Miss Alli
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Previously on You Can't Spell "Crazy-Ass, Self-Obsessed, Obnoxious, Delusional Pirate" Without "Irate": Jon and Burton, fed up to their Brillo-padded noggins with Rupert's Triumvirate of Arrogant Snots, solidified an alliance with Lill and rounded up a rather stunned Tijuana and Darrah in a plot to oust Rupert. Burton and Lill won an afternoon of beer and pizza and the carefree slaughtering of fish, but Burton gave his half of the reward to Jon, not needing any more open-mouth kisses, thank you very much. And in the end, the fish turned out not to have anything to worry about, really. Sandra tattled to Rupert that she overheard Burton and Jon plotting something, but Rupert was sure that Lill would spill when he barked the order. Peppered with Rupert's questions, though, Lill showed her immense theatrical range by acting clueless (she is the sly one), and she thus kept the Bearded Bore in the dark about his impending misfortune. Burton then triumphed at the dartboard immunity challenge, thanks to Rupert's obliging decision to have absolutely no grasp of strategy. Rupert tapdanced a bit to ensure his own continued safety, but at tribal council, he nevertheless got the big snuff. Snuff! So in the end, blustery, big-headed, self-crowned King Rupert of the Pearl Islands lasted exactly one tribal council longer than Sir Ryan-O the Pretty And...Well, Just Pretty. Some things are just so delicious that you have to roll them around on your tongue for quite some time before you feel you've gotten the full benefit. And it doesn't only apply to dark chocolate, either.
Credits. You don't really notice how rough these people look until you see them in the credits and see what they normally look like. Poor, poor dirty people. They're starting to look like the cast of a Carnivàle spinoff set in Bermuda.
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It is Night 27 at Balboa, and the weather is vaguely menacing. There seem to be a lot of storms this season; I don't know if we've ever had quite this much lightning. Or maybe it's all the same shot and I've now seen the same lightning strike a hundred times or so. That would explain my constant feeling of dj-vu, which I had attributed until now to the fact that Jon's hair makes me think of Betty White. The castaways are returning from the Rupert-booting tribal council, down one bushy beard and one raging ego. And, presumably, bits and pieces of the breaking hearts of megalomaniac-likers everywhere. Sandra stomps back to camp a little bit ahead of the group, undoubtedly dismayed that things are not going exactly the way she perhaps planned them. Creepy night-vision Christa stares blankly at a spot on the ground about six feet in front of her as she interviews that she was "shocked" at the booting of Rupert. "Maybe I've been too cocky all along, thinking I know what's going on," she intones in her trademark nasal voice. Stand aside while I fire up the "Gee, ya THINK?"-inator and blast yet another round into the sky.
“ Jon calls Sandra out for having done nothing but ride Rupert's coattails: 'Guess what? That coat just left.' It takes me a moment to grieve for the fact that 'that coat just left' is the best he could do with the 'coattail' setup. Then again, his showing any trace of genuine wit at this point would have come as such a shock that I would have never had the hiccups again. ”
Once everyone returns to camp, Sandra starts in on one of her usual Bullying Lectures to the Annoyed and Ultimately Indifferent about how nobody can trust Jon, "that bitch." "He will backstab you in a fucking heartbeat just like he did everybody here," Sandra says angrily, forgetting that, of the people there, Jon really only backstabbed herself and Christa. While her worldview would indeed tend to suggest that that's "everybody here," it's actually not. Jon, in return, calls Sandra out for having done nothing but ride Rupert's coattails, and says, "Guess what? That coat just left." It takes me a moment to grieve for the fact that "that coat just left" is the best he could do with the "coattail" setup. Then again, his showing any trace of genuine wit at this point would have come as such a shock that I would have never had the hiccups again. "Every time a plan went down, you put it together," Sandra volleys back. Now, wait, just who is that supposed to piss off? Again, the only people who are unhappy about what just happened are Sandra and Christa. Everyone else was in on it, so what's the point of declaring him the mastermind? Isn't she essentially telling the rest of the players that Jon is responsible for getting them to where they are now? Aren't they likely to...you know, thank him? Sandra is very passionate and plain-spoken, both of which are qualities I appreciate, but her percentage in terms of sense-making is not so high.
