Previously on At Least We Know It Can't Be Any More Damn Boring Than Vanuatu: A bloated cast of twenty washed up on the beaches of Palau where, almost immediately, they sent Wanda off to sing of sequestration. Poor, hot, hairless Jonathan was banished along with her, destined to spend a month learning all the words to "If You Tanked At Tribal Council, Clap Your Hands." The time you see him, he will be incoherent, alternately gnawing on a lanyard and playing the recorder. Then there was a double-whammy reward-immunity challenge that was won by the new Koror tribe, meaning that they got to take home fire. They were so grateful for their victory that they celebrated by sacrificing their box of flint and steel to the gods having jurisdiction over the bottom of the ocean. In better news, the challenge sent Ulong to tribal council, where the tribe decided that tattoos are marginally less irritating than bossy buttinskys are, and Angie escaped booting in favor of Jolanda. Now, there are a highly manageable seventeen people you're supposed to be keeping track of, so...you know, good luck. Count their legs and divide by four. Er, two. It's something like that.
We enter on night-vision Koror on Night 3, where they have not just returned from tribal council as have most introductory night-vision tribes, but instead theirs is the heartbreak of the "tragic" loss of their flint. Because after all, here it is, nighttime, and there's no fire. There is a close-up of the coconut monkey, followed by Tom's melodious voice saying, "Another day in paradise." Which is a really bad song, by the way. So bad that I'm surprised we haven't yet heard it on this season's American Idol, since they've been hauling Tiffany out of mothballs and all. Anyway, Tom's comment serves as the perfect segue to Caryn's whineterview that although they won immunity at the challenge, they of course dropped their flint into the water. Coby, elsewhere, is having a chat with (I think) Gregg, in which Coby points out that losing your flint in the water during a game show is, in terms of sudden shock, a lot like a car accident. You know, without the crash, injuries, trauma, insurance adjusters, court case, neck brace, joint and several liability, enormous damage award, appeal, settlement, contingency fee, and eventual complaint to the Lawyers' Board of Professional Responsibility. Other than that? Same.
Now, we take a whirlwind tour of GenderPoliticsburgh, where some of the Koror women are having hissyfits over the presence on their island of...rats! Because, did you know that chicks don't like rats? We're totally terrified of them. We stand on chairs and go, "Eeeeeee!" We hate them almost as much as we hate math. For those of us who live alone and take care of ourselves as women of the twenty-first century are peskily wont to do, this creates a problem, as we miss days of work while people go on without us, unaware that we are trapped in our kitchens, hoping some boy will come along with a mallet or a heavy book or something so that we can return to our lives. ["Not to play into sex stereotypes, but the other day I saw one of Glark's used teabags in the sink out of the corner of my eye, and it looked like a mouse and I squealed. In my own defense, I am the house's designated murderer of all bugs and spiders, so I'm not annoyingly girly the whole way through." -- Wing Chun] ANYWAY. Janu, rocking a nifty pair of librarian glasses but kind of making me blue with her display of girlish wimposity, interviews that she saw the rats and noticed that they were "going to town." And not in the "come on, Pa, Mr. Oleson is having a sale on lamp oil" sense, either. She goes on to jump and twitter and basically make a big old girl out of herself around the fire, all while insisting that she's "not afraid of anything." Show, Janu. Don't tell. And start with less squeaking. Janu ultimately interviews that she knows it should be "mind over matter," but the long and the short of it is that rats are gross. Well, so is math, but it doesn't mean I jump when it appears. Besides, when did they all get so spoiled? First season, the appearance of a rat was like a ham sandwich strolling by, all, "Get me! I'm great with mustard!" I mean, at least it's not dog food. I love how they end this sequence with a sound effect that kind of makes you want to write them a letter gently pointing out that "rat" is not short for "rattlesnake." Rats -- tch-tch-tch-tch-tch!
As they're all settling in, night-vision Gregg says to night-vision Tom that he loves the new camp. Tom seems surprised, and Caryn takes the opportunity to suck on a big lemon and, although no one asked her, throw in the opinion that she doesn't think there could be an island worse than this. You know, whatever the opposite of knocking on wood is, that's what she just did. Caryn interviews that choosing to come to the new island was a mistake now illuminated by the wisdom of the ages, or "day," and it was a "quick decision" they didn't think through. Of course, you couldn't really think it through, since it's just a gamble of the Let's Make A Deal variety. Old camp, new camp, might be better off, might be worse off...probably doesn't matter. Furthermore, when they made the decision, they had flint, so it seemed like they'd be able to make fire, and if they had fire at the new place, Caryn wouldn't be nearly so grumpy, I guarantee. Nobody can be grumpy when she's toasting imaginary marshmallows and drinking some delicious boiled water that is, like, 85% sure not to contain plague.
