The Specialist

S26E02

After Tribal, Dawn tries to explain to Brandon why she voted Francesca out, but Brandon is too angry to talk about it and goes off on Dawn verbally, causing her to cry (surprise!). Brandon claims he's going to go Full Hantz. Ugh.

Laura recruits Shamar to her alliance, which is basically everyone on the Fans tribe except the two cool kids couples. Shamar has done little but lie around in the shade, on purpose.

The challenge is a combined Reward/Immunity and it involves taking a raft out into the water, diving under to pull out bamboo sticks that will release rings, then taking the rings back to shore where teammates will try to toss them onto posts to win immunity and a fishing kit. The Fans really suck at pulling out sticks; they don't do a good job getting in and out of the water and can't seem to stay underwater long enough to pull the sticks. The Favorites have two out of three posts ringed before the Fans even start tossing. The Fans make a good run at the end, but Phillip and Malcolm combine to be the best ring tossers ever for the Favorites and Brandon celebrates a little too hard.

Phillip continues his reign of weirdness. I can't even, but it's kind of hilarious.

The scrambling begins at the Fans' camp when Reynold confronts Shamar about his laziness around camp. Shamar's method of arguing is maybe my least favorite ever: he just repeats the same phrase over and over again -- loudly -- and then yells to shut up. He's probably winning a lot of fans with that attitude.

Reynold finds an Immunity Idol with, like, two seconds of searching. Great job with that hiding job, producers. Laura totally sees Reynold putting it in his pocket. Michael and Matt continue to be the swing votes and don't give much indication how they will be voting.

At Tribal Council, Shamar complains about the lack of leadership and Michael agrees. Laura outs Reynold as the holder of the Idol and he admits it. In the end, Matt and Michael go with the non-couples alliance and they vote out Allie. Reynold doesn't play the Idol, but the couples alliance (which is now the couple plus one alliance) is totally gobsmacked that not everyone was on their side.

Think you've got game? Prove it! Check out Games Without Pity, our new area featuring trivia, puzzle, card, strategy, action and word games -- all free to play and guaranteed to help pass the time until your show starts.

It's Night 3 and the Favorites just voted Francesca out. They return to camp, and Dawn tries to explain her vote to Brandon, since Brandon thought they were voting Andrea out. Dawn barely gets a word out before Brandon starts berating her. Here's what I don't get: Brandon was trying to vote out Andrea. How does he have the moral high ground here? It's not like Dawn tried to vote Francesca and Brandon stood up and refused to vote for anyone. He's just mad that he wasn't part of the alliance, but he's masking it as anger that they voted out a "good person." I'm already tired of Brandon and his immaturity and it's been two episodes. Dawn tries to have a reasoned conversation with an idiot, which is impossible. Brandon promises Dawn that she'll still lose, and Dawn doesn't mention that Brandon is on the losing side by numbers. I don't know if Brandon is ignoring that fact or if he hasn't figured it out yet. Dawn walks away, which is smart, but she also lets it get to her, which is dumb, and she starts crying AS USUAL. Because Brandon was MEAN. She needs to toughen up.

Brandon tells Erik that he's feeling "revengeful," which isn't a word. He says that he's thinking of "going Russell Hantz style" on his tribe. You guys, he is crazy. He has serious crazy eyes. Also, I'm sorry that he's only five feet tall, but he needs to stop overcompensating for that. Anyway, he promises the camera that he's going to play "dirty to the core" and "go out with a bang." He does his interviews like he's a professional wrestler doing a promo. It's annoying. If I wanted to watch wrestling, I would. I like to watch smart people outmaneuver one another with smarts and savvy, and Brandon is incapable of that. I guess every season needs a few dupes, but he's not even interesting.

The morning, in the Fans camp, people are doing whatever people do when they're not at challenges: chopping wood, getting water, gathering kindling. Except for Shamar, who is just lying in the shade, looking around at all the worker bees. He interviews that he's "conserving energy." Look, I'm all for not working during the hottest part of the day. But how much energy does it take to wander around and pick up a few sticks? Or at least pretend to tend the fire? In these early days, people are just looking for an excuse to vote you out. Why give it to them? He interviews that he's been to Iraq twice, so he knows all about sitting in the shade and wasting time, and he thinks that once people see he doesn't care about the game, they won't consider him a threat. I...guess? It depends on whether people want to get rid of threats now or get rid of dead weight first. Laura and Allie talk about how Shamar is super lazy and they need to vote him off first. So it's at least on the table.

