Searching For Signal: #122 - “Survivor” - Heroes vs. Villains - Episode 9

We start out in the Villains camp right after Coach has been sent home.

The camera zooms in on a rat running across the ground. (Is it Russell? Is he carrying a tiny machete that he’s going to hide from the rest of the tribe?)

Jerri in a sidebar: She totally didn’t see the Coach thing coming. (Really, Jerri? Let’s see. You decided, over Coach’s objections, to make an alliance with Russell and the dancing bathing suit models. You didn’t think there would be fallout?)

Jerri races off to find Danielle. What’s going on? Am I safe? Danielle: “I’m not writing your name down. You’re not next.” (Let me translate that for ya, Jerri. Satan’s Trio is not aiming for you right now. But you’re ON the list.)

Jerri, because she’s still in denial, runs off to find Russell. What’s going on? Am I safe? (Sweetie, why are you even asking this man? He’s going to tell you exactly what you want to hear.) And he does. “I promise you ain’t next.” (Can you tell that Russell went to a really gud skool? And dude, if you really are a self-made millionaire, why the hell haven’t you paid anybody to fix your teeth?)

Opening credits roll.

It’s the next day at the Villains camp. They get tree mail about the next Reward Challenge, and the note spells it out that they need to rank their tribe from the strongest to the weakest in preparation for the competition. Hmm. We have Russell and five rail-thin women who having trouble standing in a slight breeze. This won’t take long.

Zip over to the Heroes camp, where they are perusing the same tree mail. At least these folks are trying to figure out the best strategy for this “strongest” thing. It depends on the competition. If strong can be offset by being too heavy, we might want to mix this up. JT: “The bigger you are, the harder it is.”

Rupert stomps off to a sidebar, really irritated with JT. Rupert thinks he’s the strongest person on the island. I see. Okay, then explain to me why you haven’t personally done a single thing that lead to a tribe victory? Care to field that question, Yoda?

Time for the Reward Challenge.

Rupert shows his butt again by hooting and hollering when he sees that Coach went home on the Villains tribe. Yep, there’s for sure an all-girl alliance going on over there. JT backs him up. Them girls be runnin’ things. (Okay, Rhubarb and Cletus, try to focus for a second. If the women folk are laying down the law over there, don’t you think they would have sent Russell home before Coach?)

Jeff explains that this Challenge involves standing in booths with little ledges for your feet, and then progressing down to even tinier ledges until you can’t stand it anymore and you crash to the ground. Members from the opposing tribes are paired up based on the rankings they did after the tree mail. If someone in any matched set tumbles, the other tribe gets the point.

Because the tribes took different approaches to the ranking thing, we have some really odd pairs, and this could be anyone’s game. Jeff: And by the way, Amanda is now the first person in Survivor history to tough it out for 100 days.

Wow, that’s actually pretty impressive from one angle. On the flip side, the poor thing has never won despite making it to Final Tribal twice. Which means, Amanda, that when the tribes merge, and they will, you need to stay far away from Parvati. She skanked your butt once before. Do you really want to set another Survivor record by being the only person to make it to Final Tribal THREE times and still lose? I rest my case.

Anyway, Jeff tells all that the prize for this Reward Challenge is a meal from Outback Steakhouse. (Can you say “product placement”?) Upon hearing the news, several members on both tribes drop to their knees in prayer. (Russell tries to do this, but once he realizes that he would be praying to himself, it’s really a moot point.)

And here we go. Colby drops first, which means Jerri wins a point for the Villains. Rupert drops next (so much for his delusional strength, right?), meaning Sandra gets a point for the Villains. Finally, Amanda grunts and hits the ground, letting Courtney (COURTNEY!) score the final point for the Villains.

As the Villains celebrate their win, Jerri bursts into tears. (I guess the girl really loves her some Outback entrees. J-Low, if you really understood how long red meat stays in your digestive tract, wreaking havoc, you’d probably shut off the waterworks.)

