RHAP: We Know Survivor - Survivor Global: Tie Revotes and the New Era Non-Auction | S47 Ep 8 with Taran Armstrong

Episode Date: November 8, 2024

Survivor Global host Shannon Guss talks to strategy expert, Survivor Stockwatch host and Big Brother analyst Taran Armstrong about episode 8 of Survivor 47. They discuss the new tie revote rule and its many implications, the non-auction of the new era, the Shot in the Dark play and where to from here for the Lavo 3.

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or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. This winter, take a trip

to Tampa on Porter Airlines. Enjoy the warm Tampa Bay temperatures and warm Porter hospitality on your way there. All Porter fares include beer, wine, and snacks, and free fast-streaming Wi-Fi on planes with no middle seats. And your Tampa Bay vacation includes good times, relaxation, and great Gulf Coast weather. Visit flyporter.com and actually enjoy economy. Hello Hello everyone and welcome to IHAP's coverage of Survivor 47 for Survivor Global. I'm your host Shannon Goss here to talk about episode 8. A lot going on. It is a global StockWatch crossover.

But I did also just introduce it as Survivor Global. Also, I don't think we've had a stopwatch episode this season yet but it still is the crossover and i have a great guest slash co-host slash crossover to talk about it with it is the king of all things big brother one of my favorite people to talk about strategy with it is a great tan armstrong taryn thank you for being here i'm sorry that i kind of just butchered your name. Listen, people butcher my name way worse than that. How? Oh, the Taron? What do they say?

Oh, I get Terrence a lot. Okay. And then Teron. Teron, yeah. Basically, yeah. Yeah. But happy to be here. Happy to bring the stock to this watch

and talk about Survivor. It's been a fun season but we will not be doing stock watch ratings i mean it's not really why do more work than necessary that's always my mantra you know me i hate going the extra mile but you're right no the stock watch is usually like a season-long tracking thing right so it doesn't make as much sense we're tracking the chizzy every season we're getting your thoughts on the season that's fun um that'll be great taryn how are you doing because big brother ended you got your life back yeah i'm doing great you know three of my players still in the game you'd bring that up who are your players great average draft play has been

going on right now that is true but good but across all the seasons you're still not doing amazing i had one goal for this season and it's been met. After Rob and I just traded boots for the first four episodes, I thought, okay, well now Rachel needs to beat Sierra by, I guess, like two votes. Well, no, she can't lose by two votes. And then I'll have a better average draft placement than Rob. And now that Sierra is out, because Rachel is my last player, that has been

finished so that's really it wasn't just average draft placement it was so dire that it was just beating rob's average draft placement and that was my new win condition for myself and it's done yay me congratulations all around really glad that's happening who are your players taryn uh andy okay genevieve, and Kyle. Okay. Kyle's doing pretty well. I mean, he's winning a lot of immunities. Yeah, well, we can talk about that because winning a lot. I mean, the threat level that even Teenie is pushing.

Teenie beat Kyle last week. He came third in an immunity challenge. He beat two weeks ago half the group in an immunity challenge. And today he won like this week he won he did win fair and square that was technically his first like real win well i mean even then like uh the winning like woman right was that yeah but he still won the challenge like if anything dropped out right oh true sue didn't keep theoretically she could have yes will carl ever win a immunity challenge that we cannot put an asterisk next to that is a great point that is a great point but your team's

incredible andy huge edgy we can talk about like i know it looks like it'll probably be a no vote finalist but like they whatever is happening with andy like they want us to care the most about him and he's our protagonist and i truly believe that genevieve one of a couple if not the best player in the game could definitely win edit though don't love how purple she was early bizarre for anyone especially genevieve especially if genevieve wins it would be one of the most questionable editing choices i think they've ever done but they've had questioning questionable editing choices before and then kyle you have a great team thank you yeah i think it's it's pretty good i had a couple of like choices that i'm still a little bit stuck on where i chose between kyle and saul oh my god if you had genevieve soul and

andy you'd have probably the best draft team i could like in memory i was also choosing between andy and teeny um and so that's good too yeah i feel like both of those feel like i might have gone the other way and been in a better spot but i'm not mad at the spot i'm in no i probably wouldn't complain as i sit here with just rachel who was he was doing well but was just left out of the vote and is my only player rachel it's all on you like you desperately need to win if i'd realized that your team was so good i might not have asked to do this podcast but here we are we're committed to it now they finally get kyle out yeah just kyle um i know it's still i want to do the draft check-ins i don't know why i'm such a masochist rachel please hold out to the draft check-in if we do it which i think we will um

yeah no but it's been a fun season. Tell the people, how have you been feeling about it? You know, it's weird because obviously Asia's on the season and that was a different experience. I actually didn't love the Asia episodes as much. And maybe part of that is that Asia's's on the season but i don't think that's really the case i enjoyed you hate asia on the screen um it was mostly that i just felt like those episodes were a little too advantage heavy i felt like we weren't really getting as

much as i wanted um and then i i feel like things started picking up uh when we started getting like the blind sides. And I don't remember who the first one was at this point, but. Kishan probably. Sure. Which was right after that. So.

Yes. Kishan. Exactly. Yeah. That's, that was the first I was like, Oh, and then it just, it felt like it kept hitting and hitting.

And, and since then, I think it's been very good. I think that it's maybe lagged a little bit here in the Mergatory era of the game until this episode that I thought was a lot more fun. Although I did find it a little bit predictable, it was still a fun watch.

Yeah, I thought it was fun because we finally got to see like the dynamics. Right. Which we've been waiting for, you know, for like two weeks so well they they did to be fair with rome that was a vote and then last week we're interested to see how it would go and then that got split up and now we get to see the dynamics which are great you know the cast is so fun like even when production are making decisions i don't love like the scavenger hunt which last year i thought was boring and this year you know for the auction tubes I thought was boring but it reminded me of like Jake in the final five or I'm

like the final five scavenger hunt again but his story and his narrative in that finale made it interesting like Andy getting no tubes like even just one tube would kind of like kill that story but the fact that he gets no tubes was so Andy and it's so interesting and then he goes to the auction and Sierra gets to share chocolate and she doesn't give it to andy and then he turns and is one of the many many votes who votes sierra out and that's an interesting narrative so like the cast is giving um even when production i feel has been like pretty good but like has questionable decisions and i want to talk i want to start by talking about some of those questionable decisions because i have so many thoughts about them yes i know you you are you're revved up about this uh tiebreaker

yeah you i don't know why you seem somewhat judgmental about the fact that i came on i'm like we have to talk about no the tie is different no not because my whole life is a lie pumped for you no you should be upset for me that's the emotion i like that you're trying to be supportive but you don't know which way to go about no this is listen we are podcasters if we don't have something to be mad about then what do we have I don't know that I'm mad I think I'm just like confused about like where is my life and like that is true about pod I am always mad and I do think that that's a big part of who I am as a human and a podcaster but and I've been more mad about other things recently but as far as Survivor goes first let's talk about this they changed the tie and I

have I've only just started the Christian Rob podcast I'm sure Christian had great thoughts about it and I can't wait to listen to it basically Jeff says premises and re-vote two people they don't re-vote they don't re-vote I know they don't re-vote I've been watching the show for 24 years they don't re-vote he says because they can-vote. I know they don't re-vote. I've been watching the show for 24 years. They don't re-vote, he says, because they can only cancel each other out. So there's no point in this situation. Sam has no vote. Sierra, there's nothing like he could cancel out.

So she should basically have like her vote, her still vote. She did vote. Jeff doesn't understand the can of worm. He just unleashed onto my life personally for a couple of reasons firstly and christian talked about this yeah like that's not been true at a three-way tie when anyone can vote anyway they still don't vote premise has always been the targets just don't vote and honestly it's

never really made a lot of sense it's actually made less sense this makes more sense but we've had the wrong way to go about it and we've always assumed that with everything now I have used that in my life because it is possible possible I might overthink the show a little bit but I've spent years yeah thank you Karen I agree I don't really do it but maybe the little bit I do I have spent years calculating what I call like vote anomalies or loopholes, re-vote loopholes. I did it last week. I said Tiana should play a shot in the dark because if she has a 3-2, she can't vote at the re-vote anyway. Neither can Gabe. They would win on a 2-1 because Gabe can't vote. That wouldn't have happened. That was wrong. Gabe would vote

because she doesn't have a vote. So he would get the advantage of his vote against her. There is no loophole. It would be a 2-2. I did it it last week we did it years ago 42 the vati tribal council the infamous pre-merge vati tribal council where where are the votes and jenny went home you'll remember that and one of the things we discussed was a loophole of if they could get okay so i'm going to set it up because this is years ago but basically chanel and Daniel in the middle. Chanel loses her vote. They want to work with Jenny and Mike. Mike doesn't have a vote. So they have two votes on their side.

High and Lydia are the people they don't want to vote with. They have two votes. And we talked about that if they really wanted to go with Mike and Jenny, they could try to get High and Lydia to vote for Mike. Because if four people aren't voting, Mike's not voting, Chanel's not voting, and the two targets aren't voting, if Mike can absorb being one of those targets instead of Jenny, instead of it being a 1-1

of what ended up being Daniel and High, what we thought would happen is that it would be Jenny now would vote and Mike wouldn't vote. And Mike wouldn't vote twice, basically, as the target and having lost his vote. I'm spiraling, but it's making sense. Basically, basically, a 2-2 vote. Yeah.

Theoretically, each side loses one of those votes and it becomes a 1-1 vote. However, if you burn one of those votes on somebody who already doesn't have a vote, you keep both of your two and it would have been two one yeah then jenny would have voted and mike would have lost basically both of their votes he would have won both vote losses rather than being mike and jenny and they would have won two one but now we find out that's not technically what would have happened what would have happened is lydia would have been able to vote as the advantage that she is entitled to against the fact that Mike,

as the person who lost his vote, didn't have a vote. So it would have gone back to the tutu. We've spent years doing this. There's so many question marks. I want to talk about vote steals. I want to talk about this, and I want to talk about what they should do. But basically my main takeaway is how much time I've spent calculating vote loopholes that didn't exist, and I just think, like, I could have learned a language.

I could have learned another instrument. I could have done something with my life but this is the reason i haven't and it wasn't even true and i'm just i'm just like where am i where what's going on i'm here for you because i i don't think this was wasted time because i think that if you went into tribal council with that plan and production knew it. They would let you do that. That is what concerns me. And that's bad. Because production, like, when did they come up with this? Was it last night when they thought this doesn't work?

And then they come up with on the fly? Almost definitely. I mean, Christian said he didn't know that this was the rule. I asked Zach, Marianne, Omar. They didn't know. Imagine being Tiana going in with that plan. Now, like like last week as an example about playing her shot in the dark and then it is a 2-2 now that would be terrible and maybe she should clarify but none of us have ever felt the need to clarify because it felt like that was the global blanket premise of revotes but i still think that them doing it because it's better tv and creating the the rule just on that and the precedent just based on that that's not the way to produce well i don't i don't think it's even gonna be press it i just think that how could it not be

president to my in my mind how this works is they were like oh it's gonna be a tie tonight oh but one of them doesn't have a vote do we do anything about that i guess because they just cancel each other out you should probably just give the person who doesn't have a vote. Do we do anything about that? I guess because they just cancel each other out, you should probably just give the person who hasn't lost their vote a vote. Oh yeah, that makes sense. Let's do it that way. And can I just say, and there's a few things I want to talk through,

it does make sense. It actually makes more sense. I think the thing that people are taking away from this is this is completely inconsistent with what they've always done. True. True on the three-person vote, which to be fair, hasn't been done in, there hasn True on the three-person vote, which, to be fair,

hasn't been done in – there hasn't been a three-person tie since CoWrong for US Survivor. But in Global Survivor, we've had this recently. We can talk about Global Survivor. But, yeah, in 2021 in Brain Feed Blonde, we had it. We had it in Return of the Outcasts in South Africa. You don't vote as a target even in a three-person tie. So it's inconsistent.

