Survivor Gabon: Earth's Last Eden
It Was Like Christmas Morning
By Jim Van Nest, Survivor Analyst
October 10, 2008
BoxOfficeProphets.com
We begin at Kota camp after Tribal. They decided that they didn't like Tribal Council and they don't want to go back. Kelly, who also voted for Ace, is feeling like the outsider now and she's just hoping something will change. Ace tells us that he hated Tribal and was surprised to see Kelly vote for him. He says that she has made herself the next to go. And with that, cue the credits.
We come back from break to the Fang tribe. Ken wants to cook some rice while Randy thinks they need to slow down as they're more than halfway through the rice after only eight days. He gives the tribe a speech about conserving the rice; after all, this is called Survivor. He tells us that Ken, Crystal and GC don't want to listen to anything he has to say. Dan, Randy, Susie and Matty go off to pick fruit leaving Ken, Crystal and GC to talk about the obvious divide in the tribe. We then join the other four talking about Crystal and GC. They all seem to feel that GC seriously has to go. Matty tells us that he feels like he has a solid alliance of four now. As they shake on it...
Probst sighting! Jeff tells the tribes that they will have to rank each member of their tribe from one to eight, with one being the most important to the tribe, eight being the least. Once the tribes are ranked, they will have to line up on pedestals. He hands out tally boards to the tribes for them to fill out in private. He tells everyone to pick a spot on the beach and get started ranking their tribe. After a while, all the tallies are made and Jeff calls out the rankings.
For Fang, #1 is Matty, #2 is Dan, #3 is Randy, #4 is Crystal, #5 is Ken with GC #6 and Susie ranked last at #7.
Kota shaped up like this: #1 is Marcus, #2 is Ace, #3 is Bob, #4 is Charlie, #5 is Jacque with Corinne at #6, Sugar at #7 and Kelly in last place at #8.
Marcus is a bit worried about being ranked #1 as he fears that people may start looking at him as a bigger target now. Jeff asks Kelly how it felt to be last and she says it's bad and she's never been ranked last at anything before.
Crystal is a bit annoyed at being ranked #4. She's even more pissed to be ranked behind Randy. The sixth place finish for GC was a huge wake-up call for him. Jeff asks Marcus if he sees any surprises on the Fang rankings. He says that he's surprised to see Randy ranked so high. Jeff asks Randy what he thinks about getting a look inside the dynamics of Kota. He says it tells him nothing. It tells about strength in challenges and friendliness, but it shows nothing about who's hooking up with whom.
Now that the rankings have been made, they can put this information to good use as they are picking new tribes. Drop your buffs. Matty is devastated, considering he had just solidified his alliance.
Since Marcus and Matty are ranked #1, they will remain on their respective tribes and will get the picking started. Marcus gets to choose first and it has to be a Fang member. He chooses Dan.
Matty then chooses Ace, as the first picks went in order. Dan is up for the new Kota and he breaks rank and chooses Charlie. Charlie is SO relieved to stick with Marcus. Ace chooses Crystal from the Fang tribe. Charlie then pulls in Randy for the new Kota. Crystal picks Jacque to join the new Fang tribe. Randy pulls in Corinne to the new Kota tribe and Jacque chooses Ken for Fang. The Kota tribe discusses the next selection and Corinne takes Susie over GC. Ken has to pick a Kota member and he has to choose between Sugar, Kelly and Bob. Jeff asks Bob if he's a bit surprised to still be up there. He's basically taking a "time will tell" approach. Ken finally chooses and he picks Kelly because she's hot. Susie then picks for Kota and she grabs Bob. Kelly then selects GC as the final member of Fang. Since Sugar is the last person standing, she gets to go to Exile. She will stay there through the immunity challenge and Tribal Council and she will then join whichever tribe loses, so that both tribes remain even.
For those scoring at home, the new tribes are as follows:
Fang - Matty, Ace, Crystal, Jacque, Ken, Kelly and GC.
Kota - Marcus, Dan, Charlie, Randy, Corinne, Susie and Bob.
