Mergatory (S43: Episode 6)

I coulda sworn "Mergatory" was a term/a title of an episode in one of these more recent seasons. Am I making this up?? Anywho - let's get into it!

Whether that first Ellie confessional was taken from an earlier point in the game and was edited into this episode, or she was genuinely feeling that confident in her socialization skills, it immediately felt like this was going to be her boot episode. Byeeee.

As always, Episode 6 was a fun and chaotic episode! We didn't have that horrible hourglass twist from Seasons 41/42 (yay!!) but we did have some messy "earn your way into the merge" twist - which I can see being something that's here to stay (Jeff clearly loves this). So us Tribemasters will need to rethink how we score this episode in future fantasy league seasons. The challenge (and really all of the challenges we've seen so far) have been really fun and just different enough from the staleness we've had these past 5 seasons. I love that we got a mini-merge feast for those who won. I love that Gabler was messy and divulged some of Baku's cracks (AKA vote out Ellie). And I loved the scramble leading into tribal council. It makes me believe that all of these players are willing to ditch their original tribal alliances and play an open/fluid post-merge game. Karla/Jesse/Cody still feel like the strongest edits this season, but I can see Miss Cassidy sneaking in with an upset. I felt like her stock massively increased this episode.

Kudos to Jeanine for holding onto that idol for herself! Save it, girl; you're going to need it to find a new alliance moving forward!

What's Up Vukelulu?!

This episode will be our final week of +3 point weekly survival. Next episode our merge bonuses will join (if they are still in the game) and castaways will earn tribes +10 points for each week of survival. Rachael, Emma, Leigh, Peach, Tribemaster Brian, and Elissa will be the only tribes with a full 5-member roster. And due to Maggie's disadvantage earned earlier this season, she will need to wait one additional week for Dwight to potentially join her tribe.

Overall this was a pretty simple week for points. Cassidy earned 5 points for naming the episode and Ellie earned 3 points for crying. Our top 10 had minimal changes, although with the loss of Ellie this week, we may start to see some shifts in our leaderboard as 4 out of the top 10 have her on their team (Amelia, Producer Jim, Chef Josh Rez, and Amanda S.) With the Ellie boot, our league experienced its biggest sole survivor loss to date. Sorry for you: Producer Jim, Chef Josh Rez, Adam, Tom Q, JoAnne, and Seth.

The biggest headline is Anastasia makes her debut in the top 10 with this week's biggest point increase (+35 points, up 9 spots). Will she be able to stay on the up?

Happy Halloween + Happy Survivor Wednesday!

- Tribemasters Liv + Brian