So everyone's angry. They shouldn't have done this. Actually, the three-person tie thing has never made sense. sense this is actually more correct i actually do think that what they should do what the precedent should be is on a re-vote everyone re-votes right and yes most of the time almost every time two people in the tie will cancel each other out and jeff will read those votes first and it really doesn't matter but then it plans for especially in the new era when there's so many things flying around it plans for all of these like tiny nuances and those things are important this thing's important here what if Sam had lost his vote privately that Jeff like he did in 42 would publicize that that doesn't seem

right either Sam should go up to vote and it should say well to be fair this one actually was public but if it was private like it's fine if I think it's like oh Sam's publicly lost his vote he's not going to get up he didn't get up in the first round but if he got up in the first round and the voting parchment said you've lost your vote return to your seat it would just say that again and in a three-person vote then they can do what they want and that means they don't they don't publicize it and it also means that like we can talk about it at a vote steal that's going to go a lot better because i want to talk about what would happen in a vote steal because it has an australian survivor and it's really messed up due to this but basically if the premise is always that they're going to get up and vote on a re-vote

that actually would be better and would we lose these fun little loopholes yes we'd lose the loopholes okay and i've had fun with the loopholes and i've been like the biggest champion of the loopholes but i think it's time to say the loophole should be done we should they should stop exploiting these things that don't make sense because it's a flaw really in the structure of the game that we've been trying to exploit in fun little ways and then we have had fun taryn i have had fun doing it okay i've wasted time but i've enjoyed it but i do think that we're 15 minutes into this conversation i do think that in the future what they should do is everyone should just re-vote and it should go much more to the premise of what happened last night which is that that it doesn't make sense for the targets not to re-vote because there are many ways in

which it makes sense especially to re-vote on a tie yeah especially because if this is the precedent then you like how it works if you don't have a vote is that you go to the voting booth and you're told you don't have a piece of paper you go to the voting booth and you're told you don't have a piece of paper you have lost your vote and they do that because there's some element of like secrecy that you don't have to reveal the fact that you've lost your vote but if you have to if you don't actually go up to vote because it's told explicitly to everyone well uh normally neither of you would vote but in this scenario actually one of you is going up to vote it's like well oh that only happens if one of you one of us has lost a vote

you then immediately have now revealed that this person has lost their vote uh so like even in that sense it makes sense to just have them always go up and cast their their vote in a repo and and as i mentioned it's a lot less confusing as well to not have to deal with all of the math and complications of who's lost their vote and why in the event of a tie and how those numbers add up and how that tends to work with everything. We did have fun with it though, right?

But it should be done. I think the fun needs to stop and we need to be re-voting in a way that is way more simple and sensical, although less mathematically fun. In thinking about 42, I do think that Jeff revealed that they lost their votes when going to the unanimous discussion about like who could participate in that. And that is a hard work around because it's like that is a public discussion. In this situation, what would have happened if Sam's vote was secret? And if they would have just sent him up there, it would have said you't vote well they couldn't have done that they couldn't have sent him up there

because the precedent has always been you don't even go up so they would have had to publicize it and that would have been wrong so that even more lends credence to the fact that they should just go up there now let's talk about the vote steal jeff says that in a two-person tie then you don't the targets don't re-vote because they'll cancel each other out. In a vote steal, that isn't true. So what would they do? And this did actually happen in Australian Survivor 2018. Try and paint this out, but Shawnee, Fenella and Benji

were in like a three to five person minority and Shawnee stole one vote and took it to a 4-4. But we've always criticized Shawnee for stealing the target's vote. She stole Sian's vote. So instead of taking it to a 3-3, say if she'd stolen Shane's vote, an ally of Sian, she actually, on the re-vote, the two targets were on her side. It was Sian, which was now Shawnee, and Benji, who was on her side. So they lost what

would have been 4-2 if Inella didn't just flip because the ship was sinking. So we've always criticized that it could have been a 3-3. It became what should have been a 4-2 but in this situation what would happen would shawnee still get to vote as sean but then would benji get to vote so does she get to the to the 4-4 or does benji not vote but she still gets to vote as sean which is kind of unfair to benji so well that also doesn't make any sense so then is it a 4-3 does she not get to what would u. us survivor do in this case because it doesn't work because the idea in modern survivor that two people will cancel out each other's vote in a tie often isn't true votes are way way more fragile than that and they got passed around and they're

lost and in the new era this is going to be a big thing and i'm so surprised it hasn't come up before i'm actually really shocked by this if you had asked me before like gut check has this ever come up that someone has been a target who hasn't had a vote I would have said a hundred percent yes clearly that's not been the case but now that we know it I just think that the global blanket rule should be everyone will stand up in a vote still everyone will vote in you know if they don't have a vote they'll just sit down again like they do on the first it just makes so much sense but anyway my life is a lie yeah i mean i i feel like it might have been this podcast it might have been another but i feel like i when i've talked about re-votes in

the new era before i have also had trouble in the past because it felt like the rules were inconsistent even before uh they were that they work on it are just strange so uh so yeah i mean it makes it very simple if we go with this logic and then wherever votes go they they stay with that person and you know if you lose a vote then you don't have a vote but you still go up to vote it's just a lot simpler that way we need to change everything people think oh this is inconsistent this is wrong we need to go back to the way it was no it's been so wrong in the past that we're moving actually to something better and we need to move all. People think, oh, this is inconsistent. This is wrong. We need to go back to the way it was. No, it's been so wrong in the past that we're moving actually to something better. And we need to move all the way there

because it's always been messed up. I will credit my brother who was getting married in two days and still very kindly spent an hour on the phone with me about this last night at two in the morning. Okay, that's the kind of family dynamic that we have. He has always said that it shouldn't be that way. They shouldn't lose votes.

They should, he's always said it. I think everyone would agree. They should all re-vote in a three-way tie. And it's always votes. They should, he's always said it. I think everyone would agree. They should all re-vote in a three-way tie. And it's always really annoyed him. And I've always said, well, at least we can have fun at the expense of the floor, exploit the loopholes and do some math. And he's always said, don't come at me with that.

I don't, that's not right. It's not what Survivor is. And I'm like, yes, it is. It's tricky math. Isn't that Survivor? And he's like, no, Survivor is about building things. I'm like, shh, two to one to one. And that is a conversation we would have for years.

And I think he has been vindicated because while it was fun, I think we do need to move forward. And I do think that, but Jeff doesn't know. Do you think Jeff knows there's a woman in Australia spiraling at two in the morning about this when he makes small decisions like that? Jeff is just like, yeah, that makes sense. That's how we've always done it.

No, it's not. And everyone's like whoa whoa this is all messed up but i feel like maybe we should you know what jeff good job you're right you have always done it this way let's just keep doing it this way the funny thing about it is even like with the vote seal stuff we always thought like the vote seal didn't carry due to the fact that like kellen forgot to use it in ghost island on the river like even that was like oh now we're learning about what carries and what doesn't carry and then it's like how does that permeate against global survivor and now we're learning this and global survivor production did not know this was a thing right

so like they've always had the premise of like targets don't vote on the revote just in general not because they're canceling each other out because that doesn't make sense with all the other stuff you've done at a three-way tie so okay i'm glad we're done you know no global blanket rule everyone stands up to vote and if they can't vote unless they're like not voting you know unless it's like you are sitting out publicly if you were gonna whoever stood up the first time stand up the second time yeah whoever's whoever's this just stand up again and then we'll just reread two votes and then i will move forward and we'll stop spending so much time on the podcast the little fun anomalies that i think we enjoyed did everyone enjoy what we did we did it last week last week what are the odds of that pretty high because i do it so often so that's my life taryn thank you so much for being

a part of this of course listen i i'm happy to to be the recipient of this that and that is how i would classify that as well you have been receiving my hysteria and i appreciate that it's been it's been a long week okay well also the auction let's talk about this they did pretty much the exact same thing as last year i think i complained about it a year ago do you have more complaints or do you like what they're doing with this auction no this is this is stupid this is what i'm upset about i'm upset too you think you're gonna be upset about one thing okay i've got i've got sadness and anger and it's today this is not an auction don't even call it that it's not an auction

it's literally just like a lottery system at best like it's you're literally just go I don't think there was a single bidding war in the entire process how could there be a bidding war some people have way more money there's no war like

it's just there's no process of like, oh, I've got money, but I don't want to waste it. I don't want to waste too much of it on this. This is capitalism, right? It's not an even playing field. People have different amounts of money and the rich get what they want. I mean, that's not an auction,

but it certainly might be a commentary on society. It might be a better version of capitalism though, because you you're forced to give away all of your money in order to succeed. Yeah. I don't know if I need to get into like the kind of economic values right now,

but you're right in that it is not an auction. This is like, I'm like, I looked at the back of my notes from a year ago. Like it is actually, it's so indicative of the whole new era that they're doing this. Like the auction is such a perfect personification of the fact that they're like something was broken people all wanted the advantage and they either like i always thought it's fine you know some cast will

do that and it'll be interesting and some cast won't but like we've always said the what you only had to do was put the advantage in the fries which they're now doing anyway and just say there's no advantages up to it and that would solve everything and that's what global survivor have done the sort of strength five and it's been great but instead of doing that they're like no we're going to fix it with all these other things and then that's so much more broken than anything was ever broken before and then they have to keep adding new things this year they added new things instead of just reverting back program it's terrible and but you know what jeff on the on fire podcast apparently was like oh i love it because it's dangerous because usually you give away your money and then you

can't lose your vote but now maybe you don't lose your vote it's like he likes that he like especially likes the danger of like no now you don't even have the agency to even pay the money that you have can you imagine if soul lost on getting the 60 cash back completely at random that would have been like the most infuriating thing of all time i mean the whole thing is random though it's like uh i mean for the most it's the thing the whole point of it is that like oh well if the auction ends at the sixth thing and i happened to have the sixth amount uh most amount of money then uh then i'm the loser and you might say like oh you should have been better at finding the tubes but even in the tubes i know it's it's it's so upsetting

the way that we watch them all like just wait the person with the most amount of money who has been like hamstrung until that point they're just waiting for their chance and they're just waiting to see if that's going to be the one it is really a lottery and like the way sue was like oh thank you jeff thank you for this not being my time and it's like but no one did anything like even like you can maybe criticize sam who loses his vote like he goes all in on the 200 because now they have to give certain amounts of things are worth because they can't just pay anything every time because then people again pay everything every time so they don't have the most amount of money so they have to say no we've set in this auction we set the price and one of you will get it and we'll talk about the gross food eating of it all and all of that but so you can maybe criticize

that he leaves himself with like an awkward amount of money at 160 by going in on a 200 instead of something where he'd go in on all this money but again if the auction had ended yeah if the auction had ended then that then he then that would have been the smart thing to do so he might as well give it a shot and he gets food no one no one can criticize anyone for anything they do here because it's just like it's just just like who didn't use all of her money what did she oh did she and she didn't that's true so i criticize that it's it's it's the only thing you have to do is just spend all your money when you can and just hope to god that in the tubes you randomly got enough that the numbers will pass you by and that there's enough things to bid on. And then then there's no agency in any of this.

