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Mike's Survivor Review
SURVIVOR: Episode 10
JT is dead, long live the Queen
We open at Heroes Camp. JT does a promo about
how he wants something to happen on day 25, something, anything!
Why he wants this on day 25 as opposed to day
24 or 26, I don’t know, but he’s just chomping at the bit for something
to happen.
Colby grumps that this is far harder than it
was before. Rupert and Amanda head off to see if they have tree male, we
get a weird
camera angle trailing behind Rupert and Amanda
that shows their legs…Come on cameraman, back up a little and get Amanda’s
ass in the shot, cause otherwise this doesn’t
do anything for me.
Rupert declares that he hopes he’s not pissing
anyone off, well he is pissing someone off…ME!
Sadly Rupert is going to be the best player on
the Heroes tribe this episode…
Which is a sad testament to the level of play
the Heroes have.
Rupert and Amanda find a treasure chest with instructions
to not open it till the key arrives at their beach.
Yau Man would ignore such stupid instructions
and break the box open with his mad genius skills and have
the Heroes eating the feast inside while the
Villains were still marching. Yau Man not being on this season is a crime.
The Villains find a Hawaiian Sling with a note
and a key attached to it. It’s a map to the Heroes camp, and everyone celebrates
that the merger is here. Russell does a promo
about how the Villains will crush the Heroes, and then holds court with
his three
loyal women to explain what happened with Parvarti
staying in the game. He concocts a ‘second idol theory’ that puts an idol
in
the grassy knoll firing from the front. ha
ha
Well really it’s just that Parvarti played an
idol when he played one to save herself and thusly in the chaos, Courtney
got the boot.
JT is declared the target of the Villains, which
is important to remember since the Villain game plan for this vote is *never*
brought up again this whole episode.
Sandra creeps like a creeper around Russell and
company and Danielle tells everyone to shut up, because the best play in
the world
is to go into a merger 5 on 5 but the 5th person
in you tribe is a complete outcast who’ll sell you all out at the drop
of a hat,
and you’re re-enforcing to them their low man
on the totem pole status.
Russell does a second promo about how he believes
he’s the only one with an idol in the game,
and that he’s going to use it to give the Villains
the numbers against the Heroes at the upcoming vote.
The Villains shamble off to Heroes Camp to merge,
Parvarti declares that the Heroes will ‘go down in flames’
and that’s the title of our show.
We return from credits with the Villains heading
up the beach of Heroes camp, Parvarti gives a promo about how she and Russell
have two hidden idols, and this puts them in
the King and Queen position in the game, but that her hidden idol is known
only to her
and her ‘Lady in Waiting’ Danielle. Parvarti
even makes royalty comments funny, and re-states that Russell shall learn
of her idol only later.
JT sees the Villains coming and does a promo
that he was horrified when he say Parvarti, but then seeing Russell was
a godsend, and that
without even being told about the ‘second idol
theory’ he declares it to be the gospel, and that as a result, now Parvarti
is defenseless and
will go in a 6-4 boot from the Heroes + Russell.
The tribes mingle and JT and Russell couldn’t be happier to finally be
together.
They crack open the box and get their feast
and confirmation that they are merged, name the new tribe, design the new
flag, blah blah blah,
everyone feasts. Colby does a promo about how
even food wouldn’t make him think they were truly one tribe, but the black
buffs,
that sold him on the fact that this is a merger
and a whole new game. Glad you could finally be swayed to accepting reality
Colby.
They start debating what to call the new tribe,
Sandra suggests “Hillains” somebody says “Yin Yang”, who I don’t know,
Rupert suggests “Winners”, Jerri says “All-Villains”
and laments that everyone’s a Villain, way to work the social game Jerri.
Man between all her whining about voting out
Boston Rob, then whining about being called on the fact that she voted
out Rob
by Sandra and Courtney and now her whining about
the Tribe name, Jerri’s just an old emo girl. She needs to be voted out
so
she can just sulk and listen to The Cure all
day. Rupert correctly calls Jerri out on her bullshit in a promo.
