Welcome to Season 45’s Next Time On Survivor weekly feature on the Inside Survivor site! If you’re new around here, I’m Steph from sunny, tropical, humid Singapore. This is a tiny space where I give my best attempts at understanding preview trailers and make my predictions for the show’s next episodes.
Episode 8’s NTOS trailer starts by teasing a women’s alliance, with Emily, Katurah, Julie, Dee, Kendra, and Kellie huddled in the camp’s shelter. They could very well “take out some guys,” as Kendra mentions, as the six women make up the majority of the ten remaining players of Season 45. However, as much as I want to see a successful women’s alliance, it feels rather idealistic to see these six very different, logical, strategic women come together.
For starters, Emily blindsided Kendra to vote Brando out just a few votes ago, causing Kendra to declare that she wanted to take revenge on Emily. I think there’ll be a quick agreement to move forward as an alliance of women, but it won’t be a priority for anyone. Realistically, I think the four remaining Reba players — Dee, Austin, Julie, and Drew —will want to get Belo numbers down first for their own safety. Perhaps after that, Julie and Dee will consider working with the other Belo women.
The next portion of the NTOS trailer shows Jake finding an advantage, or at least a clue to an advantage, in a tree. In the last episode, he wanted to keep Kaleb around but ended up being blindsided by Katurah, who flipped on Belo. His scramble to find an advantage is very understandable and expected; on paper, he’s at the bottom of the tribe, as the only one who voted against majority numbers.
However, his hunt is not unnoticed by others. Julie says to Dee and Katurah, “Is he idol searching?” This will definitely increase his target at the next vote. But as Jake says, “If I’m going out of this game, I’m going out swinging.” He has to try saving himself rather than waiting around and inevitably getting picked off.
The trailer also previews a return of the Survivor Auction. Usually, there’ll be a variety of food items, some trap items, and advantages hidden. However, with Jeff saying, “Let’s birth a new auction,” I can’t help but speculate that there’s going to be a new era twist layered on the classic feature.
Perhaps, like the rest of the season, there’s going to be much more advantages up for grabs that players can bid for. In any case, it’s been a long while since we last saw the auction on Survivor, and I’m excited to see how competitive the players of Season 45 will get.
Moving on to the immunity challenge, we see Jeff stabbing a bag, and rice starting to flow out of it. Sometime around this point of the season, Jeff usually asks for players to sit out of the individual immunity challenge to earn rice for their tribe. Now it seems like he’s putting a time pressure on the players to make the decision; the longer they deliberate, the lesser rice they’ll receive.
Since this comes after the auction, where some players will have bid for food, I predict that the tribe will collectively forge the rice and compete in the challenge instead.
Finally, I predict that the vote in the next episode will be split between Jake and Bruce. As mentioned, Jake is on the outs after the last episode; he voted for Julie and campaigned to disarm Dee. I think Bruce will also receive some votes, as he’s been deemed as difficult to work with by a few players, even from his Belo alliance.
In the last episode, Katurah flipped on Belo after finding out she wasn’t let in on Bruce finding Lulu’s idol. Now, with the band-aid ripped off, she can be even more open about voting Bruce out without needing to hedge around Belo-strong alliances.
I think Reba will be willing to vote for Bruce, especially to get rid of his idol. In particular, for Dee and Julie, splitting the votes between Bruce and Jake will keep the hopes of a women’s alliance up while protecting their Reba alliance with Drew, Austin, and Emily. Ultimately, if I had to choose one person, I think it’s time for Bruce to go as the outcome of the last episode’s tribal council points towards the fast-incoming climax and conclusion to the Katurah-Bruce rivalry.
What do you think is going to happen in Episode 8? Leave your predictions in the comments!
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Hope Bruce is voted out
Hmm while I would like to see Bruce go he does have an idol and he’d either have to be really stupid or really brave to not play it at this next tribal. And after last weeks tribal I don’t think there will be enough votes to split. Jake won’t go for a split obviously. I don’t think Kellie will be as eager to vote out Bruce anymore after losing Kaleb as a replacement for him in the alliance. Kendra might be swayed. So I think that Bruce will play his idol but only negate a vote from Katurah while Reba 4 plus Emily will vote for Kenda and she will go home. While Jake (with a necklace), Bruce, Kellie and Kendra will vote for Dee.
If Kendra does get swayed I think it will be 4 votes Bruce(Katurah, Kendra, Dee, Julie) 3 votes Kendra(Emily, Austin, Drew) 3 votes Dee (Jake, Bruce, Kellie). Bruce Idols up and Kendra leaves on the revote
U are forgetting that Bruce has an idol I hope he uses it and so does Jake so one of the women get blindsided like Katurah or Kendra.. what do u think. I hope they use them.
I see Hanna quit being extremely disappointeing