Want to check out the analysis of the previous episode before you continue? Do so here.

Another delicious episode served. Let’s go ahead and digest it. It looks like I’ll be writing the word ‘Phoebe’ a lot again tonight. Firstly, how great was Phoebe’s opening piece to camera, admitting that she had been stupid and blind not to see Kat’s backflip, eating a big old slice of humble pie. This was in stark contrast to Kat’s behavior tonight, which was the opposite of eating humble pie. That’s right, regurgitating conceited sandwich. She was just throwing that shit up left, right and centre. I haven’t witnessed so much bile since Stephen Fischbach’s #SevereGastrointestinalDistress. C’mon Kat, I must have said it at least three times already this season, when you are blinkered by revenge and emotions, you get blindsided. Obviously Kat hasn’t been listening to me. I guess she doesn’t have wifi on island. Now Phoebe has distanced herself from the sceptic projectiles Kat is spewing she at least seems in a slightly better position than at the end of last episode. Let’s breakdown just how she made it through yet another tribal.

Clueless, or Batgirl?

WIth an idol in her hands she bedevils playthings… (No, we’re not off to a good start are we?)

Phoebe must have done a lot of things right tonight, though some of them certainly seem questionable. Firstly, she found the idol. It’s about time we had someone proactive about finding the idol. Desperate times called for desperate measures and Phoebe certainly rose to the challenge. Great work. What about telling Kat and Kristie though that she had it?
I almost shat myself when she did that. After what Kat had done to her last tribal, and after Phoebe telling us that ‘Kat is dead to me’ I was shocked that she would even consider telling Kat she had the idol. We know now that she voted against Kat, but I’m not convinced that she had already decided to do that when she told Kat about the idol. We did see a scene with Phoebe and Craig where Craig had told both Phoebs and Kristie that he would let them know which way old Vavau was voting. Perhaps that’s a scene we didn’t see and this happened before she told Kat about the idol. (Incidentally how beautiful was it to watch Craig switch it up in that scene once Andy appeared? Andy’s BS radar must have been playing up because if that was me mine would have been bing bing binging more than Hector Salamanca!). If she had made that decision before telling Kat about the idol, then this may have been a really smart way to dissuade Kat from voting against her, with minimal repercussions as when Kat goes so does one more person who knows/suspects that Phoebs has an idol. Fark it’s risky though. You can’t herd a Kat. My sense is that Phoebs told those women about the idol moments before heading to tribal, not allowing Kat to use that knowledge in some other way.

There’s also the possibility that Phoebs switched her vote to Kat after hearing what Kat had to say at the tribal, that she had approached Vavau and had told them she was with them. If this is the case though it would seem like potentially a throw away vote if no-one else is voting Kat, unless of course Phoebs decides to play her idol, which she doesn’t. I suspect it’s more likely that Craig told her that the play was against Kat, or she found out some other way. Conner? Did Andy tell her to sure himself up for his Craig coup? I’d like to think that Phoebs was gunning for Kat from the moment Kat wrote Roh’s name down last tribal. If so, damn girl that was stone cold! What a way to serve your revenge! I guess we’ll never know the mechanics behind Phoebe’s move, but it’s fun to speculate.

Kat Gets Creamed

After the shenanigans of last tribal it was pretty clear that old Vavau just wanted to use Kat to split up RohBe and flush an idol and then they would be done with her. If Kat was ever going to make it through another tribal she needed to do more post-RohGo than preen, prance, and crow around camp. Not only was it not becoming of her to her tribe mates, but it actually doesn’t achieve anything. Things may have been different had the tribal not flushed the idol. Old Vavau may still have had a use for her then. If ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’ were candy and nuts then Kat may still be surviving. I don’t know that there’s actually anything she could have done to save herself tonight short of using Phoebs idol against her, but it seems she was not given the opportunity to do that. I would actually argue that her biggest downfall was not knowing what was going on around camp and generally feeling she was safe and in with Old Vavau. Some tribe awareness would have gone a long way tonight. If she had even the slightest hint that votes were coming her way she could have at least made a scene at tribal, outed Phoebs as having the idol and maybe, just maybe, she could have deflected some votes. Perhaps Andy really was a solid plan B for Craig and Kat, and dropping such a bomb might actually spook them enough to enact plan B. ‘Ifs’ & ‘buts’ huh? Was Andy really on the chopping block though?

