Month: June 2009

While they may not have wanted to, the alliance stuck together in Survivor: Borneo Episode 12, voting out Sean. That leaves a final four of Kelly Wiglesworth, Richard Hatch, Rudy Boesch, and Sue Hawk.

The alliance is now done. For real. Now it’s time for them to eat their own. Despite the fact that the four of them have made it to the final four, they don’t trust each other at all. Kelly tried to play both sides because she wasn’t really in the alliance (except she really was). Sue originally wanted to join up with Kelly to get rid of Rich, but then Sue decided she didn’t like Kelly any more, so she chose instead she’d rather go to the end with Rich. Rudy is also looking to take Rich to the end.

They’ve received pictures of each of their former tribemates, so they think the next challenge will be personal questions about them. Rudy doesn’t know, and he doesn’t care. He was just asking what Sean did again. I thought everybody knew he was a doctor. The alliance of three remains intact, and they’re hoping once again to get rid of Kelly, who still hates everybody.

The immunity challenge is called fallen comrades. It’s a quiz game to find out how much they’ve learned about each of the castaways. The challenge takes place at tribal council in front of the jury.

Who received only 1 vote at the first tribal council?
Stacey. Rudy and Sue are correct.

In treasure island relay, name the Pagong members who ran the following legs: swimming, floating bridge, paddle, run, and dig.
Colleen, Greg, Joel, Gervase, and Gretchen and Jenna. Rich, Sue, and Kelly get 1 point.

Whose shirt is this?
Jenna’s. Kelly gets it right.

What state is Gervase from?
New Jersey. Sue, Rich, and Rudy get a point.

Whose blue bandana is this?
Greg’s. Kelly gets it right.

What are the names of these two girls?
They’re obviously Jenna’s daughters, Sabrina and Sadie. Sue and Kelly are correct.

Other than the raft and personal belongings, what three items did Pagong bring with them when they moved to Tagi beach?
Mosquito net, cooking pot, and blanket. Rudy, Kelly, and Sue are correct.

Name the two Survivors from Pagong who did not compete in the obstacle course.
Gervase and Colleen. Rudy, Kelly, and Sue are correct.

Sean was the chief resident of what department in the hospital?
Neurology. Rudy, Sue, and Richard are correct.

Going into the final question, Sue and Kelly are tied at 6, and Rudy has 5. Richard is out of it with 3.

In order, list the Survivors voted off the Pagong tribe.
BB, Ramona, Joel, Gretchen, Greg, Jenna, Gervase, Colleen. Sue, Richard, and Kelly are correct.

That brings them down to the tiebreaker for Kelly and Sue. What is Sonja’s last name? She was in Tagi (for 1 episode).
Christopher. Kelly is correct. Kelly wins immunity. She uses this as an opportunity to suck up to the jury, telling them she’s interested in them and likes them.

Immediately following the challenge, it’s time to vote. Their plans have been dashed for a third time, so they need to have a plan B.

Votes
Sue
Rich
Sue
Rich

The girls stick together to vote out Rich, while the boys stick together to vote out Sue. Kelly and Rudy will be allowed to vote again. It’s obvious Rudy’s not going to turn on Rich, but will Kelly vote out Sue?

Votes
Sue
Sue

With two votes, Sue has been voted off the island. She’d rather still be on the island, which is a lot easier than driving a truck through Chicago every day.

At 4AM on day 38, Jeff arrives at camp to wake up the final three. He takes them on a boatride. Upon arrival, they will walk past the staffs of their fallen comrades, then walk on burning coals to reach the final immunity challenge.

The challenge is called hands on the immunity idol. The last person with their hand on the immunity idol wins immunity. An hour and a half has elapsed, and Jeff has gone to get some oranges to tempt them with. Rich is thinking that he’s probably never going to outlast Kelly, and he hopes both of them recognize what he’s done to get there. With that said, he’s out of the challenge. Years later, we would see Mike Boogie imitate this move (except in that case the dumb blonde who was up against him had such a short attention span that she eliminated herself, ending the challenge about 15 seconds after it began). Later, Jeff returns with some lemonade. They will now start rotating positions every 30 minutes. Now that 4 hours have passed, Jeff asks Rich about how he hopped down and put the weight on Rudy’s shoulders. Seconds later, as they’re rotating around the pole, Rudy loses concentration and removes his hand from the idol. Kelly wins immunity.

Rich and Rudy both think Kelly’s wisest decision here is to keep Rich around. Despite that, Rich has played a great game, and unless you’re one of those people who supports someone who’s won immunity a bunch of times, there’s not a lot of reason to believe Kelly could beat either of these guys, since she’s played a poor game despite her 5 immunity wins. Trying to play both sides blew up in her face because she just wasn’t smart enough to pull it off. It’s a classic overplay.