Sugar is out as a wild card right now.
So Sugar heads out to Exile and the rest get fresh clean new buffs. I'll give Sugar this...since she already has the idol, she can now choose comfort and live with ease on Exile for the next few days.
We come back from break to join the new Kota tribe as they arrive at camp. Dan is thrilled to be in the new tribe. Randy is quick to point out that there are four Kota members and three Fang members and he's pretty sure that if they lose, the Kotas will stick together. He says if it's not him, he'll be fine with that. If it is him, he'll burn the camp down. I'm liking this guy more and more. The talk turns to how solid Bob is around camp. Susie tells us how much she loves the new tribe and she can only hope to work hard and make herself worth keeping.
Next we check in with Sugar over at Exile. She naturally chooses comfort and when she gets in the little hut, she says it's almost like Christmas morning. All kinds of fruits and food awaited her. She tells us that she hopes to go back to Fang so she can hang with Ace. She hopes they boot Kelly and she can take her place.
Next up is a trip to the new Fang. GC tells us that he's happy with the switch as he's got four members of his old tribe there. Right off the bat Ken asks about how solid the old Kota tribe was and as Jacques's agreeing with him, Kelly lets it be known that she never felt like part of the old tribe. That she was never invited with the rest. All I can think is that she knows Ace has it in for her and she's outnumbered 4-3 anyway. Why would she be so stupid as to pop off like that? That does it. She has to go. Crystal takes note of Kelly's comments and Crystal thinks she might be good to bring in to their group. As Kelly goes off on her old tribe to GC, Crystal and Ken talk about bringing her in. Kelly tells us that she hopes to get something going with the three Fang members. As Crystal gets into the conversation, she asks about Jacque and her closeness to Ace. Kelly says they sleep together, but Ace also sleeps with Sugar. Ken tells us he picked Kelly because he thought she would be the easiest person to switch to his side. He tells us that he's only using her for a vote. And there you have it, Ken's in the game. Although, if these four stick together (GC, Crystal, Ken and Kelly) they may well be the worst tribe in the history of Survivor.
We come back from break to Kota receiving Tree Mail. With the mail is a lacrosse stick and ball. The note suggests a cross between water polo and lacrosse. As the tribe practices, Susie tells us that she's trying real hard but that the game takes its toll on a 47-year-old woman. Marcus tells us that Randy and Susie don't do much in challenges, and it may be Susie's hard work around camp that allows her to stay over Randy. Marcus says they'll really be watching the effort given in the next challenge.
Probst sighting! Today's challenge looks to be a lacrosse game in bumper boats. Each person gets a little raft and paddle. Jeff will throw a ball into the water and game's on. First team to score three goals wins. Survivors ready? Marcus gets the ball and slowly makes his way down "court". He passes off to Randy and with one shot, Randy scores over Ace's shoulder. 1-0 Kota. Once again, Marcus ends up with the ball. As Kelly does nothing to stop him, Marcus lofts a long pass to Randy who has an open goal and scores easily to make it 2-0 Kota. Should we be shocked when Marcus ends up with the ball again? Ken and Kelly are completely useless in this challenge as Probst is quick to point out. For the third time, Marcus passes to Randy, but this time he misses. After quite a struggle for the ball, including several people falling out of their boats, Randy scoops it up and completes the Survivor Ball hat trick, thus giving Kota a 3-0 victory. Before he sends them on their way, Jeff makes sure to let Fang know that that was one of the worst performances in a challenge that he's ever seen.
We come back from break to the Fang camp as it's time to play, "It could be anybody, because they all suck!" As they're all sitting around talking about the horrible challenge, GC quickly calls out Ken for sucking. They mention that Jacque did real well, but overall everyone pretty much sucked. In the middle of it, Kelly stands up and says, "I'm over it" and walks away. GC tells us that the plan was to dump Jacque or Ace, but after that challenge, Kelly has to go. He's going to talk to Crystal and Ken and get it set up.
