Survivor Live, Episode 10
Survivor: Fiji - Survivor Live, Episode 10 by Brian Towers -- 04/23/2007 After one of the best episodes of Survivor: Fiji in a long time, can a spirited episode of Survivor Live be far behind? Plus, it’s Jenna-free! Survivor: Live is CBS’s webcast phone-in show that features an interview with the last player booted from Survivor: Fiji. Hosted by Dalton Ross of Entertainment Weekly, this week’s guest is the eventual victim in one of the most interesting episodes ever, the ever-smiling Edgardo Rivera. Beginning as usual with my trivia question, it is: Ten episodes in to the season, ten Survivors booted. Let’s ask a question about attending Tribal Council. Which is a larger number, the number of times Boo has attended Tribal Council, or the number of times Mookie hasn’t? Drag your cursor between the square brackets to see the answer. < Boo (and Cassandra) have attended only two Tribal Councils to date. But Mookie has been to every one except that of Liliana. He “wins!” > By the way, last week’s answer was wrong. The first time contestants teamed up in the individual part of the game was actually in Survivor: Australia, when Jerri and Colby won the right to damage the Great Barrier Reef together. Well, my description of “odd couple” still applies! Thanks to alert reader “Kirk” for setting me straight. With Jenna away at one of Ethan’s charity events, the show opens with Dalton welcoming guest co-host Stephenie LaGrossa to the show. Beside her appearances here, Stephenie was a Survivor: Palau participant and the Survivor: Guatemala runner-up. Can Survivor: All-Stars 2 be far away? I never got the Palau love, but still think her performance in Survivor: Guatemala was one of the best, as she was a target from day one. Dalton says he enjoyed last night’s show and Stephenie says, “Awesome, one of the best!” Edgardo is brought on screen next. I can handle his accent, but gosh, Edgardo speaks about seventeen times faster than I can type! Dalton asks if Edgardo’s problems all came about because Mookie told Dreamz about the hidden immunity idol. Edgardo says the game fist started to go wrong for him when Lisi wanted out. Then, he and Alex tried to find the hidden immunity idol on their own but couldn’t, so they had to bring Mookie into the equation. Edgardo says that once the hidden immunity idol was found, greed took over and “Mookie changed his complete personality and became obsessed about it.” It seems the Lord of The Rings “My Precious” analogies may not have been too far off the mark! Dalton reminds us all that unnecessarily sharing information is bad, and Stephenie agrees. Edgardo speaks of the different use of the hidden immunity idol this season. He reminds us that in the past, it could be used after the vote was read out but this season, it’s used after the votes are cast but before they are read out. Stephenie, perhaps playing dumb, asks, “Why is that, what’s that all about?” Dalton gets it, but Edgardo speaks first to point out that the rules had to be changed because in the last two seasons, hidden idols were a free pass to final three. Edgardo described things correctly for this season and the last two, when Terry and Yul found an idol. But it’s not quite complete, so let me inject a little bit of Survivor history here. The very first time a hidden immunity idol was used in the game was actually in Stephenie’s Survivor: Guatemala season. It was found by Gary Hawkins/Hogeboom. That year, it had to be played before the votes were cast, so that player could not be voted for. I wonder why Stephenie didn’t remember this? At any rate, like this season, it was to be used when the holder felt they were the prime target and there was a risk they could have been wrong. Dalton liked the dramatic shots of the grinning Horsemen at Tribal Council, and again when the votes were revealed and the smiles faded out. Edgardo says they knew Dreamz had told the others they held a hidden immunity idol, but were unaware Dreamz had told Cassandra and Earl when the idol had been passed to Alex. Yup, that’s a “Gotcha!” Dalton wonders if Dreamz is playing both sides cleverly or just talking too much. Edgardo says he’s like Rocky in that he freely speaks his mind. Edgardo clarifies, at least Rocky didn’t give out his game strategy. Edgardo adds, “He’s all over the place, he doesn’t have a lot of strategy, he’s really insecure about himself, and people played his insecurities.” He reveals Cassandra took Dreamz under her wing early on and is influencing his decisions. Both hosts figure that’s pretty smart of her. At Stephenie’s prompting, Edgardo relates the tale of his eviction, saying, “During the day, it was crazy... everyone running around, names being thrown out. I heard Earl’s name, Boo’s name, Stacy’s name, Alex’s name, but I never heard my name.” That worried him, because he knew that the name that doesn’t come up is often the one going home. He continues, “When it got close to Tribal Council, I noticed no one was looking at me.” He knew that was bad, too, so he talked to Alex (who was also not getting eye contact) in Spanish, because they knew it was one of them. He doesn’t tell us what was said, though it had to be moot by then. When Probst called for the idol to be potentially played, Alex stood up and Edgardo said, “It’s your call.” Dalton notes that it was in Alex’s pocket. Edgardo confesses to being a little upset at the time, but quickly realized it would have been really stupid for Alex to play it in Edgardo’s name and then get voted off himself. It’s very honest of Edgardo to confess that, and now admits he’d have done exactly the same thing. When it came time to vote, people were pretending to write on air so the others couldn’t count the pen strokes and figure out the vote. We next see a clip of people scrambling for position before Tribal Council. Dalton notes Stacy being the one to put forward Edgardo’s name. What does it say about Dreamz when highly disliked Stacy is considered a more desirable alliance partner? Edgardo says he was playing the game by looking to the end, and felt he had a good chance to win if he was able to tell the jury, “I got here by playing the game, you guys knew I was playing the game, and I didn’t have to backstab anyone in my alliance to do it.” He feels many of others were just playing to get to the next Tribal Council and not looking ahead. Edgardo