Man, Rupert’s going to be right an awful lot
this episode, I want the stupid easy to insult Rupert back.
We get scenes from camp of the Heroes and Villains
all hanging out and being buddy buddy, with the exception of Parvarti,
who is the social outcast since the Heroes all
hate her and wanted her gone and are disgusted she has survived to the
merger.
Parvarti does a promo about how she hates this
camp, knows she’s an outcast and that the Heroes will be voting against
her.
Danielle and Parvarti talk, and Parvarti tells
her it’s all good, that she’s had her pout over the Heroes hate of her
and she’s moved on,
her promo continues with her saying that the
Heroes will soon suffer he wraith and all be voted out in short order.
Danielle and Parvarti finish their conversation
with a camera man (Clearly not the same one as the one
trailing Amanda and Rupert) getting a nice shot
of Parvarti’s bikini clad body.
This guy needs to get more of his film shown,
well played sir, well played.
Western gunslinger music plays in the background,
apparently it’s high noon and
Parvarti is about to pull out her six shooter
(Hidden idol) and blow somebody away.
Russell tells JT and Rupert a bunch of lies, explains
the ‘second idol theory’ to them in detail, and swears on his kids that
everything’s good He makes a lot of statements
about how they need not worry for a second about him, that he’s tight with
them.
Rupert’s eyes bug a little during all this, but
once Russell leaves, JT’s just lovestruck and tells Rupert that Russell’s
awesome,
a ‘good old country boy’. JT does the first of
many promos that make him look like an idiot declaring that he knows giving
Russell
the idol could blow up in his face, but that
he’s sure it won’t and that he doesn’t believe it’s possible for a second
that a man
could run an alliance with all female fellow
alliance mates.
Russell walks away from them and declares them
idiots, and that this will be even easier than he ever dreamed it would
be.
Somehow we don’t get a “Russell Hantz” out of
this promo. I feel strangely cheated.
Sandra finds Rupert and tells him that she’s a
political prisoner in the Villains camp and that she can’t talk long with
Rupert or
she’ll be voted out next, but that she needs
to let Rupert know that Russell is running everything and Parvarti is his
second in command.
Sandra does a promo about how she isn’t like
the people who ‘forgive but don’t forget’ in that she does neither.
Between her promo of spitefulness and Parvarti’s
promo about hating how the Heroes have treated her and they’ll pay.
we’re getting a lot of ‘women vowing vengeance’
tonight.
Rupert promos that he’s just gotten the inside
dope on the Villains. And that he knows the ‘second idol theory’ is a lie,
and that Parvarti still has her idol. (How amazing
is it that Russell’s lie about her idol is now true, she does have one!)
and that he has to believe Sandra, and since
he believes her, he’s sure Russell’s playing the Heroes. He notes that
‘This is where the game gets crazy’ which was
a good attempt at getting the show title, the producers robbed you, Rupert.
We come back to breakfast, where the merged and
still unnamed tribe is eating egg and other stuff, after eating that,
Parvarti and Danielle decide to eat some bananas,
which drives the Heroes up a wall. Rupert promos that coconuts are
fair game, but that all other food at Heroes
camp is split evenly. The Heroes were socialists! Get Glenn Beck on the
phone,
CBS is promoting socialism as something Heroic!
He could get 2 weeks worth of shows out of this. Rupert continues his promo
that he hates the greedy scumbag Villains and
can’t wait to start voting them out so the Heroes can go back to their
socialist paradise.
