Recap of Survivor S32E8

SPOILERS

Dara

• I may have missed a few minutes of the episode – my bad …
• Aubry is looking for cracks in the brawn/beauty alliance.
• Jason tells everybody that he let’s his daughters do his hair and make up.
• Jason tells that he wasn’t going to use his daughter to get ahead in the game, but will talk about them if someone asks him about them.
• Jason mentions how everyone sees him as a “deviant muscle” but he is “human too”, in re: to talking about his daughters.
• Cydney sees the game more of a challenge now, “who will you beat?” in the finale.

Reward

• Two teams of five use stepping poles to transport one player to a platform, then all must swim to a small platform and create a human tower.
• The winner wins ice cream.
• Jeff gives them one bowl of ice cream to share, as a taste or incentive to win the reward challenge. Way to consider germs, Jeff! Meh. They’re all pretty much dying of something out there anyway … That being said, if a bear shits in the woods and no one is around to hear it …
• The two teams are:
  Julia, as captain, chose Scot, Nick, Debbie and TaiAubry chose Jason, Cydney, Michele and Joe
• “Aubry takes a dump” – Jeff, teehee, aka she fell in the water.
• Aubry sucks at trying to get across the transport poles!
• Oh. She’s in again.
• Julia, for the other team, has yet to fall in – and is doing quite well. Jeff attributes this to the strength of Scot and Nick.
• Michele is now taking over from Aubry.
• Okay, Michele’s in. She sucks.
• Cydney is now taking over from Michele.
• Okay, Cydney’s in. She sucks.
• Julia is across!
• “Scot’s feet are bigger than the base of the tower!” – Jeff
• “It’s a blowout in the making!” – Jeff, as team Aubry still haven’t made it past the first pole transport.
• “Julia clearly made the right choice” – Jeff, on Julia picking her team.
• And with that – team Julia wins reward!
• “One bad decision is the snowball effect” – Aubry, is disappointed on how she’s playing the game. “It sucks. I wanted so much more than this”

Dara

• “The other five had to go sit in purgatory and listen to us eat ice cream 5 feet away” – Scot
• “I didn’t feel sorry fr the losers one bit” – Debbie
• When Jason says something in regards to the team eating ice cream, it rubs Michele the wrong way – and she thinks that Jason think he’s in charge.
• “I really respected the way they handled it” – Michele, in regards to how the others ate the ice cream.
• Julia tells how the win didn’t leave the five with any opportunity to talk strategy during the reward, but it gave them a good opportunity to bond.
• “Scot, he’s awesome” – Julia, wants to work with Scot.
• Scot and Jason are worried about an all girl’s alliance forming, when the girl’s go out on the boat. Nick goes to investigate.
• Cydney points out how Nick walks 50 steps from camp, then stops and turns to talk.
• “Y’all send Nick two check up on me?” – Cydney is pissed, as she believes that Scot and Jason sent Nick to check up if an all girl’s alliance is forming.
• “I wasn’t plotting against y’all” – Cydney
• Jason thinks Cydney’s paranoia is kicking in sooner than was expected.
• “The boys can talk to whomever” – Cydney, on Jason and Scot being allowed to chat without it seeming suspicious, but when she does it, they suspect she’s plotting against them.

Immunity

• “You didn’t need it, but nice to know you can win it” – Jeff, to Nick on winning last week’s immunity. Actually though Jeff, that puts a target on his back. Thanks, jerk! I mean Jeff .. eh =\
• So, the challenge is to balance on a small perch, and hold a handle behind your head. If you fall off or your hands and/or feet come off the perch/handle, you’re out.
• You would think smaller people would have more of an advantage in this challenge – at least standing on the small perch like that. But it’s not all about the perch – so we shall see …
• “It’s gonna hurt and it’s gonna hurt fast!” – Jeff
• “I’ll just get comfortable” – Jeff, takes a seat.
• Ooh.
• Jeff wants to tempt them with food.
• “Could it be a million dollar mistake?” – Jeff, on who will step out for a bite to eat.
• Julia is out.
• Jeff returns with drumsticks, pizza, brownies and drinks.
• Joe, Michele, Scot and Jason drop down to eat.
• “That is a LOT of food for four people” – Jeff
• Tai wants to push his body.
• You can tell on his face that Tai is struggling.
• “I don’t want any of the brains to get it” – Tai, doesn’t want to let the brains win.
• “Joe, Aubry and Debbie, they’re on the chopping block” – Nick
• Debbie drops.
• Aubry drops.
• Nick drops, because now all the brains are out of the challenge.
• “Cydney has it in the bag” – Nick, on why he dropped out.
• Tai asks Cydney if she’s hurting, “Nope. I’m just peachy”
• 30 minutes has passed.
• “I wanna see how hard I can push” – Tai, wants to keep fighting.
• “She’s a strong redwood, but she might snap” – Tai, on Cydney.
• 40 minutes has passed.
• “I’m calling Buddha” – Tai
• “You’re feeling it. I saw it on your face” – Tai, to Cydney.
• Cydney drops.
• Tai wins immunity!
• I personally hope Tai wins this whole thing!
• “I’ve never seen something like that happen” – Jeff, on Tai winning after he’d been struggling since the very beginning of the challenge.
• “You never gave up” – Jeff, on Tai.
• “Keep fighting all the way until the vote” – Jeff’s wise words to the tribe.

