Survivor: Fiji Finale Live Blog

8:00 - Welcome to the Survivor: Fiji live blog! Loved by 3 or 4 readers, it's time to bring it back! Jeff is just recapping stuff right now, so I'll give you a quick thought or two about Thursday's episode.

Yau Man was stupid to trade the car for the immunity idol. That put a target on him, which we saw at the tribal council. He could have just taken the car and went from there, but he overplayed his hand and I think he's going to pay for it at the next tribal council.

Dreamz was kinda stupid to take the car. If he keeps immunity at the final four, he goes to the final three and loses. If he gives it away, he loses to Yau Man. I don't think he actually knows that he is hated by the jury.

(Edited to add: I forgot about Stacy who was the stupidest of them all. She tipped Yau Man off at tribal council that he could be getting votes, which he suspected. And she missed two opportunities to get further in the game: One, she could have told Earl and Yau Man about the plan to vote Yau Man out and maybe made a final three allaince. Or she could have suggested to vote out Earl instead.)

8:10 - Wow, Cassandra is actually talking about the game! You might actually believe that she's been playing the game. Too bad she can't win.

8:13 - Great immunity challenge - somebody is going to get hurt.

8:15 - Cassandra is the most useless challenge player ever.

8:17 - Okay, how stupid do you have to be to not realize that you are in the water that you need to cross via a drawbridge?

8:18 - Sorry Boo, you can't avoid getting voted out this time (even if you don't realize it quite yet.)

8:20 - Quick vote prediction - Earl gets 3 votes (and uses the immunity idol), Boo gets 2 votes, and a priceless shot of Boo realizing that he is gone when Earl plays the hidden immunity idol.

8:24 - Boo is showing some play here. And he has the smartest method of sticking around.

8:27 - Okay, Boo could be overplaying his hand. Dreamz could get the sympathy vote? After being given a car and screwing people over? Not a chance.

8:30 - And the overextension continues. Boo is reinforcing that he is a major target and is putting his faith in Yau Man. Ultimate, it comes down to whether Yau Man trusts Boo over Dreamz.

8:32 - Here comes the idol, and the jury is shocked.

8:33 - I guess Yau trusted Dreamz over Boo. Which is fair because Boo played way too hard in the end. And Boo is right - if Dreamz keeps immunity it will be funny (and sad).

8:40 - Dreamz is going to try hard to get Yau Man the necklace, which is good to hear. It looks like Dreamz is gone unless he somehow gets Cassandra to vote with him against the loser of Earl/Yau.

8:42 - Hey, it's fallen comrades time!

8:42 - I shouldn't have laughed, but they showed Gary wiping out as part of his montage in the fallen comrades clips.

8:43 - Rocky just called himself a straight shooter, and Lisi just said she lacked the ability to stick it out.

8:44 - Michelle's clips included her falling off of the tower at the blindfold challenge. How does Sylvia's fall not make it?

8:45 - They just showed Boo's fall from the hammock! Whoever did the clips deserves a medal for including the funny, embarassing moments for those of us who were stupid enough to watch them!

8:53 - Is this a Survivor Immunity Challenge or a Torture Chamber?

8:54 - They looked shocked that the final 3 would meet the jury. Why?

8:54 - It's interesting to see the strategies of the immunity challenge - Yau Man and are laying flat back with their legs extended, whil Earl and Dreamz have their legs bent.

8:57 - Shockingly, Cassandra is the first to go. (That's not entirely fair, because the challenge is brutal, maybe second only to the Thailand final three challenge.)

8:58 - Dreamz is struggling to hold on. He's probably next to go.

8:58 - Yau Man is taking the water directly on his head. But Earl is gone next. So in theory Yau Man is in the final three.

8:59 - I think that Jeff Probst and Mark Burnett orgasmed as soon as Yau Man fell. This is almost exactly what they wanted. (What they actually wanted to see was Yau Man dropping off because he thought he was guaranteed the immunity necklace.)

9:04 - They didn't know it was final three to immunity! Wow that made that deal completely different. And Yau wants to vote out Dreamz?

9:05 - Yau Man just showed a bit of untrusting, which could screw him over.