Anyway, kind of missing the fact that she's harping on something nobody can do anything about now, Caryn calls out Tom for taking the "let's have a new adventure!" approach, and clearly holds him responsible for the decision to change camps. She calls this a "rash choice" that could have long-term consequences for all of them, blah blah blah. I would venture to say right now that the likelihood of that decision's having long-term consequences is somewhere around zero. Caryn actually confronts Tom in the fire-free darkness, claiming that Willard called for a vote but Tom jumped in with his "adventure" thing. It's like Caryn thinks Willard is the old pharmacist that everyone in Pottersville makes fun of and writes off as a crazy old coot and sprays with seltzer, and I don't think that's going to fly. And neither does Tom, who protests that he originally wanted to stay as well, but heard people calling for a change of island before he said anything, so he went along. It's hard to tell from the edited tape what might have been said, but what you can tell is that, certainly, nobody spoke up to say that they wanted to stay, including Caryn. People who sit on their behinds and let other people lead so that they can blame others later if it goes bad get no sympathy from me. Besides, the decision is in the past. Caryn tries to pass it off as a constructive discussion and not just a bitchfest when she endeavors to extract agreement from Tom that they should always vote on everything. It's like she's setting up future Rules of Engagement, which is a little bit of a crybaby move in a game like this. I mean, she could have just said, "I think we should stay." Probst has a way of putting teams to snap decisions, and feminist process is for babies. If Caryn wants input, time, Caryn should try talking. And what's even worse is that she proceeds to act out what taking a vote means, like she's the only person who can properly explain what constitutes "raising" your "hand." Shut up, Caryn. Is that the first "shut up" of the season? Oh, warm fuzzies!
Unsurprisingly, Caryn isn't doing herself any favors in the group dynamic, as we learn when Katie gives an interview in which she says that Caryn can't shut her yap about the fact that the island they're on is horrible and sucks and they shouldn't have moved there, blah dee blah. What's awesome is that, then, a storm hits, and I guess Caryn would probably claim that it wouldn't be raining if they had stayed on their old island. Instead of this dumb island, which has weather. Katie goes on to say that the majority wanted to change camps, and that if it was the wrong decision, there's nothing to do but get over it. Which is true. Everyone hunkers down against the rain, using palm fronds as umbrellas, which works about as well as you would think. Overall, though, I'm really not sure what's supposed to be so much worse about this island than the other one, aside from the fact that they don't have a shelter yet -- which they can, after all, rectify. It's not like they left garment bags packed with diamonds and Cheez-Its back at the Palau Hilton.
The sun rises on Day 4, and we are at Ulong, where Jeff and Kim are snuggling in the smelly manner that so many of the young-n-sweaties seem to think is romantic. Stephenie wades into the water to cleanse herself in soapless futility as she voices over that she thinks Ulong did just the right thing in getting rid of Jolanda. She even thinks the tribe is in agreement on this point. Aw, unity! Nothing brings people together, after all, like the homey aroma of roasted scapegoat. Jeff and Kim stir, undoubtedly pondering whether it's too early in the relationship to reveal what their real morning breath is like, not yet aware that, at best, theirs will be a romance forged in filth for all eternity. James interviews that the tribe feels much less loaded down with bossiness now that it doesn't contain Jolanda. Which is...too bad, but true. "We're not going to follow a leader," he declares. And then there's an awesome cut to the entire team standing around on the beach, just about ready to start their day. And somebody says, "So what should we do?" And then they all stand there in a circle, looking at each other. It is silent. Ashlee looks at the sky, as if waiting for a shooting star, or a weather balloon, or a cyclone-flung cow. I get up and go make a phone call to send flowers to the editing team, and when I get back, everyone is still standing around. Finally, a male voice says, and I am quoting directly here, "Wake up first." Everyone agrees, which they communicate via the ancient tribal language of nodding. Good one! Okay, you're all awake, so you're done with that. Now what? The group appears to be stumped. Again! Already! This could be a long month for them. James emphasizes in his lying-in-a-tree-terview that because the team is made up of Americans (dammit), they're going to have a democracy, not a Jolandocracy. And they'll have a giant gap between rich and poor, and they'll consume much more than their share of natural resources. Take that, jungle! Nyah!
