Just when Iron Steph looks like she might be on the verge of breaking (okay, she's already there), she gets the treemail she's been waiting for, telling her that it's time to head for Koror. There, she is adopted as a Kororian, so there is not so much a merge as there is an acquisition. Immediately, the maneuvering to bring her into some alliance or other begins, but Coby decides that for him, "maneuvering" will take the form of telling Steph everything he knows, up to and including his double-secret alliance with Gregg and Anonymous Jen, which his arch rivals Tom and Ian actually sort of know about, but anyway. Steph is relieved to hear from Tom that Tom, Ian, and Katie are still up for an F4 with Steph, and she seems less than receptive to Coby's overtures. At a pole-standing immunity challenge, Steph frankly shocks me by jumping off her post for a pizza, which I suppose means (1) she was outrageously hungry, and (2) she knew who was going home. At tribal council, Coby -- who jumped down from his post right off the bat when offered a couple of donuts -- takes a 7-2 beating and gets snuffed. Y'all, I'm not sure he had the game quite as thoroughly knocked as he thought.
Previously on Like A Loss To A Flame: Steph and Bobby Jon were a desperate little Ulong tribe of two. When they were out-eaten at a duckling-off, they lost out on a cleanliness reward that Koror took home. Tom pressed for water conservation, much to the annoyance of Anonymous Jen, who wanted a shower, the better to canoodle with Studly Gregg, the Non-Romantic Yutz Who Is Getting Action Anyway. Yet another puzzle challenge left Steph and Bobby Jon baffled, and Koror took the immunity monkey again. Doomed to a deadlocked vote, Steph and Bobby Jon played a fire-building challenge for survival, and when Steph came up with the incredibly tricky strategy of blowing on the fire, she took home the victory and Bobby Jon was rather heartbreakingly sent home. Stephenie headed back to camp and wondered exactly what it would be like to be on her own at the Camp of Great Suffering. Nine people are left. What in the hell can happen to Stephenie now?
Moon. Ulong, Night 21. A lone crab wanders out of frame at the request of the producers, who want as much of a sense of isolation as possible to greet Steph upon her return. And here she comes, with her paddle and her stuff. She tells us that being the last surviving member of her tribe is "exciting," but also "scary." She is alone, and her first thought is to check on the fire she and Bobby Jon left behind. She finds that it is still glowing, so she goes in search of the palm branches she knows are lying around. She trips in the dark. A rat munches on something nearby. Let's see, if that's pestilence, and the end of Bobby Jon was death, and the whole theme has been the military, and she's already done famine...she's completed the circuit! Hooray! Steph gathers up some fronds and starts to tear them up as she voices over that everything she knows about starting and tending fires, she learned from Bobby Jon. Which makes her victory over him a little ironic, and she doesn't even successfully identify it as such, meaning that once again, the word "irony" has suffered a blow, percentage-wise. Steph further explains that she's not sure it's a good idea for her to even fall asleep, because she's afraid of losing the fire, which scares her. She settles in under what looks like some kind of a thin blanket as she reiterates that it's scary being on her own in camp. "I'll never give up," she says as she stares from her makeshift bed up at the sky.
Morning comes to Ulong, and it is now Day 22, and Steph is on her own. She walks over to the tree where Ulong has been making hash marks to count off the days, and she notes that she's up to 22. "Twenty-two down, seventeen to go," she says." Sigh. We watch as she hacks a coconut with the machete. She calls being on the island alone "a huge shock," and she forces the coconut open. As she munches on it, she explains to us that she's been driven to wonder whether she can take care of herself in camp without anybody else there, what with the food and water and fire she has to think about. "I feel like I'm going to, like, starve to death," she comments. She stares out at the water and briefly sees a vision of a surfing pizza. Sadly, it is just a mirage.
And now, it's time to visit Camp Koror on Day 22, and a shot of Coby brushing his teeth with Colgate Total With Ennui, the better to emphasize the difference in conditions. And, I guess, the better to display Coby's mouth to what I'm sure are his six to eight loyal fans. Ian, meanwhile, counts off some little...fruits or something, and he distributes them in cups to the members of the tribe. Koror appears to be suffering, indeed -- in this case, from a lack of flatware. Brutal, these conditions! Ian interviews that the team is "getting skinnier," not that it shows all that much. He then comments that he thinks members of the team get "lethargic" because they're kind of being "drug down by each other." Heh. He goes on to show what are basically his first negative feelings toward anyone in the entire thing: "Coby and Janu have been pains in the asses for the past three or four days. Janu does nothing. She lays in the hammock all day. She's like the dysfunctional aunt who lives in the attic. [Hee.] Coby got, kind of, this attitude to him, and really has become the pouter of the tribe, and it's really getting annoying."
