April 15, 2010: Survivor Recap

Tonight's episode of Survivor was teased last week and on commercials throughout the week as containing one of the stupidest moves in Survivor history. I couldn't believe it would actually go down based on how much advance media I saw for it.

Boy, was I surprised.

The episode started out with the fallout from the last Tribal Council vote, which saw Coach ousted from the game. As I mentioned last week, I think it's very important to note that Danielle and Parvati changed their vote to Coach, but Russell did not. Russell mentioned this at the beginning of tonight's episode, and this could come back to be a big point for him later in the game since Coach is on the jury. Remember that Russell did not vote for Coach...we could be hearing more about that on finale night.

The Reward challenge was a really tough challenge from the Tocantins season. I liked how they mixed it up by making it head to head instead of who could just last the longest. I immediately said that the Villains had a distinct advantage since they could play 5 women, but over on the Heroes tribe, Rupert insisted that he would be great at it. Come on, Rupert..this challenge certainly does not favour an overweight guy with a broken toe. Let's be real.

Of course the Villains won easily, and off they went to a feast provided by Outback Steakhouse. Ok, product placement aside, I have a problem when I'm watching a "Reality TV" program and something this absurd happens...like a makeshift Outback steakhouse popping up in the middle of Samoa to make 6 steaks. Please. It reminded me of that absurd moment in Season 1 when Gervase won a slice of pizza which was delivered by helicopter. What about that says "reality"?

But I loved that as Jeff mentioned the Outback Steakhouse, someone moaned "Oohh...Bloomin' Onion!" in a food-orgasm voice, and then when they had their meal...there was no Bloomin' Onion! So it wasn't really the Outback Steakhouse then, was it? It was just a BBQ shack on the beach.

I loved how Parvati smoothly found the clue for the Hidden Immunity Idol, and immediately hid it. It's amazing to me that everyone at these rewards isn't constantly on the lookout for hints like this. Good job on her to find it and not have to share it with everyone.

Back at the Heroes camp, J.T.'s "We don't need no stinkin' steak" pep talk was falling on deaf ears. I'm sure as his tribemates pined for a big juicy slab of meat, they didn't need to hear him say that he's had about 1,000 steaks in his life, growing up on a cattle farm. Be a little more sensitive, Captain Beef.
When did Sandra become Ice Cube? She went from this meek little background piece to a fist-bumping thug, dropping "yo's" and "Homey's" and "aksing" people questions. What the hell is that?

And after my rant last week on the "fist bump", we saw two more instances this week on Fist Bumps that required a verbal command. Come on people! If you put your hand up in the air, you don't say "High Five" every time, do you? Or if you offer your hand to someone, do you say "Shake"? Seriously...

Ok, let's get to the meat of this episode, J.T's plan to hand off the idol to Russell. I think I'm not going to shock anyone when I say that this may be THE DUMBEST MOVE IN THE HISTORY OF SURVIVOR. Independent of the fact that he's handing it off to Russell, but the idiotic thing is to voluntarily give it to someone on the other team. And on top of that, someone who you have NO ALLIANCE with, and are only guessing is in danger of being voted off.
Now, let's keep in mind that when this season was being filmed, none of the other Survivors had seen Russell's season, so they didn't know his propensity for finding and using idols effectively. But that still doesn't explain why J.T. would try to save him instead of just letting him get voted off presumably, going to the merge 5 on 5, and knowing he has an idol in his pocket to gain the upper hand at the first vote.

This whole plan made NO SENSE.

And it came from a guy who has already won the million dollars in his season!

Yes, J.T., you made Survivor history all right, but I would imagine that it'll be alongside Erik and James.

There was so much wrong with this whole plan. J.T.'s idea was to just write Russell a note and give it to him on a piece of paper wrapped around the idol. Since when do Survivors have a pad of paper and a pen handy? I remember them making a deck of cards with leftover paint and some leaves, and now they just have a spiral notebook laying around?

The only one suspicious of this ridiculous plan was Amanda, which is why she has NEVER been voted out of this game, and lasted 100 days. That's pretty impressive. But she wasn't suspicious enough, as she went along with the other 4 lemmings.

Parvati and Danielle went looking for the Hidden Immunity Idol at their camp, but wouldn't it have looked a bit suspicious just going for a walk...with a shovel??? They found the Idol "in about 4 seconds", which didn't surprise me, even though it was barely buried under a thin layer of dirt. It didn't surprise me because, as I pointed out last week, this year the Idols are "hidden" very poorly, and on the Fans vs. Favourites season, Parvati stumbled across a Hidden Immunity Idol on Exile Island while snorkeling.

The Immunity Challenge appeared to be a new contest, instead of a recycled one from past seasons. It was obvious the Heroes would win this one, marking the 4th straight anti-climactic and predictable challenge result. Credit to Russell for not laughing uncontrollably when Colby told him the plan. And I do have to admit that it was a smooth handoff between J.T. and Russell, although I still shake my head at the stupidity.

Building Totem Poles in a thunderstorm? Really? What's next...plugging in a hair dryer while sitting in a bathtub? Or just simply running with scissors?

So now Russell has his hands on his FIFTH immunity idol, giving him an opportunity one more time to tell us that his name is Russel Hantz and that you don't mess with him. As much as I like him, I'm finding him exceedingly arrogant on this season, and I think it has to be due to the fact that at the time of filming, he didn't yet know that he had lost to Natalie. They had done the final Tribal Council but the show hadn't aired yet so he didn't know he had lost. He must have spent that whole time on this season thinking he had won his last season. Interesting...

Sandra declared that "me without Courtney is like rice without beans, you know?" Um...no, I don't know. That makes no sense to me, and even if it did, which one of you is rice, and which one is beans?

Tribal council was a serious yawn-fest other than a high-school argument between Danielle and Sandra about who said hi first, and a verbal burn on Jerri by Courtney. Oh...that and Coach walking in looking like the Last Samurai.
I loved when the first vote came out and it said "Jerry". It astounds me how people can live with each other, and watch each other on TV, and then still not be able to spell their name properly when voting. Did Skeletor Stefani really think that Jerri's name was spelled like Jerry Lewis?

So Courtney was voted out, and with a hearty laugh and a good-natured "Good Luck, Bitches", she made her way down the stairs of shame, and presumably to be whisked off somewhere were she can immediately down 5 tubs of Kool Whip. Seriously Courtney, I love ya...but that's not healthy.

Did you catch the Coach and Jerri wink to each other at the end? Hmmm...

Keep in mind now that Parvati and Russell have a tight alliance with Danielle...and two Idols. This is looking good for that trio.

Next week: The merge, and Sandra reveals that Russell is no victim.