Are these the dumbest Survivors in history? Have any of them ever even seen the show? What’s wrong with them? I’d usually wait to the end of the blog post to recap tribal council, but it was just SO FREAKIN’ STUPID that I’m going to do it right now.

So, spoiler alert, the young tribe lost and had to go to tribal council. It was their first one, and I thought to myself “Well, this can’t possibly go any worse than last week’s tribal council”. Yes, remember last week, when Wacky Wendy wouldn’t shut up? She done gone got herself voted out! Maybe the the tribe had already decided to vote for Wendy, but she certainly made the decision easy. There were other missteps last week too, like Holly (more on that dingbat later) admitting that she’d had an alliance with Wendy and was going to go back on it.

So when the young kids headed to tribal council, it looked like there was going to be a split in the vote – some people were voting for Brenda, others were voting for Shannon. Jeff Probst asked one simple question and suddenly the Survivors released a flood of information. Seriously, what WAS that? Former Survivors constantly complain that Probst nags them at tribal council, asking awkward questions in an effort to get them to reveal even the slightest bit of their strategy. These people? They are just letting it all fly the first time they go! Did I make two alliances? Sure! Do I hate your guts? You know it! Am I a prejudiced, bigoted ass? Definitely!

Yes, let’s talk about Shannon. After an explosive and completely unnecessary confrontation with his no-longer-a-homeboy Chase, Shannon suddenly and inexplicably lashed out at Sash with “Hey, I’m just going to get this out of the way right now – are you gay?” 

He then went on to say that “New York is filled with a bunch of gay people.” Who IS this jackass? Then, just in case Shannon’s outburst wasn’t bizarre and self-destructive enough, NaOnka had to try and one-up him by ripping into Jud/Fabio (they actually call this kid “Fabio” in the credits now – he’s like The Bachelor’s “Weatherman” on Survivor) for no apparent reason. Sure, they’d had a (pointless) disagreement at camp. But that was completely irrelevant. Why don’t these people understand Survivor? Why don’t they keep their mouths shut at Tribal Council? Why did NaOnka have to react to Probst’s questions with all the diva attitude of a drag queen whose eye makeup has just been insulted? NaOnka has no reason to hate Fabio so much. None at all. Is the kid kind of a flake? Sure. But that doesn’t call for the sort of vitriolic reaction NaOnka provided. Finally, poor Fabio just got so frustrated with Shannon messing up their game plan and NaOnka bullying him that he practically begged Probst to let them vote already. 

Had Shannon not acted like such a prejudiced knucklehead at Tribal Council, I’m not sure how the vote would have gone. Do you think more people would have voted for Brenda? Would it have been a tie? Poor Fabio got up there and halfheartedly wrote down Brenda’s name and said “I guess this is still our game plan?”
But Kelly B., who seemed pretty eager to vote out Brenda, declared that she’d vote for the most polarizing person and threw her vote to Shannon. And with that, Shannon and his homophobic rage were sent to the graveyard. I hope they hold the live finale in LA this year, because I’m pretty sure he’s no longer welcome in New York. Actually, he’s probably not welcome in LA either. He better just stay home.

That was one crazy tribal council, but I haven’t even gotten started on the rest of the crazy yet. The whole episode was nuts!

Remember in the first episode when Holly and Wendy formed an alliance in a manic, rushed interaction? Well, some people may have given Holly props for turning on her weak link alliance so quickly, but the whole thing raised red flags for me. I did not want Holly as my pick and placed her at the bottom of my list – and this week, I was proven to be correct.

**Sidenote: My Survivor pick (along with boyfriend) is Jill. I could have done better, I could have done worse. My top five selections (Tyrone, Chase, Sash, Yve, Brenda) were all gone by the time my name got drawn out of the hat. But it’s been my experience that anyone named Jill is pretty freakin’ awesome, so I’ve got high hopes.

Holly was bumming around camp when she saw Jill eating some snails. Apparently she didn’t like the look on Jill’s face while she was eating the snails though, so Holly decided to take the bucket of snails and dump them out. This is about as logical as saying that New York is full of gay people. I mean, there were so many things that made this outburst both crazy and stupid. Why did she think they were inedible? If she truly thought they were inedible, why didn’t she abstain from ingesting them herself or politely voice her concern? Why did she have to cause a scene? Again, HAVE ANY OF THESE PEOPLE WATCHED SURVIVOR BEFORE??? I could play circles around these people! How come being Canadian prevents me from participating, but being stupid and/or insane actually gets you on the show?

