Episode 29.12

It turns out that I did forget to tell you something about Survivor: Borneo in one of my blog posts. If I can remember, I’ll tell you it later, but not now. Meanwhile, I had another Survivor dream that I’ll tell you about. It was about the thirtieth season. Apparently Robin Williams was a contestant in that season during this dream. I do not know if that could have happened, but it more than likely didn’t. You do have to wonder if that could happen: a contestant from a season that hasn’t aired yet dies after production. I don’t like death, even though it happens to everyone. I like to remember the dead as a way of respect. You’ll probably see some of that in the future. I am blissfully ignorant as to anything that might have happened during the 30^th season of Survivor, although I’ll be glad to know what happens next year. For now, I should be focused on this season at hand.

Speaking about focusing about this season, I’ve been wondering if Missy will get pulled from the game. Now in the main (first) promo for an episode, they have never aired who will get medically evacuated. This would be a first if she is. It looks like it would happen at a challenge of some sort. If it is a reward challenge, the challenge will probably be incomplete, but the game will continue until we get to the immunity challenge where someone gets voted out on top of Missy being pulled from the game. If it is at the immunity challenge, then the episode will probably end with her being pulled from it. And that’s only if she’s pulled at all. One wonders if this can affect the final three/final two scenario. The last odd number season to have a final two was Guatemala. I still hate the fact that the final three is so hated by many people. It is much more interesting than a final two. But we’ll see if that ends up happening. Just don’t expect people to not win in a landslide, just because it’s a final two.

For those of you that know me from facebook, I’m going to take this opportunity to apologize for some of the stupid things that I was saying in one of the threads on the addicted to Survivor group. I was just trying to defend the underrated season of Caramoan. Now if someone can kindly explain how Caramoan is bad, I’d be glad to know. There are a lot of underrated seasons, especially if you consider things post Heroes versus Villains. I don’t get why Caramoan is considered a bad season. But since I don’t get why people like Fiji, maybe I should just ignore that whole subject entirely.

Here are the current groupings I have for medically evacuated players returning to the game. Ever since Survivor: Philippines aired, I’ve been putting medically evacuated players that haven’t returned into different groups for how they should return for potential future seasons. Since Michael Skupin, Jonathan, and Russell made up the first group and is why I’ll stick to three in a group when possible. Since James and Colton have returned, you won’t see them on the list. I consider Dana to count as medically evacuated and she’ll go with Shamar and Gary as one group. I figure bringing back people who placed around the same place when they were pulled from their respective seasons. That is why I currently have Joe, Bruce, and Erik as another group. That leaves only two left: Mike Borassi and Kourtney. One wonders how any new medical evacuation would affect this list of mine. I just hope that they do the Philippines starting twist again. Every medically evacuated contestant deserves to play again. And while I don’t like seeing that happen in the game, at least it is interesting and makes you empathize with the contestant being pulled (most of the time at least). Remember, that Gary can always go with a different twist, as can Kourtney. This would put Mike Borassi with Dana and Shamar, but only if you use the other twists. In case you are wondering, Kourtney would be put with Wanda and Jonathan from Palau and Gary would be put with Liliana, also from Fiji. Other blog posts have covered why that it, but basically, Gary and Liliana are the only two contestants to never lose a challenge whereas Kourtney, Wanda, and Jonathan were all eliminated in the first episode by means other than a vote.

You know, at first I thought the gender imbalance this season, more men than women, wouldn’t be that big of an issue. But it turns out that it was. Most, if not all, of the women this season have been underdeveloped in some way. That may mean that a man wins. But, that may not be the case either. I still don’t know if a floater will win. While I normally have no disdain for floaters, sometimes there are cases of me not liking them. Natalie this season has been weird. I didn’t know one could be both a villain and a floater. Normally, villains are up front and center. That may not always be the case. I still don’t know how I feel about her. I’m just glad that this season picked up postmerge. For goodness sakes, even the first season was lame premerge, but I don’t know anyone bold enough to say that it was bad. It wasn’t. Only if you haven’t seen it might you not like it. Also, regarding Natalie, on Rob has a Podcast, they were talking about how dumb her decision was to blindside Alec was. They were making it out to be much dumber than I think that it would be. We’ll have to see how it plays out, but I don’t think that it’s nearly as bad a move as the two commentators were making it to be. I’ve started listening to that podcast as the thing I planned on which, the Anderson’s twins first season of the Amazing Race, was taken offline before I could watch it. At least I wasn’t into this season before it was taken offline. I hadn’t even been able to watch it. But I was wanting to listen to Rob has a Podcast anyways so I added it to the list since I couldn’t think of something else to put on it.