Animal Man

Though I usually don’t like to discuss the show itself and the editing, preferring mainly to focus on the gameplay, one couldn’t tonight escape the rough treatment Andy was getting. According to who you ask on any given day the man is a shark, a rat, a sly-dog, a sloth or a snake with the personality of a fish. The man is a walking fucking menagerie. We also learned that when Andy suits up to ‘get down to business’ he puts on his hat. Just what fucking job does this man do where he needs a special business hat?! If I were more talented here is where I would post a photo of am Andy-faced rat wearing a hat and shooting fish in a barrel. Unfortunately I’m not that talented so you’ll just have to use your imagination. For those that have none, trust me, it’s a fucking hilarious image. Anyhow, whether he just dodged a bullet tonight or not, it appears that not everyone is as down with Andy as we first thought. Perhaps he ain’t playing the under the radar game as much as he suspects. In my experience rat-faced sly dog snake shark emus generally don’t blend in to the background. His name was thrown around a lot. First by Kate. I can’t get a read on Kate, was this her attempt at employing some strategy? Craig does a great job of listening to her and telling her what an awesome idea she has had, but I don’t think we see the idea of booting Andy discussed with anyone else other than Aganoans, which leads me to believe that this was a red herring for Kat, and for the audience. What we’re left with though is a pissed off Andy, and that is one particular zoological oddity that I would not want to mess with. Again, if Andy’s smart, and fuck knows he’s told us often enough that he is, he will not let those emotions get in the way of his strategy. Though I’m all for getting rid of people who want you gone, I don’t think that Kristie actually has the power to do so. He’s much better off taking the opportunity now to strike against Craig if that is his main target. If he doesn’t move soon Craig is going to scoop up Kristie and Phoebs and use them for his own purposes, of which we are sadly unaware. What would Phoebe and Kristie’s (Phistie?) best course of action now be?

Phistie of Phury

I suspect that now that Kristie has lost her Kat (a real shame for me as I wanted them to hook up with Kate so that I could use ‘KKKlan’) what is she likely to do? Well she has told us in the past just how dubious she is of trusting Phoebe, and she should be even more so now that she contributed to voting out Kat (although Kristie might not actually know that, and if I were Phoebe I wouldn’t be telling her). But she may not have many other options. We have seen Kristie try and bond with Kate and given their personalities the alliance is not inconceivable, in fact it may actually be a great move for them. Especially if the two of them can somehow get Conner, who in my mind and the mind of Andy is a floater. The three of them could then be quite the power trio (please tell me your suggestion for power trio names in the comments below, all I’m coming up with is Nirvana and we know how that turned out), and I’m sure Kristie could find some way to leverage her knowledge of Phoebe’s idol. Either in recruiting Phoebs, or outing it’s existence to Old Vavau to create a new target. Phoebs may actually choose to tell Kristie that the idol was all a ruse to get Kristie to board her train. Though I suspect that such a move would actually only reinforce in Kristie the idea that Phoebe is dangerous and not to be trusted and will work against Phoebe in the long run. Unless of course Phoebe’s move now is to shift the target to Kristie so that she can see out another tribal and get one step closer to the merge. Whatever that case we can see there are a plethora of options for Phistie and I for one can’t wait to see what they come up with.

So what about Conner and Kate?

As mentioned above, if they can get together they can actually have some power in this tribe. They’re both reasonable at challenges and it seems no one has anything against them. I think the best move for them is to a) hook up, and then b) just sit back and let the rest of Vavau come to them. You’ve got Phistie looking for some foothold to stay in the tribe, and you’ve got Andy on the hunt for his big game. Sit back and let those two sides plus Craig come to you, and then assess your options. There are pros and cons for all of those and going down that particular rabbit hole is too much of a head spin for me this late at night. I have to get sleep at some stage. Tell me what you think.

Hand on the Rung (please singalong to the Paul McCartney & Wings song ‘Band on the Run’ or I’ve just wasted a pun)

Just a quick note regarding tonight’s immunity challenge before I go. Damn that looked like a fun challenge. Great to see Matt and Nick working together on the rung puzzle, can’t wait to see which of these two win puzzle wars once the merge happens. Whenever I’ve seen this particular type of puzzle on Survivor in the past I’ve always wondered why nobody does the puzzle outside of the frame first. At least tonight it sounded like Craig had the same idea. Perhaps they’re not allowed to.

Until tomorrow night’s episode of ‘Everybody Hates Andy’, I got nothing else for you. Head back to camp.

– Russell Feathers

Episode 11 analysis here!