Episode 32.11

You know, this season is getting down to the wire and closer to the end. You do have to wonder what will happen next and possibly if I have the right dates down for the finale of the show. I don’t seem to know a lot about the TV schedule going into when the summer shows start. I just know that this show is still going strong since there was a renewal for seasons 33 and 34 (which I’ve probably already told you about before). They should be in Fiji right now filming the 33^rd season. I’m not sure what that’s about yet, but I’m pretty sure that it’s all new players. SPOILER. The 34^th season is rumored to be all returning players, which seems awfully soon to be doing that again. I can mention the contenders that I read about might being on that season. There are 28 potential players, last I checked, although I know that there won’t be that many people in the final cast. END SPOILER.

I don’t know why they flipped the airing of this season with the airing of the previous season considering how this season was filmed before the last one. It’s possible that we will never receive a straight answer as to why this happened. We might not even get an explanation. There could be any number of reasons that Cambodia was aired before this season when it logically should have aired after it. One reason might have just been the whole build up to Cambodia where we voted for the players wouldn’t have made sense to air a completely different season next. One of the things that I’m wondering about is if this season has a tie for the win and they tried to figure out how to resolve it in the extra time that they now had. But I’m not sure if that’s what’s exactly happening or not. I would actually love to see a tie for the win, even though I know it will probably never happen. I mean, the last time the final vote was even close was over ten seasons ago. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, Tai talks about having all the power. Will it go to his head? Not everyone thinks that he made a good choice. Julia is upset at over not knowing how the vote would go down. Aubry is smirking and possibly gloating over the demise of Scot. Is she doing as well as other people think she is?

In the second segment of the show, Tai talks more about the move that he made. He decides to talk to Jason more about it. The chicken might be in danger due to a hashtag shown. Jason plans on being mean some more. We then get to the reward challenge. They compete in pairs: Joe and Tai, Michele and Cydney, with Julia and Aubry as the pairs. Jason does not get to play the challenge. Michele and Cydney win and they have to choose together who among the remaining players they should bring with them. They pick Aubry, which was an obvious pick when you think about it.

In the third segment of the show, the women enjoy their reward and, of course, talk about their strategies going forward. Stuff happens at camp as well as Julia and Jason talk about how to get rid of Tai, their former ally. Can they get other people on their side? I’m still not sure what to make of the fact that some people got airtime in the preview of this season. I’m not sure if I can remember who all had that who is still in the game, although I think it is just Tai and Cydney now.

In the fourth segment of the show, we get to the immunity challenge. It already looks more interesting than the usual stuff we’ve seen this season. I like how they have to idea to write stuff in sand. Michele is the winner of the challenge. It was interesting how Joe gave up at the challenge by the looks of it.

In the fifth segment of the show, the contestants consider what to do. Aubry considers getting rid of Julia instead of Jason. Michele doesn’t like the idea of voting out Julia. Tai is paranoid (probably for good reason) so he’s going to bring his idol. It seems like Jason isn’t even in danger of being voted out. Michele doesn’t know which side to choose going into tribal council. Different discussions happen at tribal council while people try to figure out who or what side to be on. Tai asks Aubry whether or not he should play his idol and he doesn’t. Julia is the person who gets voted out.

On the next Survivor, Jason feels alone, but the majority is starting to fall apart. I love the fact that this season has been so unpredictable so far. I still haven’t figured out my ranking yet, but I will by the finale at least. I’m just not sure yet where it is going. It’s kind of like the most recent Big Brother season. I was worried a bit towards the end since all these people I didn’t like were still in it, but then it all ends well with a great winner beating the villain (in a way).

Total confessional count: Joe- 11, Michele- 23, Cydney- 21, Jason- 28, Julia- 14, Tai- 32, Aubry- 31. New confessionals this episode: Tai- 3, Aubry- 4, Joe- 0, Michele- 6, Cydney- 3, Jason- 5, Julia- 3.

