Survivor Branford: Episode 8

The peaceful Branford conditions foreshadowed the calm before the storm that the game was about to see. With the elimination of Dennis, the unlikely alliance of five that had formed at the merge would now be forced to turn on each other. Meredith and Angela were established as a solid pair and had been working closely with Josh for the last three votes. Steve and Larry were another tight twosome who felt they may have been on the outside looking in. Since Angela and Meredith were near inseparable, the guys thought that Josh would be their best bet at progressing further in the game.

Larry wants Josh's help

Final five was also an important point in the game because it would be the last time at which someone could play a hidden immunity idol. Meredith had found her idol toward the beginning of the game and expertly maneuvered her way through so that she would not even have to consider playing it. Josh had only found his idol after Diana was voted out. Winning immunity at the last challenge insured that it would be able to stay in his pocket until the upcoming tribal council. Unless either of them was to make an all-time blunder, both would be guaranteed a spot in the final four! It would be interesting to see what would happen if Josh or Meredith were to win the next immunity challenge.

Meredith knows she's sitting pretty

The final five arrived at the immunity challenge and some couldn’t believe that this was all that was left of the original 12 players. But everyone would need to focus if they were to win the most important immunity challenge yet.

Each castaway would need to run to four different stations which were spread out across the island. The first was near the rock wall at which Dennis found his idol. The second was close to where Josh found his idol at the southern end. The third location was at the beach. And the final location was a spot only a short walk away from tribal council. At each station, there would be four bags tied to a nearby post. Each castaway would need to race to one station at a time, untie their bag and drop it back off at the starting point. Once a castaway had gathered all of their bags, they would have to open them up and arrange the numbered tiles inside from 1 to 100. The first to accomplish this would be guaranteed a spot in the final four!

Steve strategizes before the challenge

When the challenge began, the castaways scattered. Meredith headed for the rock wall. Angela went to the beach. Both Steve and Larry went to the tribal council area. And Josh revisited the area at which he found his idol. Through the first bag, things were fairly even. The guys started to slow down because they began to all go to the same station at the same time. Jockeying for position to find their bags and untie them began to cost all three of them valuable time.

Steve and Larry are knot joking around

Meredith and Angela had the good luck of always arriving at a station which was empty. Meredith began to struggle with the knots and fell a little bit behind. Her strategy of jogging to conserve energy for the final part of the challenge also began to put her in a hole.

Meredith begins to untie

At every station, Angela tore through the knots like they weren’t even there. Even though she will admit that she is not the fastest runner, she began to build a sizable lead. By the time she got back with her fourth bag, she couldn’t believe that she was the first to retrieve them all. Not only that but no one else was within sight. This was her challenge to lose. Angela’s confidence began to swell knowing how large her lead was and knowing how good with numbers she was.

Angela gets to work

Angela began to tear her bags open and order the tiles on the ground. She had probably placed close to 25 of them before Josh arrived with his final bag. Steve and Larry were not far behind. Under such extreme circumstances and pressure, even a simple task like this could seem incredibly hard. As Meredith returned and began it was noted that all of the castaways took the same approach in designing a 10 by 10 grid in which to place their numbers.

Josh tries to make up time

As time passed, Angela crept ever closer to her first immunity win. She was holding her opponents off. Larry might have been the fastest overall at placing his numbers but Angela’s head start in addition to the fact that he had accidentally placed the number 81 in between 17 and 19 were too much for him to overcome. None of the others were able to make much more progress than getting halfway through as Angela placed her final number. There would be no nerves from her at the next tribal council! Angela had won individual immunity and would be guaranteed a spot in the final four!

Challenge beast

With Angela’s immunity win, it was guaranteed that either Steve or Larry would be the next to be voted out unless there was a major hidden immunity idol blunder by Josh or Meredith. Not everyone knew this though. Josh never told anyone about the idol that he had. And neither Larry nor Steve knew about Meredith’s idol. Things were about to get interesting.

