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"Win A Million Or Kick Butt? Christy Does Neither, Sob!!"
Posted by Grimme on 2003-05-02 |
Episode 11 started out so promising with every prospect that the “Siamese Twins of Brazil” would, at long last, be separated and with Heidi heading home. Everyone got to visit with a loved one. Everyone got to see Jenna and Rob’s knock-down, drag-out fight for the high moral ground----a very hard, uphill battle for both. And we even got to see some bare female breasts that didn’t belong to the emaciated Heidi or Jenna when the Amazon dancers entertained Matt and his mom. What went so wrong and made this the saddest of episodes?
At the very top of the list was that Christy got booted. Her deafness has endeared her to Survivor viewers but, unknown to her many fans, it seems that Christy was also blind and dumb as well. She obviously didn’t realize how she came across to others when she found herself in the “driver’s seat”, as she put it. Jeff Probst and the three jury members were visibly surprised when Christy proudly proclaimed “I’m in control!” .
But Christy had already put the final nail in her coffin before this tribal council vote that evicted her when she foolishly toyed with Rob on who she would vote against. Rob had clearly proven in the last two tribal councils that he had no qualms about getting rid of long-time allies Denna and Alex who had meant much more to him than Christy ever had. With his fate on the line, Rob couldn’t risk such uncertainty and turned to Heidi and Jenna in what has to be the Amazon equivalent of the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact of 1939 which saw the destruction of Christy, uh, Poland.
Christy’s other mistake was in stringing along and never giving a clear answer to overtures made to her by a desperate Heidi and Jenna who would only have allied again with Rob when it was clear that absolutely no other alternative existed for them. Like Rob, they too found that they could not rely on Christy and, again like Rob, this led the three of them back again to each other.
While Christy gloated at her very real newfound power, she frittered it away by constantly changing direction like a weathervane in high wind. As Rob pointed out, and Heidi agreed, Christy’s unpredictability must be eliminated from the game. The lesson can never be repeated enough in each and every Survivor series: do not publicly brag about your power or act like you are untouchable.
And there was a lot of touching going on when everyone got to meet with a loved one. Jeff Probst seemed to doing another “Jenna pity consolation prize” when he heavily pressured reward winner Matt to give up a visit with his own mom so everyone else could see their loved ones. CBS redeemed itself only by letting Matt have his visit and making it last all evening instead of the 10 minutes everyone else got. So glad that Jenna didn’t win the reward challenge because no one else would have gotten a visit.
This episode saw the emergence of Matt as a handyman, a leader and, to Rob at least, a threat who may have become “unbeatable”. Matt seemed to be taking the lead in negotiating the new camp arrangements, after Alex’s eviction, when he politely told Jenna and Heidi that their votes against him would have nothing to do with their personal relationship on a daily basis in the camp.
Matt’s reward challenge generosity only further emphasized his new-found power status in the tribe. Rob’s sniping about the “patron saint of the Amazon” was a far cry from his earlier dismissals of Matt as being “clueless” about the game. Rob, with only himself as “an alliance of one, a lone wolf, a mercenary if you will”, has Matt on his radar screen as a real threat.
So Jenna and Heidi survived again and Jenna showed undeniably real courage in giving up her immunity necklace to save Heidi. Only Christy and Butch, who though “loyal to the alliance to the end” was obviously left out of the loop, voted to evict Jenna. Matt’s motivations in not confiding in Butch are a puzzle, as Butch is a natural Matt ally.
Christy’s vehement goodbye speech ranks right up there with Susan Hawke’s diatribe against Kelly. The “evil stepsisters” phrase will long be treasured by true Survivor aficionados while Christy herself will long be lovingly remembered by all of North America as proof of how far determination can take anyone with physical disabilities. With her departure, Survivor:Amazon will truly turn ugly. I can’t wait!
(Your views are more than welcome on the Survivor 6: Amazon message board. Please let us know them! Just scroll to the right of your screen and click “message board”. Registering required before posting messages but it’s quick and easy.) |
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