Survivor Recap: Subtle? Or Slogging?

Survivor

Preposterous

Season 43 Episode 8

Editor’s Rating 3 stars ***

Photo: CBS

Another woman was voted out? Color me shocked! After trying her best to fight against some Survivor bad luck, Jeanine was the eighth person voted off the island and is officially our first juror. She had a rough few episodes and as we return from Tribal Council, poor Jeanine is crying about her idol walking out with Dwight. Word gets around the beach that he left with the idol, when suddenly, a week later, Jesse’s strong desire to get Dwight out makes a bit more sense. In this season’s first truly shocking moment, Jesse is revealed to have possession of Jeanine’s idol, not Dwight. With the threat of the Knowledge Is Power advantage still looming, Jesse possesses a ghost idol that no one knows about, setting himself up for a very exciting move if anyone ever decides they want to play the game this season.

Although Vesi tried to forge a relationship with the Baka crew in the pre-merge game, a clear alliance of former Coco and Vesi members has now emerged. Two successful votes in a row have solidified this group: Cody and Jesse from Vesi; Karla, Ryan, James, and Cassidy from Coco; and Sami from Baka. I’m hesitant to include Gabler in this group, although he did vote for Jeanine (as did Owen). We have yet to see why Gabler would actually be brought into this group moving forward. Sami is still keeping him close by, but unless things drastically change before the alliance resorts to cannibalizing each other, he’ll be one of the first to go.

The over-the-top rewards like a pop-up Outback Steakhouse on the beach or nights away to lavish mansions may be long gone, but food is obviously still a key motivator here. Jeff kicks off the immunity challenge by proposing a deal: If five of the 11 players give up their chance to compete, he’ll give the tribe a small bag of rice. It’s supposedly enough for four days, maybe longer if they ration more drastically. It doesn’t take much negotiating for five players to step forward. Sami is the first to take charge with James, Karla, and Jesse joining in right behind. As they’re all looking for one more player to make the deal, James turns to Owen and tells him he’s “protected.” If Owen wasn’t on red alert before, he surely is now. James has caught a few votes this season and everyone seems vaguely aware of how powerful he could be. Like everyone else this season, he has potential! But this is just sloppy. Owen knows he was on the wrong side of the Elie vote, as well as the Dwight vote. He’s very clearly on the bottom and James blurting out “You’re protected” just confirms that. As Noelle looks like she’s considering taking the step, Cassidy is the final person to sit out of the challenge. All five of the players that sat out are a part of the majority alliance, justifiably feeling secure enough to risk their personal safety for the success of the tribe.

That leaves Owen, Jeanine, Gabler, Noelle, Cody, and Ryan competing for the ability to breathe a little easier at Tribal tonight. Fairly quickly, it’s down to just Cody and Owen. Cody was instrumental in the Dwight vote and clearly has a lot of pull with his alliance, especially with Jesse. Although Cody’s completely safe tonight, he wants to win to continue supporting his alliance and their plans. Owen needs to win just to survive another night. I’m rooting for Owen, but I’ll always root for an underdog, especially in a season like this, where we’re all just hoping and praying for even a little more excitement. Luckily for us all, Owen pulls out the victory, squashing the alliance’s initial plan.

This episode had the most pre-Tribal conversation we’ve seen all season, and unlike last week, the attempt at editing misdirection actually worked out. Because Owen was Enemy No. 1, things shift quickly to Jeanine when everyone returns to camp. But things start to look up for Jeanine as Sami suddenly realizes being number seven in an alliance just means you’ll get seventh place. Even more promising, finally Cassidy brings up the gender disparity. Couldn’t they vote one more guy off before going for Jeanine? Her conversations with Karla don’t seem to fall on deaf ears and she even goes so far as to talk to Jeanine directly about her desire to get Ryan out. Meanwhile, despite his name coming up as the second option, Ryan spends the day fishing. He’s safe and comfortable, playing almost an Ozzy-type game. For now, he’ll continue to provide for the tribe and do well in challenges. But how long will this last? Things look like they could swing in Jeanine’s favor until right when Tribal Council begins.

Jeff starts the conversation by reminding us of the core thesis of the show: If you put a bunch of random people on an island, what type of society will emerge? What traits will be punished or rewarded? This season, they argue, being “subtle” is being rewarded. At least we’re all on the same page here about how meandering this season has been … This angle is primarily coming from the men: Cody, Ryan, and Gabler. They don’t feel like they need to pick up the pace of the game in any way because it’s working for them. They don’t feel like they need to panic or push against the social norms that have been established in the past two weeks because they’re thriving.

I really can’t fault them for sticking with what’s working for them, but I’m frustrated as viewer, as a superfan, and as a woman. After Gabler’s vendetta against Elie for looking in his bag — something that’s sometimes looked down on but is not unheard of at all — it feels deeply sinister when he says, “If you’re starting to get too aggressive with gameplay, you kind of get cracked into line.” This is Survivor! Aggressive gameplay is exactly why this show has gone on for 43 seasons. There’s a difference between voting out threatening, powerful players and gutting the game. And expecting people to just ride along until Gabler decides it’s an okay time to start playing aggressively is ridiculous. What’s worse is the feeling that any woman who tries to play harder will earn this label of being “too aggressive.”

Strategically, there’s nothing more boring to me than a season playing out like South Pacific, where one alliance just coasts after one post-merge vote, picking off the other side one by one. There’s no excitement, no risk. The potential for Sami to turn on Ryan and the alliance was there, but instead, they all chose the “subtle” route: voting out Jeanine, who had no allies and no idols …

Burning Thoughts

• Cassidy is aware of how the game is turning, but I think her vote against Ryan was only because she knew Jeanine would still go home. Jury management has begun! If things shifted quickly enough for her to be left out of the loop already, I think I know who will be one of the two voted out in next week’s double elimination.

• On that note, BRING ON THE DOUBLE ELIMINATION! If that’s not enough for them to wake up, there may just be no hope for this season.