Julia had three confessionals this episode. That’s the same number as Tai and Cydney. Only one person was lower than them. Everyone else was higher. Joe had the lowest with none. Michele has the highest with six. Then there are the total confessionals. Julia had fourteen. One person is lower and everyone else is higher. Welcome Joe to the bottom with only eleven confessionals. Tai has the highest with thirty-two confessionals. That’s all to mention about the confessional counts for now. This is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode 32.10

It’s hard to tell for sure what will happen with this Survivor season for sure. I can’t entirely tell where it will go for sure. Who will win? Who are threats to win? Who is blocking the paths for others to win? Why are Jason and Scot so mean? Why is Tai, who once had a great edit, joining with the bullies? What’s with this sabotaging of camp? Isn’t that dumb? SPOLIER. Will there be a nighttime medical evacuation? END SPOILER. Will a woman win as fellow blogger Alex Gomory Keisler suspects? Why am I asking so many questions? I remember that I used to do with the San Juan del Sur season before I gave it up for being something I did that I found stupid. It’s hard to tell where this season will go for sure. But I guess that we’ll find out for sure later.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1P6L5Wab18 Well, here’s the link to the Survivor Showdown that I was in. I didn’t win the showdown, but I’m glad that I did as well as I did, even if it wasn’t that well at all. It’s cool that I’m famous now, lol. I might answer questions about it later, if there are any.

In case you were wondering, I’m rewatching Survivor: Palau on DVD right now. Or, at least I would be if I wasn’t so bogged down on recorded shows on VHS. I’ve been going at a fairly slow pace with watching it. In fact, I’m moving so slowly with it, I would probably lose in a race against a sloth, snail, turtle, and a robot powered by internet explorer. Even that robot would be having a faster time than I would be with different tasks like that. Meanwhile, I’m still using a method of watching different shows at once by having a list of shows and rolling for an option from it. It’s kind of like what Sheldon Cooper did in the Big Bang Theory episode: The Wiggly Finger Catalyst. I’m looking forward to the summer when I will have more time to watch shows and hopefully won’t have any more recordings on VHS to make so I won’t be as far behind again. I will have to hope there’s less good shows on the schedule next season on TV so I won’t have to record that much. VHS tapes aren’t even my primary way of recording shows. They are my secondary way of recording shows.

There might not be any more family visits that I’ll know of in the near future so that shouldn’t affect me watching this show at all. But it has been pretty rainy and dreary all day. So hopefully there isn’t any problem with it in this or any episode. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, the men’s side talks about how they are glad the vote off happened. Tai returns Jason’s idol to him. Scot feels that being themselves if the other side does what they want, which seems kind of condescending if you ask me.

In the second segment of the show, we get to the reward challenge. They brought back the leg up challenge which I hate. This is the first time it appears outside of Redemption Island. There are three different rewards and the contestants choose between three rewards: an advantage in the game, a letter from home, or food. Once they choose their reward, they get that and only get that one reward. This is a pretty interesting twist. Sometimes they need to shake things up the way things work especially as we continue into more seasons of Survivor. Julia wins the letter fighting against Joe. Michele wins the food fighting against Scot and Jason. Tai wins the advantage fighting against Cydney and Aubry.

In the third segment of the show, Michele talks about how she is glad to have beaten the two men she beat. Meanwhile, it appears that to no surprise, Tai has won an extra vote advantage. Does this mean that he’s screwed? Sadly, those who have had the advantage so far have been screwed. Julia reacts to her reward as well. Julia thinks about which side to go on and how to get rid of their problems. I’m not entirely sure myself which side she is on. Maybe she is on nobody’s side because nobody is on her side. Nobody cares for the woods anymore, little orc. It feels like more should be happening now.

In the fourth segment of the show, Aubry and Tai talk more about the game at hand. She reveals the girls’ plan to vote out Tai to Tai. Tai talks about this to Jason and Scot, but they suggest voting out Aubry which is when Tai wants to turn on them. We then get to the immunity challenge. It’s weird that there are two endurance challenges in the same episode. Jason closely beats out Aubry at the challenge.

In the fifth segment of the show, it appears that some people still want Aubry to be voted out. It seems like Scot and Jason are too quick to flip on their allies, but maybe Julia was as well. The question is, are these people getting to the end as goats? The woman’s side wants to vote out Tai, or, at least flush his idol out of the game. Tai is worried about the vote and where it would leave him in the long run. I’m just wondering if the promos that implied a blindside are red herrings or not. We have seen red herrings before, but we also thought that we knew what would happen going into a vote before. The main flaw of the super idol is that it effectively uses two idols instead of just one.

Meanwhile, it is hard to tell for sure what is happening at tribal council. Since Jeff’s comments don’t air before the tribal council vote, it is probably going to be a blindside of sorts. Will it be that way to them or just us? There is confusion over whether or not Tai should play his idol. Scot gets the votes to be voted out and Tai doesn’t give him the super idol, meaning that Scot leaves with an idol and the super idol doesn’t exist unless there is another idol in the game. Tai’s decision could and probably will end badly. But, wouldn’t he have been in danger without it?

