Episode 39.7

If you haven’t heard by now, Rudy Boesch from Borneo and All-Stars has died recently. I have the first season on DVD and will have to watch it again, doing a general recap about it before I get to doing a special one on just Rudy. I don’t yet have eighth season on DVD yet, but that could be a good Christmas present for me. I’ll mention more of that later. I’ve mentioned before that Borneo ranks 10^th out of 38 seasons. All-Stars is 24^th out of 38 seasons. This 39^th season has not yet been ranked.

Since I already blogged about Survivor: Borneo once already, I have already mentioned some thoughts about him and I gave him a percentage of what I thought his chances were of returning to play the game again. Here are the thoughts from then, from a previous post.

Rudy is the oldest contestant to ever play Survivor. He would break his own record when he played Survivor: All-Stars. He didn’t last long into the game the second time as he was deemed too weak by his tribe and was voted out, coming in 17^th place, a place no Survivor had (or could have) come in before. He was an alternate for Heroes versus Villains, but wasn’t chosen as he was deemed too old to compete in the game again. http://brioux.tv/2010/01/survivors-cram-cbss-heroes-vs-villains-bash/ This means that it’s unlikely we’ll ever see him again since he’s only going to get older. I give it a 15% chance that we will see him again in the future.

Of course, I would never give an absolute zero for any contestant who is still alive, even if they quit the game. Still 15% meant that he would have less of a chance of returning than him coming back. What is kind of nice is that he outlived other contestants, even though he remains the oldest person who has ever played Survivor.

As usual when I reference something, I feel that I need to share it with you so that you will understand it better. Well, in the previous post, I mentioned a song called Because it’s Midnight by a band that was made up for a flash based website. Here is a link to this song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsArcMMqbhw

With both Ashley and Rudy having died since the last reunion show, I would hope that both of their deaths would be mentioned at the next one. But the only Survivor death they have mentioned thus far was when Jennifer Lyon died. You would think that this time should be different for a few reasons.

One would be that Ashley died of suicide and they could tie this into suicide prevention. Another is that Rudy was a more well known contestant. I just hope that they don’t mention just one and not another. But enough of my ramblings.

In the first segment of the show, Elaine talks about what she had to do in order to survive the vote. Lauren hopes that things can still work out well for her old tribe since the other tribe didn’t join her or her old tribe. Aaron thinks that Lauren and her old tribe mates will come crawling back to his tribe again since he believes that his tribe has all the power. Karishma is annoyed at the weather. Kellee was a bit annoyed by someone, but I couldn’t tell who as I was trying to fix a sentence due to stupid grammar check. I have well grammar, though. Other women are annoyed at men and continue talking about a woman’s alliance. Noura was annoyed at Aaron.

Janet is taken to the Island of the Idols, which makes sense to her since these are Survivor idols that she is with now. She admits that going to the island puts a target on people’s back. Rob thinks that the better players think a few moves ahead. “Master Yoda said that I should be mindful of the future.” “Yes, but not at the expense of the moment.”

Janet is allowed to play for an advantage by walking out of a tribal council if she wins a potential game, but she decides not to play since it could make her a target the next time around. So I guess we won’t know what the challenge is. She is the first person to visit the island who declined the challenge.

In the second segment of the show, Janet keeps up the trend of lying to the tribe about what the island is about. Janet flashes herself so they know that she has nothing. There is talk on the other tribe about getting rid of Dan. Missy thinks that Dan or others could be too powerful.

In the third segment of the show, we get to the immunity challenge. #imissrewards. In one of the closest challenges ever, the orange tribe loses. Kellee, who has an idol good for only one tribal, isn’t sure that she needs her idol. Will it go to waste? Surely, she can use it to blindside Karishma if she plays it right. But I think that it might not work out well if the ironic foreshadowing is hinted at here.

In the fourth segment of the show, people like Jamal think that the vote will be easy and against Dean. Jack makes it seem to Dean that Noura will be voted out next. Jamal has an idol. Kellee thinks that she should give Dean the idol and get him to vote out Jack or Jamal. Kellee thinks that her plan is risky as it could get herself voted out. It seems like she will give him the idol and he knows that he’s the target now. Will this be a string of dominoes as she says?

In the fifth segment of the show, we get to tribal council. The tribe before the swap was successful, leading to this tribe. Noura is called out by Dean for targeting Jamal. Noura thinks that the opposite of hatred is indifference. But isn’t the opposite of hatred love? Noura tells people what she thinks yet won’t straight up say that she was targeting Jamal. Jamal is fearful of an all girls alliance. He has no idea if one is really there. Kellee thinks that the idea of a woman’s alliance is sexist in some way. There has not been a successful all man’s alliance. There have been only two successful all women’s alliances that I can remember. The #metoo movement is brought up.

Jeff thinks that women don’t just bond by nature. This is a way more sappy tribal council that I ever remember happening before. But it seems good and nice. No wonder the promos said what they did. People have to humanize other players. Jeff says that there has never been a tribal like this before. While there has been powerful bonding, they still have to vote someone out.

After the votes are cast, Dean plays an idol for himself and they wonder why it wasn’t played last time. Kellee plays her part of acting surprised well. Jamal plays his idol for Noura. Jack is voted out and gets to join the jury. A quick blurb for Rudy is shown at the end as this episode is dedicated to him. Now I’ll feel a bit better if he isn’t mentioned as the reunion show this season.

On the next Survivor, the merge happens and all of the old Lairo will have to go. Who knows where the vote could wind up going next? I guess we’ll have to wait and see for ourselves as I avoid spoilers when I can. Hopefully there will be something interesting then.

Total confessional count: Aaron- 12, Jack- 6, Noura- 9, Karishma- 12, Tommy- 9, Jamal- 12, Dan- 6, Elaine- 16, Lauren- 8, Elizabeth- 9, Missy- 11, Janet- 5, Kellee- 10, Dean- 8; Rob- 10, Sandra- 9. New confessionals this episode: Janet- 2, Kellee- 3, Dean- 2, Aaron- 1, Jack- 1, Noura- 1, Karishma- 1, Tommy- 1, Jamal- 2, Dan- 0, Elaine- 1, Lauren- 2, Elizabeth- 0, Missy- 1; Sandra- 1, Rob- 1.

Jack had six confessionals, the same number as Dan. Janet is the only one lower than them with five. As for the highest, that remains Elaine with sixteen. As for new confessionals, Jack had just one, the same number as Tommy, Noura, Elaine, Aaron, Missy, and Karishma. The only people lower were Dan and Elizabeth with zero a piece. Everyone else was higher with Kellee as the highest with three. There’s not much else to say so I will let you go. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.