After Claire getting voted out, Josh is feeling good about his place in the game. He feels close with both pairs of Danny & Heidi and Matt & Frannie. However, both twosomes see this, and tentatively plan to vote out Josh if and when they next go to Tribal Council.
Tika
Carolyn, Yam Yam, Sarah, and Carson walk past the bird cage, and see that two red sticks have been added to the cage. Carolyn admits (in a confessional) that she put them there. She also placed her fake idol back at camp, marked by two similar red sticks. But why is she doing this? What’s her end game here? Does she just want someone to find a fake idol just for the sake of finding a fake idol?
Back at camp, Sarah sees the two red sticks and finds the fake idol. She reads it in secret, and the fake has the “real” fake note, so she has no reason to believe it would be fake. This is so dumb. At some point in the game, the players have to be able to trust what they see. Production is actively making the game more difficult in a place where they don’t need to. If a player is able to make a convincing fake idol, sure, go for it (Bob Crowley, anyone?). But production should stay out of it.
It also encourages faux “big” strategy. So far, we have not seen any real reason behind the fake idols. The players are using them just because they were handed them and have them at their disposal. They’re not bringing in alliance members to plan it out. They’re just acting on their own, seemingly without any thought to what could or might happen.
Reward Challenge
One at a time the players climb a ladder, and cross a cargo net. They launch sling shot at a series of five targets. Each player must hit at least one target. The winning tribe gets a large tarp, with the second place tribe getting a smaller tarp.
In addition, after the challenge, one player from each tribe will go on a journey. The winning tribe decides which players from the other two tribes will go.
Soka finishes first, with Ratu taking second.
Soka chooses Josh from their tribe to go on the journey with Jaime and Carson.
Journey
The three get the usual, “Take a walk and get to know each other” but we don’t see them getting to know each other at all.
After they separate and go down their own individual paths, all three find an immunity idol. But it has an expiration at the merge. They are also told they will not be returning to their tribe, but will be drawing a random buff to determine their new tribe.
Ugh.
Fans everywhere have been clamoring for Survivor to bring back the tribe swap. But this is not what we meant. We want *real* swaps, not just one person nonsense. I’ve been holding out hope this season would get better, but it keeps disappointing. I’m about ready to just write off the pre-merge and hope it picks up after the merge.
Tika
Josh goes to Tika, and tells them that the only part of the journey was drawing the new buff. He continues the weird tradition of lying about his job. Actually a surgeon, he tells them he’s a personal trainer. But Sarah remembers Josh saying he would take a puzzle earlier in the game because you have to have steady hands for his job. Sarah, Yam Yam, and Carolyn don’t believe him. They very quickly and easily do the math, based off Josh’s quick-hits life story of how and when he became a personal trainer, and realize he must be lying about being a surgeon, or at least being a doctor.
Ratu
Carson draws the Ratu buff, and arrives at his new home. He tells the same story as Josh, that the tribe switch was the only piece of the journey.
Soka
With Soka the last tribe left, that leaves Jaime. She thinks she has two idols, not realizing one of them is fake. Frannie, Matt, and Danny are on board with voting Jaime out right away, but are all worried she might have something, ie an idol. While Jaime is off on her own, Danny goes through her bag to look for an idol. He doesn’t find one, but that’s of little comfort to the original three Soka members.
Jaime, to her…credit? Detriment? To her whatever, she comes into Soka full of confidence. She thinks she dominated her time on Ratu, and now plans to do the same here on Soka. We of course can never know everything that happens on the island, but that idea is literally a direct contradiction to what we’ve seen from her game so far. You can never really count anyone out in this game, but surprise players (think back to Gabler just last season) will often – usually – at least show some level of self-awareness.
Immunity Challenge
One at a time, the players dive into the ocean and swim to a platform, where they climb to the top of a tower. They jump off to grab a key and swim to a floating balance beam. They cross the beam and swim to the last platform. Once all players reach the finish, two use the keys to unlock pieces to the finishing puzzle.
For Ratu, Lauren misses her key. And rather than giving it another shot, she goes the rest of the way, forcing Brandon to swim all the way back and go again.
Soka finishes first, with Ratu pulling off the comeback to take second place.
Pre-Tribal
The original Tika wants to target Josh, but the trick is making Josh feel comfortable so he doesn’t play the idol. Yam Yam and Sarah want to use Carolyn as the decoy vote and go to Josh with their plan. Carolyn, though, is none too pleased. She’s been the decoy plan before and is getting tired of it. Josh seems to buy the fake plan, and tells Carolyn that he could play his idol for her, allowing them to vote out Sarah.
Carolyn is worried about losing Yam Yam’s trust and as an ally. She might let Josh play his idol, but then still vote for him with Yam Yam and Sarah.
Tribal Council
Josh plays his idol for himself, Carolyn does not play hers, and Sarah does not try to play the fake. Two Josh votes are negated, allowing Josh and Carolyn’s votes to send Sarah out of the game.
This season just doesn’t have it. Maybe there are great characters, but they get no chance to show that with all the twists, idols, etc etc. There are waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too many idols – and too many fakes. The three tribe format is officially stale, if it wasn’t already. I’m far from giving up on Survivor, and you never know what the post-merge might bring, especially if the idols and all that jazz settles down a bit. But Survivor 44 is an absolute drag so far.
