Previously on Mia Culpa: after Eliza switched her vote to Dolly, it was time for a talk among the Y-ettes about where they stood. Specifically, Mia demanded to know whether Eliza would continue to be as faithful to her as she'd been to Eliza during their six days of enduring friendship. Eliza insisted that she was true blue, but the rest of the Y-ettes saw red over her unannounced switcheroo. Lisa proclaimed that she had "a backup plan." And not just for flotation in case of a water landing. (Hotcha!) Rory believed that, as a grown-ass man, he was not obligated to take orders from Sarge. Specifically, he held, in the great tradition of John Stuart Mill, the conviction that the taking of craps should be at the discretion of every individual, and should not be interfered with by the state except for the purposes of self-protection. Twila and Mia had a knock-down snarl-out because Mia resented anyone's pointing out...I mean, "arguing" that she didn't do her share of the hard work. Twila threatened to whip the scrawny bitch's ass. Viewers everywhere put down their cross-stitching and handheld electronic football games and sent the kids out of the room in case that happened. The immunity challenge brought news that each tribe would be losing a member. The only immunity available was an individual one, and it went to John. He also "won" the opportunity to go and visit with the women and share his immunity with one of them when it was her time at tribal council. While this might have made for a good dirty fanfic, it turned out to be just another example of a lot of people yapping about nothing, and barely had any sex at all, unless you count Eliza's sad demonstration of how you can sometimes bore a guy right out of the room, even if your mouth never stops moving. In the end, after figuring out all of the women's alliances, John chose to share immunity with Ami, who he knew wasn't being voted off anyway. The sounds of derisive clucking echoed off the cliffs of Vanuatu as a nation of viewers realized that he was foregoing an opportunity to stir up shit. That's no way to play the game, John. At tribal council, the men continued their crusade against the pretty boys and eliminated JP, much to the consternation of the ever-less-sweaty female fan base. When the women showed up for their tribal council, it turned out that Lisa really did have a backup plan, and that fortunately for the rest of us, it was to go along with the elimination of Mia. There are fourteen people left. That number will be reduced by at least one by the end of this episode. I don't suppose they'd consider a triple elimination. Because if you get this thing moving, we could wrap it up before Halloween.
Credits. It's remarkable at this point that several of these women still have essentially no personalities in my mind at all. Who's Leann? What are her turn-ons and turn-offs? If she were a tree, what kind of tree would she be? (Interestingly, a lot of these women are a lot closer than most people to actually being trees, if you et-gay my ift-dray.)
Night-vision volcano! Smoke! Or possibly ash! Speaking of which -- hello to everyone in the state of Washington! My advice is that you keep your white clothes in plastic bags for a while! Anyway, it is still Night 7, and the women of Yasur have just returned from tribal council. Night-Vision Eliza and Night-Vision Lisa are arguing over the elimination of Mia. A bunch of tiny bugs are trying to run away from this soporific argument, but no dice. They have nowhere to go. Oh, I know the feeling, tiny bugs. We are all here together, listening to Eliza complain about how sorry she is that she ever apologized for participating in the ouster of Dolly in the first place. Lisa says that "it is what it is," and that there is no point in arguing about it right now. In an interview, Eliza tells us that she was shocked to see Lisa turn on the alliance, when Eliza thought that no one was ever going to turn on the alliance except for her. Eliza claims that, in fact, she was "blindsided" by Lisa's behavior. It's difficult to believe that anyone with eyes as enormous as Eliza's could be blindsided by anything. I would think she would have peripheral vision of about 540 degrees. And of course, Eliza spits, as we saw in the promo, "That bitch." Eliza's capacity for moral outrage is truly astonishing, and is almost as clearly without sufficient support as her striped bikini. Lisa tells Eliza back at the fire that what actually led her to abandon the Y-ettes was her distrust of Eliza herself. "It all comes down to you, Eliza," Lisa says, giving Eliza a sense of importance she probably does not need. She should hear, "So take that, you chirpy little drama queen," but she's actually going to hear, "Because you are the prettiest."
Eliza, still resplendent in her unnecessary ball cap, explains that she simply does not understand how Lisa could have done that to her after she just got through doing it to Lisa and then apologizing so profusely and sincerely. How can Lisa not understand how important loyalty is when Eliza just proved it to her by being so disloyal herself and then acting really, really sorry? These are the questions that try Eliza's soul. Eliza calls Lisa a hypocrite right to her face, but Lisa insists that she simply changed her mind, and that she is not going to "be confrontational." They bicker back and forth until Lisa finally gets her southern belle on with a little "You have your nerve," at which point Scout says that she is going to bed. And why? Because the environment is "a little polluted." Yeah, seriously. Polluted with snippy sludge. A snottiness discharge. Bad attitude effluent. (The EPA is in the process of reformulating the guidelines for those, by the way, so much higher levels will be allowed in future editions of this and other shows. All hail deregulation! Making the world a better place for refineries and bitches.)
