SURVIVOR 41 (Episode 12)

WOW. Our last episode before the finale! Time flies when you're playing Survivor from your couch. Let's dig into Episode 12, Truth Kamikaze...

• The first bit of this episode serves as a debrief from the dramatic tribal the night before. Danny reveals his big secret to Deshawn that he used to be in the NFL. Heather reveals that she’s new to this whole racism conversation. Erika reveals her guilt for voting out yet another female castmate. And Xander reveals that he chose to keep Ricard around as his meat shield.

• We head to a REWARD CHALLENGE where Jeff reveals that the winning team will have a choice in the reward they receive: chicken and veggies (the obvious choice) or cookies, cake, and candy (the choice only Jenna & Heidi from Survivor Amazon would make). Deshawn interrupts Jeff to express his disappointment in the options, thinking they’d be offered some contact from their loved ones. Now… this was ultimately a silly request from Deshawn, but I do think it would have made this reward decision waaaay more interesting. Chicken and veggies vs. sweets is too easy of a decision given how underfed they all are. The option to either get some protein/nutrients OR receive letters from loved ones could have been an actually difficult decision for the winning team to agree upon.

• The yellow team: Deshawn, Xander, Erika beat the blue team: Heather, Danny, Ricard. Blue’s demise seemed to largely be due to Danny and Heather not being able to tread water and retrieve the balls whenever Ricard missed the basket. (Another example of hunger and exhaustion greatly impacting the castaways’ challenge abilities.)

• While on reward, Erika, Xander, and Deshawn discuss getting Ricard out at the next tribal (le DUH!), and there are even talks of them being each other’s Final 3 since they’ve all played such different games.

• Back at camp, Danny goes idol hunting and walks RIGHT BY ONE (LOOK DOWN DANNY. LOOK. DOWN), but he doesn’t find it. Ricard senses a pep in Danny’s step and starts a rumor that he found an idol which Danny neither confirms nor denies.

• Deshawn and Erika reignite their chicken and veggie discussion at the water well. Erika seems genuinely in agreement that a Final 3 with Deshawn and Xander could be her best shot at winning. Though I understand the thought process of wanting to go to the end with people who have different games from you, it just seems so out of touch for her to not be able to identify Heather as the clear goat in the game. This theory seems more applicable for say.. The Tonys and Sarahs of the world. There is no one on that jury who might consider voting for Heather over Erika, but there are definitely people who might consider voting for Xander/Deshawn over Erika. Right??? Is this just easier to see from the viewer perspective, or is Deshawn really getting to her?

• In his confessional, Deshawn reveals that he’s really just trying to get Erika to say the words that she can’t go to the end with Heather because he wants to be able to claim that as a move of his own down the line.

• We head to the IMMUNITY CHALLENGE where we finally have something more “relay” style - Spin to unravel a rope, climb across a net, walk across a balance beam, complete a puzzle. As soon as Ricard was the first one to make it to that puzzle, it felt pretty clear that this challenge was a runaway for the dark horse challenge beast. He won his THIRD immunity challenge which makes up half of this season’s individual immunities so far. If he manages to win the next two, he’ll be tied for the most individual immunity wins ever in one season.

• The time at camp before tribal is of course a scramble as no one ever considered what they’d do if their agreed upon target, Ricard, won immunity. They land on trying to decide between Danny and Deshawn which is absolutely PAINFUL for us viewers at home who are wondering why Xander’s name isn’t even MENTIONED when he’s been sitting pretty with an idol in his pocket for weeks. Is Xander going to be able to idol himself into the Final 4 without anyone even attempting to flush it???? Why are Danny and Deshawn accepting collective defeat when they could team up and get ONE OTHER PERSON to vote for Xander with them??? Like they really couldn’t have pulled in Erika or Heather? This could have been their big move/comeback in this game and they just let it pass right by them with seemingly no effort. The only thing I can think is that production is painting a different picture of Xander than what the players in the game are experiencing. Regardless, even if no one perceives Xander as a big threat, it would have been nice to see Danny and Deshawn at least try to use his idol as a reason to get the target off their backs.

• Enter: Tribal Council. Deshawn and Danny call out the group for not taking advantage of voting out the biggest threat in the game when they had the chance in the previous tribal. Erika chimes in to say that threats are all about perception for each individual player - which is true, but doesn’t negate the fact that Ricard is the clear frontrunner at this point.

