Did Survivor 47’s one-sided vendetta drag a player’s game into the ocean?

It is day 19 on Survivor 47, but it’s the events of day five—two full weeks ago—that haunt Sue.

Day five is the Kyle will rue for his entire, miserable life as, um, a former foster kid who seems nice, because that was the day he, too, was blindsided, and voted for Sue instead of TK.

Sue was never in danger of leaving the game, but as a young, naïve player barely out of college, she’s since forgotten that there is another game going on besides her own personal revenge plan.

This was before Sue revealed she’s actually a 45-year-old and cleverly started disguising her youth by covering her face with dirt. (By the way, Sue has explained the lack of washing her face: “I was learning how to contour with the dirt.”)

“The whole tribe knew except for me,” Sue said, and that “lights the fire under my rear end to really start taking down everyone—but especially Kyle.” She added, “I can’t wait for that day.”

In episode 9 of Survivor 47, Sue, wearing war paint, plans for the metaphorical beheading of her nemesis Kyle (Photo by Robert Voets/CBS)

After a cold, windy, rainy night—it feels like a long time since we’ve watched a group endure rainy nights and/or days—Caroline tried to do damage control with Sue, crying and talking about wanting to be on Survivor since she was five, and after years of struggling to do things because of her ADHD, wants to play a game that the little girl would be proud of.

That’s an excellent strategy to take with Sue, who is coincidentally also five years old, though Sue covered her head with her hoodie while Caroline talked to her. I first thought that was her shutting Caroline out, but then I realized it’s probably just to prevent dirt from escaping. Maybe Sue is spending her nights hunting Predators, using mud as camouflage?

Meanwhile, Andy, Rachel, and Teeny solidified their final-three alliance. “All we have to do is play our cards right,” Andy said, and “it’s going to be easy.” Ah yes, just play Survivor right and it’s very easy to make it to the end.

They decided to bring in both Caroline and Sue, to have a five-person majority, allowing them to Pagong the three former power players: Genevieve, Kyle, and Sam.

When deciding who to vote for, Rachel asked Sue if she wanted Genevieve out; Sue said, “the only person I am targeting right now is Kyle.” Twist!

Meanwhile, Kyle, Genevieve, and Sam sat in the shelter, and Sam—doing what he does best and breaking down the game—realized the other five would pick them off one by one. Interesting, he also told Kyle and Genevieve that any of them could join the other five in a vote, but then they’d just find themselves at the bottom of a six-person alliance, at best.

That’s when we heard about Genevieve’s fascinating strategy and/or mindset. “I genuinely don’t feel any of those connections to anyone out here, by design,” she told us. That goes back to blindsiding Kishan, who she’d really connected with as a person, and then betrayed in the game. Then she did it again with Teeny, who’d already forgiven her once, with the Sol blindside.

Now, Genevieve says, “I’d rather be a villain people didn’t connect with than the best friend who killed their dream.” That’s just such a fascinating effect, though it’s probably too late for Genevieve’s game.

Andy was also struggling with people, realizing that in Survivor, “there is so much variance, and the variances comes from people themselves,” he said. Then he said the weirdest thing: “not everyone out here is an AI agent playing to optimize their win condition.” Not everyone? Does he actually think there are AI players? Did he see Jankie bobbing around in the ocean?

Sam, too, was learning. Previously, he said, “I was deceptive, I was a liar, I was in control, and that’s kinda how I kept my control.” But having “power stripped from me” he’s now just being honest. “Who would have thought that just telling the truth would work pretty well on Survivor sometimes?”

Genevieve and Teeny (and someone else’s shoes) in a hammock on Survivor 47 episode 11 (Image from Survivor via CBS)

Jeff Probst’s Boat of Fun Times showed up to interrupt the exploration of game play. I dislike the journeys, but I especially hate the post-merge ones where just one person gets an advantage or a punishment, creating imbalance in the game because the producers force it, not offer it as an option.

The note said that if they could not agree, they had to draw rocks. Genevieve, Rachel, and Sam all wanted to go, so they drew rocks. Rachel said she put her name in only to prevent Sam and Genevieve from getting an advantage—that’s a player’s thinking right there—and then she drew the purple rock.

Her journey took her to a floating platform where her game awaited. A+ to the designers of this puzzle. Well, not the puzzle itself, which involved sorting balls into individual columns of the same color. That’s a game that exists in so many forms.

The clever part was the timer. Instead of an hourglass draining sand—boring!—the puzzle podium was tied to a long rope, which was coiled into separate piles, each of which was attached to a weight. To start the timer, Rachel threw the first weight into the ocean, and the ropes started unraveling.

If Rachel finished the puzzle, she’d unlock an advantage; if not, the advantage would plunge into the ocean along with her vote.

Watching her scramble to sort balls with the threat of the podium being yanked into the water was quite thrilling, and I was honestly anxious for her—what if her foot was near it when it was pulled overboard? Then I was just grateful they didn’t first make her tie her foot to the podium, which the challenge team can keep for Survivor 51: The Saw Era.

Rachel had a smart strategy of “just play the fun little game” and not even look at the ropes whipping their way into the water, but we definitely saw them. As the last rope unwound its final coils, she finished, phew!

The prize: a Block a Vote advantage. Back at camp, she decided to be “99 percent honest,” telling the truth except for the outcome. Sam doubted her story, in part because the challenge part sounded “very extravagant” to him.

