I have to applaud the producers for introducing two never-before-seen wrinkles in one episode: the early exit from the auction = hidden cache of food; and the “advantage” turning out to be an extra vote.
I can totally understand him being angry and upset over being called a liar when he really was just trying to be nice. I can even get him getting personal at Shirin in the moment and saying things without thinking because he was angry, but he kept it up even at Tribal, after he had plenty of time to cool down and actually realize what he said! I fully expected him to apologize and say that he was angry because Shirin accused him of hoarding and blah blah but what he said was wrong, but nope! I don’t know if I’ve ever heard someone on Survivor say such mean personal thing that were absolutely not game related before! That she had no family and no one at home loves her? Who does that? And then to even try to justify it by saying God hates you!? I mean, what the fuck?
It was just so random and out of the blue, Will was a nobody who hadn’t really done much of anything so far.
I wonder if Shirin is just really really really hated by everyone there. She’s edited to be annoying, but this level of hatred was just bizarre.
It was a really solid episode though! So much going on and I loved the twists with the auction & extra clue.
“No Good Survivor Deed goes unpunished.”
Yep, he was right & she was a bitch.
Eh. I felt like that veto was fully deserved. He was an outright, self-righteous, cruel, nasty, hateful, hypocritical asshole to her. She wasn’t even the one that was really pushing the hoarding idea. The only reason she got it full-face was that Mike and Jenn weren’t in camp when Will went off. I’m wondering if that was planned, so that Will didn’t have to worry about facing all of them, just the obviously weakest one. Add “cowardly” to that list above.
Frankly, all of these people are usually better people than me. If I were Jenn there would be so many birds being given as I walked away they’d have to build an aviary.
To be honest, there MAY be one or two people I’d like to see win. The rest of them can rot. And Rodney I want to get dragged out to sea by a shark.
Here is a tweet from Sierra twitter account.
https://twitter.com/sierra_dawn_/status/590982150519803904
It looks like Jen has gained 40-50 lbs since she got voted out.
I would have never recognized Max.
Holy crap, no joke.
Wow…I really thought Max was taller than that.
I agree that this was a brutal episode to watch. This bunch seems to be bringing out the worst in one another.
I also found the vote to be somewhat odd. They edited the episode to create drama over whether Dan and/or Sierra would flip. But then Mike and Shirin voted Jenn anyway. Were they so sure they didn’t have the votes that they did it to save Shirin? Or had Jenn finally had enough and asked them to vote her off? Either way, seems like a pretty defeatist move.
Mike seems like one of the smartest players left when it comes to reading people and situations and figuring out what’s going on, but one of the dumbest when it comes to actually acting on his observations. He has an absolutely terrible social game.
The only thing that really bothers me about the whole Will Vs. Shirin thing, is that Mike is the one who planted the “Will has more food he’s hiding” thought in the girls’ head to begin with.
Seems like everyone conveniently forgot that Mike was the one who first brought it up.
Yeah, there is nobody on this season that I’m pulling for. They’re some of the most unpleasant people in the show’s history (and that’s saying something). Mike is unstable and a shit-stirrer.
Well put. Knowledge is Queen in this game; Knowledge that nobody else has is King. Just outing everybody as flippers in the middle of camp was a wasted opportunity.
Somebody mentioned that Shirin is being graced by good editing; I wonder if the same holds true for Carolyn. Jenn expressed a sincere hatred for her after being voted off (might have been her YT Ponderosa clip) and she hasn’t really come off that way.
Well, I now find myself rooting for Shirin because everybody else I liked on the show is now getting smashed at the Ponderosa. And I’m thinkin’ she ain’t gonna win. Tyler’s cool. He would make for a satisfying Sole Survivor.
Mike certainly seems to be playing the game better than anyone else this season (and based on the cut so far I think he’s going to win, though there’s also the possibility he gets axed right before the final TC) but he has made some pretty damn big mistakes. His stunt at the auction was a HUUUUUGE misstep - he basically let the cat out of the bag that he was going to turn on them for the advantage, and that’s about as bad as actually doing it.
Still, plenty of points in his favor - he has a HII that he’s kept to himself, and he’s correctly identified when his alliance was thinking of blindsiding him. He’s also doing a good job of cozying up to the people at the bottom in case he needs to switch alliance or get Final TC votes.
