Survivor Philippines Survivor Smacked Me in the Chops S25E01 (CBS)

Survivor Philippines intertitle, via Wikipedia

As another September rolls around, another season of Survivor has started. This time around, they are in Caramoan, in the Philippines. The players are split up into three tribes. Three survivors who were eliminated because of medical reasons are back. They include Russell Swan, Jonathan Penner and Michael Skupin. Of those three, Jonathan is the only one who was a good player, as far as my memory goes. Russell is a disaster waiting to happen, and I’m sure that he’ll be very entertaining to watch, if he makes it past the first few rounds of elimination.

Notable players include Jeff Kent, an MLB star, who was almost immediately recognized by Dawson in his tribe, and Lisa Welchel, from The Facts of Life, who was also recognized by Michael. Russell swore that he got played into being a leader last time, and he will just sit back and relax this time around. It didn’t take him long to start bossing people around. The new guys were ready to vote him out almost immediately. Malcolm was an ESL teacher in Micronesia, so he was able to instruct Russell on how to start a fire. This is the first time in memory that a tribe has made fire so quickly.

Michael, who was taken out of the game after he burned his hands in the tribe’s fire, quickly demonstrates how injury-prone he is. Within a couple of hours, he gets a cut on the head, slices up his foot, and gets a cut on his finger by using the machete like an idiot.

Over at Kalabaw, everyone quickly agrees that Jonathan shouldn’t win Survivor, someone else should. They quickly agree to vote him out first. Jonathan sort of digs his own hole by searching relentlessly for the immunity idol. He finds a clue for it, but doesn’t find the idol itself. Over at Masting, Russell also finds a clue in the rice sack. He denies finding something when Zane sees him from the water and states that anyone searching for the idol should be immediately voted out.

The tribes go to the immunity challenge. They are also playing for reward. The 1st team gets a fire-making kit while the second team gets a flint. The last team goes to tribal council. The tribemates are divided into pairs. The first pair is tethered together and has to run to retrieve two paddles. The next pair needs to use the paddles to go out into the bay to retrieve a chest that fastened to the ocean floor. Once it’s brought back to the beach, everyone pushes it to the mat, where the last pair tries to assemble a puzzle. Russell immediately bosses his team around and makes some critical mistakes, including not putting Angie, a college runner and beauty queen, in the running segment.

It’s between Tandang and Kalabaw. The Kalabaw tribe has to pull back from the rear, and manages to overtake the Tandang tribe during the puzzle stage. They win the challenge, and Tandang is second. Matsing wasn’t in play. They head to tribal council. After the challenge, Zane blames it all on himself, in a strange strategy to blindside Russell. If he hadn’t spoken up, the tribe would have voted out Russell.

Votes to Evict

Russell      Zane
Angie         Zane
Malcolm   Zane
Denise       Zane
Zane           Russell
Roxy          Zane

* * * * *

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1 mikidemillion October 1, 2012 at 14:03

That’s funny about Michael, isn’t it? Even in the preview for this week he bumps or bruises something else. I don’t remember him being such a klutz before, but, then again, he was the one who fell over into the fire.

I might not get to the posting for this past week before I’m able to comment again, but I am looking forward to what to have to say about the tribal council cookie quote. Unbelievable she squeaked through.

See you next time!

2 range October 2, 2012 at 21:43

Man, she’s stupid that one. I couldn’t believe my ears.

3 mikidemillion October 14, 2012 at 04:57

Well, she’s long gone now. On the last episode, I was disappointed in Russell’s behavior. He seemed to be teetering near the edge and it’s probably a blessing they sent him home when they did.

I wonder why they don’t merge the tribes now. It’s ridiculous with two people left.

4 range October 14, 2012 at 13:04

I know, totally ridiculous. Russell was cringy to watch, but I guess it made good TV. It looks like they’ll keep it like this, at least until there’s one person left on Matsing. I think that they didn’t realize that this was possible. They probably thought that all 3 tribes would loose members pretty evenly.

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