Fri, November 7, 2003

Wow. Well. I guess sometimes the twist is that there is no twist. I'm referring to the fact that, this week, the tribes on Survivor just – poof! – merge. To me, when you drop a 20-megaton Screaming Incendiary Twist Device like the returning Outcasts, you let that play out a tad before essentially nullifying its force. To Burnett, not so much. There are so many ingenious consequences and strategic shifts implied by sending once-eliminated contestants back onto the teams, but most of those adjustments will pale in the light of the adjustments necessitated by the merge. Not just the new dynamic among all ten (well, nine) members of Balboa, but the paradigm shift from team challenge to individual competition. Put it this way: do you think things would be working out as smoothly for Lil and Burton if the merge hadn't happened this week? Burton returns to an unnecessarily conciliatory Drake, but Lil hates Morgan and they hate her. There's potential for some real drama and some interesting strategy there, particularly if Morgan has to return to Tribal Council with Lil immune. Suddenly, they're forced to choose one of their own (Darrah) when Lil's the one they really want out.

Speaking of Darrah, she has some serious under-the-radar potential to win this thing right now. Someone should keep an eye on that. Just saying.

But no, that's not what happens. Instead, Lil's allegiance is a no-brainer, because she's handed an opportunity to walk right into a smiling corn-fed Drake team and get some well-deserved revenge on Andrew. Woo. Super exciting drama.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The first thing that happens this week is the Outcasts vote for two members to head back into the game. I still don't understand why this is how it's done, but at least each person votes twice, so they have twelve slips of "parchment" (Ah, Probst.) and fewer opportunities to tie. (Although you'll note that the vote is still 3-3-2-2-1-1, which is almost as many ties as you can get. Does this remind anyone else of those Mendelian Dihybrid Cross worksheets from Biology class?) Besides pre-existing relationships among the three ex-Morgans and the three ex-Drakes, the only basis for the vote is the little speech each Outcast gives at the last minute. To me, this is weird, and it is one good reason why there should've been a challenge instead of a vote to pick the two winners. Pretty much every single campaign speech echoes the same sentiment – "Put me in there, and I'll win this thing for the Outcasts." To the voters, this sort of lacks appeal since two-thirds of them won't be in the game after this vote anyway. Why do they care who wins if it's not them? Burton's campaign is the smart one. "You can't vote for you, but if you vote for me and you're the other winner, I'll be your trustworthy pal from here on out." You just kinda believe he's sincere, too. (So far, his actions this week would support that belief.) So, it's little surprise that Burton won, although I would probably prefer Michelle and Lil to Burton and Lil. I guess Michelle's choice to refer to herself as a "cute little girl" late in her campaign is a mistake, but – come on – which of them can deny that she is? She's radiant with energy, positively beaming, all the way through Reverse TribCon, and it definitely makes me miss her already.

Next, it's decided who goes to which team. No, wait. Next, Probst dismisses the losing Outcasts. One. By. One. You tell me this tool isn't taking the game too seriously. Then Burton and Lil draw to decide who returns to which camp. This shouldn't be random. The decision should be Burton to Morgan and Lil to Drake. It shakes things up more, and it postpones each existing team finding out that one of their rejects is back in the game. Of course, since the merge is instantaneous, the whole arrangement is rendered moot. Which is why it's ridiculous that the merge happens so fast. There should have at least been a challenge first.

But once again, nobody asks me. (I'm starting to notice a pattern here.) So Burton walks up to Drake, all wreathed in the Dramatic Island Lightning of Valhalla. And the conversation at Drake goes something like this, "If that fucker Burton comes back over here, we are going to be so pissed! I mean there is just no way that we will ever speak to Burton again– Hey, Burton! Oh thank the holy lord it's you! You were the only one we wanted. Oh, this is such a relief!" I'm aware that they have to do what they can to patch up the relationship, but then why trash him before he arrives? There's a one-in-six chance that he'll be back. (One-in-four really, nobody believed Nicole or Ryan had a shot.) What's the point of letting on that you hate him? Also, this marks the second week in a row that the show opens in the dark and Jon has instantly reversed his position a full 180 degrees. (Is there such a thing as 110% of 180 degrees?) Last time, he was bowing to Rupert's wrath; this time, the minute Burton sits down, it's all "We're sorry, Burton." Shut up.

Meanwhile, Lil walks up to Morgan, and they're too malnourished to care. It's eerie, really. Where's Andrew's vitriolic hatred for All Things Misfit that we saw last week (mere hours ago in Survivor time)? Judging from that display, they should be forcing her to sleep in the rain, but it looks like they welcome her into the shelter and even offer her a poncho. As was the case during Rupert's short visit, it's great to see Morgan through Lil's eyes and realize that they are exactly as lazy and dumb as they look on television.

Back on the other island, Rupert is getting weird. He literally talks to Burton until the sun comes up about the reasons Drake voted him out. His professed reason for voting against Burton is that his feelings got hurt when Burton taunted him about his ladies' wear. First of all, no they didn't. You're not the kind of guy to place any stock in what dopes like Shawn and Burton say. Second, you're the one wearing the skirt, dude. It says "Screw it, I don't care what you think. This works for me." If you care what they think, put on pants. Also, we all know you voted for him because you thought he was stupid for trying to throw a challenge. You were right. Own it.

