‘Survivor: Kaoh Rong – Brains vs. Brawn vs. Beauty’ Recap: Week 9

This means war…

Last week, one of the most epic blindsides in Survivor history took place when the girls joined forces to vote out Nick … without telling Jason, Scot or Tai. Jason and Scot thought they were in control of the game after the merge (since everyone wanted to side with Brawn), so obviously they didn’t take this “girl power” move well. What did they do, you might ask? Why, what all mature 30-something-year-old men do – hide the machete and ax to create chaos around camp. And for good measure? Pour multiple gallons of water on the fire.

While I didn’t expect these guys to laugh off the blindside, they could have accepted it and looked for ways to stay in the game instead of being such sore losers. Acting childish and sabotaging a group’s literal survival (and their own, I might add) is not necessary. (Like, seriously, how are you going to sustain yourself if there’s no fire to purify water to drink or a machete to cut open a coconut to eat?) They're not the first contestants to get outplayed, and they certainly won’t be the last.

It wasn’t hard to imagine that Scot and Jason would stoop so low, but no one could have predicted that Tai would side with them. At first, he was uncomfortable with this psychological warfare, but he decided that he had to put his emotions aside and commit to the guys. It was especially disappointing to see him pour water over the fire in the middle of the night.

Choosing sides…

A line was drawn in the sand at the reward challenge. The castaways were going to be divided into two groups of four decided by a schoolyard pick, but when Jeff Probst heard about the turmoil back at camp, he told everyone to skip the formalities and just team up as they liked. With an odd number of players remaining, one person had to sit out, but could still enjoy the reward if they bet on the winning team. Joe volunteered to sit out, and Julia joined Jason, Scot and Tai against Michele, Cydney, Debbie and Aubry. Cydney and Aubry knew right away that Julia was trying to play both sides. One person who was staying loyal to his alliance though was Joe, who picked the girls to win.

It was almost a come-from-behind win for the ladies, but Scot, Jason, Tai and Julia barely finished ahead of them and feasted on Chinese takeout back at camp. The guys used the time to pick Julia’s brain and figure out if she would be willing to work with them going forward. Julia said she was because it was smarter to keep them in the game. (Of course, she didn’t say it was because they were huge targets that no one would vote to give them the $1 million prize.)

When she returned to camp, Julia told Debbie that the guys tried to lure her to their side, but that she was loyal to the girls, and oh by the way, what’s the plan for the next vote? Debbie saw nothing suspicious about this, but Cydney figured Julia had made a deal with the guys and could no longer be trusted. Aubry felt the same way, too, so she began planning to get rid of Julia at the next tribal council.

What exactly is the plan?

All Survivor fans know that when contestants are working desperately to get a certain player out of the game, that person will almost always win immunity to save themselves from elimination. That’s precisely what happened in this week’s immunity challenge. A domino block-stacking game constantly kept shifting the lead among the contestants, but Julia’s slow-and-steady approach beat everyone. Not only did this put a damper on Aubry’s plans, but it also left viewers wondering how this week’s vote would pan out if Julia was safe, and Jason and Tai could play the Super Idol after the votes were read.

Immediately after returning from the challenge, Debbie laid out the plans for tribal council…in front of Julia. Aubry and Cydney were mortified, but Debbie insisted that Julia was not flipping. Cut to the scene where Julia ran off to tell Jason and Scot about the girls’ plans. To which Jason and Scot said then they would vote out Cydney, and wouldn’t it be great if you could join us?

Frustrated and concerned that Debbie was getting to be a huge liability to their game, Aubry and Cydney decided it might be better to get rid of Debbie instead. But when they approached Joe about it, he refused to vote out Debbie, bringing them back to square one.

A confusing tribal council…

The most insane tribal council followed. After discussing the division within the tribe, Scot and Jason blew the lid on the idol situation by telling everyone that he and Tai had idols. However, they did not mention anything about the Super Idol twist. They only said that rock, paper, scissors would determine who could keep the idol. Cue a lot of whispering and confusion among the others as they mouthed “original plan” to one another. But who knew what that meant with the plan changing every minute?

Anyhow, as he was about to read the votes, Jeff asked if anyone wanted to use their hidden immunity idol. As promised, Scot and Jason had their rock, paper, scissors match. Scot won, but instead of keeping the idol, he gave it to Tai, who said he accepted it and would now sit down. (Insert shocked and confused castaways here, but the viewers knew, if necessary, they would use the idols after the votes were read.)

In the end, a dumbfounded Debbie was voted out by her alliance, with Cydney and Scot also receiving votes. Joe shook his head in disbelief, which perfectly describes how everyone probably felt after such a fast-paced episode.