It’s perhaps one of the most inconsequential moves of Survivor Ghost Island, but Angela allowing Wendell to switch fire-making spots embodies the season.
When you go on to play Survivor, there should be one goal in mind, to quote football coach Herm Edwards; “You play to win the game! You don’t play to just play it!” Of course, every player has a different idea of getting to the end, and only a few can adapt to the moving game and come out with a possible winning argument at the Final Tribal Council.
However, one of the main things to keep in mind is that whatever you do, making it to the end and pointing to some sort of resume makes for the best winning chances. In Survivor Ghost Island, Angela was drawing dead well into the Final Four. She was out on most votes, and her only strong hand to play at the Final Tribal Council was her one Immunity win.
Heading into the Final Four fire-making challenge, Wendell even noted how much he was afraid to take the “orange” fire-making station, and that the curse of orange became very real to him in Survivor Ghost Island. With Domenick having chosen Laurel to sit with him at the end, it was Angela sitting in the purple spot and Wendell sitting in his uncomfortable seat.
Even as Angela is about to sit down, he still pleads with Angela to sit in her purple spot, while she adamantly doesn’t care. Jeff Probst calls attention to it, confirms their interest/disinterest in their sitting location and gives them the option to switch spots.
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Angela agrees to swap to the jury’s dismay and disappointment, as Probst exclaims, “Wendell is petrified of orange, wants nothing to do with it, you (Angela) don’t care, yet both of you have the same thing at stake; a million dollars.” To my absolute dismay, Angela replies, “If it makes him feel better, I’m okay, because it doesn’t bother me.”
Survivor Ghost Island, in its entirety, has been a huge bummer. All the advantages in the world, all the tribe swaps and the constant reminders of the past mistakes have players have created a streamlined, semi-Pagonging game. Isolated incidents of players trying to wrest control of the game from Wendell and Domenick have been met with instant shutdown and elimination.
Angela has no winning game to speak of. Having an Immunity win doesn’t touch Domenick’s three, and she’s been on the outs virtually the entire game. She now has the opportunity to do something not even Dom has been able to do; take out Wendell, a titan of the game. Most importantly, she gets to argue that she earned her spot to the end over helping Dom and Wendell walk their way to the end.
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No matter what, I don’t think she has a shot of winning, but still, she has the chance to take out one of the greatest players of the game (and the eventual winner, even if she doesn’t know it). He’s shaken for the first time in the entire game. He’s tilted just at the idea of having to sit at an orange table. The last thing you want to do is to give anybody else an advantage in a game for a million dollars.
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By granting him an out he didn’t earn or didn’t deserve, Angela cements herself as one of the biggest disappointments in Survivor history. No matter how much she doesn’t care about superstition, no matter how much she thinks she won’t win regardless, you do not give a player with all the advantages and one-ups in Ghost Island another opportunity to feel superior.
Look, we can’t know if Angela would have won the challenge if she doesn’t budge, but what we do know is that Wendell deeply cares about it. The jury is physically emoting disgust to the idea of giving Wendell even the slightest advantage. Angela, despite the overwhelming evidence to suggest it’s not a good idea to give Wendell what he wants, gives Wendell what he wants.
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In Survivor, you play to win the game. Any step up, any leg up, anything to help secure that shot at a life-changing million dollars should be snapped up. Angela, for whatever reason, stopped playing to win the game at the last possible opportunity to do so.