9:07 - Oh criminy Dreamz is talking himself into keeping the immunity necklace.

9:08 - Can't anybody do any math? 2 days left, 4 people, means final 3 to the jury!

9:09 - Oh for the love of god. Somebody needs to explain to Dreamz that if he doesn't give the necklace up he's not going to win.

9:11 - Earl with the quote of the night - "I wouldn't have been in this situation."

9:12 - And the final knife is twisted.

9:13 - I'd love to say that I wouldn't do what Dreamz did, but I can't say that. Still, I would have never talked about how much my word meant to me.

9:14 - Congratulations to Earl, winner of Survivor: Fiji.

9:15 - Yau Man is shocked that Earl voted for him, which is true. Earl could have saved Yau Man, but he chose to go for the guaranteed win.

9:16 - The real question is now who will ask Dreamz how he will explain to everybody (and especially his son) as to why he was willing to sell his integrity for a chance at $1 million. My guess is Rocky, the straight-shooter.

9:22 - Everybody thinks they are going to get ripped. I think Earl is probably going to get off pretty easy. And Dreamz is going off, about his decision and how he feels good about it, which means he doesn't.

9:24 - That's what Cassandra did - she was the official timekeeper!

9:25 - Cassandra threw her underwear out about three weeks ago. I feel as though you, the reader, should also know that.

9:26 - Oh my god. Cassandra just said she can't swim and that everybody else is lucky that she can't because the food would be there sooner.

9:27 - Cassandra thought that the odds were against her - which is true for the first part. Once the tribes became one the odds were on her side of making the final three.

9:27 - The traditional

9:28 - Dreamz thinks he is standing next to Oprah because of his success. Um, I can't explain what that means.

9:29 - We get the Earl overlooking everything shot again, harking back to the first episode. Foreshadowing his ruling of the game?

9:30 - Dreamz is shown sitting and thinking, possibly contemplating what he did to make the final three?

9:31 - Cassandra is shown walking the path, to symbolize her journey? (Okay that was a stretch.)

9:32 - Opening statements:

Earl - Says hi to everybody. He's played an honest and clean game (Lisi reacts). He made the right move to position himself best. He was never voted for, he never had to win an immunity challenge and he's still here. He doesn't want the sympathy vote, he wants the respect vote.

Cassandra - She got in an alliance and never wavered (Final 6?). She started out weakly, but felt she was a friend to everybody and was somebody who would listen to everybody.

Dreamz - He told everybody his story. Um, he's playing the sympathy card. Those who know him know what the money would mean to him and what he would do with the money. So vote for him so he can help himself with the money. Oh, and others as well.

(Is Dreamz trying to throw the vote away so Earl can win? If you aren't going to at least try to say that you made moves that helped you and eliminated much of your competition, then why not just keep your word?)

9:39 - Michelle is up first. She sounds like she has a cold. What is the greatest hardship you faced?

Dreamz had to already sleep in dirt, so he was reliving it. It was his first

Cassandra had to overcome her inability to swim. Michelle asks if her fear of water earns Cassandra a million. Cassandra goes back to the friend card.

Earl says he was a member of the original

Edguardo asks Earl how he found out about the other immunity idol on the other alliance. He says Dreamz.

Mookie asks Dreamz if he told anybody about the other idol. Dreamz immediately says yes, but he considered it

Alex is very bitter. Alex is very very bitter. He attacks Cassandra for taking Stacy as a "friend" and using her for her vote

Lisi is very bitter as well. Lisi says that Cassandra's water shoes are ugly and she's unprepared for the game. She says that Cassandra was over her head and propelled by greed which starts a fight. She asked Dreamz how many zeroes there are in a million. When Dreamz says 6, Lisi says "interesting". Dreams thinks Lisi is calling him stupid (which I thought as well), but Lisi does not respond. And she asks Earl about the Yau vote. Earl says he wasn't acting, and was shocked that Yau Man was getting voted out and Dreamz did not live up to his bargain.

Stacy says the only difference between him and Dreamz is that Earl is more sophisticated. She asks if she should give Dreamz the million because of need. Earl says everybody needs the million, or else they would not be there. He then goes into his upbringing, which was also hard with being raised by a single mom, drugs being in his family, etc. Stacy looks satisfied. Good answer by Earl.