Like, you just have to hope for the best in that. Yeah, that is that's the option. Now, my thing about this is that, like, I don't hate the concept. Like, there's a way to make this. There's a way to make this interesting. I think it just can't be an auction because it's not an auction and you can't have it stay at a lottery. rewards but you also need to you need to balance the idea of getting these rewards these food food items or maybe even an advantage with uh getting like the lowest point value at the end of the thing or like making sure you're not the highest at the end of the thing um it can't be

an auction because that turns into a lottery but you could have like little mini challenges where you bid points like there's different ways to make a system like this work but not in the way that they're trying to make it work in my well the way to fix this which again i would just do a regular auction we said this last year the way to fix it is to have a big advantage at a point that may or may not come up and now you actually have to have the advantage in the auction auction and then people might not spend all their money and might risk losing a vote at the hope of bidding for and then having the most money when it gets to the big advantage which they may never get to that at least would give some decision do i want to spend all my money on this food item

or do i want to maybe lose a vote like that that's not a decision like he kept saying like it's an interesting dilemma i'm like it's not a dilemma it's just a race like in the hope that you your number comes up and it's like your turn in line. It's that game in Mario Party where you just go up and you press the thing and you hope it doesn't blow up. The Wiggler. It was just one of the worst games, okay? It is no slapperazzi, the best of the Mario Party games. Yeah, don't wake Wiggler or waking Wiggler

or something like that. That is it. Is that the one? You go up to like various like little dynamite explosion. Oh no, that's the one I'm thinking of is when you have to like various like little dynamite explosion oh no that's the one i'm thinking of is when you have to like pat the giant caterpillar and then um eventually he wakes up but you think that no one controls when he wakes up and then you lose it's a very bad i don't know your one the dynamite game yeah there's like a big bomb in the background or whatever uh and then yeah either way yeah yeah no there's no

like if it was a decision like i'm gonna hold out then then there'd be agency and there'd be decision making then there'd be a balance but i still wouldn't do that i still would just do an auction with the advantage hidden in the fries which is what they're currently doing um it just makes no sense like it really is the analogy of like you know when there's like snakes in a town so they release like the bears or whatever and then they release the wolves and like that's it it was like oh they're like oh everyone's going to the advantage so we're going to do all these things and they're like well that's now got its issues so this year they added even more and all of that was even worse and the crazy thing about it i just jeff has things in his

mind we talked about this last week where he was like these big votes can be passive they better make sure they rarely ever vote in big votes it's like no one that wasn't broken why are you trying to fix it oh we're the final four sometimes they vote out the biggest threat gotta change that so he like fixes these things but then something like the auction is so clearly broken and he's like we're gonna do it but more and worse like why is this thing but then there are other things being solved that are not problems just boggles the mind it really it's really I mean like I have fun with it because it like it's the the premise of what of something even auction adjacent is fun like watching them eat food and like that's fun but the but no the concept and like the structure it just makes no sense at all and it's like we can't

pretend to Jeff that this is as you said even an auction like we have to be realistic about the fact that this is simply weird we just need to keep talking about it so that eventually somebody goes on the show and they explain this to jeff uh and he lets them sit on his stump all right if you're a future player piss jeff off you just have to say jeff is gonna be like welcome to the survivor auction and then you have to be a christian and raise your hand and be like actually jeff this isn't an auction anymore the way that you've set it up and he'll be like what do you mean player uh can you explain that to me uh and then he'd be like wow like he did when they explained the shot of the dark horse wow well i think we're being mean i have a i have a compliment sandwich but it's like the sandwich

is like all what well what's the nice part meant to be filling because it's like one tiny little bit of cracker cracker and we've like filled it right up because we were so mean but i mean we like i like the gross food eating like that was you sandwich the mean part in two compliments right so yeah so the mean part is we're overflowing with like bologna right now and we're gonna get a tiny little cracker and that's the sandwich part but yeah i mean i like the gross food eating because it felt like a classic kind of callback in the auction quote unquote that is also like a fun callback but um I was talking about this with Zach and he wanted me to give his idea of what it was um yeah he said that you could just do a

regular auction with money you know like how an auction is yeah um you could do that you could do that and then you could be like okay like we're doing gross food eating now and like whoever you know he Zach said you could bid an amount of money like we're doing gross food eating now. And like, whoever, you know, he, Zach said, you could bid an amount of money. Like I will eat this thing for $80 extra or whatever, or you could do, you know, whoever guesses gets like, whoever is first gets a hundred dollars and then they all have to, you know, and then the issue was like, when everyone's left with $500, they would all just wait for the advantage that had been the issue. And then they would all like draw rocks for it. It's like, well, that would give someone spending power. You know, if you want to to make it uneven that's a way to earn it

that's fun and classic so yeah i think the leaning on that is a fun thing but maybe you just like you know you combine it with a real auction this time yeah i i agree i i i think i again, it's just like, it's just really simple to not have the advantage being a thing that you buy. And I agree. I think that you can like you can add little mini games. I think that's fun. But I think that like you start simple. What the auction was. Like what the auction was.

Yeah. And and then you can build from there if you want to if you feel like it's not uh enthralling enough but but at the very least just get you know get bidding warbacks get like get bidding wars back get um like there wasn't a single time in this episode where jeff was like going once going twice because there was it was always just yeah you're right was there even a gavel no there was a was there it was at the beginning of the thing they showed a little clip of a gavel striking but i'm sure he hit it probably but like it didn't matter it was all a matter of it's just purchasing it's not it's not yeah it's not

yeah it's capitalism i think that's what i think that's what it is. And to the point where, I mean, I thought that it was wrong that if you opted in to spend $200 to try the gross food eating to maybe get the breakfast, then you got your money back. If you opted out, why wouldn't everyone opt in at that point? I say if they had the money anyway, but maybe they did, but like, yeah, if you lost, you get your money back. And I was like, well, no, they should have to spend their money. But then I'm like, no, actually getting the money back is a much bigger punishment. Now they're competing just to lose their money. Like, if you lose, you get it back.

But then it turned out to be worse for Sam because he lost them. Because then there was enough items left that they could spend. And then Sam had too much. And it's so uptick. It would have been better for him if it was risk all of your money. Yeah, he wanted to. He wanted to spend on just Kyle not maybe having meat and maybe having Kyle's. That was a fun prop bet.

Why did Jeff allow that? Yeah. And that's a classic, too. He's a Jew. He won't eat the ham. He was betting on being meat and he's a vegetarian and he won't eat the meat. And Jeff was like, no, I like when they used to be able to share things. And like even like that's classic, classic.

Like that was fun. I do think I didn't like the sharing I felt like that was that broke it a little bit because then you could just like you could share money and then you could share yeah like oh who even cares uh who gets it because they'll just share it that is true but it is a social game and then well I mean at that point I mean I don't think that shows lives of like who has enough money for you to like go in on a BLT for but I mean like I did think the most interesting part of the auction I liked it I did have fun complaints was that but um yeah was Sierra not choosing Andy and that was crazy to me because so she chooses Caroline who got the who ate bugs and then got the fish eyes so she got all the gross food none of the good stuff Gabe has not been on any reward as he said um and he had got like the water and the

coconut but Gabe's gonna be her target and Andy poor Andy he couldn't even bid for the chance of fish eye you know to be to be like a super fan who can't play in the auction when it's like you're watching everyone do it and it's on your season and people have like waited for it that is so unfortunate and for like her to not even think of like andy this was asking some of the exits and i i kind of wish it had been pressed more like how could you not choose andy like if he's feeling neglected by them i think that would be a really big problem and showed i think how sierra viewed andy and thought that he was coming across all good but he knew exactly how she felt and the fact that he doesn't even that she doesn't choose him and chooses opponents in toku and and the thing is as well no one could be like oh that's

so threatening you're so close to andy because i think anyone would and should choose andy who got no money and had to watch the auction as like a spectator surely yeah i mean i think the the line of reasoning was like that the the gabe um and i think caroline like they hadn't yeah they got the booby prize and well caroline caroline none so andy ate last week and neither of them did and then none of them is like last night uh yeah and and then murgatory they that and that is what it is like murgatory none of them were in and then caroline was in the social i was just her not gabe or andy so yeah the most recently he ate with the potato salad and stuff yesterday but he couldn't do the auction that's so sad yeah and like he was like running around like man i can't find anything and they

were like oh dude that sucks oh here's one it's like in his hair it's like behind his ear like how are you doing yeah like surely i don't surely I thought that I thought that that was indicative. I thought I was interested that they didn't even make more of a narrative. Maybe Andy wasn't that mad. Maybe he was understanding. But like if you're my ally and you can share something and I'm a super fan who is now not participating in the auction in this really sad way. Surely Andy is like the first person you choose. I think I should think anyone would choose and not even for strategic reasons.

I mean, yeah, well, I mean, I think that's, that's kind of part of the story that they're telling and who knows how much of this is, is like built up or,

or exaggerated through their storytelling. But like the way that they're telling the story is very much that Andy is not valued as a person or a player out there. And I see this on big brother a lot where it's not even just an edit. Like I'm actually just physically watching them do this where if you start to not value somebody in the game, it can become something bigger. And like their very presence starts to like annoy you

because why are they there when you're doing all the work you're playing the game and they're not they're just being dragged along um and like it can really like it can really build in that way uh and it feels very clear that the story they're telling is that this is what's happening with uh with really the whole tribe um and andy although i feel they're protecting sam from this whether or not he was a part of it is another story um where the way that they speak about andy is so dismissive and so kind of like they literally said, I always forget about Andy. Right. Yeah. And so like the idea that you would even need to comfort Andy, I think it can can not say this happened to Sierra, but like can feel like, oh, well, that's even more annoying. What a burden he is that because he's so bad at finding these things. Now we have to waste a sharing spot on him

um and and that's how i think these things can sometimes go uh again not to put that on sierra because i she didn't uh say that or uh really indicate that's what she was doing but uh she kind of did a little bit she was like we're gonna drag him along until it becomes intolerable to us or something like that so in in the game, she definitely set it out right in the, for the, for choosing the reward, I feel like. Oh, right. But like, you can't separate those things. If that's how she feels, like if, if, if Andy, if Sam is in the position Andy is in, I think she thinks about Sam.

And maybe even not just maybe if it's like pretty much anyone, but Andy, like I don't, I think that if that's what she's saying to us and that's how she feels and then an instinctive choice that she has to make on the spot, she doesn't even think to show that kindness to andy like i think that that manifests in a very like core instinctual way surely yeah like those things have to be connected yeah i agree uh and and i mean i think that like um i think that's really the story of this episode it's also like the story of the whole tribe really

for this entire season minus again sam who i feel like they have um you know either gone out of their way to sort of like prevent from being a part of this uh or or just genuinely was the person who like took most of the chance on andy um but, but either way, that's why I felt so confident in this episode. There was no way this was going to fall on Sam because it felt like the entire season has been building to like Andy's revenge. And I think from a viewer perspective, it doesn't seem like Sam has been the person at the forefront of that. So for Sam to be the one to take the hit on Andy's big,

she's all that moment didn't make sense thematically and plot wise to me. Yeah. And I want to talk about that from a story element because it's such a big story element. And that's why I say Andy is so much the protagonist because at the end of the day, Andy piled an eighth vote onto an already splittable majority that were already like Jen already had it, that she was coming for,

that she was coming for that she was coming for Goda um and maybe like Andy really wanted to split up the pair and that makes it more like a Sierra Sam thing but like a lot of people obviously had like conflicting interests and a lot of people wanted Sierra out and we can kind of talk about her as a target so like I know that like Annika tweeted I think being like I wouldn't have turned on her it's like and that's really nice but like then it would have been like seven to four instead of well if yeah if rachel voted it was what eight it was eight to two yeah i mean it doesn't make a difference i mean the way that the edit is telling the story is that like andy is the catalyst that makes this flip happen. But it felt to me like the reality was that Saul and Genevieve kind of wanted this to happen.

And maybe Andy is in Saul's ear about it. But like, I think, I mean, from my perspective, what I'm trying, what I'm guessing happened is that the conversation between teeny Saul and Genevieve was what decided this entire vote where they went, well, are we going with Tuku or are we going with God? Uh, and Genevieve and Saul both said we'd prefer to take out God, uh, and teeny maybe was leaning the other way but two to three they outnumbered teeny and so they decided to go in that direction um and so i think there's a good argument to make that says uh saul and genevieve decide to go in that direction regardless of what andy's doing

um but the edit certainly made it seem like he was a big part of that decision although we didn't get a specific example of him actually convincing them to go in that direction uh so it's hard to say exactly but clearly we're supposed to feel like this was uh largely andy's move i think i can say exactly sorry it was eight to one so yeah again if annika's there she doesn't turn it's eight to two maybe eight to three if rachel doesn't play a shot in the dark if andy doesn't turn again eight to two like he's piling on a seven person majority and i think i can say what would happen because genevieve and i think sol have really been driving things and we see genevieve i mean we don't really know when things are done timing-wise but it feels like genevieve is doing it pretty soon after they get back to

camp in this episode before the challenge talking to sue and caroline about what had happened last time and wanting to come up to gada and yeah i mean it's all in their hands like why would andy be the decider like just logically like one way or the other like they don't need him in any capacity like even even i think like if you're kind of torn between tuku and gada if you're lavo like they can't split on tuku they're like should be split at some point they can't right it would have been like six to four without sam's vote um and they can split on gotta sam doesn't have a vote it was it would even with andy and if rachel doesn't play on the dark it's seven three so they can split you might want to do that just out of safety even if you're lavo um and think that it would rebound and ida would rebound on like sam or sierra you you never know. Maybe that slightly pushes it.

