Crocs, Cowboys, And City Slickers

Previously on Crocodile, Tears: The tribes were scrambled, and Brian, Amy, and Gary got the shortest end of the stick, winding up outnumbered by the former Nakum athletic mafia of Bobby Jon, Blake, Brandon, and Danni. On the other side of things, Judd, Margaret, Cindy, and Brooke wound up on a tribe with Steph, Jamie, Lydia, and Rafe, and that evenly split tribe wound up at tribal council. Judd decided to make the flip and team up with Jamie and Steph to boot Brooke. He also believed himself to be King Kong. Fourteen people left, which seems like...really a lot. It's still so painfully early.

Credits. Margaret must be just so pleased that her iconic shot shows her coated in mud. A mask, Margaret. Think of it as a cleansing mask.

It is night at the Maya ruins. We are at Nakum on Night 11, where they are presumably coming home from tribal council. Just so you can keep up, Yaxha is now 4-3 in favor of former Nakum, and Nakum is now 4-3 in favor of former Yaxha. So it's good to know this worked out in the way most likely to make me flap my lips with my finger like Daffy Duck. Unsurprisingly, Steph is griping to Judd on night-vision about how much she hates tribal council. I'm sure I'd be sick of it if I were Steph, too. Somebody should tell her they don't make you go if you win. Cindy blows on the fire. Margaret looks unhappy. Judd voices over that he's "feeling good" about his decision to boot Brooke. Margaret is not looking so happy.

As the group sits around the fire, Judd is executing the classic Defensive Maneuver ("Hey, I Have Nothing To Be Defensive About" variation). He insists that "it is a cutthroat game." Margaret concedes, as she sort of has to, that he's "absolutely right." He continues making the "we're all here to play" argument, and she continues not liking it, because he screwed her. I mean, they're both right. He's playing the game, but he screwed her. She goes on to argue in an interview that she's "sad" about Judd voting with Steph and company, which is sort of BS, because she's not sad -- she's frustrated, because she's hosed. Indignation is not a form of grief, really. She calls Judd "a traitor," which is (1) sort of true; (2) kind of meaningless; and (3) almost entirely irrelevant. Judd yells to Margaret that he doesn't "give a rat's ass" what anyone thinks of him after the game, and she does chose to take exception to that. I think it would have been smarter for him to argue there's no reason for them to be angry at him outside the game than to argue he doesn't care. He blusters about how as long as his family loves him, that's all that matters, and...why go that route? Why not just say there's no reason for anybody else to take it personally? I'm not sure "fuck you" is the smartest or the most logical response here, not that it wouldn't be really tempting. Judd interviews that he "can't wait till [Margaret] goes, too."

Infra-red snake.

The morning, Day 12, we are at Yaxha. A crocodile makes its way, open-mouthed, toward the underwater camera, and then closes its mouth at the last minute. "I will eat your camera! EAT IT, I SAY! But not right now!" Blake is looking out at the water, and then he interviews that he's sitting here thinking about his chances in the game, and that they look pretty good to him. Which they would, because he's up 4-3, and he should be in no danger of getting voted off until at least the merge, at which point individual immunity will start to be available in addition to the fact that depending on how many people are there at the merge, he may be able to ride his current alliance all the way until very close to the end. It does make a certain amount of sense. "I don't think it could have worked out better," he comments. Wait, what is that bat-like creature flapping its wings and buzzing Blake's head? It looks very much like Foreshadowing.

And then...radio-controlled bug. Which, in this case, scares the crap out of Amy. I'm not sure you'd last long in this game if you were that scared of bugs, I'll tell you that right now. You're lucky if a bug like that isn't emerging from your hair. The beetle flies around in pursuit of Amy, and she says in some disbelief, "I didn't know beetles could fly." "They're magical beetles here," Brian comments. Hee. Brandon talks in an interview about how he's not used to people like Amy who are from the city. He's used to "more farming type of people." Amy goes on to question Brandon and Bobby Jon about farming stuff, like how you go about making your living growing wheat. It seems silly on the one hand, but what should she do? Act like she doesn't care because it's unfamiliar? The show sets her up to look kind of silly, but this is what you do with people who do things you don't know anything about. You admit you don't know, and you have them explain it. I doubt Brandon or Bobby Jon would be mocked for asking her what police work is like.

Brian gives an interview in which he says that these aren't the kinds of people he usually becomes friends with, either, because he's "very New England" and "very blue-state." So these people are "not [his] style." We watch as Bobby Jon tells the tribe that when he gets home, he wants "a new pair of cowboy boots," because his current ones are held together with duct tape. Classy! Brian interviews that these people are "good people," and that he doesn't at all dislike them; they're just different from his usual crowd. Of course, he manages to pronounce the names of places like "Tulsa" with an emphasis that makes it sound like he doesn't like them a little bit. Sometimes Brian is very, very twenty-two, which is sort of okay, because that is inherently something one outgrows. In other news, it's amazing how I feel like "red state" and "blue state" are already getting old, and it's only been a year on that, really.