Rupert pulls the Heroes tribe aside (Sans Colby,
who has better things to do than play Survivor) and tells them that he’s
not
on board with Russell 100% and that JT’s idol
may still be in his hands, yet JT can’t believe this, he’s convinced that
the
‘second idol theory’ is true. “Look at the
way JFK’s head snaps back!” he cries out, lamenting Rupert’s clinging
to the
Magic Bullet and Oswald acting alone. Rupert
finally convinces the four of them that they’ll tell Russell one target
and vote another,
so the vote will down 5-4-1 and that way if Russell
is duping them, whoever he tells to use the idol to save themselves will
be a wasted idol.
Amanda starts a promo condescending on Rupert
for his foolish paranoia and mistrust of Russell, but she manages to pull
the plane out
of it’s tailspin by saying that doing what Rupert
suggests is most likely prudent, since it’ll keep the Heroes in the lead
no matter what happens.
JT on the other hand, blasts the engines into
full throttle in his tailspin of Rupert bashing, he’s declares that Rupert
needs somebody to
handle his game play decisions for him, and that’s
why JT’s been doing that for him all game, and that how on earth can Rupert
trust Sandra,
when the truth is so painfully clear. He does
admit if Sandra isn’t lying odds are he’s going home, but she HAS to be
lying,
because she’s a woman, while Russell is a
‘good old boy’.
Good point - more on that later.
Rupert finishes either with a separate couple
of conversations with JT and Candice, or just weirdly tightly shot clips
of the group
conversation they were having where he continues
to express his doubts about Russell. He tells Candice that anyone who would
swear on their kids right away is somebody he
doesn’t trust. Now I’ve read a bunch of forums posters saying “Oh Rupert’s
saying
all this cause he got the info from Sandra.”
But honestly, re-watching the Russell/JT/Rupert scene, I’d say Rupert wasn’t
comfortable
with Russell from the start. Man, first Coach,
now Rupert picks up that Russell’s a scumbag - is Russell’s charm somehow
ineffective
against the most awful people that have ever
played survivor?
Parvarti finally gets some alone time with Amanda,
the last two standing from the Fans Vs Favorites four that was packed into
this season.
Parvarti does play up that Russell’s sold her
out and she’s toast. Amanda does assure Parvarti that she’s getting booted
at Tribal, barring an
immunity win. Amanda says she has tried to make
the case to vote out Sandra, but that she has ‘no power’ in the Heroes.
Who the hell
would have power then? Colby and Candice
are the outsiders, Rupert’s an idiot (Except for sniffing out Russell.)
so JT just tells them all
what to do and they do it, what a bunch of lemmings
the Heroes are.
Amanda and Parvarti both seem to believe that
they have the upper hand due to this conversation as their dueling promos
explain.
They get into a series of saying “I trust you”
back and forth to each other the way teenagers say “I love you” back and
forth…
Tragically they don’t make out like teenagers
do. (Not that CBS would air lesbian make-outs, hell they cut away from
Ami
getting kissed by her girlfriend on her first
season on Survivor, CBS: no fun at all.)
Finally we get to the immunity challenge. Jeff
asks Russell what the name of the new tribe is, Russell mumbles through
an explanation
that it’s the ‘yin yang tribe, meaning good and
evil.’ (One of my friends pointed out yin and yang don’t mean that, but
tragically us
stupid westerns think it does, so we’re sticking
to it! Facts be damned!) Why would Probst give
him that line to butcher?
Rupert would have given an explanation that would
have made everyone in America tear up over it, or they could have hauled
Coach out of the Pondarosa and had him talk about
it, don’t trample on the tribe name Russell, that’s not cool.
Immunity is ‘get on a pole, put your feet in the grooves in the pole and hang on for dear life.’ Last person standing wins.
This is the second smallest-person-wins-challenge
in a row.
David Spade would beat Mike Tyson in this challenge
ten out of ten times.
The producers want a girl to have immunity -
why?.
Colby and Sandra drop out instantly, Russell joins
them shortly. Rupert cracks next, and appears really bummed out about it
for some reason, when he has to know he’s not
going home tonight. Beat yourself up when it matters Rupert, not
now.