I agree that I wonder if Shirin has benefited from good editing to make her just seem quixotic/harmlessly annoying as opposed to actually unbearable. Kinda reminds me of Christina from Colton’s first season - everyone hated her and treated her like dirt, but we never saw any reason why.
Will really does seem like a terrible person, though. I can understand being upset at being falsely accused of something you didn’t do, but c’mon, this is Survivor, it’s going to happen. But the way he just brazenly said he “didn’t make personal attacks” then responded to Shirin’s examples with “but it’s true!” as if that makes it non-personal… wow.
Ugh. I’m done with Mike. That was both stupid and mean. I now have nobody to cheer for this season. None.
If you mean not playing the idol, I think it was neither stupid nor mean.
I thought it was a good play by Mike.
Dan now knows that he is the 6th on the pecking order. He found a crack in the alliance.
(I think it was Tyler and Will that voted for Dan)
Did I mis-hear, or did Mike tell someone at the end of tribal that Dan still had the extra vote?
When did Mike find this out? He said it in front of everybody, so I guess the secret is out and Dan is wondering who must have pilfered his bag to know about it.
You didn’t mis-hear, you misunderstood. He said that Dan got two votes in Tribal - one from Tyler, one from Will. (But it would be hilarious if Dan mis-understood and thought his secret was out)
The interesting TC vote saved an otherwise ho-hum episode. The first reward challenge was certainly creative - required a combination of physical skill and out-of-the-box thinking.
But I’m not a fan of the immunity one for multiple reasons. 1) The whole “two immunities, one for a man, one for a woman” seemed forced and unfair, as if the producers did it just so Mike/Shirin could both win and shake things up. It also meant that man had a 1:5 chance of winning whereas a woman had a 1:3 because of unequal numbers. 2) I’m not a big fan of the “we adjusted it to your weight” challenges. They don’t do it for other challenges where big people are disadvantaged (i.e., the “stay on the pole as long as possible” ones), so why should they be equalized for a challenge that would help them?
Dan is a complete tool. He think he knows what’s going on, but everyone is (quite candidly) playing him. You would think a “superfan” would realize if you ever could describe your game as “passive” then you’re doing it wrong. And watching him speak with women is just… ugh. His bio says he’s married, so I guess he’s not completely out of his element, but he totally gives off the vibe of someone who sits at home behind a computer reading PUA tips and thinking they’re all that. His attempts to seem like he was emphathizing with Shirin were painfully transparent.
Not a fan of Tyler going through Dan’s bag - I feel like going through other people’s bags should be off-limits from a rules perspective, personally. Maybe the producers just really like forcing people to bury things in hidden spots.
So, that vote. Mike said that Shirin would vote Tyler, and he would vote for 1 of the other 4 (Dan, Will, Sierra, Rodney). If you take him at his word, then the loyal thing would be - everyone still vote Shirin, and Tyler vote one of the 4 and hope he didn’t replicate Mike’s vote and it’s a 1-1-1 tie. Of course, Mike lied and voted for Tyler as well. Only Will blinked (I think Tyler HAD to vote for someone who wasn’t Shirin, just out of self-preservation). Not surprising. Hopefully it’ll make things interesting next round since everyone knows Mike has an Idol even if he doesn’t win Immunity.
I thought that he said that Dan got an extra vote as in two votes during Tribal.
Even though Tyler is my boy because of my one degree of separation from him, I thought that it was shitty to go through Dan’s stuff. Is this typical in Survivor? What if he had found an Idol? Could he have kept it for himself? Do people usually hide their idols somewhere and if so can someone else find it and keep it?
Mike’s move was brilliant. He forced a schism in the alliance. Mike has immunity via the idol for one more week even if he doesn’t win the challenge. Still, with Mike’s vote and Dan’s two votes, it’s not enough to overcome the other five. Mike needs to win the challenge and give Dan the idol. Make the group fracture more and lose one of them at the same time.
Ah, I see it now. Thanks for clearing that up for me.
I also notice that they are picking teams for the challenges by “playground pick” instead of the usual drawing of straws. I don’t recall them doing this on earlier seasons, or not at least as ofter as they do now.
I wonder why this is and why they vary the method. I would also think that choosing of the people who get to pick the team members, and how they choose them, would be important enough to show on TV since it can show favoritism.