By Kim

Shamar actually stands up on two feet for a while. I imagine he's like a circus bear in that it's not his natural state, but he can maintain it long enough to get a treat of some sort. Anyway, he talks to Sherri, who looks a lot like a cut-rate Sandra Bullock from The Blind Side, if she'd been left out in the sun for too long. Anyway, Sherri tells Shamar that she's in an alliance with Mike, Matt, Laura, and Julia, and they want Shamar to join them. Shamar says he's in, so now they have six. Sherri interviews that it will be the six of them against the two couples, the "cool kids" alliance. Sherri advises Shamar to keep bitching about water and do what he does best, and she might not be visibly standing with him, but he needs to know that he's safe. I guess he's a decoy, so the majority alliance can pretend they're voting him out and actually blindside the cool kids. That's really smart. Keep an eye on that Sherri. Shamar likes that idea too. Sherri interviews that Shamar is her Phillip. In other words, he's the goat that she's going to take to the finals, because she knows that she'll beat him, and he'll deflect attention from her.

Over at the Favorites camp, Cochran talks to Brandon about his outburst. Cochran wants to create tribe cohesion. Brandon confesses that he was so angry that he planned to sabotage the camp, spill the beans, and throw challenges. But then he realized that he would be seen as a quitter and he has to think about his kids. Cochran does an interview where he's sitting in this natural rock chair out in the water that is about the coolest thing I've ever seen. I don't know if Cochran found this location or the producers did, but it's awesome. Anyway, Cochran says that it's "frightening" that Brandon can show extreme rage and then be incredibly pleasant, and he's so unpredictable that it's hard to trust him.

Phillip walks up on them and Brandon invites him into the conversation. Brandon wants to unite the tribe to all vote the same way. I don't think Brandon understands this game. He really just wants to be in the majority, but he thinks that's tribal unity? I don't get it. Anyway, Phillip says that he doesn't know if he can trust Brandon yet, but since he's Phillip, he couches it in an analogy about CEOs and middle management. Phillip interviews that Brandon is "narcistic" [sic] and he doesn't have any empathy, which Phillip finds crazy. Look, when PHILLIP thinks you are crazy? You might want to look into some therapy and possibly medication.

Brandon walks back into camp and complains that Phillip is calling himself the CEO and claiming that he can't trust Brandon due to his actions on his past seasons. Can Brandon keep his mouth shut for five seconds? Apparently not. No one really gives him the reaction he's looking for, which is, "You are SO right, Brandon! I am going to diss Phillip and join forces with you!" Brandon interviews that Phillip is messing with the wrong person and he advises the rest of his tribe to cut the head off the snake while they can. Corinne assures Brandon that Phillip isn't really the leader, and Dawn says there's still room for everyone to work within the tribe. We'll see. I could see everyone bringing Phillip along as the goat again, except this time, he might actually earn some votes in the end. Unless he annoys people too much.

Both tribes report for the challenge, and the Fans find out that the Favorites voted Francesca off. And then Phillip knocks over his tribe's flag. Probst asks Michael for his reaction to the vote, and Michael says that he can see that the Favorites came to play, and they are showing no mercy. Probst explains the challenge: three people race to a raft, and three others pull the raft out to a platform. The rafters dive down to an underwater cage and pull out bamboo sticks, which will release rings. Once they have nine rings, they will be pulled back to shore, where the remaining tribe members will toss the rings onto three posts to win. This is a combined reward/immunity challenge, and the reward is a fishing kit.

The tribes kibbitz to decide who's taking which role. Both seem to struggle, although we rarely see this part of the challenges, so maybe it's always this way. Shamar seems to feel like no one is listening to his ideas, but surprisingly for him, he doesn't start yelling. Instead, he just mutters to himself.

