Previously on Everyone Who's Going To Be Rolling Right Over His Ex-Girlfriends, Take One Step Forward -- Not So Fast, Ethan: Saboga. Chapera. Mogo Mogo. There was no fire, and no fire meant no water, unless you wanted to risk an outbreak of Panamanian brain worms, which Sue did. Rudy and Rupert formed an early alliance based on honor, although they could also have formed one based on being placed to each other when Jeff calls the roll alphabetically. Ethan and Tina formed an early alliance based on the buzzards circling overhead. Boston Rob and Amber "made a connection," as Jeff puts it, and you are certainly competent to insert your own porn soundtrack, I suspect. At the immunity challenge, early bumbling by Saboga that looked to be the result of miscommunication between self-appointed big men Rupert and Ethan was too much to overcome, and while the other teams celebrated, Saboga prepared for tribal council. Despite Tina and Ethan's efforts to recruit Rupert and Rudy to send Jenna back to her beauties, Jenna and Jerri ganged up with Rupert and Rudy to boot Tina. Ethan whined bitterly, as he is wont to do, upon learning that Jenna wasn't interested in handing him any more free money than he already has. At a soaking-wet tribal council, Tina took a most ungracious fall, while everyone concentrated on how to transport rainwater from the sky into their mouths as efficiently as possible. "Who will be voted out tonight?"
Credits. Golly, everybody sure does look wet.
We return from commercials, and it's Day 4 at Saboga. Jerri sits inside the shelter (which, if Dalton Ross is to be believed -- and Dalton Ross is always to be believed -- she did quite a lot), staring out at the rain. Rupert voices over, as we watch Rudy stroll on the beach, that coming back from tribal council without fire was "devastating." He says that between the pouring rain, the loss of Tina, the thirst, and the disappointment of not being allowed to bring the torches back with them, they were mightily depressed. Furthermore, because they did expect to bring the torches back, they actually left the pot at camp full of nasty well water when they left, thinking they'd boil it when they got back, so they didn't even come back to a pot full of rainwater that they could use. Ouch. Rupert, with most uncharacteristic understatement, calls this "a bad way to end Day 3." Seriously, cold, wet, no food, no water...that's not even a good way to end Day 3 of your sentence in federal prison. It's always interesting seeing people take on conditions voluntarily that would violate the Eighth Amendment if they were inflicted on you against your will, just so that they can be on television.
The clouds shift. Chanting voices bring news of the growing sense of desperation, and also sound a little bit like ambulance sirens.
Jerri interviews that the night was "the most miserable night of [her] life." She says that she didn't actually get any sleep at all, because she was busy rocking back and forth and trying to stay warm, which was difficult, because everybody was so wet. In a conversation around what the editors would not like you to notice is the fire they don't have yet (yes, you can see smoke) because they would like you not to notice that they took this out of sequence (seriously, never try to fool the Eagle-Eyed Forum Posters, for they are formidable and devoted), Rudy talks about having been in Vietnam, and how some of the conditions were similar. "Your boots never dry," he muses. Ethan asks if Rudy was ever scared. Rudy looks at him like it's a really, really silly question that he still doesn't blame Ethan for asking. "Was I scared? Yeah, about...the whole year." He chuckles. "Rudy is one of a kind," Jerri interviews with open admiration. She points out that he sleeps on the ground when the rest of them are crowding in under the shelter. She also mentions again that Rudy is all bad-ass about drinking the unboiled water, but as with the sequence, when you see him dip water out of a pot with the dive mask, he's clearly dipping it out of the reward challenge pot from later. Jenna, in any event, interviews that with regard to drinking the unsafe water, Rudy "does what he wants," so there's no point in arguing with him. Rudy then tells a campfire -- whoops, lack of campfire, of course -- story about how his military days included trips to a bar that offered the rare opportunity to get ice in your drinks. When he asked at the bar where they got the water, they told him it came from the reservoir, which he knew had about six bodies floating in it at any given time. Ohhhh, sometimes it's easy to forget the luxuries you enjoy on a day-to-day basis. 100% Rotting-Corpse-Free margaritas on the rocks, for instance. Everyone cringes. "Did you drink it with ice?" Jenna asks. "Yeah," he nods. He chuckles at the memory, as if hearing himself say it out loud, it sounds crazy even to him. That was a really nifty little scene. Every once in a while, Survivor actually manages to feed the half of your brain that doesn't make you sort of hate yourself.
We move to Mogo Mogo. Hatch is, I believe, lying under a blanket made of his own skirt, which is...I mean, you know I'm telling the truth, because how could I make that up? This is followed by a great shot of Colby lying on the ground with his buff tied around his head kerchief-style (or actually Jonny-Fairplay-style), looking like the washerwoman in a bad movie about the working classes of 1950s Russia. He interviews that because they haven't been able to get fire, there's no water, and dehydration is a real problem. Shii Ann explains that their tongues turned white from how dehydrated they were. Yeah, I don't think your tongue changing color is ever good news, except in the case of grape Popsicles. "We were just dying of thirst," Shii Ann says. See? Now these are people who could use some grape Popsicles. Lightning appears in the distance as a storm approaches. Before you know it, we're watching rain fall in heavy drops from the edges of rocks and off the ends of plants. The music kicks up with a ray of hope. Perhaps Survivor All-Stars will not end in desiccated tragedy! Lex explains that their first reaction to the rain was that they had to keep dry, but then "the light bulb went on" (I certainly hope it didn't take very long), and they realized that this was a shot at fresh (or at least close enough to fresh) water. Lex and Shii Ann sit under a fringe of palm fronds, sucking water as it drips from the ends. "I never thought I'd be so happy to see tropical rain," says Shii Ann. It appears indeed to be an intense, soaking rain of exactly the kind you need if you want to be able to catch a significant amount of water before it soaks into the trees and the ground. Lex says to Shii Ann that if they can keep it up for a while, he may actually get as much water as he wants. Interestingly, catching it off the ends of dripping leaves is probably a relatively good way of getting water when you're dehydrated, because it keeps you from gulping it down in great big swallows, which would probably just make you throw it up or make you feel sick. I'm guessing, but that's what makes sense to me.