They don't even need Andy for that. So logically, why is it anything more than like, okay, cool, Andy, jump on the ship. Nice to have you aboard. Why would that ever be anything that he is driving? Well, you could make the argument that if Andy's not there in Saul and Genevieve's ear talking about why they should be going after Sam and Sierra.

And instead, there's somebody else there who's like talking them up and talking about how they can work with them and will make that happen, like that he was a part of of making them lean in that direction. But I don't think there's a lot of evidence to say that we haven't seen a lot of those specific conversations or heard from them that they felt like andy was the one that convinced them but either way like the very presence of a different person can always change things yeah i mean i i love andy and i love what he did you know like reading the fact that they were so dismissive of him like picking up on that like the fact that fiera will say one thing to his face and then one thing to us in confessional and that he will then parrot what she said in

confessional like he reads very well how people perceive him and they underestimate him on that and him making new allies saying i want to be with lavo connecting to soul connecting to genevieve as we've seen piling on i'm very very much in favor of but i can't give andy the credit that he is the instigator of anything like that has not been the power structure here I don't think it's what is necessary here I think we've seen Sam and Sierra be this big romantic couple even before they were on the same beach and got to talk to Andy really much about it you know he might have done a little bit of the journey with the amulet but even before that they were talking about Sam and Sierra like they were always going to be I think a target um and I don't think I can really put much of that on Andy like I fully have to credit soul who gets fully his way for sierra to go um genevieve for connecting to tuku wanting to do

that and like those are the two people i think are driving it and i credit um you know tuku as well parts of tuku caroline as an example um for connecting really well to genevieve and being that option and not being a good target in and of it herself where you know two of the two coups the two coups were immune at that point um so those that's it for me i still credit andy on jumping on and having the good read but there's no way that he is like the power broker here and the fact that they're showing it to us like he kind of was and that the revenge arc was such a massive part was just funny to me because again like it did not make or break this vote for me and it didn't even make or break a split like it was literally an eighth vote to a majority and it was such a big storyline yeah uh i mean again i feel like there's definitely a world where the way that andy paints the the the picture that andy

paints about sam and sierra is part of what convinces saul Genevieve, who could go either way if they wanted to, to go in that direction. But they are clearly the ones making the call, I think is undeniable. Yeah. So what do you think of that call? Like, what do you think of the call firstly to go like with Chukwu against Goda?

Because last week it seemed like they were going to go the other way and then they hit a target within that. Yeah. I think ironically, Tiana was proven right from last week it seemed like they were going to go the other way and then they could target within that. Yeah, I think ironically, Tiana was proven right last from last week. It was a very good argument that she made, which was that if we vote out Rachel, we come back and they're not going to work with us. We're too too much of a united front. And so instead they were forced to cannibalize.

forced to cannibalize. And, and I think that because Tian is now gone, the other side felt a little more comfortable, you know, going in, working with them momentarily. Now, the next question is like,

if Kyle doesn't win this immunity, does that change things? Because I think there was a lot of attention on kyle and maybe part of it is like well do we want to piss them off without taking out kyle who might continue to win these things continue to win has kind of won one maybe sue could have won we still don't know listen he has he has undeniably won the immunity challenges uh he has not necessarily first but he has one auctions aren't auctions winning isn't being in first place up is down things have no meaning but sure that's that's where we're at right now i mean and

i think gabe would be a better target like from what we know of gabe and kyle you know like gabe is i mean well sue and gabe are much closer kyle doesn't have really two crew allies like what we know um he's like He's never going to make the big, scary move I think that Gabe is going to make. Gabe's a much more aggressive player. I would much rather be like, oh, now I have to go for Gabe. That would be a blessing, I think. And I still don't think it would have been Kyle

necessarily. I mean, we see that Sol's very connected to Kyle. We see Genevieve talking about going for Goda before even the challenge, if that's shown in the right order to us and I think we even maybe hear that it's before the challenge can't really remember but I don't think it would be Kyle but I will vouch for Caroline here who was the one saying last week they should stay together because from her perspective and from the women the two women's

perspective and that's what her main thing is she was right that they would never be targeted they were saying this episode should we go for one of the two guys that was immediately what they were saying and I think that if they do vote out Rachel last time like yes Kyle goes here if he's vulnerable and if he's immune then Gabe goes and they do take a hit but I think it just kind of pushes everything because I think Lavo will switch again next time and I want to talk about that but I think that then once they switch again now she's buffeted it kind of like one more tribal and she has a shield she's specifically using them as shields now she's used up a shield and yeah and then I think next week now they're working later with them and maybe you want to kind of get the jump on it being the first relationship but I think then they're working with them later and we're just it's kind of just

like one tribal council forward because I think Lvo will be incentivized to swing i think the structure is going to be about swinging and taking out targets so as long as you can just kind of not be swung at as much as possible like stick together last week have the shields in front of you who will be taken out when you're swung against work with people then when you're the one swinging and then keep working it like that like i think that's a good structure i think that that's what caroline is putting in place with her shield trying to keep the relationships and the shields that she have as has as long as she can then she'll kind of wear the losses and then she'll move on and i think that makes sense for her what she would yeah i mean i i think that um i think it's i agree i think that lavo has to swing back because yes if

you don't you've now left a four-person group um and you're continuing to now rely on players like andy and uh say rachel say they take out sam yeah then they left at what would be a four five without the ability to split if they miss on one idol they're at a four four and they need someone like rachel to go with them so they need a swing they need to keep it more malleable something something like the Tika 3 did. Swing back, keep those options bigger, and move forward like that. Which is why

there is a lot of risk to this play because you know that Andy has flipped on Gata. So if you look at this numbers-wise, right, like Tuku still has a fairly tight four. Like, Kyle is maybe not, like, the most ingratiated,

but he's also not the most, like, ambitiously betraying kind of player. He's not Andy. He's going to stick with that crew for the most part, I think. Whereas Andy is firmly away from Gata. So it's kind of like a four, three, one. Um, and in that sense, it makes sense to go after the four first because that's a type four that's

going to vote together. Uh, whereas the others, you always have the Andy secret weapon. Um, however, I think Saul recognized that not only do I feel like I have Andy, but I also feel like I have Rachel. And and so if I feel comfortable enough that I have both of them, then I can take this one side out over here and then move in and probably decimate the rest of, uh, of Tuku, um, from here. Um, that does leave Sam in, in a little bit of a,

uh, you don't leave him too long, but like, you definitely need to take out a few of the, the Tuku numbers now. Um, and as long as you can rely on Rachel and Andy, which is not the best prospect,

Rachel, very smart player, uh, and Andy, very self-interested player uh like those are not two people I would want to have to rely on unless I felt very comfortable with my relationship and read on them um but it's the it's the move Saul is making and I think that if he pulls it off good yeah you go all in on like an Andy and to be fair while he's slipping on

you would know why like they put his name out they never you know it was it was such a colossal mistake to never recover that like Sierra in the exit interviews is like I thought he'd be okay with it because we had this narrative it's like yeah and that makes sense and I didn't want them to know we were close for sure be the first to have that conversation with him and explain it it's the same way she did on the exit interview the same way we've said it over the last couple of weeks but they lost that I think if you're soul you're not like wow Andy's a big flipper you're like that was a bad situation for Andy I'd probably be out the door too like they they are literally talking to us about how they always forget Andy they didn't even give him chocolate and peanut butter you know people

are taking their clothes off for such a thing so I do think that you know you might trust it his relationship with Rachel is very good very well handled to tell her about the advantage but still keep it a secret read her so well connect with her separately and then invest in that like I think that if that if it's based on Genevieve and Sol keeping relationships in the midst of this like kind of tricky pendulum strategy it will go well for them because they're doing very well at that like if that's what they're betting on I do think that's very good but you are right and that if they're going to come back and wish they need to and at least take out i would say gabe carl or

gabe or probably both as you're saying kind of like really cut into tuku and that like tuku four that will leave sam in for a while so then it becomes if we're saying this is fine and i do think even on like vibes and relationships it's fine and i do think that they can swing back and i think that that's a doable plan. If they're doing that, then should Sam have been the target? Because as you're saying, whoever you save is being saved, not just for like, I'll see you again tomorrow at Tribal, I'll vote you out.

It might be rounds from now that someone like Sam is still in the game. So would you have gone for Sam over Sierra? Or Rachel, who would you have gone with? I do think Sam is the more dangerous player, but that's based on an edit that has clearly built Sam up a lot more than Sierra. I can understand why,

especially if you're Saul and you want to pull Rachel, you'd take out Sierra over Sam because Sierra is probably closer to Rachel. She's ironically the glue. After all this glue talk, she actually is the glue. She's the glue guy. Yeah, exactly. But at the same time you know sam is closer to andy theoretically uh let's just edit i think that's probably done now

yeah um but but you know you say that but like there's a thing that happens where like resentment is, is bred in darkness, right? Like, you know what I mean? Like Andy is, is like harboring this resentment because he hasn't actually talked to them about it really since I guess like the first tribal. But now that it's out there, now that Andy's going to have to explain himself to Sam, like I flipped and here's why Sam can now now kind of be like oh my god and depending on how he plays it some people get defensive some people like don't handle it well but if sam's a savvy enough player he can really be like oh my god you're so right we really took you for granted and he could

and he and and why wouldn't andy accept his apology at that point and be like you know what what we did have was kind of cool at one point um and uh and now you know we can maintain a relationship in the game and i i maintain a number you maintain a number and we can move forward from here uh he could also do that with sierra but i do feel like it's a little less likely it happens that way in that direction. So there's there's pros and cons, you know, going back and forth there. I think you also have to consider the fact that, like, I don't think that Lavo is a tight three. I really don't. I mean, they could be.

But like these are three people who not a single one of them was their first pick to work with the other one. They all lost their number ones. They are they are like the the the number two tribe alliance. That's true. And they all have different motivations and goals right now. Yeah. So like I don't think teeny is just going to hang around while you keep booting people that they don't want you to boot. I don't think Genevieve is going to continue to let Saul decide who to take out when she would have preferred Rachel, especially if Saul is trying to work with Rachel.

So I would personally anticipate that this group splits up relatively soon. I think that they probably want to get to a firm power position first and then make a move. Yeah. that they probably want to get to a firm power position first and then make a move yeah um and so who's positioned best once that happens Saul is clearly trying to be the one to have Andy and Rachel which is a decent uh base um and uh Teenie's trying to get the women together uh and Genevieve has like her own crew that she's working on so uh that's kind of I think the real game under the game right now, which is like who can actually position themselves once you've taken

control and don't get too distracted by the battle that's coming and lose the one right in front of you and have like Andy or Rachel flip to gotta. And all of a sudden lava was not in control anymore or sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think, well,

firstly with Andy and his relationship with Sam and Sierra, like Sierra, he was less close with. So like, that's the distance, but like Sam is like, it's like a worse betrayal because like he was his person. It's like more unforgivable that Sam like allowed these things to

happen, you know, like, and, and soul says Sam especially gave the name, which is what we saw as well at the murgatory vote. So it might be like the feelings are harsher but obviously from a game perspective like you should make nice but

i don't know how workable that relationship is i think i think like i think it hurts more but it also like if it hurts more it it you still that means that you have that connection that can be yeah toxic relationships very much who amongst us can't say we haven't gone back to a toxic ex exactly especially if like the toxic eggs uh is like a valuable number in a game for a million dollars you know that happened to me yeah i mean like yeah from a game perspective keep it open but it wouldn't be my like first preference don't do it on emotional reasons but like yeah keep it as an as an option if you can but I think Andy you know hopefully will have the control in that

relationship and he should do it with Sierra or Sam but it's like how much personal feeling um comes in the middle there and then in terms of like them I want to talk about Labo but in terms of like them being options um firstly you know a lot of it wasn't just like the Labo 3 deciding although I do think it was interesting how like almost like mutually exclusive and incompatible what they wanted was like, I think they all had like a first, second and third option that were all completely different, which is rare.

