OK guys, you know what I want to talk about in regards to Survivor this week. But no spoilers before the “click more”, so you know what to do…

Quit Once, Shame On You.

Quit Twice, Shame On…Survivor

I have so many words for Colton, I don’t know which one to choose…

Crybaby. Selfish. Wuss. Idiot. Whiner. Wimp. Narcissistic. Delusional. QUITTER times two.

I never believed that Colton had to leave Survivor: One World for legitimate medical reasons. And I believe that was proven this week – Probst revealed that Colton never had the appendicitis he feigned, and now he quit again. And for no good reason! Colton was on a winning tribe, he was sitting pretty. But he wasn’t content to actually play the real game of Survivor, he wanted to play his twisted version.

Survivor is a slow game. There’s a lot of sitting around, a lot of swapping stories. But every minute of it is game play, if you have the right approach. The social game is important, and constant. Survivor isn’t all backstabbing and blindsides, just like it isn’t all physicality either. It’s a mix, but Colton couldn’t accept that.

“If you don’t have people who are willing to roll with you, there’s not a lot you can do,” Colton whined.

WRONG. First of all, you don’t need people to roll with you. YOU need to roll with THEM. Colton hated the lovey-dovey nature of his tribe, but if he was a true player he would have forced himself to roll with it. Do whatever it takes to fit in – braid girls’ hair, join the massage circle, listen to dull stories about peoples’ lives. That’s. The. Game.

Colton wanted to cause chaos, and he wanted his whole tribe to just play along with his madness. When they didn’t, he sulked and then quit. It is literally the worst game play I have ever seen. Make friends. Earn allies. Bide your time quietly, waiting for someone else to screw up. Waiting for the perfect moment to make your move. Odds are, that perfect moment won’t arrive in the first week, before the tribe even loses a challenge. Patience, grasshopper.

So Colton cried like a baby at the duel, and then Probst went to town on him for being a pathetic quitter. Good! I’m glad to see Colton go. Probst never wanted him on the show, neither did viewers, and he shouldn’t have been asked back. I hope it was a lesson for producers.

Dominoes

OK, on to the real game. Tyson did not take Rachel’s place in Redemption Island, because they both knew it would be a stupid move.

The “truel” this week was again rooted in having a steady hand and lots of patience. The players had to set up dominoes to perfectly collapse and knock a ball onto a plate. Once again, Candice nailed it. She came in first by a mile, and won another Hidden Immunity Idol clue for her husband. Marissa and Rachel both struggled in the challenge, and Marissa eventually took second place. Rachel was eliminated.

Back at the Veterans’ camp, Monica’s reputation suffered a little thanks to Brad’s intense game play. The players on RI made it clear that he’s running the show, and that Rachel was targeted as a way to try and get to Tyson. Since I have Monica in the office pool, I really hope she doesn’t suffer because of her meathead husband.

Meanwhile, John chose to let Brad in on the HII clues, but didn’t allow him to help look for the Idols. Weird choice – everyone knows he has the clues, so why would he share the clue but not accept help? I think the right choice here would have been to share the clues with the entire alliance. Just tell everyone that you want to find the Idol and wait until you need it to benefit the alliance.

Let’s Get Physical, Physical

Aw yes! I love these physical,  head-to-head challenges. In this one, the players had to use big bean-bag like things to push one another off a floating dock.

During Tyson’s turn, he popped out his shoulder. Hopefully that injury doesn’t effect him later in the game. The most compelling match-ups were the family members. Aras beat his brother Vytas, which wasn’t surprising given their sizes – but their longstanding sibling rivalry made it a more heated match. Tina beat her daughter Katie – I wasn’t surprised because Tina’s a badass, but that’s pretty embarrassing for Katie. And Laura M. beat her daughter Ciera.

In the end, the Veteran team won again. This was a really bad challenge for the only two girls left on the Newbies team. Katie was beat by her 52 year-old mother as well as by Rupert’s wife Laura. Ciera was knocked over with one tiny push from Kat, and by her crying, guilt-stricken mother. It seemed obvious that one of those girls would go.

Plans, Plans and more Plans

Since Katie cooks the tribe’s meals and Ciera doesn’t, Ciera was clear target for the tribe. But Brad Culpepper got it into his pea brain that John needed to go instead.

Look, I think John handled his HII clues poorly and paid for it dearly. But it was really dumb for the Newbies to weaken their tribe even more by voting out their strongest dude. Yes, the combination of John and Candice will eventually be very dangerous. But there’s plenty of time for that, and meanwhile the Newbies tribe is getting decimated.

Not only did Brad want John voted out, but he wanted to be the only guy not voting for him. That way, if John won his way back into the game, Brad would be able to work with him and bring him back into the alliance. Um, what? Who would agree to that?

Then, Hayden started talking about voting out Brad instead. Even though that would still weaken the tribe, I kind of dislike Brad and was hoping it would happen. At Tribal Council though, it felt obvious that the tribe has decided to go with John. There was a big emphasis on the threat that his Hidden Immunity Idol clues posed, it was was too late for him to get that target off his back. John was unanimously voted out.

Interesting. Very interesting. So far, the Newbies have based a lot of their decisions on the Veterans, rather than their own tribe. They voted out Marissa to punish Rupert. They voted out Rachel to try and get Tyson to take her place. They voted out John because Candice is winning duels. The problem is, these moves feel a bit too premature. They’ve weakened their own tribe, but nothing they’ve done has shaken up how the other tribe functions. At this rate, very few of the Newbies will make it to the merge. Hopefully then, some of them will be able to team up with their family members to form a new majority alliance – but they have to be able to get their first.