We get our first graphic of the challenge which
says we’re 20 minutes into things. Amanda falls off at this point, and
we quickly
get to our next graphic that puts us at 40 minutes
where JT falls off. JT had faked he was tired earlier,
but now he falls for real,
if he was faking and just flipped or really got
worn out I have no idea.
At the 90 minute mark Jerri cracks, at 95 minutes
Candice suddenly packs it in. Jeff asks her why she’s quitting when she
doesn’t
appear to be in bad shape, she says she doesn’t
think she can last longer than Parvarti or Danielle, so she’s gonna quit
now rather
than beat herself up further without hope of
winning.
Once Candice drops out, Danielle and Parvarti
talk and Danielle says she wants to win because she wants the immunity
necklace
since Parvarti has an idol, so Parvarti agrees
with that and steps out, and with that Danielle and her gross fake boobs
win the challenge.
Rupert does a promo that Parvarti most likely
will play an idol since she stepped down from the challenge willingly,
and this is fine
with him, because his plan will counter her idol
playing and expose Russell for being a lying scumbag. Man, dealing with
“New and
Improved game playing Rupert” is jarring. I feel
like my whole world is crashing down around me.
Back from the break JT does a promo that he now
suspects Parvarti might have an idol, so he’ll tell Russell it’s Parvarti
tonight,
and then the Heroes will vote out Sandra or Jerri
with their 5 votes, and win the vote 5-4-1. Colby and JT debate
the merits of
Sandra Vs Jerri, and really could care less which
one it is, all women are the same anyhow. The producers get exactly what
they
want in a shot of Jerri and Sandra floating in
the water, having no idea that it’s them that are in the crosshairs of
the Hero Alliance.
Jerri and Sandra talk about how they just hope
it’s not one of them that goes home tonight, and that tonight will be fireworks
at tribal
and everyone’s going to be freaked out by what
happens. Jerri tells Sandra that the Heroes have to think they have
this in the bag
given the way they are acting, so Russell’s doing
a good job conning them into believing he’s on their side. Sandra does
a promo that
she told Rupert the truth about the Villains,
but that nothing’s come of it, and she doesn’t want to push further or
else she could get
herself voted out, so as much as she hates Russell
and wants to vote him out, she’s stuck with staying in the Villain Alliance
tonight.
Russell does a quick promo about giving Parvarti
the idol to protect her for tonight. We see him give it to her and she
hugs him.
Russell explains that he needs to keep the Villain
women with him to run the game so this is in his best interest. Parvarti
does a promo
celebrating that she now has two idols, and clearly
the Heroes fears of her being a world beater of a player have been proven
true
because she’s got two idols for crying out loud.
Of course, James ws an idiot who got voted off with two idols, so maybe
that
shouldn’t be the standard by which one is judged.
Amanda and Parvarti have a second chat. Amanda
promos that she really needs Parvarti to play her idol, but only for herself,
and that way it will be wasted and they can vote
out Jerri or Sandra. Amanda wants the idol flushed out since ‘having idols
floating around ruins things’.
Amanda does some horrible lying about how Parvarti
really needs to play her idol tonight, really really needs to play it to
save herself,
cause she’s 100% the target of the Heroes Alliance,
that’s the gospel truth, pinky swear on it. Parvarti does a promo that
Amanda is lying,
and it’s painfully clear she’s lying, and that
it sucks that Amanda is lying to her, but whatever.
Parvarti does a final promo that her idols could
be wasted if she uses them on the wrong person, but if she doesn’t use
them,
well somebody from the Villains could go home,
so really she’s damned if she does, damned if she doesn’t, unless she picks
the right person to give the idol too.
The tribe walks past their new flag, which is
painted all awesome and has everyone’s names/initials on it. If I win Mega
Millions
on Tuesday (191 mill jackpot) I’m totally buying
that flag, don’t even try to outbid me, can’t be done. And we’re off to
tribal.