We join the three in conference. GC says they have to keep Ace and he thinks Kelly has to go. She was terrible and has a bad attitude. Ken and Crystal go along with him, but their concern is that Sugar has the immunity idol and it could end up messing them up. Matty comes up to them and just assumes it's Kelly. When they tell him no, Jacque, he doesn't really like it at all. They tell him that they think Jacque, Sugar and Ace are more likely to bond together with the idol than Kelly, Sugar and Ace. The next thing we see is Matty talking to Jacque. He tells her everything that's going on. She's totally thrown off by this and now has her sights set on Kelly.
Next up is Kelly talking to Ken. She says she worked her ass off in that challenge and she doesn't get it. Ken tells her that they all feel like Kelly is the outsider, which makes her a better play right now. She totally un-makes Ken's mind on this one. He tells her she really needs to talk to Crystal. She goes to Crystal and Crystal tells her they thought her and Ace were real close. Crystal admits she played great in the challenge. She tells us that as she's talking to Jacque, she kept welling up with tears and after how hard she worked in the challenge, Crystal is feeling like she needs to keep Jacque. So, right now, it's up in the air between Jacque and Kelly. Interestingly enough, Jacque will slice them up if the tribes merge. She has her alliance and right now, she's looking to stay in the game, no matter the cost. It'll sure be interesting to see how Tribal plays out.
Jeff asks GC if Tribal Council is getting old. He says he's tired of showing up here. Jeff asks Matty if keeping the tribe as strong as possible is the plan. He says most definitely...at least for him it is. Jeff then asks Ken if he can trust the new folks and Ken says it's too early to tell yet. Does Matty trust Ace? He says he doesn't know if he trusts him, but he wants him on his side. Jeff then asks Ace if they should trust him. He says that Ken's right. Right now, they have to earn trust. He just thinks they need to do whatever they can to keep the tribe strong and to do what's best for the tribe.
Jacque's next. How frustrating is it to go from the solid tribe to this one? She says she thought they would be awesome and she was working her butt off in the challenge. Next up is Kelly. Jeff asks her about her performance in the challenge. Kelly is quick to point out that Ken and Crystal were worse than her in the challenge. Way to make friends and influence people. This girl may have the worst social game EVER on Survivor. Naturally, her accusation pisses Crystal off. She says she is not weaker than Kelly and that she just couldn't figure out how to make the rowboat thing work. Jeff stops this to point out that Jacque, Ace and Matty were the only ones contributing in the challenge. Jeff asks Ace if that has him feeling any better. He says no. It would be bad strategy to vote him out, but he doesn't feel safe at all. Jacque says that despite being strong in the challenge, she feels very vulnerable. Jeff asks Ken that if the Fang members stick together who should be most worried. He says Kelly and Jacque because they really need physical strength in the challenge. And with that it's time to vote.
We see Ace's vote for Kelly saying that it feels good to return the favor. We then see Kelly's vote for Jacque saying simply, "Sorry." They show us Jacque's vote for Kelly, but give us no comments. We then hear GC's comments saying that it would probably have been smarter to keep the person he was voting for but this is how it has to be. We do not see his vote, though. I'll go tally the votes.
First vote - Jacque. Second vote - Kelly. Third vote - Kelly. Fourth vote - Jacque. And it looks like the rest of the votes come up Jacque and she becomes the fourth person voted out of Survivor: Gabon. And also, she becomes the first really frickin stupid vote of Survivor: Gabon. You can't keep a useless whiny bitch like Kelly and get rid of a solid player like Jacque. That's why the Fang tribe is a joke. That's why GC, Crystal and Ken have NO shot at winning this game. You just can't go far with stupid. These kinds of votes really piss me off. I want to smack anyone who voted for Jacque because it's an insult to anyone who's a fan of this show to watch some people be that dumb. Because I hate to end on such a down note, at least this vote will stop me from butchering the spelling of Jacque's name for the rest of the season.
Next time on Survivor: an elephant gets up close and personal with the Fang tribe and GC goes missing right before a challenge. We see a shot of the Fang tribe screaming for GC with no response. Maybe he got eaten by a monkey, dude. Until next week, take care!