I have no idea what I would have done in Chris' shoes tonight on Survivor. He was in a very tough spot.
Option 1: Get rid of Twila. She and Scout will clearly never vote for each other, so splitting them up is a very good idea. It would also leave Eliza, Julie, and Chris as a voting bloc against Scout, practically guaranteeing Chris a spot in the final three. With both Eliza and Julie feeling strongly tied to him, as they seemed to be, he'd stand an extremely good chance of being one of the two finalists.
Option 2: Get rid of Julie. With Ami and LeAnn on the jury, that's two guaranteed votes for her should Julie make it to the final two. Getting rid of her is therefore a very smart move. On the downside, it leaves Chris and Eliza against Scout and Twila. Since Scout and Twila will never defect from each other, it means Chris and Eliza can choose to stay together and go to a tiebreaker against Scout and Twila, or one of them has to defect to the other side and vote their erstwhile partner out.
Chris chose option 2, and Eliza was NOT pleased. Even if she's sufficiently annoyed to seek an alliance with the other women, it's safe to say Twila will never agree to it. If Chris decides to vote against Eliza, the other two will do the same. But then Chris is in a pickle-- he'd HAVE to win the final immunity challenge. His choice is, I think, by far the riskier path in terms of making it to the finals. On the other hand, if he gets there, he wins a million dollars. Neither Scout nor Twila can possibly win the cash unless they're up against each other and everyone is forced to choose the lesser of two evils.
The odds at this point seem to favor Twila and Scout making it to the final two. I really hope Chris makes it-- he's the most "deserving" of the four, having miraculously avoided execution for his disastrous stint on the balance beam in the first immunity challenge and then surviving in the face of the female alliance. Twila's an acceptable second choice. Eliza and Scout have merely coasted under the radar-- Eliza barely so-- and it would be disappointing to see them collect a million bucks as a result.
Remember: the final episode is this Sunday, with the reunion immediately thereafter.
Posted by Peter at December 10, 2004 01:05 AMI think he figures that no matter what combo of people he ends up with in the final three, he's going to have to win the final immunity challenge, so he's angling to get to the final challenge with Scout and Twyla. Everyone can see that he's got a good shot to win paired up with any of the other players, so they're not likely to pick him over the other player.
You've got to figure that Julie, if she's smart, would pick Eliza over Chris for the final two. And likewise for Eliza.
Even if Chris could engineer a split of the two camps at the final three, say Eliza and Twyla, I think those two would pick each other over Chris (and should).
Thus he's got to win the final immunity challenge to win the game, and so he wants to go to the final three with the weakest two - Twyla and Scout.
Obviously the best position you can be in at the final three is to be the person everyone would choose to go with you, but Chris doesn't have that luxury. No one hates him, and everyone knows that. Julie may not like him much now, and neither will Eliza once she's voted off, but they might still vote for him if it comes down to him and Twyla or him and Scout, because they HATE Twyla and Scout.
Posted by: Don on December 10, 2004 10:40 AMI think Don has it right. I assumed he was setting himself up for immunity challenges (although Twila has proven a tough bird on the endurance ones) and the final vote. Seems a matter of *when* you want to make use of the animousity between the women.
Posted by: David S on December 11, 2004 05:44 AMWhat's gonna be *really* interesting is if Eliza wins immunity, which she's certainly capable of doing. This, by the way, would have been another reason to kick Twila - Scout is very unlikely to win the next immunity.
But even though Don's reasoning seems sound, I think Chris had more of chance than you think to be taken to the final two by either Eliza or Julie. I'm not sure either one of them would want split up the "grrl power" vote... and I don't think either Twila's or Scout's votes in that situation would be a lock for Chris. Maybe against Eliza.
Regardless, I think Chris made the best *final two* choice - to try and go up against Twila or Scout. Whether he gets there, however...
Posted by: Dave on December 11, 2004 09:19 AM