On the next Survivor, Tai feels that he’s on top of the world now, but the alliance of Jason and Julia will probably turn on him. I guess it was time that Tai cut ties. He voted against Scot and got an idol out of the game. I just wonder if that is allowed in the rules, but I guess that it is. Is what Tai did the right move? Now he’s the only one with an idol, but everyone knows that he has an idol. And they also know that he can turn on people so I’m not sure if he’ll do as well as I originally wanted him to. Do I still want him to win? Who would make a better alternative besides him? It’s hard to tell for sure what will happen, but at least we are in for a wild ride.

Total confessional count: Michele- 17, Cydney- 18, Jason- 23, Scot- 28, Julia- 11, Tai- 29, Aubry- 27, Joe- 11. New confessionals this episode: Aubry- 5, Joe- 0, Michele- 2, Cydney- 1, Jason- 3, Scot- 4, Julia- 2, Tai- 6.

Scot had four confessionals this episode. Aubry had five and Tai had six. Everyone else was lower in terms of number of confessionals. Joe had no confessionals and Cydney only had one. In terms of total confessionals, Scot had twenty-eight confessionals. Tai is the only one to have a higher confessional count than him at twenty-nine confessionals. Everyone else had lower total confessionals.  Julia and Joe have the lowest confessional count with eleven each. We are getting to the part where it is harder for me to come up with ways of changing the order of names that you see. I’m sure that I’ll come up with some sort of new order as I always do. I’ve made it this far with no problems so hopefully I’ll remember what other ways I can change the name order. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode 32.9

You might be wondering where I plan on ranking this season among the other seasons of Survivor. I honestly don’t know where to rank it yet. At first I thought that it might be somewhere in the middle that I rank it. But I might go higher than that actually. This season has had great tribal councils and various other drama. But I’m not sure if it’s good enough to rank that highly. We’ll see what happens for sure. I have until the end of the season to decide for sure.

If I know what is going on regarding the future of Survivor, then I believe that they are filming the thirty-third season right now. Normally I’m on top of filming dates, but I haven’t been able to keep track as much lately. For instance, I have no idea when this season was filmed, just that it was during the airing of Worlds Apart. They will be in Fiji for seasons 33 and 34. I don’t know what they might do regarding twists and all that. I also don’t know if there are returning players on either of these seasons or not. I just know that I haven’t looked into seeing which former contestants might not be on social media. Of course, I think that it’s possible that Candice returns to play again on season 34 considering how she has played in seasons 13, 20, and 27. Mathematically speaking, she should be back soon. But that’s only if the pattern continues, which it might not.

It looks like in the near future I will finally get to be on a Survivor podcast. This one is called Survivor Showdown which seems to be a replacement for the one I originally planned on being on before they decided to stop doing that podcast. (It appeared that they didn’t care as much about it as they could have or used to.) I’ll post the link to the episode I was on in this blog after it has been made. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, Scot talks about how their alliance blew up. They decide to hide various important objects away from their tribemates. Tai considers this to be a bit too much. But Scot does decide to hide the tools. Why is he doing this? He must want people to not like him.

In the second segment of the show, Debbie talks about how the important items are missing. It seems the edit is implying that a woman will probably win. If it were a woman, I’d guess that it would be Michele who wins if it’s a woman. Scot pours water on the fire. What is wrong with him? Tai is against what Scot and Jason are doing and planning on doing with the other tribe members. This makes me really hope that something bad doesn’t happen with the super idol. Although, they can only use it once, so hopefully they don’t take out someone too important. Plus, the way they are pissing off Tai may not make him go along with the plan to use the idol.

The reward challenge has an interesting way of deciding the two people playing. Joe decides to sit out and he supports the group of Aubry, Debbie, Cydney, and Michele who are competing against the team of Julia, Scot, Tai, and Jason. Julia made an interesting move by deciding to support the men. Will this decision come back to haunt her? The male team and Julia end up winning the challenge. Is this good or bad for Julia? There isn’t enough in her edit to support a win, but now there might be enough to show why she doesn’t.

In the third segment of the show, people talk about the reward that they won. The men try to bring in Julia and she seems to be playing both sides. I really don’t see this ending well for Julia. The problem with the majority alliance thus far tends to be that they do not have enough numbers to split the votes. The alliance wants to turn on Julia.

In the fourth segment of the show, Tai puts out the fire, deciding to sabotage the tribe again. The woman’s alliance thinks about getting rid of Julia, but Debbie thinks that they have to stick with voting out either Scot or Jason. The most interesting part is that they don’t realize that it was Tai who put out the first the second time. All they have to do to win the immunity challenge is to hit a gong. Between that and balls, whoever designs the challenges on Survivor probably has a dirty mind. Or maybe it’s just us viewers that have minds like this. There are numerous disasters for many players throughout the challenge. There sure are enough ways to lose this challenge that it’s hard to tell who could win. It seems like there is a design flaw with the dominoes or, at least, the plank they are stacked out. Julia is the person who ends up winning the challenge.

