tHIS IS REVIEW FROM GARBOTALK
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Garbotalk’s Vidcaps, Analysis and Predictions
Episode 13, "Eruptions Of A Volcanic Magnitude!"
How much fun was that last episode! I don’t know which I found more entertaining, the sniping between Ami, Scout and Twila, or her crass tossing the finger at everyone (blurred by the editors, of course) on her way out. Ami was a very poor sport and quite vengeful, all the while oblivious to how badly her behavior reflected on her. On one hand, she’s defending herself as not cocky by saying she is loving, kind, generous and giving. Then the next day, she’s yelling at Scout, “Hey! Get your own damn blankets! Those blankets are ours!” She showed herself to be the true villain of the show, and I’m sure more than one viewer sang to themselves as I did, “Ding, dong! The witch is dead!” when she finally was voted out at tribal council. Phew!
Another revealing moment of the episode was when Chris and Eliza were talking privately at reward. Eliza had been drawn back into Ami’s orbit, forgiving her for voting against her, and enjoying all the positive attention Ami poured on her. Smart Chris knew that sending Eliza and Ami on reward together alone with Julie was a bad idea, and so he fought to the last to win that crucial third position. He was able to be the antidote for Ami’s spells on Eliza. In their private chat, Eliza asked Chris to replace Scout with Ami for their alliance, but Chris shook his head no. He responded with something like, “Who would you rather compete against in the final challenge, Ami and Julie or a 60 year old woman and Twila?” His logic was flawless, and Eliza ultimately stayed the course with the ragtag alliance of four, voting out Ami. Well done Chris.
We have some interesting vidcaps and clues to follow for this episode.
From the promo: JP: Next time on Survivor...
Twila: I am so sorry that I ever made that f---ing statement.
JP: Twila unleashes her dark side.
Twila: You motherf---ers can kiss my ass.
Julie: Twila flipped out and I'm going to completely use it against her later on.
From the CBS website: One Survivor is alienated from the tribe after an outburst that jeopardizes any chance of being in the Final Four.
Twila’s defensiveness brings her negativity quotient to an all time high. After a tense tribal council, the five return and continue the squabbling. Julie or Eliza must bring up Twila’s swearing on her son to Ami and Leann that she was part of their alliance. Eliza then probably attacks Twila, saying this lie is proof that Twila’s promises are not trustworthy. Scout probably tries to calm everyone down, Chris looks surprised and Julie is rather amused. Julie needs a wedge to grow between Eliza and Twila for her to have a chance, and this is her ticket to exploit it.
The CBS quote that this behavior “jeopardizes any chance of being in the final four,” is, in my opinion, a red herring. Twila’s temper and lashing out at everyone certainly makes her less sympathetic, but so what? Remember Sandra from Pearl Islands ? She cussed out numerous players often, including Lil. Big Lil ended up choosing Sandra to go to final two with her, giving her the game. Rowdy players whose temper’s are on edge after 30 days of deprivation on the island aren’t that surprising. In fact, it could be argued that Twila becoming less likable actually makes her a more attractive final two opponent. In a choice for final two, the person who wins that final IC is going to want an unlikable person standing next to them.
From one promo:
Eliza: I think you're a liar, T!
Twila: Chill out!
From another promo:
The women are fighting amongst themselves.
Eliza: I think you're a liar, T! I think you're a liar! You know I'm sick of it!
JP: Eliza and Twila have it out.
From the CBS website: Tempers flare when one tribemate refuses to tell another the whereabouts of some buried provisions.
In the first photo, Twila is digging into the foliage, looking for something. It may be that she has a hidden stash of food that she is hoarding, rather than bringing back to the others. She might share with Scout or Chris, but she certainly doesn’t want to share with the lazy bowheads who’ve been sitting around camp! I find this amusing. Sandra did the very same thing, tossing out the fish Rupert caught in spite so the others wouldn’t get to enjoy a meal after evicting Rupert at tribal council. But Sandra covered well by initiating a fight with John to keep from being discovered for her actions.
