Before the opening theme song even played, I used “edgic” or “editing logic” (not to be confused with “edging,” which is something else, and I pray you don’t Google) to figure out what was going to happen in the episode. In the last episode, Steven read the description of his Block-A-Vote, and he said he plays it before tribal council to say whose vote he wants to block. That is a detail we had not heard before when talking about the A-Vote family, so I figured it would be important later. In the “Previously on Survivor,” he mentions it again, which signals it will also be important this episode.
Also, early in the episode, Soph (yes, I’m going to keep calling her that to make it easy) kept talking about how she wanted to turn on Savannah and Rizo, but wasn’t sure when the right time would be. I used all of that to figure out that Savannah would win immunity, Soph would be in danger, Steven would play his advantage, Soph would ask for it at tribal council with her Knowledge Is Power advantage, he would have already played it, and she would get voted out. I was right about everything but who would go home.
This brings us to something curious about the new era of Survivor: The small tribes force people to form tight bonds, which make for un-shatterable alliances. But because they’re all superfans, they know they can’t go to the end with their alliances and realize they need to break with them at some point to differentiate their game. However, because of those tight alliances, they wait too long and end up never flipping. That’s just what happened with Kyle last season, though he rode that strategy right to a $1 million check, much to Kamilla’s chagrin. We’re seeing the same thing now with Soph, Rizo, and Savannah. She knows she needs to turn on them, has had every opportunity to do so, but still hasn’t taken it. I thought karma would come for her this time, but it was pushed down the road one more vote. Either that, or she’s going to end up losing in the final to the man, the myth, the legend, R-I-Z-G-O-D, Rizgod, baby, who is now the odds-on favorite to take it.
At the beginning of the episode, we learn that Rizo made another very smart move: telling everyone that his idol, which he found at the start of the game, was only good until there were six players left. As he explains, when it’s down to six, they think he’ll be forced to play it, so they won’t vote for him, which will give him protection both when there are six players left and when there are five.
There’s a reward challenge, and Savannah wins, predictably taking Rizo and Soph to the Sacturary, where they eat a bunch of tacos, appropriate some sombreros, and read their letters from home. Remember when they used to fly people’s actual moms, financés, and best friends lying about dead grandmas on set, and we would all have a good cry? We used to be a country. We get to hear all about Rizo’s family coming from Albania, his autistic brother, and all the odds he has overcome to be there. Then it’s Soph’s turn to talk about her and her grandmother always watched Survivor together and it was their show, but her grandmother died and that is what convinced her to apply. We hear nothing from Savannah. She must have been like, “Yeah, everyone in my family is fine. No one is sick or disadvantaged. No, they’re not really into Survivor. Sure, they support me, but they don’t really get it. They’re not big fans. I mean, my life is just kinda normal. I got bullied at work once, though.”
After this, Soph is talking about how she really thinks she’s not going to turn on Rizo and Savannah, and I believe her fate is totally sealed. Meanwhile, back at camp, Sage is dealing with a rat running through their shelter and wishing she had gotten on Big Brother, where the rats are figurative, not literal.
For the immunity challenge, castaways need to balance a ball at the end of a plank, and whoever lasts the longest wins immunity. It comes down to a showdown between Savannah and Sage, and this whole challenge should have been sponsored by Pilates. Sage is really digging in, asking Savannah to drop out so she can win, saying that, even though she voted for Savannah in the past, she has a plan to take them both to the end. Please. This was almost as crazy as when Kristina says at tribal that Savannah should have taken her on the reward to build trust and make a number who would vote with Savannah. Um, didn’t you say at the last tribal that you hated her? And didn’t you end up voting with her anyway, and she still got to take her friends on the reward? Yeah. That.
Sage is trying to outlast Savannah and telling everyone in her life that she loves them: her mom, her grandma, her grandpappy, her great-aunt Mary Lou, and her dog, Biscuit. She keeps telling “Austin” and “Paris” that she loves them. Does she mean the cities? When Sage eventually loses, Savannah tells her she’s proud of her, and that Austin and Paris are too. But we don’t know who those people are. The editing can make sure we remember exactly when Steven needs to play his Block-A-Vote, but it can’t clue us in on the names of Sage’s loved ones she keeps repeating?
After the challenge, Steven wants to stop one of the Tres Leche Alliance — as Rizo, Soph, and Savannah start calling themselves — from voting and have Kristina and Sage help him take out Soph, the only vulnerable member of the group. That is what I thought would happen. Meanwhile, the Three Milks are planning to steal Steven’s advantage and then use it to vote him out of the game. But I feel the tides starting to change, and it happens when Rizo talks to Sage and tells her that she can vote with them to get rid of Steven. He tells her what she already knows, that she can’t beat him in the end. Kristina makes a great point that Steven is the only person likely to beat Savannah in a challenge, but we can already see that might not be enough to sway her.
I will say that Soph has some great ideas to flip on Rizo and Savannah. Her other great idea is to use her Knowledge Is Power and take Rizo’s idol, which would protect her for sure at this vote, since she knows that Steven is lobbying against her. Think about it, she could have taken it, everyone would have voted for Rizo, and she would have been safe and possibly still had an idol, finally turned on her alliance, beefed up her résumé (which she knows she needed to do), and pulled off the most exciting move of the game. Instead, she … doesn’t.
She asks Steven for his advantage, which we know he already played when they were back at camp, and she’s left with nothing but embarrassment and the look of a fool in front of the jury. Instead, it’s Rizo who makes the big move. He goes up to Jeff with his idol and says that he is going to be selfish and play it for himself. He pauses, puts it back into his pocket and says he’s going to save it. If he goes home, he goes home. “I’m going to risk it for the biscuit,” he says. He’s risking it for Sage’s dog, Biscuit? I don’t get it.
Turns out everyone voted for Steven. He blocked Savannah’s vote, but it didn’t matter. It seems that someone was willing to flip on their alliance, but it was Sage and Kristina, because the other side had too much hardware and they didn’t want to get rid of Soph. That’s because Sage and Kristina think she’ll flip, which, I’m sorry, I don’t think she ever will.
Rizo has set himself up perfectly to win this game and, honestly, the edgic supports it. He’s been grandstanding in front of the jury, been the dominating force behind changing several votes so they would go in his direction, and has proven that he’s willing to be underhanded, dastardly, and cunning whenever he needed to be. He’s really annoying and a total nerd, but it turns out he might be just the villain I was hoping for, and, honestly, he and Savannah have played their asses off while Soph just thought about it.
