Survivor: David vs. Goliath episode 13: Immunity/Reward Challenge

Once again on Survivor: David vs. Goliath, we have two classic challenge ideas brought back with the results highlighting that anyone can win immunity.

The Reward and Immunity Challenges from yesterday’s episode have two things in common. First, they have both been used in multiple seasons of Survivor, dating back to over 15 years ago. The other common denominator is that out of all people, Keith Nale has won both of them!

Let’s first take a look at the Reward Challenge. Each castaway is tied to a rope and has to maneuver up, down, and around an obstacle to free up more of it. When they think they got enough slack, they have to go under and over a few wooden posts to get to the sandbag throwing stage. The first person to knock off all their block with their sandbags wins reward. You can revisit this challenge in the video below.

Davie was the first person who thought they had enough rope and actually made it to the sandbag stage without having to grab more. He built a solid lead by knocking down nearly half of his blocks. The only problem is that he could only retrieve two of his bags since his rope didn’t allow him to go any further.

Alison got to the final stage next, but she couldn’t hit water from a boat. Then Angelina arrived but had to go back because she didn’t have enough rope. Kara had some good throws but didn’t have enough rope to retrieve her bags.

Nick was there soon after and had two great tosses. It then came down to a thrilling showdown between Nick and Davie who were just trying to knock off their last few blocks. Eventually, Davie nailed his final block and won a reward, which consisted of a trip away from camp to enjoy a full-on meal of their choice including surf and turf, sliders and fried chicken.

Reward Challenge Takeaways:

Davie’s decision to take Nick and Kara was completely strategic. Yes, Davie wanted Kara with him to talk about blindsiding Nick, but he realized that if he didn’t take his “closest friend” Nick, then everyone would be suspicious.

Although the challenge field is wide open, this reward proved that Davie and Nick are still the top two threats for challenges focused on physical ability. That bodes well for them if the next three challenges are geared to athletic ability. However, that usually isn’t the case during the modern age of Survivor. Now is the time for the balance and endurance challenges that force the castaways to stand in one place and move as little as possible.

Reward Challenge Rankings:

Creativity: 2/5

Difficulty: 2/5

Entertainment Value: 3.5/5

The Immunity Challenge brought back an exciting concept that has been featured in six other seasons of Survivor. It involves the castaways balancing a ball on a flat round disc while standing on a thin platform. At regular intervals, each person will add a ball, with the maximum being three. This classic challenge can be seen below.

Surprisingly all seven castaways lasted through the first stage, even with a little rain coming down. Balancing two balls greatly multiplied the difficulty, as both Kara and Angelina dropped fairly quickly, followed by Davie and Christian a few minutes later.

With just under a minute left before reaching the safety of adding another ball, Nick lost control and dropped the ball. It came down to Alison and Mike who were now tasked with balancing three balls! Both Mike and Alison’s balls were shifting back and forth, but it came to a point where Alison couldn’t keep them together, giving Mike his first Individual Immunity.

Immunity Challenge Takeaways:

This marks the seventh straight different person to win immunity. That is a Survivor record as no other season has seen seven unique castaways since the merge, win immunity in a row! This shocking fact shows that in a season where the big physical threats have been taken out early, anybody can win. Even Mike White who has been the first out of so many challenges can win the necklace!

With immunity being completely up for grabs, it may be unlikely to see someone go on a run to secure a spot at Final Tribal. However, there are only three immunities left and two until the fire challenge at the Final Four. Winning the necklace just once might be enough for a big threat like Nick or Davie to at least have their fate in their own hands in the fire challenge.

Immunity Challenge Rankings:

Creativity: 1/5

Difficulty: 3/5

Entertainment Value: 4/5