In the fifth segment of the show, Aubry is convinced that Julia could easily turn on their side. She lies to the men about what the plan is, sticking with the women. But will people believe that she is still on their side? It appears that Debbie could be a target of the vote. Why would they get rid of Debbie? Julia might actually be the swing vote and it is hard to tell what is going on. Tai reveals his idol at tribal council as does Jason. They are actually trying to decide what happens with rock/paper/scissors. But who will the vote go for? Jason gives his idol to Tai so it becomes a super idol, I think. WHAT’S GOING ON!? The votes go all over the place and one has to wonder if the idol will be needed. It wasn’t needed as Debbie is the one that gets voted out of the game. I’m shaking as I’m typing this over the type of craziness that I just witnessed. I don’t think that I can rank this season as average when it is probably higher. But I’ll figure that out later.

On the next Survivor, the man’s alliance looks good, but it appears that Tai could flip on them. Will he? I honestly can’t tell what’s happening and I’m quite glad that this is quite an unpredictable season. I don’t know what will happen next.

Total confessional count: Cydney- 17, Jason- 20, Scot- 24, Julia- 9, Tai- 23, Debbie- 23, Aubry- 22, Joe- 11, Michele- 15. New confessionals this episode: Jason- 2, Scot- 5, Julia- 3, Tai- 3, Debbie- 2, Aubry- 6, Joe- 2, Michele- 2, Cydney- 3.

Debbie has two confessionals this episode, the same number as Jason, Michele, and Joe. Everyone else has higher confessionals this episode with Aubry at the highest with six. In terms of total confessionals, Debbie has twenty-three, the same number as Tai. Scot is the only one higher with them with twenty-four confessionals while everyone else has less. Julia has nine confessionals, the lowest of the group. I’m not sure if I can tell who will win based on confessionals alone, although they always tend to say who won’t win. It could be a floater winning as I suspect, although that wouldn’t be a bad thing. We’ll see what happens as this crazy season continues to unfold. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode 32.8

Well, we now have the next medical evacuation: Neal. And now my groups of how people can return with these groups will change again. Neal joins the list of players that I’m picking from, which is Bruce, Gary, Joe, Mike Borassi, Kourtney, Dana, Shamar, Erik, Terry, and Caleb. Now I haven’t even mentioned who the three would be that I most want back. But I’ll do that if they decide that they will do the twist again, which they might not. Anyways, my new groups are Erik, Neal, and Bruce as group one, Joe, Shamar, and Terry as group two, Caleb, Gary, and Mike as group three, and Kourtney and Dana can be group four. Now those are my groups, for now at least. I wonder which medically evacuated players are the most likely to return.

Sometimes family visits happen and affect my TV watching. To date, this has not affected my Survivor blog in any way. But it could happen. I thought that I would tell you about this in case it does. I would say that if you don’t see a post on Wednesday when it isn’t Advent or Lent, I should be back soon and the blog post will have an explanation as to why I am late. Plus, there could be any number of reasons I could go on an unexpected hiatus. I just hope that I will be able to know this enough in advance or be able to return in enough of a short time. I guess the reason that I’m telling you this now is because my uncle is visiting on Wednesday. This caused me to miss the live Survivor episode, but I recorded it on VHS. I don’t know when I’ll be able to watch it. I probably will see it on Thursday after all, although if I can still watch it on Wednesday, then I will. I guess you’ll notice whether or not I did this when you see what day of the week this blog was posted at.

It seems that more often than not, the promos for an episode of Survivor can reveal too much about it. There will be some sort of crazy tribal council going on in this episode. There will probably be an audience blindside which typically speaks to how much they leave out of editing. I used to think that this show had great editing, but now I’m convinced that it does not anymore. We need to watch the tribal council for something interesting. It make sense as this is now the dramatic postmerge tribal council that was delayed an episode due to Neal’s evacuation. I just wonder how it will be interesting. I know that Jeff previously thought that Aubry’s vote switch was a Survivor first, but it wasn’t, I don’t think at least. Gervase switched his vote in Borneo’s first merged tribal council, although he had to as he originally voted for someone who was immune. As stated before, Hayden started writing a vote for one person, scribbled it out to write another, and then ultimately stick with the first name after all. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, we seem to continue exactly from the moment that Neal left the game and Scot mentions the previously on Survivor thing Jeff does. Will the beauty and brawn tribes team up together as they say they will? I thought that three tribe seasons would get rid of the Pagonging problem (if one calls that a problem), but it just seems to change it.