Like it's not even like, yeah, well, I'm like more on that person. They literally all, it was like, it was like a cycle. Like Genevieve wanted to keep Sam and,

you know, Sierra has confirmed an exes. They were really close. We saw with the like buoy that they had that connection she says a shield but we've heard now that they have a really good relationship she wants to keep sam um she really wants rachel out so like sierra is her middle option soul really wants to keep rachel in seems to really want sierra out so sam's his middle option teeny really wants to keep sierra wants sam out and rachel as like a secondary like women's alliance thing is this the second option

so literally completely different from all three but you also have to think about the fact that the the two coups also had things that they wanted like Caroline really wanted Rachel Andy obviously wants one of them a Sierra so maybe that's a bit of his influence Carl seemed to want Gabe said Rachel or Sierra so if you're kind of hearing those names like Sierra might have just seemed like as a consensus, the most people were happy with it. And I do think she's the glue between Rachel and Sam. I do think Sam possibly is like a physical threat.

Someone you are never going to forget about though. You know what I mean? I think that's been a big thing for them. And they kind of worry that you might forget about someone like Rachel will go out like the sneaky threat. They said you might go under the radar. And I just think that the last thing that might make me vote out Sam over Ciara, because I'm really between it, is they seemed really sure that Sam and Ciara have an idol.

Genevieve's using that to vote for Rachel. Actually, it's a great argument to vote for one of Sam or Ciara, because you can split. So if they do play the idol, the other person obviously will go home, or Rachel would have gone home had they done that. But if they don't play the idol now you've like set the idol out why are they so sure the two of them have an idol have they heard leaks about this pot had did rachel give anyone anything about this idol that sam found i don't know if they knew when it expired like if they think sam especially has an idol then i would have voted out sam in just the thought and

the hope that you're sending him out with an idol you can split it's perfect opportunity to possibly flush something that might have weighted the scales a bit to me on voting on sam yeah i agree it's it is an interesting thought i mean i think that you have to assume that somebody from that tribe has an idol um maybe not have to but like that's uh but all their idols expired expired. Like they're aware of the fact that they were like, that there are timed idols. Both of the other tribes had idols that were played, right? But they have to be played. Well, like even if they hadn't been played,

they'd be out of the game by now. But that's what I mean where it's like, they had idols that had to be played. So you would assume that somebody on that tribe is going to find an idol. And if they didn't make it a permanent idol by going through all of the steps then surely it would have been played by now um because they would have had to play it therefore somebody must have a permanent idol on that tribe

um why would you assume that somebody that somebody would not play an idol that had to be played uh and therefore there's no idol so yeah i think it's it's pretty good logic to assume that somebody has an idol there they'd be wrong but it would be but they'd be it would be make a lot of sense we wouldn't fault it at all um because it was like a strange thing of like why sam didn't play it was very specific to that situation so if it's that anyone could have an idol then sure if it's that they've heard sam had been looking if they've heard any part about that with rachel as a possible leak then i think i'm taking the shot on sam at the point where in the hope i'm sending that with an idol oh he plays it and sierra will go anyway so imagine a world where rachel is leaking like yeah sam has an idol um and but then andy's saying no i'm telling you

if sam had an idol i would know they would be like, Andy just doesn't know. But that makes them feel like, oh, is Rachel protecting Sierra then? Because we have more reason to believe Andy than we do Rachel. And that's even more evidence that maybe Sierra should go over Sam. But that's pure fan fiction right now. They seem so sure that one of Sam and Sierra had it.

Like, I don't know if that's just based on like, they seem like they would, which they do. Or is it like based on like some information that they're trying to discern and based on that i think i think that's yeah a really good reason of why you go for sam or sierra over rachel if that's what you think like trying to get out an idol and this perfect split opportunity is what i would do but i just don't know if they know where it's i mean i think you can be relatively comfortable that andy probably doesn't have it um although i wouldn't i would not take that to the bank um and then you could probably also think well you know the odds of rachel having

it are a little bit lower considering the spot she was in last time and how clearly desperate she was like she didn't seem like she felt comfortable there uh oh that's true they know rachel doesn't have an idol that is that's a really good point so uh i mean i don't think they know it for sure but like uh given the fact that she needs clearly needed the uh yes safety without power um she'd be a great actress if she had an idol in her back pocket and was always going to be fine because she was sweating bullets like that that you know that probably is what it is so i don't't know if they know who between Sam and Sierra has the idol that they think that they should have for the reasons you gave of like, someone must have a long-term idol because nothing's been played and fleshed out.

So it must be one of the two. So that's what they, we solved that. That feels, that's, thank you for that. Oh, that would have annoyed me. That's exactly what happened. So then it could be between Sam and Sierra. Then it has to be one of Sam or Sierra. I think just on the hope, ironically, Rachel has an idol,

but based on everything they know, I think it's a fair assessment. If Andy is their source of information, which is the more likely option, then Andy knows for a fact that somebody has the idol because he found the thing, returned it, and then it was gone.

And the person he talked to about it was Sam. So he's probably pointing the finger at Sierra the most for having it. I think that's very fair i think that makes a lot of sense i'm so glad we gained that up so yeah from that perspective of like sierra might have the idol based on the fact that it's definitely not rachel unless you found it like today and it may also it may also be part of the reasoning for why they're deciding to take shots at at uh at gata over tooku because they know that gata has a title or they in their minds they know that gata has an unused title that's a very good point so should so sam maybe should have come out and

been like knowing that they all have had time titles and hearing about the gay played an idol hearing about robe and they definitely know all of these things and they heard we saw them here about gabe knowing that to lessen the gata threat level where it's like i know what happened to your tribe idol ironically sue did find something else and you can't always find something else but like you definitely played something so there's something that's gone maybe something was found you definitely they also have a pretty good idea that somebody on tuku has an idol given the oh that is true as well the red paint so maybe that maybe that discounts the the motivation yeah but but you still but i think in terms of the vote

split i think that's right yeah in terms of that i do think yeah but you're right that they probably think because gabe hasn't come forward would gabe come forward and be like that's why i found my one tribal idol um they don't know when the red painting happened like only two crews know that caroline now still in the game who's protecting i'm sure about it yeah so do they think that that was gabe's that got flushed do they think that that they definitely have because then they think okay they both have one and now i think yeah i think gabe says no i had nothing to do with the paint i found an idol i played it it had nothing to do with the paint and there's not really a lot of reason for him to lie about

that so the reason that would be now they don't think someone who has the idol but i don't think anyone's thinking about that in the moment yeah well he well he the thing is that sue hasn't come to him with the idol so he could protect her if they were in on it together but otherwise it's like what am i going to protect the random toku red paint assailant who's just flying around with paint somewhere who hasn't come to me like if they coordinated that that's the thing she could have gone to him it's like if this ever well at the merge or whatever like this is coming up about the paint you you like knowingly played an idol maybe you can tell people that's what it was they would have all had to agree to it they would have just had to trust that like kyle's not gonna say anything and tiana's a part of that and she was there at the time so yeah that's a tough one i

still think she should have worked out with gabe separate to that and it might have worked out but yeah there is no real gabe at that point isn't in on this he doesn't just know to protect tuku to protect sue who hasn't even told him but you're right okay so they know that there's probably an idol on both sides but they can split on one side and i do think that that might be if they know that then that's the the concerning thing or the thing that you might take into account now in terms of like lavo yeah them going back and forth because i was thinking like could they be the Tika three right Tika did this so well they did the pendulum strategy and there's a few things that it was contingent on I think like three major things the first thing was like they

weren't targeted themselves because they did so well not being a threat and were like goofy and you know all of that and people fell for it and Sol's been working on that but I do think this Larvo three are more threatening and I do think that people would want to come for them the other thing was the other sides just would not work together for their mutual benefit which was infuriating um will will guard and two who do that i mean these newer players i find often do like they're so savvy like even andy i think would be like as you know as connected as he's been he would be that like superfan self-interest player who will do that thing. He said on the mat, he threw John under the bus, right?

John had done nothing wrong. So I do think that might be an issue. And then the third being thing being loyalty, you know, like Tika were very, have I ever seen Chuka? Chuku? Anyway. No, but Tika though, the Tika three from 44. I do think that they're, you know, they stayed loyal. And we talked about it at the time. Like they were, I thought, big final tribal threats against each other

and went there with the hope, like, cause it kept them so stable to stay strong. So like they basically, they had the battle at the end in what ended up being like fire and final tribal council. Instead of having the battle with each other, there might've been none of them get there. And I thought that was a fine bet but even within that surely a sense of loyalty also if you're between that kind of dilemma of should we turn on each other or should we really

like battle it out at the end and still have a chance loyalty feeling good about it has to be a reason that you also like tips the scales more and what is also a fine decision of going to the end together and as you said larvae don't have that so i'm kind of i don't i don't know that the tika possibilities are there because i i do think that people will come for them i think they'll come for each other i think that you know possibly they'll be teamed up against because they're threats i don't know that it's there but i think that it's what they could do right like it could be a plan if they could pull it off to go far together because they're just so much in the middle um is there any possibility there or is they they're definitely just like capitulating fairly soon i i feel like there's just not a lot of incentive for them to stick

together i think i think they have too many other options and they're all too threatening to each other um at least from the perspective of the edit and they don't have that built-in loyalty base uh like the tika three like the tika three they came together early on they were a three on the tribe these three did not work together in the same way they came together toward the end but like uh i just don't feel like they have the same level of like coherence um so i would assume that they split up here and i like is it in any of their interests to stay at three i don't really think so unless you have no other options to get to the end but i think they all have different paths uh right now it looks like teenies's is maybe the hardest. But but I also think they have one of the better edits. So so maybe you could argue that Teeny needs to stick around. But but in many ways, that's that's worse, because now you're surrounded by Saul and and Genevieve, who both directed the strategy and you stuck with them because it was the safer way to get to the end. But how are you going to win the jury vote? So I think they all have incentive and they're all strategic and

self-interested and have shown in the past that they are strategic and self-interested. Maybe Tina's teeny slightly less so. Tina has been a bit more of a team player. But Genevieve certainly is willing to go off and do her own thing. And Saul has been very willing to go and do his own thing. So, you know, I think I would expect that this is going to break up for sure. Yeah, I think the thing with the Tika 3 is they had other options, but they always use them for the primary purpose of furthering Tika. Like those options, and I'll give a Big Brother analogy from a season I didn't watch, but I think I'm right. You can tell me.

This is what the cookout did, right? Like it was always about the cookout but they had their other relationships they used that secretly to further the cookout and that's what tika was doing jam jam was close to jamie um i think was carson close to lauren they had their other relationships but they were using that it's like oh i'm working with tika i'm really close to that person it's like no you're gonna get cut because my ultimate loyalty is tika and i think the issue with lava is i think that could be flipped where the ultimate loyalty will be to these other options that they all do have very, very well. And that's the impressive thing that reminds me of Tika is like,

most of the relationships we've heard of are to Larvo, were to Tika instead of between Tuku and Gata that at least we've seen, you know, Sol with, we've seen now with Kyle, with Rachel, Genevieve with Caroline, we see a bit with Sue. We've seen genevieve with andy we've seen soul a bit with andy we've seen teeny um you know with sierra but with with the women as well um those are the relationships like what big relationships can we even think of between godda and and tuku that would combine against lavo but i do think that laavo will then you know go against themselves with these relationships and almost be the instigator of that and it shows like how much power that

they're the ones they have the power to do that yeah I mean we talk about this on Big Brother but like the optimal strategy for an alliance is not necessarily the optimal strategy for an individual and right now Lavo theoretically if it's in this, could completely break the game by playing as a team and getting to the end as a three. Yeah, which Tika did. But that only works for one of them. And the other two are playing a losing game there, which is always going to be the case.