Jon, looking even creepier and scragglier than usual under the punishing gaze of night vision, interviews that tribal council that night was "one of his proudest moments in this game." He says, in a way he thinks is magnificently perceptive, that "the one factor you can always count on is greed," and he goes on to cite Tijuana's and Darrah's "greed" for their decision to come aboard the new alliance with him and Burton. It's not greed, in fact, because greed has to do with wanting more than you need, not looking out for yourself when other people are legitimately out to get you. I mean, what would have been the non-greedy thing to do? Intentionally let yourself lose the game? ["That would have been the noble thing to do, I believe." -- Rupert] It's just another installment of Jon's usual self-aggrandizing yammerfest, and his efforts to cast the game in epic terms as if he's secretly taking advantage of other people's dark sides like some kind of cynical, Darth-Vader-ish savant are about as credible as everything else he has said and will say in this episode. Convincing people they can do better in an alliance with you isn't really leveraging any quality of theirs, after all, except the fact that everyone wants to win. I'm not even going to waste the breath involved in telling Jon to shut up, because his existence squanders enough of the earth's oxygen as it is.
Back in Sandra's rant, she yells at Jon that she hopes Tijuana, Darrah, and Lill will "turn on [his] ass." Well, I guess she told him! Seriously, what kind of a declaration of war is that? "I hope your alliance that will otherwise oust me doesn't hold together, and that I am somehow saved at the last minute!" Oooooh, you go, girl!
“ Jon, by the way, has returned to his kerchief- on-the-head look, and appears to be the second coming of the ugliest housewife stumbled across in 1948 by a now- traumatized former door- to-door vacuum- cleaner salesman. ”
"Who threw the fish out?" Burton asks, opening a new chapter in tonight's ongoing Festival of Highly Questionable Behavior. "Sandra, did you throw the fish out?" he asks calmly. She hollers back in his face: "No, I'm hungry, what the fuck am I gonna do with throwing fish out?" As it turns out, Rupert had fished in the afternoon and left the fish in a bucket, and now they're gone. Burton seems to suspect Sandra more than Christa initially, probably because Sandra does seem to be the loopier of the two. In the end, though, he concludes that Christa is responsible, because Sandra credibly points out that she was flapping her yap the entire time, and it seems logical that it would have been one of the two of them who wouldn't want the tribe to have Rupert's fish. Christa denies involvement, and Sandra continues to deny involvement as well. Jon insists that he thinks he even saw Christa skulking around in the area where the fish were, so suspicion begins to center on her. In an interview, Jon -- without a hint of irony -- says, "That was the most idiotic, childish thing I've seen since this game has begun, and Christa will be penalized." The idea of his talking down other people's behavior as "childish" is really so ironic that he's lucky that oft-repeated bolt of lightning didn't come dashing over and take his head clean off at that moment. Moreover, if he would really change who he votes against as a result of that incident, he's not as good a player as he thinks -- but I suppose we've pretty well established that already. ["Finally, he didn't 'see' jack, so shut up, Jon." -- Wing Chun] Christa interviews that everyone apparently now believes she tossed the fish, so she fully expects to be voted off .
We then actually see the abandoned fish lying out in the jungle with little crabs crawling all over them. Oh, the humanity! Or...you know, the fishiness. There's a really horrible "the fish have crabs" joke in here somewhere, but I'm not looking for it. You could, but what would your grandmother think? More on that later.
The morning, Burton, Jon, and Lill agree that they can smell the fish and could smell them all night, so they can't be far. Jon, by the way, has returned to his kerchief-on-the-head look, and appears to be the second coming of the ugliest housewife stumbled across in 1948 by a now-traumatized former door-to-door vacuum-cleaner salesman. Burton says that he and Lill can go get water, and Jon can look around and try to trace the smell, presumably because he's the least likely to be distracted by the stench of himself. When Burton and Lill take off water-hunting, though, they abruptly run across the fish, strewn all over the ground just behind the camp. As they recover the fish, Lill interviews that Christa swears she's innocent, but Lill thinks she did it, essentially out of anger that Rupert was booted. Around the morning fire, Christa continues to insist that she had nothing to do with it, and Burton tells her that she is the only person who could have done it, so she must be fibbing. "You're lying. And you have a reason to lie," he says loudly. In an interview, Christa snorfles that she left the group for a minute to put her canteen down, and that they've all concluded that she threw out the fish during that time. She struggles with the frustration of having no way to prove that she didn't do it. I feel for Christa in one sense, but I also don't think she's a very nice person, and she has sometimes taken great pleasure in lording it over other people on the tribe that she has power over them -- remember, she gave Darrah and Tijuana a snotty dressing-down at tribal council in a way that was pretty gratuitous. To some degree, she's reaping what she's sown here. No one believes her because she hasn't shown any interest in, or developed any kind of friendly relationship with, anyone other than Sandra and Rupert. She spent several weeks convinced that those were the only allies she needed to get through the game, and this is what can happen when you become so fixated on your compatriots that you foment resentful feelings against you on the part of everyone else. Rule #1 Of Survivor: No Fomenting.