feels that Stacy has been brainwashed and is being used by Earl and Yau-Man. Dalton implies she’d finish fifth with either group, bur Edgardo disagrees. He says he and Alex were going to take her past final five and to the end, because they figured she couldn’t get jury votes. “She messed up,” he concludes. Kellen from Kansas is our first caller today. He sees Edgardo as an innocent bystander in the plan to get Alex out. Edgardo thinks the Horsemen ran out of time and couldn’t make a counter-move. I’d suggest there wasn’t one, because (1) at the time they thought Alex was the target and they’d already moved to block that; (2) three votes, even plus that of one confused ex-cheerleading coach, is still not a majority in a group of nine. Dalton asks about last week’s Tribal Council, when there was no time to strategize beforehand at all. He asks, “After that, were you worried about Mookie’s vote?” Edgardo felt Mookie had “dumb strategy.” Edgardo stood behind the idea of taking unlikable people to the end, not a Michelle, Earl or Yau-Man. He says they discussed it “about thirty times,” and Mookie didn’t see it that way. To this day, he still doesn’t understand Mookie’s plan. Once again, it’s Jerry in California. Trying to identify where it went wrong for Edgardo, Jerry asks if he blames Lisi revealing the hidden idol clue to them, their bringing Mookie into it, Mookie spilling it to Dreamz, or Dreamz telling Earl and Cassandra? He also inquires about Edgardo’s bow and arrow prowess. Edgardo blames Mookie telling Dreamz, because he thinks three on an idol is the correct play. He feels they still had a chance, until Dreamz caught the idol being passed to Alex. Edgardo admits they made many mistakes, but they tried their best to fix them. Edgardo still swears by his archery skills, but says what they had in the challenge was “the Fischer-Price bow and arrow,” and that his hands were too big and sweaty to do it right. While practicing with equipment they had made themselves, he was hitting everything. He tells us that Earl was really good with a bow and arrow as well, and Edgardo thinks Earl would have beat him anyway. Dalton jokes that Edgardo choked, and Edgardo admits it was very embarrassing and says his friends remind him about it constantly. Michael in Missouri asks Edgardo if he watched previous seasons, and asks him to name his favorite final two from any previous season, and also, how would he vote between them? At least I think that’s what he said, he hangs up before Dalton can clarify. Edgardo is confused, so Dalton interprets the question for him to ask something equivalent to, considering players from any season, who would he take with him to the final three? Nice save, Dalton. Edgardo names Jonny Fairplay and Stacy, people no one would vote for. Ha! The hosts offer up Lillian and Judd as other possibilities. There’s been eight finalists who only received two votes or less, so right there is no shortage of names you could put on that list. In fact, almost every season can provide a contender! It’s time to play Edgardo’s “Time Capsule.” In this feature Dalton plays back a message Edgardo recorded to himself before the game began. He says, “Hopefully, patience has paid off and you won Survivor. I hope you were nice to everybody and you’re sitting in your brand new apartment in Miami Beach with the money that you won.” Back live, Edgardo is happy how he played. One regret is backstabbing Liliana, because he had promised her he wouldn’t vote her off. He says, “I guess Stacy wanted to be the prettiest person on the island, so she wanted Liliana off.” Pressed by Dalton for clarification, Edgardo says he knows Liliana would have been useful in the challenges and wishes they’d booted out Dreamz instead. But Alex told him the others wanted Liliana out. Asked why, Alex told him, “Stacy wants to be the prettiest girl on this island.” Edgardo now slyly says, “I think… I don’t know, man. Stacy, the prettiest one? I don’t know.” He adds, “I was really nice (to Stacy/everyone?) in the show, and withholding, but I don’t need to strategize any more, so it can all come out and I can say anything I want.” Dalton doesn’t understand how anyone can vote off “a hot chick who gives back rubs.” As usual, segment two begins with a graphic fact. In this one we are reminded that Edgardo was part of Puerto Rico’s Davis Cup Tennis team. Dalton asks Edgardo about his parting words about hating Cassandra. Edgardo explains that he wanted to get her off because she was “just getting by in the game,” something he hates from past seasons. He compares her to Cirie from Survivor: Exile Island. Her impact on Dreamz was another factor, “she was keeping him confused.” He figured that she was in the middle of the alliance and by removing her, Dreamz would be much less connected to Earl and Yau-Man. Edgardo clarifies, he “hates” Cassandra as a player, not as a person. He calls her “a great person” and says that she really cared for people on the island. He hopes she didn’t take that wrong. Frankly, without this explanation, I don’t know how else she could have taken it. Dalton asks Stephenie about differentiating “people” from “players.” Stephenie says it’s hard, because it’s a social game. You have to look at how to get to the end of the game and separate people from game play. That’s how she was able to vote out Judd. She tells us she and Judd are fine with each other now. Besides Cassandra and Stacy, at the time he left Edgardo was also upset with Dreamz, Mookie, and Boo. Gosh… who’s left? Edgardo lost respect for Boo, who he felt was flipping sides often and not thinking long term. Dan from Oklahoma thought the Four Horsemen’s weakness, besides having “no-strategy-Dreamz” as a member, was focusing too much on the hidden idol and not enough on gathering more votes. He feels Boo and Stacy were up for grabs at the merge and could have been gathered in. Edgardo reminds us, they had planned it that Dreamz would try and get Cassandra (on their side); Alex would get Stacy; and he would talk to Boo. However, when they got into the merge camp, their former allies were acting “really distant.” When he saw Cassandra hanging out with Earl he knew they were done for and would have to use the hidden idol to stay in the game. Stephenie opines that maybe Boo could have been swayed. Edgardo notes that the other alliance was also