'Survivor: Gabon': Firestarter by Dalton Ross

'Survivor: Gabon': Firestarter

by Dalton Ross | Nov 14, 2008
In
the first individual immunity challenge for the merged team, Susie and
Sugar surprise all by dominating, and there are more surprises in store
for Corrine and Charlie at tribal council




HOT MAMA Susie, once targeted by her tribemates, surprised everyone by winning the fire challenge for immunity

Crystal: What is it that I did to Randy for Randy to be bashing Crystal so much at Kota camp?

Randy: Okay, you want a list?


Man,
I had to go check a calendar after watching this last episode of
Survivor: Gabon, because I could have sworn it was the Fourth of July
judging by all the fireworks on display. Actually, it was more like a
boxing match with plenty of punches to the gut. In this corner: an
Olympic gold medalist in the sport of trash talking. She's big, she's
bad (at least in challenges), and she can knock you over faster than a
bowl of rice (well, maybe not rice). She's known in these parts as the
Tribal Council Terror. Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands
together for CRRRRRRYYYYYSSSSSTALLLLLL COOOOOOX!!! And in the other
corner: He'll videotape your wedding, rub it in human feces, and make
you eat it for dessert. His questionable temper is matched only by his
questionable taste in tropical shirts. He's the self-proclaimed king of
Gabon. Ladies and gentlemen, a round of applause if you will for the
ornery, the testy, the wild man of the wild, RRRRRRRAAAAAAANDYYYYYYY
BAAAAAAAAILEEEEEEY!!!

I was getting all psyched for a tribal
council beatdown of epic proportions, but then something somewhat
uncomfortable happened: Randy started yelling at Crystal about how she
and G.C. acted back at the original Fang. Fair enough; they were both
pretty useless and moody. But then he threw this in: "You and your
posse ran the tribe like it was a gang." Whooooooa there, cowboy. Am I
the only one who cringed when he said this? Maybe I'm at fault for
being one of those oversensitive, bleeding heart, tree-hugging East
Coast liberals that everyone loves to make fun of, but when I hear a
white dude describing two black people as a "posse" and a "gang," well,
it just makes me wince. Let me be clear about something: I'm not
labeling Randy a racist. Don't know the guy well enough to come to any
sort of conclusion about that. (I do know that in our pre-game
interview he promised to be an equal opportunity offender, giving hell
to both contestants and the host. Just watch him go!) Plus, I wasn't
there. Tribal council gets presented to us after it's been through a
chop shop of editing. Maybe he amended or clarified his statement. I
have no idea, so I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt and
just say that it was a...poor choice of words.

Crystal,
surprisingly, did not fight back after that. I say surprisingly because
while staying quiet is always the way to go in a situation like that,
Crystal has never been one to exactly keep her anger in check. Neither
has most of this cast, really. In fact, when you think about Michelle,
Kelly, Crystal, G.C., Randy, and Corinne — this has been one of the
angriest casts in history. Lighten up, people! It's never raining
there. It's not 115 degrees as in many Survivor locations. There are
barely any bugs. You didn't really even have to build a shelter. Don't
you realize how easy you've had it?! Try one day in Guatemala and get
back to me.

NEXT: Matty gets down

But all the drama and
dissention wasn't limited to tribal council. The back-and-forths
started right at the reward challenge when Fang saw Marcus was gone,
and Corinne remarked that, "He doesn't deserve to leave the game."
"Then who does?" Kenny replied. "Who does deserve to leave the game?"
Ken, of course, was right. True, Marcus was a bit screwed over by
producers switching up tribes for the 4,371st time, but you know what
screwed him over even more? Telling Crystal he was going to vote out
her closest ally in the game. That was a stupid as hell move and when
you make stupid as hell moves, you go home. (Or rather, you go to
Ponderosa to star in a series of product-placement packed web clips.)

Finally,
they got to the slingshot golf reward challenge. Corinne sat out for
Fang, as did Sugar (who, while technically a participant in the
challenge, did absolutely nothing except concentrate on not breaking
out into tears). Randy was once again at his most delightfully
abrasive, but instead of mocking or taunting the other team, he started
going at it with his own tribe — specifically, Matty. The more the two
of them got into it while trying to make a 6-inch shot, the more I
wanted them to miss it, just for the comedy of it all. Admit it, so did
you. It's okay. It doesn't make you a bad person. It just means you
have an appreciation for the finer things in reality television —
confusion, degradation, and outright humiliation. It's why we get along
so well, you and I.

