Survivor 14.12 "It's like a field trip for grown people!"

Four months later, and here I am, finishing up my review of Survivor: Um. Where the hell was it? Oh yeah, Fiji. It was a really good season, and deserves a better wrap up than I'm gonna give it, but life happened. I was preparing to move right as the season was ending, and you all know what a all-encompassing deal that can be. I am now sharing a beautiful 2 bedroom home on a lovely, peaceful tree-lined street, with my sister, who has always been more consistently employed, hence our nice digs. And we have central air. I have never in my life had central air--my parents don't have it, I had NO A/C during the 10 years I lived in LA, and only a swamp cooler for my first 2 and a half years in Sacramento, where triple-digit temperatures rule the summer! So anyway, I'm living large. Anyway, on to the review. If you're lost, go back and read the review of 14.11 that I wrote in May.

ALEX: "I AM THE DRAMA KING!"

Alex realizes that his last minute decision to vote against his last-remaining fellow Horseman, Mookie, saved him from elimination. Yay backstabbing! Earl is bent because Alex would have gone home if his alliance had all voted against Alex instead of doing a split vote between Mookie and Alex to protect them from the second Immunity Idol that ALex and Mookie could only have found had it been floating in the water-well with a bow around it. Earl is ticked because ALex is much more of threat to win Immunity (and sway people to his side, perhaps) than the bitter and now departed, Mookie. Stacy tries to make nice with former-friend Alex, which unnerves Earl, who dispatches Boo to break-up the gabfest. Alex continues to make grand pronouncements about his secret plans to dominate the game, odds be damned! Like in the morning, he tells us he's in "ninja mode," as he lies around looking defeated so he can eavesdrop. As a longtime reader of the "G.I Joe" comic series, I can assure you that real ninjas...er, well, comic-book ninjas, anyway, are a little more pro-active than THAT. I mean, Snake-Eyes would win individual Immunity, like, every single time, so he wouldn't need to mope around. Come to think about it, Storm Shadow would be PERFECT for Survivor, because he's constantly switching loyalties between the Joes and Cobra. Anyway, all that geekiness to say: Alex is no ninja. Elsewhere, Earl refers to Yau, Cassandra and the utterly untrustable Dreamz as his "core four," which strikes fear in the heart of everyone who's rooting for Yau or Earl. They plot strategy as Cassandra stands by doing a lot of "Mmm-hmmm"-ing. Yau doesn't want Dreamz brought along because of his friendship with Cassandra. Everyone agrees that getting rid of Alex is Job Number One...

REWARD CHALLENGE

Stacy wears her Immunity Necklace to the Reward Challenge, for whatever reason. In this challenge, the players all have their hands tied behind their backs, while they pull off pieces of pork with their teeth, from these big hunks of meat hanging from rope. It's very messy. They have to fill up this bucket, and the players with the top three biggest piles of pork get to go on this river rafting adventure. Boo, Yau and Dreamz win the trip, and Boo, as the big winner, gets to send someone into Exile. He chooses Earl, who wanted to go so that only he can see the clue to the Idol. In Exile, Earl reads the Second Clue, and feels it may be enough to find the Idol...

ADVENTURE TIME

Yau, Boo and Dreamz go on a helicopter ride to get to their River-rafting site. Boo starts jawing, "Ah'd spend six or seven hundred dollars on one of these here whirly-birds, jus' to impress mah sweetheart on a date!" Or you could just take her to the cee-ment pond, Boo. Yau and Dreamz wish Boo could shut-up for a few moments. Then they get a safety lesson and it's on to the river, as Dreamz wishes his siblings could be there to take part in all this: "It's like a field trip for grown people!" Later they get a giant lunch and letters from home. Yau gets a message from his kids, Boo gets a message from his sister Ellie Mae, and Dreamz gets emotional about the "deep stuff" HIS sister says in her letter.

BOO! TO BOO

The winners return to camp, and Alex delights as Boo and Stacy start complaining to him about how annoying Boo is. As annoying as he is, he doesn't have a fan-club on the jury, like ALex does, though. And wouldn't Boo make an ideal Final-Two partner? Ala Clay?