Twila gives a little speech about how if they're going to beat the boys, they have to remain a strong team. Twila is wearing that buff tied around her head in a way seemingly calculated to create the appearance of a mullet. I guess if you can't get it cut, you do what you can to create that "party in the back" look when the mood strikes. Twila then announces that she, too, is going to sleep. Apparently, going off to bed has become the method of choice for order expressing your disapproval. It beats what I would be doing, which is throwing rotten fruit at people's heads. If I really liked them, I might yell "Duck!," but mostly I wouldn't. Lisa interviews that she isn't surprised that Eliza and Julie are angry with her, but that she voted the way she thought was right, and that she's not taking any abuse over it. It's good to see someone standing up for her principles, because all of reality television should not present women to be quite as vacuous as they are on The Apprentice. Some of us vote our consciences when we're trying to win money, you know. Eliza is not feeling the forgiveness vibe, and interviews that if Lisa were gone tomorrow, Eliza would be "thrilled." Oh, same to you, Eyeballs McGee. "She repulses me now," Eliza says. Eliza has clearly been taking morality lessons from Mirna. Has she mentioned that Lisa is sick and disgusting?
Hey, that's not a Volcano! Actually, that's gross. I didn't even notice the two bats hanging upside down the first time I saw this episode. Man...creepy, sleep hanging upside-down from a tree...I think I had that roommate in college. Chad and his bionic foot (okay, prosthetic foot...it's probably only bionic in my daydreams, where Chad and I fight crime) are taking a stroll on the rocks. It is now Day 8, and Chris and Rory are also on their daily constitutional. Rory has decided to wear a kerchief tied around his head. That always makes people look like starving mothers in a movie about fascism. Rise up, Rory! Start a union! Write for an underground newspaper! Not without your daughter! Anyway, Rory interviews that although he received three votes last night, he's not worrying about it. As he and Chris work on gathering branches or something, he tells Chris that they have nothing to worry about as long as they keep to their five-person alliance. Rory goes on in his interview to explain that he has an agreement with Chad, Travis, Sarge, and Chris. He should be safe unless something goes wrong. Well, maybe not "safe," but also not "."
Around the fire, a restless Brady stares at Rory. John is elsewhere looking equally unhappy, and he explains to us in an interview that he's bummed out about the way the tribe is going. Specifically, all of the guys who, as he puts it, "have great personalities and are good athletes" have been sent home, and he doesn't understand why you would "let fat dudes run the show." It's amazing how John can sort of have a point at the beginning, and then act like such a prick that you don't want to agree with him at the end. I mean, think of where the world would be without fat dudes. There'd be no Essence of Emeril and no Lord of the Rings movies. Nobody wants that. As Brady and John walk in the jungle, they discuss the puzzling fact that the other guys are setting themselves up to lose challenges. They seem not to understand that the guys only have to worry about losing team challenges for a few more weeks, after which it's going to be a good thing, not a bad thing, to have the young jocks sitting at home on the couch. Everyone has seen the immunity monsters, and nobody wants to go to the end with the Colby, because the Colby might not be such a freaking sap. John continues the not getting it in an interview in which he says that he has no idea why the other guys think this plan will work. I wonder if it's because it's working right now. I mean, I'm speculating, but it seems like that could be one reason. The best part of this sequence is when Brady shakes the tree from which they're gathering coconuts so hard that he shakes one down and it conks him clean on the head. All of a sudden, the FBI guy is a cartoon. A really, really hot cartoon. (And now, this page is going to get awesome Google hits.)
Back at camp, Brady admits that as long as the alliance of five remains intact, there isn't very much that he can do. Like hapless Survivors of yore, he has decided that his only chance to stick around is to rely on bringing fish to the masses. This was the part where I was sure we were going to get a visit from Rupert. You can only imagine how horrifying this was to me, considering that I have barely recovered from his last appearance. Or, should I say, appearances? Let's just not talk about it anymore; I'll wind up with spittle in the corner of my mouth and my eyes bulging out of my head. At any rate, Brady hopes that the other guys will like him better if he's catching fish. So he and his knee-length blue swim trunks go wandering into the ocean, hoping for the best. Brady says in an interview that the fishing may change the minds of just enough people to keep him alive. We watch him in the usual Survivor-style adventure montage, in which he attempts to catch fish and humiliates himself by catching ones so tiny they can only be enjoyed as appetizers, and then only by very small people who aren't hungry. It's amazing how when I first saw Travis's Bob Barker shirt, I thought it was very cute. Now, I have seen it enough, and every time it is in view, it makes me kind of want to punch him in the face. That's very common, I find, with ironic clothing. "Look, I'm wearing a Mr. T. sweatshirt!" "[Thwap.]"
Brady refers to the fish he caught as "Little Fish and his brother Littler." Because animals are apparently only in our lives to be humiliated, even in death. It's the same reason people put shirts on dogs. In fact, Brady even says that the smaller fish are stupider than the larger fish, and that the only fish stupid enough to stand around and allow him to hit them with the spear are the small ones. I'm not sure the physics of that hold up, considering that I'm almost certain it's actually a bit easier for a small fish to avoid being speared than a large fish. But it's easy for me to say -- these are the sorts of things you have the luxury of thinking about when you aren't fully occupied by the fact that you're stuck on an island for weeks with a bunch of guys who smell like feet. Travis opines, in fact, that the fish Brady is catching are not even worthy of being eaten. Fortunately, Rory is happy to eat the little ones, so the fish do not die in vain. And really, beggars can't be choosers, and it seems to me that one bite is better than no bites. It's not really clear to me what the guys are eating, I guess. They imply later it's plantains, but is that it? Because that's rough.