• The discussion is pretty tame until Deshawn goes rogue and drops a Truth Bomb Kamikaze: “Erika will not be taking you to the end Heather, she told me at the water well.” Bruh. What are you doing????????? I’ve really tried to think through what his strategy was here, and well, I don’t think there was any. This was a move based purely on emotion. He thought he was being voted out and just wanted to stir the pot for everyone else before losing. Now this COULD HAVE been a strategic move IF he used this information to make Heather weary of Erika before tribal. He should have pulled Heather aside at camp and told her this information to cause some chaos and uncertainty, and then maybe he could have pulled off an Erika vote out with Danny and Heather. Instead, he just threw himself under the bus and ruined any shot he had at maintaining his trust with Erika. Oh Deshawn.

• The votes are in and it’s a tie between Danny and Deshawn, causing a revote where Danny is ultimately the one sent home. Do you all think it was intended to be Danny from the beginning, or did they flip and keep Deshawn around after seeing how he blew up his own game?

• The episode ends with yet another twist - Jeff says: “Tomorrow you will be taken to a new island where you will start over.” The preview of the next episode looks like it’s filled with chaos and running and tears. It’s gonna be interesting folks.

THE LEAGUE: As we bid farewell to Danny, he unfortunately brings in zero points for those with him on their tribes. Ricard and Xander yet again bring in a boatload of points for their tribes (25 and 21, respectively)! Brendan maintains a healthy lead with 624 points though he lost Danny off his tribe which means he’s now down to 3 tribe members. Could this create an opening for someone else to snag the lead? Amanda makes a move up to 2nd place with 589 points. She still has 3 tribe members and her Sole Survivor in the game, making victory seem within reach for this Survivor newbie. With Erika, Ricard, and Xander on his tribe, Paul took in the most points in this episode (62). Danny’s vote out hits the tribes of Adam, Brendan, Christina, Gracie, Hannah, Kath, Maggie S., Mel, Peter B., and Robert. The hardest hit though goes to Vukelulu’s reigning champion, Casey, who lost her Sole Survivor and final tribe member, leaving her as the official last place member of Vukelulu for this season with 230 points (yes, even less than Petra). Ohhhh how the tables have turned. Is it perhaps time to retire the buff? Casey, THE TRIBE HAS SPOKEN.

As we head into Wednesday's finale, we still have quite a few league members with their Sole Survivors still left in the game (which can earn their tribes a bonus 75 points!) Not a soul has DeShawn, Erika OR Heather as their sole, but there are a few tribes with Xander (Amanda, Dawn, Hanna, Paul) and Ricard (Maggie L, Peter L, Vicky).

1st	BRENDAN (624 points)	Danny(x), DeShawn, Erika, Xander
2nd	AMANDA (589 points)	DeShawn, Ricard, Xander
3rd	MAGGIE S. (569 points)	Danny(x), Erika, Ricard
4th	CHRISTIE (564 points)	Heather, Xander
5th	PAUL (557 points)	Erika, Ricard, Xander
6th	MATT R. (553 points)	Heather, Xander
7th	BRIAN (542 points)	Erika, Heather, Ricard
8th	ANDREW (515 points)	DeShawn, Ricard
9th	HANNA (503 points)	Danny(x), Erika, Xander
10th	VICKY (502 points)	Heather, Ricard, Xander

11. BRI (498 points)

12. RACHAEL (497 points)

13. AMY (484 points)

14. PETER L. (476 points)

15. ANGELA (465 points)

16. MEL (462 points)

17. MAGGIE L. (455 points)

18. PETER B. (446 points)

19. GRACIE (435 points)

20. KATH (432 points)

21. LIV (412 points)

22. DAWN (403 points)

23. ROBERT (399 points)

24. ADAM (385 points)

25. JIM (373 points)

26. CHRISTINA (366 points)

27. MATT S. (365 points)

28. JOYCE (352 points)

29. LORI (348 points)

30. ALLIE (314 points)

31. TORI (306 points)

32. PETRA (297 points)

33. ROBBIE (291 points)

34. JILL (258 points)

35. CASEY (230 points)

Full points sheet:

Season 41 Weekly Standings - Ep #12.pdf

Download PDF • 36KB

'TIL NEXT WEEK!!!

Tribe masters Liv + Brian