Mysteries so far this season: Will Missy get medically evacuated? Will it just be an injury that won’t require her to be pulled from the game? How will this affect the challenge she was probably at? Is someone else causing her injury? Are they doing this intentionally? Would they be punished for it? Would this be the first time someone caused someone else’s medical evacuation? Was the edit a trick as usual? Is nobody getting pulled from the game? Will the finale be the next episode? Will there be a final two or a final three? Just remember, if the finale is on a Sunday, then my posts will return to their regular times. They won’t be on Thursdays again until Lent starts next year. I have to avoid online stuff (just Survivor spoilers) whenever I’m watching on delay. Anyways, once the finale airs, hopefully not on a Wednesday, then I will post updates of this blog on Sundays and Wednesdays during the hiatus between this and the 30^th season. I can’t promise that every Sunday and Wednesday will have these posts as I may give stuff up randomly. I have a lot of these random posts already written and I hope that you like them. I noticed that my list of players for a potential Survivor: Legends season has gotten a lot of readers and that’s always good. Meanwhile, you can enjoy any post of mine on this blog even when the show is not airing new episodes. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, we get back from tribal council and Natalie does what she can to prove that she voted out Alec by accident. Keith is glad that he is still in the game. Thankfully, I don’t yet know any spoilers about this episode and it was at the very beginning of the tape, so I didn’t have to look for it on the tape to get potential spoilers. You may know that some of the Christmas stuff I watch is on a tape. That tape has a lot of old commercials. The most notable of them in the Hershey’s kisses ringing the bells doing We Wish You a Merry Christmas. The commercial still airs to this day. It is pretty old, I just don’t know how much.

In the second segment of the show, we get to the reward challenge which looks like it could have the Missy problem happening. Missy is on a team with Jon and Keith. That means that Natalie, Baylor, and Jaclyn are on the other team. Despite Missy’s possible injury, the challenge continues as normal as the injury is not serious enough to stop the challenge. But her injury may prove to be a liability in the challenge to her other members. In the end, her team still wins. Jon gives up his reward for Baylor. I can’t tell if the people who keep giving up their reward is generous or foolhardy.

In the third segment of the show, we get to the reward of a spa day. Missy talks about her injury and she seems to be wearing a special sock or something during the confessional so it may not take her out of the game. But we don’t know yet. Jaclyn suspects Natalie of intentionally flipping instead of accidently getting rid of Alec. Natalie is alone on Exile Island and is upset about being away from her sister for so long. And yet, her game is probably all the better for it. Meanwhile, before the challenge starts, Missy is treated by medical and they say that they might have to pull her from the game. She tried hiding the injury, which didn’t work. If I were in that situation, I’d probably want to get the treatment that I needed for a potential quicker recovery.

In the fourth segment of the show, it is decided that the injury is not actually serious enough to pull Missy from the game, keeping my grouping the same. Missy won’t play in the challenge. We get to the immunity challenge which seems like a better version of a leg up. Jaclyn is the first person out of the challenge, although Missy not playing it could give an advantage. In the end, it is Natalie that wins the immunity challenge. This could mean that things end badly for Jon.

In the fifth segment of the show, Jon doesn’t like losing the challenge. Natalie is working on a way to get rid of Jon. However, she is concerned about his hidden immunity idol. You do have to wonder if Natalie will give her idol to Keith to protect him. That could happen, but I don’t know yet if it will. That’s why I’m worried. Baylor is trying to and probably failing to convince Missy to get rid of Jon. We then get to the tribal council. At tribal council, as usual, the drama unfolded quite quickly. I have no idea what will happen as it one of those, not much was given away tribals. Missy had to be carried to the urn to cast her vote. No idols were played. It was a three way tie between Keith, Jaclyn, and Jon. This then leads to the revote. In the end, it was Jon who got voted out. This confuses me into wondering what the whole idol thing in the first promo was about. Did they edit that whole thing out? Maybe it doesn’t happen until the final tribal council.

On the next Survivor, we get to the finale. It is hard to tell what’s going to happen based on that. Now I’m thinking that Natalie might actually become a finalist. I don’t know if Missy will last until the end of the game or not. I don’t know who I want to win anymore. I hate twist endings.

Total confessionals: Jon- 41, Keith- 27, Missy- 20, Jaclyn- 22, Baylor- 27, Natalie- 25. New confessionals this episode: Missy- 2, Jaclyn- 2, Baylor- 5, Natalie- 4, Jon- 5, Keith- 3.

Poor Jon. He gets over forty confessionals only to get voted out. This leaves Natalie, Baylor, and Keith as the three highest in terms of confessionals with Missy as the lowest. I’m not sure who I want to win anymore. Natalie might win. I mean, teams from the Amazing Race typically have a Survivor winner on them. That’s why I thought that Keith and Whitney might win this Amazing Race season, but that was not the case. If either of them plays Survivor again, then we know who might win between them. Meanwhile, with the finale on Sunday, I might live tweet, but only if there is no sports delay in my region. Even if there is, I still might live tweet, I’m not entirely sure yet. Meanwhile, I have to figure out how to rearrange the names for this coming finale. Expect it on Sunday. Then expect random blog posts until the next season starts. For the last blog post of this upcoming season, you can expect the usual things. I will look back at my predictions for the season and see just how much I got right. I will crown the three dumbest moves of the season, the most memorable moment of the season, who I believe to be the breakout character of the season (an award I give to a new player who left his or her mark on the game). Don’t forget about me ranking the tribe swap and season as a whole. I’ll probably be right about a floater winning as the final five is full of them. I’m hoping that I like the winner at least. The most recent winner I absolutely despise is Sophie, although she’s not my lowest ranking winner. Sorry if I was hating on her, but I’d have to rewatch her season to see what exactly she did to win. I’m hoping that I like whoever wins this season, although I might not. If I do have bad feelings now for the potential winner, then they might change once this person does win. Right now, I’m rooting for Keith. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.