Survivor Guatamala Episode FourPretty interesting episode. Opening we see everybody lying around, devastated by the heat and lack of food. No reward challenge per se this time, just a little chance for the tribes to give some rewards to other members of the same tribe. Gary, Judd, and two women get packed off for a picnic. (Gary got two rewards--the shower and the picnic; nobody else got that).
Then Probst springs the trap. Which member is the most supportive of his or her tribe? Brian and Rafe are chosen. The rest of the teams switch, although one other Nakum is allowed to remain with his original tribe.
This sets up an uneven match in the Yahxa tribe that gets remarked on a bit. It's pretty obvious that the three former Yaxha will be voted off in order by the four Nakum if this tribe starts losing. And that creates an odd dynamic that became obvious to me by the end of the episode. I'll leave it to the end of the post to reveal it.
At Nakum, meanwhile, Steph takes advantage of Judd, luring him into her group. Although the two groups are even tonight, Judd looks very likely to switch allegiance to the former Yaxha. Humorously, he talks about not liking his old tribemates, with all those young men; he talks about all the "male-tosterone" going around.
The immunity challenge was interesting; an outrigger race to gather three sets of paddles, which they then brought back to the beach. The paddles then had to be thrown to break three tiles at varying distances. Nakum takes the early lead arriving at the beach first. Steph manages to break a tile on her third throw; advantage Nakum. But then Yaxha manages to catch take the lead as Judd seemingly can't hit the target. At the end both tribes are trying for their last tile and Yaxha, after a few close calls, finally wins.
Much back and forth about whether Judd will betray Nakum. He says "The wheels are turning" at one point, and I couldn't help replying, "But the car's not going anywhere!" In the end he stabs his former teammates in the back. Cutie pie law student Brooke gets the hook.
This sets up the oddity. Next week these teams will meet again in the reward challenge, and somebody will realize that the former Yaxha and Nakum are now equal, but each has an advantage now in their former enemy's camp. If the Yaxha majority in Nakum loses intentionally, then they can vote off a former Nakum member. And if they win, they know the Nakum majority in Yaxha will vote off an original Yaxha member. So to the extent a team wants to keep their former mates in the game for the single tribal councils (hello, Pagong!), it ironically pays for the majority groups in each tribe to sandbag in the immunity challenge.
Which may be why Probst emphasized that things would be changing again. What if they reform the original tribes? Then Judd's got an bullseye on his chest as the person who stabbed a Nakum in the tribal council. That would certainly make for an interesting dynamic.
Random thoughts: Gary's still on the hot seat for being an NFL quarterback. The merge hurt him there too, as the sportscaster gal obviously remembered him. He didn't help things by admitting that he went to Central Michigan; everybody's gotta be thinking that she was right on the first part, why would she be wrong on the second? What an irony too that they didn't choose him to throw the paddles in the end!
Judd's definitely shaping up as the villain, but it's hard to really dislike him because he's not bright enough to be really devious. He's no Boston Rob, or Johnny Fairplay.
