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Probst sighting!

The pacing of this episode is lightning fast. Everything that happens directly impacts the game and we are loving it. Today's challenge features three heats. The first one involves players digging up a peg then using it to negotiate a series of hand puzzles. Rupert shreds on this competition with Sandra nipping at his heels, offering a strong performance in a challenge for a change. The other three to advance are Russell, Jerri and Danielle.

The next heat of the challenge gives each player four pegs along with a rock climbing wall filled with peg holes. Players may use the pegs however they see fit in order to negotiate the wall and reach the top of the base. ELR cleverly takes a running jump up the wall and spikes a peg hole midway up. This allows him to be the first one to compete the challenge. Rupert and Parvati also advance, meaning there is a two in three chance that one of the Villains can eliminate whomever they want at the second Tribal Council. The final challenge is a puzzle where players must swap around the pieces until they show a picture of the Survivor logo. It is a hotly contested race, but ELR edges Rupert and Parvati to win immunity. So, if Parvati and him do wind up in mortal combat prior to the next vote, only she has a chance to go home. As such, it makes sense for them to kiss and make up. Here's hoping Parvati has better taste than that, though.

Once everyone has returned to camp, Parvati makes her opinion clear that Rupert is about to go home. We grow concerned when a monologue shows her saying, "There ain't gonna be any Heroes left. No Heroes!" This leads us to believe that a Villain is about to go home, but it's hard to envision a scenario wherein that occurs.

Right on cue...

ELR approaches Danielle and talks about what they are going to do since they cannot beat Parvati. Does he want his Survivor Wife gone? Probably not. He does want to scare her, though, and he also wants to find out what the score is within his alliance. ELR's ego dictated that he believe himself to be calling of the shots. If he is an alliance with Parvati and Danielle is in an alliance with Parvati and the two of them do not like one another, that means Parvati has the power position. He should have realized this three weeks ago and we said as much at the time.

When the light finally does go on for ELR, his plan becomes the most straightforward route, the one he always chooses. He attempts to create discord by turning the two women against one another. First, he talks to Danielle about voting out Parvati and then he quickly reports back to Parvati that Danielle is trying to orchestrate her elimination. It is a dumb move of course, as Parvati has a very good BS Detector.

After hearing what ELR says happened, Parvati tells him that she will go talk to Danielle about the situation. Russell panics at this news. He has gotten away with so many transparent lies during his two times playing Survivor that he has forgotten that it is easy enough to find out the truth in such instances. When Parvati heads in Danielle's direction, Russell throws himself in front of her and begins to berate her for being so much of an idiot that she would go talk to the person she talks with the most in the game. This actually happens.

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