Dara

• So the plan is to split the votes with brawn voting for Aubry, and for beauty to vote for Debbie.
• “One hell of a challenge!” – Tai, on how hard the challenge was.
• Based on the time of the episode – I’m thinking it’ll be a fast vote tonight?
• “Tai, that was excellent, sir. Way to suffer, man” – Debbie, to Tai.
• Nick wants to take advantage of Aubry, so he tells her the plan and for her to vote for Debbie so that she’s safe tonight.
• “This is not typical of me to reveal my true self” – Nick, to Aubry.
• “He’s just so confident it’s ridiculous” – Cydney, on Nick.
• “He needs to go now” – Cydney, on Nick.
• “All the girl’s stay as close as possible” – Cydney, thinking of an all girl’s alliance.
• “If it back fires, oh well” – Cydney, on making a move.
• “If we write Nick’s name down, Jason’s gonna be gunning for us” – Julia, to Michele.

Tribal

• Note this is Nick and Michele’s first tribal.
• Neil is back! – well, on the jury. He’s smiling.
• “Avoiding tribal for 20 days” – Michele, notes how it’s a great thing but you also haven’t really had a chance to play.
• Debbie notes that brain, brawn and beauty have stayed distinct, but now brawn and beauty have teamed up.
• “We stay strong” – Jason, on his alliance.
• “I think our seven is pretty strong” – Scot, on the brawn/beauty alliance.
• “We didn’t think there was an idol” – Tai, lies.
• Tai mentions how everyone knows about the super idol. This surprises Julia, who says she knew nothing about it.
• Methinks Tai has said too much … how did he find out about? Or rather, how does he fake that he found out about it without revealing he has an idol of his own?! Sneaky sneaky, or rather, tricky tricky.
• Someone (I think it was Debbie) mentions that if you didn’t know/talk about the super idol, than you’re probably on the bottom of the alliance.
• “I always have hope” – Debbie, on her chances of staying tonight.
• “Often times there’s more not said here than said here” – Debbie
• Scot thinks the vote will go as predicted.
• And it’s time to vote …
• Will it be Aubry, Debbie or Nick?
• “See-ya late, Debbie. It’s been fun” – Nick, voting for Debbie.
• “Over confidence is a weakness” – Debbie, voting for Nick.
• And when the votes are being read …
• “Oh, man!” – Nick, looks worried.
• And with that – Nick is out!
• Scot and Jason voted for Aubry
  Nick voted for Debbie
  Debbie, Joe, Julia, Michele and Cydney voted for Nick
  Tai voted for Jason.
• Neil looks even more happy. Much happier in fact, with the result.
• “As long as you keep fighting, anything can happen” – Jeff, on tonight’s result.
• “I was extremely cocky this vote” – Nick, on not expecting to be voted out.

Thoughts

Firstly, why did Tai vote for Jason? Is he not in an alliance with Jason? It seems odd that he would just vote individually like that – especially if it is revealed that he was the one who wrote Jason’s name down. It puts a huge target on his back. It’s also odd as Tai seems quite tight with Scot, yet he is willing to vote out his right hand man. It really just doesn’t add up at all. I hope they discuss this – either next episode or during the reunion.

Secondly, would Cydney have considered an all girl’s alliance if the incident involving Jason/Scot and Nick hadn’t have happened. I personally think that she considered it out of spit. I think it’s a smart move to jump ship as they are kind of arseholes, and they do have an advantage in challenges. I think Cydney did make the right move, however. I think an all girl’s alliance is smart – but probably not the best idea for Cydney long term. This vote, yes, absolutely, but long term, she’s the only brawn girl. It stands for reason that Debbie, Aubry and Joe will stay together in this alliance, and Julia and Michele also seem pretty tight – so in terms of how far she could move within the alliance, it is likely that she will be at the bottom no matter what. Of course, this is just speculation – and she did seem to bond a bit with Debbie, so who knows. But that’s just what I see. If she had stuck with Jason and Scot, she probably could have easily been carried to top 3, but she would have had no chance of winning for how she played the game – but would have a chance if the jury just didn’t want to give Jason or Scot the money.

Cydney is going to be a player to watch. Still, I don’t think she has much of a chance of winning. But then again – who does? I think Aubry has a good case if she were to make it to the very end. At this stage, I don’t see Joe, Debbie, Michele, Cydney or Julia having a chance at winning. I like to think no one would vote for Jason or Scot – so really, I can only see Tai winning if he makes it to the final three because everyone likes him.

Lastly, I don’t think that voting off Nick was the right decision. I think a smarter move would have been to vote out Jason. Nick wasn’t the one in charge – he didn’t have much power – he wasn’t the leader. They should have cut the head off the snake and voted off Jason – this also would have been a great time for a blindside – especially as they may not get another chance. It also would have flushed the idol out of play – although I don’t think anyone except Scot knows about it. Also, we can see from next week’s preview that Jason brings out his vindictive side. It’s going to be pure evil next week! It’s going to be some edge-of-your-seat viewing!

I also feel like if they had voted off Jason, there is a good chance that Nick would have tried to work with Michele again with the girls. I definitely think he would have easily made the jump across and joined her on the more powerful alliance. I don’t think he really had any strong ties with the boys.

Now, if they had voted off Scot, I don’t think the effect would be the same. People seem to like Scot more than Jason – so he is more of less seen as Jason’s right hand man. Also Scot really hasn’t proven to be that useful in individual challenges, only group challenges, so he serves a purpose.