With the relationships after the tribe swap starting to settle in, the castaways of Survivor SA Island of Secrets are starting to play a more complex game.
Although last week’s episode of Survivor SA: Island of Secrets switched up the original tribes, Day 1 loyalties didn’t appear to change. That lead to a predictable vote out. Now that the cast has time to settle in their tribes, will this be the time when gameplay begins to shine?
The Lamuei tribe returned to camp after voting out Rose-Lee with a grateful and determined Durão. Although his best bet is for his tribe to win immunity, he’s still holding out hope he can make a move with Jacques.
The Reward Challenge
Wasting no time at all, we go straight from the intro into a memory-matching Reward Challenge. The winning tribe will be taken to a Bio-Strath smoothie bar where the players will enjoy, you guessed it, smoothies, along with fresh fruit. The runner-up will receive a fruit platter and a bottle of Bio-Strath.
Oddly enough, the bromance duo is reunited as Rob and Nathan sat out. Seipei got the first match for Laumei. The tribes then began trading matches leading to a three-way tie with the next pair winning the challenge. Laumei picked incorrectly, giving Ta’alo the perfect opportunity and they took advantage by winning the first place reward.
After Geoffrey chose another incorrect pair, Seipei finished it off by getting Laumei the runner-up reward. Throughout this entire challenge, Rob and Nathan were strategizing and comparing notes. Nathan concluded that he might as well throw the Immunity Challenge to vote out Mike or Geoffrey, and Rob was on the same page. This time, Rob wisely sat back and allowed his other tribe members to select the player to ship to the Island of Secrets, and Rocco picked Geoffrey.
While most the Ta’alo members were so engaged with socializing and enjoying their reward, Meryl spotted a special package fixed in the roof of the smoothie bar. She just couldn’t find the perfect opportunity to grab it herself, so she told Dante and created a realistic distraction that allowed him to snatch it without anyone noticing!
At Laumei, Seipei continued to play the mom role, while Jacques took the initiative in trying to bring in Durão, with Felix as a possible target.
We next see Geoffrey face a dilemma on the Island of Secrets, to choose either a jar of candies for himself or dry firewood for his tribe. He wisely took the sweets as you can find firewood any time you want, that’s the classic Survivor chore.
When he returned to his tribe, Geoffrey told them his options and brilliantly added another choice: that he turned down a secret advantage. After piquing his tribe’s curiosity, he brought back the nearly full jar of candies to share with everyone. That was some smart, savvy play by Geoffrey.
At Ta’alo, Meryl and Dante opened up their package and found out that it was a clue to an idol hidden at the Immunity Challenge. Approaching the challenge, Nathan suggested the idea to Steffi of throwing it to vote out Mmaba. Steffi was clearly not digging it, so Nathan thought of a convincing reason to have her be the one to sit out the challenge.
The Immunity Challenge
The challenge was the usual set up of climbing a large platform to jump off and grab a bag. However, the final phase presented an interesting twist to a slide puzzle that required the pieces to get relayed through a few other slide stations. Ta’alo got off to a lead quickly grabbing their puzzle pieces and heading to the relay slide puzzle. Laumei was the second tribe to reach their puzzle, but Ta’alo had a sizable lead, while Sa’ula fell behind because of Mmaba’s struggles.
Meryl was able to solve the puzzle fairly quickly to win immunity for Ta’alo. That gave her plenty of time to grab her idol underneath the puzzle table, awkwardly finding a place to hide it, but did anyone see her?
The challenge dragged on as Jacques could not finish the puzzle for the life of him even though he’s been known as a puzzle master. This pissed Felix off and he went on and on criticizing Jacques’ efforts. In spite of Nathan’s attempts to throw the challenge, Laumei performed so poorly that he eventually ended up solving the puzzle with his tribe’s help after nearly two hours!
Even as the challenge went on, Dante was convinced that some people noticed Meryl’s idol discovery. She decided to reveal her idol to the entire tribe to avoid there being any suspicion. Needless to say, even Rob who always talks about loyalty was shocked at Meryl’s decision.
When Laumei returned to their camp, Felix was super annoyed with Jacques. However, all of the other tribe members were disappointed with Felix’s attitude. Seipei did a great job of cementing that target onto Felix. Durão wanted to make the Felix blindside even more brutal by showing him his fake idol, but he lost it swimming in the ocean.
At Tribal Council, the charade continued, and Felix sounded convinced that Durão was getting his torch snuffed. After the votes were read Felix was surprised but left a lot calmer than I thought he would. The looks on everyone’s faces were priceless, finally getting to smile and relax after pulling off a perfectly crafted blindside.
I have to say that this is by far my favorite episode and Tribal Council of the season so far. The players are thinking past basic loyalties and are starting to form strategic relationships. Plus, the Immunity Challenge was thoroughly entertaining, and this cast of characters is beginning to hit its stride. Looking forward to watching the drama continue next week.