Vote
Rudy

With the lone vote against him, Rudy has been voted off the island. He doesn’t blame her.

Now that they’re leaving, they burn their camp to the ground. It’d really suck if Jeff came to them with a twist right about now.

Kelly just wants to get through the firing squad. Rich doesn’t think any of these people are vindictive. Wait for it.

Rich is proud of the game he’s played and would be happy with $100,000, but he really wants the million. It would change his life (years later in prison).

At the final tribal council, the two contestants first are allowed to make opening remarks.

Kelly wants people to know it’s a game. She hopes they’re not going to be judged on how they chose to play that game. Huh? Rather, she wants to be judged on the type of person she is.

Rich doesn’t care about who the best person is, and he doesn’t think anybody really knows who he is anyway. His approach was about strategy from the beginning.

Gervase asks if there’s anything they would change. Rich was too comfortable believing he could trust what was said. Kelly wouldn’t have joined the alliance (the one that got her this far). She also found it hard casting some of the votes she did.

Jenna wants to know who they would put in their place. Rich would choose Rudy due to his integrity, loyalty, and gameplay, and he would also choose Greg, who he felt could have been big competition. Kelly would pick Sonja and Gretchen because they were strong women. Sonja? Really? This may be enough to swing over the female votes, however.

Sean doesn’t have any questions. He thanks Kelly for keeping the camp afloat, and thanks Rich for teaching him some things about himself along the way.

Colleen asks what three character traits are essential to get to the final two. Kelly responds faith, strong will, and likeability; Rich responds self awareness, observation, and ethics. Colleen is amused by Rich’s answer since he didn’t do so well when it came to answering questions about people’s kids’ names. He wasn’t there to make friends. Instead, he was observing on the basis of gameplay.

Rudy just wants everybody to know how dumb he feels after the mistake he made at the final immunity challenge.

Greg asks for a number between 1 and 10. Rich: 7. Kelly: 3. That is all.

Sue has no questions. Just a rant. Rich is openly arrogant and pompous, but she respects him because he’s worked hard to get where he’s at. However, since he’s unable to admit his failures without going into a whiny speech, that makes him a bit of a loser in life. Kelly sucked at the rowing challenge, getting beat by Gervase, who could barely swim. Anyway, Sue had been willing to let Kelly sit next to her because she was her friend, but because she lied to her, that showed she’s two-faced and manipulative. That’s why she fails all the time at life. With all that mean-spirited nonsense out of the way, here’s what it all boils down to. Kelly will not get Sue’s vote. She hopes that’s the one vote that makes her lose the money. If she ever passes her in life, she would not give her a drink of water to save her if she’s dying of thirst. The island is full of only two things: snakes and rats. They owe it to the island’s spirits to let it be the way mother nature intended, for the snake to eat the rat. Bitter much?

Gervase has voted for Kelly, but he’s gotta get something off his chest. What Sue just did can be summed up easily: sore loser. It was okay for her to play the game, but it wasn’t okay for anyone else to play. She played both the rat and the snake herself. Then, after she was eliminated, she had to blame someone, crying and belly aching about her defeat.

Votes
Kelly (Gervase)
Kelly (Jenna)
Rich (Sean)
Kelly (Colleen)
Rich (Sue)
Rich (Rudy)
Rich (Greg)

With 4 votes, the Survivor: Borneo winner is Richard Hatch. They came very close to making a horrible decision, but in the end, the jury made the right choice, awarding someone for playing the game well, instead of someone who just happened to win a bunch of challenges.

The alliance planned to vote out Kelly for being less clever than she thinks she is, but after Kelly won immunity, they opted instead to vote out the last remaining Pagong, Colleen, in Survivor: Borneo Episode 11.

Rudy’s given his word. His word is good. He hopes that whoever has given their word in return is good, too. If not, he has friends back home who handle people like that.

Rich is promising everybody they’re going to the next step with him. He doesn’t care who leaves as long as it’s not him.

Sue confronts Kelly about being a backstabber based on what Colleen said. Kelly, who’s said repeatedly she’s not in this alliance (yet nonetheless has continued to stay with them), says she was never trying to be with the other side. Sue is mostly upset that Kelly tried to look like the good guy and throw the others under the bus. Rich is willing to listen to Kelly’s ranting, seeing this as a good thing for himself.