The challenge begins. For the Favorites, we've got Erik, Brenda, and Andrea on the raft, with Cochran (really?), Corinne, and Brandon pulling. At least they tried to put their lightest people/best swimmers on the raft. The Favorites really don't have a super strong guy. Their strongest guys are Malcolm and Brandon, maybe? The Fans have Sherri, Hope, and Julia on the raft with Shamar, Matt, and Eddie pulling. Those are some strong guys. Will it make a difference?

The rafts arrive at the platforms at about the same time; the Fans have a slight lead, but only a few seconds. Erik goes down first for the Favorites and pulls out a ton of sticks. The Favorites strategy seems to be to pull some sticks all the way out and then pull some sticks partway out for the person. Sherri is the only one going in the water for the Fans and she's not doing a great job. The Favorites are quickly rotating people in and out of the water, and they have six rings while the Fans only have one. The Favorites get all nine rings and the Fans only have two, so the Favorites head back to the beach. The Favorites also have a good pulling strategy: they put Brandon closest to the water, so he's doing most of the pulling while Cochran and Corinne are just managing his slack for him. The Favorites get back to the beach and start tossing rings before the Fans even finish collecting rings and get onto their raft.

Malcolm quickly rings two posts, so he only needs one more. The Fans aren't even back to shore yet, but Shamar is pulling like hell. No one can accuse him of slacking off in challenges. Reynold starts tossing rings for the Fans and rings one post. Phillip takes over tossing for the Favorites, and gets the final ring, so the Favorites win. Brandon is screaming and whooping, which is sure to win favor with the other tribe. Dummy. Act like you've been there before. As they leave, Reynold interviews that he can't wait to get rid of Shamar, and their vote is obvious. Is it, Reynold? Is it?

The Favorites return to camp, victorious. They're psyched about the win, and the fishing kit. Once they finish celebrating, Phillip says that they need to collect more wood, so I guess the celebration is over. As Phillip and Malcolm collect wood, Phillip explains the nicknames he has given each of his alliance members, like Malcolm is "The Enforcer." Malcolm interviews that Phillip is getting ridiculous. And then they break the fourth wall as Phillip introduces each of his Stealth R Us Inc members: Cochran is "The Intelligence Attache", Malcolm is "The Enforcer", Andrea is "The Eliminator", Corinne is "The Dominatrix", and Dawn is "The True Grit." It's weird to see them looking directly into the camera, but it's also amusing. I'd rather see this than another million hours of Brandon complaining about how people are mean or whatever. Malcolm interviews that he's happy to play along for a few days, but Phillip is insane. Glad Malcolm gets that.

Things are much less happy over at the Fans camp. As they return, Eddie tries to lighten the mood by saying that they don't have any fish in their water anyway, so the fishing gear isn't necessary. I highly doubt there are no fish. If the fish are that scarce, the gear would probably be an enormous help. They stand around and dissect their performance challenge, which is always dangerous, because someone is going to feel blamed.

Their big issue is that they took too long to decide who was doing what, but Shamar thinks that people were too insistent on what they could or couldn't do. Reynold immediately calls Shamar out for having a bad attitude, and Shamar wonders why he's not allowed to voice an opinion. Reynold accuses Shamar of being childish and Shamar employs my least favorite arguing tactic: repeating a phrase over and over again, loudly, in hopes of drowning the other person out. He just keeps saying, "Let it be childish then. Let it be childish then. Let it be childish then." Reynold just repeats that he doesn't like Shamar's attitude and Shamar asks, "What are you going to do about it?" Reynold says he's going to vote for Shamar and Shamar's like, "Good. Problem solved." If you were part of Reynold's alliance, wouldn't you be even slightly concerned that Shamar doesn't seem worried that he's going home? Wouldn't that cross your mind? Shamar interviews that he thinks Reynold is trying to provoke a fight so that people will vote against Shamar. I don't think Reynold is that smart. Shamar tells Reynold to stop pretending that he wasn't going to vote for Shamar even before the challenge. Reynold probably thinks the damage is done, so he and Eddie go off to collect wood. Shamar yells after them to go talk about it, and Reynold yells something back and Shamar just yells, "SHUT UP!" Look, Shamar isn't wrong, but his method of delivering information leaves a bit to be desired. He might feel safe now, but what about when the cool kids are all gone? What then?