Meanwhile, odd, lazy-hillbilly-style music starts. Hatch is strolling around the beach naked, unsurprisingly enough. He prattles dully about enjoying the rain and hoping it lasts for a while. Lex interviews that Hatch's nudity doesn't bother him, because he just finds it funny. Hatch continues strolling around with nothing but his trusty post-production blur to cover him, and he condescendingly tells the people who are under the shelter staying dry that they'd be warmer if they just got out in the rain. Naked, presumably. There's an uproariously funny shot of an uneasy Colby unable to stop peeking at Hatch's package, even though he keeps trying not to. He really is very cute and silly. ["I am glad you are on board." -- Wing Chun] "The bad part is," Colby says, "the rest of us are becoming comfortable with it. That's what's even spooky. We got an overweight, gay, naked man walking around, and no one seems to let it bother 'em." I'm not sure a skinny straight man walking around naked would seem very much more natural to me ["no, Lex, that's not an invitation for you to test that theory" -- Wing Chun], but I understand what he's saying. I just find Hatch's routine, among other things, to be very tiresome at this point...I mean, the nudity is there to make other people uncomfortable and to get camera time, and I would really prefer to see the many other things undoubtedly going on in this tribe that do not directly relate to Hatch's ass. Colby also remarks that he thinks Hatch wants everyone else naked too, and Colby doesn't see that happening. Eh, killjoy.
Elsewhere, the surprisingly happy and functional Chapera is flat-out loving the rain. "We got some waaaa-tah!" Boston Rob is singing, joined by some of his tribemates under the shelter. Even the often sour Alicia is having fun, but Boston Rob and Amber are so happy they're actually wiggling. It's kind of cool -- I love the part of a show like this where borderline insanity sets in, and they're getting to it nice and early. Amazon Rob -- in an interview in which he is wearing a large and comical wide-brimmed hat that I think he may have stolen from an old lady right in the middle of weeding her vegetable garden -- says you would have thought the rain was champagne from how excited they were to get their hands on it. The tribe hangs out under the shelter -- well, everybody else hangs out while Big Tom dances in front of them -- singing a very, very bad, very tuneless, almost entirely lyric-ignorant version of "Have You Ever Seen The Rain," which is probably one of the most endearing things that has happened on Survivor in several seasons. Big Tom continues his happy dance, which has a very Woodstock feel to it, what with the rain and the closed eyes and the strong likelihood of chemical mood alteration. The rest of the tribe continues singing, and there is actual happiness in the camp, even in the face of the very difficult conditions. Buffoon tribe, indeed.
Howling and circling birds. We return to Saboga, where the team wanders out into the woods and finds a large crate that is locked with three padlocks. It has a note attached to it that says, "Don't Open, Very Valuable, Keep Dry." They return to camp with the crate, wondering if they're going to be playing later for a set of keys to go with it.
Over at Mogo Mogo, as some of the recycled happy pirate music from last season plays, Colby and Jenna M. are retrieving their crate, Colby opining that it feels like "something substantial" is inside. "Maybe it's an animal," Jenna says. Not that there are any air holes. And not that there's any indication that you're going to get to open the box any time soon. And not that you wouldn't probably be aware of movement or noise inside the box if it were, say, a chicken. But Jenna thinks, nevertheless, that it might be an animal. She interviews that it's interesting when you get a box, because that makes you wonder what's in it. And, of course, whether whatever is in it needs to be fed or bathed or have its coat brushed. As the tribe considers the crate, Hatch guesses that it could be food, while Shii Ann guesses that it could be matches. As Mogo Mogo stares longingly at the mystery box, Colby interviews that anything they give you is good, because it's "like a gift."
Over at Chapera, however, Boston Rob has a different idea. He wants to just crack it open. He grins devilishly, and then he explains in an interview that they were starving, so he figured to hell with the note; they should just open the box. The rest of the team, however, thinks they'll ruin their chance to keep it if they open it. Boston Rob interviews that everyone else feared that they'd "upset pretty-boy Probst." Heh. I understand his feeling that there's not a whole lot they're going to do to you as punishment for opening it, given that they're not going to send the tribe home or anything, but I do think the one thing they'd certainly do is take it away from you, so the point seems fairly obvious -- there's no point in opening something you'd probably then lose anyway. I think Boston Rob is so hungry he's become delirious.
thing you know, the teams are gathering for this week's reward challenge. This is the first the rest of the teams learn that Tina was voted out. Hatch tries to smile bravely, but he is extremely unconvincing -- there is naked insecurity (rimshot!) hiding behind that smirk. Morasca isn't looking too happy, either, and it's not just because she's concerned that the locked crate they left back at camp contains a kitty. In this challenge, Jeff explains, each team will retrieve a series of logs that will be inserted into a frame to build a ladder. (Jeff calls it a "staircase," because he's more of a hanging-out-of-helicopters guy than a verbal-skills guy.) The logs are tied up out in the ocean, in a line from fairly near the shore to fairly far away. The entire team (well, five members, because somebody from each of the two intact teams will have to sit out) will swim out to the farthest log to retrieve it, bring it back, and put it into the ladder frame. Then somebody drops out and four swim out, then three, then two, then the final person swims out to get the final log, and when they've assembled the ladder, they climb to the top and they're done. As Jeff points out, your "anchor" -- that last person -- will have to swim all five times, so that's a lot of swimming, especially when everybody is hungry and tired and wondering whether they're showing their best sides to the camera. The reward, Jeff claims, is blankets. Blankets? Considering the level of suffering, I think Jeff is lucky no one rushed him and ripped his photogenic arms clean off when he said all they would get would be freakin' blankets. ["The Eagle-Eyed Glark would want me to note that he could tell, from the way the pile of blankets was sitting, there was something underneath it." -- Wing Chun] Anyway, Big Tom will be sitting out for Chapera, and Jenna will be sitting out for Mogo Mogo. She's like the invisible tribe member. She's there, she's not there...who can tell?