We watch as, out in the water, Coby washes Caryn's hair. I guess if I were on a tribe with a hairstylist, I'd let him wash my hair, although I have to think I would also be capable of washing it myself, especially if it were as short as Caryn's. Coby complains to her, monopolizing the conversation as the worst hairdressers do, that he's "sick of the tribe," and that he's sick of the way everyone gets so excited when Ian or Tom brings them food. Yeah, that is a pretty silly thing to be grateful for, I guess. Who needs to eat, after all? I bet Coby doesn't touch the food Ian and Tom bring back, just in order to make this very point. I bet he's on some sort of a point-proving hunger strike. Oh, he also complains about how everyone in the tribe "sat on their ass for 20 days," so apparently there's now just one communal tribal ass upon which the entire group rests in order to avoid work. We watch Janu, lying in the hammock (known as "the ass") as usual and taking a sniff of a lily or something. How romantic. Dreaming of her beloved, I assume. Or of a ham sandwich. Anyway, Coby allows that there are exceptions -- people who have done work, by which he means himself and Caryn, I suppose. And then, rather hilariously, he says that as of Day 22, he's not carrying these people anymore, and they can run out of food and firewood. Yeah, I suspect that's exactly what will happen. Because nobody does any work except for Coby. Please.
Coby offers an interview in which he says that he's "cranky and everybody knows it," so he's trying to "control [his] temper." It's really not his temper, of course. It's his whining that's the issue. He tells us that he's going to sit right out in the water for a while so that he doesn't have to see the guys back at camp who are looking at their fishhooks and thinking about fishing. Because that is sooooo stupid. He bitches about how they're "daydreaming" -- since Tom and Ian never bring in any actual food, as we know. I mean, other than the shark. And the clams. And the snakes. But other than that!
Over at Ulong, Steph takes out the outrigger and goes underwater, trying to nab herself some food. She doesn't see any fish, though, or any clams, so she's thinking it's back to coconut. , we watch her throwing a coconut up at the top of a palm tree, trying to knock down some of the others that are growing up there. No dice. "I have to get them somehow," she mutters to nobody in particular. I would have liked it if she had invented an invisible tribe member to talk to. Like Harvey. Harvey the giant invisible Ulong member. That would have kept her entertained, at least and he would have been at least as useful as a lot of the other people on her tribe. She then gets herself a big bamboo pole that you can tell is very heavy, and she tries to knock them down, but the pole ultimately tips over, and it doesn't seem like that's going to work, either. So she does the only thing left, which is to climb up the tree. She gets herself up to where the coconuts are, twists one, and throws it down. Back on solid ground, she looks exhausted, but is at least happy she pulled down a big coconut. She voices over about her crappy day -- "Went fishing, no fish. Went clamming, no clams. Tried to do that coconut thing, almost dislocated my shoulder." Heh, I'll bet. She cuts up some coconut and fries it over the fire. Before, it was raw coconut. Now, it's fried coconut. Steph is like the Bubba Gump Coconut Company. "I don't know what else to do," she says. "It's tough." She's in tears as she waits for the food to cook and says, "If I win, it'll be worth it." She twirls her buff. "That'd be awesome." Awww.