targeting floaters Boo and Stacy. Gail from Florida has called into Edgardo’s interview to ask Stephenie about Palau. It’s about, when she “merged” into the Koror tribe, she told Tom all the game secrets except about Gregg and Jenn wanting to flip. She wonders, had Steph told that to Tom as well, could she have stayed in the game longer? Stephenie says Tom already knew about them and was trying to separate them, but Jenn wanted her out badly. Steph still feels that as such an outsider, she couldn’t get any farther than she did. Jamison in Massachusetts is on the line to ask Edgardo if he was he a follower of Alex, or did Edgardo plan for himself? Edgardo says he thought he was making the decisions, but he let Alex do the talking. One think he’s sure of is that they talked over all their decisions together. Stephenie says that in Guatemala, she took the blame as the one making all the decisions, but really she and Rafe discussed everything together. Does that make Rafe and Edgardo the clever ones? The next series begins with running the clip of Tribal Council. With the Horsemen sitting about as the votes are read, looking so cocky… funny stuff. Edgardo reveals to us that he never took his stuff to Tribal Council as a superstition, and he hasn’t seen it since. He thinks they’ll use his clothes to clean pots. I expect we’ll see the others wearing his shirts in the weeks to come. Edgardo retains some evil thoughts for Dreamz, but Dalton points out that Dreamz was on the outside of what was going on too. Dalton wonders if Edgardo ever thought of the scenario with everyone voting for the ones who have hidden immunity idols and both idols getting played, resulting in all votes being nullified. They did, and to avoid it, that’s why they targeted Cassandra instead. Actually, reader “Kate” posed this same question to me about three weeks ago! Dalton asks Stephenie what it feels like to see a plan go awry at Tribal Council. She says it is, “Shocking, gut-wrenching.” Edgardo reminds us he had never seen a vote against himself before. Dalton suggests that like Stephenie, he should have tried to talk someone into quitting like Janu did in Palau. Stephenie suggests crying. Edgardo says, “I saw that in one Tribal Council with Anthony and I didn’t want to beg for anything.” Ouch! David in North Carolina asks how tough the immunity challenge (called, “Chimney Sweep”) was, and also, why did they trust Dreamz so much? As they run a clip of Boo in the challenge, Edgardo says the challenge was, “Horrible.” His feet were too big and he knew he wasn’t going to win. About trusting Dreamz, he says, “We didn’t trust Dreamz. If they showed in the show that we trusted Dreamz, it’s completely incorrect. We never trusted Dreamz one second, we knew he was a snake and a rat, we were using him to get into the other alliance. But it didn’t work out, he got the best of us.” Edgardo says Dreamz is the first Survivor to be “both a snake and a rat!” Dalton refers to Stephenie performing well in individual challenges and asks her, did she look forward to the endurance challenges? She says she did okay in them, but in the aiming and throwing ones, not so much. Can we just check the history files for a second? Stephenie’s performance in challenge was legendary, but not in a good way. That was a big part of her storyline! The actual numbers are, she won just twice in eighteen individual challenges over her two seasons. One of those was actually not an individual win, as she was a member of a temporary team of four that won a reward (like we saw last week with fivesomes). The other win was truly hers, a key immunity victory that was seen as a redeeming moment. Melissa in Maryland is positively elated to have gotten through. She giddily asks if Earl and Yau-Man are the power players. Edgardo says people are lazy, so since Yau-Man was willing to work hard around camp, he was going to be around for a while. That’s the definition of a power player? Well, whatever keeps you in the game is a source of power, I guess. On his last day, Edgardo saw the game as between two teams, himself and Alex against Yau-Man and Earl, with the other people in the middle as their pawns. Ironic, since he was voted out for being seen as Alex’s pawn. Dalton notes that there seems to be respect between the two groups. Edgardo says he and Earl talked together on the last day. They have common ground in that they have the same job. He says there was definite respect among the four. The next segment is called “Probst’s Thoughts,” where a message is played that Jeff Probst recorded for the departing contestant. Jeff says, “Edgardo, I’m cracking up, you had the funniest disposition out there. I know you wanted to win, but you had a healthy, ‘It’s just a game’ approach. I admire that you kept your sense of humor intact.” Edgardo says he indeed wanted to win, but he was raised to keep a smile on his face. Dalton modifies that credo for Survivor and it comes up as, “A smile on your face and a knife behind your back.” Segment three begins with the “minus 10” feature. This is where Dalton reads ten rapid-fire categories for the guest to comment on, each in ten words or less. Here’s how it went: 10. Hidden immunity idol – Should have kept that for myself! 9. Tennis – Don’t do it any more, too much work. 8. The Four Horsemen – Maybe Two Horsemen instead of four? 7. San Juan – Beautiful beaches, beautiful people, and also kind. 6. Dreamz – Man! He sucks. 5. The TV show, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia – Best show ever made. 4. The Curse of Ravu – Rocky, Mookie, and uhh… Anthony… (Buzzed for taking too long) 3. South Beach – Second best place in earth! 