Winning immunity very much emboldened Angela. She began to think of more creative strategies now that she knew she was safe. One idea that she kept coming back to was a blindside of Josh. It made sense to her for a lot of reasons. Josh was both a strong social and strategic player. He pulled the strings on the biggest move of the game when Amanda was voted out. He also had two immunity wins to his name. She knew that Josh had built quite the resume. Now that he didn’t have the necklace, targeting him would be a hard thing to pass up.

Angela shows off immunity and explains her plan

Angela talked this over with Meredith. They bay area hippie couldn’t think of any counterarguments to Angela’s points. She herself was safe since she would be playing her idol. It was the time to take a risk in voting Josh out. A final four with the two of them plus Larry and Steve seemed manageable. Both Angela and Meredith believed that it was possible to get Steve and Larry to turn on each other. It was hard to not get excited about the final three.

Steve and Larry were both in the mindset of trying to break Angela and Meredith apart. They knew Angela was safe so it went without saying that they would attempt to vote Meredith out with Josh’s help. But before they could put this into motion, they were joined in conversation by Meredith and Angela. Angela took the lead in explaining that it made all the sense in the world to vote out Josh. Whereas the four of them thought now would be the time to begin turning on each other, they were happy to delay this to achieve an even bigger outcome.

Steve and Larry think things through

Josh knew what was going on. He was sure that he and Angela would turn on each other at some point. He had to give her credit for making a move that he would have made himself. But his hidden immunity idol was the big secret that he was letting no one in on. While he pretended to be resigned to his fate he really was trying to figure out if Larry or Steve should be voted out. He was fairly sure that he would receive four votes. Since none of them would count, Josh’s vote would essentially determine who would be sent home. He thought about this all the way to tribal council.

The final five shares a laugh

At tribal council, the hot topic was hidden immunity idols. Neither Josh nor Meredith admitted to having one. Larry boldly stated that there were no idols in the game. Steve was not worried either because Dennis had been voted out with the last idol left. Steve might have been the only one to still think that Dennis possessed a real idol. It was pointed out that despite coming into the merge with a 5-3 deficit, the former Totoket tribe now stood in the majority. This was a source of pride for Angela, Meredith, and Larry but was more of a coincidence than a concerted effort to play along tribal lines. Angela expressed disbelief in her dominant immunity win but said that for the first time she was completely relaxed at tribal council. In a light moment, she was accused of taking performance enhancing drugs that morning which contributed to her win. Things turned serious again and after a few closing remarks, it was time to vote.

The usual fear is gone

Not surprisingly, right before the votes were read Meredith stood up and played her idol. But to the disbelief of the rest of the tribe, Josh followed suit and played his idol! What the other four figured to be a sure thing was anything but now.

One idol...

...two idols

The first three votes were read and they were all for Josh. Angela bemoaned the fact that her plan would have worked perfectly. The fourth vote came for Steve making him the only person to that point with any votes. The final vote was almost as much of a shock as Josh playing an idol. It was for Larry! Somehow, there had been a tie with Steve and Larry receiving one vote each!

Larry makes a strategic play...

...to negate Josh's vote...

...whose idol negated Angela's plan.

Josh, Angela, and Meredith would have no opportunity to confer upon whether Steve or Larry should be voted out in the revote. The two guys were given the opportunity to plead their case. Steve explained to the group how he had Larry were basically the same. Same moves, same abilities, same personalities. He urged the group to just do what they felt was best. Larry agreed but said the one key differentiator was that he had voted for Steve to save himself! Whether he knew or not why he did this, it was a brilliant move! Steve couldn’t believe this and said “you voted for me you b------?” Larry couldn’t suppress his smile as the other three prepared to revote.

Larry tries to convince Sangria to keep him

In a unanimous revote, the other three all noted that Larry was stronger than Steve in challenges. Despite his best efforts to save himself, Larry became the 8^th person voted out of Survivor: Branford! Being a true class act, he wished everyone luck and maintained his positive attitude even after his torch was snuffed. The final four was only one step away from making it to the final tribal council. But it would be the biggest step that many of them had ever taken.