Next, Holly overheard Dan refer to her as “crazy as sh**”. Instead of considering what would be the best move for her game, Holly reacted emotionally/like a crazy person. She stole Dan’s gangster alligator shoes, filled them with sand and tossed them in the ocean. Because he called her crazy. That’s like overhearing someone calling you fat and retaliating by eating everything in their fridge. Just when you thought Holly couldn’t get any crazier, she started to feel guilty about what she’d done and decided to own up about it to the group.

Hearing Holly actually say the words “I took your shoes out of your bag, filled them with sand and threw them in the ocean” did not help her case at all. No one was angry, they were just baffled. You know what else is baffling? A guy who brings $1600 shoes with him to play Survivor in Nicaragua. Also, Dan said in a pre-show interview that he planned on hiding his wealth from his fellow tribemates. Is revealing that he wore $1600 alligator shoes concealing the fact that you’re filthy rich? I don’t think so. The Antiques Tribe is displaying a whole lotta crazy, and it was perfectly summed up by my favorite dude Tyrone – “I’m gonna keep one eye on her [Holly] and one eye on my shoes.”

And still, the Tribal Council outbursts and Holly stealing shoes did not cap off the crazy for the night – NaOnka had to go steal some socks as well. What the hell? Are Rupert and Russell hiding in the jungle of Nicaragua somewhere advising the players to steal and damage personal belongings? 

NaOnka lost one of her socks and decided to yell at her tribe a bit and then steal poor, innocent Fabio’s socks. He went over to politely inquire if, perhaps, she had accidentally taken his socks and she went nuts. Because there is clearly something in the water in Nicaragua.

The reward/immunity challenge this week was a good one, and it was the first time we got to see the Medallion of Power come into play. And personally, I didn’t like it. The challenge was for some members of the tribe to dive through mud and then search for little balls in a pile of hay, then other tribe members would bounce those balls on paddles until they got it into a barrel. It was a fun challenge, and the incentive for the Antiques to use the MoP was strong – they’d start the challenge with one ball already in the barrel and would get to sit out one person from crawling through mud. 

The thing was, using the MoP made the challenge feel like a bit of a cheat. Originally the Antiques lost their lead to the young kids. But then the young team started missing their final shots and the Antiques caught up, took over and won the challenge. But wouldn’t it have been more exciting if the Antique’s didn’t have that advantage and still caught up? It would have made their victory sweeter. 

It was also interesting to see NaOnka sit out the challenge for the young tribe, even though she’s a gym teacher and was boasting about her muscles and athleticism earlier in the episode. Really, NaOnka? Really? Apparently it was so that Kelly B. would be forced to participate and NaOnka would have a chance to see if Kelly’s leg would come flying off like Heather Mills on Dancing With the Stars. Instead, she just gave Kelly the opportunity to prove that she’s just as strong an athlete (or stronger) than everyone else. It’s a tightrope walk for poor Kelly. If she’s too weak, she gets voted out for dragging down the tribe. If she’s too strong, people start to feel threatened about competing with her in the finals.

The Antiques selected the fishing gear as a prize (over a tarp) and returned to camp where they found a clue to the hidden immunity idol in with the gear. Um, weren’t these clues supposed to be hard to decipher this year? Jill cracked that thing pretty quickly. It looks like anyone who once subscribed to Highlights magazine or spent lunchtimes watching Classic Concentration with Alex Trebek  would be able to solve that baby. Unfortunately, Jill’s stroke of brilliance was overshadowed by the stupidity of giving the solution to Marty. Whhhyyyy? Why Marty? He has evil written all over his face! They found the idol, but it’s in Marty’s possession and that’s all that counts.

And that brings is to Tribal Council with the young folks, which we’ve already gone over. But just to reiterate: THESE ARE THE STUPIDEST PEOPLE EVER! I’d be shocked if some of them could even provide definitions for the words “strategy” or “subtlety”. 

What did you think of the episode? Are you as frustrated with these wackjobs as I am? Do you think Holly’s days are numbered? Sound off below!