It’s the biggest merge in Survivor history, which comes with more twists, another sponsored reward, and the most boots in one episode.
Photo: Robert Voets/CBS
A merge this huge deserves a feature-length episode, which is exactly what we get in this episode of Survivor. It’s Day 12, and Rizo is riding high after pulling off “Operation Bad Blood” against Charlie while also nabbing an Idol and joining forces with Kamilla, Dee, and Cirie. On the flipside of Tribal, Jonathan is sore about getting blindsided over his buddy Charlie, but he doesn’t have much time for moping because a go-fast boat is coming to whisk them away to the merge. Before the boats come in, Ozzy makes things right with Christian by sharing that he has an Idol. He tells Emily as well to strengthen their alliance. She says something expletive and offers a fist-bump.
At 17 people, this is the largest merge in Survivor history, but Christian only has eyes for Rick Devens. “Oh, captain, my captain!” he says as they snuggle in a hammock. They discuss their past collaborations. Devens tells Aubry that he’s the one who planted her Billie Eilish Boomerang Idol. It turns out everyone knows that Aubry has an idol, thanks to Emily. Word travels fast in a group this big, and we get a Bye Bye Birdie “Telephone Hour”-style montage of everyone telling everyone everything, including Aubry’s BEBI, as well as Ozzy’s. Genevieve still has some cards she’s holding close to her chest, though, as she doesn’t tell a soul — not even Rizo himself — that she gave her second BEBI to Rizo. Shrewd.
There is no ceiling to Cirie’s social game, and more people just spells more opportunity, as she snaps into gear, gathering oppo intel from her newest ally, Ozzy. “I’m in a poly relationship now with Rizo and Ozzy,” she tells the camera. We see that Genevieve is working with Colby and Joe, and Colby’s tight with Coach and Stephenie, while Coach is trying to woo Jonathan by admiring his eight-pack. Cirie notes that Old Era-style alliance loyalty and rigidity are going to be a problem in this game, and that she wants to play with more New Era fluidity. Smart, adaptable, but not very Polysecure.
A boat comes with a message about a major, game-changing twist hidden in the jungle, so everyone immediately scampers off in all directions: Rick sniffing under rocks like a truffle pig, Colby limping on his injured foot, and Christian composing a new trance single that goes, “Landmark, tree, nook, just keep going, going, going.” Ozzy finds the advantage, which tells him he has five minutes to pick someone to take with him to Exile Island. He goes with Rizo, the season 49’er wild card, so that it doesn’t look like he’s playing into some sort of existing alliance, and Rizo is cautiously excited about “either the adventure of a lifetime or scariest night of my life.”
The one challenge of the 86-minute episode offers immunity, reward, and another fan twist: three people will be sent home in a “blood moon” reaping, the most people ever sent home in a single episode. I know that every time Jeff introduces a twist this season, he backs it up with stats about fan votes, but I stand before you, confessing to be in the silent minority: I don’t need all these twists. I don’t want to see everyone suffer more than they have to. I think it’s nice when the players eat rice. I don’t know who Zac Brown is! Fans also voted on the phoenix-themed design of the individual immunity idol, of which there will be three this episode. That makes for some scary stats and high stakes for losing players: out of 17 total, three will have immunity, and two are over on Exile Island. That means that only 12 people total will be up for elimination, with one in four going home. Furthermore, these will be the last eliminations before the jury.
Jeff then immediately ruins the stakes-building tension by launching into an interminable Applebee’s ad. It’s the “biggest reward of the season,” and Jeff extols the virtues of “the classic apps that you love” and the “signature item fan favorite” sizzlin’ steak and “Applebee’s newest dessert” sizzlin’ caramel apple pie. Despite all the sizzle, this segment is absolute fizzle (unlike Exile Island, which is Rizzle), and yet I still prefer this product placement to Zac Brown’s Fresh-Caught Fish Hut Open Mic.
If I were a restaurant chain, I would not want my product shown in conjunction with nasty, sore, bare feet, but I’m no brand strategist. The challenge is an endurance test where contestants stand on narrow footholds in a big wooden frame, stepping down at timed intervals to lower, narrower footholds. Contestants are split into three groups, with the winner of each group winning immunity and the overall winner earning their group some “Whole Lotta Bacon Burgers,” etc. Emily is the first to drop, Colby’s on his bum foot, and Stephenie has both bunions and pigeon toes and is “proud of it.” Jonathan is the first to go in his group and pumps them up by yelling, “Ladies, hold strong!” Dee lasts the longest in Teal and immediately steps down, forfeiting her team’s shot at mozz sticks. Christian wins individual immunity for Purple but drops. It comes down to Chrissy and Stephenie, duking it out for Orange, and Stephenie takes it all, bunions be damned! Teal and Purple are sent to different beaches to start makin’ deals and takin’ names, while the winning girls-and-Jonathan make their way to eat good in the hood, the hood being Fiji.