Ulong goes to pick up its treemail, which will be stumpmail this season, apparently. When they read the clue, it says, "Keep on your toes while making this run; your rivals will seek to spoil your fun; You'll too have the chance to spoil their mood; stay out of the water, and you may catch more food." I'm sorry, "You'll too have the chance"? Thanks, treemail-writers. The International Society Of Hari-Kari-Committing Copy Editors just called to thank you for providing material for the spring banquet. They occasionally lack motivation, but not this year. Angie reacts to the stumpmail by saying, I think, that she anticipates that the challenge will require them to "fight people," although I originally thought she said "bite people," which would have been awesome. I mean, that's a challenge they've never done, so...heads-up, challenge producers! Angie interviews that she's "not sure of [her] game plan," given that she knows she received votes at the last tribal council, so she's trying to be a "valuable asset." I feel so bad for saying this, but I would find Angie a more valuable asset if she hadn't picked quite such a teeny bathing suit. She is not fat, but this suit is like the Ultra White-Thigh Pointer-Outer. Not a good choice. Boy shorts, I would say, would have been the way to go. And...I'm thinking she's not waxing, and even that makes me uneasy, you know? Anyway, not that the modesty lies down with the tattoos all that often. ["Given that they had to start in the clothes on their backs, I'm betting that's not a bathing suit at all, but her bra and panties, so...yeah." -- Wing Chun] Angie works on sealing her own fate some more by claiming that she's likely to be up for elimination soon. And at this rate, she will be.
The teams approach the challenge beach. They line up on their mats, and Koror sees that Ulong got rid of Jolanda. Probst asks Koror how the fire they won is working out, because he totally has noooooo idea what happened. He's a babe in the woods, except that he's not a babe, and it's the jungle. Katie breaks the news to everyone that it's not working great. "We capsized yesterday," she says, to a head-flop from a mock-surprised Probst. (I hate that he wears Survivor hats, incidentally. Bands performing in their own shirts, blah blah blah.) Ian reports that, indeed, the flint, it is kaput for the moment. This causes no end of grinning for Jeff, because I have a feeling he's pretty much an asshole, and even if this didn't benefit his team at all, he would still think it was awesome, just because the other team losing something they won is so funny. Ha ha ha! Also funny? Wedgies. Ian vows that although Ulong has the right to gloat, Koror will find the flint. He refers to Koror as "the Bad News Bears," meaning that they may make many sequels before giving it up already.
And now for today's challenge. It's an obstacle course involving a rope swing, a run on floating barrels, a balance beam, a "wobbly bridge" (whatever, let's not get political), and a rope bridge. Then you grab a flag and come back the same way. Oh, and the other team will have people trying to hit you with big sandbags swinging from ropes as you're running. Fun! It's like gym class, if they had given rocks to the popular kids. And everyone you assign to run the course has at least to make it over the rope swing once, so none of this punking out and doing nothing so that your fast person can go over and over again. And the reward this week? Well, you've waited for it, you've wanted it...it's the Castaway Fishing Experience. The spear! The snorkel! The fins! Everything you need to make like Rupert, only with (I hope!) fewer delusions of grandeur. Jeff also reports that if Ulong wins, it will get fire. It seems kind of unfair to me that if you win fire and you lose it in an accident, you can't win it again. I feel like the opportunity to win fire should persist until you don't need it anymore. But anyway. I don't want to get too exercised about justice and reality shows. Anyway, this news makes James yell, "You da man!" to Probst, which is kind of funny, because...I mean, you'd expect him to say "You da spittlin' rooster's mama!" or something more colorful like that.
Koror sends Tom and Gregg off to be in charge of swinging the heavy bags. Guys who are strong, but not necessarily all that agile -- might be the right call. Ulong does the same thing, sending Jeff and Ibrehem to the bags. Koror is told that they'll have to sit somebody out, and they choose Willard. And now, for reward, "Survivors ready...go!"
James and Coby beat the rope swing, and James scampers across the barrels and the balance beam, even fending off a flying bag. Coby goes muuuuch more slowly. James finishes the bridges and gets to the flags, so he's kind of off to a flying start. As he heads back, Coby falls off the course into the water. And then worst of all, James and his flag are almost back to the starting line when they fall into the water, so Ulong isn't getting that flag, either. Both teams are empty so far. Ian and Bobby Jon go , and the highlight is where Bobby Jon gets hit by a bag and yells, like a complete spaz, "GET THAT BAG OFF ME!" He's all angry at the bag. Oooh, irrational rage at inanimate objects and the vague suggestion of an unquiet mind. I'll tell you right now, Bobby Jon gets all the pieces of self-loathing ass he can handle. He and Ian both make it to the flags. But Ian loses his concentration awaiting a bag from Jeff that never comes, and he falls off anyway. Booo! Bobby Jon does an admirable job of trying to survive a fall on the rolling barrels, but he just can't stay there hugging and rolling forever (snerk), so he eventually falls in as well. And he roars again, looking up at the sky like a crazy man, rar! So...not off to a great start here. Katie attempts to go for Koror, but can't handle the rope swing, even. She has to complete it, too, because they can't win unless everybody gets across the rope swing at least once.
