Survivor Gabon: Episode’s 1 & 2

The show opens with a panoramic view of Gabon, on Africa’s western coast.  Lordy be, this country is staggeringly beautiful.  I can see why it’s referred to as the last Eden on earth.  And then the camera pulls in and we see the 18 new survivors tromping through the rain forest in a single file line.  Now, let’s stop here for a moment, shall we?  I assume that these people have all at least seen Survivor before.  So, why on EARTH are there douchebags out there in full on suits and women wearing dresses and high heels?  Wear comfy clothes and good sneakers because you are going to need them!!!  But, I digress.

The contestants meet up with Jeff (**swoooon**) in a clearing and begin to introduce themselves and the lying begins immediately.  Crystal, the Olympic gold medal winner, leaves out the fact that, oh, she won a freaking gold medal in the Olympics.  Randy, who edits wedding videos for a living, thinks marriage is bunk and he never plans to do it, but doesn’t tell anyone that.  Marcus, who is actually a doctor, tells people he’s “in the medical field”.  Seriously?  What is up with all that lying in the first 3 minutes?  Oh well….on to tribe selection.

In Gabon, the elders typically make the giant decisions, so in keeping up with the natives, Jeff has the two oldest contestants pick tribes.  This means Bob, the 57 year old physics geek (who is already on my last nerve) and Gillian, the 61 year old nurse and granny are the respective tribe “leaders”.  They proceed to do a standard playground team pick, which always hurts someone’s feelings.  Because someone is the last one picked.  This time around?  That someone is Michelle.  And of course, Jeffy-poo has to ask the question, “Does it bother you that were picked LAST Michelle?”  He might as well have said “Does it bother you that NO ONE LIKED YOU ENOUGH TO PICK YOU?”  It bothers her.  A lot as it turns out.  So, after the tribe pick-a-palooza, this is how it shakes out.

Bob’s Team - KOTA (yellow buffs)

• Ace (who is a douche)
• Sugar (a pin-up princess!  Yay!  I already like her!)
• Marcus (doctor in hiding)
• Charlie (pen-pal of Clay Aiken, hot for Marcus and Dan)
• Paloma (student from So. California)
• Kelly (blonde, perfect, hate her, retail sales)
• Jacquie (medical sales, uber competitive)
• Corinne (outright stated from the get go she was going to be a bitch)

Gillian’s Team - FANG (red buffs)

• Crystal (the NOT Olympic gold medalist)
• Susie (hairdresser - thank goodness someone is there to braid hair)
• Matty (personal trainer who inherited money at 18 and pissed it all away partying by the time he was 28)
• Randy (the marriage hating wedding video editor)
• Dan (hunk-a hunk-a burning lawerly hotness)
• GC (maintenance man, overcoming poor childhood and lots of time spent homeless)
• Ken (professional video game player…seriously?  how do I get that job?)
• Michelle (the bitter, last chosen one)

The first challenge happens immediately.  This is a reward/immunity challenge.  One person from each tribe would win individual immunity and be safe.  For the remainder of the people, getting to the top of that steep hill, all together, meant tribal immunity.  In the end, GC wins individual immunity for Fang and Marcus (hottie) wins for Kota.  Now, what remains is to see which tribe wins over all immunity.  Crystal (the NOT Olympian) sucked, surprisingly bad!!!  She should have flew through this course and seemed to really struggle.  Between her and 61 year old Gillian, the Fang tribe was doomed to head to Tribal Council that first night.

Both tribes win essentials, including rice, but the winner of the challenge, the Kota tribe, also won corn and beans.  They both take off with their supplies and head to their respective camps.

Kota makes it to camp to find some already existing huts.  Bob, the physics teacher, took control and built the camps necessary things.  Surprisingly he hasn’t really irritated anyone yet, but I think that is only a short time away.  He’ll definitely get on everyone’s nerves.

Over at Fang, Gillian goes out and hunts for elephant dung and after find it, actually suggests that the tribe EAT IT!  It’s apparently full of nutrients from undigested things, but I’m here to tell you people…..I’d have to be one breath away from death before I’d eat elephant shit.  I’m just sayin.

Ken and Michelle take off to have a look at their surroundings and look for termite mounds.  He convinces her to eat one, which grosses me out beyond belief, and then remarks “That’s hot”.  No it’s not.  It’s gross.  He’s hoping for a romance.  Shared between termites.  ::::shudder::::

Over at Kota, Ace is already irritating the daylights out of everyone, as I figured he would.  He’s bossy.  No one likes bossy.  Charlie is in absolute heat for Marcus and Marcus is absolutely straight.  Poor Charlie.

Elephants are roaming near Fang and Randy (the marriage hater) bangs his head hard enough to require stitches.  Day freaking ONE and this dude already has to have stitches.  That would be me.  LOL  Michelle is whining about being cold.  In fact, Michelle is whining about everything.  She’s a whiner.  She won’t last.

Another reward/immunity challenge, this time they have to slog through a leech filled swamp, dig through the sand and retrieve puzzle pieces and put them together.  In the end, Kota won the challenge and sends Fang to Tribal Council.  At which Fang got rid of Michelle.  Whining never gets you anywhere honey.  That’s a lesson well learned.

Episode 2

Returning from TC, happy to have the Whiner gone, Fang turns to their newly elected “leader” GC to provide.  He makes fire with the flint given them.  Over at Kota, the tribe is riding high on two major victories.  Alliances are already beginning to form.

At Fang, GC tries to lead, but the tribe isn’t being respected at all because they don’t trust his judgements and workload assignments.  There is infighting and distrust.  Ah, welcome to Survivor folks.

GC wakes in the middle of the night and decides to wash clothes which makes noise and wakes Ken.  Now he’s joined in on the noise making party and this irritates EVERYONE.  Gillian tells GC to please keep the “blah blah blah” down at night after everyone is asleep.  He doesn’t take this very well, as to be expected.  And then?  He resigns as leader.  Because that’s the grown up thing to do.

Reward/immunity challenge will offer the winning tribe fishing gear - a necessity for Survivor life.  The tribes have to push a giant boulder through a bunch of gates, one person has to climb on top and get a key.  After three stops and three keys, they roll the boulder to the end, find the right key to unlock the gate and roll the boulder onto a pedestal.  Winning tribe sends a member of the losing tribe to exile island.  Standard.

Gillian gets in the way, as usual.  And Kota kicks ass, as usual.  Kota wins, winning flint and a 3rd straight victory.  Kota sends Dan to Exile Island where he searches for the hidden immunity idol.  He does not find it.

Fang MacGyver’s a fishing pole out of shoe laces and a part of Randy’s glasses, which Crystal baits with worms she caught.  They manage to catch a couple sardines, which gives them protein for the first time in the game.

Dan returns from Exile Island which gets people all kinds of stirred up thinking he found the hidden idol.  During TC, he stands up and dumps his bag out in front of everyone to prove he doesn’t have the idol, and the tribe then turns on Gillian.  She is viewed as the oldest and weakest, so she is voted out 7 votes to 1.

Whew!  This was a LONG update since CBS showed 2 episodes back to back on Thursday.

Tune in this Thursday at 8pm EDT, 7pm CDT on CBS for the next episode.