it would have been awesome if sean's quitting speech was just to trick sifu

It really blows my mind that the team who goes to tribal first after the switch up never seems to take into account something very vital: that if you vote out one of your own at that first vote (like the women were going to do to Sifu tonight) that you run a huge risk of communicating to your original tribe mates on the other tribes that the loyalty is dead, and they’ll feel like they have a green light for it to be a free for all. And then come merge, you’ll have no clue where you stand.



I honestly think it’s a major leak to vote out one of your original tribe mates in this situation. It shows a major lack of foresight.
The only exception would be if you have the opportunity to get rid of someone from your original tribe that is already agreed upon by everyone from your original tribe was the person who definitely needed to go, either because of trust issues or tribe chemistry.

The second quit really took the wind out of the sails of what has been a fantastic season so far.

Never been harder to call a winner as 90 minutes has meant almost everyone has been given reasonable content. But if I had to guess where we are currently
Contenders
1) Dee
2) Kellee
3) Emily

Middle fodder
4) Julie
5) Austin
6) Bruce
7) Jake
8) Kendra
9) Drew
10) Kaleb

Drawing slim

11) Brando
12) J Maya
13) Sifu
14) Katurah

Yeah this is a great point but I get the sense many players are often trying to break free from the original tribe dynamics. You could just see J Maya had been waiting to have an ally like Sean and it energized her to think she could finally pick her own ally. She obviously already realized she was not ever going to work with Sifu to go far.

I also just saw a tweet from Katurah showing a GIF of her reaction to everyone finding out Sabiyah had been voted out and she was tweeting that she was disappointed because she knew she wanted to work with Sabiyah once a merged happened.

Seems like people want the choice of working with their own allies instead of having to trust people they don't really trust yet just because they were originally placed with them.

In Jeff's interview, he said this is the reason they actually had a vote this time (compared to Hannah). There was nothing that previously indicated Sean was going to quit, and he and production did consider that it might all just be a ruse.

Ironically, that decision to still have a vote will be impactful in the game because of Dee still voting for Sifu; he knows all isn't well with his place in the tribe, and he doesn't seem like the type to go back to camp and say "ha ha cool one guys, you got me, good move, no hard feelings it's just a game".

No kidding.

Was anyone unclear on that?

does everyone go to ponderosa or just jury? or is there 2 ponderosas?

There are plenty of lodging accomodations. But for the pre-jury players, they will send them on a trip so they're not sitting in Fiji

Casting is a disaster

https://survivor.fandom.com/wiki/Ponderosa

Google is your friend

I disagree, just pretend that Dee had a little bit more common sense and sided with Mama J that getting Sean now, Sifu next is the obvious play. I actually decently liked Sean as a player but the second he talked about quitting I was "meh, okay. I guess the order just changes". No big deal.

Also, imagine being married to someone this clingy that they give up a once in a lifetime experience just so they can spend like 14 (?) more days with you. Them watching the show together afterwards where he makes it very far is so much more valuable to both of them.

Sifu had to know he's next already, even without this 1 vote at tribal. He may be a dud but he can't be THAT dense. (I'm assuming they lose at least 1 more challenge before merge, that tribe is weak as hell)

I think it depends on which girl you are, J Maya doesn't know that Sifu does not have the idol (whereas the other two women know he doesn't) so the threat of him idolling a woman out is real come the next round. Also she seemed to have a genuinely close bond with Sean, and she's actually on the outs with the other two, so I think he'd be more valuable to have around to potentially cause a tie.

Otherwise, I used to be a fan of the "always be throwing" idea but now, not at all. Too many variables with the idols/twists. I'd rather coast on a winning tribe for a bit, because it's so nuts.

I still think for J Maya it was correct to fold and flip her vote to Sean in the end, for a few reasons;

1) He may still quit the next day, leaving you a tribe of 3, all women and you and Julie probably the physically 'weakest' left so very good chance of ending up back at tribal.
2) Leaving Sifu in gives you a better chance of winning the next immunity than Sean in even if he doesn't quit
3) Even if they end up going back to tribal again pre merge Sifu may just not have an idol and can throw a clean 3-1 vote onto him
4) Even if they end up going back to tribal again pre merge Sifu may be conned to not play any idol he has
5) Even if they end up going back to tribal again pre merge and Sifu plays an idol there is only (a all other things being equal) 33% chance he's idolling you out


Of course this could all be a moot point as in reality I wouldn't be at all surprised if Julie and Dee end up just flipping the next vote onto J Maya anyways.

I think about families, not unlike my own, where kids are seeing what Hannah and Sean have done and parents trying to explain this is not the way you should approach challenges and hardships encountered in life. It really does drive home how many snowflakes there are in today's world, and how lousy a job casting did of sniffing this out. Or maybe they saw that those two were "weak" and figured that would be a beneficial show dynamic?

Dunno why the girls were so convinced that Sifu had the idol when they know Austin has their tribes one

Do respect Jake a lot. Should be inspiring for all the fatties who don't want to put the work in

At least noone quit tonight

How would you feel about being in an alliance with Emily when she's going to immediately confront everyone about everything that is said in confidence? She's obviously for full transparency in the alliance. Who is down with that?

Of course Homer Simpson wanted a sandwich. But in this case, I think that was a good idea. Useless advantage that requires cooperation of others and incentivizes others to vote you out, or sandwich. Easy choice. Overall, great job, Austin, this episode.

Anyone else thinking, be careful, Bruce, during the challenge? I noticed he turned sideways when descending the platforms. Solid adjustment.

I get that Bruce is annoying, but isn't Katurah unhealthily fixated on him? To the point she might not be as adaptable and open to all possibilities as she should be? She might think about Bruce more than Bruce himself...which seems a tall task.

Definitely sandwich.

J maya is a level 1 thinker.

Man this episode really highlighted how many gamebots are on this season lol. None of them except maybe Austin are interesting either. Give me Emily, Jake, Kendra, Bruce, Sifu all day.

Brando might have been the biggest gamebot of all of them so no great loss. He should have used Drew turning down an alliance with him as ammo to try and pull in Emily but instead he tried to bargain again with Drew and that was silly.

I'd be a bit nervous but I think for a UTR player that is mostly going to play an honest game to a certain point it would probably still work for them to have her around.

Bruce is Katerah's white whale as the great Fishbach once said about Joe...but there's always other white whales as the great Jeremy (and yourself) just said. You always need options in this game

Fischbach and Joe is also who I thought about. I predict they go back to back with Katurah going first.

Brando was the most boring castmember so no big loss. Thought he was playing reasonably well but Drew is better in confessionals and seems better at the game so I'm glad he survived.

Austin & Kaleb are playing the best active games at the moment. I'm sure they'll be cut at around 7th or 8th. Tallest blade of grass and all