Rocky - How did you manipulate the best. He uses the term "kicker" and demands that everybody begin the answer with "I'm the best kicker because..."

Casssandra can't answer. Dreamz was able to manipulate the game so he wasn't on the chopping block. Rocky says that that was an answer. Earl had to be the biggest kicker because nobody thought he was playing the game. Rocky also says that that was an answer.

Boo gives props to Yau Man. He gives a fantastic question about whether Dreamz as a Christian was playing the game or if he went back on his word. Dreamz says he was playing straight through. Boo then calls Dreamz an immature Christian and he believes in Dreamz and that he will become a strong Christian and will be able to look the devil in the eye and say "No I do not want the bauble that you dangle in front of me". If you did not see the show, you need to see it for this exchange. It was incredible.

Yau Man admits a mistake in trusting Dreamz and he gives Dreamz the opportunity to admit he switched his mind. Dreamz says he didn't and says he outwitted, outlasted etc. Yau man then asks Earl about why he would vote Yau Man out. Earl says point blankly that it's because Yau Man would win.

And now, it's contemplation time. Based on the jury questions, Earl wins.

9:57 - Voting time. Nobody's vote is revealed like normal. Does Earl clean sweep?

9:59 - Jeff congratulates everybody, and he's bringing the votes back to the States to reveal them there. Jeff's method of leaving? Unknown, we only see him walking down the steps fo doom. And now here he comes in the same outfit as he wore in tribal council. The dedication he shows is awesome.

10:01 - Here comes the vote (after the Jeff speech):

Earl (who is looking a bit healthier)
Earl
Earl
Earl (here comes the clean sweep)
Earl!

10:03 - Rocky pushes Earl to his family instead of the survivors. And here come the other players who weren't a part of the jury.

10:04 - Jeff confirms that Earl did win 9-0 for the first time ever. I'll post where he ranks in terms of best Survivors ever later this week, after I have a chance to think about it.

10:06 - We get Earl highlights, and how he dominated the game, ending with his looking over the island. Jeff has changed.

10:07 - Earl didn't know he was coming to Fiji until 2 days before he left. And he has never really watched the show before (the first season he saw). But he became a big fan of the show!

10:08 - The Yau/Earl alliance started day 1. They eventually changed from to the end to top 5 and top 4. Yau Man appreciated Earl's work ethic, and that he included Yau Man in the tribe.

10:10 - The key moment that won Earl the game was voting Yau Man out. Earl was shocked that Dreamz didn't give up immunity, but then thought "I just won $1 million". Jeff polls the jury, and 6 people would have voted for Yau Man (Michelle, most notably would have voted for Earl.) Jeff then notes that Dreamz changed 3 lives - Yau Man, because he cost Yau $1 million, Dreamz because he cost himself $1 million, and Earl, because he gave him $1 million.

10:11 - We go to break with highlights of everybody falling down, finishing with Michelle's fall. I shouldn't have laughed, but I did. Again, they avoided Sylvia's fall, which was the funniest of them all.

10:18 - Dreamz highlight clips. Jeff asks Dreamz about his much different perspective. Dreamz wasn't affected by the elements but had an issue with falling into and out of immunity.

10:19 - Jeff asks if he was playing from day 1, Dreamz said no that's not what I said. Jeff reiterates the question twice before getting frustrated and moving on to Cassandra (saying "this is exactly what it was like during the taping"). Cassandra said that he was playing the role of somebody who was flying by the seat of his pants. She was also impressed with his ability to get into

10:23 - And here comes the truck. After the clips, the audience boos, which makes Boo start waving to the crowd. Jeff asks if Dreamz was going to keep the deal from the start, or not. Dreamz never intended to keep it. Dreamz thought about giving it up, but he went back into game mode. Jeff then asks Earl if he thought Dreamz would keep his word when Yau Man asked if Earl thought Dreamz was going to keep his word or not. Earl did believe it (but apparently Cassandra knew he wasn't).