And this is where Sad, Sad Tattoo Girl sees her opportunity emerge. Angie swings across on the rope bridge, and then she follows the only method of making it across this course that's really going to work, which is a little something called Skitter and Pray. You skitter, and you pray. And also, the guys throwing the bags feel a tiny bit sorry for you, I think, and maybe subconsciously try slightly less hard to pulverize you like you're a ripe melon. Angie makes it all the way to the flag, as Katie struggles with the rope swing. Angie eventually dodges a couple of bags that come on the way back as Tom and Gregg figure out that they're about to be in big trouble, but then she actually manages to make it back to her team. With their first flag! Ashlee goes for Ulong, and...Katie's down on the rope swing again. She just...it's like the rope gets five feet longer when she's the one hanging from it. She's hitting the platform with her knees, y'all. ["That would be me: decent upper-body strength, no co-ordination." -- Wing Chun]
Elsewhere, Ashlee, with her enormous fake boobs looking very conspicuous in that top (sorry, it's true), gets a flag and heads back. Ashlee finishes the course. Ulong up 2-0. Katie? Well, as Stephenie starts across the course, Katie finally gets some advice from Willard to keep her knees pulled up longer, and on some of these, it's clear that that wasn't the problem, but the advice appears to help, because Katie does finally get across on the swing, thank God. Stephenie is on her way back already, though. Ulong takes a 3-0 lead when she lands. to go for Ulong is Kim. Katie tries very hard for her team, but Kim tears right by her. As Katie stands, panting and wondering how she's going to get back with this flag, Ian calls out to her that if she's too tired, she should quit so somebody else can go.
Meanwhile, Angie swings out onto the course for Ulong again after Kim returns with its fourth flag. Katie decides that quitting is the better part of valor and throws herself in the water. Janu goes out for Koror. Oh, and here's Angie with Ulong's fifth flag. Currently a 5-0 lead for the previously suck-ass Ulong tribe. "Angie, you frickin' rock," someone (Steph, maybe) calls out, providing a balm for Angie's tortured, puny soul.
Ashlee is on the course again for Ulong, and Janu is still working her way back, now with Koror's first flag in her hot little hand. She finally swings back to put them on the board as Ashlee continues back. She makes it, so it's 6-1 Ulong. Jen is up for Koror, and James for Ulong. James makes it, then Jen, so it's 7-2 Ulong. Caryn makes it about two steps across the course before falling off the barrels, so that will do it for her. Good one, genius. Maybe if you had taken a vote. As Tom tries really, really hard to use a bag to kill Bobby Jon, who followed James, Ian scampers out, and he's very agile, but honestly, he's a humongous target and, with great frustration, he gets knocked off by a well-timed flying bag again. In my favorite moment, Coby decides to center his chi before he goes, so he's doing a meditative moment with a huge helping of Just Jack, standing on the platform thinking, "I will BE the barrels...." This gets him a whole two steps before he falls off. Way to go, Eastern philosophy. Bobby Jon starts back, as Janu starts out again for Koror. When he gets back with a flag for Ulong, Bobby Jon is so excited that he does a sort of...freak-out ooga-mooga dance in which he, among other things, vibrates and pounds on himself. No, seriously. It's kind of a gorilla thing. That there's a crazy man. So now, Ulong is up 8-2. Janu drags herself toward a flag, as Stephenie energetically bolts out onto the course. She almost falls off, but doesn't. Janu and Stephenie both make it back safely with flags, so it's 9-3 Ulong. Kim is out on the course trying to get Ulong's last flag, as Ian goes out again for Koror. They both get flags. They both head back. Weirdly, however, when Ian gets back to the start, his landing from the rope swing isn't quite firm enough, and he can't hang onto it and falls off anyway. But it doesn't really matter, because here comes Kim, and she has Ulong's tenth flag, and that will do it. Koror is depressed.
Probst congratulates Ulong on its victory and throws its flint over. In a great moment, Kim reaches over and impulsively grabs Angie's face and kisses her on the cheek, which is nice only because you know how much Angie needed it, and even when people shouldn't be so goddamn needy, once they are, it's nice to see them at least get a rescue. It's even better when Ibrehem reaches up from the back row and tousles Angie's hair. She is in heeeeeaven. You know at the end of Lucas, when he finds the jacket in his locker? It's like that, only without all the unrealistically rhythmic clapping and the concussion. (That we know of.) Probst tells Koror that he's thinking it would be a good time to go home and look for the flint box they lost. They agree. Everyone wanders off, either dejected or happy, depending on whether they won or lost. I think I need a macro for that.