The mud volcano actually created the entire island. They’re turning it into a challenge. The contestants will collect as much mud from it as they can, putting it into their buckets over the course of 5 minutes. Reward will be a trip to a mysterious bar with Jeff, where they will watch the first 5 minutes of the very first episode of Survivor. Kelly gets 15.9 pounds. Rudy gets 10.0 pounds. Sue gets 15.0 pounds. Sean gets 15.4 pounds. Rich gets 12.8 pounds. Kelly wins reward.

Everybody had a lot of fun at the challenge. They seem to be over the fact that they hate each other. That won’t last long.

Sue has told Kelly that she needs to align with Rich, rather than her. However, they agree to treat each other in a civil manner. It seems Kelly’s only chance here is to keep winning challenges.

The immunity challenge is to answer questions about island folklore after listening to Jeff tell them a story about the island. Some interesting aspects of the tale: every person voted off has had their torch blown out by the wind (to be relighted so it can be ceremoniously snuffed out), it has rained at every tribal council, and Joel chased a pit viper away from camp only to be voted off at the next tribal council (welcoming snakes into your camp is supposed to be good luck). When the story is complete, behind each of 5 masks in the jungle is a question. They need to answer those questions correctly. Kelly has won immunity again, so there goes the theory that they can vote her off. Her plan is to vote for either Rich or Sue. Now that she has very little other choice, she is finally out of that alliance she hated so badly, or so she says.

Votes
Sue
Sean
Sean
Sean

With three votes, Sean has been voted out. His torch does not need to be snuffed because it went out during the vote, as has happened to all of the post-merger people who have been voted off. Whether they wanted to or not, the alliance has stuck together. Despite her talk to the contrary, Kelly continued to vote with the alliance, making it unanimous against Sean. Sean’s elimination represents the removal of the last of the people who really did not want to play the game, although he at least gets some credit for making an effort, even if it was too late.

Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another recap of Survivor: Borneo episode 13.

Sean finally stopped voting in alphabetical order, not that it mattered because the alliance now has enough votes to control the game, and Gervase was voted out in Survivor: Borneo Episode 10. As for the remaining Pagong members, they were stupid again, this time voting for Sean, their best swing vote hope.

With everybody else gone, Colleen is now the last Pagong standing. She believes that the alliance is scrambling, each trying to further themselves in the game, with the exception of Rudy, who will just watch it all happen. Even Sean’s starting to treat the game a little more like a game. With all that’s going on around her, Colleen has absolutely no interest in improving her standing. She doesn’t enjoy playing the game and pretty much seems resigned to go home.

Reward is a night on a yacht with TV, stereo, luxury dinner, bed, and shower. It is a multiple choice challenge.

Pound for pound, insects are a better source of protein than beef. True or false?
Everybody answers true. Everybody is correct. Almost 80% of an insect is good for protein.

What must be done to water collected from inside green bamboo to make it safe to drink?
The correct answer is nothing. Rudy and Colleen are correct.

After some more questions that we don’t get to see, Kelly is eliminated.

If you do not have water, you should:
Not eat. Digestion removes even more fluid. Everybody is correct, but because she’s one color behind the others, Susan has been eliminated.

If you eat a poisonous mushroom and survive the first 24 hours, you have a 90% chance of full recovery. True or false?
False. Some mushrooms will kill you 2-10 days later. Richard is correct.

What is the longest venemous snake in the world?
King cobra. Sean is correct.

The dangerous female black widow spider is identified by a blue hourglass pattern on her abdomen. True or false?
False. The answer is red. Since they have advanced all the way to the mat, Sean and Richard move on to the tie breaker.

Which can you drink to kill intestinal parasites?
Kerosene. Just hope that doesn’t kill you before it kills the parasites. Sean wins reward.

One person may be able to join him for breakfast. He said he’s going to bring Kelly because he owes her a dinner.

With the growing rain storms, the castaways are becoming increasingly miserable. As the sun comes out, Sean sees his yacht and a rainbow, which has a pot of gold at the end for somebody. Jeff tells him he can invite someone for breakfast. He asks Kelly if she wants that to be her meal. She does not respond yes, but rather tells him not to pawn the decision off on her. The girls want him to grow a pair and make up his mind. Okay then. Rich can join him for breakfast the next morning. Following his dinner, shower, and massage, Sean gets a surprise visit from his father.

Now Kelly’s mad at Sean. Dumbass. She should have said yes when he asked, rather than saying it wasn’t her decision. She got what she deserved.

Colleen thought it was a pretty smart move if Sean’s buttering up Rich to save himself.

Sue wants to know what’s going on in the world, but Sean’s father doesn’t know. He has, however, brought a care package for each person, which does include some food.