But I think a lot of people would rather try to make their own way and get into a better spot to potentially win. And I think either way can be viable. But like, you know, famously for the cookout, like, yeah, the end in the way that they did benefited one person in particular and not the rest of them game wise at the very. Yeah. So I don't know if there's like a standout person right now but usually one starts to emerge and it's at that point that you usually

by the time that person emerges it's too late to do anything about it so um you know if you really want to make your own way you have to start early i think well i think that with a three-person alliance you know obviously the the strategic incentive is we will get to the end together and with that amount of control. If we don't come for each other, can anyone come for us? And for Larvo, I don't know. That's the thing. For Tika, that wasn't true.

And for Larvo, I do think it has to be self-inflicted. So that's the gain. It is a group win, but it's an individual win to sit there with the chance to tell your story, which is a good story. Again, it's difficult competition, but at least you're telling it and you have a shot and we can look back at it for like carolyn now and say like hey maybe she would have had a better shot against other people maybe at least worked out for her but like i think jam jam had a good shot against carson i think carson had a really good shot against jam jam like just going for that and having the opportunity

and feeling like you could capitalize on that opportunity with a great game to speak to that is something that i think all of lava would have and that is attractive but i do think that there has to be a like if that's the dilemma like do i stay strong and have that chance or do i break it up to go there to have a better shot of winning at the end but it's harder to even get to the end if that's an interesting toss-up and i do think it is the alliances like this then surely loyalty is a part of that and they don't i don't think they're as loyal enough to each other to be that to be the thing that tips the scales and that's the problem is that you have that dilemma and you can make the choice

of like you know what maybe i will just take my chances at the end and i'll go with these three people but you're not the only one who has that choice the other two are also making that decision and all it takes is one of you in this prisoner's dilemma to decide you know what i don't want to go in that direction uh and the whole thing breaks up and you never had a chance to begin with um so uh so that's you know that's where like even if they were inclined to go in that direction it requires so much trust um and i don't know if that exists amongst these three. Yeah, I agree. And I want to talk about Teenie with that

because I feel like Teenie really loses out here on the three. Like Sol gets exactly what he wants. Genevieve doesn't get what she wants with Rachel, but seemed fine with Sierra going. Save Sam, who we've heard now. That's the connection. Wanted very much to go with Tuukku, was very much leading that. Likeachel didn't even i'm not rachel teeny didn't even want

to go with tuku like she lost out even on the side they were going on let alone getting exactly the wrong name like she had all the losses here um so we concern for teeny on this like how do we feel about where teeny's at with that i do think it was a strategically bad episode for teeny um i i do think that teeny has one of the strongest edits of the season um this was probably one of their worst episodes in total um but uh but yeah i mean i think strategically this was not great um because they did not get what they wanted and uh they're now in a situation where um you know like what options do you have left i think that they really need to look at like who am i going to work with from here because saul and genevieve are both building their armies

secretly so maybe they don't even know about it but like teeny really needs to either build an army of their own uh or um or just like point at sol and genevieve and be like hey guys you see what they're doing over there and then kind of like let them let them battle it out for a little while well teeny's army was the women's alliance and can i just say that since the women's alliance was put out there three women have basically been voted out like rachel was going to be voted out and then tiara and then sierra so wow it's like the worst chekhov's women's alliance i've ever seen where if a woman's alliance has spoken about a woman will go home in the third act if it's spoken about in the first act this is like it's like a curse like will

another man be voted out of the show i don't even know like they've literally it's worse than ever before so that's gone very very poorly and like the thing is like I feel for teeny because you know it's kind of like what I said about with like with Sierra and Sam a couple of weeks ago when Annika went and Sierra talked in the exes about like having her own distrust of Annika and stuff but I you know anyway it was a it was a two-two vote if she flips right um she doesn't have the power she needs Sam and she's she's then prioritizing Sam as she has to numerically and as she should and for Teenie I feel like at this point she's prioritizing Lava which she should but that many losses isn't great like at first I was like okay all of Lava were doing it I'm kind of high on all the Lava but yeah

especially on the rewatch I'm like Teenie didn't even want to go with the side let alone losing the person she least wanted to lose and like and sierra spoke in the exits about how close she felt to teeny so that isn't great that's too many losses and like if they are building a coalition all of them to come for each other then like she's taking the first hit like she's gonna have the least options i think that teeny will have so yeah that was that was unfortunate because what do you do that i don't know that there's anything to be done like you can't flip it they have like a massive majority and everyone wants to you know you can't even go to gata like who are you going to rachel sam sierra you don't have andy and yourself like you don't have the numbers i think i think you

just have to hope that like the meta of this era of survivor which is you know chop off the head of that sticks out the tallest uh works in your favor as you let sol and genevieve like build their their armies and then you can go to people like rachel and andy who are very smart and be like man these two are really running the show now but they've done such good social work with the andes and the rachels yeah yeah so it's teeny it's teeny like it's teeny losing out socially right now like teeny was seen so much as like the social expert the center of everything at the very beginning like like on lavo and now i feel like teeny has lost options that have gone home tiana possibly was an option that wasn't teeny's fault but like they've i think the other lavos have made social gains and i don't feel like like i wish that if teeny had been the one to connect so much

with then those might have been the options and those would be the people to turn on them with but i don't know that those options are existing because i think they're getting a little bit outpaced socially or yeah it seems like it seems like they really went for the women's thing um and that that's why you don't do it did not pan out um so uh so like you know unlike uh sol and genevieve who have gone for things that they've been able to protect uh teeny has unfortunately not been able to to maintain the women's thing yet i mean the flexibility of the women's thing is that you can always keep trying it until eventually gotta respect teeny beating the drum every time just not a woman and they're like we hear you we're gonna vote out a woman every time that is that is the problem

with it too is that like uh you know if you're saul and you hear that at all at any point you now are incentivized to well if it's between sierra and sam i might as well keep sam around if there's this notion of taking out guys, then I need as many guys in here as possible before they come to me. So I don't think it's an invalid strategy, but you definitely have to be careful about who you say it to. Yeah. It's gone an unfortunate way. I think for, for teeny, I want to talk about Rachel. He's an interesting spot.

A couple of things with Rachel here. Firstly. Yeah, I mean, that moment with Sol at the beginning, I think is really interesting. We hear now that they've kind of had a connection outside of that. I think that Sol did that so well, read Rachel so well to know that, like, she could keep that, like, secret. I think maybe Genevieve that I hear in Exit might have known about how the advantage was used last week, but I still trusted the right people that it hasn't come out. It could still have the wow factor later on possibly,

although if like Rachel goes to a jury, she'd probably tell him. But like people would be impressed with that without it coming back on him. Like the read is good. Like the innate connection I think is really good. Rachel can't be angry here. I think about being on the wrong side of the vote. Like Sol does go out of his way to save her. He has been her guardian angel twice. Like she should just be angry here. I think about being on the wrong side of the vote. Like Sol does go out of his way to save her. He has been a guardian angel twice.

Like she should just be very thankful. I think it really invests in that relationship. So I thought this was really interesting as well because a lot of what we said last week was like, well, how much is it Sol and Rachel's connection? Or how much will you always mess everything up by giving it to the obvious person on the bottom just to be against Tuku?

And now he's trying to work with Tuku. So it's like those relationships he tiana said that she felt close to soul those relationships were there it just it was individual enough i think they had the connection with rachel wanted to actually help rachel specifically which is a credit to his relationship with rachel um and it wasn't necessarily like as structural as we thought so kind of how do you feel about their relationship now i mean i will say if i'm racial i don't feel great about sol really he saved her twice but i don't i don't see it that if i if i don't look at it as being saved if you leave me out of it like the the the advantage being used on me is one thing obviously you couldn't tell me beforehand you tell me after

and when she was saying like it's pretty clear that he did this for me uh he was looking out for my interest for no other reason than just to look out for me and like my instinct there was like uh i mean he he found the advantage he either had to use it or didn't um and he like he either could save you or could like didn't like it wasn't necessarily like he lost anything by doing this for you um so i wouldn't personally take that as like and i get why on the island you might feel differently your life is on the line somebody comes and saves you um but but but if i'm thinking about it from like the perspective of the game i'm not going to take that as like this guy's definitely looking out for me i'm going to take it as like, this guy's definitely looking out for me. I'm going to take it as like, okay,

he saw it as advantageous to keep me around. I like that. Um, however, if I then get to this next vote and I'm feeling so uncomfortable that I need to make this play with my shot in the dark, which I'm sure we'll talk about soon. Uh,

and the guy that I was supposed to, that was supposed to be looking out for me, that was supposed to have to save me and wants to work with me completely left me in the dark to flounder in that position. Sure, he kept the vote off of me, but he's clearly not looking out for me. He just thinks that I'm a number for him and wants to keep me around. But I'm not in the circle. And that means that I need to do something else in the same way that Andy felt like he needed to do something else because of like personal relationships.

This strategic relationship does not work for me. There's a few things here. I mean, I do think that he could have not used it because again, for some people, Tuku taking out Rachel and creating the necessity of the slim majority of the others would have been better that's not necessarily true for lavo in the middle but it could have really created something um when they had to do that so he he saves rachel i think pretty individually um

i mean again as a swing it's kind of okay but i forgot it was definitely worse so the one that six was meant to be was yeah i think what i mostly mean is it's not as though he played an idol on her. Which even then is not necessarily a sign that the person cares about you in the game. Even then it could just be a play. This was more like, oh, I got a thing. Yeah, sure, I'll use it. Or it could be at best or at worst. Yeah, it's more of a minor choice.

But I do still think it speaks to the relationship. Because again, he's working with Chukwu now. If he wanted to help Chukwu, he could have... yeah it's more of a minor choice but i do still think it speaks to the relationship because again he's working with toku now if he wanted to help toku he could have he could have um you know sent it to one of them they block her but she can't even play her shot in the dark so look he didn't make it worse he didn't leave her to die that's the way that's the thing he didn't leave her to die so i do think and i do think the reason that it works is because they seem to have a relationship. Like if she's just kind of like a number, then maybe she feels like, OK, thank you. But like, I don't know how important it is.

Maybe it's just like, again, like how you see your game numerically. And then if you're going to leave me out of a vote again, how much do I matter to you? I think a lot of it is based on the actual connection. More important than even the conversation where he tells her about or even saving her. It might be the conversation we saw in the camp of how well they connect i think that it's all based on that and i think that's very important then he leaves her out of the vote um what is the reason what's the excuse because what you have to do is what sam did not do and manage it immediately of why i've done i i vow to you i wouldn't let you go i would not and that like really i mean and he'd be right like

i i'm taking that on that i wouldn't let you go I've just got in this group like I didn't want it to spread like I know that you're really really close with Sierra even to put you in that position which I don't love but like maybe something like that um I just like in case they played an idol like I couldn't be the reason that this went haywire but I was always going to save you now she might be upset she she wasted it we'll waste it we'll talk about it. She used the shot in the dark. That's gone. She could have used her idol.