"Survivors ready...go!" Hatch is naked, of course, because anything he can do to stand out more and be on camera more, he is perfectly willing to do. Chapera gets off to the fastest start. "Come on, Big Red!" yells the sidelined Tom. Saboga is right with Chapera at first, but Rudy rather quickly lags behind. Jenna helps bring him along. "We need you, buddy," she says. "Come on, you just have to get to the beach." He stumbles as they get out of the water on the beach, and once he's up, Jerri grabs his hand to help him in. Shii Ann, Rudy, and Alicia drop out of their respective tribes for the leg. It's still essentially a dead heat, but the teams begin to separate, Saboga first, Mogo Mogo second, and Chapera third. For the leg, Jenna, Kathy, and Amazon Rob sit out. Big Tom continues shouting encouragement; Boston Rob looks dead tired. The order remains the same, and Jerri, Colby, and Amber are the to sit. In the last leg, it's Ethan, Hatch, and Boston Rob, but there is no upsetting the order at this point, and the winning log is brought home by Ethan as a voice yells, "We love you, Ethan!" I originally thought it was Jenna, but after several listens, I actually think it might be Jerri. They both transparently hate him, so either way, it's a sop to the guy with the big log. (If I had a nickel for...oh, never mind.) Saboga is the big winner.
Unsurprisingly, given the lameness of the blanket reward, Jeff explains that there is a catch. The catch is that instead of the blankets, they can choose a prize package including flint for starting fires as well as a pot that has instructions on the side that will lead them to the first of the three keys they need to open the mystery trunk, which, Jeff reveals, contains rice. You can tell how intensely these people are frustrated by their situation just by watching the way Boston Rob's face goes cold with despair when he hears that one of the other tribes might be given flint so that they could have "a constant source of fire." However, as it turns out, the catch in the catch is that if Saboga takes the prize package instead of the blankets, then all three tribes -- not just their own -- will get that package. Left with really no choice, Saboga goes for the alternative, which means all three teams are taking the same reward back to camp. This smelled to me like a situation where they had to find a way to get these people fire, because you can't actually let them dehydrate into little raisins. The deal was just far too obviously slanted to force them to take the flint; why would you take blankets, compared to a fire? However much warmer you think you'll be with blankets? Fire will be better. Plus you can eat, and you can drink, and you can function. So there was no choice. All the teams rejoice. Lex blows a kiss to Jenna L., which she returns. Ah, love among the tattoos and nipple rings. The only person who looks unhappy is Hatch, who I think was still thinking maybe he would spontaneously make a fire at some crucial time and win big points, and who now has no such option and has therefore done nothing yet for himself except act like an jerk. Oops.
After the commercials, it is Day 4 at Mogo Mogo. Hatch is yapping his flap (or flapping his yap, if you prefer, according to the communicative property of tribal crapola) about how he can't believe they got rid of Tina first. Lex describes it as a "shocker," and Hatch says he was just sure they'd get rid of Rudy first. Hatch now interviews about the Tina booting, opening: "Holy crap." He can say nothing except the obvious: "Biiiiig targets on the winners." He tries to act nonchalant, but he is completely...chalant. Or something. Lex tells the rest of the tribe that although the Tina ouster surprised him, he thinks it's cool, because it sets a tone of strategy and ruthlessness that he likes. "It's business this time," he says. Somewhere, a lizard yawns. That was a great shot. Who knew lizards yawned? Although having heard Hatch speechify again about how unconcerned he is about threats to himself, I have to say, I'm with the lizard.
Over at Chapera, Boston Rob says that he found the challenge the toughest of any he's ever done, "in any Survivor." Yeah..."any" of the, you know, one that he's done before. Amazon Rob, meanwhile, interviews that the news of Tina's departure made him enormously happy, first of all because he thinks Tina is "a big phony." Wow, discord in the Survivor family. That's going to be awkward at the wrap party. He says that furthermore, seeing the winners targeted is nifty with him from a self-interest standpoint. "Last time I checked," he says, "I didn't have a million dollars. Yet." A bird waggle-headedly stalks something on the beach, and Chapera starts in on building a fire. "Let's go, Tommy, first try," Boston Rob encourages. It doesn't happen on the first try. Alicia interviews that she, of course, knew exactly how to build the fire, but that Boston Rob and Big Tom were too macho to let her do it. It certainly is easy to say you know how to do something when you're not the one who actually has to do it. Furthermore, when Alicia says to Big Tom, "Can I try it?," he says she can, and gives her the stuff and doesn't seem to protest, so I'm not sure what she's grousing about. As she tries her perfectly right method of fire-starting that was completely obvious to her from the beginning, Big Tom mini-interviews with a grin that he's "gotta keep his mouth shut." He also comments -- mixing his metaphors extravagantly to suggest a workplace packed with both illegal discrimination and an overabundance of middle management -- that they have "maybe four or five bosses and one Indian." Apparently, Alicia doesn't instantly have luck with the fire either, so she probably ought to try the mouth-shutting strategy as well, given that her "I knew exactly how to do it" thing appears to be an exaggeration, at best. It looks like what ultimately happens is that Boston Rob, Amazon Rob, Alicia, and Amber all work on getting the fire going, but Alicia is the one of them most devoted to patiently lecturing everybody else about what to do. Understandably, Boston Rob interviews that Alicia spends too much time giving orders. "It's her nature, she's got a big mouth, she needs to learn to shut it." Not that Boston Rob could shut his mouth if there were a stream of bees flying into it, but he is right about Alicia, and she doesn't seem to have the ability to do it in an endearing way, as he does. The fire starts, whoever is responsible, so things are much happier immediately. "There'll be no more rubbing of sticks togethah," Boston Rob says.