Jeff blathers on about if they’ve really merged
or not, or if it’s just two 5 person tribes still butting heads, Russell
declares the tribe
that wins tonight’s vote will pagong the other
tribe into dust, so tonight’s the most important vote in the game. A bunch
of other
dithering and blithering happen with Coach and
Courtney hamming it up for the camera and we finally get to the votes.
Russell votes for JT, declaring that he’s likely
a good guy, but JT giving up his idol was dumb and for that he gets voted
out.
Sandra votes but it’s not shown, Parvarti votes
JT and puts an arrow through a heart and some XOXO’s on it, telling JT
this is her ‘love letter’ to him, returning the
favor of his attempt to vote her out by handing Russell his idol.
Danielle (With the immunity necklace thankfully
covering her gross fake boobs) votes without it being shown, and Jerri
votes for JT
saying “I hope my name doesn’t come up tonight.”
And with that we get to Heroes voting, Amanda writes down Jerri without
her
speech shown, Rupert writes down Jerri and says
he hopes Parvarti does play the idol and show everyone Russell’s a liar,
JT votes,
Colby votes, and Candice votes, showing Jerri
and saying that the Heroes are voting for Jerri because she’s least likely
to get an idol if one is in play.
Probst gives the speech about playing an idol
if you want to do so, and Parvarti makes a joke about food around camp
(A sore subject for the Heroes) before handing
her Immunity idol to Sandra, to which the Heroes react with bemused indifference.
It was funny - the Heroes started smiling and acting glib and confident about how smart their plan was.
Parvarti then busts out the second idol and hands that one to Jerri, to which the Heroes react with groans of defeat, “Damn it” says JT.
The Heroes' eyes got REAL: big when Parvati played
that second idol.
They knew they were screwed, but they didn't
yet know who was going home.
Russell looks gobsmacked that Parvarti’s kept an idol secret from him and she’s handing them out like candy.
ha ha
Russell was sweating like he was Michael Steel
at a Palin-hosted KKK rally.
All those dozens of idiotic boats about
"Nobody crosses Russsell Hantz"
and he was now threatened by a girl - horrors!
Rupert grumps to Amanda that “I knew we shouldn’t have trusted that (Silenced)”
I would've liked to seen that word.
It's must've been mother-effer because SOB
and bastard would've been allowed.
Probst gives us the speech that these are
in fact real idols and thus any votes against Sandra or Jerri won’t count.
And with that Jeff reads off 5 straight votes
against Jerri that don’t count, each of which appears to horrify Jerri
more than the last.
I saw it a different way.
Jerri is kinda attractive, but her personality
sends people running away from her.
I think she was in shock that Parvati saved her
(it was strictly for strategery reasons) but Jerri seemed to convey
that THIS was the first validation she's ever
gotten as an adult that she's worth something - she was in total shock.
And then JT gets votes, he praises Russell for
defeating him, and shakes his hand, and then he’s out the door.
Russell tells Parvarti that she has some explaining
to do, but she doesn’t seem to really care, and with that
the Heroes lose JT, their only player with a
brain.
NEXT WEEK: Russell wigs out because he’s not in
control of his alliance,
and Sandra turns on the Villains, finally having
her chance to vote out Russell.
THOUGHTS
Parvarti’s play was really smart, she knew she
wasn’t going to be voted out because of Amanda’s awful lying,
she knew Russell wouldn’t be voted out since
the Heroes thought he was with them, and she knew Danielle
wouldn’t be voted out since she had the necklace,
so she defended the two people the Heroes would go after,
and as a result, sent JT home. Admittedly this
leaves Sandra to flip to the Heroes, there was little that could
be done about this, since the Villains stupidly
kept her over Courtney on the last vote.
It was a smart and bold move on Parvati's part
to give up immunity and save her two allaince mates.
Having a 5-4 edge with nine people left should
give the Villians an unsurmountable lead, but the problem is,
once one has nothing to lose they're more likely
to make a deal with the enemy and backstab their friends.