Steph later goes to retrieve some treemail. The first thing she sees is a tube that's marked, "Do Not Open: Give To Koror Tribe." She comes across a map. She actually chokes up a little as she reads the treemail that says, "Dirty, hungry, and all alone; this is no way to be. Pack your canoe with all you want -- " And here, she realizes that she's getting out and starts to cry. She's doing this very endearing thing where she's jumping up and down in tiny jumps, she's so excited, but she's also crying from the built-up emotion of being by herself and being the last person on her tribe to be around. And from being hungry and exhausted, I suspect. Anyway, she tries to collect herself and reads, "Pack your canoe with all you want, and paddle out to sea. The lone Ulong Survivor, you're the only one to endure. The phase of your adventure starts with a trip to Koror." Typical shitty doggerel, and yet she cries off and on through the whole thing. I mean, I always want to cry too, but, like, for someone's English teacher. Steph is, you know, moved. Poor kid. And at the end, she sniffs, "That's awesome," in this way that just cemented her in my heart as my favorite woman on this show, ever. It's not like she wasn't already, probably, but she is seriously so cool. And when she opens up the map and sees the route to Koror that she's going to paddle, she gets even happier. "It's a merge," she says to herself. And then she adds, "I'm...gonna have friends!" Aw! And it's not like usual, where everyone sucks and you'd have to find that line ironic! She is actually being delivered into the arms of the least sucky tribe ever, on average! Oh, and after saying she's going to have friends, she adds, "And food!" Hee. Indeed, isolation is painful, but counting your ribs is even worse.
As Steph packs to go, she tells us she's hoping she doesn't cry when she sees Koror, because it will make them think she's a "lunatic psycho." You know, I find people hold that against you much less than you'd think. I love the fact that, as tired as she is, she drags that damn Home Depot box down the beach and muscles it into the boat, because it's just about the only thing of value Ulong ever got. She sticks the Ulong flag in the back of her canoe. (Miss Alli's Mom: "She...is tough.") She takes off.
Triumphant music. Koror. Day 22. Steph drags her canoe up on the beach and, clutching the tube meant for Koror to open, heads toward camp. Koror, meanwhile, is lounging in its glorious shelter, having nothing else to do. And once again, Janu is sniffing a flower. What the hell is up with that, anyway? Did she faint recently? "Oh, look, here she comes," Anonymous Jen suddenly says. They all sit up as Steph heads toward them. "Hee-e-e-ey," Steph laughs. "What's up?" Coby is the first to go down and hug her, purely for strategic reasons, of course. Janu barely manages to stir from the hammock, incidentally. Steph gets hugs all around, with my favorite being from Ian, who has such long arms that he sort of swamps her teeny self. Ian interviews that if nothing else, just having another person present was exciting for his bored tribe. "I missed you guys, too," Steph is saying. "I was all alone; I almost had a nervous breakdown." "I know," Coby says eagerly, "you're going to have to tell us all about that." He does love gossip, so he's not entirely without endearing qualities. Steph hands over the tube she got at camp, and Koror opens it. First, the message inside tells them that Ulong is done for and Steph is now a member of Koror. Second, it tells them that they're going to have some visitors, and may have the opportunity to "work to get a feast." They all react excitedly. Steph eagerly rids herself of her crappy blue buff (heh), and they hand over her new brown one. For some reason, smelling the buffs has become a running joke, so they all smell Steph's new buff as she voices over that she was extremely excited to get rid of the stupid signs of Ulong membership. Uh, not that she doesn't love the old gang or anything. She calls his her "new chapter." The chapter with less sucking! The chapter without the losing streak! The chapter in which Steph is all out of bubble gum!
Katie shows Steph into the shelter, and of course, Steph is wildly impressed, starting with the clothesline. "I love this camp," Steph interviews. "It's so much better than ours! There are places to sit! Oh, my God." Yeah, she's pretty happy. "There's a toilet. That's working! There's clean water." She finds out from Katie that they're using the clean water from the reward last week just as drinking water, and agrees that "that's smart." Yeah, she would. "This is like heaven," Steph interviews, "compared to where I came from." She doesn't even want to say "Ulong" anymore. It's just "where I came from." She's like a refugee. As Katie and Steph walk with Anonymous Jen, Katie bubbles about how much Koror always liked Steph and wished she was with them. Anonymous Jen now tells us that she originally hit it off very well with Steph back before the tribes divided originally. But now that she knows how tough Steph is, her feeling is that they should get rid of Steph immediately, before she becomes a threat.
Actually, my favorite part of this little sequence is when Steph is talking about Kim and says, "She was just not in a good mood -- she and Jeff hooked up..." And then there's a pause, and Katie scrunches up her face and says, "Eeeew!" Which is immature, but...it's exactly how I react in similar situations, so I kind of have to give it the thumbs-up. Kim and Jeff? Eeeew! Gregg and Anonymous Jen? Eeeew! Jeff and Julie? Eeeew!