In the second segment of the show, Jason tells about his daughter with autism. I hope that he doesn’t think negative things about it as that can ruin my impression of someone. I don’t watch Undercover Boss anymore as they aired one single person’s stupid opinion about it. Of course, different people have different types of autism (if they have it). We then get to the reward challenge. Scot, Nick, Julia, Debbie, and Tai are the yellow team while Aubry, Joe, Michele, Cydney, and Jason are the blue team. The blue team struggles a lot on the challenge. This leads to the yellow team winning reward. Aubry is upset over the team that she picked as it didn’t work out. But we don’t even know how the team picking went down. Guess I’ll have to watch it online and hope that it is there.

In the third segment of the show, the reward is at camp for some odd reason. Debbie refers to it as fantastic. That’s interesting considering how Dairy Queen’s nonsensical motto is fan food, not fast food. (Serious, what does that mean?) Scot opens up about his family and Mormon faith. Was that an SIU hat that I noticed? Which SIU might it be, I wonder? Anyways, it’s interesting that after all this negativity with Scot’s and Jason’s edits that they are suddenly being changed to be more endearing to the audience. Why the sudden change? Anyways, before I lose focus, it appears that people suspect that an all girls alliance might be happening because of a random trip that people took. Could this actually happen because the guys are paranoid? That would be ironic to see an alliance be formed simply because someone thought it had already happened, but it didn’t. I’m starting to see what might actually be brought up at tribal council.

In the fourth segment of the show, we get to the immunity challenge. (I’m going to do a quick segue here and point out to all of you bloggers and potential bloggers that sometimes it is better not to eat when watching Survivor although it does typically air around suppertime.) They lose a lot of people to the only food temptation in the game. Maybe this is to avoid what Natalie Anderson did by intentionally bringing food out to drop out of the challenge. Anyways, it’s interesting how many brawns dropped out of an endurance challenge. But they figure that they are probably safe. Are they, though? The challenge comes between Cydney and Tai. Tai seems to be the one struggling the most. But can he win? Apparently he is a Buddhist. I do wonder what those people believe. Tai ends up winning the immunity challenge when Cydney’s body gives out. Has Jeff really never seen something like that before? This seems like the type of thing that would have happened in the past.

In the fifth segment of the show, the plan is to split the vote between Debbie and Aubry. Nick reveals part of this to Aubry. Whatever happened to the phrase loose lips sink ships? Survivor contestants should know by now that they shouldn’t talk as much and be as open as you would in real life (if you are at all). Cydney talks about getting rid of Nick. I’m also wondering if a floater will win the game again. I don’t hate floaters the way some people do. Sometimes they just slip in there and win. I think this in the first time that there is a first jury member at the first merge tribal council. I don’t know if that could have possibly happened with Joe in Tocantins or not. Stick to the plan is brought up again at tribal council. People are convinced that the seven are staying together. Tai brings up the super idol for some odd reason. That wasn’t that smart a thing to do. Tai tries to play it off as something that someone could be misleading him about. Nick gets voted out of the game. I wonder how the votes went down.

On the next Survivor, the men seek vengeance after Nick’s blindside and the women’s alliance (if there even was one in the first place) seemingly crumbles just as soon as it started. What will happen next? Well, next time we’ll see.

Total confessional count: Scot- 19, Julia- 6, Tai- 20, Debbie- 21, Aubry- 16, Joe- 9, Michele- 13, Cydney- 14, Jason- 18, Nick- 11. New confessionals this episode: Debbie- 2, Aubry- 2, Joe- 1, Michele- 2, Cydney- 5, Jason- 3, Nick- 2, Scot- 1, Julia- 1, Tai- 1.

Nick had two confessionals this episode, the same number as Debbie, Aubry, and Michele. Joe, Julia, Tai, and Scot only have one confessional this episode. Cydney has the highest with five and Jason has three. In terms of total confessionals, Nick had eleven (probably more), which is higher than what Julia and Joe have. Everyone else has higher confessional counts. Julia still has the lowest, now with only six. Debbie has the highest with twenty-one. Tai is second highest with twenty. Scot is third highest with nineteen. It is still anyone’s game since we don’t know who could win and what will happen. Will someone come out of the shadows with the win? Or is someone clearly getting a better edit than others? Will it be a man as usual or will a woman pull off an upset? I’m eager to find out. I still don’t know where to rank this season yet, but I don’t have to decide until the finale. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.