“ You know, there are a number of moments that are burned in reality- television history on the basis of sheer idiocy, and 'she died, dude' is definitely one of them. ”
The first to appear is Sandra's husband Marcus, a pleasant-looking fellow who runs over and gives her a big hug. Just seeing them hug makes Lill burst into tears, because she is as nutty as a fruitcake, as they say. Tijuana is greeted , by her "high-school sweetheart and still great friend" Billy. Hmm, I wonder what that relationship description means, exactly. It sounds from the description like it could be the "loves her dearly; discovered he's gay" friendship, but that's not quite the vibe I get from them. Might be a fortieth-birthday marriage pact thing, I suppose. Anyway, Billy's very cute, and Tijuana's very cute clapping excitedly about seeing him. I definitely have the most actual affection for her out of all the people who are left. up is Burton's mom, Didi, who didn't quite dress for the Pearl Islands, in that she's in a fairly fancy black pantsuit. Man, that getup will take a while to recover from a trip into the drink. Mother and son share a nice hug. Lill's husband Lonnie shows up , and she predictably cries all over herself embracing him. There is Titanic-esque tin whistling. Lonnie doesn't even get the open-mouth kisses, though. Scandale! Darrah's boyfriend Bradley comes around the corner, looking for all the world like the president of the Young Republicans of Tupelo, and they hug, too. At first, Darrah looks a little numb about seeing him, but before long, she's all weepy, too. Christa's fianc is , and she's crying, crying, crying as he comes over and hugs her. See? A real boyfriend loves you even when your roots are showing. "Hey, I'm about to cry," Jeff observes with what passes for warmth.
"Jon," Jeff says , "here's your buddy Dan." Around the corner, making Fairplay Fingers all the way, comes Jon's bud, who looks very much like the beer-swilling idiot friend you'd expect a pipsqueak like Jon to have. They hug, and then Jon says softly to Dan, "How's Grandma?" There is a pause, and then Dan says, "She died, dude." You know, there are a number of moments that are burned in reality-television history on the basis of sheer idiocy, and "she died, dude" is definitely one of them. The fact that it doesn't seem to arouse more suspicion in more of these people is how you can tell they're not that bright. ["I'd also say that the rest of the contestants didn't react to this announcement with more suspicion may have been because being all alone in an intense situation can create a kind of mass hysteria, like when you go to camp and sit in a Spirit Circle and a counselor reads a sappy poem you're all supposed to think is meaningful, or some such fruitiness, and then one girl gets a little emotional about it and then before you know it everyone is totally bawling and you don't really know why except you just get carried along in the moment." -- Wing Chun] Would Big Dumb Dan have been making with the Fairplay Fingers if he had been about to tell the guy that his grandmother died? Would Jon, had he really been expecting either Big Dumb Dan or Old Granny Fairplay, have started by gloating to Big Dumb Dan about being in the final seven? It's just patently absurd. It's not worthy of Eddie Haskell, let alone Richard Hatch.
“ Jon acts all broken up at 'she died, dude.' Overhearing this, the other castaways begin to react. Lill, of course, is all sad, because she missed the scout badge in intellectual curiosity. ”
Anyway, Jon acts all broken up at "she died, dude." Overhearing this, the other castaways begin to react. Lill, of course, is all sad, because she missed the scout badge in intellectual curiosity, and she takes things about as literally as a four-year-old. Jon and Dan hug again. When Jon sits back down, Jeff asks him about what just happened, and Jon says that it was either supposed to be Dan or Old Granny Fairplay showing up, and the reason it's Dan is that Dead Old Granny Fairplay is no longer with us, having gone to the Dead Granny Resort in the sky, where she is playing Dead Granny Canasta with all the other Dead Grannies. ["Watching this a second time, I did notice that Jon was careful to be vague about the details of exactly where Granny Fairplay was now -- in a metaphysical sense -- and just said something along the lines of 'She's not around' instead of 'She passed away' or even 'Jeff: she died, dude.'" -- Wing Chun] Burton pats him on the shoulder. "I can hope to win this and get some more information," Jon blubbers. Darrah looks teary. Lill clutches Jon's hand. Sandra looks at him, thinking precisely the following: "Like hell your grandmother died, you creepy little lowlife toad."
