After back-to-back heavy losses and a couple of flips, the once-dominant Uli alliance is at the bottom with only Savannah, Soph, and Rizo remaining against a loose coalition of seven outcasts who’ve teamed up to take control. And once they return to the freshly named Lewatu Tribe, it’s damage control time. Soph tries getting in good with Steven after putting his name down, and she realizes Savannah and Rizo’s combined threat levels are no longer an anchor for her, but an albatross around her neck. So it’s time to cut ties and jump ship.
Meanwhile, cracks are already forming in the new majority. MC was hiding some details about her idol and whether she’d play it or not, so Jawan’s not sure she’s a long-term ally anymore. But for now, it’s Savannah and Rizo in the firing line, even though Rizo still has an idol that everyone knows about. Being on the bottom brings some opportunities to become a useful pawn, though, so Rizo sees the bright side and pledges to play a more fluid game while Savannah’s just grateful to have survived a boot that could’ve been her own.
The next morning, while Sophie applies her makeup skills to painting the tribe’s new flag, idol hunting is afoot with MC’s idol back in the wild. The name of the game is clear: make sure the old Uli alliance doesn’t find it, no matter who else gets it. And into Kristina’s pocket it goes, no catches or stipulations aside from Steven and Alex seeing her find it. Now this whole crew is armed, deadly, and gunning for Savannah with the Bottoms Up alliance running the show behind the curtain. Yep, the target is locked on Savannah. Jawan’s terrified of her gunning for him in return, and Sage is annoyed with her attitude and swings Soph away from her control.
Savannah’s annoyed right back, fed up with Sage presenting herself as a victim while Savannah’s totally powerless. It takes her back to her old job, where she was an outcast in the news business, forced to put on a smile for the camera while her co-workers avoided her off-screen and openly talked smack within earshot. The stress got so bad that it took a physical toll on her reproductive health, and now she’s right back in a stressful environment, dealing with those feelings again. But she’s been through some serious hurdles and emerged as a strong woman, so she knows how to lock in and get it done.
But just when the game seems to shift by the players’ hands, production steps in to twist it up themselves unfortunately. Split into two groups of five, the winning group takes immunity and avoids Tribal in favor of a sandwich feast, while the losers head to Tribal. Additionally, the longest-lasting player gets an advantage. Not the worst variant of the twist, but like… did we need to do this? Especially when the game finally got interesting? Complaints aside, it’s MC, Sage, Sophie, Jawan, and Rizo versus Alex, Savannah, Soph, Kristina, and Steven. Savannah locks in as promised and wins immunity and reward for her group, along with an advantage to be revealed later.
On Loser Beach, Rizo’s on the bottom with an idol to guarantee his survival. Sophie’s willing to put her game on the line to blindside him, though, but it might be a tough sell. Jawan makes the pitch as such: MC broke trust with him, but Sophie’s the biggest challenge threat on the board, so Sophie’s gotta go before anyone else (except Rizo, obviously). But Sophie’s scheming up something else behind the scenes: throwing a hinky vote on Jawan just in case Rizo saves himself and puts her name down.
MC’s her accomplice here for this devious plan, but this accomplice is already going rogue. To make up for the idol mishap, she leaks Sophie’s plan to Jawan immediately after, elevating Sophie’s threat level through the roof and destroying her already lackluster social capital. And with all that info, Jawan starts thinking about new plans, tells Sage he wants Sophie out instead of Rizo, Sage goes and tells Sophie, and now Sophie doesn’t trust MC and starts her apology tour with Jawan. What a mess.
Back at the merge beach, the winners chow down and debate who’s going home tonight. Rizo might have the sole vote, and Sophie’s probably doomed after all her challenge dominance. Not a lot of options, really. But when Savannah finds her advantage, it’s yet another wrinkle to this twist. She will join the losing group at their camp, have all the conversations she wants, head to Tribal with them fully immune, and then either cast a vote for someone or secretly bank that vote for another day as an Extra Vote. She’s the Grim Reaper coming to cause chaos, and it starts with linking up with Rizo to plot against the rest.
Excitement gets to Rizo, who dreams of saving his idol, Savannah getting an extra vote, and sending Sophie to the jury… or maybe they vote MC out instead! Sophie’s the big comp threat here, but getting rid of her now would be pointless. Anyone can win a challenge, and Sophie can’t win everything when she’s already lost to Savannah today. MC has so many connections, but Sophie has nobody. She’d be the perfect ally moving forward! Too bad Sophie doesn’t want to hear about it, because Rizo’s in no position to call shots from the bottom. But hey, it’s better than going home in 10th place, so she might as well look into this MC plan and see what happens.
With all these little twists, the debate comes down to sticking to Rizo as the vote and hoping he loses the game of chicken with his idol, taking out Sophie to open up the game in challenges, or surprisingly booting MC to remove a stealth threat who’s proven she can’t be trusted. All with their own pros and cons for everyone involved. When the pitches are finally laid out at Tribal, MC goes rogue and starts a live Tribal in an attempt to assure her safety, and nobody really wants to rope Sophie in on much of these plans. In the end, Savannah banks her Extra Vote for another day, Rizo holds onto his idol, and MC is voted out unanimously as Sophie escapes elimination by a hair.
Despite the less-than-desirable twist mucking up the game, it actually paid off to create a fun episode and a fun outcome. Sophie played her ass off and almost got bit for it, Rizo and Savannah worked from the bottom to find new power for the night and beyond, and Rizo can credit himself for this MC move being his own, done while on the bottom with an idol he didn’t even need to play.
Does this mean Sophie is now part of their little underdog squad? Maybe, maybe not. She’s proven she’s capable of flipping on a dime to save herself, so she might just leave next week without much fanfare if nobody wants to take her past another round. But hey, that’s like three interesting votes in a row compared to the zero we had early on, so the season is legitimately looking up. It won’t reach the heights of great seasons with a pre-merge that boring, but with how utterly rough that start was, just ending as a “good enough” season to tide us over for Season 50 is a victory.
Written by