Daniel tells us why he will not win season 42 and then shows us with a Tribal Council meltdown.
There are certain scenes that will go down in cinematic history.
Darth Vader telling Luke Skywalker he is his father.
Hai, Chanelle, and Daniel from ‘Survivor 42’.Robert Voets/CBS
(Shameless plug for my recentStar Wars cover story, by the way).
Jack Woltz waking up next to a severed horse head.
The Wicked Witch of the West melting.
The cast of ‘Survivor 42’.Robert Voets/CBS
I’ve referenced this scene from 1984’sFootloosebefore inSurvivorrecaps.
I cannot overstate how slowly tractors drive.
Like, can’t get a ladder up in aSurvivorwater challenge slow.
Jonathan and Maryanne on ‘Survivor 42’.Robert Voets/CBS
No split-second decisions to be made here!
You could literally just step off the tractor as it was still driving and be all good.
Of course, that’s not what happens to poor Chuck Cranston.
Chanelle and Jenny on ‘Survivor 42’.Robert Voets/CBS
Hewantsto jump off, but can’t.
But I know what the message that came out of this week’sSurvivorTribal Council was.
The message was plain, and the message was clear.
Hai is a freakin' badass.
If neither flipped their vote, they would go to rocks and one of them would be voted out.
So they climbed their tractors and played a good ol' fashioned game ofSurvivorchicken.
And allow me to say this: Daniel Strunk may be the worst chicken player of all time.
When the law clerk did that, it was over.
We’ll never know, because he chose not to start from a place of strength.
The game is already over.
What does that even mean???
I’m not sure I can fully communicate what a terrible Tribal Council performance this was from Daniel.
The only thing working in Daniel’s favor is that is it early.
And he’s a totally engaging personality who is super fun to watch.
But the dude said it himself: “Let me tell you why I will lose season 42.
The reason is that I am constantly in a state of paranoia.”
His words, not mine.
So, props to Hai for standing strong and winning that battle of wills.
Or maybe it’s justMaryanne.
And that they did.
And that is why you are out there.
I once bought my daughter a brand new water bottle before a trip to Europe.
She left it in the Newark airport before we even got on the plane.
This drove me absolutely insane.
But do you know why they kept losing them?
Because they were kids!
What’s Daniel’s excuse?
“Another example of Daniel Strunk having an epic fail.”
Again, his words.
But I don’t want to focus on the fact that Daniel literally lost an immunity idol.
Instead, I’d like to talk about the parchment.
The parchment that Dan put down his underwear.
The parchment that was snuggled up close to Dan’s nether regions.
The parchment that Dan then had tohand backto Mike.
How bummed do you think Mike was to have to handle that thing?
The way Daniel loses things,who knowswhere it ended up down there!
Why would he have not put everything back in the package before handing the package over to Mike?
Because I fear the lines may be getting a bit blurred at this point.
Anyway, that scene was crazy.
Also, shout out to Mike for rocking the Wesleyan University sweatshirt.
The Ladder of (Non) Success
Wow.
This immunity challenge was no joke.
Let’s get into what went down here, because it was history-making.
But enough about the guy who could out arm-wrestle me with a single pinky.
Let’s talk about what happened to the other tribes.
You could see it before the challenge even started.
And, unfortunately for the contestants, the current was movingagainstthe direction they needed to go towards the ladder.
There’s one incredible shot that sums up the struggle.
It was of Swati diving down to start untying the ladder.
You saw her start to descend, and then her entire body started movingbackwardsaway from where she was swimming.
The craziest part about this challenge is just getting to the ladder WAS THE EASY PART!
For Jonathan, it was child’s play.
For the other two tribes, impossible.
This is the Monster!
We’ve hearing about this Monster for seven months now and here it freakin' is!
And it’s just as badass and scary asJeff Probstpromised.
RELEASE THE FREAKIN' KRAKEN!!!!!
Oh, I loved it.
I loved it all.
You wantSurvivor?Here.
Producers made the right call here in getting the contestants out of the water.
I also never got the sense that anyone was in any actual danger out there in the water.
Even Rocksroy’s plea of “I need help!”
(Ifound the article about itbut it looks like video accompanying it is long gone.)
Clearly, producers thought they could get this one off, but it didn’t work out.
However, it made for a fantastic bit of television.
Props to the camera operators both above and under water for catching all the action.
(Survivoris the most gorgeously shot program on television, you know.)
Props to the producers and editors for putting it all together so flawlessly.
And, above all, props to the players for enduring all that misery.
Definitely not as well as Jonathan.
But look, I’m not the person you want to hear from about this challenge.
The person you want to hear from is Probst!
see to it togive it a readto get all the scoop!
But first, Chanelle was sent with Omar on the prisoner’s dilemma hike.
This was a weird one.
And then they toldusthe same thing.
And then they both did the exact opposite, risking their vote.
Meaning they both lost their vote.
That dude seems totally safe, so probably the right call.
That meant they desperately needed Chanelle’s vote as a tiebreaker to take out Lydia.
But Chanelle risked it.
Just a brutal decision.
Yes, that bad.
The bad news was not over for Chanelle.
Hai was noticing a social game that seemed suddenly “frazzled.”
His gut was telling him something did not add up.
It was a wild sequence of events, and all SO EASILY AVOIDABLE!
All Chanelle had to do was not risk her vote.
As a result, I havenooooooidea where the tribe is at right now.
And congrats again to Hai for both snuffing out the ruse and standing strong against it.
Well played, sir.
But before it’s possible for you to seethat, you have a few other things to see here.