(I told you there was a lot of politics in this
game.).
If one of the Heroes comes to Sandra and says,
"Your tribe hates you, come with us," that could happen
and the next Tribal could be 5-4 Heroes is Sandra
(or Jerri) flip.
But Parvarti’s play most likely will save her.
For Parvarti and the Villains, the best result of a Sandra flip is that
Russell,
the object of her hatred, is voted out right
away, an immunity win by him or him finding an idol would mean Sandra would
start slashing and burning the Villains till
she could finally get to him. If he goes right away, she might flip back
to the Villains,
Sandra’s not about to trade 5th place with the
Villains to be 5th with the Heroes, she’s going to have to play a very
difficult
game of always being the swing, without people
tiring of her being in control of votes and finally deciding to just get
rid of her.
And Sandra doesn't seem to hate Parvarti, during
the "I hate Russell, I hate Coach" speech she never brought up Parvarti,
and Parvarti gave her an idol. I don''t know
that she boots Parvarti quickly even if she has the chance.
Whatever Sandra does this week will be very interesting.
NEXT WEEK
The unveiling of my new “Who will win” scale and
predictions.
Questions or comments, send to mikethedealer@hotmail.com
A couple of comments:
When J T got blindsided by Russell (kinda) he
said, "Well played," but
in the closing credits, J T said,
"It was a big mistake trusting Russell and
I paid for it and remember, NEVER TRUST A WOMAN!"
WTF?
Why is J T blaming Sandra (presumably) for warning
them that Russell was a lying snake?
At least for now, JT hates women more than Russell - it makes no sense.
J T's a good old boy from a southern farm, so maybe he figures women
are good for two things,
but I can't find any valid reason for J T to be a woman-hater unless
she's just a brainless Rethug.
Also, unless something super-drastic happens, Russell has already lost
this game, making his boasts of
"I'm the best player in Survivor history,"
sound extra-super-stupid because he'll soon find out that
he didn't win the first season and he mistakenly thinks is winning
this one, too.
I can't wait for next week when Russell confronts Parviti, "How
dare
you betray me?"
Her likely answer will be, "Little man, you were never in
charge - you were always my pawn.
Now shut up and sit down or you're going next," ...and what
can Russell do? ha ha
Right now, EVERYBODY hates Russell.
The Heroes super-hate him because he stupidly swore on his kids' lives
he was loyal to them
but Russell had to know that clumsy lie would be exposed at the very
next tribal. Idiot!
And the Villians hate Russsell for acting like a bully when he really had no power.
Better yet, the JURY hates Russell more than they hate losing.
Go to http://www.cbs.com/ponderosa
and watch a five minute clip of J T after he gets voted off.
They show J T getting fresh clothes, and a private chef is shoveling
steak and protein into J T by the bucketload.
Then J T and Coach and Blondie get together and bitch about what a lying,
backstabbing SOB Russell is
and remember, THIS IS THE JURY THAT DECUDES WHO WINS!
*I* have a better chance of winning this game than Russell.
Update - Russell arrested in Louisiana
Excerpt:
Russell Hantz of Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains
was arrested April 23 in Lafayette, La.
The reality-free braggart was taken into custody
at 2 a.m., 15 minutes after an emergency call reported
a physical confrontation near Justin Street.
Hantz was charged with simple battery and released this morning.
No bail was required, but he was given a misdemeanor
summons and a court date scheduled for June 24.
In court, Russell told the judge, "Ah’m not guilty. Ah swear on mah kid’s life!”
Then he turned away from the judge and exclaimed,
“I’m
Russell Hantz - doesn’t he know
who he’s dealin’ with?! I’mma make sure
he does cause I’m Russell Hantz…
Parvati, I need my Immunity Idol to get out
of jail!"”
Russell, always the bully, pushing people to the
ground..
I wonder what her name was?