2. Advertising – Fun, and I need a job right now. 1. Being on the jury – (grumpily) It sucks, because you don’t get the million bucks! Edgardo speaks about being on the jury. When first booted, he was discouraged and didn’t care about being on the jury, but that view soon changed. He says he took it seriously and wanted to give the money to someone who would use it well. When sitting on the jury at Tribal Council, he says it’s funny because, “You see through people. You know who’s telling the truth, who’s lying, and who gets on your nerves.” He emulates someone unspecific just pretending to be happy to spend another day on the island but not getting to the point. Stephenie says, “Like Ian.” Dalton asks if one’s opinions on how to cast that final vote change once you leave the game. Stephenie says that when you vote in final Tribal Council, you’re still high on emotion and who backstabbed whom. She’s been told by cast mates in the Guatemala season that if votes happened on the live finale, they would have voted differently. Dalton wonders if that’s the perspective of time, or does seeing the whole picture including secret confessionals cloud one’s view. Stephenie says in Palau she decided to vote for Tom and there was no swaying her. In Guatemala, she learned that Judd got mad and worked against her with other jury members and changed people’s minds. Stephenie supports the idea of totally isolated jury members. I think separation is a good idea in principle, but I wouldn’t want to be isolated for up to two weeks! Edgardo says that the real backstabbing comes at the end of the game, and that influences votes. Hmm, that’s promising! Judy in LA asks, if they felt double-agent Dreamz couldn’t be trusted, why not test him with some misinformation? Dalton jumps in to suggest, because they needed his vote. Edgardo says it was Mookie who was giving Dreamz information, never him. Edgardo didn’t feel convincing others is his strength, so he only talked to Alex and then Alex presented plans to the others. A clip of the reward celebration is played. (The reward was called “Get Smashed Q&A”). In it, Yau-Man uses “The Syndicate” alliance name for the first time on screen. Edgardo refers to Mookie’s telling Dreamz about the hidden idol as the dumbest move of the season. He thinks Mookie got caught up in the moment. Edgardo wasn’t there himself, but says if he were, he would have demanded possession of the idol right then and there. Dalton admires Cassandra bringing the right people to the reward, instead of just amassing her friends and leaving the others back in camp to plot and scheme against them. Edgardo knew it was bad news for the Horsemen when she made those choices. Edgardo suspects Dreamz doesn’t know what “syndicate” means. I can help here. Breaking it down to the root words, “sin” and “dictate,” it’s means, “The Devil made him do it!” See, I’m smarter than a fifth grader! Dominic from Arizona asks about voting out Lisi instead of Dreamz. Edgardo says it was his first mistake, but at the time the two guys seemed solidly with them and Lisi seemed less stable. Diane in Edmonton is the next caller. She says this show (Survivor: Live) is good because it gives you “closure” on the episode. She asks if the way Moto treated Dreamz and Cassandra was their real demise. Yes. Remember my formulae “7Mo = A³ + E? + ( 0 * (b + l + s) ) – C&Dz” from week five? As “E?,” he was one who seemed to recognize that the two girls were behaving badly and needed to stop it. Our last caller today is Jessie from Pennsylvania. She asks Edgardo if he modeled his play off that of previous players? No, but he borrowed from several. One was Johnny Fairplay, because he got people to do what he wanted yet was never seen as a threat. His objective was to “keep my integrity. I didn’t want my friends back home to see somebody that wasn’t me.” I guess he wasn’t taking that altruistic thought from Mr. Fairplay! Dalton asks Stephanie her opinion of each remaining Survivor. Here’s what she said, with Dalton’s additional comments where noted. Alex – A threat, but without the numbers he’s gone soon. Boo – Here for the long haul, but not winning. Dopey. Dalton says, he’s at the bottom of totem pole and maybe he’ll flip again. Stephenie thinks he might be athletic enough to win challenges. Cassandra – Has gone from riding coattails to playing smart. Dalton notes the similarity to Cirie, including the sudden burst of strategy. Both agree she’s no factor in challenges. How they can say that after she just won one I’m not sure. Dreamz – Done, gone in next two shows. Dalton sees him as having had the potential of being a valuable swing vote, but he can’t cash that in because he’s seen as untrustworthy. Earl – Yau-Man over Earl at the end. Mookie – A victim of numbers, done. Dalton expects him to scrap hard until he’s done… but he’s done. Stacy – Take her to end because she can’t win. Neither finds her attractive. Yau-Man – “He’s my pick.” Smart, likeable, works hard. Dalton agrees with the character assessment, though Earl is still his pick. The network promo is run next. It tells us: Dreamz has some explaining to do; Alex and Mookie discover Yau-Man’s hidden immunity idol, and a new plan is born. In case there’s any doubts, the rules are clear that the idol can’t be stolen. Looking in people’s stuff is fair game, though. Yau-Man looked through Sylvia’s bag, remember? So, he ought to know better! Note, Mookie had “his” idol buried somewhere for exactly this reason. Flashing back, the history of searching your competitor’s stuff goes all the way back to Kel and “Beef Jerky-Gate” in Survivor: Australia. Neither host likes the idea of re-hiding the idol, but Edgardo thinks it gives the underdogs a chance to fight back. You know how The Syndicate should play it next week? Send Earl or Yau-Man to Exile Island to control the new clue. And, how cool would it be if Yau-Man had TWO hidden immunity idols? As the show comes to an end, Dalton thanks Stephenie, and we’re done. Stephenie does a creditable job as co-host and we could do so much, much worse. Still, I hope the next time an opening comes up we can get a fresh take on some different topics, perhaps from a different season. Maybe one of the pre-All-Stars seasons? Or Jonathan Penner? CBS Website: Here CBS’s promo items for this week. A severe injury leaves one Survivor in excruciating pain. Can they recover or will they be removed from the game? Two Survivors discover powerful information which, if revealed, could change the course of the entire game. With few options left, tribemates are faced with a decision of blackmail or betrayal if they want to keep their alliance intact. This week’s clues seem pretty obvious to me. If you’d like my interpretation, my eAddress follows below. Last week’s clues promising “one of the most dramatic Tribal Councils in Survivor history” were pretty much right on. I think it’s one we’ll be talking about for years although I can’t say they topped the original “snakes and rats” speech. In Conclusion: I see the folks at CBS got this show posted a lot quicker this week. Well done.
