Survivor – Espada is over a barrel

After last week’s Shannon drama, this week’s episode was kind of dull, but we can certainly see trouble brewing with NaOnka. In fact, she is the one player in the game right now that I downright dislike because of the way she talks to — and about — people and by her actions. Knocking Kelly B. out of the way to grab the hidden immunity idol clue was really unnecessary and I’m glad she had no clue as to how to decipher it. Maybe Kelly B. will just trip over it and find it.

While not a lot was happening at La Flor, Espada began to see some tribal dynamics at work. Marty was kind of coerced into revealing he had found the hidden immunity idol and the whole tribe cheered and said that would make them stronger come the merge. I don’t know the wisdom of revealing something so major at this point. It certainly is a double-edged sword. There are pros and cons to keeping it quiet, because holding on to it will only make the others question your loyalty for not getting it out in the open sooner rather than later. But telling everyone you have it basically keeps you safe. Who’s going to cast a vote for the guy with the immunity idol unless they just want to get rid of it? If history holds true, though, once the idol has been played, another one will be hidden to take its place. Marty needs to keep that in mind now that he’s pretty much overthrown the tribe’s leader. It won’t take long for the peasants to revolt once the new leader starts abusing his power.

Of course, Esapda may not have even had to worry about such things if they had performed better in the challenge. After using the Medallion of Power last week to give them an advantage, Espada was on their own this week, and La Flor was pretty sure they didn’t need the advantage the Medallion offered. Has no one learned yet that cockiness is generally the undoing of a tribe during a challenge? They almost learned it this week, as Espada took a commanding lead over La Flor. But too much reliance on Jimmy Johnson as the tribe’s coach, and his reluctance to take Tyrone out of the challenge after he missed more than a few tosses was their downfall. Jimmy T. was begging to swap out with Tyrone but neither of them would give him a chance. Tyrone would have been my target for elimination but Jimmy J. took every opportunity — including this week’s Tribal Council — to say he was one of the weakest players so he got the boot.  Don’t pick Tribal to call out your own weakness!

I think Esapda made a huge mistake by getting rid of Jimmy J. this week, especially after all of the observations on Danny’s weakened condition. “Delusional, party of one Danny” believes he is a stronger player than Jimmy J., yet he can barely move! And Espada kept him around because he’s not a threat. Marty needs to get a grip on his paranoia, because he single-handedly got Jimmy J. voted off the island. It’s never made sense to me when tribes vote out their stronger players this early in the game, and keeping Danny around for physical challenges is not going to help Espada one bit. I like Marty, and he has the potential to be a really great player but I fear he’s going to turn into Russell Hantz and start bullying his tribe mates into doing all of his dirty work, and in the end that will not win him a million dollars.

“Coming back to camp after Tribal Council was so fake, faker than faux fur.” – NaOnka

“I’m strong as any of the women, even though they’re built like … some of them are built like mooses.” – Danny

Clacked by Chuck Duncan
on Sep 29, 2010 @ 22:54 EST5EDT