Coby declares it "hilarious" how people started "kissing Stephenie's butt" as soon as she showed up. In fact, he says that "Katie shot up Stephenie's butt." Coby would know, since he probably ran into her. Furthermore, Coby, of course, doesn't know that there's an existing relationship there, because Coby has absolutely no idea what's going on and is not nearly as clever as he thinks. He goes on to mock Katie for all her comments to Steph about things they did when they first got there, but again, he doesn't understand that Katie is partly reaffirming the alliance, so his mockery is a little misplaced. "We all saw each other the first day, Katie, you don't have a special bond with Stephenie," he lectures for the camera. And, of course, she doesn't -- that he knows of. And then for some reason, Coby says that he's all excited to get Steph alone and fill her in on the details of "every alliance" in the tribe. He seems to have some idea that this is going to be awesome because it's going to reveal how non-united Koror actually is in spite of its warm appearance, but...why is that advantageous to Coby? It just makes no sense. The boy is not a strategist.
A bit later, two large gentlemen come around the bend on an interesting flat boat, approaching camp. The guys pull their boat up, and the tribe introduces itself. The guys report that they are here to teach the tribe how to catch fish. Ian expresses that he's "so excited" to learn how to "fish, Palau-an style." Joe (one of their trainers) breaks up something or other, saying that they'll use that to catch little fish, and then they'll use the little fish as bait for the big fish. He shows them how to tie three hooks together at the end of a line and then he wanders out into the water hip-deep, twirls the line a little bit like a cowboy, and flings it out into the water. Tom quotes the old give-a-fish/teach-to-fish line as Joe brings in the little bait fish. Coby, Ian, and Tom all take cracks at trying to get bait, as Joe explains that they've got to get this done, or they can't go fishing. When the bait-catching is a little delayed, Joe suggests that some people can stay behind and work on learning to catch bait, and he'll take others out to work on learning to actually catch fish. "Well, there's four of us," Coby announces. "Two do bait, two do fish." I guess he means there are four guys. Certainly, the women don't count, at least to Coby. Coby announces further that he will stay and do bait. "Tommy," Gregg says, "you want to go with me and catch fish?" Tom says he does, but he also thinks Ian should go, so Tom asks Joe if Joe can take all three of those guys out. As they discuss this with Joe, Coby immediately starts to bitch: "And I'm going to be left out, as usual. That's fine, I'll stay with the girls." Tom points out that Coby just said he wanted to stay back and do bait. Coby bitches more, all, "Whatever," and to what I suspect is Coby's surprise, rather than get into a pissing match, Tom just says, "I'd like to go fishing. I made the poles, I'd like to go out." Tom explains in his interview that Ian had already done a lot of work trying to fish, and it didn't make sense to leave him behind when they were learning how to fish. "You want me to stay and we can catch bait?" Ian offers to Coby. "No. No, y'all go fish," Coby says as he stomps off. Ian calls after him: "Coby, do you want to come and learn to fish?" Coby stomps off.
Honestly, Coby's entire argument here is so lame it needs crutches. And a telethon. Email campaigns have been organized to get morning drive-time DJs fired for making fun of people who are tragically afflicted with that argument. It is that bad, and I am not joking. Not only did he have nothing to bitch about in the first place, but when they called his bluff and offered either that Ian would stay and do exactly what Coby originally suggested, or that Coby himself could go learn to fish and he turned them down, he proved that this wasn't ever about what they did or didn't do. Coby, in the great tradition of jerkweed Survivor contestants, doesn't actually want to solve the problem -- he wants to retain the problem as something he can complain about. It's a tradition with a long and storied history ["in all-girls' middle schools, and I speak from weary experience…shut up, Coby" -- Sars], and it's just as obnoxious now as it always has been. It's just free-form bitching for bitching's sake; it's just Coby being angry to be angry, because he can't help trying to position himself as the only person who doesn't suck. Which would really go a lot better if he sucked a little less. He is the self-righteous blusterer of the moment, and like most people, he's not flattered by that role.
