I like this way of doing the tribe merge. Creates a good amount of drama, AND it creates inter-tribe conflict which will carry through the next votes.
We all knew who was going, though. Bit of an anti-climax.
I keep wondering, though, that the merge feasts and the like were usually places to get hidden immunity idols, or clues. Have they stopped doing that? Are contestants still looking, and we just don’t see it?
I don’t like it because it annoys me that half the people don’t get to participate in the merge feast even though all but one of them do get to the merge. It just seems petty to me.
I feel similarly negative when on The Challenge everybody except the winners is up for elimination. What I don’t like about that is that everybody up for elimination has to pack all their shit up in case they get eliminated. That means a ton of their time is taken up packing instead of interacting with each other in the house. But really why I don’t like it is that it just seems petty to me; being mean to the contestants for no good reason.
For whatever reason I seem to care a great deal about how fun and communal the experiences are on these challenge-based reality shows, even if that footage isn’t shown.
This is by design to get the players to interact with different people and bond over shared experiences, good or bad. I think it’s ultimately good for the game; votes along old tribal lines are boring.
I was fine with this change to the merge and I also am finding myself cheering for the nerdy guy who got buff for the show.
I’m glad even Jeff has acknowledged the hourglass thing isn’t coming back. That was a change I hated and I will also say I am very glad there is no redemption island or any kind of exile island.
The rule set seems pretty good this year.
First of all, tonight I learned there’s somebody in the game named Heidi. Where did she come from?
Second, she completely misused that control-a-vote advantage. If the goal was to weaken the Ratu alliance (and it sounds like it was), she should have told a Ratu to vote for another Ratu. For instance, she tells Lauren to vote for Jamie, then Matt and Yam-Yam would obviously vote for Jamie as well. Worst-case scenario, Lauren uses her extra vote and it’s a tie.
Also, Frannie, having already won her own immunity, could have saved her boyfriend by dropping her ball. Lots of one-dimensional thinking in this episode.
There was also a large meal on the line for Frannie, so I don’t fault her too much for that. Winning individual challenges is often used as a merit argument in the Final Tribal also. That challenge also looks like it takes a lot of concentration, so it might be hard to strategize when you’re focused on winning.
Hard agree on Heidi, though. She made a lot of new enemies the way she played it, and she didn’t impact the vote at all. Regardless of her using the advantage or not, the 3 Ratus still decided who went home, so playing the advantage on Yam-Yam was worse than useless.
Also, pretty much everyone knows that the other players have good cause to fear ‘unbreakable’ alliances. As long as Matt and Frannie were both in the game, they were close to the top of the target list. Having the other gone will likely let the remaining person go further than they otherwise would.
And it’s easy enough to justify not saving him to yourself: “He and I are true soul mates. By giving up possibly just an extra day or two of his company NOW, I increase my chances of winning, and if we end up together he gets the benefit of the money anyway.”
Yeah, I mean the camera just shows us Yam yam and Carolyn, and a couple others, There are a few others I saw that I turned to my wife and said “where has she been”?
Yeah, and Yam Yam and Matt should have not gone along with the idea that is was one oif them, and voted together for one of the others.
Yeah agreed that was the better move… she should have picked one of the other two to vote lauren that had the two votes.
That would put three votes on her and the other one left from the trio would have to decide if it wanted a tie or get lauren out.
But im glad of this format of splitting into two teams for immunity. It shakes things up really nicely…
I just thought of a nice twist, split into teams, and the person that wins immunity gets the immunity but the team of that person loses so they go up to tribal council to have someone voted out…
If Heidi had chosen to control Jaime’s vote, and told her to vote Lauren, and YamYam and Matt had voted Lauren, and Lauren used her bank-a-vote and voted Matt with both votes and Brandon voted Matt then the result would have been 3-3 (3 each for Lauren and Matt)
Tie vote…and a RE-vote. Matt and Lauren cannot vote
Presumably, Heidi still controls Jaime’s vote and it is still Lauren, YamYam votes Lauren, and Brandon votes Matt.
Lauren is voted out 2-1.
This assumes that both Heidi and YamYam want to save Matt. Big assumption! If Lauren had been voted out, the women would have out numbered 6-4. Maybe not what Heidi wants.
That ‘balance your full body weight on little slivers of wood’ challenge seems to be the only one women almost always win.
Score one for the walking in high heels training regimen!
I think the women were down 5-7 at the merge.
I believe it’s now women 5 - men 4. Seems to show how strong that ‘gotta keep the tribe strong’ bias is, and how completely it vanishes once individual immunity becomes the rule.
I’ve heard several past players describe how it is necessary to create drama or somehow otherwise demonstrate watchable content to get screen time. Some people are good at it - some not so much. We notice it every season, half-way through someone pops and we turn to each other and say, “who’s that!?”
Good set up for the challenge since if Lauren hadn’t partnered with Danny, she probably wouldn’t have gotten to that part anyway.
I liked this episode. Good amount of drama, and it actually involved gameplay instead of interpersonal relationships. And I was glad to see Carson only had an upset stomach. I’d hate to see him go.
Excellent blindside.
Fun little bit from Brandon’s exit interview:
Apparently they had talked about splitting the votes but never finalized any plans. So Brandon still thought he was good until too many Frannie votes came up.
Who are you all rooting for?
I’m hoping for the nerdy guy who 3D printed puzzles before he arrived or Frannie.
Then again, if that crazy/goofy lady wins, I’ll be pretty happy, too.
RIP to Keith Nale who played on the 2nd Blood vs Water season (with his son Wes) and the 2nd Chance season in Cambodia.
I’m rooting for an all Tika final three.
I saw that, remember Keith really well. He was a local TV chef on local news. I mean, we saw him on TV here in Michigan, figure he was from here. Not sure.