And then we watch as Danni, I believe, gives an out-loud prayer before the tribe eats. Brian bows his head compliantly. He interviews that the tribe is "very religious," always praying before meals and whatnot: "We say grace before every meal, we pray before every challenge, we thank Jesus for everything." He explains that while he's not religious himself, objecting would be rather foolish, since all it would do is put people off. On the record, my personal view about this is that it's exceedingly rude to suggest group prayers to groups of people including ones whose religious beliefs you don't have specific reason to believe are the same as yours, unless you are in your own home and they are visiting you. I think it's rude to place strangers in the position of discussing their religious beliefs in a setting in which they are essentially asked to take a position -- (1) Participate; (2) Don't. It's just rude. If you want to thank Jesus, why can't you thank Jesus yourself? Why does everyone else have to bow their heads for your prayer to work? You want to pray before a challenge, you have plenty of time. Go. Pray. If you learn through normal conversation that other people are of the same religious persuasion you are, then you can pray along with those people, but the notion of just acting on the assumption that unless they actively object, everyone probably wants to ask Jesus for help with every challenge? That's just mind-bendingly presumptuous. And no, "Say, is it okay if we all pray before the challenge?" is not all right. Prayer is opt-in, not opt-out. Opt-out puts people in precisely the position Brian is in, where they're going to go along whether they mean it or not, and doesn't it kind of dilute your prayer to have people in it who are only going through the motions? Just remember: according to some sources, God kind of wants you to pray in private anyway.

Anyway, all the praying had better be done, because it's time for a challenge. Probst brings in the group. Yaxha gets to see that Nakum voted off Brooke. The only thing that seems to be going on among the former-Nakum boys (Blake et al) is a lot of nodding, so apparently, they don't plan on missing Brooke. You'd think they might at least be interested for strategic purposes, since it suggests what went on, Judd-wise. Jeff asks Stephenie about the water at Nakum, and she says that, of course, they can't go in the water. Blake, for his team, agrees with how miserable it is not to be able to dive in. He says that they do wade out waist-deep, which gets Amy going about how there was a crocodile within a few feet of their dock, so she tends to nag the group to come back in when they get out too far. Jeff asks if this means they've really seen crocs, and Blake describes the one he saw swimming by this morning, close to the beach.

Jeff puts up with Blake for as long as possible, which isn't that long, and then he's like, "Yeah, whatever. Challenge!" He explains that it's a reward challenge. In the first step, one tribe member will cut through a rope with a sharp stone. (Incidentally, the setup footage shows the mystery hands sawing the rope, not chopping at it.) This rope will release two "handles," which are wooden pieces you take with you to the station. There, someone else has to chop a log, and when that log is chopped, two more handles will drop. Then you take your four handles and run up to the top of a ramp, where four other people (besides the two you've already used) will put the handles into a big crank, and they'll turn it to drag a cart on a rope up the ramp toward where the team is situated at the top. Once you drag the cart to the top, the six people who've already been used will hop in the cart, and the last one will chop the rope holding the cart. The cart will roll down a track, coaster-style, to the bottom, with the four tribe members inside. It's kind of like Magic Mountain, only instead of magic, there's hard labor.

Jeff asks Farmer Beavis about the social aspect. Does he see that changing? Farmer Beavis says yes, and that he's gotten to know and like some people better than others. Blake fails to grasp the irony. Jeff asks Gary about the way the tribes came together, and Gary says that it was scary at first with the numbers against him. Asked whether it's like two groups or one tribe, Amy says that, to her, it's one group and one tribe, and this is her loyalty. But she acknowledges the disadvantage she's at. Blake, on the other hand, admits that he still feels his old tribe bonds. Jeff asks Brian what he thinks is needed to keep old lines from dictating the vote, and Brian basically says that he hopes they don't operate that way because you should get to know people and so forth. Which is kind of silly, because that's not a good argument at all. In any event, he says that if he's voted off, he'll be "a victim of a minority." But he doesn't mean it that way.

Bobby Jon goes on about how they've all worked hard to get here, voting somebody off is always difficult, and on and on. He wishes he could keep everyone's dream alive. Barf. Bobby Jon votes. Brian votes, rather revoltingly intoning, "You may be the Golden Boy, but I'm platinum." Yuck. Okay, now he's eighteen. Brandon votes for Brian. Amy votes. Gary votes for Blake. Blake votes for Brian, just saying he's the weakest of the Yaxha members. I kind of wanted him to say, "You may be platinum, but I'm gold. Or...silver. Wait, how much does titanium cost?" Danni hesitates, and then votes. "B..."

Jeff brings back the votes. One for Blake. One for Brian. Another for Brian. Another for Blake. And...another for Blake. To my complete and utter shock, Jeff's words are, "Fifth person voted..." Because it's Blake. It's BLAKE. Are you kidding me? And does that mean that Danni and somebody else flipped? Meaning Bobby Jon, since we saw Farmer Beavis vote? That never actually happens! It's always a fake-out! Ooooh, Burnett, you are a slippery one. Blake gets up and leaves, and Brian tries to keep himself from breaking into a grin, not that he doesn't completely deserve one, considering how down and out he looked to be. Jeff calls it a "big shift," and he sends them home. I have to agree with Wing Chun that Jeff really needs to stop trying to be pithy. He doesn't have it in him.

Over the credits, we learn that indeed, Bobby Jon and Danni both voted for Blake. And that Blake is completely shocked to be eliminated. Makes no sense! How could they? Would you like to hear about his girlfriend's boobs?

week: Amy gets hurt again. Oy. And Bobby Jon and Jamie do the crazy-man naked chest-bump! Awesome!