Pretty, pretty Brady tells us that, for him and John, "it's getting down to the nitty-gritty." He's hopeful that the two of them will find a means of escape at the last minute, but it's really beginning to look bad for those of us who mostly watch the show in order to look at people who are better-looking than the ones we see on the bus every day. You know, for an FBI agent, Brady has not shown any particularly remarkable ability to manipulate people into doing what he wants. I wonder if this is how he treats criminals: "I really hope I can find a way to shake the guy up and make him confess, but it kind of doesn't look like it's going to work. I wonder if I'll be the first agent sent home from spy camp. That would suck."
Volcano! I really hope that isn't a bird falling into the volcano, although it sort of looks like it is. We watch the tribes pick up their treemail. As usual, the crappy poetry seems to imply that something good is going to happen, but doesn't tell you enough to know whether it's a bread and cheese picnic or free hookers for everyone. It does seem to give a little bit of information about the puzzle, which it appears will be like a big game of Concentration. Man, my sister used to kick my ass at that game. Travis/Bubba apparently is a lot like my sister (in that way only), because he promises that he is very good at this kind of game. Twila, on the other hand, thinks that the women have better memories than the men. Also, they have prettier eyelashes and big purses that they can use for various forms of cheating which they might be able to invent later. Hitting, if nothing else. Seriously, guys are such babies if you hit them with your purse. Little-known fact: that's actually why the travel iron was invented.
The teams proceed to the spot for the reward challenge, and as they step onto their mats, there's some kind of strange rattlesnake sound. I find the use of poisonous animal noises a particularly cheap device for creating tension. If you're going to go for visceral terror, you could just use a siren, or a hypothetical recording of Bush's November 2, 2004, 11:38 PM acceptance speech. ("In my second term, I will introduce the Dangerous Groceries Control Act, with which the FBI will have the ability to connect to every bar code scanner in the country. In connection with our new biometric surveillance program, this will allow us to monitor the large and unusual purchases of organic produce, chai tea, and granola cereals that often accompany subversive activities.") Jeff asks for an update about how things are going back at camp. Scout reports that things are much more peaceful recently. She chooses not to say, "since Mia took her waggling head off to Loserville." But you can almost see Twila's twangy little heart mutter, "I heard that." When Scout is asked how life could be even better for Yasur, Scout refrains from saying what she is probably thinking, which is, "Can you do anything about Eliza?" Instead, she focuses on the fact that they don't know as much as they wish they did about finding food. Jeff asks Lopevi the same question. Brady steps up and tries not-so-subtly to remind the guys that he's been out there trying to catch fish for them. I'm sure they appreciate it. I'm sure that they've appreciated it both times that they've had a bite of fish as a result of his valiant efforts.
Jeff explains the reward challenge. There are thirty items on little tables with covers over them, and they make up fifteen pairs. It is, as the clue suggested, essentially a big game of Concentration. The teams will alternate sending someone to uncover two items at a time. The first team to match five pairs will win the challenge. Now, Jeff asks if they'd like to know what they're playing for. They all say they would, and Jeff turns and calls into the woods. To the sound of the kind of frantic drums that, on television, can only mean pornography or the arrival of natives, a man emerges from the woodsy brush. He is wearing some sort of a grass skirt, and Jeff introduces him as Da. Or Dah. Or something. Jeff might have made it up because the contestants aren't smart enough to pronounce his real name. Jeff explains that Da will be spending twenty-four hours with whichever team wins the challenge. During that time, the castaways will have the opportunity to take advantage of his "rock star" qualities when it comes to surviving in Vanuatu. Jeff warns the teams that Da doesn't speak a whole lot of English, which should make him feel right at home with people like Travis and Twila. Jeff claims that Da can explain how to improve their shelter, cook their food, and remove grass stains without damaging the color of the garment. Okay, not the last one. But as a general matter, he's there to make things easier for the inept, which, coincidentally, is exactly what these people need. Jeff points out that as a matter of fact, they're all pretty much wussies, because they've only been here for nine days, and they have thirty to go. I think the most educational thing about Survivor this season is that it teaches you that if Lost ever really happened, the people on it would quickly become much uglier than Matthew Fox.