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When we return, Jeff explains the details of the plank-walking challenge. He'll ask a question about the castaways, and they'll answer for themselves, and their loved ones will answer for them. Whenever the answers match, you get to send somebody else's loved one another step down the plank toward the end. So it's like The Newlywed Game, only with more clichd pirate trappings and less of Bob Eubanks pumping you for information about the weirdest place you ever did it. The fourth hit to anyone's loved one will send that person off the plank and out of the game. Last one standing wins reward, which is the right to go back and spend twenty-four hours at camp with your beloved castaway. Or, in the case of Big Dumb Dan and Idiot Jon, the castaway who got you your five minutes of fame.
“ Jon says, 'I have about a million questions I'd like to know about my grandmother, but obviously some people don't give a shit.' Lill nods enthusiastically with Jon's anger, because when you're tending the garden of your own doofusness, you have to water it as often as you can. ”
The loved ones take to their planks. During the questioning, we learn several things. Sandra's nickname is "Changa." Darrah's boyfriend thinks her nickname is "DJ," but she thinks it's "Nub Nut." I'm not sure whether I want to believe that Darrah has a boyfriend who calls her "nub nut," or whether I want to believe that Darrah can't spell "numbnuts." They're both really, really sad possibilities to consider. Burton and his mom both write down that his nickname is "Burton," which is much funnier than it should be. When we get to the plank-walking itself, Sandra points fiercely and dramatically and takes her first shot at "Fairplay's buddy." She ain't fooled, people. That's no accident -- she thinks Dead Old Granny Fairplay is a pile of horseshit. I might not be so sure if she hadn't done it so eagerly right at the beginning, complete with pointing, but she did. And I am. Lill indignantly retaliates on Jon's behalf by sending Sandra's husband down the plank. Jon just cannot believe Sandra's insensitivity and says, "I have about a million questions I'd like to know about my grandmother, but obviously some people don't give a shit." Lill nods enthusiastically with Jon's anger, because when you're tending the garden of your own doofusness, you have to water it as often as you can. "It's not all about you all the time," Sandra snaps back to Jon. Lill lectures with patient exasperation, "His grandmother just died." See, as far as I'm concerned, Sandra should have just gone for broke. If she didn't believe him and she was going to take a whack at his buddy first, she should've just said, "You know what, Jon? I think you're lying." That wouldn't have made her look any worse than what she just did, which was to suggest that she maybe did believe Dead Old Granny Fairplay was really most sincerely dead, and just didn't think it was important. So rather than the "it's not all about you," which struck me as an unfortunate and weaselly hedge, I wish Sandra had just said, "Considering what I've seen from Jon so far, I don't believe anything he says, and I'm sorry if his grandmother just died, but he's made it impossible for anyone to assume she did just because he says she did." That, I would have respected. ["The Sandra we know couldn't have been that articulate, I don't think, and would have said something like Jon's lying about his grandmother's death left him 'ass out' or something." -- Wing Chun] Anyway, Jon sends Sandra's husband down the plank. Burton sends Billy walking. Christa, with a shrug, picks Burton's mom. Poor Didi. I hope she won't lose one of those earrings in a mess of seaweed.
The game goes on from there. Highlights: Tijuana answers that her favorite meal is chicken, but she admits that Billy's answer is actually the right one -- she forgot about mac and cheese. It's very cute the way Tijuana keeps apparently deciding that Billy's answers are better than the ones she came up with. Sandra loses her nerve and stops going after Big Dumb Dan, now picking on Lill's husband because Lill picked on hers. Lill goes after Sandra's husband yet again. Jon sends poor Marcus on the final ride into the water. Marcus jumps off obligingly. Splash! , there's a question about fantasy professions, and Darrah answers, "Modeling," while her boyfriend answers for her, "Nursing." Darrah: "We're gonna have to talk when we get home." Snerk. Christa's fianc is to end up in the water. Burton thinks the personality trait that could make him lose the game is "Funny." Gosh, I can think of three things that are wrong with that answer without even breaking a sweat. Darrah's boyfriend goes in the water. Burton's mom goes in the water, to the dismay of everyone -- it's not easy to see anybody's mom walk the plank. Burton (just call him by his nickname, "Burton") gives a very effectively comic cringe as she makes a splash. Jon sends Billy into the water, and Billy even throws Jon a "my condolences, man" as he goes in. That Billy is a nice guy. Cute, too. If Tijuana has decided they should just be friends, he can call me anytime. As if that's not enough, Billy cannonballs into the water. Aw, love him. Tijuana giggles and applauds. If she isn't in love with that guy, she sure acts like she is.