We find Ulong canoeing toward its beach in the outrigger. They pull up to shore and hop out, still high from the accomplishment and thinking about catching some fish, making a fire, and having, as Jeff puts it, "some protein." Ashlee congratulates Angie, slapping her on the ass and everything, so you know it's really heartfelt. Ashlee points out that Angie motivated everyone on the team. Angie interviews that she "needed this so badly," and...well, we noticed. And then we see Bobby Jon hugging Angie, and it's like Angie is totally the Quarterback Princess. Bobby Jon then interviews that he "judged Angie way too quickly." He gives her credit for having "dominated" the challenge, which...not really. I mean, she got two. So did some other people. She did go first, and that was cool, but the idea that Angie somehow took over that challenge the way Boston Rob used to for his team or whatever...just, not really, it didn't seem. Anyway, he thinks that Angie's heroics "changed the whole morale" of Ulong. Really? The whole morale?
Flint makes you light fires! So now Ulong has a little fire going, and they're so excited they can hardly stand it. "I love fire," James mock-sobs. Jeff says that as soon as they got the fire started, he wanted to go and catch some fish. Or maybe "explore and see what's all around us." In other words, "hang out, kind of like I would do at home, only without my shirt on, and with TV cameras." He pursues spear-fishing, and he catches what I literally think is the smallest fish I've ever seen caught on this show. He explains that he "didn't get a lot, but [he] got enough so that everybody could have a couple of pinches of protein." "Pinches"? Yeah, thanks, Dr. Atkins. stop: ketosis! Apparently, Jeff doesn't think his three-inch fish is going to feed the hungry tribe, because he goes and captures a helpless clam, which is great prey, because it is defenseless. You can see the clam down there like, "Oh, SURE, it's because I can't move, right? Is this because I can't move?" (Or, as Law & Order would say, "Is this because I'm a bivalve?") Jeff adds that he's really glad Koror doesn't have its flint, and he hopes they don't find it. He's a little assy, in case you haven't noticed yet.
Maybe just to spite Jeff, Koror is out looking for that flint. (That would be reason enough for me.) They have to start, of course, by figuring out where they even were when they lost it, so right now, it's hunting for a...flint in a waterstack, or something. Ian slips off the back of the canoe and dives. As Tom explains, however, they went out at a terrible time, and while they were waiting for Ian to resurface, they had to paddle like hell just to stay stationary, because the current was enormously cruel. On shore, lazy-asses Coby and Caryn kibitz that the people in the boat aren't in the right place. They're pretty sure it was more that way. They think the canoe should be over this way. And...shut up and drink your coconut, Caryn. Suddenly, out in the water, Ian announces that he sees the box on the bottom. He dives. He voices over that it was the strongest current he'd ever dealt with, and the box was under about twenty-five feet of water. Which is a lot. He also points out that the box was very difficult to move off the bottom for various reasons, and that the entire project became more difficult as he got more tired. He kind of hints that he thought he might drown, but I think he's just trying to scare me. Don't die, Ian! I like you; you are nerdy. We see him dive for the bottom, and when he comes up this time, he says that he "got it," meaning that he has hooked a rope around the box that they can use to pull it up. He gets the boat to come to him, and then he gets up in it and Tom gets in the water, and together, they haul the box off the bottom and up into the boat. And...good show, kids. A lesser team might have declared it a lost cause, I think, especially since they didn't even know exactly where to look. Ian talks about how great it was to finish that project -- "like running a marathon and winning first place." Frankly, in circumstances that tend to make people overly cranked anyway, I don't doubt it. The overjoyed team brings the box back to shore, where Ian and Katie share a huge hug. They are best pals, you can tell. Ian tells Tom, with a sort of a "what the fuck?" laugh, that it is one of the happiest moments of his life. You can tell he thinks that's kind of stupid of him, which is healthy. They do recover the flint and steel from the box, and they do start a fire. They agree that it was "a good day, a good day."
Elsewhere, Ulong is eating its giant clam. (I don't even know what that would be a euphemism for, but in this case, it isn't one.) Stephenie reminds us that this nighttime feast is the first time they've had water, food, and fire for four days. She declares everyone "ready to chow down." Well, almost everyone. The clam is eaten. Seaweed is eaten. And then people get a little creeped out, because Ashlee declares that she is...not hungry. No, really. "Not hungry." The team tries to get her to eat, but she doesn't want to, and Jeff expresses in an interview that this is of some concern, because he believes that the team needs to stay strong, and he doesn't want some weakling "bringing down our team." Bobby Jon notes that Ashlee just disappeared into the shelter and went to sleep, and he goes on to make vague statements about how that might have been a mistake, because there was this fire, and people were sitting around it, and folks do get voted off, after all. He has a way of making everything seem like a vague threat of a beating, even when he seems to be talking to himself.