Twila isn’t so lucky. She appears to be called on it by starving Eliza, who doesn’t believe her protests of innocence. It is odd to me that players would take the risk of alienating those who may eventually be on the jury by either antagonizing them, or openly fighting with them. Both Eliza and Twila are showing poor strategy in continuing their war of words. I suppose its human nature to get fed up, but the better strategy, employed by Scout, Chris, and to some extent, Julie, is to shut up and quit painting a target on your back.
From the CBS website: When a tribemate catches two Survivors talking strategy, an altercation erupts that makes everyone realize what's at stake.
From the promo: VO: And is Chris the new power player...
Chris: I think they all trust me.
VO: ...or is he heading for a big fall?
From another promo: Chris: We're having some fun right now, it's dangerous.
Again from the CBS website: Working both sides of a divided camp, one Survivor makes conflicting promises going into Tribal Council. Which way will the tribe member vote?
Julie’s photo looks to me like she’s listening in to a conversation, as Sandra did frequently in Pearl Islands . Of the vidcaps shown in the promos, the ones of Chris and Twila in the jungle suggests to me that they may be the ones conspiring and observed by Julie. Of course, Julie is going to run this information directly to Eliza in hopes of creating a rift. I’m sure Eliza will confront Chris about this, and demand he swear allegiance to her. After all the fighting with Twila, Eliza much prefers Julie’s company, and Eliza and Julie together could gang up on Chris. They could easily threaten to go to Twila and Scout and reveal promises he made to Eliza and/or Julie, basically offering him the alternative to either join with them against Twila, or face eviction himself.
What would Chris do? He promises to do whatever they want, of course! The question is which group of women will he truly align with at tribal council? Chris is the one “working both sides of a divided camp” who “makes conflicting promises going into Tribal Council.” He probably promises Twila and Scout that he is with them, and also promises Eliza and Julie that he is with them. This is a risky maneuver for Chris because one way or another, he is going to make two people very angry.
On to the challenges! For the first challenge, there will be a land super challenge! TV Guide posted a drawing showing the course that is planned (though the article said it was for LAST week’s episode, obviously in error).
I lightened the drawing, removed the handwritten notes and typed them in for easier viewing, then found corresponding photos from the earlier challenges showing survivors competing in the different stations displayed.
Jeff gathers the survivors together and yells go! There are four sections, in which one person is eliminated. I believe he will have them stop and restart after each round rather than run the entire thing consecutively.
Round one is the mud crawl, and the slowest person, Scout, is eliminated.
Next is the pig grab. Ten pigs are in a pen, with only four marked, while the rest are in there as decoys. Once they catch the correct pig, they must put it in a pigpen. Of course, Eliza still has a hard time touching pigs and is eliminated. In the last photo above, you can clearly see winners Julie, Twila and Chris in front of their filled pig pens, awaiting Jeff’s go for the next round.
The next round is to put together a tiki tan tam puzzle of 10-12 pieces. Once assembled, it will stand tall in the proper order. When Chris loses this round, he also loses his temper and shoves his puzzle over in anger.
This portion, the balance beam, is managed easily by Julie and Twila. After completing the balance beam, they jump into the cargo net and slide to the ground.
The first person to hit three targets with the sling shot causes a fire to light and follow a rope up to the fire wok, which erupts in flames. Once it is lit, a winner is declared. The reward would have to be a good one to top last week’s car and spa visit.
And it is! The winner takes a teammate to join her at the edge of an erupting volcano! The two wear protective ponchos. The first person has a cap on backward, and the second wears it forward. They both have long shirts and baggy pants, and the one on the left has curly light hair, while the one on the right has dark hair. We have bandied this one about in MESS all weekend, blowing up photos and enhancing them as best we can. The best analysis of the person on the right was done by aka Ives who enhanced the photo and found a pocket that matches pants worn by Julie. Also, she wears the cap she borrowed from Chris. The person on the left is either Scout or Eliza. I think the light curly hair and long baggy shorts belong to Scout.
So Julie wins the reward challenge and takes Scout with her to the volcano. There is also a possibility that another car will be awarded to the winner. I hope that is true, because this super challenge at final four is a difficult one.
