Survivor Micronesia, the art of the romantic alliance, and how not to have one

Not one, not two, but three separate couples got the spotlight at one point or another in Survivor: Micronesia. One did not last that long.

Things continued to not go well for Airai on day 4 thanks to the lack of fire, a decent shelter, and water. Yes, despite having flint. It was like the Cook Islands tiebreaker all over again, but without Jeff Probst to sadly hand them matches. The infamous generational gap took the form of a work ethic debate, and Chet, Tracy, and Kathy had to build a shelter for themselves because they didn’t fit in. It took them a while, but they did get a fire going.

Six players kicked off a separate game … the game of love. We talked about James/Parvati and Amanda/Ozzy a bit already (though production broke out hilarious tracks for the Amanda/Ozzy scenes; Cirie named this episode, “The Sounds of Jungle Love”, for them). But two fans, Mikey B and Mary, also started flirting, and of course Joel commented on how obvious it was.

At some point, one has to remember that these are real people who are presumably experiencing actual attraction and deciding to act on it. And hey, Boston Rob and Amber are still married. Still doesn’t make it any less weird for audience members … or other players, like Cirie and Jonathan, who actually bonded a bit over the shared awkwardness.

Airai applauded Malakal for getting Jonny Fairplay out. The fans did not get another chance to applaud in front of Probst, though, because they lost the immunity/reward challenge, which was a variant of a Cook Islands challenge: the break boxes open to get a key, then do a puzzle. The fans did not start the puzzle. In short, the favorites put fishing gear in Ozzy’s hands, sent Kathy to Exile Island, and then had to send Cirie to Exile in a Survivor twist.

Kathy and Cirie had to wander all over the Exile area to find clues, but didn’t actually find the idol. Despite that, the fans started overthinking the idol politics when they had to decide whom to vote for. More accurately, Mikey overthought it, and then everyone else started thinking about breaking up the showmance as payback.

The Mikey/Mary romance was basically killed off before it began. Of course, the votes went all over the place, thanks to the Mikey B plan, but Mary had six votes to Chet and Tracy’s two apiece.

Next: Survivor Gabon: The 5 best moments

Normally, those sorts of infatuations last a bit longer on Survivor, but remember: these are the fans. This tendency to overthink and overestimate what’s going down is going to be a trend as we continue diving deep into Survivor Micronesia.