This past week on “Survivor”, we saw the end of the two tribes, culminating into a single merged tribe, as well as a return of one player from the Edge of Extinction. As each of the three tribes came to the beach and Jeff announced it was the merge, he also brought on all of the members (except Sandra) of the Edge of Extinction. Those players had a grueling challenge to compete: to make their way back into the game, with the losers sent back to the Edge. As they lived on Extinction, some players earned advantages.
Natalie, Danni, Tyson, Rob, and Ethan all earned an advantage, not having to dig up the string for their pole in the challenge. Boston Rob led the way immediately with Tyson on his tail throughout the entire challenge, but Yul also came up from behind and caught the two of them in the final part of the challenge, as the first to guide a ball up a maze would win and get back in the “Survivor” game. Tyson and Rob were neck and neck after Yul’s ball dropped off the maze, with Tyson taking the win over Boston Rob and sending himself back into the game.
Shortly after the challenge came the signature merge feast, where Denise was asked how she got out Sandra. As she explained, Adam said that each of the old school players was gone, forgetting that Tyson was sitting right there beside them all. As the day went on, Jeremy and Wendell began to form a tight bond and Jeremy decided to target Wendell’s ally, Nick. After getting wind of this, the rest of the tribemates didn’t exactly think that was a good idea, specifically with the fact that Wendell and Jeremy were getting very close on the newly merged tribe.
During the immunity challenge, Jeff Probst revealed that for the first time ever, a woman and man would win individual immunity. In the challenge itself, however, it was cold and rainy and the castaways had to hold onto a pole, and whatever man or woman held the longest upon the poles would win themselves safety, as well as a fire token.
As the challenge went into play, several people went down almost right away due to the weather conditions at hand. In the end, it came down to Jeremy and Nick for the men and Kim and Denise to the women. The weather held out for nobody, as Denise ended up beating out Kim for individual immunity, and Jeremy beat Nick for the individual immunity, as he and Denise also got that key fire token. Going into Tribal, Jeremy tried to push against the growing Wendell situation, but the tribe was seemingly eager and unchanged on their decision to go and vote out Wendell.
At Tribal Council, Adam was the scapegoat, the one with the eerie feeling in their chest. Wendell ended up being blindsided in the end, as even his own ally Jeremy ended up turning on him in the end, sending his former ally to be the tenth person voted out of Winners at War, and to the Edge of Extinction. Find out what happens this Wednesday on the next episode of “Survivor: Winners at War”!
Jeff Babcock is a third-year student majoring in communications. JB884128@wcupa.edu