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Corinne heads back down to the water’s edge to wait until it’s time to vote. “She was never part of our core alliance,” Phillip self-justifies to Dawn and Cochran. Phillip is dead on, in that Corinne’s budding relationship with Michael is a threat to Phillip. But he’s simultaneously being mean and not doing what BR would have done.

Anyway, it’s an excuse to give Cochran a bit more Survivor-narration as he spins a story about how “tonight’s vote is probably what sets into motion a series of events that completely bring the Phillip and Corinne feud to the surface and make it clear why they can’t play together.” This is almost a plea to viewers to keep watching the show. “Something will happen soon, I promise!”

Tribal Council. Michael gets the first question, about how horrible things are in the tribe with the losing. He says there is tension in the tribe. Why would any of the “favorites” be tense? Julia talks about how the “favorites” know they have the numbers, but they are looking further ahead than this vote.

Probst asks Corinne whether the tribe tension is about who to vote off, and she agrees and says that “you don’t want to screw something up here and regret it down the line.” Phillip talks about “understanding the process.” Even Tribal Council is boring tonight. Self-Deprecating Comedy Improv Nite starring Cochran would be better than this.

Probst asks Dawn if she’s seen Corinne and Phillip try to work through the process, and she makes an uncomfortable face when she says “seen it, felt it” but she thinks if they all have the same goal, the conflict will work itself out. Probst wants to stir up... well, something, so this Tribal Council isn’t a complete wash, so he points out that Phillip put himself in the hero role again tonight. He admits that it was him who lost the challenge, but he also picked up that whole statue by himself (reviewing the tape – true), like that erases the loss.

Probst asks Michael what his pitch is, and the reply is that he has been working to stay since he landed on the “favorites” beach. Probst wants to go deeper, so he asks Cochran about how Corinne “likes to play with the gays” and if that would work against him. Cochran points out that people would see Michael working with Corinne which could be a threat. Corinne says that it is all exaggerated. She says she has no loyalty to Michael because she’s only known him a handful of days and a two-some alliance makes no sense, but “it’s neat that he’s gay.” I think this is true, but not the whole truth. Michael is a good post-merge play for Corinne, who needs to bring more to the table in any move to vote out Phillip.

But Michael is ready for a vote. Even he’s bored with Tribal Council, and he might be the one going home. He says he’s felt like a cat dangling from a tree for five days and just wants it done. Probst stretches things out by asking Julia another question, and it’s a long rambling answer that I’m not even going to bother recapping. It’s time to vote.

When Probst returns from the “tally”, and as the “favorites” planned, the vote is tied between Mike and Julia. Revote. Will this episode never end? Why do we have to see Phillip having trouble getting the lid off his pen?

Julia. Julia. Julia. Michael gives her a kiss on the cheek, and she tells the tribe it’s been fun and good luck before getting her torch snuffed. “Who was that?” at least one of the “favorites” thinks to themself. Probst doesn’t need to tell Michael that he has his work cut out, but he tells him anyway.

Next time on Survivor, There’s a merge! Andrea is worried about everyone. And there’s a food-eating challenge. With a montage of contestants gagging. Prepare for balut.

Julia gets to say more in her farewell speech than we saw for the entire seven episodes she was on. She says it was so difficult going up against veterans and “being at their mercy” but that she couldn’t have done anything different. I wonder if anyone will even remember her at the reunion.

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