Over at Saboga, Rupert and Jerri are working on the fire. "Oh, my God, I'm gettin' excited," Rupert says. Uh, I don't want to know where he's going with that. Rupert doesn't have great luck with the flint at first. "This is showing me that I'm not...you know, I thought I was a outdoorsman. And I am...with a lighter," he says. HA! Yes, that is the first genuinely funny thing I have ever heard out of this guy, ever. He made me chuckle, and it's because he has discovered the previously unfamiliar concept of humility. It really is interesting to see how much his approach changed between the seasons. He cackles at his own fire-starting ineptitude.
Jenna and Ethan retrieve water from the well. "I don't know," Jenna is saying in response to something. "You're much stronger than I am." Ethan is preoccupied with his upcoming ouster, understandably. Ethan: "You don't think I'm -- after my display today, you don't think I'm the biggest target out there?" Snerk. Did you hear that? He just called his own winning performance "[his] display." I'm surprised he doesn't have to check his ego as luggage when he travels from one place to another. I have literally never heard anyone describe his own performance as "my display" in a way that's self-congratulatory. Yes, your majestic display of manliness...I just...well, no more really needs to be said about Ethan's preposterous self-importance, because it really does speak for itself at this point. Anyway, to this almost amusingly arrogant remark from him, Jenna says, "Yeah." What's she going to say, after all? "Yes, Ethan, after your display, all will fear you"? She interviews that she felt bad for Ethan, because he knows he's on the block, and it's hard for him to walk around knowing that he's probably going to get booted. She says that he wouldn't even really let her congratulate him after the reward challenge, so he's obviously very unhappy. As they walk, she says, "You don't know when we're going to lose immunity . We might not lose. It might be nine days, who knows? Just give it a couple days' rest, okay?"
Ethan interviews that Jenna told him, "Well, you know, maybe we'll keep you around a little longer, that's what you wanted." He sarcastically says, "Thanks, Jenna, thanks for granting me that one wish." Wow, that's interesting...and completely delusional. He was the one whining about being voted off. He was the one whining about being a target. She's made no secret of her own interest in voting him off, so there is nothing she can say to him when he starts up with that crap except that even if he does get voted off, it won't be until the team loses immunity , so he might as well just hang in and see what happens. She never said -- at least in anything that we saw -- anything that is even in the same universe as what Ethan accused her of saying. She never said "we might keep you around if I feel generous." What she said was, "We might not be put in the position of voting anybody out any time soon." Jenna never implied that Ethan would not be voted out at the first opportunity or that he would be "kept around," because she's already made clear her intentions at this point. She never asked Ethan to thank her, nor did she claim to be doing or offer to do anything gregarious for him. It's obvious that Jenna still intends to vote Ethan out and is making no bones about it. All she said was that it might not even come up for a while if they didn't lose immunity challenges, which is, after all, true. It's really all she can say, other than just telling him to shut the hell up, which is probably what she should have done. I guess if Ethan carries his ego under the seat in front of him, his historical revisionism must fit in the overhead compartment. Surprising.
Back at camp, they finally get the fire started, and Jenna gets a little too close to it blowing on it, and she gets ashes and sparks back in the face. Whoooops. She interviews that she idiotically got too close to the fire, and that the flying sparks singed the front of her hair. Yikes. Too bad it wasn't Ethan, who put his face just as far into the fire as Jenna did and certainly has just as much hair available for singeing. Ah, well, you can't have everything. Jenna happily adds that singed hair or no singed hair, having fire is "like the power of the gods." Rupert jumps up and down very enthusiastically about having fire, and if they can blur Hatch's ass, I wish they would have blurred what's going on with Rupert's shorts in this scene, because...that is really too much information. I'm starting to think the show needs an underwear prerequisite.
Mogo Mogo. The fire preparations are not going well, particularly, and because there is a storm approaching, Lex suggests that they wait to work on the fire until after the storm. Shii Ann agrees, but Kathy disagrees and wants to keep trying. The most fascinating thing about this tribe is how hard everyone is working not to come off like a control freak. Lex and Kathy are both well aware that they can be bossy, and they're both clearly trying to have their way without alienating anyone. Apparently, whatever Mogo Mogo winds up deciding to do, it doesn't result in having fire, because the rain pours for a while, and then night falls, and Mogo Mogo is still fireless. There does appear to be Hatch-Lex spooning, as reported by the Eagle-Eyed Forum Posters, though it's beyond my capabilities to tell from the night-vision camera who's who for sure. Kathy and Shii Ann talk, and Kathy blames the "lame boys" for the fact that there's no fire. Come on, Kathy, let's not go down that road. We don't need "lame boys" to be incompetent at camping; we can do that all on our own. We have the vote now, you know.