Anyway, Ian interviews that Coby was "huffy" and complaining about this whole thing again, how he was split from the group and so forth. "It was just -- he was being a pain in the ass," Ian says. We watch as Tom goes back to camp and starts explaining to Katie and Caryn how to catch the bait -- which he, of course, just watched the guy explain. "I can show them, Tom," Coby says forcefully. "I'm in charge of the bait thing." I swear, there just isn't an eye-roll that's grand enough to express my feelings. In an interview, Coby fairly swells with pride about how awesome he was when he "stomped off with the girls" to do the bait. It was awesome, if by "awesome," you mean "fate-sealing, probably." Coby says he hopes Tom stays out so that Coby doesn't have to "see his face" for the rest of the day. Tom, Ian, and Gregg go off fishing with Joe and Edwin.
Fishing trip. Joe and Edwin teach them how to drag the line through the water so that the fish will see the bait, and then they start to bring up fish. Gregg talks about how great it was to be out there with these guys on their own turf, learning from them about fishing, which they are, unsurprisingly, pretty good at. When Tom takes a shot, he, too, pulls up a fish. Not a giant fish, but a nice fish. They paddle back to camp as the sun is setting, and they return with a big haul of fish, as well as a lobster. Steph is very impressed, as you can imagine, as she no longer has to subsist on coconut and Bugs-N-Water Soup.
As they wait for dinner, the tribe is confronted with a bottle of rum. Ian explains that the guys opened up some coconuts and poured in the rum, and then they were drinking out of that. "It was sooooo good," he comments. Tom, on the other hand, is swigging rum directly from the bottle. I have no idea why none of them ever seem to think they're going to be hit hard by liquor in these situations. If I skip dinner before a party, it takes me about a drink and a half to get to the arm-grabbing, everyone-loving phase that otherwise takes...well, two and a half, at least. Tom should have anticipated that his body might not be entirely prepared to swig hard liquor from the bottle.
And then it is evening, and they're still drinking, and now the fish is ready. They enjoy a large haul of food, and as you listen in on the conversation, it's hard not to notice Tom becoming a little more...um, slurred. You know, as things move along. Finally, as he struggles to blast through a sentence, Katie turns to him and says, "Tom, you're not driving tonight, okay?" Mm-hmm. In an interview, Katie notes that Tom wound up being something of "a lightweight," and she wonders how this can be. Oh, it can be. It's always the one you'd never guess. And then Tom gets up and tries to go to bed, I think, or something, and all of a sudden, the fun ends, as it usually does. He falls down, and it's embarrassing, and Ian has to go over and ask him if he's all right, and Tom says that he is. But then as he tries to get into the shelter, he falls down again. So then Steph goes over to help him out, and...yes, it has officially ceased to be fun. Actual falling-down drunks are such a pain in the ass once you're out of college. Steph helps him get settled, and then as she settles in as well, she voices over that she did previously have this arrangement with Ian and Katie and Tom, but that was a long time ago, and she's not sure how they feel now. She says that "you're stupid if you don't" consider the possibility that you could always be to go. Noooo! You are not the to go. I won't tolerate it.
The morning, Tom and Ian are out trying to catch bait. Tom comments in an interview about last night's party and his own state of intoxication. "I'm missing a few gaps in it," he says. Oh, I've been there, dude. He says that he thinks the tribe got as much as it possibly could from Joe and Edwin during their visit, and now they're ready to do whatever fishing they can. And it's a good thing, because it's time to say goodbye to the guys. Tom tells them as they're leaving that if they come by the island again, they should feel free to drop by and see if they're all right. Tom talks about how great it was to meet Joe and Edwin and learn from them all the stuff that they learned from their dads. "It is a good morning," Tom says. Ian says to Tom as the guys are leaving, "That was reeeeally cool." Tom: "Having these guys come out and show us how to get a meal?" Ian: "I was talking about watching you get drunk last night." Tom laughs a little uncomfortably. "Oh, that was cool, too?" Of course, Coby finds the otherwise touching departure of Joe and Edwin to be yet another opportunity to complain, now about how Tom "would not stop kissing their butt." Apparently now, gratitude toward people who offer help to you is a sign that you are a jerk. It sort of goes, I guess, with Coby's theory that having contempt for everyone and everything is a sign that you are awesome.