The immunity challenge is to stand on planks. Over time, planks will be removed until each person is standing on just one plank. Last one standing wins. The first plank is cut with nobody budging. Then it’s time to cut a second plank. Rudy is the first one out, perhaps to get away from Hatch’s singing. The others get away from it next, as Richard falls in. Rich and Rudy are on the beach discussing how Kelly is going home tonight, and Colleen’s in no danger. The final plank has been removed. Sean falls in as it’s being removed. Sue’s right behind him. If Kelly hangs in there, Sue wants to eliminate Sean instead of Colleen. Rich and Rudy are onboard with that. Colleen asks Kelly if she’s getting voted off if she falls. Not by Kelly. What about the rest? Colleen eventually falls as the sun’s going down, and Kelly wins immunity.

Kelly says she’s out of the alliance. Yeah, this again. Pagong didn’t trust her because they saw her as a double agent, and Tagi doesn’t trust her because they see her over on the other side. Kelly has decided she doesn’t care how she treats the rest of the tribe, whether they’re on the jury or not.

At tribal council, Kelly’s still complaining about her decision to not ask Sean to take her with him. His explanation for his choice is that Rich provides them with so much food.

Votes
Sean
Colleen
Colleen
Sean
Colleen
Colleen

With 4 votes, Colleen has been voted off the island. It was her time to go, as she wasn’t going to bother playing, like the rest of Pagong. Her last words: play fair, be nice. Good luck with that.

Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another recap of Survivor: Borneo episode 12.

Although Kelly didn’t vote with her alliance, Sean’s alphabetical order strategy still ensured they had enough votes to eliminate Jenna in Survivor: Borneo Episode 9.

The plan had been to vote out Gervase, but they changed it at the last minute because Jenna had to go, which they knew would only take three votes.

Gervase thinks there’s gotta be an alliance. Really? As for Sean, no, he’s not 100% sure. It seems, however, he’s realized that his alphabetical order strategy is stupid, especially when everbody knows about it.

Hatch plans to wait for a couple more people to go home before he starts to feed people like kings. He views his fellow tribe members like he views these fish. Just waiting to be picked off.

Sue’s strategy is to play the role of the dumb redneck. I’m buying it. She doesn’t trust Rich, and her plan is to burn him eventually. She does, however, trust Kelly 100%, and she has no plans to turn on her. In return, Kelly only trusts Sue, but she doubts that trust.

Gervase is again a father. His son was born while he was on the island. That makes 4 kids, although he’s never been married. When Rudy was young, you got married as soon as that stick turned blue.

They get a pizza box before they go to the challenge, so they know what reward will be. I wonder if that 30 minutes or less thing still applies. The winner will get a phone call home to the person of their choice, plus a slice of pizza delivered by helicopter. The game is a simple balancing act. The first one to get across the poles wins. Everybody runs the first leg, and the fastest four will advance. Sue, Gervase, Rich, and Sean proceed. Rich and Gervase make it to the final round. Gervase wins reward. He offers everybody a bite of his slice of pizza. He’ll call his girlfriend in the morning because she had the baby. I’d say call now. It’s 3AM in Jersey, but someone with a newborn is probably still awake.

Kelly thinks the alliance, which she’s been part of for weeks, is dirty and conniving. She decided a while ago to not be part of the alliance. She believes she’s hiding this well from Rich, but he sees she’s changing. Her plan is to either lie down and let Rich do what he wants, or she’s going to try to beat him at his own game (good luck with that).

The immunity challenge is to build a fire with kindling and torches. They have three minutes to place the wood, then they’ll head out into the water to get fire. Richard is first back to the beach. Gervase takes a long time to get back with his fire, and when he gets back, it goes out, so he has to return to the water. He’s pretty much out of it, but it doesn’t really matter anyway. Hatch has a healthy lead, and nobody else is even close. Rich wins immunity.

Gervase and Colleen make costumes for tribal council. His codename is Bullseye; Colleen’s is Sitting Duck.

Sean has agreed to join an alliance with Pagong, as long as Kelly is onboard. One big problem is that the ideal target is safe at tonight’s vote.

Hatch continues to get increasingly suspicious of Kelly.

Sean has, finally, agreed to get with the program. He will be voting in his own best interest.

Sue says that alliances are the American way. So is she finally admitting there’s an alliance?

Votes
Sean
Gervase
Gervase
Gervase
Gervase

With 4 votes, Gervase has been voted off the island. Apparently aware they were unable to get Sean on their side, the Pagong folks made another vote that didn’t make a great deal of sense, rather than letting the sole survivor try to work with him over the next few days.

Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another recap of Survivor: Borneo episode 11.