That would be very annoying if you weren't filled in on that. But in saying that, he has saved her twice. He knows she's close with these people. He'd be putting a lot on her to tell her and ask her possibly to go with it. And I think saving her from the shadows, given he's already done it, given they are any way close if he can manage it is very doable but don't do what Sam did and just leave it to Fester probably would be my advice yeah I mean I completely agree and I think there's absolutely a world and I think

we're certainly being set up for that world where Saul is able to make this work I mean we literally just saw this happen where Rachel was blindsided with the whole breadwinners thing and then went right back to to Tukku or to Gata and Sierra and was totally fine to have been left out

of that and been blindsided to whatever degree she was actually fine with it. So I think that's certainly the case. If I'm just putting myself in Rachel's shoes shoes that doesn't work for me like i um i'm certainly not gonna go to saul and be like what the hell in fact i'm gonna go to saul and be like wow great job i totally get why you didn't tell me like i thank you for looking out for me i know that it's you that kept me out of the line of fire um but then i'm going like okay i need to get i need to get this guy out yeah because i do not want to be a person who is just enabling the person who's

running the game um and i think that that's what you are if you allow a player to just make moves without your knowledge uh that and and use you as a piece on the board in that way um yeah so that for me personally i'm just i'm just not gonna not gonna lie down on that with that i think my internal monologue might be but like you could even split you know like even if like what could i have done like i was powerless but at least like i would have known it wasn't me again like she could have played her idol in that spot and we'll talk about it like how annoying is that just to know it's not me um would have been enough just to be like brought in on it like it's not even like it was so delicate if they play an idol we think they have an idol we're done like again like the idol gets flushed and the other person goes home i mean it's it's totally possible he did say something to her as

far as i'm concerned i think she's saying on twitter that he didn't say her say anything to her um so yeah so yeah i mean she plays the shot in the dark so we need we need to talk about that so it seems like she's not in on the vote even if he like i not to go too deep into this especially to said it wasn't the case but like if saul tells me it's not you don't worry oh we're gonna go deep on it i'm i'm still not gonna be like oh i just trust that then um you know i i would still maybe use the shot in the dark play um but it sounds like he didn't even do that and so certainly with that in mind like he's not the guy i'm gonna be like oh yeah saul's my guy from that point forward i'm definitely looking over at uh at tuku um and i'm saying hmm all right lavo just betrayed tuku uh or sorry uh but they were about

to vote her out like that's the thing is vegas can't be can't be choosers like he's not a guy because he doesn't tell her when he's saving her. It's at least better than the four who were going to vote her out completely. Sam, who she's had her issues with. Andy, that's, you know, like Sol is her best option. And maybe that's a concern, but it's also true.

What I mean to say is that I'm going to Tuku, maybe not the very next round, but maybe after they turn on Tuku. And then I say to Tuku, like, Hey, are we really going to just let them run the game? They just keep flipping back and forth like this. Uh, maybe I go early and I, and I try to go in, uh, and get them to go against. And maybe I take out one Lavo first because like, okay, fine. You want to take out one of my allies and keep me safe. Let me go to Tuku and do the same for you. Let's take out Genevieve or TV

teeny. And now you are more reliant on me than you were before tit for tat uh like that's that's just the way i think i would try to play the game if i were in that spot i do think that's an issue for a lot of it was like it's a lot of smart people like rachel wood caroline wood i think that that is that's a pretty tricky thing but you mentioned that she yeah so she plays on the dark and she doesn't play her idol people found this really interesting and it is really interesting and i'm sure it's been talked about and will be talked about through the week a lot um but there's been a couple of talking points so the first one which i think she's confirmed and which is great was that she played the shot in the dark to kind of see how everyone reacted like a temperature check

and then she could play the idol i mean josh kettles has always said that so you you know you do the idol shot um well the shot in the dark with an idol chase so that's always the way to play your show in the dark if you have an idol because then there's like a small chance you won't have to play your idol at all and you'd rather keep if you're going to leave tribal council with one thing you'd rather keep your idol then you're shot in the dark so i thought that i think we all thought that was gonna happen and i was like oh finally oh the discourse is making it on screen oh am i in the television now like this is so cool um there's not what she didn't it was actually even better i think her gut

was great in reading that like she was out of the loop as far as we know but not the target so like playing your shot in the dark and then seeing how it goes and not actually going all the way to playing your idol is kind of like the perfect gut check i think on that but like what do you think about this as a move i i really liked it i instantly was like oh this is interesting and i think it works on so many different levels some of them probably only work in this season if you stop if you if this doesn't become a thing but like i think certainly her vote isn't needed in either scenario, either it's going the way that she was told it's going to go and she doesn't need her vote or it's not going the way she was told it was

going to go and she doesn't need her vote. So there's not a ton of reason to keep her vote. So yes, might as well play the shot in the dark. It allows her, as you said, to gauge reactions from the other players. So as she's tail, Hey Jeff. Yeah, I'm going to, I played my shot in the dark. And you can sort of get a sense. And if you feel like you can read it well enough that they're like totally unconcerned, then maybe you don't even need to play the idol at all.

If it hits, you don't even need to play the idol at all. If it doesn't, you can decide maybe you don't need to. And if you do feel like you got anything sketchy you can just play your idol um so all of that's good but i think there are some other added benefits one is uh like jury management uh i feel like this is so much better than having like certainly game wise but also jury wise than having played an idol wrong i think you look like an idiot if you play your idol and there are no votes on you. You don't look as bad if you play your shot in the dark

and there are no votes on you and the votes were against you. It just wasn't on you particularly. I think what it does is kind of indicate, you know what, while Sam and Sierra were completely blindsided, Rachel saw something coming and decided, you know what, I might as well give up my vote to try to protect myself here. I think it makes her look

smart. And then on top of that, there are a couple other added benefits that may only work once, but I do think they're pretty valuable. She's played her shot in the dark. So this, I think, might help, might convince the others that she doesn't have an idol because she played a shot in the dark and didn't follow it up with an idol uh so it's like well if you're not thinking on this level then you're thinking wow she clearly doesn't have an idol because she felt super uncomfortable and then played a shot in the dark and not her idol uh in the same spot as like last time she didn't, she clearly didn't have an idol. She was terrified. So you think, okay,

she's a lot less likely to have an idol. And then on top of that, now she doesn't have a shot in the dark. The new meta for the new era is that you have to blindside people because you're worried about them playing a shot in the dark. But if you know that they don't have a shot

in the dark, the motivation to blindside them isn't quite as prevalent. And I think that the shot in the dark is one of the reasons why we've seen so many idol blindsides specifically last season is because you're blindsiding somebody as if they had an idol because of shot in the dark constantly.

But now that she doesn't have a shot in the dark, you might get a little bit lax. You might get a little bit lax you might get a little bit like you know what i mean yeah we should keep it from rachel that we're voting for but like it's not the biggest deal in the world oh my god uh she doesn't have a shot in the dark to play um but in actuality she has an idol to play which means like that's the most valuable thing you can have uh when having an idol is knowledge that people are going to vote for you um so i think it works on so many different levels.

I don't know if she was thinking about every single one of them and some of them in particular, these last parts may not work if somebody's thinking hard enough about like, well, it actually might be more likely that she has an idol. Yeah. And that's what she wants us to think. So they don't know that we know they know, you know? Yeah. But I don't know. I don't know if they'll think that way. So I think that I think those benefits might exist for her. Yeah i do i i love all of that i think that's amazing um

yeah i mean like from a jury perspective i'd be like i'm like impressed i'm like yeah being like on the like knowing something was iffy but kind of feeling like hey but i've read that it's not me so i played my show in the dark and on my idol i'm like yeah you that's like the perfect way to solve that issue to tell the final tribal yeah yeah i had an idol in my pocket i played my shot in the dark and on my idol. I'm like, yeah, that's like the perfect way to solve that issue. Great story to tell at Final Tribal is, yeah, I had an idol in my pocket. I played the shot in the dark to gauge whether or not I needed to use it. That makes me seem so smart. Yeah, Twitter loved it. And the jury would also be like, mother.

Yeah. So I think that's great. The other thing that people have been saying, and I think that she's kind of said this wasn't true, but like, yeah, did Saul tip her off? Because we're saying possibly Saul should have tipped her off um and then did she do it to not have to show her cards um which I think she's saying didn't happen I would really not like that because people that would be so smart like to not show your cards and this is

what happened in the first um tribal council 44 when Matthew did this exact thing and I really didn't like it then like and infuriatingly it worked for him but it was like yeah he didn't show his cards and everyone was on board with him if i was out there i'd be like no like if you stand for nothing what do you fall for like what andy is doing like properly flipping to like be with the majority surely would be better than just like not pissing off sam in the game but like actually like showing your cards being with a group like if i was tipped off i would want to go and be like i'm of my own volition i just want to flip on god they voted against me last time like i'm not with them so i think i would do that and i would way rather in a game sense just piss off sam and be properly with this majority who now i mean again we don't think it'll stick but like show like as as gabe

says at tribal council like your vote is your truth so i would way rather do that and then from a jury perspective because i think steven was and I know it all is being recorded tomorrow but Stephen was saying like oh then Sierra won't be pissed off as like the first juror like for me if I was a juror like and I do think a lot of newer jurors not all of them last season notably but a lot of newer jurors I think could actually be impressed that she knew where the going was good you know and that she was in on it so I think that instead of like if that was the reason if it was to not show her cards I'd way rather show my cards and if she knew that she was that it was going to be Sierra I would just vote for Sierra and and like you know be on that side but if she didn't know then I think this was great

I think like testing it and that seems like what it was but i'm sorry if my cat is meowing angelica you have one job um but as i'm talking through this big talking point um i love it which is annoying um yes my point was that for me i want to get your take on it even though it doesn't seem like what was happening if she knew would you vote with the other side would you bury your vote in a shot in the dark like in in this world where she where soul does tip her off what does she do in general i don't think the there's a lot of value in burying your vote and i have seen this talked about a lot like oh well this is so valuable because she didn't have to show her cards by casting a vote against either sierra or sam or against gabe Gabe. You know, but like... Well, I definitely wouldn't vote against Gabe

if I knew that I was on the wrong side of the vote. That would be, yeah, that would be bad. But I mean, but like, here's the thing. Rachel not voting for Gabe because she played her shot in the dark, I think means nothing. Like, Gabe is not going to be like, man, I wonder who Rachel would have voted for if she had her vote.

Like, he's going to know that she was planning to vote with them if he left her out of the vote. And you can just bury it with like, oh, yeah, that's what I was told. That was the direction I was told. Like, if Gabe goes up to her and says, hey, Rachel, who would you have voted for? Were you planning to vote me out? What is she supposed to say yeah he would assume she was voting for him anyway and no one could ever think she wasn't yeah right like no i was burying my vote for somebody else or like oh i i purposely didn't like none of those

answers are satisfactory so like i purposefully voted would be like i don't think anyone would respect that you know like the whole point is you're burying it so that they don't know but i didn't want you to know so i'm burying it like, oh, so you like you didn't vote against like, you know, I'm one of the targets, but you're not voting with me at that point. Like, again, you're a little man coach. Like that's fencing in a way that no one enjoys. And then what do you say? Oh, I would have voted Sierra.