We move to Yau Man. "Love many, trust few, do wrong to none". Yau Man believed that Dreamz would keep his word, until he hesitated in responding to Jeff. Yau Man thinks that Dreamz is smart, and has flashes of brilliance that he doesn't know what to do with. Apparently Yau Man wanted to convince Dreamz to give up the necklace, but he let his pride and stubborness get in the way by stopping him from doing what his gut thought was right.

10:35 - Rocky's turn. We get Rocky's outbursts. Rocky said hello to everybody who talked to him, and explained he was not the angry person he looked like.

Off we go to Anthony/Rocky. Jeff talks about Anthony getting nudged by Rocky to stand up for himself. Anthony agrees but disagrees, which you would expect from him. Jeff then starts to jump around. Alex was in lawyer form at last final tribal council. Lisi finds it hard to hide her feelings. Jeff gives her props for being a go to person along with Rocky. Boo did tear his ACL in that mud challenge. Michelle planned on winning the million dollars, but didn't. Edgardo missed his family because of being blindsided.

Up next, Gary, and somebody who gained weight to prepare for the show.

10:47 - We're back, and the finale is apparently the 200th episode. Gary is up, and he was evacuated because of a thousand fire ant bites. He also has a tatoo of Survivor: Fiji. Mookie is asked what the worst part was. He said going to tribal council each and every time. Stacy is asked about the personal hits she took in the poll challenge. She says she got grounded by the challenge. Liliana gained 20 pounds because she didn't want to be voted out because of malnutrition (she ended up having to lose weight). Rita's kids are very proud of her. Sylvia designed a house that will be on a HGTV called "Extreme Building". Erica's hair is totally different. Jessica was able to bound with amazing people (and she's looking hot). A sneak peek of the next location is next!

10:54 - We're going to China! They're going to be on a lake. And it's going to be a new group, which puts to rest the All-Star rumours. Earl is on the Daily Show tomorrow morning. htpp://www.pedaids.org Happy mother's day to Earl's mom (who is getting half of the money?), and we'll see you in China.

I'll check in later in the week with more thoughts. Until then, a fantastic show to finish off an up and down season.

Your very quick Survivor: Fiji finale predictions

Big post to come probably tomorrow, but I didn't want to miss making my predictions:

5th eliminated: Yau Man
4th eliminated: Boo
Winner: Earl

Survivor: Fiji Episode 12 thoughts

Let the games begin!

Alex put up a good fight this week, kinda making sense with his pleas to get them to vote off somebody else, but much like Adam of last year, failing in his goal. And now we can get on to the last part of the game - splitting of the ruling alliance. The core alliance seems to be Earl, Yau Man and Cassandra. Boo is definitely on the outside, while Stacy and Dreamz are non crucial members of the alliance.

Now that we've set up where everybody stands, let's try to figure out where things go from here. It seems pretty obvious that everybody is afraid of Yau Man having the immunity idol, and they are going to force him to use it this week. (Earl might not care too much, but I don't think he's going to stop the idol from being played, as he is an incredible position right now.) And everybody seems to agree that Boo is first to go, then Stacy. Which leaves us with who is going in 4th spot (because it seems as though the final tribal council will be the top 3 again - the finale is this Sunday).

Here's where the drama will begin. Earl and Yau Man know that their competition is each other. So the question is whether one will turn on the other. And I imagine that Earl will allow Yau Man to get voted out so he can win the game.

Who goes this week? I'm going to say that wrench is thrown into the plans and Stacy goes this week because Boo wins immunity.

Short Survivor: Fiji Episode 12 Thoughts

In Haiku form:

Alex? Down! Awesome!
Now the real game can begin.
Earl looks like winner.

Survivor: Fiji Episode 11 Thoughts

Let me just get this out of the way: Thank goodness Alex is still around. After this week's farce, I am looking forward to next week when Alex concocts another scheme, only to have it blow up in his face. Last week was the attempt to use the immunity idol, only to have Earl et al get rid of Edguardo. This week, they tried to blackmail Yau Man with revealing that he had the immunity idol. This was foiled by Yau Man...revealing to his team that he had the immunity idol and Alex and Mookie attempted to blackmail him with that knowledge. The fact that they went through Yau Man's bag to find it horrified the team, and the secret that Yau Man had the idol was overlooked. Not to mention that Alex took out the one person he could count on to vote for him should he make the final two. It's been a banner last two episodes for him.