Rachel did tell Caroline and Sue the truth, and suggested they loop in Andy and Teeny. That made Sue trust Rachel more, though it did not dissuade her from her anti-Kyle vendetta.

Genevieve pitched Rachel on getting out Sue or Andy if Kyle wins, because Genevieve told us, “they are great to bring to the end with you” and “that frees up more seats for us.”

It seems clear everyone thinks of Sue and Andy as pawns, right? Andy talks a lot about how he’s controlling the game, but there’s no evidence of that.

Anyway, all this did, though, was convince Rachel that Genevieve was a “very important person to get out as soon as possible,” because Genevieve is making the right kinds of attempts.

Rachel races to finish her Survivor 47 episode 11 journey puzzle before it’s dragged into the ocean

At the Immunity Challenge, Talky McShowhost didn’t just introduce the challenge, he paused to fill some time in this 90-minute episode with reflections about feelings.

I didn’t hear what anyone said because I was so distracted: first by the sad music that accompanied all this, and then by Sue’s eyes, which looked like they’d just stopped bleeding through the dirt.

The challenge was one that’s been around for 20 seasons now and involved the skill of balancing. But also spelling: players have to stack blocks spelling IMMUNITY on a platform they’re holding still with a rope.

“You want to guarantee you see day 21?” Jeff Probst asked the players. “Win this.” Oh, and don’t die overnight.

The fun of this challenge is that it’s super-hard, so people get close and drop their stack and have to start over.

“That is why you never give up, because anything can and often does happen,” Narrator McExposition yelled. I will take this as confirmation and affirmation that I should continue to plead and complain and hope that someday, he will return to the days when he did not fill every moment of silence during a challenge with his voice saying the same things again and again and again.

What was kind of funny is that, every time Probst highlighted a player as getting close to winning, their tower dropped. I assume that was the blocks trying to escape the sound of his voice.

Eventually, it came down to Rachel and Kyle, with Rachel backing up slowly to her platform, and Kyle racing to complete his last letter and beat her to the platform.

Rachel won, and while everyone celebrated with her, Probst yelled, “you will live to see day 21.” Now he’s a fortune teller?

With Kyle vulnerable, Teeny explained “the best thing for this entire group to do is to vote Kyle out.”

Of course, Sue was down for that. “I’ve been drooling—drooling—for this day,” she said.

Genevieve and Sam realized they could do nothing. “I have zero power right now. The group is going to do what they want,” Genevieve said. Sam said he’ “go with the group once again.”

Kyle knew he was in trouble because “a family man is a dangerous person to have at the endgame,” and I’m not really sure that’s true, that a jury would automatically be like Oh you have a family? Here is $1 million. Congratulations, family man!

I wonder if that’s part Andy’s thinking—that the others are wildly overestimating Kyle’s success in a final-three scenario, since Kyle doesn’t seem to do much in the game besides win challenges and be a nice human.

“It’s all about the order,” Andy told his five-person alliance. Then he said Kyle’s challenge wins were a coin flip, and “it’s not that risky” to keep him around. He did some math to show how unlikely it was Kyle would keep winning challenges, based on a 50/50 shot to win each challenge.

First, friend, don’t give them ideas about challenges, or we’ll have coin-flip immunity challenges. Second, no, immunity challenges are not a coin flip! These are skill-based challenges, and even if they are all about balancing, Kyle is excelling in them.

Caroline was frustrated by Andy’s math. “It’s not 6.2 percent. I don’t know where you got that number from,” she told us.

Teeny said it’d be “the dumbest look ever for us as players in this game” to not vote out Kyle.

But Andy thought he was “playing the numbers” and the “the hard part” was convincing the non-AI players. Honestly, he kind of sounds like AI bots here, just making shit up and presenting it convincingly.

Tribal Council starting at 9:13 meant a lot time for insightful chat like Andy saying, “We’re still kind of playing the way we’re playing.”

This was definitely one of those episodes of Survivor that 1) needed a reward challenge and 2) would have been an overstuffed hour of content, but struggled to get to 90 minutes. I am already fearing the finale, which will not be one three-hour episode, including the after-show/pizza reunion, but two two-hour episodes. Four hours instead of three? Oof.

The biggest revelation that came from Tribal Council was that Sol was wearing a shirt under his vest this time. And it wasn’t raining so he wasn’t wet. He was also wearing yellow pants so tight I am amazed he was able to walk.

Kyle suggested they create “a crowd-pleasing moment,” but instead he was voted out. Sue wrote “Tweedle Dee” on her vote for Kyle, a reference to something Andy said Kyle said—so yes, Sue’s grudge is so strong she clings to any piece of information.

On his way out, Kyle hugged every single player, and thanked them for being a friend, and traveling down the road and back again. Their hearts are true.

From the jury, Gabe said, “what a hero,” which I took as mocking but may not have been? Sierra said, “He’s a gentleman. I’m not.” Ha!

After his torch was snuffed, Kyle went in for a big hug from Jeff Probst, and then went over and thanked and hugged the camera operators, climbed up into a tree to thank the bats, got down on his hands and knees and thanked all the bugs for their service to the earth, and then, finally, six hours later, made his way to Ponderosa.

I kid, of course. While Kyle was not that interesting of a player to me, even despite his impressive challenge wins, he seemed like a very nice and kind person.