Now, Coby mentions that "Stephenie's going to add a whole new layer to the game, even though nobody thought she would." Well, except for Tom, Ian, and Katie, who kind of thought maybe she would. Not that Coby knows this. Coby says that he's going to "work Stephenie into this game." Try, Coby, try! And then we watch as Coby tries to call Steph over. "Stephenie!" he calls out. "C'mere!" When she comes over and says they can go wash her face, he tells her that he's "waited two days to get [her] alone." As they leave, Katie, Gregg, and Anonymous Jen all watch and take note of how glaringly obvious that was. Coby tells Steph that he knows they all know what he's up to. "Because I was so bold about it," he brags. "I did it on purpose." He is so totally turning into a character from a Christopher Guest movie, y'all. He tells Steph about how the main alliance consists of Ian, Tom, Katie, Gregg, and Anonymous Jen. But he also tells her how Gregg and Anonymous Jen want to break off and join with him and get rid of Tom and Ian and that bunch.
Back at the beach, meanwhile, Katie tells Gregg she's looking forward to the part where Steph comes back and tells her everything Coby said. Heh.
Coby goes on to tell Steph that he doesn't know whether the target of booting this week is Steph or Janu. He does know, however, that Jen is Steph's main enemy, because Jen is "so jealous of you." Mm-hmm. Apparently, Coby is now confusing his own jealousy-driven worldview with everyone else's. Coby talks about how the two of them always went up against each other in challenges, and Anonymous Jen usually got her ass kicked. He tells her that the original plan was to vote off whoever came over from Ulong, but now it's more complicated, because people like Steph. Coby interviews that he's always gotten along with Steph, and he thinks that Steph "really appreciated that [he] was talking to her strategy first." He tells us that he knew it would basically be "like claiming land," in that whoever got to Steph first, that's who she would believe. Because apparently, Steph isn't very smart and has no mind of her own, or something. I mean..."claiming land"? Doesn't that just slightly insult the person you're talking about? Yeah, I thought so. He then talks about how, as soon as he was done talking to Steph, Katie and Jen started talking to her. But he was confident that it wouldn't matter, because he had gotten to her first and planted the flag of Twerpsylvania or whatever, so there would be no swaying Steph, I suppose. Yep, whatever you put into a girl's head, she just goes with that. We're dumb! So Coby isn't worried about Jen and Katie talking to Steph. "That's all right," he snots insufferably. "I talked to her first."
Of course, Coby's strategy doesn't take into account the fact that when you do talk first, the other side has a chance to refute whatever it is you just said, which is why attorneys like to go last in arguments, not first. And indeed, Steph tells the girls a good bit of what Coby told her, specifically about how they're jealous of her. The girls all laugh and agree that Coby...is weird. But of course, with Jen and Katie both standing there, it looks like Steph doesn't spill the bit Coby said to her about how Gregg and Jen want to flip sides. Presumably, that is best saved for another time. Katie interviews that Steph told them everything (well...maybe), and that Jen still does think Steph is a big threat, and it "isn't good" that Coby shared that with Steph.
Elsewhere, Tom and Steph have a chat in which he assures her that, far from being some kind of a "dead man walking," there are actually other folks who are likely to go before she does. Steph looks thrilled. And clean! Tom, almost sounding still slightly drunk, tells her that he just wanted her to understand that they still had her in mind. "Myself, Ian, and Katie will look out for you," Tom says. Steph then interviews that people keep telling her that she's not on the block, but she's not sure who to believe, so she needs to "figure some things out."
Challenge beach. The newly enhanced Koror tribe shows up, and Jeff takes back the immunity monkey. Hilariously, Steph mutters, "I never even touched him." Hee. Jeff actually brings it over so that Steph can see what the coconut monkey feels like. This season certainly is high in pathos. Jeff says that we are now finished with the immunity monkey for good, because from this point forward, all challenges are individual. He displays the tacky individual immunity necklace. Frankly, I'd rather wear the monkey. On my head. He reminds some of the lazy-asses of Koror that some of them haven't been competing at all very much, so this may come as a bit of a "shock" to them, having to get out there every time and compete. The challenge this week is standing on perches in the water. If you fall off or jump off, you're out. Last person standing will win. And from the challenge, they'll head directly to tribal council for the vote. And, incidentally, the person who goes tonight will be the first member of the jury. Jeff sends them out to climb up on their perches. Once they're all standing, Jeff settles back into a comfy chair and grins. "This could go a while," he says.