So a hearty Huzzah! to Alex. Maybe this week he can come up with a plan of telling everybody that he wants to leave in an attempt to actually convince people to keep him. I'd imagine that this would work out as well as his other schemes.

I have to admit, after Boo went down and started to yell about his ACL, I thought we might see an injury removal. Instead Boo soldiered on, which is pretty impressive. I guess he's gone in two weeks though.

Meanwhile, the other immunity idol is officially out in the open, which means Yau Man can probably cruise into the final 6, when he might use it. At the same time, it seems as though Cassandra and Stacy were rather not shocked by this, and were more angry about Alex and Mookie's sneakiness. Maybe they won't even think about the idol going forward.

Who goes next week? Alex, of course. Even though we can remember the times when somebody needed to win immunity to stay on the island and did, more often than not they don't win and get the boot. So, sorry Alex.

Survivor: Fiji Episode 10 Thoughts

Well, this is a bit late. And I'm a bit ashamed because this is the first time since the first episode that I was actually excited to write about an episode.

The have/have not twist was tiring only because the only thing that wasn't predictable was who would get voted out next. Sure, they switched up tribes, but the pain continued. The merge and team challenge was actually a good idea to shake up the game...then Jeff basically asked everybody their voting plans at tribal council and messed up that "no team play" plan. But this week was probably the best self contained story that Survivor has ever shown, because it had so many twists. Let's start from the beginning:

• Earl catches Dreamz talking to LAX about the immunity idol. Rather than lie, Dreamz tells everybody else that Mookie has the immunity idol. I don't know what to say about this. He went from a four person alliance to a six person alliance. But it worked out for him, so I guess I can't come down too hard on him.



• Earl's crew talks to Stacy and gets her on their side. The catalyst for all of the game play. Why choose Earl over LAX? Honestly, I don't know. Maybe she likes them more than LAX? Maybe out of Moto v2.0 loyalty?



• LAX talks to Stacy to make sure that she is on board. She is rather non-commital (or more specifically, she is "hot and bothered"). All of the sudden, LAX is scrambling to come up with another plan.



• LAX decides that Alex is going to be the target, so they will give him the idol, he can use it, and then they will vote out Cassandra. Brilliant idea to an extent. The problem is, even if they vote out Cassandra, LAX is in a tie 4-4. They really didn't think that through. What they should have tried to do was bring Cassandra to the dark side. For whatever reason, they chose to do the exact opposite and they decided to tartget Cassandra. Did they think that Dreamz would go with this plan? Not the best of moves, but they are thinking.



• Dreamz tells Earl and company that they are going to use the idol and Alex is the person they are going to use the idol on. Earl/Boo/Yau Man/Cassandra decide to turn them on their ear and instead vote out Mookie. Smart move, and Dreamz is either brilliant or lucky. If he saw that LAX was not really furthering their chances, then it's a brilliant move to offer up the idol information. It earned him some instant trust to get into a new alliance. But more than likely, he just got lucky and was trying to keep Cassandra around. It will be interesting to see how stable he is votingwise later on.



• Earl tells Stacy the plan, but Stacy suggests that they vote Edguardo to make sure they get somebody. This was the best decision made of all of the decisions from this episode. If Dreamz is actually a spy trying to run Earl's team into a trap, this is the best counter possible. Especially since they decided not to tell Dreamz that the plan had switched. They got a buffer from a trap, and they got a relatively fool proof way to test Dreamz's loyalty.

And then we got the tribal council voting. Alex confidently offering the immunity idol. LAX smirking as Cassandra's name is pulled. The smirks becoming shock as Edguardo's name is pulled. And Dreamz wondering if he had been double crossed even though he had remained true to Earl's team.

(Note: This is where I had predicted Alex's boot, but having seen the show it would be foolish to post an official prediction.)

Survivor: Fiji Episode 9 Thoughts

I hereby declare that Michelle Yi gets to slap Jeff Probst one time at a time of her choosing.

(If you do not get the reference, you need to watch more How I Met Your Mother.)