Day 5, Mogo Mogo. Finally, they get their fire started. Kathy interviews that getting fire is "everything" at this point: "It gives you a purpose." They read the clue on the pot that is supposed to lead to the key. Mogo Mogo goes and pokes around in some cliffs and such, and Hatch appears to be the one who finds it. He then interviews, as full of himself as always, that anyone who looked at their situation would think that it was a big day, what with the fire and the water and everything. He, on the other hand, thinks that's all "outside the game," because only the interpersonal dynamics are important. So I guess his attitude is...that he could easily go thirty-nine days without water? I mean, I see his point in the sense that the voting part is what he cares about, but there's also no denying that sooner or later, you have to have water, and sooner or later, you have to eat. It's when he overplays his routine that way that you can tell Hatch isn't as confident as he pretends to be. Furthermore, purely from an entertainment perspective, this egotistical-bastard routine is wearing thinner than tissue paper at this point, and right now, all he's doing is taking up time that could be spent on people who are more interesting.
A sloth hangs from a tree. I know that's a sloth, because the Suriname Scientist came back from...well, Suriname, with two wonderful pictures of a sloth climbing a tree, and we agreed that it could not possibly be a real animal, given how much it looked like a small child in an animal suit, which is also true of this thing.
Rudy strolls on the beach, favoring his right leg a little. (Excuse me, is that a sloth joke? I don't think I appreciate that, on Rudy's behalf.) Back at camp, Jenna quietly asks Rupert if Rudy is still limping. Rupert agrees that Rudy doesn't look very good, but weakly points out that at least he's still getting around. Much is understood and unspoken as Rupert looks at Jenna, shrugs a little, and says, "He's...you know...tough old man." Rudy now speaks for himself, saying that his foot hurts when he walks, which makes him limp "a little." It does look like he's not limping very much, but it also looks like his foot is pretty stiff. "Probably in a week, it'll be back to normal," he predicts. He returns to camp, and Jenna asks him how the foot's doing: "Any better?" "Not much," he answers. He says he tried to see if he could run, and he couldn't. "Rudy's not doing okay," Jenna interviews. She says that he's got a blister, and he's got some other foot injury. Back at camp, Rupert says, "I sure hope it's not a running challenge today, 'cause we'll be...out of luck." Yeah. They all see the situation developing, I think; they just really don't like it.
And now, it's time for the immunity challenge. The teams converge on a beach, and Jeff takes back the two immunity idols from Shii Ann and Amber. The way this challenge works, the teams each start out on a platform out in the water. They hop in and dive down to the bottom, where there's a broad, flat boat with fourteen heavy crates in it. They have to get the crates out of the boat, which will cause the boat to come to the top. Then they're to bring the boat back to the platform, flip the boat, bail out any water that's in it, and get it to the point where they can row it back to shore. Row it to shore, bring the boat up to the mat on the beach, and you win immunity. First two teams are immune, as last time. Incidentally, for those of you keeping score at home, there is nothing said about having to remove the crates one by one, or any other description of how you get them out. Jeff just tells the contestants to get the crates out of the boat. Alicia is sitting out for Chapera, and Shii Ann is sitting out for Mogo Mogo.
As the rain continues to pour, the contestants dive down underwater. First, the slipknots that hold the crates to the boat have to be untied. The usual suspects, including Ethan, Rupert, Lex, and Boston Rob are involved in this maneuver. The underwater shots of Boston Rob's back, by the way, are very flattering. Just saying. Big Tom is good at this, also, and appears to be the first on Chapera to get a crate out of the boat -- and he takes two, while he's at it. Jeff yells that there's two thousand pounds of weight in "that boat." Is that possible? If there are fourteen crates, that would make each crate 142 pounds. They're moving 142-pound crates underwater? That seems unlikely. Incidentally, there is an absolutely outstanding music moment as Ethan and Rupert throw over a couple of crates and the music goes, "Dum-dum-dumm..." and then it waits, and Rupert struggles with a crate, and as he finally gets it out of the boat, the music goes, "DUM!" It's hard to explain, but it's brilliantly cool. Team Burnett, as always, knows its stuff.
Saboga, with Ethan and Rupert working on the crates, is the first to get its boat to surface. When Chapera, however, gets the boat to the point where it's got five or six crates in it, Boston Rob and Big Tom dive down, grab one side, and dump the rest of the crates. Hatch does the same with the Mogo Mogo boat, though it looks like it's only with maybe one crate left. Rob and Tom were the ones who really gained time there over how long it would have taken them to get the crates out one by one. Saboga flips its boat essentially underwater, so that it winds up completely filled, sitting with the top of the boat essentially at water level. They then start trying to take water out of it in buckets. Jerri, with no bucket to use, frantically tries to kick water out of the boat. Chapera, meanwhile, drags its upside-down boat back to the platform. By getting Amber to sit on the back end, they manage to get the front end up and onto the platform. In the spirit of insane overanalysis of small moments, I was interested in the intense but very controlled way that Boston Rob says to Amber, "Get on the top of the boat." Despite the fact that he wants her to do this right this minute, he very intentionally does not yell, but says it very calmly. It appeared to me that a lot of this challenge came down to keeping your head and not creating a frantic atmosphere, and for all of his historically obnoxious qualities (of which he has many, which I fully expect to flower in the coming weeks), Boston Rob seemed to be intentionally not acting freaking out and yelling orders, but talking to her in an almost normal, though serious, tone. He had a plan for how to do it, and they believed him, and that's why I think what's going on back at camp does matter, because if you have total chaos and no leader (like Saboga), then there's nobody who can do that, and this challenge really did require some coordination. A good moment for Boston Rob. And yes, that was several sentences about one sentence, which is always a bad sign that one is paying too much attention.