On to the immunity challenge! This challenge looks to be similar to the folklore one used in Africa . If you remember:
Immunity Challenge Tree Mail:
The answers are clear,
Cause in the story you'll hear
Everything you need to know,
But will you retain,
Or listen in vain?
Will your lack of attention show?
With Immunity at stake,
Watch the choices you make,
Or you could be the next one to go.
Challenge Name: African Folklore
Challenge Location: Lions Grove
Description: After listening to a story about various African traditions, myths, and superstitions, the Survivors must race to a series of stations and answer questions relating to the story. Each station contains a choice between two statements, one true, one false, each with a corresponding ostrich egg. The tribe member must decide which answer was true, then crack open the egg. A false answer will lead to an empty egg; the correct answer will reveal a strip of colored leather contained in the egg. The tribe member then ties the colored strip to the corresponding band of color on a staff they had been provided. First person to get five strips tied to their staff and return to the center of the circle wins immunity.
Winner Gets: Immunity
Winner: Lex van den Berghe
Jeff gathers the survivors to sit and listen to story time, probably about the culture of Vanuatu . The survivors must remember the details he gives them, then find the correct clues in the forest that correspond with the story. Running around looking for clues was funny in the first Survivor in Borneo . Rudy went from clue to clue, not remembering the story, and kept saying, "I dunno." Hopefully these survivors will not have as difficult a time as Rudy. Each survivor has a post with their name on it, presumably for them to collect and gather the clues.
The survivors run and find each post with questions and a bag of answers to the clues. Probably there are two or three possible answers for each clue, and they must grab the correct item. A necklace can be seen on Scout’s post that has a blue and white item attached to it. Yet in the shot earlier with Jeff standing by Twila’s post, there is nothing on the necklace. Perhaps they gather pieces to add to their necklace like the blue and white object, and the first one with a completed and accurate necklace wins.
You can also see a large red wok behind Scout’s post, and in the overhead shot of all of them running, on the bottom right already lit. I don’t know the purpose of this object. Originally I thought they might have to start a fire under it as part of the challenge, but since it is already lit in the overhead shot, that would be unnecessary. So who knows why it is there; perhaps for decoration.
In this challenge, not only memory, but running for clues is important. Scout would probably do very well at the answering part, but the running is her downfall. She won’t win. It will have to be one of the others. Of the remaining players, Julie, Chris and Twila are good at running, but perhaps not so good at clue solving. Eliza is my pick for the best clue solver/runner combination. Her memory is pretty sharp. So I’ll say, based only on logic since we have no visual clues, Eliza wins the immunity challenge. Now, who will go home?
Eliza and Julie will probably try to work on Chris to get him to agree to align with them and evict Twila, a strong competitor with too much attitude lately. Eliza wants Twila out for lying to her and possibly hiding food. Julie wants to replace Twila with herself for a final four. Chris will say whatever it takes to get them off his back, I have no doubt, whether or not he means it.
Although Chris probably enjoys Julie’s company, he has to remember that she backstabbed him and the rest of the men after swearing to be part of their final 5, and then promptly returning to the women. She is not trustworthy no matter how cute she is when sunbathing naked. In fact, Chris predicted early on after the swap up of players that Julie was the type to be able to flirt and work her way to the final five. He knows her power to charm, and has been a victim of it. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me! Also, she has great athleticism and balance, more so than Chris does, and could probably beat him easily in an endurance contest. If she won the reward challenge as I suspect, that would show her strong challenge ability.
Twila is a strong player as well, but with Twila is Scout, the weakest player out there. Chris will continue to remove physical threats as he has done the entire game. Of the remaining players, Eliza, Julie and Twila are the biggest physical threats. Better to align with the group of two older women than the younger ones if he wants a chance at all to win a challenge. Also, Twila and Scout are not well liked on the jury, and he’d have a much easier time winning against one of them than a bowhead.
I believe Chris is the power player this episode, and will choose to align with Scout and Twila. He will remain with his final four agreement and not flip to align with Eliza and Julie. Thus, I believe Julie will be booted at tribal council.