Survivor: Fiji - Survivor Live, Episode 10 by Brian Towers -- 04/23/2007 After one of the best episodes of Survivor: Fiji in a long time, can a spirited episode of Survivor Live be far behind? Plus, it’s Jenna-free! Survivor: Live is CBS’s webcast phone-in show that features an interview with the last player booted from Survivor: Fiji. Hosted by Dalton Ross of Entertainment Weekly, this week’s guest is the eventual victim in one of the most interesting episodes ever, the ever-smiling Edgardo Rivera. Beginning as usual with my trivia question, it is: Ten episodes in to the season, ten Survivors booted. Let’s ask a question about attending Tribal Council. Which is a larger number, the number of times Boo has attended Tribal Council, or the number of times Mookie hasn’t? Drag your cursor between the square brackets to see the answer. < Boo (and Cassandra) have attended only two Tribal Councils to date. But Mookie has been to every one except that of Liliana. He “wins!” > By the way, last week’s answer was wrong. The first time contestants teamed up in the individual part of the game was actually in Survivor: Australia, when Jerri and Colby won the right to damage the Great Barrier Reef together. Well, my description of “odd couple” still applies! Thanks to alert reader “Kirk” for setting me straight. With Jenna away at one of Ethan’s charity events, the show opens with Dalton welcoming guest co-host Stephenie LaGrossa to the show. Beside her appearances here, Stephenie was a Survivor: Palau participant and the Survivor: Guatemala runner-up. Can Survivor: All-Stars 2 be far away? I never got the Palau love, but still think her performance in Survivor: Guatemala was one of the best, as she was a target from day one. Dalton says he enjoyed last night’s show and Stephenie says, “Awesome, one of the best!” Edgardo is brought on screen next. I can handle his accent, but gosh, Edgardo speaks about seventeen times faster than I can type! Dalton asks if Edgardo’s problems all came about because Mookie told Dreamz about the hidden immunity idol. Edgardo says the game fist started to go wrong for him when Lisi wanted out. Then, he and Alex tried to find the hidden immunity idol on their own but couldn’t, so they had to bring Mookie into the equation. Edgardo says that once the hidden immunity idol was found, greed took over and “Mookie changed his complete personality and became obsessed about it.” It seems the Lord of The Rings “My Precious” analogies may not have been too far off the mark! Dalton reminds us all that unnecessarily sharing information is bad, and Stephenie agrees. Edgardo speaks of the different use of the hidden immunity idol this season. He reminds us that in the past, it could be used after the vote was read out but this season, it’s used after the votes are cast but before they are read out. Stephenie, perhaps playing dumb, asks, “Why is that, what’s that all about?” Dalton gets it, but Edgardo speaks first to point out that the rules had to be changed because in the last two seasons, hidden idols were a free pass to final three. Edgardo described things correctly for this season and the last two, when Terry and Yul found an idol. But it’s not quite complete, so let me inject a little bit of Survivor history here. The very first time a hidden immunity idol was used in the game was actually in Stephenie’s Survivor: Guatemala season. It was found by Gary Hawkins/Hogeboom. That year, it had to be played before the votes were cast, so that player could not be voted for. I wonder why Stephenie didn’t remember this? At any rate, like this season, it was to be used when the holder felt they were the prime target and there was a risk they could have been wrong. Dalton liked the dramatic shots of the grinning Horsemen at Tribal Council, and again when the votes were revealed and the smiles faded out. Edgardo says they knew Dreamz had told the others they held a hidden immunity idol, but were unaware Dreamz had told Cassandra and Earl when the idol had been passed to Alex. Yup, that’s a “Gotcha!” Dalton wonders if Dreamz is playing both sides cleverly or just talking too much. Edgardo says he’s like Rocky in that he freely speaks his mind. Edgardo clarifies, at least Rocky didn’t give out his game strategy. Edgardo adds, “He’s all over the place, he doesn’t have a lot of strategy, he’s really insecure about himself, and people played his insecurities.” He reveals Cassandra took Dreamz under her wing early on and is influencing his decisions. Both hosts figure that’s pretty smart of her. At Stephenie’s prompting, Edgardo relates the tale of his eviction, saying, “During the day, it was crazy... everyone running around, names being thrown out. I heard Earl’s name, Boo’s name, Stacy’s name, Alex’s name, but I never heard my name.” That worried him, because he knew that the name that doesn’t come up is often the one going home. He continues, “When it got close to Tribal Council, I noticed no one was looking at me.” He knew that was bad, too, so he talked to Alex (who was also not getting eye contact) in Spanish, because they knew it was one of them. He doesn’t tell us what was said, though it had to be moot by then. When Probst called for the idol to be potentially played, Alex stood up and Edgardo said, “It’s your call.” Dalton notes that it was in Alex’s pocket. Edgardo confesses to being a little upset at the time, but quickly realized it would have been really stupid for Alex to play it in Edgardo’s name and then get voted off himself. It’s very honest of Edgardo to confess that, and now admits he’d have done exactly the same thing. When it came time to vote, people were pretending to write on air so the others couldn’t count the pen strokes and figure out the vote. We next see a clip of people scrambling for position before Tribal Council. Dalton notes Stacy being the one to put forward Edgardo’s name. What does it say about Dreamz when highly disliked Stacy is considered a more desirable alliance partner? Edgardo says he was playing the game by looking to the end, and felt he had a good chance to win if he was able to tell the jury, “I got here by playing the game, you guys knew I was playing the game, and I didn’t have to backstab anyone in my alliance to do it.” He feels many of others were just playing to get to the next Tribal Council and not looking ahead. Edgardo feels