It's interesting, because a number of people on the forums thought that the presentation of Da was really uncomfortable, like he was being "given away" like a slave. While I would never claim Survivor is necessarily above an offensive dynamic like that, in this case, I more had the sense he was being given away like a very expensive consultant. True, he'll show you a few things and do some things for you in the process, but for the most part, he's going to show you how to do stuff, because he's smart, and you're not. It didn't bother me, although I am curious as to whether that's the way Da typically dresses. I suppose it easily could be. ["I was waiting for him to break character and confess that he has an engineering degree from CalTech or something." -- Wing Chun]
All of the castaways believe that time with Da is well worth competing for. Just one time, I would love it if they all said, "No, Jeff, as a matter of fact, we think this contest is just too goddamn stupid, and we're all going home to eat cockroaches." Imagine the hilarity. The teams line up in front of the open field where all of the objects are arranged. Chad is first to go and uncover two items. First, he uncovers a wooden pig. , he turns up what Jeff is calling a "tam-tam." Don't look at me; I don't know anything. Chad returns, unsuccessful. Lisa is to go, and if you don't see the humor in Lisa being the first one to go in search of a pair, you're a better person than I am. Lisa uncovers a shrimp trap. And then, a coconut. Rory turns up a tribal drum, and then, a wooden idol. Speaking of wooden idols, isn't it about time for another Clay Aiken joke? I haven't gotten a poorly spelled piece of hate mail with no capital letters in parts of it and nothing but capital letters in other parts of it in so long.
Scout uncovers what Jeff tells us is a gourd, although it looks to me like the top of a superhero's spell-hurling cane. They have some crazy-ass gourds down there in Vanuatu. She then turns up a nautilus shell. Jeff promises that there will be a match soon, which I think means he doesn't know these people very well. to look for a match is Travis. This ought to be fun. Travis uncovers him a grapefruit. Jeff comments that he's only thinking about one thing. "Yeah, eatin' it!" offers Twila. Yeah. Glad she's keeping up. Nothing like finishing the part of Jeff Probst's joke that was too obvious for him to make you seem like a wit. Travis then uncovers the tribal drum. Lisa and Twila immediately know that this is their first shot at a match. Ami walks out onto the playing field and uncovers one tribal drum, and then the other. The women have the first match. I think it's charming that Ami wears skirts to challenges, but I do think she's a little too fancy for the room. Also, sunny yellow skirts have a way of looking rather dingy and unpleasant after you don't wash them for a month.
Brady turns up a palm frond, which doesn't make him happy at all. In fact, he waves it in a rather dismissive manner. Finally, someone who treats these challenges with all the dignity they deserve. I love Brady. His second try turns up the other grapefruit. Again, if you don't laugh at Lisa's excitement over the grapefruits, you're missing obvious shout-outs to Wing. ["Thank you." -- Wing Chun] Eliza eagerly runs out, claims the grapefruits, and returns to her team. "Nice grapefruits," Ami says, stepping on the joke, which was already doing fine on its own. Chris heads out and uncovers a pig jaw. With his second try, Chris helps the women by uncovering the other shrimp trap. The men are failing to learn the game. You go back to something you've already seen if you don't get a familiar object on the first try, because this way, all they're doing is feeding the women opportunities to make matches. To wit: Julie takes one shrimp trap, and then the second. Yasur is now ahead three matches to zero. John goes out and uncovers a pig jaw. He does not successfully locate the first pig jaw, which we've already seen. Because John? Good athlete. Not a genius. Instead, he turns up a wooden pig, which we've also already seen.
Leann grabs the pig jaws. Yasur needs only one more pair. Sarge goes out, however, and picks up the two wooden pigs. Finally, a match for the men. It seems oddly appropriate that it would be pigs. Grapefruits, pigs, it's all one big suggestive metaphorical world of artifacts and fruit. Twila goes out and finds a coconut, but she's unable to find the other one. Oops. Instead, she finds the other nautilus shell. Well, I thought she had, but maybe it's the same nautilus shell. Chad goes out and finds the two coconuts. Four matches to two, in favor of the women. Lisa hits a nautilus shell, and then hits the other. She even does a smug little dance, and you know Rory is going to love that. So Yasur wins reward, and we'll have to try to see if they can learn anything. I am skeptical. All of the women hug each other, and for a moment, it really does seem as if they've managed to get rid of a lot of their problems just by getting rid of Mia. The men, on the other hand, appear despondent. Jeff sends them home empty-handed. Then, he brings Da over to meet the women. Jeff reminds them that they've won the opportunity to benefit from all of Da's extensive knowledge. Da will meet them back at camp, so that he can have a suitably dramatic entrance that will look good in the previews. The women head back to camp, arm in arm and hand in hand. You'd almost think they had recently cleansed to their tribe of a disruptive jackass.
Volcano! In the preview shot many of us believed was going to turn out to be Rupert, Da paddles toward shore. From camp, Eliza can see him approaching and alerts the rest of the team. Twila reminds us in an interview that Yasur won the consulting services of Da for twenty-four hours. "We're wantin' to learn from him," she says. Of course, it comes out more like, "Were-wan-a-larn-fuh-mim," but this is the episode in which we learn that clarity in spoken language isn't everything. The women help Da to bring his boat up on shore, and I almost think one of them says "hola," but I'd really like to think not. Because I don't think Da speaks Spanish. Da does not stop for pleasantries, but heads directly up the beach to the women's camp. As Scout explains in an interview, he got right to work. I also suspect that some part of his failure to chat may have to do with the same dynamic that resulted in the women's being ignored at the opening tribal ceremony. Not that Da is being nasty to them, but that he doesn't normally socialize with groups of women. It seems at least like a possibility.