Seriously, what is the point of setting up two teams after a merge and then sending one team to Tribal Council immediately to vote someone out when Jeff Probst goes overboard on his "probing questions", basically allowing Alex to state who he is targetting for voting? This was not Jeff's shining moment.

The sad part is that they did a lot ot mess up the strategy of the players. From the merge on Exile Island to the return to Moto's camp which had been stripped of everything, to the random tribes, everything went so well. Then they throw it away by asking leading questions to havepeople reveal who they are voting for.

My guess is that this has just delayed the inevitable meltdown of the Alex/Eduardo/Dreamz/Mookie alliance. What am I basing this on? The preview, of course. Mookie told Dreamz about having the immunity idol this week, but next week he's giving Dreamz trouble about the way he voted (to eliminate Michelle). Dreamz then tells the Earl team about who has the immunity idol. And the title for this week's episode? "It's a Turtle?!" The immunity idol is a turtle. You think it gets revealed in some way (or used?) and this is the reaction fo somebody who is outside of the loop (hello Stacy)?

So, who is the lucky loser to be sent to the jury this week? I'm going with Alex getting blindsided. Mookie will think that he is in danger and will play the immunity idol. But it will be just a ploy to get rid of the actual target - Alex, with Dreamz flipping sides to join Earl/Yao Man/Cassandra/Stacy.

Survivor: Fiji Episode 8 Thoughts

Let's make this brief (since I'm off schedule).

Yao Man is the greatest thing that could have happened to this season. There is no argument - the season went from cruise control to "what will Yao Man do next?" and the man delivers! If I can go further, he is going to be the most beloved player in Survivor history, including over Rupert (who I only remember for the opening episode; someday I will get the Pearl Islands set and watch that season again).

Lisi, OTOH, is one of the worst things that could have happened to this season. It really only turned around once she started her "I'm quitting, no I'm not" act (if only for Jeff's mockery of it, along with the subsequent mockery that the rest of the work got to join in on). And she did bring us one of the most enjoyable Tribal Councils in recent memory, with Dreamz not only battling for his spot in the game, but utterly destorying Lisi at the same time. His best line was at the end though. "Jeff, I'm ready to vote" put the cap on a tour de force of making sure you stay (or at the very least make everybody else feel foolish for voting you off).

Who goes this week? Well, it depends. If it's a team immunity challenge, then I'm going with Mookie, who gets the boot only because individual immunity challenges are coming up. If it's individual immunity, then it's bye-bye time for Alex to go. His strength will be too much for people to ignore.

(In an unrelated note, you might have noticed a post on a previous entry about the SurvivorWiki project. Like you, I took it to be just another spam message and ignored. As it turns out, it is officially endorsed by CBS, linked to off of the main Survivor: Fiji page, and is now housed on a CBS domain. Jonathan Penner from last season is answering questions, apparently along with Bob-Dawg. So maybe I was wrong.)

Survivor: Fiji Episode 7 Thoughts

What a fantastic contrast of characters in this episode.

On one hand you had Rocky, he who never learned his lesson. Openly mocking your teammates for eating too much after a victory (especially when it is your first victory in the game)? Way to shoot yourself in the foot there, champ. So after the predictable Ravu loss, Rocky thought he was cool, and Lisi was going. But Lisi was willing to work to save herself, and had the advantage of coming into the tribe after Rocky had his first blowup. Combine that with Eduardo's manueverings and you had Rocky surprised at taking the walk of shame. Unfortunately, Jeff revealed that Rocky was the first member of the jury, so we will see him week after week (on the plus side, his question could be fantastic).

But at the other group, we get our hero of the season. Yao Man is arguably the most popular Survivor since Rupert, and this week he did not disappoint. First, he finds the immunity idol and celebrates. Then, he tells Earl matter of factly that the mission had been accomplished. And finally, he comes up with a plan that nobody had come up with to that point - creating a fake Immunity Idol. Now granted, the fake Idol looked a lot more like Wilson than an immunity idol, but who knows? Maybe the "II" (for immunity idol) on the fake idol will trick somebody.

