Tue, October 11, 2005

You laughed when I said it was time for Stephenie to start considering an all-female voting bloc, because she was already outnumbered 4-3 on the Yaxha team. But – ha! I laugh last, because this week Steph is moved to Nakum in a mini-merge team swap which results in a 5-3 majority for the women of the new Nakum. At first, it seems as though the most fun we'll have this week is watching Danni eat an apple and then watching Gary take a shower in public. (Not that that's not plenty of fun.) But, after dispatching Gary, Amy, Judd, and Margaret to a special high-altitude picnic, Probst shuffles the remaining contestants into:

The New Nakum: Jamie, Lydia, Stephenie, Rafe, and remnants from Nakum Classic: Cindy and Brooke, and the unsuspecting Judd and Margaret.

A Yaxha to Remember: Danni, Bobby Jon, Blake, and Brandon, plus Yesterday's Yaxha: Brian, Gary, and Amy.

I quickly do the math and – dammit! I still like both teams more or less the same. (I also like Jay Leno more or less the same as either team.) This makes it so hard to know what to want in the challenges. As before, I still prefer Steph's team ever so slightly, but I really wish Rafe and Lydia had stayed on Yaxha, and Danni and Brandon had stayed on Nakum. Then we'd see some hate!

Next, the reward challenge winners are snacking atop a few hundred feet of Mayan ruins. (Did they have to climb all those steps? That's no picnic!) The subject of Gary's NFL career comes up again. This is clearly going to be the focal point of Survivor: Guatemala, just like the will they/won't they tension of AmbeRob in All-Stars and the will they/won't they suspense of Chad and his fake leg in Vanuatu. Gary denies playing football and adds that he's never even heard of football. After Margaret explains the basic concepts, Gary chuckles: "A lot of those 'Peanuts' cartoons are finally making sense."

Back at Yaxha's camp, Gary and Amy meet their the newly commingled teammates, and Gary finds himself face to face with Danni in the welcome circle. She publicly runs down the stats on the back of his NFL trading card, and he continues playing dumb. He insists that he was born with neither feet nor balls, so this whole football thing is absolutely preposterous. Her response: "Um." I'm curious whether she'll bring it up again. She knows he's keeping it secret to avoid becoming a target (based on the assumption that people will vote to take a million dollars out of the hands of a football player who's presumably pretty well off, rather than the likelier assumption that he'll be regarded as a physical and strategic threat). She knows he's going to deny it no matter how ridiculous he sounds – which is, to anyone but her, not that ridiculous. So, I wonder if she'll keep pursuing it, or trying to convince others of who he is. That might even be a liability for her.

At New Nakum, things are going more smoothly. Judd has adopted the Shii-Ann role from Thailand: immediately embracing the new team members and shitting on his former friends. He's happy for the new female majority, because now he feels his alpha-dog status will go unchallenged. (Not unreasonable, since Jamie's the only other male guy, and Judd walloped him in the second immunity challenge.) To use Shii-Judd's words, he was tired of all the "male-tosterone" at Nakum Classic. He's right: it can be hell getting that stuff out of upholstery.

The klutzy fumbling that passes for alliance-building in the New Nakum reminds me of the nine discrete "final fours" that AmbeRob managed to build out of only six people in Survivor: All-Stars. Nobody's paying attention; everyone's scurrying between cliques, sizing up the possibilities. With Stephenie now aboard, Nakum assumes it's losing immunity this week, and moves to get prepared early. Both Nakum Classic and the Ghosts of Yaxha Past seem fascinated by the idea of splitting along team lines – forcibly ignoring the fact that neither of these sub-groups is a particularly good team. It would make more sense for the stronger team members to band together and get rid of dead weight like Lydia, Rafe, and Margaret. Or – y'know – for the women to ally against the guys. Instead, everyone goes bonkers courting Shii-Judd, and he somehow manages to become the swing vote in an even-numbered team. You know what I say about the swing vote: always vote for that person. Why consolidate all the power in one undeserving person? Get rid of him, reunify the entire rest of the team, and next week you've got a ballgame. (Gary: "Ballgame? I have no idea what that means.") In this case, fragmenting the team means you'll lose a good player in Brooke, alienate another in Cindy, and Margaret – well, no loss there really, but by cleaving the team so deeply, you run the risk of affecting its future performance, and reduce the number of votes you will be able to seek in unforeseen clutch situations.

Also, this is one scenario when it might be preferable to play coy. Rather than asking Judd point-blank what he's going to do, it might be smarter to say, "I know there are a lot of new possibilities, and I know you have some different options with your vote tonight. If I were you, I'd do this and here's why." Putting him in a position where he has to lie to you or make a promise he doesn't want to make isn't good for anybody (cf. Vinick and the religious wackos in this week's still-Santos-heavy West Wing). If both sides are doing that, he's going to have to lie to somebody, so he's more likely to give up: "Screw these guys; I'm my own man." If you don't back him into a corner, you just seem friendly and helpful, and you give him something to think about with no strings attached; it's easier to take the advice when he's not weighing it against the sales pitch. (Also, a note to Margaret: it never works on this show to "hope" someone isn't going to screw you. It's a strategy show, not a hoping show. Maybe you were thinking of Three Wishes over on NBC – and by the way, no wishing for more wishes.)

As Shii-Judd thinks and thinks, the editors lay it on thick by repeatedly cutting to a monkey in various thoughtful poses. We get it, guys. Editing this show is boring. There's only so many ways to cut a show when all the footage is Gary intentionally mispronouncing "football."

Needless to say, he finally decides to vote with the Yaxha Invaders, and Brooke is sent home. It's a shame: I think there are stronger, more interesting teams to be made out of this group of players than Rafe, Jamie, Lydia, and Steph. Oh, well. Steph still has time to go "girl power" if she wants to. Yay!

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