HINA - NIGHT 8
Thank you Savannah for your outward hate for the old HINA chants as they came into challenges and using that to target Matt and vote him out. I agree wholeheartedly, I love that you hated it too, and I love that ULI is punishing the old HINA for it in this way. hahahaha
Watch out Jason.
KELE - DAY 9
Shannon is incredibly desperate and continuing to take up the most space of anyone on the tribe. I love when people play the game full throttle but I also love when other people recognize the one player who is playing too hard. This situation at KELE feels like when one person is hooking up with multiple friends in a friend group. It’s just not going to last and eventually blow up on you.
Watch out Shannon.
HINA - DAY 9
Speaking of desperate, Jason finds himself right atop the list. He’s got a ton of work to do but Jawan gives us the indication that he would like to connect with Jason but the fact of the matter is Jason is screwed and he is the easy vote.
KELE - DAY 9
I think at this point, most viewers had made up their mind on Sage. They think she’s the “weirdo/wackadoo” and perhaps they should because all we know is that she collects blackheads, which is weird. However, being put on new KELE with Shannon, we get our next nugget from Sage, or should I say white head. Sage is the pimple on the face of tribe and she is ready to pop. Despite what we’ve known to this point, Sage sees through Shannon’s game and is ready to release the acne aka all her true feelings to others as they begin to piece together that Shannon is playing too hard and talking to everybody. Good for you Sage, now can somebody get her some acne cream.
JOURNEY - DAY 9
MC - volunteers, already doesn’t have her vote, can she lose a second vote?
NATE - Jawan rigs the rock draw, Nate is skeptical to go, but Jason isn’t going.
MC and Nate are tasked with moving sandbags from point A to point B to keep their vote. As they are pacing the sand, they are out of breath, sweating, and getting to know each other to distract from the horrendous task in front of them.
Then…
Oh Jeff, how you slay me with your infinite deception and emotional roller coasters. Now, the simple game of dumping sandbags has become a full fledge competition. You got to love it right? An advantage to be had but only for one, while the sandbag challenge will remain.
The end result is Nate outwitting MC. Nate knows his limits and knows he will lose to her and so he manipulates the situation so that the sandbag challenge is all but finished so that they both ensure they don’t lose their vote but still leave the opportunity to find the advantage. Nate outwitted MC to play the challenge on his wavelength and it feels like the best outcome for him. He got to build a little bit of a bond with MC and didn’t lose his vote.
The end result for MC is a sense of pride. She is proud of herself, her body, and the accomplishment of completing the sandbag transfer even if it means she only keeps her vote and loses out on an advantage. I’m not sure I have a great read on MC at this point. I feel like that may be related to her being the female Jonathan aka challenge beast of the season and still without a torch. I think MC’s game needs an L so she can retrieve her Beware Advantage idol and we can see where she stands in the social game.
KELE - DAY 9
Post journey, Sage is at it again and this time she is going all in. She reveals to the old HINA majority that Rizo found the Beware Advantage and likely has the idol, however, what she really has done is use her knowledge of ULI to build trust with old HINA and further put the target on Shannon.
Well done Sage. Much more than meets the eye for sure. Sage is the leading candidate for this season’s award for Most Underestimated player.
IMMUNITY CHALLENGE - DAY 10
REWARD - 4 Chickens (3 hens, 1 rooster)
SIT OUTS - Kristina (KELE)
Good for you Kristina, searching the sit out bench, HARD! That’s how ya do it on Survivor!
This challenge begins and it feels brutal. The cages are enormous and definitely awkward. Plus, they have to do it as they go through the marsh portion of the water and then “bread” themselves to be chicken cutlets on the beach.
KELE beats HINA to releasing their rebounder but the back and forth challenge ends with Alex hitting the third basket before Rizo, sending HINA back to Tribal Council again. Sophi is headed back to Tribal again, keeping her streak alive of being at every Tribal. On the other hand, KELE avoids Tribal again, old HINA members still don’t have a torch, and they just earned a sustainable food source.
Let the scrambling begin.
KELE + CHICKENS - DAY 10
Ok, so the chickens are a whole other ball of wax. They are a food source and they can produce a food source which, practically speaking, is amazing at this stage in the game. However, it isn’t all rainbows and unicorns when it comes to the chickens. They are a food source but someone has to KILL THE CHICKENS in order for them to be eaten. So, you need someone to step up and be the one to end the life of another living thing so that everyone can eat and benefit from it.
Steven and Alex step up to play the role of executioner and it did not go smoothly, at all! I think I would be the one to end the chicken. I could do it. I don’t think I would grab hold of it and break it’s neck (I think that’s what Steven and Alex did) but I would find another method with a little more space between myself and the chicken. Also, if there is some way to hoard some chicken for yourself in this scenario, I think you got to do it. That little bit of protein can go a long way and my guess is in that moment you would be feeling desperate enough to try and figure a way to pull it off.
HINA - DAY 10
Pre-Tribal and the choice seems simple. Vote Jason and keep the numbers advantage in ULI’s favor or keep Jason to prevent the game from becoming a clear ULI vs. old HINA war.
Savannah is the straw stirring the drink at new HINA and her move to “bring Jason in” could be enough to save him and make Jason see her as the most trustworthy ULI in a merge situation. I think Savannah’s awareness of how Jason could be a value to her long term/bigger picture game is a clear line of demarcation between her and the rest of ULI. She has built a solid foundation with ULI and sees this vote through a lens that nobody else at new HINA does.
At this point, Savannah’s the best player in 49.
TRIBAL COUNCIL - NIGHT 10
Jawan’s real moment of questioning his ability to express himself hits home. He makes me feel paranoid too. It feels like an interview, cause it is, and interviews are not my cup of tea. To counter that fear, I think that being in the moment, in the game, and my life on the line, I would adapt and figure a way to communicate effectively.
Savannah is candid when she reveals the value that Jason can bring. Interesting that she said it to everyone.
Following up, Jawan reveals the mirror that Jason is to him in this game. Jawan is self conscious from his failure to make fire on day 2 and it’s still weighing on him. Ultimately, I don’t think Jawan is a strong player, nor is he long for this game. He just doesn’t have it.
PREDICTION: Jason gets voted out. ULI isn’t ready to eat their own.
VOTES
JASON - 5
RIZO - 1
“10 days…more than I thought I’d have” - Jason
Jason’s final words is in reference to being this season’s alternate who got the green light late in the process to play in 49. It’s a fitting end to his story. Jason was a big part of old HINA’s success in avoiding Tribal because of his puzzle skills, but his lack of a social game presence, and some bad tribe swap luck, put an end to his game. In the end, I think Jason lost because he didn’t distance himself from old HINA after the swap and pre-swap having all the success they had at HINA, never allowed him to get a social/strategic presence in the game.
From a viewer standpoint, to be brutally honest, we lose nothing in Jason being voted out. He doesn’t move the needle, AT ALL! There’s a reason he was the alternate. I know a lot of people like Pokemon and find a conversation about it between him and Jawan interesting, however, I am not one of those people. Lastly, I think Jason falls into the same category of Survivor player that Matt did, forgettable and doomed by too much early tribe success. I think you need to go to Tribal early in the game to experience it because it can only serve your game, especially the social and strategic aspects. Jason never had that and so we say goodbye to him knowing next to nothing about him and wanting nothing more either.