IMMUNITY CHALLENGE

It's one of those several-part races, where on person wins the first leg, in this case, Boo. I didn't take very good notes during this part, so four months later, I can't tell you what exactly Boo did to move onto the Final, but anyway, the next two people have to dig up steps to place on this tower kinda thing and race to the top. Alex makes this big show of how desperate he is, yawn. Jeff chides Cassandra for how meek and ineffective her strategy is. Dreamz digs up all the steps and finishes the leg before anyone else can find a single step. Cassandra quits, and much to Yau and Earl's consternation, ALex moves on to the Final race against Boo and Dreamz. Fear not, gentlemen, becaus3e Alex is so determined to win "ninja style" that he decide not to USE the steps, thinking he can scale the tower without them and go down in Survivor History as the most-awesomest competitor ever. Instead, Boo wins. And in the interest of fairness, I do have to mention that Boo may be dumb and weird and annoying, but he's got a mighty-fine build.

LAST-MINUTE CHANGE OF MIND?

Yau and Earl are thrilled and feeling safe and pretty now that Alex is surely going home. Yau even speculates that he doesn't even NEED his Immunity Idol. Alex tells us that he simple refuses to beg for his life, that he'll let others come to him. Cassandra comes to him to tell him she's proud of the game he's played, and he starts rambling on about he wants his CHILDREN (that he doesn't have) to be proud of him one day, groan, and then he tells her this would be the perfect chance to take out Yau. He warns her that Yau WILL take out Dreamz and she does a lot of "Mmmm-hmmming," as is her custom, but soon you can see that Cass's wheels are turning, and the idea of a power-play HERE, that could take out Yau, is most-appealing. Then Alex lobbies Earl and Dreamz to dump Yau. Yau sees all the discussions being held outta his earshot, and starts to fret. Earl scoffs at ALex's idea and tells him, "I'd rather vote your ass out now." He's quite certain that Cassandra and Dreamz aren't taking Alex seriously at all, but he's grossly overestimated their loyalty to him, because Dreamz and Cass are VERY interested in getting rid of the likable Yau, not just because the jury is sure to give him the million, but because he's so close to Earl. Stacy is easily swayed against Yau, "I'm a follower," she shrugs. Of course, Dreamz is flip-flopping this way and that, and then Cassandra is concerned with how the jury is gonna look at such a betrayal. Honestly, Cassandra, the jury would probably be more impressed by anything resembling game-play, at this point. Things are looking bad for Yau, who has to play the Idol in advance if he's to save himself...

TRIBAL COUNCIL

Mookie arrives, looking clean, but still full of bitterness and rage. Alex starts pontificating, "You know ME, Jeff, I'm gonna FIGHT, until the very end! Viva Alex!" Yau tells Jeff that he's not worried about going home tonight, as he trusts his alliance. Then Dreamz starts babbling, "It's definitely a possibility that Alex could sway three people over to his side, and secretly vote out Yau, Jeff." Alex starts choking on the words, "Dreamz, shut the hell up!" that are struggling to escape his angry lips. Yau wonders if this is all a ploy to flush the Idol out. ALex then insults everyone by saying, "I'm really surprised at how confident they all are, you have to think ahead!" Yau chooses not to play the Idol, and the flip-floppers decide not to keep insufferable Alex over good-guy Yau. Like ALex, Jeff makes a BIG deal about how this alliance will now have to start turning against itself, but it's not really a big deal, since this alliance was ALWAYS a very pragmatic alliance to get rid of Ed, Mookie and Alex.

EVICTED SURVIVOR FUN FACT

Alex, who is originally from Colombia, graduated from Harvard Law and was also on that Ivy League school's boxing team. His exit speech is very much a PSA to the Youth of the World, he talks about giving it 110% (groan) and following your dreams. That's d-r-e-a-m-s, not D-r-e-a-m-z. Following your Dreamz will get you stabbed in the back, as Alex can surely tell you.

ALex is eliminated in 7th place. In Borneo, laid-back Gervase missed the birth of one of kids to finish in 7th place. In the Outback, a black lawyer and model named Nick finished in 7th place, and I'm tired of trying to convince you all of this fact. I don't care if nobody remembers him, it's the truth! In Africa, weird Frank was shot down and in the Marquesas, Tammy who I thought was gonna be so interesting and turned out so boring and bitter exited here. In Thailand, smug Penny and pretty said bye-bye and it was no surprise while in the Amazon, smug and pretty ALex said bye-bye and it was a HUGE surprise. In the Pearl Islands, Tijuana's game went South and in Vanuatu, LeAnn was ousted just as she turned the corner from rootable to irritating (under Ami's sway). In Palau, tough and entertaining Steph finally got snuffed out, but she returned in Guatemala to help snuff out Gary "Don't call me Gary Hogeboom" Hogeboom. On Exile Island, Bruce's digestive system did him in before his crappy teammates could and last season, it was finally lights out for the cagey and entertaining Jonathan.

Peace Out! Christine :D