This also gave us a chance to take see Earl in action. He got everybody away from the camp so Yao Man could look for the idol, but did it in a way that did not bring any questions to him or Yao Man. If they aren't careful, this could be the final two.

Who goes this week? Lisi bought herself one week, but I'm afraid that will be it for her. She is still firmly on the outside of Ravu, and the most vulnerable.

Survivor: Fiji Episode 6 Thoughts

Dear Mark Burnett and Jeff Probst,

I apologize for ever doubting you.

Sincerly,
JayRo

Okay, they basically just manipulated the game to stop the inevitable from occurring. But it made Lisi look like a complete idiot, which is always a good thing. We get a full on emergence of Earl as a mastermind. And the challenge was brilliant.

It was amusing to see the all-man tribe lose, even though they were specifically picked to be the strongest and continue to win. Maybe this caused Rocky to go completely into whiny little punk mode, I don't know. But I do know that the fun will begin next week when Rocky meets Lisi.

Speaking of Lisi, um, what the hell was that? The first sign of things not going your way, and you fold like an accordian? Jeff was so great during that incident, digging at Lisi in many different ways. As well all know, he despises quitters. And I think he was poking at her to see if she really wanted to quit. (I think he had some frustration to get out.) Her retrospection on Exile Island was funny, because you have to think that she was considering that she had probably thrown her game completely away.

Who goes next week? I'm going with Lisi. We all know that Rocky likes men. As compared to women. I mean to hang out with. As tribemates. And if anything, his tribe does not like peole who don't appear to want to be in the game, which Lisi left no doubt about the last time everybody saw her.

Survivor: Fiji Episode 5 Thoughts

I don't have too much to say about last episode. Ravu lost again, and made a smart(ish) elimination in Rita. Yao-Man lost to a girl in a physical fight. But the most interesting thing was what happened at Moto.

Moto has been living the good life too long, and it's affected their camp life. We saw the beginning last week with Lisi and her "This alliance is only 5 strong" comments. And this week, we saw more division in the tribe, with Dreamz and Cassandra on the outside. Of course, none of this matters because we have a SWITCH~! coming up. It's as thought CBS is trying to tell us "Yes, we know they fucked up. But you can tune in because things are changing." And if I'm reading the undertones, the outsiders might become the insiders.

So who goes this week? The outsider who is going to get screwed by this: Anthony. It's too bad, but he doesn't integrate himself into groups easily or quickly, and in a SWITCH~! situation, that only hurts you.

Survivor: Fiji Episode 4 Thoughts

X-Treme Sports has been airing old episodes of Survivor every weekday. They are currently at Survivor: Africa, and I just watched the Kelly/Brandon fiasco (summary: Brandon can vote with his tribe and switch the game. Instead he votes with the other tribe and puts himself out of the game very quickly. DUMBEST MOVE EVER.) I watch it and still get angry at the play, even though I know exactly how it will end up.

Why I am bringing this up is due to the stark contrast to Survivor: Fiji. I'm watching it, but quite honestly the show is on auto-pilot until we get to the merge. Ravu is so inept that the producers had to make up a twist that would only help them. Seriously, did they have two bottles: One for Ravu which said you can either go to Tribal Council and move into the luxury camp or keep immunity and your camp, and the other which we saw Moto get? Because if by some miracle Ravu won that challenge and got the bottle Moto got, it would have been one of the biggest swings in Survivor history. (And might have gone to making the show slightly interesting.)

What we get is history instead, with Moto going down two members without losing an immunity challenge. And frankly, I don't see them ever losing an immunity challenge, which means that Ulong can celebrate no longer being the worst tribe ever.

Who's going next week? Good bye Rocky. Karma comes back to kick you in the ass.

Survivor: Fiji Episode 3 Thoughts

I'm very close to just making my weekly post on Survivor: Fiji just my predictions for the next week. Heck, I can probably use the famed TMQ Auto-Text for Ravu: Ravu loses again and looks to shoot themselves in the foot by not eliminating the weakest person on their tribe.

This week, they came close to voting out Anthony, which is just stunning. If ever there was a time for a unanimous vote, it was this week. What does Sylvia bring to the tribe? An ability to cause laughter by slipping and falling on a slip and slide, then try to swim somewhere but go nowhere? Thankfully, Rita did not vote for either, because I am positive that I could not handle it.