As the lessons begin, Da immediately climbs a bent-over tree by walking up the trunk. That is awesome. The women look on, amazed, as he drops a bunch of coconuts to the ground. He hacks a coconut open, takes a chug from it, and shares it with the tribe. They express their gratitude, and he asks them to follow him a little more. Thoroughly convinced, they trail after Da into the trees. Da is completely the coolest thing ever, if only because he makes it so obvious that nature is not hostile in any inherent way; it's a matter of knowing what the hell you're doing so that you don't eat things that are meant to be decorative or try to sleep on a plant that uses itchiness as its natural defense mechanism.
Food exploration begins. Da pulls up a root from very close to the women's camp, and informs them that they can eat it. See? Interesting! In an interview, Leann chuckles over the fact that they simply had had no idea what to eat until they met with Da. Most remarkably, Da shows them where to find sugar cane. Yes, that's right, the women have been growing candy near their camp and had no idea. They are all thrilled. Da shows them something else to eat -- a...nut or something? -- and Twila makes a truly hilarious face trying to understand what he's saying. It's the perfect facial embodiment of "Say what?" The music of excitement turns to music of confusion, which you can identify because it has more things going "boing" and "zoop." Lisa opines in an interview that Da had an easier time understanding them than they had understanding him. She explains that, like people throughout history who weren't too bright, the women learned from Da by making him point at things. He shows them something about how to open a coconut by making reference to the "face" on the end of the coconut, which looks like it would be kind of cool to know, if we had time, which we don't, because there is complaining and stupidity to get back to eventually. Ami takes a turn opening a coconut. Julie describes the women as "in awe" of Da. She adds that Da cooked a great dinner, too. Overall, she says he was "a blessing." Ami essentially agrees that the women were so busy enjoying Da that they almost forgot how much they hate each other.
Over at Lopevi, the guys are lamenting the fact that they weren't able to win the challenge. Rory claims that Da could have provided them with "every creature comfort" that they needed, and...I'm not sure I would go that far. This isn't Gilligan's Island. Da doesn't make coconut televisions or curtains. Still, though, you have to feel for the guys as they sit around gnawing on plantains yet again. There's almost nothing I would want to munch on quite this often, and definitely not something that I most often hear described as "like a banana, but more potato-y." Chad confirms in an interview that morale is low, and that Travis, in particular, is not into the repetitive eating. Furthermore, Travis is missing his family fairly acutely. Travis glumly tells us that, indeed, his biggest concern while he's on the island is how the family is back at home. He wonders if they miss him, even though he's pretty sure they probably do. "My boys are my life," he says. In fact, they are his life to such a degree that he had to leave them for thirty-nine days to go and be on TV. ["Again, thank you. Does he love his kids as much as Jenna Morasca loved her DYING MOTHER?!" -- Wing Chun] It's my favorite argument. It's not that I think you're doing anything wrong by leaving your kids for that long -- heck, they'll live. It's the way people sit around and act like they've been taken from their kids, as opposed to having chosen to do a fun, frivolous activity away from their kids.
Around the fire, Rory and Chad discuss Travis's state of mind and agree that he's allowing his thoughts of his family to distract him from the game. In fact, in an interview, Rory refers to Travis's love for his family as "his weakness." He tells this to Travis in person, as well, warning him that this will make people wonder whether he's "trippin'." As if there's ever been a person on the show who wasn't. In return, Travis tells us that he thinks Rory, like many of history's irritating individuals as well as most of the boys I loved between the ages of thirteen and thirty, is primarily "misunderstood." As we watch a little bit of bickering between Rory and Sarge, Travis explains that Rory is only one of several guys who has a strong personality. Travis seems to hold Sarge and Rory equally responsible for the fact that they do so damn much fighting. No matter whom he holds responsible for it, Travis says that he's tired of the arguing and stuff. The more I watch this, the more I think Sarge is in serious danger, once things get to an appropriate point, of being the first of these five to go, because nobody likes a bossy-ass, no matter how much they say they're going to follow you. And the women, in the event of a merge, are going to hate him. Ladies don't like it when you tell them when to take their craps. "Play nicely," Travis tells Sarge and Rory around the fire, "or you're both going to time-out." No kidding. At this point, I would even consider corporal punishment, which I don't generally believe in. But could I paddle Sarge? I believe so. Travis thinks they need "harmony in the team."
Back at Yasur, Da is using bamboo to make up a mattress cover of sorts for the hard shelter floor on which the women have been sleeping. The more the women talk about how wonderful it is and how much more comfortable they're going to be, the more I think about how hilarious it would be if they got kicked out of their camp week. See how I'm getting sadistic? I've been watching these shows for too long. Ami wants Da to help them with fishing, but he looks a little bit dubious about that one. I'm not sure what they think they're going to fish with. Da does not seem to know either. Instead, later that night, we watch as Da brings the women torches, and takes them along the beach to hunt for crabs. They don't actually find any crabs, but Da explains to them how to wait for the right point in the tide. Scout seems to think that the day with Da was not only good as a learning experience, but somehow that it helped the team to recover from some of the ugliness that has plagued it in recent weeks. That's an awful lot of ugliness for one man to unknot in a short time, but he does seem like a very smart guy. Maybe mediation is the other thing he knows about, besides beds and coconut faces. Maybe he's the Dr. Phil of Vanuatu. Scout calls it "a wonderful day."
