extended family it is! Li'l Russell immediately sets about telling everyone on Galu about his immunity idol in order to make some kind of deal for it, an offer no one actually believes in except for John, who is supposedly a rocket scientist. Laura is so dismissive of Li'l Russell's plan that she incurs his wrath and he tries to convince the men of Galu through John to vote Laura out next. That appears to be the plan until Laura goes and wins individual immunity in a stupid T-ball challenge. John also wins immunity because Probst decided to give two necklaces away this week. Which means, if you're keeping track, that there are four people with potential immunity going into Tribal Council. Li'l Russell tries get Monica voted out instead, but the only person he has on his side is Shambo and she's useless. Erik decides that he would also like to see Monica go, but tells Jaison, Mick, and Natalie to vote for her in such a way that they are totally disgusted with him and decide that all four Foa Foa votes should go to Erik. While Li'l Russell sits around and worries that he'll be the next to go, Natalie heads for Galu's women and easily convinces Laura and Kelly to get rid of Erik. They, in turn, manage to get everyone else to agree to this except for Shambo, who doesn't remember who Erik is. At Tribal Council, oblivious Erik does most of the talking, saying the people of Foa Foa are useless and there's no way any of them can do anything in this game now. Um, except be four jury votes when you're trying to win a million dollars best case scenario, idiot. The votes are cast and while Li'l Russell decides to play his idol (underestimating Natalie's ability to make things happen), Erik keeps his in his pocket and we all get to watch his smug smile disappear slowly but surely as he is voted out of the game with ten votes to Jaison's two. Although I'm pretty sure one of those was Shambo voting for Laura, forgetting that she had the immunity necklace and also that her name was Laura and not "Jason."
Get our predictions on who we think will win.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!The pathetic tribe of Foa Foa return to camp. Jaison promises his tribe that he'll be less of an Eeyore from here on out, except he says this with absolutely no joy, so I kind of doubt it. He then reminds us that Foa Foa is down to just four members and their plan going into the merge is to "divide and conquer" Galu, which he pronounces incorrectly despite hearing Probst say it the correct way all those times that he announced their challenge win. Li'l Russell calculates that with 12 people left in the game, it's possible that the merge will happen now. Only because if they don't do the merge now at 12, then by the time they do it at 10 there will only be 2 people left on Foa Foa and the producers simply must give Li'l Russell every possible opportunity to win at the expense of all the other contestants and also the viewing audience's enjoyment of the show. Both Mick and Jaison can be heard coming up with plans on how to split Galu apart and who on the tribe to ally with, but only Li'l Russell gets the interview where he explains the strategy the show will no doubt credit him for coming up with on his own. Even though we already saw this happen just last season.
The next morning, we go to Galu and a seriously edited voiceover from Laura where she says that it's obvious since her return from Foa Foa that Shambo doesn't like her and there's a divide amongst the tribe. This is illustrated by the fact that Shambo says they're missing a canteen and offers to lend hers to Laura until they find it, only for Laura to decide to count the canteens out herself because she doesn't trust Shambo's counting abilities. I wouldn't either, but on the other hand, Shambo has demonstrated that she's really good at losing essential survival items, so I might also be inclined to believe she's done it again with a canteen and not bothered to count them. Shambo is all offended, thinking that Laura is accusing her of lying about the canteens when I think it's more that Laura doesn't have much faith in Shambo's ability to count to nine. She says Laura clearly has a problem with her and offers to "take a walk" to talk it out while various men listen and make "ugh, women fighting" expressions. Shambo quite diplomatically says that if Laura doesn't want to talk to her about it, that's fine too. Laura snottily says she doesn't need to work anything out with her. Shambo walks to the beach and throws a rock in the ocean and, contrary to my expectations, she obviously doesn't have much experience in softball because that throw was awful. Can't Shambo be good at something? Laura innocently interviews that she was just asking where her canteen was, since the last time she saw it was when she handed it to John on her way to Foa Foa (apparently they aren't allowed to take their own canteen to the other camp? Okay ... ) only for Shambo to make it a "huge big deal" and bring up other stuff. Laura pretends she has no idea what Shambo is talking about even though Laura just said last week that she knows Shambo doesn't like her and we've seen plenty to suggest that the feeling is mutual.