Over on Exile Island, Ozzy and Rizo bond without their third. “Cirie told me that ‘you need to get good with Rizo,’” says Ozzy. “She vouched for him, and that’s as good as gold,” says Rizo. Rizo tells Ozzy about his Idol, cementing their polycule. Meanwhile, at Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill + Bar, Jonathan double-fists Shark Bowls while Kamilla and Chrissy chase their Shark Bowls with wine. “Hey, you know what we’re doing? We’re eating good in the neighborhood,” says Chrissy, and Tiffany more or less tells the camera, “She’s gotta go.”
I’m going to break down everything that happens next by mini-tribe, starting with the Applebee Gang at Vatu beach, where Jonathan is just a big, leathery football getting tossed around between two opposing teams of women. It’s Kamilla and Tiffany versus Stephenie and Chrissy, New vs. Old Era, both sides visiting Jonathan in his hammock to make appeals. Kamilla tries to re-earn his trust after the Charlie blindside, while Stephenie has a much easier time telling him that the other girls are just using him, but that he and she and Chrissy are all “cut from the same cloth.” Chrissy cries to Tiffany and Kamilla, saying that she knows they’re voting her out, but that she wants them all to stay friends and leave on good terms and have a joyful Tribal Council … sike! She wants to get Kamilla gone. At Tribal Council, Kamilla pleads a case that this is the vote that she most wants to survive, as it’s the one that can at least get her onto the jury. Not spoken like a true winner, Kamilla. She is the eighth person voted out of Survivor 50. “Bro!” she says to Jonathan. “Drag that man through the mud!” she says to the girls. In her exit interview, she says it was “fun getting lied to,” and “it’s nice to be played,” which at least is the joyful attitude Chrissy was looking for.
Next is the Purple team at the old Kalo camp. Aubry has an Idol and Christian has immunity, so Rick Devens is the only one in their trio who is vulnerable and exposed. They agree that they have to take out Genevieve, who takes Christian aside and tries to swing him towards her and Joe. Her approach is aggressive. Her strategy is to be “real” with Christian, saying, “Devens and Aubry are a sinking ship, but you are tied to them,” arguing that he’d be better off with her and Joe. Christian pretends like he’s going along with the plan, and calls Genevieve the following: “smooth as velvet,” “deadly,” dangerous,” and “a frigging Terminator.” Joe is absolutely lost in all of this. At Tribal Council, Christian says, “I’m glad I’m wearing immunity, because otherwise I worry I’d be applewood-smoked,” and I’d like to read this as Christian mocking Jeff directly to his face, but Jeff laughs, because the more product placement, the better. But Christian’s efforts to convince Genevieve were not enough, so she plays her SITD, which doesn’t work out. She gets voted out unanimously, and gives her coat to Aubry while offscreen Devens says, “That’s classy!”
Finally, at old Cila camp, it’s girl-power-hour, making the whole back-half of this episode a brief, sweet reprieve from a season that has so far over-indexed male. Coach and Colby are outnumbered, and as Dee puts it, “You’re gonna sit, you’re gonna shake, you’re gonna roll over for me, because you’re gonna be my little puppies tonight.” Housetraining begins with Coach, who tells her that Emily told him that she wants Dee gone. Rather than building trust, this backfires on Coach, as Dee rubs his nose in it and asks why he didn’t tell her sooner. Dee immediately tells Emily, and the two of them see it as fuel against Coach, who they want to vote out because Emily is convinced Colby is going to get Medivac’d for his foot anyway. They bring their plan to Cirie, who thinks the foot thing is a gamble, and sways the girl towards voting out Colby, the bigger threat and less clumsy player of the two.
This Tribal Council is the emotional climax of the episode. Fire represents life in this game, but tears represent ratings. Colby talks about being in his fifties, which is apparently the “decade of reflection,” and he cries as he thinks about how his life has been defined in so many ways by Survivor. Dee shares that she was three when Colby first played. Cirie cries too, thinking about how she started this game twenty years ago. Coach shares an “ancient Samurai proverb” that I don’t remember because at this point, the episode had been going for what I think is ten hours. Colby gets voted off, sharing hugs and “I love yous” with Coach and Cirie. Before going, he tells the group, “Find the joy.”
That one was a heavy tribal, and OZGOD (new ship name) is going to have a lot to catch up on while they’re back from Exile Island, which I imagine was looking something like this.