Jeff makes conversation by asking Tom whether he's tempted to look at Steph as a free boot. Get rid of her, and he can keep the tribe exactly as it was before. "Sure, you could look at it that way," Tom says. "I guess we'll see tonight." And then Coby can't resist the urge to make himself seem smart, so he says, "Let's not all be stupid. All these people are playing a game. There's already alliances built. They want Stephenie as a vote. They know they can't control certain people" -- here, Coby makes a face that's like, "I'M THE X-FACTOR, BABY!" -- "we're going to take each other off of the game." So Coby basically just turned into the Shii Ann of this episode, sort of congratulating himself for calling out the fact that everyone's got a plan, when...everyone knows they've got a plan, because of the...the plan-having. Know what I mean? No one actually thinks that there isn't any strategy going on, so to whom is Coby imparting any information? Nobody, that's who.
Later, Janu is squirming. Gregg is leaning over with a sore back. They've been up an hour. Jeff suddenly produces a tray of donuts. Coby asks whether he can have all of them if he jumps in, and Gregg wants to know if they come with a glass of milk. "No way I'm turning down a donut," Coby says. I actually think it's pretty funny when Katie says, with a hand over her mouth, "This is really hard. I'm going to, like, wet myself. I don't know what to do." What I like about it is that she's really commenting on how shocked she is at her own level of emotion over the damn donuts. Jeff says he can guarantee two donuts each, and Coby immediately jumps in. Janu says she's coming too, because her back is killing her. When they're situated on the dock, Gregg teases, "Cobe...save me a bite?" And Coby has to make an exaggerated, "Oh, ha ha ha, sure" face, just as if Gregg asked seriously, which he didn't. Way to...not get the joke, kid. Coby's room-reading skills are not going to win him any awards, that's for sure. Coby proceeds to make a great show of gloating over his donuts, so he's apparently lost all interest in remaining on the show. Because honestly, between jumping and then being the biggest asshole he possibly can? He seems not to care. If he thinks he's in danger of being voted off, why jump off for a damn donut? If he thinks he's not in danger of being voted off, why work to put himself in danger by working so hard to alienate everyone? Whatever. At any rate, he shows off and gloats, apparently also not having read the part of the playbook that makes clear that the rewards to come are almost sure to be better than whatever was given away first. Based on past experience, everyone who quits is now going to eat something far better in front of him than he just ate in front of them, so this is all going to be rendered a little less effective, torture-wise. When Jeff asks the group what it means when two people give up immunity for donuts, Katie quite correctly sums it up: "Either they want to go home, or they don't think they're in danger of going home."
At an hour and a half, Tom wipes off a little sweat. "What are you gonna jump for, Jen?" Coby asks. "Chocolate sundae!" Jen calls out. "Ohh, peanut butter," Caryn says. Picking up the cue, Ian slowly says, "I would take my clothes off for some chocolate and peanut butter right now." Jeff: "Nobody wants to see that, Ian." You know what? I bet he doesn't look any scarier than Heidi. In fact, I bet he looks largely the same, except for the implants. "You got any baluts?" Tom (I think) calls out. "I'd jump for a couple of baluts," Ian agrees. Jeff has no embryonic duckling. Too bad for Tom and Ian.
Time passes. It gets darker. Shortly after two hours and 23 minutes, Jeff emerges with a plate and announces that he has fifteen chocolate chip cookies, and you have fifteen seconds to decide. "I'm going for it!" calls Katie, and she jumps. And then Jen. And then, at the same instant, Ian and Gregg. Tom, Caryn, and Steph remain on their perches. When they're situated, Jeff gives them the plate of cookies, along with a glass of milk. Ian actually licks the plate when all the cookies are gone, which is pretty cute. He also declares it was completely worth it. I don't know. I found that sequence really odd, and highly suggestive that the deal was already done for the upcoming boot. Because I just can't believe this many people would go that easily. I assume they already knew very well who was going, probably boosted along by the fish/bait incident from this morning. I know, I know, "spoiler."
Later, when it's fully dark, Caryn says to Tom, "You think you could stay overnight?" "I could stay," Tom says. "I'm a stubborn Irishman." We are at the three-hour mark. "Caryn wants to jump," I say to Miss Alli's Mom. We agree that there is absolutely no way Steph is jumping for food, ever, so it will be interesting to see whether she can outlast Tom. Jeff emerges with a big tray. He announces that once he uncovers what's under there, you'll have five seconds to jump for it or not. And then he pulls the cover. "Pizza," he says. "Five seconds." Steph leans forward with her hands on her knees and says, "Oh, my God!" And then...she is in the water. And so is Caryn. I was totally shocked that Steph jumped. After all that she's endured! That's insane! I mean, unlike the rest of the wimp-ass people from Koror, she's at least been starving for three weeks, so I suppose the promise of something with actual food value (unlike cookies or donuts) would have some legitimate appeal, but I was still shocked. She has to know that she's not entirely safe, and I can't believe she made that call. But she does, and accordingly, Tom wins the first individual immunity. On the dock, Steph and Caryn dig into the pizza. Tom is given the immunity necklace.
