Caterpillar to Butterfly (S42: Episode 11)

The penultimate episode of Season 42!! This season has FLOWN by - I still feel like I’m playing catch up. And I’m really missing these Ponderosas this season - they were like my breathers in between episodes! Let’s dive into Episode 12, “Caterpillar to Butterfly.”

• Lindsay is on a HIGH after this tribal. Not only was she saved in the Do Or Die, her #1 ally, Omar was exposed as being a huge threat after orchestrating the Drea blindside, making Lindsay not an immediate threat/target, positioning herself really well to make it to the end.

• Personally, I like Lindsay fine. She’s hauling ass in the challenges, I think her social game has been good (distancing herself from Jonathan), but is it just me… I feel kinda nothing towards her?? Like on paper, she’s great and “doing” Survivor - I’m just not getting that “wow” factor from her. I think I will feel disappointed if she wins. And maybe it’s because we don’t have as strong of “a story” from her in a season where there are sooooo many great stories. Even a player like Romeo who really has become quite the goat, I feel way more from him.

• Omar on the other hand is getting all the “wow” factor points and honestly, not many players can handle these big, splashy moves without becoming the center of attention. It was such a smart move (and really his only choice) to return the idol to Mike after tribal because that at least proves his loyalty to Mike.

• Mike is beginning to catch onto Omar and is no longer fully trusting him. Mike wants to pull one over on Omar before Omar is able to pull one over on Mike. He also sees how close Omar and Lindsay have gotten. Maryanne notices this too, and calls Omar out in a confessional saying he went from “a caterpillar to a butterfly” (yes, the name of the episode) in the eyes of the jury.

• The next morning we see Lindsay doing her best acting, telling Jonathan she’d want to vote Mike out next to potentially flush the idol. Because Jonathan is Lindsey’s biggest (and really only other) challenge threat left, he’s not buying it and believes Lindsay and Omar are no longer interested in working as closely with him.

• Jonathan now is all in on working with Mike and is willing to blindside either Lindsay or Omar at the next vote before one of them can do the same to him.

• We get a reward challenge!! And it’s a big obstacle course which involves the castaways unspooling rope, balancing on a beam to collect a key, that leads them to solve a big, challenging 3D puzzle. The reward comes with a choice: sustenance or decadence.

The joy!!!!

• In an impressive come from behind(ish) win (it always comes down to the puzzle!), Omar wins his first individual challenge! He chooses Romeo, Mike and Maryanne to join him for cookies, cake and sweets sending Jonathan and Lindsay back at camp with only a few scoops of rice left in their bag.

It's become veryyyyy awkward between these two...

• When everyone gets back to camp from the reward, Lindsay targets Mike to make him feel comfortable in thinking their next target would be Jonathan if he doesn’t win immunity. She also (kinda stupidly) reminds Mike that her amulet has now evolved into a Charizard AKA a full blown IDOL buuuuuuuuttttt the last time she could use it is at final 6.

• Mike then runs off and shares this information with Jonathan and Maryanne (who had no idea Lindsay was keeping this information from her) that if Lindsay wins immunity, she could and probably would be playing her idol on Omar. Mike promises to be loyal to Maryanne and would even play his own idol on Maryanne if he thinks she’s not safe, not knowing that Maryanne has her own idol that she’s been keeping a secret. (FINALLY someone who can keep their lips locked!!)

• The news of Lindsay not telling Maryanne about her amulet/idol lights a fire under Maryanne’s ass and she is DIALED in and ready to make a move!

• For the immunity challenge, the players competed in another obstacle course ending in a table maze. And in another nail-biting finish, Lindsay edges out Jonathan and sinks her final ball, winning immunity!

• With immunity around Lindsay’s neck, Jonathan was now vulnerable to the vote. Jonathan and Mike know that their best chance of survival is to keep each other in the game so they start gunning for Romeo. Maryanne doesn’t like this plan and thinks it’s better to use Romeo’s vote to her advantage.

• In order to gain Romeo’s trust, Maryanne turns to him and reveals that she has an extra vote that they can use tonight. With this news, Romeo is excited to play ball, Maryanne is confident he would be voting with her (and her extra vote).

• When Maryanne tells this plan to Mike and Jonathan that she’s confident that Romeo will be voting with them, they boys are weary that Lindsay will play her idol on Omar, flushing out all of their votes, so Maryanne suggests that Jonathan and Mike throw their votes onto Romeo so that if there needs to be a revote due to an idol play, it would be Jonathan vs Romeo.

• Lindsay feeling “Survivor confident” at tribal ends up not using her idol on Omar and Omar is blindsided in a 3-2-2 vote!

The irony with the title of the episode is that although Maryanne called Omar the "butterfly" from his moves in the Drea vote, MARYANNE truly went from caterpillar to butterfly in this episode. That was a straight-up, BONAFIDE, game-winning move from Maryanne! Not only was the blindside orchestrated so masterfully, Omar pretty much handed her the check by dropping a little “you did it?” to her as he’s getting his torch snuffed. Her response of “I did” for all the jury to see is just the UMPH she needed to prove her strategic prowess.

Omar really had such a dynamic and FUN game to watch. He was the mastermind behind some of the season’s biggest moves, yet was able to do so without anyone realizing he was the one actually making them! His move of the game, knocking out Drea was incredible and so well done until Drea outed him on her boot (should this even be allowed???) He was classic old school Survivor villainy and I was here for every MINUTE of it. (ALSO its was confirmed in exit interviews that Omar had an [unaired] Idol Nullifier! Since this was not shown in the main show, he does not receive points for being voted out with an advantage).

So who do we think has the best chance of winning? Where do you stand heading into tomorrow night’s finale?!?

HOW DID THE LEAGUE DO:

This was a very tame point-scoring week as we head into the finale. The biggest earner was Lindsay (25 points) thanks to her Immunity win.

With Omar's exit, Amy, Elissa, Emmy, and Petra all lose their Sole Survivor. Allie B, Allison K, Emmy, Joyce and Survivor Pete are unfortunately voted off the island as their tribes are down to ZERO.

Lori is the one to beat. She has FOUR players still left in the game on her tribe, but that doesn't mean this is an automatic win for her. There are still a bunch of people with their soles still left in the game and if their sole is crowned the winner of Season 42, that's a BONUS 75 points:

• Tribes with Jonathan as their sole: Our current league leader, Lori and Coach Juju (currently 9th place)

• Tribes with Lindsay as their Sole: Freddie (currently 11th place), Nina (currently 8th place), Rachel (currently 14th place)

• Tribes with Mike as their Sole: Laura (currently 2nd place), Peter L (currently 22nd place), Tom (currently 13th place)

• Tribes with Romeo as their Sole: Amanda S (currently 37th place), Cristina (currently 40th place)

• And no one has the potentially favorite to win, Maryanne as their sole!

This is for sure going to be a FUN finale! Can't wait to hear what everyone here thinks!

Your tribemasters,

Liv + Brian

PS a fun little Easter egg that was revealed on reddit this week (...but also let's find a new location/stop filming in Fiji):