Survivor China: week 11

So how did the biggest, strongest and not necessarily stupidest guy this season manage to get voted out last week while holding two immunity idols? I don’t get it either, but those who did survive Tribal Council were all very relieved to have pulled off the blind-siding. Personally I was quite impressed by how calm and rational James’ farewell speech to the video camera was, and thought the others were very mean saying they feared for their life if the plan didn’t work. Later he turned up for jury duty and glared at them. And then I understood.

PG – bless her – has decided that voting out James was not a masterful strategy by highly skilled players to get rid of the strongest person, eliminate both immunity idols and improve their own chances of winning the million dollars ($640k after taxes). No, it was certain proof that the original Hidden Dragon alliance is collapsing. If she can get just two other people to swing over to her side, and if she can keep winning immunity, and if there’s a lightening strike that kills Amanda, Todd, Denise, Courtney and Eric, she’s in with a chance.

As suggested in the ads, this week the loved ones turned up to participate in the challenge. Among much hugging and crying were frequent apologies for the body odour. Denise’s first words to her husband were, "Can I have your socks?" "Please" might have been nice too, but she apparently smelled so bad he was happy to comply as long as she didn’t breath on him.

Loved ones and Survivors were blindfolded and sent into opposite ends of a maze, with instructions that the first pair to team up and reach the middle would win. PG is a chip off the old block, with her Dad pointing to where he thought the middle was and saying, "We need to go that way". I’d like to point out that pointing is not much help to a blindfolded person, although it is slightly amusing to us at home. Amanda and her sister used freaky and annoying bird calls to cut through the shouting and find each other. Denise’s husband Robert just followed the smell and they won.

Long before Corey Delaney / Worthington forced himself uninvited into our media consciousness with his yellow sunglasses and even more horribly yellow hair, another ghastly little twerp named "Johnny Fairplay" competed in Survivor Pearl Islands and pulled off one of the worst stunts in Survivor History. In both cases the act itself was abhorrent, but the chutzpah with which they pulled it off had to be at least acknowledged if not actually admired.

When Johnny's best friend turned up as a loved one Johnny asked, "Where’s Grandma?" and was sadly informed that she had died. Trouble was, Grandma was so alive she answered the phone when Jeff rang the family off-air to express the production team’s condolences. The whole thing was a total lie, pre-planned between the pair of them to ensure that the challenge winner would give up the luxury overnight reward so that Johnny could "get all of the news from home" and "come to terms with his grief".

Why bring up ancient history? Because this week every Survivor fan was dragged back to the memory of that series when Todd came face to face with his little sister at the reward challenge. He pointedly asked how his even younger sister is doing, only to be informed that she had miscarried her baby.

Denise never explained whether it was sympathy or pure strategy, but she chose Todd and his sister (along with Amanda and her sister) to share the reward of a massive lunch on a boat. She also got handed a mobile phone to receive a call from home. The producers had chosen a phone from Sprint Communications because, just like Denise and Robert had to be to win the challenge, Sprint is known for speed and communication. It wasn’t subtle. Neither was the font size of Sprint Communication’s credit in the closing titles.

Oddly, Todd doesn’t appear to have mentioned his little sister's tragedy at all during the entire lunch. I suppose it’s hard to talk and cry and stuff your face with chocolate cake at the same time, so he focussed on doing that last one really well. In fact, poor Kimmy – whose unplanned teen pregnancy and subsequent miscarriage is now world-wide news – didn’t even get a mention until back at camp when Todd, Amanda and siblings went for a swim to gloat about how great the reward was.

For the record, Amanda’s sister’s butt had to be pixelated as she jumped in the lake. Either that family really likes skimpy swimwear or there’s a genetic birthmark that’s just too horrible for prime time. Eroc Giron and Brian Metz, who get closing title credits as ‘Digitizers’, deserve a bigger font even than Sprint Communications for their efforts. Possibly an Emmy, too.

Back at camp during the reward, PG was seriously peeved that Denise didn’t return the favour and invite her to share the reward, since she’d taken Denise to the Shaolin Temple a few days before. They all expressed total disbelief about Todd’s sister, and Courtney did a brilliant replay of Todd’s Oscar-worthy performance as a grieving brother, for which she definitely deserves an Emmy.

The immunity challenge involved wading back and forth through an obstacle course in a swamp, trying to decide which statements out of three pairs were true so that the right keys were picked to open a box and raise a flag. The questions this week were things like, "The Chinese invented barbed wire" and "The Chinese invented gunpowder". Once again there was a perfect opportunity to learn more about the reign of Emperor Nasi Goreng, and once again the producers passed it up.

As jokingly suggested last week, PG won immunity. Her family is Chinese so she kind of had just a little bit of an advantage getting the questions right. Erik knew he’d be targeted for elimination and did some nice work trying to convince the others that Todd was lying about his sister. He and PG both went to work on Denise, pointing out that the others will only take her to the final four. In fact at Tribal Council they both managed to talk generically about how there are ‘certain people’ at camp who can choose between being fourth in their current alliance or possibly winning the game. They may as well have said, "I’m not going to name names, but her initials might be Denise."

It didn’t work, so Erik got voted out in a four-two decision, and can now break up the jury box flirtation that seems to be happening between Frosti and his sweet little Southern Belle Jaime. Todd looked very happy and not at all grieving as he trotted out of the Tribal Council pagoda. Next week might be a different story though, because it looks like the girls plus Denise might gang up on him. With only five Survivors left now, and only a couple of episodes to go, it’s getting very exciting.