The moon hangs, and then we are at tribal council, where Koror has rarely had to tread. Jeff points this out to them: "Steph, you've done this a lot. Koror, you've done it just once." He talks about how eight of them gave up immunity in return for food. And one of those eight, of course, was Steph. Jeff asks Steph about joining Koror, and she raves about how the tribe welcomed her so warmly and so forth. But she knows the score: "They could just get me out and keep their tribe together," she says. Jeff asks her about the rivalry with Anonymous Jen, which...isn't much of a rivalry if you ask me, but...okay. Jen agrees that there is some competitiveness. Jeff turns to Coby, and Coby talks about popularity, and how Steph is well-liked, and that could make her a target. But he seriously intones that "there's other targets to be had, too." Dun dun dun!
Jeff asks Janu, given the difficulties of camp, "who's not pulling their weight at this point." Janu hesitates, and then says that over the last few days, it would probably be her. She acknowledges that she's been lying around uselessly. Jeff asks if she'd be surprised if it were her, and she says she thinks it probably is her, actually. But it "doesn't worry [her]." Well, that's good to know. He then asks Steph how worried she is, on a scale of one to ten, that she'll be sent packing. "About an eight or a nine," she says. Jeff asks her why, given that, she would get down from the perch and take the pizza. Good question! (For once.) Steph non-answers the question by saying that she knew Tom wasn't going to give up, and she's bad with temptation, so she took the chance. She says that she just has to hope she gets the chance to go on. Jeff asks her how she'll feel about the pizza if she's voted off, and she says, understandably, "I'll be so mad at myself." Well, right. "It will probably be one of the biggest regrets of my life." ACK!
Jeff asks Tom if he wants to assign away individual immunity, and Tom decides to keep it. (Shocker!) Tom goes to vote. Ian votes for Coby. "Buddy," he says, "it's like being in the Mafia. It's business, not pleasure. It's just your time to get whacked. You're bad for business." Hee. Steph votes. Katie votes. Janu votes for Steph. Caryn votes. Jen votes. Gregg votes. Coby votes.
When Jeff comes back with the box o' votes, he reads the first one for Steph. She looks nervous. The second is for Janu. All the rest are for Coby. Snerk. He is unhappy. Coby walks over to have his torch snuffed, and after he is snuffed, he turns around and says, "That was a great compliment, thank you." Oh, man, he needs a wedgie. That is so insufferable. It's not a compliment, jerkweed! They didn't vote you off because they were afraid of you. They voted you off because they can't stand having you there. Deal! Sheesh.
What's interesting is that this would have been the moment for Gregg and Anonymous Jen to put their plan into place and round up Coby, Caryn, and Janu for the switcheroo on the power alliance. Sure, Tom was immune -- so vote off Ian. I kind of don't understand why that didn't happen, although I suppose Gregg and Anonymous Jen don't know that Steph is with Tom/Ian/Katie, so they don't realize that they just gave up their last opportunity to be up 5-3, and will now be 4-4 at best once they decide to pull their big switch. Anyway, Coby the noted non-strategic genius heads off. Jeff tells them to "get used to it," as far as voting somebody off every week, and he sends them back to camp.
In his interview, Coby goes back to talking about how great it was to be part of the team, and then says, "And you're very smart to get rid of me." Puke. "Every single one of you said you got rid of me because I was a threat." Said...said when? Said at tribal council? Said that was the reason they were voting the way they were? Please. Even if they did, they're putting you on the jury, dude. They're not going to say, "I'm voting out the person I can't abide having to see every day." But I couldn't really abide seeing you by the end, either, so...good riddance, pretty much.
week: Janu compounds her uselessness with combativeness. And...somebody gets sent to isolation? Man. It had better not be Steph. Because that would be incredibly sad.