Cut to the Villains wandering up to a cute little Outback shack on the beach, complete with a fully-stocked bar. Sandra sucks down what looks like a raspberry margarita in less than three seconds. (I don’t know about the rest of you, but I suddenly want to party with her.)

They settle in to eat, and we see that as Parvati snatches up her napkin, a rolled-up clue tumbles out. She quickly shoves it into her panties, and it appears that no one sees this maneuver. While the rest of the gang digs in, Parv can’t stand the suspense and suddenly announces that she has to pee. “Be right back!”

Danielle, latching on to the fact that Parvati does not turn down meat of any kind and therefore something must be up, decides to follow her. “Me too!”

The two of them confab on the beach, where Parv shares the clue with Danielle. There’s another hidden Immunity Idol, if you can just figure out the producer’s weird nursery rhyme about where it might be. They do a happy dance.

Parvati in a sidebar: I only shared the clue with Danielle as a strategy move.

Zip over to the Heroes camp, where we initially have JT bellowing that he doesn’t care about any damn steak. Fine, don’t really believe it, but okay. Then JT takes his first moronic steps into Insanity Land. He spells it out like this to the rest of the tribe: We are just about to merge, I just know it. Russell’s on the outs over there with the Villains, he’s going next. If we win the next Immunity Challenge, I’m going to give our Idol to Russell so he can save himself and then immediately join us after the merge. Genius, right?

Crickets chirp.

Amanda in a sidebar: “This is CRAZY. We don’t really know what’s going on over there.” Surely she’s not the only one who sees the madness in JT’s plan.

But apparently she is. There’s a sidebar with Rupert, and his broken toe, where he’s practically salivating at this brilliant move. Even Candice, who generally has a level head, spews this to Amanda: “It could give us the numbers, and it gets the Idol away from JT.” Wait, you’re going to give an Immunity Idol to someone on the OTHER tribe?

Oh my God these people are stupid. Why isn’t somebody stopping this?

Back over to the Villains camp, where first we have Russell sitting on the beach, watching a rainbow develop off in the distance. I have no idea what that’s all about, because Russell doesn’t understand natural beauty. He only understands things he can buy or steal. I’m fairly certain of what political party is stamped on his voter card.

Cut to Parvati and Danielle, racing around the island and trying to figure out where the hidden Immunity Idol might be. Amazingly, they find it. (I guess they didn’t read the script where it clearly explains that only Russell is allowed to find these things.) Parvati is jumping with joy. “I’m the queen. And usually the king does what the queen says anyway.”

Quick shot of Russell, realizing that something is up and racing around the island to find out what his marionettes are doing. He doesn’t find them. Good.

Transition to the Heroes camp, where JT is writing a love letter to Russell, using a lined page in a spiral notebook that nobody has seen up to this point. I didn’t see anybody bring that notebook on the island. Where did it come from? I’m going to guess that Jeff wandered through the camp and handed it to JT, saying something like “we’ve already run the promos showing that you did something dumb-ass, so here’s some paper. Pay it forward.”

JT in a sidebar: I’m really nervous but I’m gonna do it.

Stupid man. Exactly how did you win on your season? Oh, that’s right, you chipped a tooth and everybody thought that was money-worthy instead of just bad coordination.

Time for the Immunity Challenge.

Jeff explains that this event involves the tribes competing against each other to work bags of puzzle pieces (natch) along a rope over an obstacle course. Once a tribe gets five bags to the endpoint, they then have to build a totem pole out of the pieces. (Perhaps this is not the time to ask what totem poles have to do with an island south of the equator.)

So off they go, and it becomes clear early on that the Heroes are going to win this thing. What’s more important is that Russell and Colby end up being the last players on both of their tribes, standing around at the starting gate while the various players flail away on the obstacle course. Colby gets Russell’s attention, and tells him that he needs to meet up with JT right after the race. I think Colby even mutters “I love you, man”, but it’s not clear because there’s a lot of splashing around in the riptide as the race progresses.

Russell is stunned, but recovers quickly, telling lies to Colby that Parvarti is running the show over at the Villains camp. Russell agrees to vote Parvati out at the impending Tribal Council that will be the result of the Villains falling on their ass in this competition.

