Welcome to Season 43’s Next Time On Survivor feature on the Inside Survivor site! It’s a tiny space on the internet where I look at episode preview trailers, attempt to decipher them, and give my thoughts on what I think may happen in the upcoming episode.
One particular player stands out during this week’s preview — and that’s our favourite AlliGabler. In a night scene, he tells Owen, “I’ve got a plan to get to the Final 3,” followed by a confessional saying, “I’m hiding in plain sight.” At first read, it’s easy to assume that Gabler’s Final 3 refers to Owen, Sami, and himself, the three Baka tribemates who have been together since Day One. However, though they were closely associated together before, they seem to have drifted in recent episodes.
Sami has been deemed as playing all sides, and Owen seems to be just a passive number when he’s not the target. Meanwhile, Gabler sits more comfortably and consistently with the majority. I guess Gabler is proposing for him and Owen to work with another pair — Jesse and Cody, or Cassidy and Karla — and abandon Sami, whom they cannot count on.
Then, it’s convenient to pitch breaking up the obvious pairs to the opposing side. I predict Gabler is going to want to play the middle, not dissimilar to what Sami has been doing, “hiding in plain sight” while offering himself as a vote to the more established and prominent pairs of players left.
I think this also connects to something highlighted in Episode 10 — Gabler identified the Jesse and Cody pair to Karla right before tribal council. Although it did not amount to the eventual vote in that episode, I think it does set up the pair to be broken up very soon. Will Gabler be the one breaking them up? Time will tell, but I’m sure he’ll be able to get the buy-ins of the rest of the tribe, especially Karla, who looked really interested.
The next portion of the preview centres on a boat-mail arriving at camp, and the players immediately run off. The mail has to be a clue to an advantage, probably the idol nullifier that has yet to surface this season thus far. At final 7, there are three immunity idols in the game — one belongs to Karla, from the pre-merge Beware Advantage.
In Episode 10, Jesse mentioned that he highly suspects Karla has the idol as he heard she was collecting beads, the challenge laid out in the Beware Advantage. I think this information will be relevant to this episode, perhaps signalling Karla’s downfall getting outplayed by Jesse, misplaying the idol she has been keeping mum about.
The other two immunity idols are held by Jesse. One actually belongs to Cody (and I wonder why Cody hasn’t asked for it to be returned), and the second was originally Jeanine’s. As far as we know, the second idol’s whereabouts is still unknown to the rest of the tribe, as Jesse received it from Dwight just shortly before tribal council. With this in mind, my prediction is that Jesse (and Cody) will try to get Karla out in this episode before she can use her idol correctly.
Finally, the preview shows the upcoming challenge, which has players fighting hard to stay below the grill as the tides and waves rise above them. It’s a classic water challenge, and it’s refreshing to see it again instead of the usual land endurance challenges we’ve been having for individual challenges post-merge.
All in all, my prediction is that Karla will go home this week. I hate to see her leave, but I think her story has run its course, as the focus shifts onto the strategic games of other players such as Gabler and Jesse. My second guess would be Sami, as he’s seen by most of the tribe as untrustworthy and overplaying.
Leave your predictions in the comments.
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