Like, wait, why? Like, who tipped you off? Like, you know, I just don't think there's actually a lot of value there. There are some specific cases, I think, that that there would be not all players are rational and maybe you know if gabe were an irrational player that's like anybody that writes my name down for any reason i'm gonna be after them uh and oh guess you didn't write my name down so i won't be after you you just would have but on a technicality, I think Sue might be one of them. But like, still,

anyone would think that she was voting because I think she was, you know, voting it. So, yeah. In general, I don't think it's worth burning this otherwise potentially useful advantage, especially when you do have an idol and you can play it for that reason. Now, the fact that she didn't have to write a name down,

I think is an added benefit to this particular move. She also doesn't have to pick between Sierra and Sam, which is useful because she theoretically didn't know which of the two of them would be voted for if she accidentally votes Sam. Then now Sam knows that she was going to pick Sierra over him. But again, it's like you probably knew that anyway. And if she votes against Sierra, then Sierra is like, oh, you didn't know and you voted me out like that's gonna make me annoyed on the jury potentially so like there's certainly some things there but i just don't think it's that valuable i wouldn't play the shot in the dark specifically for that advantage yeah i i don't it's annoying to me because it's novel so i think people are like you know then then it gets a lot of like hype around it it's like oh my god and now no one knows what she was going to vote it's like

but they can't assume and they would like just because it's like new and interesting doesn't mean it's right and this happened with Matthew in 44 and it was annoying because it did work but I hated it then and I just think like if you know where the votes are going like vote correctly or you're a mole in which case be a mole use that to be your thing but then you're like voting for Gabe with the knowledge like then do that and like then if you if they really are like we're gonna use you to get with Sam in this like very clear majority that's about to break up I think but like if they're doing then then do that but like just fencing like now no one will know it's like yeah now everyone can think that maybe you were gonna vote for them that's maybe even worse like now they don't know that's bad I think you know so

I think if she if she had the name she should have voted out Sierra if Saul gave her that and she believed it and then could go to people and be like uh not because I was tipped off but I just wanted I just want to flip and then like do what Andy did you know if it's being compared to Andy I'm higher on if this was the case if like you know Andy actually flipped I don't think that's what happened with Rachel so I'm not criticizing it I'm criticizing the thought of just bury it I'm like if you if you hear if you're tipped off properly flip go all the way off don't don't don't fence it but I don't think that's what it was I think she was left out of the vote which has its own issues

but the read playing a show in the dark gauging it all the points you gave very novel very cool good read much better like that's good i would be much much more critical if she was tipped off and um and made that decision so that's where i sit with that but i still i think she's confirmed that that wasn't the vibe so anything else should we get to the chizzy let Let's do it. Yeah, let's do it. Okay, take it away, Jacob Sager-Weinstein and MC Color. One, two, three. One, one, one, three. One, two, one, two, three.

It's getting, it's getting, it's getting kind of chizzy. Three, two, one. All right, here's where we're at. Look at Genevieve and Sol technically directing a lot of things, sitting at the top of the charts who are you going to give points to taron um i mean i feel like there's a pretty clear top three right like in my mind and it's i think sol genevieve and rachel um you know like i think this was obviously a big episode for andy but it's like um you know r like, I think this was obviously like a big episode for Andy, but it's like,

um, you know, Rachel makes this really cool play. She gets an idol. Um, Saul directs this vote. Genevieve is still in a good position. You could maybe make the argument that you could swap Andy and Genevieve.

This is a big move from Andy. but, uh, but I, I'd feel pretty comfortable with those three in there. Then it's a matter of the order. I think Saul getting his way makes me put him in the top spot. I thought you'd be lower on Saul because you don't like how he handled Rachel so much.

And you think that that's like a ticking time bomb. I mean, that's fair. But that's sort of like predictive. Like if that's not true, then I've unfairly docked him points because if he is talented enough to keep her on board, then it's an even more impressive move. So and quite frankly, I think the edit is trying to tell me that it goes okay, but i i could be

reading the edit wrong as well uh so maybe i'm too high on this move and maybe this move is partially what turns uh you know turns sour for him um but i think for now you know just the fact that he was shown to be the one to get his way he is setting up some good things i like him in that top spot. He seems the most primed to do well right now. And then I just, I appreciate the move by Rachel. And I think that the spot she's in now could be very, very good. If Lavo starts flipping on Tuku and she gets to sit back with her idol,

she gets to make this case if she makes it to final tribal. I think that she's actually well positioned here. So I'd probably put her at number two. And then Genevieve, I think just, and again, I could see the argument that maybe you put andy here um but uh i think part of it is that like i felt like this is a long time coming for andy uh so it didn't feel like super like uh big that this happened this finally happened i feel like this we've been waiting for this to happen forever. Whereas Genevieve has continued to develop a strong position in the

post-merge portion of the season, which I think is a very good thing to be doing for a long term prospect. So I'd put Genevieve there. Yeah, I think that's very fair. I'm glad that you gave points to Rachel. I will

also say now that I've let my whiny cat in, it't Angelica it was Eliza I'm sorry for besmirching Angelica's name yeah I just assumed that was wrong of me um so my points I'm glad you gave points to Rachel I'm gonna give her an honorable mention I feel like she's left out of the vote you know like it's cool and it's novel and like I wish I had a cute little point for it but I feel like people are driving the vote that I have to give points for. Andy as well, honorable mention. Like again, he's piling onto a vote for me. I don't think he's instigator, but it's absolutely the right thing to do. And I'm glad he's like found some other allies that might give him chocolate.

If they were asked about who to give chocolate to. Honorable mentions there. I'm going to give three points to Sol as well. I think it's going okay with rachel i think he could have told her but like do you want to be do you want that to come out like he seems very concerned yeah i don't think you should tell her to be right to to right so then it's a hard situation yeah yeah like i don't think that he necessarily made a big mistake um i was just mostly talking like if i am rachel from her perspective um like i think saul has to make the move in the way that he does and the question is is he does he have the chops to

follow through and pull it off yeah i mean between a bit of a rock and a hard place um in terms of the fact like yeah you don't want to be the person who's giving her that information and leaving her out when you've done so much to save her is unfortunate he does you know everything to save her he gets his way he wants Sierra out he gets you know so he gets everything that he wants and I do think that it's a bit of a two-part move like definitely go to her and explain that and be like look you know I I'm having to do all these things with the shadow like I'm your secret guardian angel every time and no one knows you know like it's not this whole big public thing I would have liked to tell you but seven people would have been pretty angry at me um well I don't know if that's great either but like it

was delicate but I made sure it was never you and just work with her on that and hopefully she's she's grateful for that um even though it did send one of her closest allies home so um three points I'm giving two points to Genevieve who I think seemed to be a very big driving factor in the vote with Tuku. Connected really well, it seems, to Caroline and Sue. Got not fully what she wanted because she wanted Rachel out, but I feel like you don't usually push it, right? Like, like Teenie didn't. You know, like, if more people want Sierra.

And I do think, like, Rachel, for the idol reasons we've given, that they don't think Rachel has an idol, like, is probably the worst objective target um so it's a hard one to push when I would probably try and split up the pair who I think hasn't more likely to have an idol anyway um but the reasons were valid for her but like not getting across the line is a terrible for me and it's still fine for her and I think she's doing a lot and then on the other side of that I'm going to give a point to Caroline because I feel like Caroline rebounded well last week when it could have gone possibly really badly like I was concerned for her you know hoping to do

a women's alliance and then technically like going to vote out and voting out one woman going to vote out two women um but it wasn't about the women's alliance like she had connections to she had connections to the allies or it's on the depth, to Genevieve. So she, I've finished that sentence now. So she, I think, did well with that and is a big part of, not necessarily why Labo made this decision, but is working really well as Tuku and Labo now. And even when they do eventually come for Tuku,

it won't be her, you know? And I don't think her name is really ever mentioned in that. So I think that connection is good. So those are my points. And that means that Sol is in the front. 18 points. Genevieve now on 15.

Sam's on 11. Teenie's on nine. Sue is on nine. Andy is on nine. Rome left on seven. Caroline's on seven now. Rachel's now on four. Kyle's on three.

Gabe, two. Tiana, one. And Asia, one. Did I miss anyone out? I think that's it yeah what i see on the chart great well i know i'm just reading it's hard to do math in the moment this isn't the math i like to do i like to do math around a revote structure that doesn't exist and that's it that feels like a long time ago it's a fun podcast taryn thank you for receiving

my neuroses listen i that's what I'm here for. Do you? Is it? Thank you. That means a lot. That really does mean a lot. Do you have, tell the people. Oh, we had a question, actually.

I think I've answered this before. Logan Ledger asked, what's your dream auction item? I mean, the mac and cheese, pretty good. I agree. Love that. But Tini said that she hated it and it was like too hot and it was like too hot feeling yeah i'm feeling yeah i feel like there's a there's a the solution to that and it's one solution for two problems which is just like let it eat it slower just

eat it slower yeah yeah it feels like a year problem maybe teeny maybe they're not allowed to like take it with them probably yeah um no you definitely aren't allowed to that's actually what's a big plot point because i was out of africa you can't take the stuff but like teeny got the mac and cheese early so you have a lot of time to eat um mac and cheese would be good i really like the breakfast i wouldn't eat grubs for breakfast it was also a lot of meat um but i like a good breakfast would be my go-to. I also wanted to complain about this. Thank God. I almost left the podcast while I was complaining. I said it last season with Liz, but they really, they should,

they should just cater to the contestants' dietary requirements. I really like, it's, imagine if it was like a religious or cultural thing, like an Australian survivor. I know that they cater to the, to the dietary requirements. Like give them, give every single option a veggie option like it's not fair I don't think as a vegetarian I didn't feel good about Kyle having to betray his morality in a way that could make him even feel sick like for something he learned and like yes he should have gone for the mac and cheese but also they all have different amounts of money and it's not actually a bidding war so when he gets

to the his like designated item because he has a certain amount of money and it's that item on the list like i think there should be a veggie option for him that i wanted yeah i know i said that with liz like she has intolerances catered for her at reward yeah have you i mean have you uh thought about this margarita curse yes it well twice is that a curse i i i was seeing that it's like this is the fourth time the fourth time isn't it kelly and then sierra who were the other people who drank a margarita and then went home um oh i have to go look now um i swear i was i was seeing that uh that there were a bunch uh hold on let me is it that they drink their margarita in that episode

or they've ever drunk a margarita I think it's let me look so I'm seeing Kageyan who was it? Jeffra oh my god and then then Jen? Jen?

In what was a pod? Where are you seeing this? Are you like reading through a list of auction items? Oh, okay. That would be a crazy reason for someone to go home. Like we just talked through Sierra as an auction. The person I read said this is literally the last last four survivor auctions it's been this way that they've all got the margarita and then they went home that episode yeah i don't know how

accurate that is but like that's bizarre potentially correct wow no one well the thing is that they will bid on it because it'll be covered and also that'll be their time to spend their money because it's not an auction but they're gonna be like oh no do you think that if you just like pour it out and don't drink it that would be enough maybe yeah i think they all they all drank some so i think that probably only counts for when they had a margarita as a prize the last four times a margarita was a prize the first margarita went out that's crazy it's always been a woman well there you go i mean who should be really getting the hate the margaritas yeah so i mean wow i thought that all this sojourney doesn't work it's bad it's not good i yeah i thought

that there was reasons that sierra would be like a logical target but i didn't realize it was just that her fate was just tied up in that maybe it like throws you off your game a little bit you know because you're a little bit drunk i didn't think about that no food you know is she so is she the only one who had anything alcoholic at the auction probably i think maybe it's that but we said well last week you said it was good to be drunk because like teeny was drunk um at murgatory and then we felt like teeny to andy could just be like oh so drunk i don't know what happened i'm sorry but then you don't think about then you get a little too drunk and now you got voted out you're like where am i and next thing you wake up at ponderosa you're like how did i get here yeah maybe that's so that's what it is that is that's probably it is. That is, that's probably it. Yeah.

Okay. Well, now we know this was great. Taryn, tell the people where to find you and what you're doing, you know, like, do they just like power you down during the off season or. Listen,

find me on Twitch. I'm watching survivor live when it airs. So what you can do is you can be watching it yourself. You can find me over on Twitch. You can have me on as well and i'm basically doing live commentary in the moment uh doing some of this analysis that you're hearing now uh and just reacting in general and we have chats during the commercial breaks and there's a big uh community that's chatting alongside the whole thing so it's it's a fun

time come and hang out yeah that does sound extremely fun well i'm just talking about it on survivor global every week next week my guest is ferris we're going to talk about about all of this see how soul handles the fallout the soul out no the puns are not punning today um i think i'm just too rattled from the revert thing and that's it follow me subscribe this has all been on youtube what's the point of saying it the at saying it at the end of the video every week we're on youtube come watch us on youtube you would have seen briefly my incredibly sweet but annoying cat uh and that's it this has been great thank you taryn thank you to everyone behind the scenes yes no this is this is always a seasonal favorite i mean really enjoy it every time so thank you thank you to the team thank you to everyone for listening and And I will see you next time.

Bye. One million pounds. One million pounds.