that Stacy has been brainwashed and is being used by Earl and Yau-Man. Dalton implies she’d finish fifth with either group, bur Edgardo disagrees. He says he and Alex were going to take her past final five and to the end, because they figured she couldn’t get jury votes. “She messed up,” he concludes. Kellen from Kansas is our first caller today. He sees Edgardo as an innocent bystander in the plan to get Alex out. Edgardo thinks the Horsemen ran out of time and couldn’t make a counter-move. I’d suggest there wasn’t one, because (1) at the time they thought Alex was the target and they’d already moved to block that; (2) three votes, even plus that of one confused ex-cheerleading coach, is still not a majority in a group of nine. Dalton asks about last week’s Tribal Council, when there was no time to strategize beforehand at all. He asks, “After that, were you worried about Mookie’s vote?” Edgardo felt Mookie had “dumb strategy.” Edgardo stood behind the idea of taking unlikable people to the end, not a Michelle, Earl or Yau-Man. He says they discussed it “about thirty times,” and Mookie didn’t see it that way. To this day, he still doesn’t understand Mookie’s plan. Once again, it’s Jerry in California. Trying to identify where it went wrong for Edgardo, Jerry asks if he blames Lisi revealing the hidden idol clue to them, their bringing Mookie into it, Mookie spilling it to Dreamz, or Dreamz telling Earl and Cassandra? He also inquires about Edgardo’s bow and arrow prowess. Edgardo blames Mookie telling Dreamz, because he thinks three on an idol is the correct play. He feels they still had a chance, until Dreamz caught the idol being passed to Alex. Edgardo admits they made many mistakes, but they tried their best to fix them. Edgardo still swears by his archery skills, but says what they had in the challenge was “the Fischer-Price bow and arrow,” and that his hands were too big and sweaty to do it right. While practicing with equipment they had made themselves, he was hitting everything. He tells us that Earl was really good with a bow and arrow as well, and Edgardo thinks Earl would have beat him anyway. Dalton jokes that Edgardo choked, and Edgardo admits it was very embarrassing and says his friends remind him about it constantly. Michael in Missouri asks Edgardo if he watched previous seasons, and asks him to name his favorite final two from any previous season, and also, how would he vote between them? At least I think that’s what he said, he hangs up before Dalton can clarify. Edgardo is confused, so Dalton interprets the question for him to ask something equivalent to, considering players from any season, who would he take with him to the final three? Nice save, Dalton. Edgardo names Jonny Fairplay and Stacy, people no one would vote for. Ha! The hosts offer up Lillian and Judd as other possibilities. There’s been eight finalists who only received two votes or less, so right there is no shortage of names you could put on that list. In fact, almost every season can provide a contender! It’s time to play Edgardo’s “Time Capsule.” In this feature Dalton plays back a message Edgardo recorded to himself before the game began. He says, “Hopefully, patience has paid off and you won Survivor. I hope you were nice to everybody and you’re sitting in your brand new apartment in Miami Beach with the money that you won.” Back live, Edgardo is happy how he played. One regret is backstabbing Liliana, because he had promised her he wouldn’t vote her off. He says, “I guess Stacy wanted to be the prettiest person on the island, so she wanted Liliana off.” Pressed by Dalton for clarification, Edgardo says he knows Liliana would have been useful in the challenges and wishes they’d booted out Dreamz instead. But Alex told him the others wanted Liliana out. Asked why, Alex told him, “Stacy wants to be the prettiest girl on this island.” Edgardo now slyly says, “I think… I don’t know, man. Stacy, the prettiest one? I don’t know.” He adds, “I was really nice (to Stacy/everyone?) in the show, and withholding, but I don’t need to strategize any more, so it can all come out and I can say anything I want.” Dalton doesn’t understand how anyone can vote off “a hot chick who gives back rubs.” As usual, segment two begins with a graphic fact. In this one we are reminded that Edgardo was part of Puerto Rico’s Davis Cup Tennis team. Dalton asks Edgardo about his parting words about hating Cassandra. Edgardo explains that he wanted to get her off because she was “just getting by in the game,” something he hates from past seasons. He compares her to Cirie from Survivor: Exile Island. Her impact on Dreamz was another factor, “she was keeping him confused.” He figured that she was in the middle of the alliance and by removing her, Dreamz would be much less connected to Earl and Yau-Man. Edgardo clarifies, he “hates” Cassandra as a player, not as a person. He calls her “a great person” and says that she really cared for people on the island. He hopes she didn’t take that wrong. Frankly, without this explanation, I don’t know how else she could have taken it. Dalton asks Stephenie about differentiating “people” from “players.” Stephenie says it’s hard, because it’s a social game. You have to look at how to get to the end of the game and separate people from game play. That’s how she was able to vote out Judd. She tells us she and Judd are fine with each other now. Besides Cassandra and Stacy, at the time he left Edgardo was also upset with Dreamz, Mookie, and Boo. Gosh… who’s left? Edgardo lost respect for Boo, who he felt was flipping sides often and not thinking long term. Dan from Oklahoma thought the Four Horsemen’s weakness, besides having “no-strategy-Dreamz” as a member, was focusing too much on the hidden idol and not enough on gathering more votes. He feels Boo and Stacy were up for grabs at the merge and could have been gathered in. Edgardo reminds us, they had planned it that Dreamz would try and get Cassandra (on their side); Alex would get Stacy; and he would talk to Boo. However, when they got into the merge camp, their former allies were acting “really distant.” When he saw Cassandra hanging out with Earl he knew they were done for and would have to use the hidden idol to stay in the game. Stephenie opines that maybe Boo could have been swayed. Edgardo notes that the other alliance was also targeting floaters