Survivor retro rewatch: Gabon episode 3, “It Was Like Christmas Morning!”

Another episode of Survivor Gabon where Fang has to make key decisions, and yet another case of them sealing their own fate.

The winds of change are coming. With the producers intent on not letting Fang have any nice things, the two challenge wins in a row from the previous episode had to be remedied with swift Survivor Gabon justice. That, or they had planned to switch up the tribes after three eliminations anyway. Whatever floats your raft!

Either way, we begin episode three with everyone gathering around the fire and wondering why Kelly decided to stick with Paloma and try to vote out Ace. The Kota majority don’t trust Ace, but this knock-off Bond villain is intent on throwing her “into the slaughter” as his next victim right before the opening credits. Editing translation; he’s probably not going to do this.

Fang, even in victory, is miserable. Randy does his Randy thing even when he’s talking logically, smack talking his dumb tribe for eating too much rice nine days in. The fact they were eating three square meals of rice a day, let alone the fact that this is the second time he’s tried to get them to stop eating so much rice speaks to just how unprepared most of Fang was for the game of Survivor.

While Kota aligns their ducks in a row and a Fang Four alliance starts to form, CBS throws that inevitable wrench. Now the tribes have to rank themselves in terms of tribe importance, with “1” being the most important. Fang ranks themselves from Matty, Dan, Randy, Crystal, Ken, G.C. and Susie, while Kota sees Marcus as most important, followed by Ace, Bob, Charlie, Jacquie, Corinne, Sugar and Kelly.

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Of course, Jeff Probst isn’t running a popularity contest; he’s finding some obscure way to make a tribe swap interesting. In a twist of fate, only the most important members of their tribes were confirmed for their tribe, with Matty staying on Fang and Marcus on Kota. The rest of the teams were decided in snake fashion, with the new member picking the newest member of a tribe in an alternating format.

This led to some pedestrian and interesting tribe choices for Fang, which would now look like this; Matty, Ace, Crystal, Jacquie, Ken, Kelly and G.C. Crystal choosing Jacquie and Ken picking Kelly basically “because she’s hot” really exemplified just how not dialed in Fang was in determining tribe strength.

Of course, the most hilarious part of any Exile Island season is learning which player would become the ongoing target of exile. Survivor Gabon would try to make Sugar have a hard time, but with the idol in hand, she could pick the Comfort jar and have a relaxing Sugar Shack time for days on end. This crucial isolation of Sugar is a double-edged sword that would make her become an interesting vote dynamic, but for now, time to relax!

Back to the game, members of each tribe in the minority had differing strategies to establish value. You can tell how old school a season really is by how that is approached, and with Susie trying to continuously work on the camp to appeal as a hard work shows her lack of strategic depth. Kelly appealed as a turncoat, showing just how spurned she was at Kota and how willing she is to be a voting number.

Of course, it wouldn’t matter for too long, as Fang had to enter another Immunity Challenge. This was a cool adaptation of water polo, with players on rafts using paddles as both maneuvering tools and to pick up a ball and shoot it into the opposing net.

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Fang was dead in the water from the start, as their strongest player, Matty, couldn’t take on a whole team of competent Kota members. Marcus would get the ball off the scrum, someone would pass it up to Randy near the goal, Ace would miss a save, and Kota would score. Meanwhile, Kelly, Ken and Crystal were barely able to float in place as Kota 3-0’d fairly easy on their way to a win.

Remember how Kelly was talking trash about her old tribe to appeal to her new one? That’s the one correct move she could have played at that moment, and it helped solidify a voting bloc to get Jacquie out. Why not take out a strong member of the opposing alliance like Ace, especially if the fear is that Sugar will share a Hidden Immunity Idol with him if she comes back?

It’d be too simple an answer for Fang, a tribe that constantly gets caught up in the near future and doesn’t look ahead. After a whole lot of Jacquie crying about how it’s not fair Fang keeps Kelly because she sucks more than her (even though Survivor is all about loyalty), it was Ace’s turn to be on the outs of a vote as Jacquie was sent home.

Would this put Ace finally on the chopping block? Would Fang win an Immunity Challenge ever again? Would Randy continue to be the shining beacon of smarmy negativity among a sea of characters with nothing to say?

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Tune in next time for an exciting episode of Survivor Gabon, with Fang trying to find one of their team members who hides minutes before a challenge. What hijinx!