And then everyone wanders off to sleep, and we get our obligatory night-vision footage of the snugglefest going on between Jeff and Kim. Angie interviews that Kim might be playing him, but that she's not sure. She wonders, understandably, about whether there's an alliance there. Really don't think the snuggling is very smart. Boston Rob and Amber got away with it; they will probably be the last to do so.
The day, Angie and Kim (I think) retrieve the treemail, which includes a military mess kit and a sheet with a Morse code alphabet on it. And in Morse code at the bottom, they figure out that it says, "Learn this." So they head back to camp, determined to "learn this." They immediately decide to split up the alphabet so that each person only has to learn three or four letters. So basically, they're banking on the fact that they will all be together when they use it, and that it won't be a situation where, for instance, each person has to execute a maneuver requiring them to know the alphabet. It's pretty risky, and given that they have literally nothing else to do, it seems like they could have learned, or at least tried to learn, a little bit more of the twenty-six-letter alphabet per person in the time they had. We watch them all quiz each other off their little flash cards. Bobby Jon explains that they got a real boost from the reward challenge victory, but now they need to win the immunity challenge. And also, he will whup your ass.
The teams arrive at a challenge beach, and Probst takes the coconut monkey back from Koror, making him "up for grabs" again. (The monkey, not Probst, although that would have been funny.) (Probst, not the monkey, because monkeys? Never funny.) Probst reminds them that he hopes they learned their Morse code like they were supposed to. He then explains the challenge. The team will swim out to a platform and then dive down ten feet to a rope that's threaded through a weighted barrel and then extends fifty feet to a foot locker. In other words, the barrel keeps the rope running along the bottom. While underwater, you pull the rope through the barrel, dragging the foot locker. Basically, you do this by bracing your feet against the barrel and pulling as hard as you can -- getting the idea? Every ten feet you move the foot locker, a marker will pop up showing how far you have left to go. When you finally retrieve the foot locker, you open it, and eight mess kits will float up out of it. You unclip the eight mess kits and bring them to shore. Each of them has a Morse code letter on it. You arrange them to make a word, and then you're done. Koror sits Katie for this particular challenge. And..."Survivors ready..." Oh, shut up, Probst. They're not that ready, but they're going anyway.
The teams swim out, being reminded that all eight of your members who are playing have to make it out to the pontoon before you can dive. Willard lags a little for Koror, and Ulong gets to dive first. Jeff drags the foot locker for Ulong while Willard is still getting to his team. Stephanie heads down and pulls as Willard finally arrives and Koror is free to go. Coby and Tom both dive. Ulong pops its forty-foot marker. Tom, the stud, apparently pulls the thing ten feet on his first shot and single-handedly gets them caught up. Angie and then James flame out for Ulong as Ian and Tom head down for Koror. Koror seems to have concluded that two people pulling is better than one, because they're sort of sending down teams. Teams consisting, pretty much, of "Tom and someone." And Tom and Ian pull the thing another ten feet, and their thirty-foot marker pops up. Ashlee heads down for Ulong, and she does nothing. Conspicuously not heading underwater, incidentally, is Kim. Tom heads down again for Koror, and their twenty-foot marker pops up. Jeff and Ibrehem go down, but I'm not sure they've really figured out how to do the bracing with their feet, because they don't get much accomplished, and they certainly seem strong enough to drag the thing, so I don't know. Tom keeps pulling, and their ten-foot marker comes up. This challenge certainly is all about Tom, and I am all about challenges that are all about Tom. Stephenie heads down for Ulong again. She is trying her hardest. For a chick who opened on a note of stupidity last week, I'm starting to kind of like her. Ian goes down for Koror and pops the last buoy, so they're ready to open their trunk and go. Ian goes down and opens the locker, and the mess kits come up. They unclip the kits and head in, as Ulong keeps trying to pull, apparently just not having the strength or the...whatever...to move the thing. They either are huge weenies, or they never figured out how to pull that rope properly.
Koror swims to shore. Ulong struggles in futility. On the beach, Koror shuffles the mess-kit letters, and before long, it figures out that the word is, unsurprisingly..."immunity." Which Koror wins, meaning that Ulong is going to tribal council again. Stephenie slaps the water. Ulong dog-paddles around in despair. As it sort of should, because that display was sad. Koror is getting the coconut monkey. Ulong is warned that it will be heading for tribal council. Pat the monkey! Love the monkey! Because as you all know, out here on the island, the monkey represents life.