Anyway, this balancing maneuver helps Chapera to wedge the boat against the platform and get it up and out of the water to be flipped. They do this exceptionally well -- they manage to get themselves distributed perfectly so that they can get the boat flipped and back into the water without the back end's dropping in, which I think is the tough part. Mogo Mogo comes down somewhere in between the Saboga and Chapera performances, because they flip the boat with less water than Saboga, but a lot more than Chapera.
Saboga, on the other hand, is sucking wind. Ethan is sitting inside the boat, and why he believes you can raise a boat up while sitting in it is not entirely clear to me, but anyway. His team eventually orders him out of the boat. Then, you can actually see, during a shot of their trying to get the boat flipped, that Ethan grabs one of the bailing buckets and flings it behind him away from the platform into the ocean, all, "Well, we won't be needing this!" Way to go, genius.
Chapera, meanwhile, starts paddling. Wooooo! I really didn't start out to root for anyone, but I have to say, the buffoon tribe has stolen my heart. Mogo Mogo continues bailing. Ethan notices that his tribe needs the bailing bucket for, you know, bailing, and he dives in dramatically after it. Finally, Mogo Mogo starts moving, though as Hatch gets in the boat from behind, it appears that he absolutely pounds his blurred region against the back edge of the boat when he stumbles, and...that looked painful. Seriously, seriously painful. Although I'm sure he would assure you that he did it on purpose, and it's all part of his strategy to manipulate everyone. Those testicle bruises are just decorative. ["Here's a question for the lads out there: when you're competing in physically demanding activity, don't you kind of want your junk to be insulated? Like, if not in an actual jockstrap and cup, at least in a pair of fairly snug briefs? I'm just asking, because it really seems like Hatch is inviting disaster by allowing his action to just flap in the breeze, or water, or path of errant oars, or what-have-you." -- Wing Chun] As they start moving, they're already only a couple of inches up out of the water, so they're in some trouble that Chapera, for instance, just isn't in. Chapera, in fact, is in such good shape that they have time to concentrate on coordinating the paddling -- and who takes the role of paddling coordinator? Sue Hawk. "One! Twoooo!" she yells. It's weird, because Saboga does seem at this point to have the boat mostly bailed, so it seems like if they would just chill out and get in the boat, they'd be fine. However, once they get on their way, they realize that they are without all their paddles, so Ethan has to go back. Hatch falls out of the Mogo Mogo boat, to a holler from Jeff of "Hatch takes a dump!" Hee. I hope not. Give a hoot, naked man, and don't pollute.
Chapera paddles. "One! Two!" Hee. It's like they're the varsity, and everybody else is the scrub team that didn't even make JV.
Saboga's boat sinks. Ethan is the big sink-ee, since he's the one in back when it happens. He also remains on the back of the boat bailing, even after it starts to sink, instead of hopping out before they go under entirely, which is what he probably should have done. Mogo Mogo, too, has to stop and bail some more before they can keep going. Hatch is pushing their boat from behind, by the way, and I'm surprised that was allowed. I'd think if everybody didn't need to be in the boat, everybody would have just dragged it back to shore. Back at Saboga, a frustrated Jenna yells at Rudy, "Get your butt up here!" HEY! I don't know what the nature of her relationship with Rudy is, and she's seemed warmly inclined to him in the past, but that? No, Jenna, do not do that. You're annoying me so much less than last time; let's not ruin the nascent strands of goodwill growing up between us.
Chapera: "One! Two! One! Two!" I love them. Seriously. Among other things, for all the things I don't like about some of them, every person on that team hauls ass all the time.
In one of the best shots in the history of Survivor, we now see Mogo Mogo row, row, rowing their boat, despite the fact that it is underwater. Really. They're sitting in the boat, they are in water up to their chests, but they are paddling away. I had no idea that was possible. Saboga, on the other hand, has given up and is just swimming and pushing their boat through the water toward shore. Chapera hits the beach, and Boston Rob hops out and says, "Everybody out, everybody out!" And everybody hops out, and they run the boat up the beach. Alicia raises her arms to welcome her team back, as Mogo Mogo gives up on the paddling and drags the boat the rest of the way. As Chapera carries its boat to the mat, Boston Rob yells, "Say it, Jeff! Say it! 'Chapera'!" It would have been better if he had called Jeff "bitch" right there, but...you can't have everything. Alicia dances and pumps her fist. "Chapera!" says Jeff. It's all big hugs. That was really impressive. They executed that challenge perfectly, and they are enthusiastic and goofy and weird, and their young guy and their old guy have figured out how to work together. I'm telling you, Boston Rob found his leadership gene buried somewhere under his incredible living carnival of sexist bullshit.
Mogo Mogo manages to get its sorry butt across the finish line, so they're also going to be immune. Not so immune is the beleaguered Saboga, destined once again to head for tribal council. Again, there is a terrific shot of Colby and Lex leaning back and collapsing onto the sand at precisely the same moment, and the music crashes to punctuate it. Jerri and Jenna both toss paddles in frustration. The Mogo Mogo folk, by the way, hug Hatch, even though he's naked. Now that's taking one for the team. Ethan sits shaking his head in disbelief ("Who knew you were supposed to keep the bucket?") as Jeff hands out immunity idols to every team that isn't his team. That entire challenge, among other things, was absolutely flawlessly edited and scored. Absurdly good television. I watched it again when I finished writing this paragraph, just for the hell of it.