The sun sets and rises, and Ami and her sunny yellow dress are walking on the beach on the morning of Day 9. Da finds the women a crab. They thank him, and give him a bunch of affection I'm not sure he really wants, and they send him on his way. In The Annals of Uncomfortable Hugs, I think the one between Da and Twila will be recorded as one of the most noteworthy. Eliza interviews that she was amazed at how "attached" they became to Da in such a short time. It's remarkable what happens when a guy makes it possible for you not to starve, beat the crap out of yourself with your own bed frame, or die of dehydration, white-tongued and bug-eyed. Oh, and he shows you where the candy is. I'd be attached to him, too. As Da leaves, we are all reduced to barfing as the women insist on singing him off. You can almost see the guy with a little cartoon bubble over his head, and in the bubble, you can see the words, "What did I do to deserve that? Weren't the beds comfortable?" Furthermore, there are a lot of good songs in the world. This is not one of them, at least as presented by these women. I realize many good songs are not public domain and thus not show-appropriate, but still. For some reason, after Da is gone, Ami and Twila are off to the side, hugging. I think the singing made Twila cry. Or else she's crying because she's blind, having been exposed to Lisa's unnaturally white teeth. Da paddles off into oblivion. Thank you, Da. I certainly wish the people who are actually playing the game talked as little as you do.
Volcano! A crab crawls on the beach at Lopevi, although I'm not sure the guys have figured out yet that you can eat those, so I'm not sure it has anything to worry about. If they ever figure it out, he's going to have to figure out how to make like a rock in a hurry. Rory has decided to start off today by taking a walk with the Hawaiian sling, despite the fact that he admits in an interview that he has no idea what he's doing. (I swear, if we have another Hawaiian sling theme, I'm going to find Mark Burnett and we are going to have words.) He practices with the sling, shooting at trees and whatnot, but as he explains, he's not sure how to aim it. As Rory leaves camp, Brady tells him to be sure not to break the spear. Brady voices over that Rory did nothing productive with the spear except mill around "for hours." He adds that he thinks the time is growing ripe for his master plan to separate Sarge from Rory and break into the alliance. Accordingly, Brady sits around with Sarge bitching that Rory's doing such a poor job with the spear. "He's never going to put any fish in this fire," Brady says dismissively. Brady tries to give Sarge a talk about how, if they don't get rid of Rory, no one is going to see Rory as a threat, and he's going to last until the very end. It's the Lill Theory of Surprisingly Deadly Ineptitude. Brady tells us that he "planted [his] seed" (ooh, sexy) and "did what [he] could do" to get Sarge thinking bad thoughts about Rory. (Not that kind of bad thoughts. Ew.) He says he also made the argument to Sarge about strengthening the tribe and trying to win some challenges, which is not an objective the group is going to advance by getting rid of Brady.
And now, it's time for more treemail. The clue suggests that this task will have something to do with working together and, possibly, making up really awkward rhymes. Well, I guess they all suggest that. And it usually doesn't turn out to be true. Eliza explains in an interview that she and Julie feel that it's very important for the team to win immunity, because they are the only two who voted to keep Mia in the game, so they're feeling very exposed, and not in the fun, "I Got Manhandled In Mazatlan" kind of way. The win, she says, is "essential."
We sweep over to a vast beach, where there are two large game boards laid out on the ground. The way this game works is that you're game board is divided into 16 boxes, and on the boxes are colored symbols. There are four symbols in each of four colors, and the object of the game is to arrange them in a 4x4 grid such that no row or column has two of the same symbol, and no row or column has two of the same color. (You've done this in puzzle books on airplanes while trying to ignore the child kicking your seat and singing "Jesus Loves Me." You probably finished it right before the hot towels.) Jeff calls the teams in to start the game. Jeff points out that the teams are tied at seven members each, but obviously, the upcoming tribal council will put one of them at a disadvantage again. He explains the rules, adding that each tribe has to choose a person to stand on a perch and direct the rest of the team members as they attempt to arrange the puzzle pieces. The first tribe to finish the puzzle will win immunity. Yasur chooses Eliza as its eyes, while Lopevi, for some reason, chooses Rory. Why they would choose someone none of them has any use for to be their leader and tell them what to do is very mysterious to me. Perhaps I should see my failure to mind-meld with the castaways as a good thing.