Boo and Stacy. Gail from Florida has called into Edgardo’s interview to ask Stephenie about Palau. It’s about, when she “merged” into the Koror tribe, she told Tom all the game secrets except about Gregg and Jenn wanting to flip. She wonders, had Steph told that to Tom as well, could she have stayed in the game longer? Stephenie says Tom already knew about them and was trying to separate them, but Jenn wanted her out badly. Steph still feels that as such an outsider, she couldn’t get any farther than she did. Jamison in Massachusetts is on the line to ask Edgardo if he was he a follower of Alex, or did Edgardo plan for himself? Edgardo says he thought he was making the decisions, but he let Alex do the talking. One think he’s sure of is that they talked over all their decisions together. Stephenie says that in Guatemala, she took the blame as the one making all the decisions, but really she and Rafe discussed everything together. Does that make Rafe and Edgardo the clever ones? The next series begins with running the clip of Tribal Council. With the Horsemen sitting about as the votes are read, looking so cocky… funny stuff. Edgardo reveals to us that he never took his stuff to Tribal Council as a superstition, and he hasn’t seen it since. He thinks they’ll use his clothes to clean pots. I expect we’ll see the others wearing his shirts in the weeks to come. Edgardo retains some evil thoughts for Dreamz, but Dalton points out that Dreamz was on the outside of what was going on too. Dalton wonders if Edgardo ever thought of the scenario with everyone voting for the ones who have hidden immunity idols and both idols getting played, resulting in all votes being nullified. They did, and to avoid it, that’s why they targeted Cassandra instead. Actually, reader “Kate” posed this same question to me about three weeks ago! Dalton asks Stephenie what it feels like to see a plan go awry at Tribal Council. She says it is, “Shocking, gut-wrenching.” Edgardo reminds us he had never seen a vote against himself before. Dalton suggests that like Stephenie, he should have tried to talk someone into quitting like Janu did in Palau. Stephenie suggests crying. Edgardo says, “I saw that in one Tribal Council with Anthony and I didn’t want to beg for anything.” Ouch! David in North Carolina asks how tough the immunity challenge (called, “Chimney Sweep”) was, and also, why did they trust Dreamz so much? As they run a clip of Boo in the challenge, Edgardo says the challenge was, “Horrible.” His feet were too big and he knew he wasn’t going to win. About trusting Dreamz, he says, “We didn’t trust Dreamz. If they showed in the show that we trusted Dreamz, it’s completely incorrect. We never trusted Dreamz one second, we knew he was a snake and a rat, we were using him to get into the other alliance. But it didn’t work out, he got the best of us.” Edgardo says Dreamz is the first Survivor to be “both a snake and a rat!” Dalton refers to Stephenie performing well in individual challenges and asks her, did she look forward to the endurance challenges? She says she did okay in them, but in the aiming and throwing ones, not so much. Can we just check the history files for a second? Stephenie’s performance in challenge was legendary, but not in a good way. That was a big part of her storyline! The actual numbers are, she won just twice in eighteen individual challenges over her two seasons. One of those was actually not an individual win, as she was a member of a temporary team of four that won a reward (like we saw last week with fivesomes). The other win was truly hers, a key immunity victory that was seen as a redeeming moment. Melissa in Maryland is positively elated to have gotten through. She giddily asks if Earl and Yau-Man are the power players. Edgardo says people are lazy, so since Yau-Man was willing to work hard around camp, he was going to be around for a while. That’s the definition of a power player? Well, whatever keeps you in the game is a source of power, I guess. On his last day, Edgardo saw the game as between two teams, himself and Alex against Yau-Man and Earl, with the other people in the middle as their pawns. Ironic, since he was voted out for being seen as Alex’s pawn. Dalton notes that there seems to be respect between the two groups. Edgardo says he and Earl talked together on the last day. They have common ground in that they have the same job. He says there was definite respect among the four. The next segment is called “Probst’s Thoughts,” where a message is played that Jeff Probst recorded for the departing contestant. Jeff says, “Edgardo, I’m cracking up, you had the funniest disposition out there. I know you wanted to win, but you had a healthy, ‘It’s just a game’ approach. I admire that you kept your sense of humor intact.” Edgardo says he indeed wanted to win, but he was raised to keep a smile on his face. Dalton modifies that credo for Survivor and it comes up as, “A smile on your face and a knife behind your back.” Segment three begins with the “minus 10” feature. This is where Dalton reads ten rapid-fire categories for the guest to comment on, each in ten words or less. Here’s how it went: 10. Hidden immunity idol – Should have kept that for myself! 9. Tennis – Don’t do it any more, too much work. 8. The Four Horsemen – Maybe Two Horsemen instead of four? 7. San Juan – Beautiful beaches, beautiful people, and also kind. 6. Dreamz – Man! He sucks. 5. The TV show, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia – Best show ever made. 4. The Curse of Ravu – Rocky, Mookie, and uhh… Anthony… (Buzzed for taking too long) 3. South Beach – Second best place in earth! 