Eddie and Reynold approach Matt and talk about how much they can't wait to get rid of Shamar. Matt affirms that he's with them, and then interviews that he has to choose which way to go, and he thinks Michael will go with him, whatever he decides. So Michael and Matt talk to Sherri, who wants to vote out one of the cool kids. Matt makes the case that they could vote out Shamar, and they'd still have a majority, plus the cool kids still wouldn't know that Matt wasn't on their side. That sounds like a good deal for Matt, but is it good for anyone else? Sherri thinks that Shamar will chill out once he makes it through the first vote. In other words, she'll tell him to shut it. Laura walks up and Sherri asks her who she thinks should go, and Laura says it should be one of the girls, probably Allie. Laura interviews that she thinks of the four cool kids, Allie is the only one who is a strategic threat, because she's thinking about the game and the others aren't.

Reynold, as a fan of the game, knows that Hidden Immunity Idols are a big part of the game. And, they're always hidden in a hole in a tree. So after looking for like two minutes, he totally finds one. Come on, producers. I mean, I get that you want people to find them, because otherwise why have them at all, but does it HAVE to be this easy? At least last season, they did something different with it being the knob on the lid to the rice barrel. Anyway, Reynold tries to calm down so he can walk into camp with a stone face. As Reynold gets dressed for Tribal Council, Laura totally busts him with a bulge in his pocket. She doesn't say anything, but she's worried that he'll give it to Allie at Tribal. She doesn't have enough time to rework the voting plan before they leave, though.

The Fans arrive at Tribal Council. Probst wonders what it's like to play the game with people you may not have much in common with outside of the game. Michael totally calls out the foursome, who became fast friends. Allie says that they're the same age, and they didn't mean to exclude anyone. Shamar says that Eddie and Hope seem like a couple but not Reynold and Allie. Probst asks Matt if he's concerned about the foursome, and Matt says he's not concerned.

Probst asks Shamar how the experience has been. Shamar says he's a big boy and he's having a hard time subsisting on such little food, so he's trying to conserve energy. He says that he's done two tours in Iraq, but at least there, they had leaders to provide direction, but here they are all individuals who want to do their own thing. Probst asks Michael if they failed at the challenge because there were too many voices. Michael thinks so; he knew while they were strategizing that they were in trouble, because no one was making decisions for the tribe. Reynold thinks they need to be one tribe to win, and people get frustrated with Shamar's critiques because he sits in the shelter all day and does nothing. Shamar just chuckles and Eddie says that Shamar was in the hut for nineteen hours of the day yesterday. Probst is shocked but Shamar doesn't deny it. I want to know how they knew it was nineteen hours. Do they have watches? Did someone make a sundial? I would like to see the sundial. Anyway, Shamar thinks he's an easy scapegoat for the tribe's problems because he's big and loud.

By Kim

Probst wants to know what Laura thinks, but she lies that she thought they were voting as a family tonight (no, she didn't) but she saw someone with a bulge in their pocket, and she looks right at Reynold even though she claims she doesn't want to say who has it. Probst notes that, and Reynold just pipes up and says that he does have the Idol, and apparently his pants are too tight, but he didn't know what was going to happen tonight, so he figured he should bring it. His alliance mates look stunned and shocked; he didn't tell any of them he found the Idol. Laura wonders why he brought it if he thought they were all voting together, and Reynold says it's Survivor 101 to bring an Idol if you have it. Michael agrees, and Reynold adds that he's now a target and the Idol is a "pocketful of kryptonite." What you may not know is that Reynold's dad was the original bass player for the Spin Doctors. Reynold claims he's going to play it tonight, and Probst asks if this is good news for Shamar. Shamar says that the foursome have targeted him from day one. Sherri says she's blown away by what's happening, but she's sticking with her original voting plan.

The voting begins. I don't think Reynold's revelation changed a thing, although it may have introduced doubt into his alliance mate's minds. Reynold doesn't actually play his Idol, which is smart but takes some balls. Then again, he thinks Matt and Michael are voting with his group. The first four votes are for Shamar, but the six are for Allie, so she's going home. That's too bad; I was digging her off-the-shoulder Flashdance shirt. Guess the cool kids just found out that not everyone wants to be with them. It will be interesting to see if any of them try to join up with the other side or somehow think they can stick it out.