After a commercial, sad cello music accompanies us back to Loser Beach, a.k.a. Camp Saboga. Jerri says to the team that she thinks they played stronger, just not smarter. "It was so frantic, I wanted to get goin' already," Ethan says. See? That's why they needed a calm leader saying, "Get on the top of the boat." Heh. Jenna points out that even after they got going, they sank again once he and Jerri climbed in. Ethan calls it "one stupid mistake," but I think it was really more a series of stupid mistakes, starting and ending with Ethan. The interesting thing is that Mogo Mogo did badly enough that I think Saboga, had they seen what Chapera did and just copied them, could have still pulled it out. I mean, had they not panicked when they did it wrong the first time, there was still time to recover. As Rupert sharpens what I guess is going to be the fishing spear, Jerri interviews that this challenge was "a huge letdown," and that each of them is blaming himself or herself for part of it.
Over a shot of a turkey (?), we hear the beginning of Rupert and Jenna's stroll, in which Rupert says he wanted to smack Ethan for sitting in the boat when they were trying to bail. Rupert points out the stupidity of "pushing [the boat] down and bailing." Jenna interviews that the problem is that Ethan "gets way too excited at challenges." Yup. With the thrown bucket, and the being in the boat, and the other problems, that's clearly about mental errors, because you know the guy's physically strong. Jenna gives Ethan all the credit for being such an asset to the team at the beginning of the challenge, but says that he wound up hurting them at the end. Which he did, after all. Ethan, meanwhile, has a new strategy for staying around, and he goes off to see if he can catch a fish. In an interview, Ethan says that based on the Tina boot, he thinks he's obviously the most likely to go. He says that the fishing was indeed an attempt to get people to want to keep him. Furthermore, he points out that "[i]f they, or we, expect to win any more challenges, Rudy has to go home." Which is probably true, as much as I hate to admit the veracity of anything this dink has to say, and even though today's challenge might have actually gone better with a little more Rudy and a little less Ethan.
Jenna has a talk with Rupert to the same effect -- that they don't have a choice but to vote for Rudy. Rupert is very torn, because he knows the situation, but he also already made an agreement. He voices over that Rudy is a "hero," and "deserves to be" there. He tears up talking about how much he admires Rudy for being able to hang in at seventy-five, when Rupert himself struggles with the conditions, and I say amen to that. Things get fragile when you get older, and I indeed think Rudy kicks huge amounts of ass for even wanting to come out and do this. When I'm seventy-five, I don't anticipate brain parasites and thirty-year-old dingbats being among my daily battles, I will tell you that much. ["I'm fine not dealing with those things already, at age twenty-nine." -- Wing Chun] Rupert explains to the girls how he and Rudy befriended each other on the first day. "I know what you're saying," Jenna says. "I adore him. But...we're losing, bad." Jerri interviews that although they're talking about voting Rudy out, she feels bad, because "he's tough as nails." She goes on: "He never once complained about anything out here. Not once." Rupert tells them that he'd rather vote himself out than write Rudy's name. Jenna gives Rupert an out, and asks him if he'd rather vote for Ethan. I think this was very smart of her, even though I don't think of her as much for strategy, because if she kept insisting that he needed to vote for Rudy, Rupert would have been more likely to go off with Rudy and Ethan and get rid of, say, her. By doing this, Jenna keeps Rupert with her, even if he's not going to vote with her on this occasion. "I'm not writing Rudy's name down," Rupert interviews.
Ethan emerges from the water, saying that his spear bounces off the fish. Damn rubber spear. Damn plastic fish. As Jenna explains, Ethan came back empty-handed, when he was trying to make a case for how he could stay. As she further explains, however, Rupert went right out and returned with a fish. He does indeed come back almost immediately with a little bit of protein for the group. Ethan high-fives Rupert about the fish, but understandably, he is not actually pleased, as he has pretty much just proved the opposite of what he had in mind -- that no one needs him for food, because Rupert is Food Guy. Rupert is the Rocco DiSpirito in the crap-ass Italian restaurant of your Survivor experience. The rest of the team is ecstatic, though, and Rupert points out that while it's not a big fish, it will give up some meat. About a bite and a half per person, it looks like to me. But still, very cool -- more for the point it makes than for its actual ability to fill bellies. Ethan says, "Rupert goes out, five minutes later, he comes back with a fish. Great." Oh, stop whining, ya big baby, before somebody carves a pacifier out of a tree stump and stuffs into your trap. As my nephew Little A would explain it, Ethan's going to wind up as the first guy with a hand-carved nuk-nuk.
"I'm trying to find my niche," Ethan interviews as the tribe eats the fish, "and it's not workin'." That's because you've alienated your tribe, dear. Jenna and Jerri don't like you because you're a dog, Rupert doesn't like you because you f'd up the challenge, and Rudy doesn't like you because you're full of crap, and he's not. So that's why you can't find your niche. It's not that complicated.
That night, Saboga makes its way to tribal council, back to the Treehouse of Horror. When they're all seated, Jeff asks Rupert how fire has improved life for them at camp. Rupert says that prior to getting fire, they were "sad." In fact, they were "whipped." He says that winning the challenge and giving everybody fire was a great boost for the tribe. Jerri smiles with what appears to be genuine delight. "Let's talk about today's challenge," Jeff says, as Ethan sighs miserably and rolls his eyes. Yeah, why talk about challenges? That is so boring. Jeff says that it looked to him like they were shoo-ins at first, because they got their boat up first. What went wrong? He asks Ethan what happened. "We made a silly mistake," he says. He says that they should have pulled the boat out of the water. He doesn't mention sitting in the boat, throwing the bucket...there are a few details left out of his version of the story, mostly involving the screw-ups that were attributable to him. It's interesting how Jerri said earlier that everyone was blaming himself or herself for losing; the exception seems to be Ethan, who is in fact the most blameworthy. Ah, irony. Jerri is asked if the loss today set them back. "It's our second time in a row here, and that always sucks," she says.