"Survivors ready, go!" At first, the approach to the game seems to be fairly haphazard on both teams. Surprisingly, Eliza un-bugs and appears to give reasonably good directions. Which, equally surprisingly, the team seems to follow without too much complaining. Jeff declares that there is "a key" to figuring out how to do this puzzle, because he is a huge, annoying know-it-all at times like this. Yeah, it's real easy to talk about the key when you've seen the answers, Teacher's Pet. The men continue to behave as if they're just moving tiles around and hoping for the best, and the background music mocks them with the twanging. Because see, country music implies low intelligence! Get it? Eliza, on the other hand, has a strategy involving arranging each color and symbol in a diagonal. I'm not sure she quite has it exactly right yet, but at least she's thinking about solving it in a puzzle-like way, rather than just moving stuff around and hoping to stumble on it, like people used to do with Rubik's Cubes before that smart-ass wrote a book about them. Whatever Eliza's plan is, anyway, the women are least willing to let her lead. The men, though, are over there ignoring Rory most of the time. I think I would know they're stupid without the banjo cues. Even Jeff comments that Rory "may have lost control" of the situation. The women finally get their pieces all arranged, and they announce to Jeff that they think they have it solved. Jeff announces that indeed, their solution is correct. The women have won again. I think Mia was the opposite of a good-luck charm. She was the anti-rabbit's foot. The women hoot and celebrate. Jeff reminds Lopevi that they will be heading for tribal council, as if they don't already know. I do sympathize with Jeff's situation. It's so hard not to come off smug when you never, ever compete at anything yourself and probably couldn't complete a brainteaser given three hours and a personal assistant, but your entire role is to snipe at people's failures, all camp-counselor and disappointed. The guys, duly chastised, walk back to camp with their heads literally hanging down, as the women exchange more hugs and love. It's the Year of the Woman, in the same sense that the Olympics are the Fortnight of the Athlete: sure, there's lots of cheering in the moment, but eventually, there will be a sobering letdown as society's long-term attitudes rebound, forcing yesterday's hero to be tomorrow's cover of Maxim.
There is underwater footage of fish, which symbolically represents the way the men of Lopevi are drowning and gurgling in their own ineptitude as they return to camp from yet another loss. Chris says that the challenge was "a mess." (Honestly, I cannot improve on the description of Chris given to me by Wing this week, in which she commented that it was time for him to go back to being the second banana on the morning drive-time radio show in whatever town he's from.) Around the fire, Sarge openly blames Rory for the loss. Sarge insists, in fact, that he knew exactly how to do it, and only didn't tell them because they had decided Rory would be in charge. What a flaming pile of horseshit. And if it's true, he's an idiot. There are ways to communicate that fall in the wide chasm between silence and ordering people around the way he usually does. (As a matter of fact, many of us exist almost exclusively in that chasm, because we don't like it when people beat the crap out of us, but we're not good at being quiet, either.) Brady agrees that there was not enough "direction" given during the challenge. In an interview, Rory simply says that it was a bad performance for them "as a team." Apparently, he has not gotten the memo that he was entirely to blame. Oh, wait -- actually, he has. He says in an interview that he's willing to "take that on [his] shoulders." Probably because he has an alliance of five, so at this point, accountability is as cheap as it will ever be. "I may be a pain in the fanny," he is thinking, "but I am their pain in the fanny."
Travis, strangely emerging as the voice of reason, points out that it wouldn't have mattered who was in charge when no one was listening anyway. Sarge insists that Rory was looking at them "with a blank stare" during the game, and I don't think I remember that. Nor do I know how Sarge could possibly know that, considering that he was ignoring Rory for the most part. And besides, if he really saw Rory with a "blank stare," you're saying he wouldn't then have jumped in if he really knew exactly how to do it? Shut up, Sarge.
John sits around with Travis asks him whether the reason why Rory is still in the game is that no one perceives him as a threat. Amusingly, Travis comments that in fact, the reason Rory is still around is that he's supposed to be "good at puzzles." Understandably, John's like, "Yeah, good plan." Travis thinks Rory might have had a bad day. And...well, yes. We would certainly hope that wasn't a good day for the Puzzlemaster. Travis asks John whether he would consider voting for Brady if that's the way things are going to go. He claims that this might make the other guys feel like they can work with John, but when there are only going to be the six of them left, why would they work with John? This is the worst argument ever. Well, besides, "I like being the swing vote." John tells Travis that he thinks the problem that they're going to have is that they will never beat the women with the men they're keeping on the team. Travis looks down at the sand. Travis asks John rhetorically who he thinks is the leader of the alliance. John supposes it might be Travis himself. Travis shakes his head. "Sarge?" Asks John. Travis nods somberly. "He calls every shot," Travis says.
As Chris and Rory take a walk together, Rory says he really hopes the alliance will hold, because he's sure that if it doesn't, he will be the one to go. In fact, he says that he would be "dead right now." Rory suggests in an interview that the person most likely to move against him would in fact be Sarge, presumably because of the endless bickering and the fact that they can't stand each other. Rory tells Chris that Sarge "likes to dictate what goes on," and says he's not sure if Chris is ever noticed that. Chris is like, "Yeah, I've noticed." I think people around the world without televisions or electricity have noticed. In an interview, Chris allows that Sarge might decide to "make a change" because of his dislike of Rory. Why these guys have all decided to let Sarge tell them exactly what to do is very confusing, because at this point, the alliance is large enough relative to the entire group that there's no need for them to do that. If they want to get rid of Sarge and have one less giant blowhard to deal with, they can do that easily and still have their alliance. I think that's what I would do. Because Sarge bugs me. A highly metaphorical bat goes flying off in some direction or another. I think he stands for fleeting loyalty. Or rabies.
