Tonight's episode is titled "Following a Dead Horse to Water." Based on the sneak peek clips, it looks like the girls talk about forming an alliance but there's no way that will happen. Julie also prominently features in the clips. Reba and Bello going after each other is probably what will happen. In one of the clips Jake tells Julie he lied to her the entire previous day and asks if she believed him. She said she did and then she tells us that she doesn't trust him at all now. I can see Julie wanting to target Jake but the others will probably push for Bruce.

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Brian

On Wednesday, November 15, 2023 at 5:38:54 PM UTC-7, Brian Smith wrote:
> Tonight's episode is titled "Following a Dead Horse to Water." Based on the sneak peek clips, it looks like the girls talk about forming an alliance but there's no way that will happen. Julie also prominently features in the clips. Reba and Bello going after each other is probably what will happen.. In one of the clips Jake tells Julie he lied to her the entire previous day and asks if she believed him. She said she did and then she tells us that she doesn't trust him at all now. I can see Julie wanting to target Jake but the others will probably push for Bruce.
>
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> Brian

I thought tonight's episode was great despite the outcome.

The episode started with the content I mentioned above. The next morning a boat came to camp with a table and a clue. They seemed to have no idea what the table signified. Kendra read the clue which told them to run into the jungle to look for bamboo tubes that were full of money The tubes contained different amounts of money and there were 40 in total. They could only find one at a time and they had to bring the tube back and drop it in their basket. It looked like Bruce was going to end up with nothing as he kept walking past the tubes. He ended up with just one tube.

Survivor Auction

When they went to meet Jeff the classic Survivor Auction was set up. None of them seemed to know what the setup was for. I had to laugh when Katurah exclaimed this was something never done before and that she knows her Survivor history. Two seconds later Jeff tells them it's the classic Survivor Auction last done in S30 in 2015. Now we know Katurah is not a longtime fan and has never watched "old" seasons. Jeff then tells them that for the new era they've made three changes to the challenge:

1. Scramble for money.
2. No advantages/rewards involved.
3. The first five auction items would be guaranteed but the total number (max of 15) would depend on the number (6 to 15) of the rock Jeff drew. The number would not be shown to the players as the person with the most money left would lose their vote at TC.

Kudos to whoever came up these changes as they made the auction much more interesting.

The first four items were all good. Then Katurah won the fifth item and expected it to be bad. Jeff offered her another choice, but she kept the first one which was a huge mistake. It was two giant fish eyeballs. She took a small taste and said she didn't want it. Jeff put it up for auction again and Austin nabbed it for $100 and actually ate a good amount of one eye. Gross as hell! Jake was ready to barf.

After the sixth item the people with large amounts of money started to freak out as they didn't know if the auction was over or not. IIRC, Dee spent her entire $900 on a chocolate milkshake. After the eighth item Kellie was very concerned as she had the most money. Lucky for her there was at least one more item which she grabbed. She lucked out and got exactly what she wanted. Item 10 was the last one (cake?). In the end, despite only having $80 to begin with, Bruce ended up with the most money and lost his vote.

Back at Camp

Not surprisingly, most of them wanted to take out Bruce. Drew was very excited, and Kellie wanted him gone because he was negatively impacting her game by putting a target on her by constantly being around her and saying she's his number one.

Immunity Challenge

Before the challenge started, Jeff took out a huge bag of rice and hung it up. He told them the bag contained more than enough rice to last them until the end of the game. The catch was that four of them would have to sit out of the challenge to get the rice. Kendra, Emily and Drew volunteered right away in that order. Katurah was then ready to volunteer but wanted assurance from the others that the people sitting out would not be targeted. There was silence so Jeff said "Katurah, I'll help you out." He then took out a huge knife and stabbed the bottom of the bag. The rice started pouring out into a basket below the bag. Drew asked if they were losing that rice and Jeff said yes. Katurah then volunteered but her indecision cost them half the bag from what I could tell.

The last three people left in the challenge were Bruce, Jake, and Julie which I thought was fitting. Jake drooped out first of those three and then Julie leaving Bruce with immunity. This of course ruined the plan to try and take him out.

Post IC/Pre TC

At one point, Emily told Drew about the girls' alliance and asked him to tell no one. I've been sensing for a while that Emily trusts Drew more than Austin. With Bruce safe, Drew pitched to Austin, Julie, and Katurah that they consider taking out Kellie and go after Bruce and Jake next time.

Tribal Council

I thought Jake shot himself in the head a number of times during TC with his poor performance. He was making no sense, and the long pauses didn't help.. When Jeff asked if anyone had an idol or advantage to play it looked like Jake was waiting for Bruce to play his idol on him. But that didn't happen.. Jake played his SITD got "NOT SAFE." At that point I thought Jake was done. I was wrong. In a huge blindside, Kellie was booted by a vote of 5–3. The three "K" girls voted for Jake. Kellie was shocked and visibly upset. She looked at Austin and said, "You did this" and a minute later did the same to Emily. Austin replied "Yes," and Emily said, "You played a great game." It's not clear if Drew came up with this plan on his own or if he and Emily concocted it.

Next Episode

Looks like Austin likes Dee!

FYI from Mike Bloom.

"Some advantage points following that #Survivor vote:
-Drew's Safety Without Power has officially expired (good until 10)
-Austin now has 2 idols. At least Emily and Drew knew about the amulet one. We don't know if Austin told anyone about the first one from sacrificing his vote."

https://twitter.com/AMikeBloomType/status/1724979043647340921

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Brian

S45E08 will be remembered for one moment of pure bliss summed up in three words......"The Emily Dance".
The booty shimmy, the deep bass accompaniment....absolute perfection :-).

On Thursday, November 16, 2023 at 6:31:30 PM UTC-7, zeppo wrote:
> S45E08 will be remembered for one moment of pure bliss summed up in three words......"The Emily Dance".
> The booty shimmy, the deep bass accompaniment....absolute perfection :-).

That whole scene was great. It's like Emily was a different person back in Ep01. Jeff: "Who are you?!"

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Brian