Oh, and Rudy. Jeff asks Rudy what about the game continues to appeal to him. He says that he's not sure why he's there again, which makes his tribemates chuckle. He says he's three years slower than the last time he did it. He says he likes it, though -- it's tolerating the people, not the elements, that's the challenge. Jeff asks him how he is physically. He says he's good -- he cites the foot, but says it's getting better. Jeff now asks Rupert about any fear of being the odd man out because he's the new guy. Rupert says certainly he has that fear. "My one saving grace right now, I caught a fish!" he says, with enough good humor that it doesn't come off as self-important at all. "I poked it with a stick, I caught a fish!" he says. Everyone else is chuckling, while Ethan stares at Rupert with hate. Hee. Hmmm, Rupert may get extra points with me for being Guy Who Foils Ethan. You know what they say about the enemy of my enemy, after all.
Jeff now turns to Ethan, asking whether catching fish makes Rupert more valuable. Ethan noncommittally says, "Yeah." Jeff asks him if he had any reaction when Rupert showed up with the fish. Ethan says he was psyched that he would get to eat. But of course, he mostly talks about how this relates to the coolness of himself. "Yeah, I didn't catch a fish first, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to catch ten tomorrow," he says. Well...no, but the fact that you were utterly ineffectual, claiming that the spear "bounced off" the fish, makes me suspect that you will indeed not catch ten fish tomorrow, unless they come crawling up to you, play dead, and ask -- no, beg -- to be stabbed. Jeff asks Ethan about Tina's having been voted out because she's won before. Does this make Ethan nervous? Sure, he acknowledges. His "insides are upside-down." Aha! So the crap is rising to the top. That explains a lot. He says he has a target on his back, and seems disbelieving and frustrated that it's "out there in the open." I guess he wishes they'd lie to him more.
Jeff asks how the vote goes tonight. "Is there a chance that it's still a money issue?" he asks Jenna. She says there is. She explains to Jeff that people get voted out all the time for being "too strong, too alpha-male, too much of a provider." She doesn't see how voting off a winner is any different -- isn't that the strongest person of all? In fairness, that's really not what she said last week about why she didn't want the winners to win again, and although I think she's right under either theory, I'm not sure she can have both. She adds that you vote off the people you see as competition, because that's the only thing you can do. It makes sense to vote off people who are proven competitors.
Time to vote. Jerri votes. Rudy votes. Ethan votes for Rudy, saying "it was an honor to be on [his] team." Ethan then solemnly adds, "This is purely strategical." He certainly will not be anchoring the relay team at the Dictionary Olympics, studly though he may be. Jenna votes. Rupert votes for Ethan, saying, "Ethan, you're tough. Rudy and I made a pact, and I am not voting for Rudy." I feel for him, but...on the other hand, it's fairly easy to do this, being Rupert, knowing that the girls and Ethan are going to vote Rudy out anyway, which he pretty clearly does. I mean, he knows the girls are voting for Rudy. If he voted for, say, Jerri, you could believe he thought Ethan and Rudy might vote for her or something, but he's making this vote knowing what's coming. Furthermore, had he really wanted to save Rudy -- as opposed to just avoiding voting for him -- he would have told Rudy what the girls were planning, and they would have gone to Ethan. You don't think Ethan would have taken a deal to vote out Jenna? Oh, yes. He would have. So while I know Rupert's regard for Rudy is sincere, the gesture is a little hollow.
Jeff returns with the urn. Jenna looks at him quite miserably. Rudy. Ethan. Ethan. Rudy. Rudy. So it's Rudy going home. He stands up and is snuffed, and he turns and gives a wave to the tribe. They all wave back. Jerri is in tears watching him go. I won't say I cried, but...you know that thing that's the first stage of crying, where you feel it in the back of your throat? Well, I'm not admitting that happened either, but if you wanted to make a guess that it might have, I'm not saying I'd throw you up against the wall and demand that you take it back. Jeff smirks that tribal council is "an interesting place, always emotional." He gives a little salute to Rudy and how awesome he is. "I know you didn't want to vote him out," Jeff says, "and yet, somebody had to go. Which is exactly what makes Survivor what it is: complicated." He sends them back to camp with their torches.
Although a lot of the focus in this episode was on Jenna and Rupert's affection for Rudy, I found Jerri's obvious respect for him and her obvious disappointment in voting him off the most affecting, somehow. It strikes me that she's probably -- between the first round of this show and all the crap she's taken for it and her time on The Surreal Life -- seen so many people who are so full of it in so many ways that I would bet she found this boot really depressing. Because she knows that Rudy may well be the only person among this entire group -- and is certainly the only person in her tribe -- who is not full of it, and yet she didn't have a viable choice except voting him off. It is, in a way, what makes Survivor complicated, but not so much strategically complicated as just complicated because it makes you align yourself with sleazebags and screw people you like, and yet it's something everyone has agreed to, so how much can you really hate yourself?
In his exit speech, Rudy says that he was caught off-guard, because he had talked to everybody a couple of hours ago, and thought they were still voting off Ethan. He's upset with Jerri and Jenna for voting him out: "If I was them, I'd stay clear of me. I got a lot of friends." Heh. It's funny -- there were people who were really put off by that, but it never would have occurred to me to take it seriously or to think he was really trying to be menacing. I took it as more of an "I'll get you, dammit," which doesn't really mean "I'll get you." Aw, Rudy.
week: Rupert versus Jerri in the Clash of the Big Giant Egos, and Hatch taking on a big giant shark. Who will get out alive? No one's eardrums, I'm thinking.