Sarge takes a moment to feign uncertainty, saying that if Brady leaves, he will be very sad, because Brady is a good worker, and we all know that Sarge is all about the meritocracy. In fact, there's Brady right now, up in a tree, knocking a coconut down. But because he does it from above rather than shaking from below, he manages not to bean himself. Sarge also allows, in the interests of ratcheting up the suspense, that Rory is "a bad seed." He also says the team is "fighting for survival." Not really. But thanks. The team leaves for tribal council.
The increasingly dirty and sweaty men make their way up to the fire pit. Jeff is waiting for them. When they're all seated, he asks them about today's challenge. He asks Rory about having received "zero respect" while he was trying to give directions. Adding this to the fact that Rory has received votes at every tribal council so far, how does Rory feel about this? Rory says that he is "scared as hell" to be there under these circumstances, as a matter of fact. Jeff talks about the shift over the last couple of challenges and the way the women have been performing so much better. He taunts the guys a little bit with the fact that the women have improved their lives back at camp so much at the same time, thanks largely to Da. Asked if he can feel that shift, Travis points out that the women "really kicked [them] in the groin today." He says that the team took it hard, but he also says, all evidence to the contrary, that at the challenge they're going to be "a whole new ball team." Well, it's an interesting theory. "Based on what I'm looking at, I don't buy it at all," Jeff says, proving that he can, when necessary, be useful. Because that's exactly what I would've said.
A beauty shot of Brady follows, as the show tempts the women in the audience to think about how sad it's going to be when he's gone. ["And the gay and bisexual men, also, I'm guessing. He's really very pretty." -- Wing Chun] Jeff asks Brady whether he thinks that the guys started playing an individual game, as opposed to a team game, too soon. In other words, is it going to come back to haunt them that they've now booted off the team almost everyone capable of running a fifty-yard dash without collapsing? Brady says that indeed, he thinks that from very early on, the guys were thinking about where they were going to be six or eight challenges from then, which prevented them from developing team unity. Jeff asks Chris what he thinks about the fact that the way they're going right now, the guys may be able to outlast each other, but it looks like all of them are going to be eliminated by the women. Chris protests that the women might not stay together, and Jeff asks him what makes him think the women wouldn't stay together. Gee, Jeff, I don't know. Maybe every other season that's ever happened, ever? I'm not sure Jeff has been watching the show. Maybe he finds himself too smug, and it's kind of painful.
Jeff asks Chad why he's been shaking his head throughout Chris's little speech. Chad says something I don't really understand about how once other people start going individually, you have to go individually too. Something about it being your "backup plan" and...yeah, I'm confused. But I like Chad. I told couple of people this week that I think the funniest thing going on the season so far is that the "older guys" are letting Chad hang out with them, sort of on the assumption that he's not one of the young, strong guys. I suspect Chad will do just fine for himself in physical challenges, and is in this position because, consciously or not, they don't really think of a guy with an artificial foot as a threat. It's not that anybody's doing anything wrong, I think he's just benefiting from subconscious things that other people aren't even aware they're doing.
Asked whether he's concerned about his fortunes tonight, John claims to be "extremely worried." He says that, clearly, athletic guys are on the endangered species list in this particular ecosystem, and that he's one of the biggest spotted owls of them all. He also makes a really obnoxious comment about how there's nothing else he can do, because he's not going to pretend he's not as strong as he is. Well, that's admirable, and likely to lose you the million. Jeff asks Brady what's motivating his vote tonight. Brady says he wants the team to be as strong as possible. Also, he would like not to lose his chance to become filthy rich.
Chris votes. Travis votes. Rory votes for Brady. "Brady, you caught the first fish. You even climbed the pole. But the spirits sometimes dictate that it's time for you to go." Was that supposed to be a poem? Because if it was, it really sucked. Chad votes. Brady votes for Rory. "Maybe the third time is the charm," he says. Heh. John votes. Sarge votes.
Jeff returns with the vat of votes. He reminds us that the decision is final, so this will be no Florida recount. Or, you know, lack of a recount. The first vote goes to Brady. The second vote goes to Brady as well. The third vote goes to Rory. Fourth vote to Brady. And the fifth vote goes to Brady, meaning that he will go home, taking with him all of my dreams of watching the season with my tongue hanging out. When he's gone, Jeff points out to the tribe that voting out all of the strong guys so that they won't be individual threats later can completely screw you if you do it too early in the game. He doesn't mention that leaving them in the game can screw you as well, as you know if you watched Colby or Ethan or Boston Rob. But then, I am a student of the game. A bored student at the moment, but a student nevertheless. Jeff sends the guys home as the music swells.
In his exit interview, Brady says, "How much did that suck?" Oh, how I agree. And here is an interesting factoid for you: John voted for Brady. Not sure what good he thinks that's going to do him.
week: Volcano! Do they really have to put that in the previews? Buffs are dropped. Oh, and do you remember reading that there was an earthquake while they were filming? You're about to see it.