Unfortunately, they made the shot. My
disappointment, however, was somewhat offset by the inexplicable humor
I found in watching Corinne off by herself yelling and jumping in
celebration. She just looked so...lonely. Even the team win couldn't
keep Randy from sulking, leading the always emotionally even-keeled
Sugar to proclaim, "Whatever, we won. Good Lord!" Fang's reward was to
be slapped in the face with wet leaves and then forcibly stripped down.
No wonder Randy was sulking. Although the sulking wouldn't last long as
he began getting a bit cozy with a native. "I haven't had a girl come
on to me in, like, 20 years," Randy informed us. Now, why could that
be? He's so damn cuddly! Oh, I kid, because Randy of all people can
appreciate it. For all of his grouchiness, dude has a pretty dry sense
of humor. While Randy was making time with his lady friend, Matty
was...well, I don't know what the hell Matty was doing. My man had ants
in his pants and he needed to dance! Or ants in his sarong, or ants in
his whatever he was wearing. For a second there I thought I was
watching Breakin' 3: Electric Gabonese Boogaloo. Again, I had Matty
pegged as a total dud from my pre-game interview with him, but he's
become one of the more engaging characters this season (granted, that's
not saying a whole lot, but still). As much fun as Matty and Randy were
having though, it all went south for them when they got back to camp,
as you can see in our exclusive deleted scene from last night's episode.

NEXT: Charlie gets taken out


Back
at Kota, Kenny was playing the game so well, in twisting and turning
the competition's heads, that he even had his own boat spinning in
circles. Also moving nowhere fast was Bob at Exile (non) Island,
futilely searching for the hidden immunity idol. But let's give props
where props are due: The physics teacher did the next best thing,
constructing what has to be the best fake hidden immunity idol ever.
(Although I do have a soft spot in my heart for the stick with the
smiley face on it. So genius and simplistic — and, when put in the
properly idiotic hands, amazingly effective!)

It was then off to
the immunity challenge where we all waited with bated breath to see if
Randy would indeed puke at the sight of Crystal as promised. He didn't.
In fact everyone appeared all lovey-dovey at the news of a merge,
especially Ken and Matty who began hugging each other while stroking
each other's arms and heads. Charlie, meanwhile, stroked and hugged an
imaginary Marcus, perfectly reenacting the pottery making scene from
Ghost before Probst broke up the imaginary love-in. And how much do we
adore Bob for making a new blue buff bow tie? Is it just me or is he
starting to look more and more like Dr. Emmett Brown every day. Just
hook him up with a white lab coat and a DeLorean, and he's good to go.
(Eighties movie references — I got a whole bag of them! Don't make me
start busting out some Krull and Better Off Dead doozies.)

So it
was individual immunity they were now playing for. And they'd be
playing with fire — literally! The challenge was a classic
first-to-build-fire competition. Images of Sandra and Becky from the
Cook Islands pathetically attempting to make fire with matches began
dancing in my head. Ah, good times. That still ranks in my top 5 tribal
council moments ever. But it turns out that this wasn't any ol'
ordinary challenge. It was a Survivor Bizarro Challenge! How else to
describe a competition that was dominated — dominated! — by Susie and
Sugar. I mean, no one else was even close. It's not like we thought
Crystal would pose any sort of challenge whatsoever, but where was
Randy, Kenny, Charlie, anyone else whose name ends in an "e" sound? I
don't want to say that Susie and Sugar had been complete non-factors in
the game up until now because their vote flips certainly took care of
Ace and Marcus, but, as we know, that was more due to coaxing from
Kenny and Crystal rather than their own scheming.

In any event,
Susie burned her rope the fastest and got the honor of putting on the
ugly-ass immunity necklace. But Sugar would end up being the one with
all the power as foursome #1 of Randy, Corinne, Charlie, and Bob and
foursome #2 of Kenny, Crystal, Matty, and Susie fought for her vote.
"Sugar is so weak and naive and gullible," said Corinne. "I've been
nasty to her for 25 days. I was nice to her one day, and she's sold. So
it doesn't even make sense, but she buys it. She's such a moron." Not
so fast there, Ms. Thang. Sugar was apparently not so sold, falling
instead for Kenny's plan to ouster Charlie (who Kenny was still bitter
at for forcing him to share the hidden immunity idol clue).

It
was about this point when I started yelling NOOOOOOOOOOOO! at my TV
screen. Charlie was my preseason pick to win it all, and now some
professional videogamer who calls himself "The King of Smash" was about
to smash my prediction to a million pieces. And that's just what he
did. Following the Randy-Crystal fireworks (which culminated with Randy
yelling "bitch!" as he cast his vote) we learned that Sugar — after
crying, natch — had gone with foursome #2. But don't feel bad for
Charlie. He's off to see Marcus! Now they can frolic around Ponderosa,
rubbing sunblock all over each other in many a CBS.com web video.

What
does Probst have to say about all the bickering that went on last
night? Well, you'll just have to check out his weekly EW.com blog to
find out. And why were Matty and Randy bumming hard when they got back
from the reward dancing extravaganza? Well, you'll just have to click
on our exclusive Survivor deleted scene below to find that out. And
then it's all up to you. Did Susie and Sugar impress and surprise you
in the immunity competition? Did Randy go too far at tribal council?
And what are Charlie and Marcus up to at Ponderosa? There's a time to
post and that time is now! web page