“ The rest of the castaways are being banished to a separate beach with a machete and some matches. This may sound kind of bad, but of course, not having to spend your evening with Idiot Jon and BDD is its own reward, giving the reminiscences about fictional sexual conquests that seem sure to follow. ”
It comes down, in the end, to Lill's husband and Big Dumb Dan. Burton, predictably, sends Lill's hubby into the water so that Jon can get all the scoopage about Dead Old Granny Fairplay. Lill says that she totally understands this, and her soon-to-be-soaked husband will, too. They're going to let Jon have some time alone with his tragedy. I would point out that based on where Big Dumb Dan is standing right now, somebody else threw him a vote besides that first one from Sandra, and it's interesting that they didn't show us who it was. Anyway, Lonnie goes into the ocean, and Lill leans over and gives Jon a big kiss on the cheek, as she is wont to do. Jon goes around and hugs everybody, telling them how grateful he is for everything. Jon bounds over to give a huge embrace to Big Dumb Dan. Burton remarks to BDD that Jon has lost about thirty pounds, and BDD says he thought Jon gained ten. Is that wit? Because Jon is scrawny? Oh, BDD, you witty, witty thing.
Jeff announces that the result of the reward challenge events is that Idiot Jon and BDD will have the camp to themselves for twenty-four hours -- the rest of the castaways are being banished to a separate beach with a machete and some matches. This may sound kind of bad, but of course, not having to spend your evening with Idiot Jon and BDD is its own reward, giving the reminiscences about fictional sexual conquests that seem sure to follow. Everyone hugs, and Jon explains that BDD is known to him as "Thunder-D." Good gracious, what a fuckwit he is, seriously.
The rest of the castaways, the time we see them, are de-boating at Isla Hermita, which is apparently Spanish for "Barren-Ass Beach Not Quite Chosen For A Madonna Song." "Home, sweet home," Sandra says unhappily, stewing (I suspect) over the fact that she still thinks they got taken by Jon back there at the reward challenge. Tijuana explains that it's a struggle to get settled in at a new place, as Burton opens a coconut and finds it to be rotten. Do you get it? It stands for moral decay, y'all. ["But does it STINK of ROT and DEATH?!" -- Wing Chun] Burton interviews, as we already knew, that they all let Jon take the reward challenge because of Dead Old Granny Fairplay, and that their loved ones will all be there when it's all over, after all. Dead Old Granny Fairplay, on the other hand, is worm food. Worm food, I tell you! Lill interviews similarly and gravely that she just had to suck it up, because Jon's news about his grandmother was more important than her hanging out with her husband. Oh, Lill.
Back at Camp Balboa, Jon and BDD are walking up the beach toward camp. "That was a brilliant performance, sir," Jon says, which is completely ridiculous, considering that BDD's contribution was "She died, dude," and he didn't even say that very convincingly. Nevertheless, Jon goes on to voice over that, indeed, Not Dead Old Granny Fairplay is perfectly fine, undoubtedly at home watching Jerry Springer. (Oh, she would.) Jon explains in an interview that he has only one chance to win a million dollars, and so he thinks there's no reason not to take "every single advantage possible." He tells BDD confidently that he's in the final two for sure, by the way. He grins that he hasn't come anywhere near getting voted off yet. BDD interviews that before he left to come on the show, Jon hatched this brilliant scheme and asked for his help. ["By the way, a poster on the Fametracker boards by the handle of Matthew IV has said that he is the friend of a friend of Jon's, and suggested the grandma ploy as a joke, never imagining that Idiot Jon would be idiotic enough to go through with it." -- Wing Chun] Jon happily interviews that the non-death of Not Dead Old Granny Fairplay could wind up being "the dirtiest thing ever to be done in this game."