(A quick message to Rocky and Mookie: Last week I made mention of it, but I feel as though I need to emphasize it: YOU ARE NOT AT A POINT WHERE YOU SHOULD BE WORRIED ABOUT WHO IS A THREAT TO YOU! TRY WORRYING ABOUT WINNING A CHALLENGE BEFORE WORRYING ABOUT WHO MIGHT ELIMINATE YOU!)

One thing I didn't get was Sylvia's "I was backstabbed" comment. Who backstabbed you? Rita? Maybe if you did something productive you wouldn't have been voted out.

Who's going this week? I'm going to say Papa Smurf because of his injury. They won't lose a challenge, but they will end up losing.

Survivor: Fiji Episode 2 Thoughts

You know, it's bad enough that Ravu has to endure the living conditions that they do. But those conditions aren't going to get better unless they start winning challenges. And with their choices on bootees, I'm wondering if they even care about winning challenges.

Choosing to get rid of Erica over Sylvia this week was another blindingly stupid move. Erica has enough strength to help around camp and win challenges. Sylvia has none of these qualities. She in theory is smart enough to help solve puzzles during challenges, but it didn't help this week. And the consensus is that Sylvia is more annoying than Erica around camp. So why are you voting out Erica? Out of some short-sighted decision to punish her for your loss? Because she's "a threat"? (Nevermind that you are 6 days into the game, and individual threats aren't worrysome until at least day 21. I guess if you are destined to not make the merge, you have to get your scheming and gameplay in somehow.)

Yau-Man once again served to be the entertainment for the show, with his hug/search of Sylvia. Next week, he will search for the rat that voted against Lex in Survivor: Africa.

I don't have too much to add about Moto, other than Boo's luck with injuries was kinda amusing. It's a rare person that combines that much bad luck with a lack of common sense.

Who's going this week? I'll stick with Sylvia. She is an outsider and somebody will have to take the fall for this failure. Too bad it will be her.

Survivor: Fiji First Episode Thoughts

Poor Jessica. So hot, and yet she was held accountable for you know, blowing the challenge. On the bright side, she now can lay claim to the title of "hottest Survivor to be the first bootee", wrestling the crown from Nicole from Pearl Islands (the woman who was only wearing a dress when stranded, and yet still got voted out).

What's interesting though is how much Jessica was hung out to dry by Rocky and Erica. They knew she was in trouble, and not only did they not tell her, but they voted for different people, thus guaranteeing her departure. If she knew she was in trouble, maybe she could have made an argument along the lines of "there were 4 of us who could have done that last puzzle, maybe we should have worked as a team to complete it". Or even "maybe putting the lightest people inside the chariot was a poor idea".

With that said, I think Tribe Hotness (official nickname of the Ravu tribe) made a mistake. As much as I think Yau Man is fantastic, if you aren't going to put the engineer in a position to solve puzzles, and he's not that strong, why keep him?

Of course, this mistake is not going to come to bite Ravu in the butt, because the have/have not theme for this season is going to destroy them. The weak are just going to get weaker, and there's just going to be a vicious circle that is only stopped when either the tribes merge, or the dreaded switch occurs.

(As a side note, this would have been an ideal time to really mix things up by having the tribes switch for each immunity challenge. This might prevent a pagonging situation and in this case, could make it fair for all participants.)

I'm going to refrain from selecting a winner right now, though I will note (much like Dalton Ross) that Earl is already getting edited like they would edit the eventual winner. His major hurdle right now is that he is on the Ravu tribe.

The question remains: Who's going this week? I'm going to have to go with Sylvia, the exiled architect. As we've seen in the past, getting exiled in the beginning of the game leaves you on the outside of any any potential bonding that goes on. And this works even more against Sylvia, as she has laready been tagged as a leader type. Given the success rate of leaders early on in a losing tribe (especially one that is under the stress that Ravu is under) and she's going to be a huge target.

I'll be back later in the week to talk about a couple of Survivor lists that have been recently published, and then back again on Thursday/Friday to talk about the second episode.