Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains, week two

(Note: I got my new computer built and will be spending most of the rest of today configuring it. As a result I’m posting the Survivor update today, and the vlog either tomorrow or Sunday.)

Camp Villain started this episode out in a state of complete disarray because they couldn’t figure out how to get a nice shelter built. Remember this fact; it will be important later.

We started out with a pretty terrible scare. Boston Rob, overworked and overstressed thanks to his fumbling tribe, fainted in the jungle and whacked his head on the ground. Jerri found him laying there helpless, unable to move or get up. Probst comes out with medical and, fortunately, Rob is described as “looking worse than he actually is”. Seems to have been a touch of the flu combined with exhaustion or whatever else. He wasn’t pulled from the game, and in fact bounced back pretty quick, saying he got over his case of “crybabyitis”.

I’m glad for that. I’m tired of seeing some of my favorite players pulled from the game for medical reasons. Penner and James in Fans vs. Favorites, Black Russell in Samoa, that mean old cuss in Tocantins… it’s been happening too much in recent seasons. I believe Rob’s bout with illness had two positive effects on the Villains tribe. First, it solidified Rob’s resolve. I think we’ll see less “make everyone happy” from him and more of the Robfather from All-Stars. Second, that much reality has a way of unifying a tribe, even for just a moment. Even Russell vocalized his worry about losing a strong player to illness. Anything that can jar King Russell out of the game for just a moment must be nothing short of an Act of God.

(He was back to his old self by the end of the episode, wondering if he should get rid of Rob before he gets too much control of the tribe. Good to have you back, Russ!)

The challenge was a complete disaster for the Heroes. The Villains bicker and backstab back at camp, but they are forceful in these challenges. The enormous block staircase puzzle was back, and Probst made sure to let everyone know that three of the players had done this challenge before: J.T., Coach and Tyson.  Right away the Heroes saw their advantage: J.T. has won this challenge before, so they’ll let him be the caller and get the puzzle done. “One Voice” was their strategy and their mantra.

(Interesting side-note: a quick jaunt back through the archives reveals that in Tocantins  I observed the reason Coach/Tyson’s tribe choked was because they refused to let one person take the lead and solve the puzzle. I doubt either of those egomonsters admitted their mistake to their new tribe, but if they did, I’d say it worked.)

Boston Rob is a madman when it comes to puzzles, and the Villains made short work of their staircase. The most iconic moment was when they were having difficulty getting one of the giant blocks up to the highest tier… Rob lifted it up on his back. Holy shit! This guy was on the ground two scenes ago! But they got it done, and took home immunity and a tarp.

So who ruined it for the Heroes? Maybe it was Rupert, who sat out the challenge because he wasn’t sure he could roll the huge blocks with a hurt foot. Maybe it was J.T., who didn’t solve the puzzle fast enough.

…nah. It was Steph and James, who were both instrumental in demolishing the “One Voice” mantra. Steph constantly tried to steal the spotlight from J.T. and solve the puzzle all by herself. (And, as a humble viewer, I’m about 95% sure J.T. had it right and she wanted to do it wrong. That might have been a trick of the editing, though.) And James, with his big booming man-voice, kept shouting Steph down. The resulting chaos caused everyone else to crumble.

I want to make this very clear. This tribe has Tom. And Colby. And J.T. And Steph. And James. The act of physically moving the blocks was zero trouble for them; hell, they might as well have teleported across the field. All they needed was one person to tell the workhorses where to position the blocks, and they would have won. J.T. knew this, and was ignored.

Back at Camp Villain things were looking up. The brief shake-up followed by a clear win did wonders for morale, and the addition of a tarp to their resources meant no more bickering about the shelters. Oh, and Russell speared a chicken, thereby covering the distance in food advantage as well. The Villains are living large. I am confident in calling them the stronger tribe at this point.

James went equal parts butthurt and ballistic back at Hero Beach. The scathing he gave Stephenie was legendary. He might as well have been preaching! At one point he had half of the Heroes gathered around, listening to the gospel of St. James about how the vile witch Stephenie survived a destroyed tribe and was therefore bad luck. Etc. etc. etc. He went on and on about it.

I think James’s tirade was out-of-place for three reasons. First, because it is not productive; arguing about who lost the challenge is almost never a good thing. Yeah, maybe Steph blew it today, but who will blow it tomorrow? J.T. took responsibility for not being as forceful in getting his tribe to focus as was Boston Rob, but of course Steph had already been cast the villain in this situation, so nobody listened to him. James should have just made a short comment, perhaps to Steph in private, and then got on with life.

Second, all this talk about how Steph is a pariah because she outlived her entire tribe in Palau… well, it completely ignores the fact that she made the finals in Guatemala. She’s played this game twice, James, and she spent her entire second round demonstrating how much she learned from the mistakes of the first. Willfully ignoring 50% of a person’s game is going to be more and more dangerous as you go forward, because you’re going to get blindsided by someone who ends up acting in a way you aren’t going to expect.

Third, if past experiences are such an important indicator… should the Heroes really be listening to the guy who let himself get voted off with two immunity idols in his back pocket? There’s only been one stupider move made in the entire history of Survivor, and the person who made it was too embarrassed to come anywhere near Heroes vs. Villains.

Let’s see if I have a good handle on the alliances here: Tom, Steph, Colby on one side… Amanda, James, J.T. and Rupert on the other. Cirie and Candice in the middle. I think? Those last two were the swing votes anyway. Tribal was more James vs. Steph bickering, with Colby and Tom rallying to Steph’s cause. It didn’t do them any good; the swing votes didn’t come through. There was a moment when Amanda looked worried — the moment, in fact, where Cirie pointed out how Amanda slit her throat in Fans vs. Favorites — but it was Steph gone home in the end.

Of course she had to have the last word. And of course James told her to shut her mouth.

Who’s gonna win? The Heroes are in bad shape. Everyone is too busy with the in-fighting to be playing any Survivor. It’s hard to call any of them a winner with the game in its current state. The Villains, on the other hand, seem… well, if not unified then at least somewhat content. They have good shelter now and a nice cushy numbers advantage. I’m sticking with Russell.

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