2. Advertising – Fun, and I need a job right now. 1. Being on the jury – (grumpily) It sucks, because you don’t get the million bucks! Edgardo speaks about being on the jury. When first booted, he was discouraged and didn’t care about being on the jury, but that view soon changed. He says he took it seriously and wanted to give the money to someone who would use it well. When sitting on the jury at Tribal Council, he says it’s funny because, “You see through people. You know who’s telling the truth, who’s lying, and who gets on your nerves.” He emulates someone unspecific just pretending to be happy to spend another day on the island but not getting to the point. Stephenie says, “Like Ian.” Dalton asks if one’s opinions on how to cast that final vote change once you leave the game. Stephenie says that when you vote in final Tribal Council, you’re still high on emotion and who backstabbed whom. She’s been told by cast mates in the Guatemala season that if votes happened on the live finale, they would have voted differently. Dalton wonders if that’s the perspective of time, or does seeing the whole picture including secret confessionals cloud one’s view. Stephenie says in Palau she decided to vote for Tom and there was no swaying her. In Guatemala, she learned that Judd got mad and worked against her with other jury members and changed people’s minds. Stephenie supports the idea of totally isolated jury members. I think separation is a good idea in principle, but I wouldn’t want to be isolated for up to two weeks! Edgardo says that the real backstabbing comes at the end of the game, and that influences votes. Hmm, that’s promising! Judy in LA asks, if they felt double-agent Dreamz couldn’t be trusted, why not test him with some misinformation? Dalton jumps in to suggest, because they needed his vote. Edgardo says it was Mookie who was giving Dreamz information, never him. Edgardo didn’t feel convincing others is his strength, so he only talked to Alex and then Alex presented plans to the others. A clip of the reward celebration is played. (The reward was called “Get Smashed Q&A”). In it, Yau-Man uses “The Syndicate” alliance name for the first time on screen. Edgardo refers to Mookie’s telling Dreamz about the hidden idol as the dumbest move of the season. He thinks Mookie got caught up in the moment. Edgardo wasn’t there himself, but says if he were, he would have demanded possession of the idol right then and there. Dalton admires Cassandra bringing the right people to the reward, instead of just amassing her friends and leaving the others back in camp to plot and scheme against them. Edgardo knew it was bad news for the Horsemen when she made those choices. Edgardo suspects Dreamz doesn’t know what “syndicate” means. I can help here. Breaking it down to the root words, “sin” and “dictate,” it’s means, “The Devil made him do it!” See, I’m smarter than a fifth grader! Dominic from Arizona asks about voting out Lisi instead of Dreamz. Edgardo says it was his first mistake, but at the time the two guys seemed solidly with them and Lisi seemed less stable. Diane in Edmonton is the next caller. She says this show (Survivor: Live) is good because it gives you “closure” on the episode. She asks if the way Moto treated Dreamz and Cassandra was their real demise. Yes. Remember my formulae “7Mo = A³ + E? + ( 0 * (b + l + s) ) – C&Dz” from week five? As “E?,” he was one who seemed to recognize that the two girls were behaving badly and needed to stop it. Our last caller today is Jessie from Pennsylvania. She asks Edgardo if he modeled his play off that of previous players? No, but he borrowed from several. One was Johnny Fairplay, because he got people to do what he wanted yet was never seen as a threat. His objective was to “keep my integrity. I didn’t want my friends back home to see somebody that wasn’t me.” I guess he wasn’t taking that altruistic thought from Mr. Fairplay! Dalton asks Stephanie her opinion of each remaining Survivor. Here’s what she said, with Dalton’s additional comments where noted. Alex – A threat, but without the numbers he’s gone soon. Boo – Here for the long haul, but not winning. Dopey. Dalton says, he’s at the bottom of totem pole and maybe he’ll flip again. Stephenie thinks he might be athletic enough to win challenges. Cassandra – Has gone from riding coattails to playing smart. Dalton notes the similarity to Cirie, including the sudden burst of strategy. Both agree she’s no factor in challenges. How they can say that after she just won one I’m not sure. Dreamz – Done, gone in next two shows. Dalton sees him as having had the potential of being a valuable swing vote, but he can’t cash that in because he’s seen as untrustworthy. Earl – Yau-Man over Earl at the end. Mookie – A victim of numbers, done. Dalton expects him to scrap hard until he’s done… but he’s done. Stacy – Take her to end because she can’t win. Neither finds her attractive. Yau-Man – “He’s my pick.” Smart, likeable, works hard. Dalton agrees with the character assessment, though Earl is still his pick. The network promo is run next. It tells us: Dreamz has some explaining to do; Alex and Mookie discover Yau-Man’s hidden immunity idol, and a new plan is born. In case there’s any doubts, the rules are clear that the idol can’t be stolen. Looking in people’s stuff is fair game, though. Yau-Man looked through Sylvia’s bag, remember? So, he ought to know better! Note, Mookie had “his” idol buried somewhere for exactly this reason. Flashing back, the history of searching your competitor’s stuff goes all the way back to Kel and “Beef Jerky-Gate” in Survivor: Australia. Neither host likes the idea of re-hiding the idol, but Edgardo thinks it gives the underdogs a chance to fight back. You know how The Syndicate should play it next week? Send Earl or Yau-Man to Exile Island to control the new clue. And, how cool would it be if Yau-Man had TWO hidden immunity idols? As the show comes to an end, Dalton thanks Stephenie, and we’re done. Stephenie does a creditable job as co-host and we could do so much, much worse. Still, I hope the next time an opening comes up we can get a fresh take on some different topics, perhaps from a different season. Maybe one of the pre-All-Stars seasons? Or Jonathan Penner? CBS Website: Here CBS’s promo items for this week. A severe injury leaves one Survivor in excruciating pain. Can they recover or will they be removed from the game? Two Survivors discover powerful information which, if revealed, could change the course of the entire game. With few options left, tribemates are faced with a decision of blackmail or betrayal if they want to keep their alliance intact. This week’s clues seem pretty obvious to me. If you’d like my interpretation, my eAddress follows below. Last week’s clues promising “one of the most dramatic Tribal Councils in Survivor history” were pretty much right on. I think it’s one we’ll be talking about for years although I can’t say they topped the original “snakes and rats” speech. In Conclusion: I see the folks at CBS got this show posted a lot quicker this week. Well done.