See! I do believe you, Keith! And I especially believe him after he finishes getting all three of his balls form start to finish before any of the other players-including Missy, who is trying it busted ankle and all-get a single one through. “This is a big advantage-believe me,” he says. And unfortunately, that’s exactly what happens. But when that “help” makes the entire second challenge obsolete, then yes, I have a problem. You win it, you earn some help in the second part. Essentially, the reward portion is just the first phase of the immunity challenge. Philosophically, I have gotten to the place where I look at these reward/advantage/immunity combo platters as two-part contests. This time, by winning the reward, Keith’s advantage is not a head start or do over in the next challenge, but rather the opportunity to practice it all day in advance. So giving the advantage on the next-to-last challenge as opposed to the last one is an improvement. I understand all of this holds true for the penultimate challenge as well, but I don’t care. That way when you walk into that final Tribal Council you can look at the jury and be all “Yeah, I did this.” When you have not been playing on a level playing field, however, then it is considerably less impressive. It is obviously the most important challenge of the season, and if you are gong to win yourself into the finals, you should have to do it without an advantage. My biggest beef with this when it was done in the past is that the final challenge should be completely 100% on the level.
The whole “win an advantage in the next challenge” is something I have absolutely hated in the past, but it will shock longtime readers (not to mention Jeff Probst) when they find out right now that I hate it a little bit less here, and I’ll tell you why. To win, the players have to untangle a rope they are attached to and then run to assemble a bridge and knock down blocks with sand bags. The first challenge is not for immunity but rather that new thing they do where they make it a reward challenge where you win an advantage for the next immunity challenge. The other interesting thing about the final Tribal Council is that… As in Amber Brkich/Natalie White disaster. That’s the type of game that should be rewarded. Even when her moves were questionable-and I still go back and forth on Natalie’s play to oust Baylor, because going to the end with Baylor and her mom seems like kind of a dream scenario, even if it would strengthen their argument that they played the best by getting both of them to the end-Natalie was always playing, always thinking ahead, always taking risks. I’m not writing all this to hate on Jaclyn, but there was no doubt who played the bigger game. Truthfully, when they kept cutting to Jon’s smiling face on the jury as the votes were being cast, I figured it was a pump-fake, but you just never know. Water.) In any event, Natalie indeed did take her rightful place as winner.
(Vytas did the same thing for Monica in the last Blood vs. I am kind of guessing Reed just voted for Jaclyn to give her second place money over Missy. NOW WE’RE AT 6 VOTES! HOLY TYLER PERRY IDOL, JACLYN IS GOING TO WIN!!! This season’s one saving grace of a Natalie victory is about to be ripped away from us!īut it was all a ruse, as I hoped it would be. And what about those knuckleheads Keith, Wes, and Alec? They are more clueless than Alicia Silverstone, so who knows how they’ll vote? For all we know they may vote for freakin’ John Rocker to win! But if they don’t, they just as easily could vote for Jaclyn. Well, if Reed voted for Jaclyn to win, then his boyfriend Josh may do the same. And then disaster scenarios started dancing in my head. How in the name of the Medallion of Power could he actually vote for Jaclyn as the most deserving player? When they showed that vote from Reed I almost spit my Milwaukee’s Best halfway across the room. But what the hell is Reed doing voting for her?!? Reed knows this game. If she didn’t get his, then that five-hour silent treatment before that one Tribal Council could end up extending to a lifetime. There was no way, right? Okay, we knew she would get Jon’s vote.