Survivor Redemption Island: Put Your Hand on Your Handle

We are now dangerously close to the end of another season of Survivor, yet Phillip is still bitching and complaining about rice.  If I did not know any better I would swear that rice is like kryptonite to Phillip.  One can only imagine the problems he has when ordering Chinese take-out.  But we’ll get to that in more detail in a little while because we first must start at the beginning.

As Murlonio returned to camp Ashley & Natalie were happy that they were the last two girls.  Yes, but you are still outnumbered and you did not need to be.  You had Andrea and could have taken over the game leaving three girls still in the game, but you instead chose to blindly follow Rob and follow his every command.  After Ashley spoke with Natalie about staying together Natalie ran right to Rob and confessed everything.  Rob told her to just keep up appearances and keep doing what he says.  Like I have said before, Rob is the master and is playing a great game.  Rob’s only fear, and rightly so, is the person who will be joining the game from Redemption Island.  Rob had his hand in the ouster of each and every one of them and has no friends out there.  Well, maybe Matt because he is just so stupid. 

Andrea arrived at RI and got some dirty looks from Matt and some yucky hugs from Mike & Ralph.  I’m not sure what I was expecting to see between Matt & Andrea, but what we got was them arguing about how they looked at each other and something about Matt throwing Andrea under a bus.  Okay, that is a phrase whose time has passed and is officially done.  It has to go.  I am declaring a moratorium on throwing someone under a bus.  Meanwhile, Ralph proved he is no gentleman when he refused to let Andrea into their little hut and made her sleep on the ground.  Now he did clarify that if this was his house he would give her a bed to sleep in, but this was not his house.  Karma will get you Ralph.

They all gathered at the RI arena for the challenge.  Our four contestants would need to navigate a handle through a maze, break a tile, remove a bag of puzzle pieces and put together a puzzle.  Ralph flew through the maze with amazing agility.  It looked like he would easily stay on RI for another few days.  However, when he got to the puzzle he looked at the pieces in front of him and turned to mush.  It was basically the equivalent of me getting a golden horse with a plaque written in Chinese and trying to interpret it.  It just was not going to happen.  By the time the other three contestants finished up Ralph was still staring at the pieces and it looked like he had done nothing.  Remember that karma Ralph?  It just bit you in the butt. 

I have to take a break here and say that I have made a decision on RI.  I do not like it.  I think that when someone is voted out they should be gone.  They should not be able to get back into the game.  If someone from RI gets back into the game on Sunday and then suddenly wins I think I will be sorely disappointed.  I hope the producers drop this next season.

Anyway, back at camp we had Rob & Grant discussing how Ashley needed to go next.  Rob said that Ashley and Natalie are no different than any other couple and must be broken up.  I understand this, but I tend to think having Ashley on the jury only guarantees a vote for Natalie, whom you have promised to take to the finals.  Time will tell if this is a good move or if it will even happen.  Anyway, Rob worked his magic even further by telling Natalie that he “can’t stand what she’s doing to you”.  Oh please!  Of course she can’t see it because it is what Rob is doing to her, not Ashley.  Then Rob had the line of the night, which I am sure really made Natalie happy when she was watching it for the first time.  “Natalie may not be the brightest player to ever play this game.  We all know that.”

What is it with rice that gets Phillip so riled up?  Rice seems to get him so angry and irrational.  As our castaways were looking at how to divide up the rice Phillip started yelling at the girls about how much they should each.  Phillip seemed to think that the average woman only needs 1700 calories per day and that Grant needed more in case he needs to beat Mike should he return from RI.  This started quite the argument and shouting match, but to me it brought up several questions.

1. How exactly did Phillip become an expert on how many calories an average woman needs per day?
2. How the hell much rice would one have to eat to obtain 1700 calories?  I’m pretty sure they don’t have that much.
3. Why does Phillip think that Grant is the only one capable of beating Mike? 
4. Is Phillip related in any way to Uncle Ben?  If so what might their relationship be like?
5. When they finished filming was Phillip immediately taken away to a mental ward for observation?

The immunity/reward challenge had each castaway putting fish hooks together to grab a bag, open it up and put together a hanging fish skeleton puzzle all with one hand tied behind their backs.  I can only imagine what it would have been like if Ralph had been around to attempt this, but I certainly have to think that it could not be any worse than Natalie.  Natalie was so bad at this that Jeff berated her and told her to just quit since she had no chance of winning.  Ouch!  Ashley was victorious and won immunity and a catered meal.  Naturally she was able to choose someone to join her and naturally she chose her new BFF Natalie. 

The feast looked delicious and it seemingly made our small and sexy girls sick.  I’m just guessing, but it appeared they both consumed more than 1700 calories each.  Well, at least there was enough rice for Phillip to hand feed it to Grant.  I don’t know if he really did that, but it would have been funny.

So now what would the Robfather do?  Ashley previously came up with a plan to oust Grant so he could defeat everyone on RI.  I would guess they would feed him lots of rice before he went.  So Rob had a dilemma.  Blindside Grant or Natalie.  Certainly if he wanted to break up the Ashley/Natalie alliance then Natalie would be the way to go.  However, there is no chance that Natalie would defeat any of the castaways on RI.  Phillip is just way too crazy to get rid of plus he’ll do anything Rob says, but then again so does everyone else.

It was painfully obvious, at least to me, that Tribal Council would be less than vicious and Grant would be blindsided.  That is exactly what happened, but now does Grant have revenge on his mind?  Can Grant defeat Matt, Steve & Andrea and get back in the game?  We'll find out Sunday night.