If you’re yet to check out my analysis of the previous episode, make like Kristie and float on over here.

A fantastic episode tonight and we finally see the best that Kate has to offer. Unfortunately this was derailed by arguable this season’s two biggest knuckleheads, Sam and Kylie, with more than a little help from Lee. Kate certainly went out with a bang. Let’s get straight into it.

Pyramid Scheme

As I mentioned above, tonight really was a cracking episode of The Kate Show. Throughout the season Kate has shown us just how strong a competitor she is physically and emotionally in challenges (puzzles aside). Over the last few episodes though we have seen glimpses of great strategic and social game play from Kate and she was certainly starting to pop up on a few fans’ radars as one to watch moving forward. Tonight, when she needed it most, she really shone. So what did she do tonight that was so great I hear you ask? And to that I say, seriously? Why are you asking that, wasn’t it obvious? Firstly, she recognised that she was on the chopping block (there’s gotta be a better metaphor we can use in these situations, please comment below if you have one you’d like me to use in the next post). She also recognised that it was going to be difficult to really form any relationships that would save her. But she knew that she had to find a crack somewhere. In the previous episodes we caught a glimpse of her trying to assemble the avengers and create a team of goodies. It didn’t play out her way last night (she voted against one of her own good guys in Kylie, what was that about?). So she has a more concerted crack at it here tonight. Firstly she chats with Kylie, to at least get some idea of who the good guys are. Kylie of course gives her that info but is as non-committal as ever about flipping, and wisely Kate doesn’t push it as I’m guessing she suspects that because Kylie herself is such a good guy, she’d run and tell her ‘alliance’ (OMJ I can’t not laugh as I type that Kylie has an alliance). Given what happened later we know that she’d be absolutely right about that.

Kate then takes her opportunity to talk Sam and Lee, as she sees it, the two other good guys in The Pu. How serendipitous that they should be the two that were left at camp with Kate. The way she plays them though was a joy to behold. Knowing that she couldn’t just say ‘let’s form an alliance’, she spells it out to them another way. In fact, you might say she paints for them a pretty clear picture. “This is how I see it as an outsider” she says or something to that effect, drawing Sam and Lee a map of the structure of their so-called alliance and their place in it. So she didn’t say, you should do this or that, she draws them a picture. To make it as easy as possible for these Neanderthals to understand she makes it a simplistic little cave drawing (I shouldn’t be too hard on these guys, they seem like beautiful, wonderful, inspirational people, but when it comes to Survivor they aren’t the most strategic thinkers in tribe). So Kate let’s them see their place in their own alliance, and also see how devious and manipulative their so-called allies are. It worked an absolute treat on those two and thus begins a chain of events that almost sees the departure of our good friend Nick.

Unfortunately, all the great individual work aside, it’s hard to soar like an eagle when you’re surrounded by Sam and Kylie.

The other simply ingeniously delicious thing that Kate does, is at close to tribal time, she pulls Nick aside and begs for help. Firstly her performance was flawless, she really came off to Nick as someone who is almost resigned to their fate and hoping for a miracle. It lulls Nick into a false sense of security so that he may be less likely to play his idol. It also pulls Nick away from his allies and the rest of the tribe so that there is less opportunity for him to see that maybe there are some shady things going on around camp. Some classic keep your eye on my left hand while I sharpen the knife with my right. Matt couldn’t perform better misdirection than this (at least we haven’t seen him do so). Unfortunately, all the great individual work aside, it’s hard to soar like an eagle when you’re surrounded by Sam and Kylie.

The Goon Show

Again, I don’t want to be too hard on Sammy, at least he gave it a crack tonight, but it’s clear he doesn’t know how this game works. Even Barry would have figured it out by now. Damn I hope he doesn’t win. Ok, so, when Sammy sees the cave painting, you could almost see the light bulb light up in his head. He finally (kind of) understood that it wasn’t all about just being a nice bloke, as some of those others he consorts with are less than savoury types. This dude does not abide such duplicity and dishonesty. He picks up his adamantium shield and decides he needs to do something about this, the good people of Australia deserve better! And he goes about trying to consolidate the team. His conversation with Kristie was awkies. Kristie seemed to just be sitting there listening to them and waiting for them to get to their point and thinking ‘you don’t have to pussyfoot around guys, just tell me what you’re thinking’. But Sam skirting around the issue isn’t direct enough for Lee, who has to interject with some locker room words of wisdom. I can’t remember exactly what it was he said but it felt cheesy and overly earnest to me. Kristie is obviously moved by their appeal, as she responds, ‘whatever’ (I’m paraphrasing here).

Next on their recruitment drive is Kylie, and when I saw Sam take her off into the bushes I was thinking “good work Sam, leaving Kylie until last and doing it just before tribal”. But that wasn’t the case was it? No no no no no no no. Time for our next spaced cadet to shine. Perhaps I missed a scene or perhaps it was left on the cutting room floor. The part where Sam said to Kylie, “Hey K, would you mind running off to Brick and telling them all about our plans because then they’ll really like you and you can be with the cool kids and they will probably now put you at the top of their alliance as reward for your honesty and loyalty”. Kylie, you should be so lucky (see what I did there?) Dear reader, I hope you pick up on the sarcasm here, I know I can be a little too subtle sometimes. Incidentally, how delicious was it to watch Nick stride by in the background while Sam is trying to get Kylie to vote for him. Love your work Nick.