As Ulong paddles home, Ashlee insightfully interviews that when they lost the challenge, "everybody was sooooo disappointed." Thanks, Ashlee! Moreover, they realized that it had been raining, and she says that in fact, their first priority was making sure that their fire didn't burn out. When they return, they find that in fact, much of the fire has gone out, but as Ashlee explains, they were able to scoop up the hot coals that were left and rush them, ER-patient-style, to a cave. It's all Code Glow and shit. In the cave, a bunch of little campers discuss whether to sit in the cave or go back to camp, and Angie, James, and Stephenie wind up staying at the cave. They have a quiet chat in which Angie says she's told Ashlee she's up for an alliance, because she's so grateful that she wasn't booted last week. Kim's tepid performance at the immunity challenge is brought up, and James announces that, indeed, "it is time for her to go." He interviews that Kim didn't exactly rush to help the team to pull the foot locker across the bottom of the ocean, and she's fully cooked, as far as he's concerned. "Kim is gawn," he announces. "Oh, yeah, fer shurr." And then he leans back on his tree with his arms behind his head, so you know he's probably right. When has anyone on this show sat back and relaxed and not had things go according to plan, after all?
James has a chat with Jeff in which he calls Jeff on being "attracted to Kim" ("James" is Palauian, interestingly enough, for "observant"), and says that Kim is "a threat." Um. A threat? And -- you're going to love this -- James claims that Kim is a threat "psychologically and sociologically." Yes, Kim is a sociological threat. Like TiVo, or the cotton gin. Jeff stammers out that he, on the other hand, is thinking Ashlee should go. So to review, surprisingly enough, Jeff doesn't think that the girl he's been sleeping with should be booted. Go figure. Jeff insists that he can see that Ashlee is "breaking down." Despite the fact, I guess, that she helped win the balance challenge and at least tried to dive in the immunity challenge, unlike...Kim, for instance, who apparently requires no breakdown, because she simply floats around looking pretty. Jeff then interviews that James is irritating him, because he has no right to approach Jeff and say that it should be Kim rather than Ashlee. Jeff again claims that "Ashlee has kind of changed her frame of mind," and it would appear that in neither her old nor her new frame of mind has she been inclined to sleep with Jeff, so she is probably doomed for that reason if no other. "At this point, let's vote off our weakest link," he implores us, the viewers, rather uselessly. And I'm calling bullshit on anybody being the weakest link besides the person who chooses not even to try for the length of an entire challenge. You would think that even if she knew she couldn't dive very far, she would have felt obligated to make a show of it or something.
Bobby Jon and Stephenie go for a walk on the beach as the ominous surf pounds, and Bobby Jon advocates the booting of Ashlee. He interviews that Kim and Ashlee are "about right here," making the even-Steven, balanced-scales motion with his hands. As a result, he says that it's a matter of going with "gut instinct." Out in the water, Stephenie makes the entirely valid point that there's a good and substantive reason to choose Kim, and that's to break up a Jeff/Kim coupling before it even can get started. But Bobby Jon, never having seen the show before, doesn't understand how a two-person alliance is that big a deal. Steph seems to make the point that the alliance already seems relevant, in that Kim was so confident that she wouldn't be booted that she didn't make any effort at the challenge and, as stated above, exactly. Steph interviews that the current status is that she, James, Angie, and Ashlee still want to boot Kim, and Bobby Jon is "undecided." He doesn't seem undecided to me. But anyway, she knows that the other three people (Jeff, Kim, and Ibrehem, apparently) want to vote for Ashlee, so now it looks like it might be a tie if Bobby Jon goes with the other folks.
Stephenie and Kim take a walk, and Kim asks what Stephenie's plan is. Stephenie claims not to know, but Kim's all over it, and asks if she's the one going. Steph says plainly that it's her or Ashlee. "Really?" Kim asks. "Who said me?" Steph hesitates. "It's like the consensus," she says, using "consensus" in the less common sense of "opinion of part of the sharply divided group." Kim, in an interview, gears up for a round of the totally weird speech somebody gives every now and then about how in order to earn her "respect," people have to tell her in advance if they're voting for her. I just don't understand that at all, let alone what it has to do with respect. It's a game, isn't it? Why do they have to tell her? They're kind of already screwing her. Kim carries this philosophy to a conversation with James in which she argues that she doesn't deserve to be booted and demands that if he's going to vote against her, he tell her before they go to tribal council. He promises. And then he gives her the wink, the tongue click, and the finger gun. Wow. That's all three elements of Baby, I Would Never Lie To You, Except About Whatever We're Talking About Right Now, Because I Would Totally Lie About That.
Elsewhere, Steph gives the bad news to Ashlee that it kind of looks like it might be her, too. But Steph does at least claim that she thinks this isn't smart, as Angie looks at the ground. Steph warns the other two women that if there's an alliance between the four currently holding to boot Ashlee, then if the rest don't make a stand this week, they'll just be booted one by one. Angie, in an interview, predicts a tie. And here goes the tribe, off to tribal council.
