Originally Posted by
JasonEvans
I liked this latest episode and the twist of dividing into two new tribes for the challenge and vote out. It is a way of potentially shaking things up a bit post-merge. Sadly, the division ended up putting the dominant alliance in a strong position on both new tribes.
And I wasn't all that surprised by the move to take out Nasser. He is a likeable player who could cause problems down the line with his idol. I'm a little surprised he did not see it coming. Was he really that convinced they were going to take out a non-threat like Heather? What I really do not get is why Shan used her extra vote to create a tie. Huh? If she and Ricard wanted Nasser out, why did she cast an extra vote for Heather? I just don't get it. Seems like a big waste of an extra vote when they could have taken out Naseer anyway by just using her regular vote. Did they suspect that Heather and Erika were trying to pull a fast one? Even if they were, how does using the extra vote help Ricard/Shan in that case? I feel like they just threw away Shan's extra vote.
Oh, and as an aside, why why why why why do players share that they have idols and advantages?!?! It only marks you as a more dangerous player. I get it if you are down in the numbers (like Xander) and want to hold the threat of an idol over the dominant alliance as a ay of making them split their votes or target someone else because they assume you will use your idol, but no one who is in a position of strength should ever reveal that they have an idol or advantage. So foolish!
Lastly, there was a zero percent chance Xander would use his idol to protect Evie and take out one of the dominant alliance. Doing so might have been good for that one episode, but it would put Xander in much more peril moving forward. The reality for him at this point is that as soon as he loses a challenge, he's highly likely to be taken out. He needs an idol as protection as soon as he does lose a challenge. Giving that idol up means giving up his only wiggle room in the game. Not gonna happen.
One of these days we are going to get an episode where Xander loses and does not have his idol any more. The editors will show us everyone scrambling and talking about voting out anyone but Xander... and then when they get to tribal we will see Xander get every vote. Mark my words, no one wants to go with him to the end.