Needless to say, I don’t think this was a wise move for Kylie. Well, it’s not the right side to align with. Brick will cast you aside like I did my cassingle of Locomotion in 1989 (see what I did there?). Here’s an example that illustrates the extent of Kylie’s awareness in this game. Kylie tells us at one point, “they (Brick) just want to pick off other players one by one just so they can keep the numbers in this game” So, you mean, like, play Survivor? That’s literally the object of the game. At least we did see Sam say to Kylie that he would take all the heat for the flip, I thought that was clever. Clever way of helping Kylie to make her decision and not feel as though there will be personal consequences for her, but also a good approach for him to manage the fallout with his alliance once the deed was done. Then he goes and spoils it all by piping up at tribal council, seemingly unsolicited, telling everyone that Nick is a ‘snake’, throwing Nick more shade than a tree full of blue whales on a cloudy day. Not that Nick needed that much shade. All Sam did was a little bit of spadework and then Nick snatched that shovel from him, and in true Nick form announced “that’s not how you dig my grave, this is how you do it!! Dig dig dig dig… Well if Nick wasn’t going to play his idol before this, he sure is now. Perhaps, Sam actually knew that Nick wasn’t going to get enough votes anyway and so was actually trying to make him flush the idol. In that case, mission accomplished. Had Nick not played his idol however all they needed though was Lee’s vote and a tie would have been forced, and who knows how tribal would have ended then.

Ball Spinner

Damn there were some hypnotic balls on the episode tonight, and few more more hypnotic or rhythmic than Lee’s. I would expect nothing less from a man whose profession is to literally stand out in the sun and concentrate on balls. ‘Twas such a shame that Lee couldn’t stick with the plan and roll with team good guy tonight. Though I do think, once Kylie had outed Sam’s plan, it was a good move for Lee to make like Shane Warne and throw a flipper, flipping straight back to Brick and The Pu. Had he gone with team good guy he stood to lose a whole lot more than Sam. He seemingly had pretty good relationships with El and JL, who may have chosen to stick with Brick had the plan gone through. Also, all the heat for the move seemed to be directed at Sam (fair enough, he always said he would take all the blame), and Lee seems to have come out unscathed. I would imagine that had Lee flipped and joined the good guys proper, if Nick were to play his idol and still be in the game, with Kate gone the numbers are actually still against the good guys. I suspect from here he’ll just keep playing the way he has been. Playing it safe and sticking close to his pals. This should at least see him through a few more tribals until he becomes too much of a threat in challenges and get’s headhunted the first time he loses immunity, or makes it to the end. He’s actually a solid chance of winning when I look at it like that. Shame, I personally don’t find him particularly interesting though I’m sure there are thousands of you out there that do (good one DYB, like there’s thousands of people out there reading this).

Hail Hydra

If Sam is leading a charge for the good guys, then I guess that makes Brick and Nick the snake, the baddies. Again Brooke needs to get some credit here. She’s clearly created enough of a perception of an alliance in Kylie’s mind that Kylie feels the right thing to do is confide in her (see what I did there? – well that’s it, unless we see Kylie come out in some gold hot pants, I’m afraid I’ve used up all the Kylie references I have for the season). So good job Brooke. I know they said it themselves (Brooke says “we just won Survivor”, not sure if you’ve seen Survivor before B-roller, but I don’t think there’s ever been a season where more than one person has won), and I hate them for it, but at this point it really does seem like it’s Brick’s game to lose. They are a super tight two and seem a super tight three with El, plus they have JL and Kylie working for them. If they can keep their shit together and have luck on their side we should see at least one of them in the top two.

Regardless of what Nick does, he certainly has some work to do to make it to the end, even the other baddies think he’s a baddy.

Though Nick feels like his head is on the chopping block, it seems that he is safe for at least one more tribal as Sue and Kristie are still there, and perhaps people may feel less comfortable around Sam now. That may be Nick’s best play from here, stick with his current alliance to get rid of Sue and Kristie, then before the finger is pointed his way, he could either make a move against Sam, hoping that Brick and the others now have a sour Sam taste in their mouth after tonight. Or, perhaps he could actually join with Sam, draw him a picture showing him that the women are currently the ones with the power and start trying to brea the brick wall. Regardless of what he does, he certainly has some work to do to make it to the end, even the other baddies think he’s a baddy. That’s bad. Where to now then for some of our other people in a tight spot?

Float like a butterfly, sting like a bumblehead

While Kristie’s floating is a good plan, it will only work for so long, and historically even if you do get to the end that way, without making any big moves you will struggle to get jury votes. We’ve already seen from both Lee and El that they have a soft spot for Kristie, and she’s well-liked enough to be one of the pink ladies. I can see her forming an alliance with Lee and El, and possibly Sam to turn on Brick and Matt when they’re ready. In fact, if she sticks with Sue, then they are a solid two numbers that are up for grabs, and we all know that two is better than one, THAT’S NUMBERWANG!

Matt

Magic Matt seems to be off the radar at the minute. I suspect he is biding his time to strike against his angels. Not sure who he’s going to use for that particular mission though. Perhaps he’s actually planning to stick with Brick for as long as he can. Unfortunately for him it seems El has taken his spot in that particular threesome. Could he possibly take Kylie under his wing, stick with the angels but form a sub alliance with K, and somehow stick it to the angels before they stick it to him? I’m having trouble seeing a path for him at the moment, I guess we need to see some more from him to know where his head is at. Similarly for JL, I feel like we haven’t really heard from her since Nick gave her fashion advice on the beach. One to look out for.

Well, I think that is probably the longest post so far from me this season, I guess it was a worthy episode. Until next time, I got nothing else for you, head back to camp.

– Russell Feathers 

Episode 17 analysis here!