When they're all settled, Probst claims that they're all "very subdued." But first, he wants to talk to Angie about her "amazing turnaround" after her crap of last week, resulting in her reward-challenge performance of this week. He asks her whether she thinks there was "an impact with the tribe," in that her stock rose somewhat. She hopes so, and adds that she's not sure where the perception that she was a "a physical weak link" came from, but she thinks it isn't true. Probst reminds the team that the good news is that they won reward. But then, of course...the immunity challenge. Probst asks Kim how the team took the loss. She says that the reaction was "total devastation." Well, one would hope not. You have to save something for natural disasters and the cancellation of sci-fi shows of which you are a fan. Kim claims that she was unprepared for the bonds that would form between herself and other people. (Chicka-bamp!) Ashlee smiles knowingly. "We rely on each other so much," Kim whimpers. Angie rolls her eyes broadly. Snerk. From self-pitying isolation to confident eye-rolling in three days!
Probst gets all nosy as usual, asking Jeff whether he has any friendships or "flirting" going on. Jeff says that, to no one's surprise, he and Kim have gotten to know each other a bit. Probst asks Kim when she first became aware that she was attracted to Jeff. First she fans herself, claiming "it's hot in here all of a sudden." From that? From being asked when she was attracted to him? Amateur. Girl couldn't banter to save her life. Kim then gives up that, from day one, Jeff was staying up and she couldn't sleep, and the rest is history. And probably really boring history, too, so why even get into it? Probst asks Steph whether she's noticed what's going on between Jeff and Kim, and Steph's like, "Duh." But she covers it well by just saying diplomatically that "they hang out a lot" and "they cuddle." James puts in a more ominous "We've all noticed." Jeff then tries to make the claim that it's really a practical advantage to have someone sleeping with you when you're cold. Mm-hmm. You're one pragmatic young man, Jeff! Probst tells Jeff that that's all well and good, but points out that whether he and Kim are really becoming a couple or not, if they're perceived as one, that will be bad for him. Jeff claims that everyone knows there's no alliance between himself and Kim. Steph does not look like she knows. Nor does James, judging from his incredulous scrunchy-face. Kim repeats the absurd claim that this wouldn't change anything, but the problem is that if she wanted to sell that, it would be very important not to give the impression of resting on her laurels by, for instance, failing to move her ass in an immunity challenge. Probst asks her if it had ever occurred to her that anyone might interpret her thing with Jeff as threatening, and she giggles, "Not until now." So I guess she's never seen the show either.
Probst asks James what the basis will be for his vote. "Ah got ma mind made up," James says, not answering the question. He does add that it's a person who "can't hang with the rest of us." So, inability to hang, then, is about to seal someone's fate.
Time to vote. Steph votes. Ashlee votes. Ibrehem votes Kim, surprisingly enough, saying that he feels like he has to be loyal to Ashlee because she picked him for the tribe. Now why, then, weren't there five votes to boot Kim without any help from Bobby Jon or Jeff? Why didn't Ibrehem, Angie, Steph, James, and Ashlee just get rid of Kim? Oy. I wonder if it was lack of communication, that tricky devil. Angie votes. Kim votes. Jeff votes for Ashlee. "I'm a man of my word. Plus, you just bug the hell out of me," he says, rather gratuitously under the circumstances. I get the feeling he is a major dick and will be revealed to be more and more so over the course of however long he is around. We'll just see if I turn out to be right. I can usually sniff out jerkitude with pinpoint accuracy, although my usual method of being enormously attracted to the jerk is admittedly not the method I am using here, so my powers of prognostication may be impaired. James votes. Bobby Jon votes. And now, it is time for Probst to fetch the urn.
When Probst returns, the first vote is for Kim. The second vote is for Ashlee. The third vote is for Jeff, which makes him make a face. Then Ashlee, Ashlee, and Ashlee, and that will do it. Kim makes a face like she's sorry, which she isn't. Probst snuffs Ashlee, and she leaves. Probst says that he thinks the tribe is tight, but he advises them to "get a clear goal." Like winning! That would be a goal. They all walk off.
And really, does anyone care whether Ashlee or Kim got voted off? No. Because there is too much cannon fodder, because there were too many contestants, because the show is hopelessly overblown right now. Booooo. Furthermore, I hate to pick on the way the show is assembled, because it's usually impeccably made, but it's always weird when, in order to preserve suspense over the booting, they conceal the entire sequence in which a bunch of people change their votes. Why did everybody who was going to vote for Kim decide to vote for Ashlee? They didn't give really a hint of why Steph would have changed her vote, or what their plan is if they hand over power to a foursome of Jeff, Kim, Ibrehem, and Bobby Jon. I walked away confused, and I hate that.
In her exit interview, Ashlee kind of sniffles that she doesn't mind leaving that much, and that she thinks her tribe could tell. I sure wish we knew whether, by chance, she gave that information up to anyone.