Reality TV Thoughts

Survivor 48 has unleashed a plague upon us all!

On a more serious note, episode 7 of Survivor 50 reignites the question of just how honest can you be in a game of Survivor. Is honesty and integrity a true ideology that can function in the game, or is it destined to lead to lies and betrayal anyways? It’s an interesting question that I believe will continue to be explored as the season goes on. Despite the disappointment of honesty and integrity winning out by the end, my thoughts on the season are still high. Reckless twists like the Blood Moon pose way more of a threat to 50 than the Honesty and Integrity alliance that’s clearly been set up for a fall.

The Journey: Stephenie’s Dislocated Shoulder Redux

Stephenie was probably one of the more boring people that could’ve gone on the journey. Unfortunately though, she is randomly selected. After arriving at the journey, Stephenie finds out that she must hold her arm up for an hour or else a bucket of dirty water will fall on her and even worse, she’ll lose her vote! Stephenie talks about her shoulder injury on Heroes vs Villains and how she had to get reconstructive surgery after that. For that reason, she must rely on her non-dominant left hand for this challenge. She’s in a lot of pain for most of the challenge, but she needs to set a strong example for her children. She ends up completing the challenge and earns a steal a vote. How exciting!

Cirie’s Rizard of Oz

Who knew the best alliance of Survivor 50 would consist of Cirie, Ozzy, and Rizgod? After Rizo and Ozzy return from Exile Island, they are caught up on the events of the Blood Moon. They also get a chance to meet with Cirie and formally establish their alliance, which they give one of the best alliance names in Survivor history, Cirie’s Rizard of Oz. As previously established, Cirie really loves Rizo. She is willing to tell him everything that she knows. Firstly, she tells Rizo that Dee exposed his idol (to be explored later). Already a pretty huge sign of trust, but the next thing she tells him is way more consequential for future episodes.

After Stephenie returns from the journey, she lies to everyone that she only lasted long enough to be able to keep her vote. Cirie sees right through this, though. She confronts Stephenie by the water well, where she basically forces Stephenie to confess that she won a vote steal on the journey. Cirie promises not to tell anyone about this, only for the next scene to be of Cirie immediately telling Rizo about Stephenie’s advantage. Cirie was Stephenie’s kryptonite on The Traitors, and she will seemingly be it as well on Survivor 50. Stephenie just seems to fall into Cirie’s trap every single time. Oh, and to cap things off, Ozzy wins individual immunity, his first since South Pacific! What a great episode for a wonderful alliance.

Aubry’s Horrific Lie

After telling Devens and Christian that she would play her idol, Aubry ended up not playing it at the Genevieve vote off. Now that they’ve returned to camp, Devens and Christian are pissed at her. Had they known she wasn’t gonna play it, they would have happily voted her out. When they confront her, Aubry claims that she forgot to play her idol. Of course, they don’t believe her and no one really does, as talk about her idol continues running rampant. During a quick conversation with Cirie, Aubry is encouraged to play her idol at the next tribal council. She admits in her confessional that this was a pretty boneheaded lie and that she needs to get rid of her idol now. So, at tribal council, Aubry plays her idol pretty unceremoniously. She does give a pretty fire line as she plays it though. “An idol that everyone knows about is not an idol at all, it’s a scarlet letter.” And there ends the story of Aubry’s idol.

Coach’s Power Trip

The Dragonslayer 1.0 is back! Much like 1.0, Dragonslayer 4.0 is getting on everyone’s nerves! He is being messy as he tries to take down the dragon that is Dee. Firstly, with Colby gone, Coach needs someone to take his place in the Four Horsemen alliance, which was apparently always a thing. The person he chooses? Rizo. Coach delivers this groundbreaking and life-changing opportunity to Rizo by… telling him outright that he’s Colby’s replacement. Rizo pretends to be excited, but in confessional, is confused by Coach’s thought process and obviously does not want to be on the bottom of this alliance. Also, it’s an all guys alliance! That’s not how Rizo rolls.

Throughout the day, Coach spiels to everyone about how they won’t win the game by lying, which sure… He’s playing this game honorably, the right way to be played, the only way, in fact. Everyone else is annoyed, obviously. Emily at one point considers getting rid of him. When he’s not creating haikus while lying on the hammock, Coach is making it clear to everyone what he thinks of them in the game. He’s talking about not telling people who are in the middle about the split vote plan. This plan needs to be for his allies only. Of course, he says this around Devens, one of the middle people, who then brings it back to his closest ally, Christian. Now, the two of them know what Coach thinks about them. And neither is down to just be a lackey for Coach! It gets to a point that Rizgod of all people is the one that has to tell Coach to calm down! To top off this absolute clowning of Coach, Tiffany gives a scathing voting confessional in which she calls him a self righteous hypocrite.

Jonathan Somehow Outsmarts Dee

Tragically, this episode was a Dee downfall episode. After the Kamilla blindside, Tiffany forces herself to keep her composure around camp. She has Chrissy, Jonathan, and Stephenie fooled, with Chrissy calling her “eloquent.” In a confessional though, she tells us what she really thinks, which is that Jonathan is a lying skank! While Tiffany handles the situation well, Dee unfortunately does not do the same. In the morning, when Dee confronts Jonathan and Coach about Jonathan’s lies, she comes off looking poorly. Jonathan makes her look like an untrustworthy liar by continually asking her if she’s lied before. Dee does not respond well at all. Jonathan seems to take some kind of glee in this, which, ugh. After that whole debacle, things only get worse for Dee. She had told Emily about Rizo’s idol, but finds out that Emily has spilled this to Cirie, who brought it back to Rizo. Dee is now freaking out, and when talking to Rizo, does not admit that she told people about his idol. Rizo knows she did from Cirie, though. Their alliance from the Charlie vote is now over.

Coming into the challenge, Dee knows she must win to have any shot. Unfortunately, she falls just short and her fate is sealed. A last ditch effort to blindside Coach goes nowhere. At tribal, she desperately runs around, telling people to vote Coach. She knows that the shot in the dark is her last chance, though. When that fails, she is voted out in a 9-4-1 vote.

Dee Valladares: The Last Winner Standing

For having such a big reputation coming into the game, Dee held up surprisingly well. She held a lot of power on her original Kalo tribe and then on the swapped Cila tribe. She was comfortably in the majority for the Colby vote during the Blood Moon with the immunity necklace around her neck. She fell apart at the first real merge vote, but it’s okay. It does not take anything away from her dominant win on 45 or her gameplay up until that point. It does seem that the Charlie blindside had large repercussions for both Kamilla and Dee, but who knows if voting Rizo out would have saved them. That wasn’t even Dee’s biggest mistake. She truly messed up with saving Rizo and gaining his trust only to spill the news about his idol. She got rid of Charlie, who would have worked with her, only to then burn Rizo, who she wanted to work with instead.

Overall though, I loved Dee’s run on this season. Her outlook on the game is very interesting. She doesn’t take anything that happens in the game personally outside of the game, which is respectable. She knew she faced an uphill battle and made the most out of it. Now, she’s going to serve looks from the jury bench. And if her exit interview is anything to go off of, most people are going to take whatever happens from here on out very personally…

Conclusion: Downfall Incoming

This was more of a bummer episode, seeing the honor and integrity alliance seemingly be in control of the game and one of the best new era players leaving. Their reign will be short lived though, if the dit is to be believed. And I am sure that it will be a glorious downfall. So while this episode was one of the weaker ones so far, it doesn’t really diminish my enjoyment of the season so far or my hope for the future. It has set up so many storylines that will hopefully lead to golden results.