But Burton rightly assesses that his most important priority right now is to make nice with Drake, so he pretends to care. He learned his lesson – Make. Rupert. Happy. Last time, he angered Rupert and was almost unanimously voted out. This time, he plays friendly, and before he knows it, Rupert and Christa have invited him to their little strategy session, to plot for the merge. That paid off! (Ironic as it is that Christa was the one in Burton's sights back when he threw immunity.) And it represents the single moment this week when the strategy is interesting. Christa makes the fantastic point that Morgan may ally with Jon in a merge even though they dislike him, because they "don't have a choice." Well put. And it opens my eyes to the brilliance of Drake's strategy last week, when they eliminated Shawn even though Jon seemed the logical choice. They realized that based on Burton's statements and the celebration at last week's challenge, he was likely to return to the game. If Shawn was around, he and Burton each represent a power base for the other. But if Shawn is gone, it's easier to recruit Burton to take aim at Jon. Brilliant. Thinking like this is what makes me still like Drake even though I'm no longer super-fond of any of its individual members.

And then, the merge. Oh, all right, fine. At least now the Morgan team is finally facing the right direction when they row. The strategy at this point becomes fairly pat. As much as it would be fun to be rid of Jon, it's more important to assure a Drake majority in the newly-formed Balboa tribe. (Jon's ability to remain "not the most important priority" has lasted through five Tribal Councils now, which I believe is cause for concern. With individual immunity now in play, will he be able to "we'll vote him out next time" his way into the final two?) They've got Lil on their side and it's a fleeting opportunity to scatter Morgan's alliance to the wind by removing their erstwhile superhero Andrew. (His super-powers? Whining, forgetting, and shrugging.) What's interesting is that Morgan may actually respond well to his elimination. They're tired and apathetic enough that his removal may open the door to a fully integrated bipartisan Balboa team. He never really did anything for them in the first place. (However, I still would like to see Morgan picked off one by one. I'm not crazy about any Drakes right now, but none of the three remaining Morgans has ever impressed me as a worthy competitor in this game.) And I'm inexpressibly delighted by Andrew's conversation with Lil when he realizes he's on the chopping block. (Not by Rupert making hand gestures behind him while they talk; that guy is rapidly digressing into self-parody.) Andrew tries to pretend that the Morgan Bond should compel Lil to vote with them, and actually says "it would mean a lot to us." She says she'll think about it, and that's when Andrew really walks into it. He actually asks, "will you get back to me and let me know?" Hello?! Was he there in week three when this exact thing happened before? Fortunately, Lil was, and she brings it up. I never had a big problem with the way he handled it back then (nobody knew she'd be back), but he's a major sleaze for thinking he could put it behind him. I'm thrilled that it came back to demonstrably bite him in the ass.

So, he's as good as gone, but Drake continues to strategize. It's why I love them. They know they have six votes for "Savage." (I think Probst likes calling him this because it reminds him of Johnny Depp's quirky "Savvy?" from Pirates of the Caribbean – and, less explicably, from Once Upon a Time in Mexico. Maybe it's his "I said god damn!") They assume Morgan's four votes will go for Jon because, hey, theirs would. So would mine. But, just in case, they have Burton hand over his immunity to Rupert. (See, Burton and Lil are immune because they're returning Outcasts, but Burton won immunity also. Apparently, you can always give your immunity away at any TribCon, but nobody ever does because then they'd be vulnerable. But with two immunities – yes, that's a 2:1 immunity-to-nipple ratio – Burton can safely bequeath one of them away. No, I don't think it makes sense either. But Probst showed his work so we have to give him partial credit.) Anyway, to Rupert it goes, which ensures that the remaining Morgan bloc won't accidentally vote for Rupert out of petty you-go-for-our-strong-guy- we-go-for-your-strong-guy revenge. This way, Jon's vote count is high in the case of future tiebreaker situations. (I don't know how often ties come up at TribCon, but the last season I watched, all the competitors were obsessed with the vote counts and how they affect tied votes, so I have to assume that at the very least it doesn't hurt.)

This is brilliant strategy because now they're thinking one and two Tribal Councils ahead of the game. Well played. This way, maybe just maybe, if Jon continues to stick around long enough to where it's tough to come up with votes against him, they have an ace up their sleeve. I'm still hoping that they'll eventually achieve unanimous ejection for him, though. He calls himself "Johnny Fairplay," but based on his shock-blond hair, bouts of yelling, and generally psychotic behavior, I think "Drake Busey" would be a perfect moniker.

Really, the only downside is that Burton is handing Rupert a stabbing weapon. Yikes. (Also, by giving him the Individual Immunity Idol – the cool kids call it the I3, just like the cool kids use the phrase "cool kids" – you're giving him a physical symbol of his awesomeness, which we all know will go to his head in weird ways.)

© onebee · all rights reserved