Two seconds later, Jeff declares the Heroes the winner. A Villain is going home.

Four seconds later, JT discreetly hands the Idol to Russell during the Hero celebration. (I am clawing my face at this point. WHY are you people doing this? It’s madness.) Russell is so psyched about this turn of events that his head almost explodes. Sadly, it doesn’t.

Sidebar with Russell: “People are actually giving ME the Idols!” What the hell?

We arrive at the Heroes camp, where JT is very proud of himself. “We did it! We just made Survivor history.” And you probably did, but not for the reason that you think. Rupert, also overly joyful that they’ve done something spectacular, is convinced that “Russell is having a hard time containing himself.”

Cut to the Villains camp, where Russell is clearly NOT having a hard time containing himself. He’s already handed JT’s letter to Parvati, and she’s reading passages aloud in between bouts of hysterical laughter. “(What, is he in fifth grade, passing notes?”)

Parvati in a sidebar: Why would JT even do this? He’s just handed his heart to Russell, who’s going to stab it into a million pieces and then I’m going to eat them up. Yum!

Sandra in a sidebar, musing on the upcoming eviction possibilities: “Me without Courtney is like rice without beans.” (I have no idea.)

Courtney and Parvati get together, and Courtney tries to increase her value. Hey, if you keep me past the merge, Amanda trusts me and that’s a bonus, right?) Parvati DOES seem to be interested. So you’d stay with me after the merge? Courtney nods vigorously, but then the wind shifts a blade of grass and we can no longer see Courtney.

Parvati in a sidebar, where she’s actually showing some intelligence instead of just skin: Keeping Courtney might just be the right thing. I’m going to need somebody when I finally ditch Russell. But I gotta work this plan just right.

Cut to Russell and Parvati sharing the stunning JT development with Danielle and Jerri. (Danielle: “Oh shut UP!”) Everyone has a nice chuckle over it, then Parvati slyly starts trying to turn the vote away from Courtney and toward Sandra. And it seems to be working. But you never know on this show.

Time for Tribal.

Jeff brings in The Jury, which at this point is just Coach. He’s wearing some lame kimono thing. Seriously, when is someone going to sit down with this man and explain to him that he is NOT a Ginsu Warrior just because he bought the knife set 20 years ago? Geez.

Jeff’s first question is directed toward Sanda. How important is trust? Sandra, a little rattled, comes back with, “Great, Jeff. We all know that the person who gets the trust question is the one who’s in trouble.” Good point.

Danielle jumps in, saying that she doesn’t care for Sandra because Sandra runs around telling people things. (Jeff: Uh, Danielle, the question was about trust, not about who has a big mouth.) Then Danielle and Sandra get into a medium-level catfight, where Sandra competently holds her own, basically telling it like it is, and Danielle increasingly shoves her foot further in her mouth. Interesting.

Russell jumps in, because the camera has been on someone else for longer than 15 seconds and he can’t stand that. “Look at me, Parvati and Danielle. We’re still here and THAT’S what trust will do for you.” I think you’ve got that a little bit backwards, Russ. The three of you are still here because the people in the other alliance DIDN’T trust themselves. And that’s a little different.

Then Courtney and Jerri get into it, mainly because Jerri lies that she was never in an alliance until she joined with Russell. Courtney: Really? Go back and look at how you voted, Hair Club for Women. “You flipped just in time to save your butt. I didn’t”

And she’s right. Final results: one vote for Jerri (that would be Courtney), and everybody else, including Sandra, votes for Courtney. The Flagpole, on her way out: “Good luck, bitches.”

Jeff makes a final announcement. As of tomorrow, Parvati will also hit the 100-day mark in Survivor. The camera shows a grinning Parvati as she wiggles around in self-satisfaction.

But hey, Parv, what happened to keeping Courtney? The merge has got to be just seconds away. You might regret sending Courtney home.

Then again, the real wildcard if the merge happens soon?

Sandra.