Between tears and rocketing coconuts, "Survivor" heads into its Sunday finale with its villains alliance intact, despite last week's events.
After Rupert's exit — Russell realigned with Parvati and Sandra after voting against them and for Danielle last week — there is but one hero left now, Colby, who seems forlorn and dejected, at least when he wasn't yelling at his older brother. Yes, the final six's family members came to visit and participated in the reward challenge, catching water their "Survivor" all-stars threw at them.
Colby didn't win because his strategy was simply to berate his brother. His "Survivor: Australia" castmate Jerri did win, and decided to take Parvati, Sandra and their family members on the reward with her. They went to the blowholes of Savaii. (It's the Samoan island next to Upolu, which is the island where this season and last season were filmed.) At the blowholes, the villains and their family members participated in product placement for a cell phone while throwing coconuts into the huge geysers, launching them spectacularly into the air.
Meanwhile, Russell was blowing his hole. He got uglier than usual and called the women "a bunch of unappreciative little bitches."
Earlier, as his wife left the reward challenge location, Russell whispered to her that Parvati's "in trouble now" and that "she screwed up."
Calling the women's rejection of him "a million-dollar decision" — never mind the fact that he broke his alliance with her last week to vote off their mutual ally Danielle — Russell returned to camp with Rupert and Colby and swore he'd go with them to the final three. Since the remaining Heroes had no other real option, they were up for this, especially Rupert, who thought he could easily win against Russell.
But Rupert didn't get that chance. After the immunity challenge — Parvati won, defeating Rupert — Sandra approached Rupert about voting for Russell. Rupert went immediately to his new friend, apparently forgetting that he'd called Russell "garbage" just a few days ago.
Russell hates when he thinks people are after him, so he does the most logical thing imaginable and confronts them. "Either you're with me, or you're against me," he told Sandra, who later gave him the finger.
Meanwhile, Rupert was being annoying around camp. Colby said "he's just completely clueless," while Jerri said, "I have never in my life seen anybody that inconsiderate." She wondered if Rupert's behavior — which included sawing and stomping branches in the middle of the night — was the result of cockiness or something else, and said, "I'm leaning more toward stupidity right now."
With Parvati immune, Russell decided to vote with his original Villains instead of for Sandra. And Sandra played her immunity idol because it was the last Tribal Council at which she could use it. Also, Rupert had suggested during the Tribal Council conversation that a Villain should turn against their fellow Villains to prove that they were the best, which made her uneasy.
Sandra's idol play ultimately turned out to be unnecessary because of Russell's vote, but she did get to shock everyone and prove that she's more of a player than she lets on. And now she's one of two previous winners going into the two-hour finale on Sunday.
Will her alliance with Parvati and Jerri hold up? And will the women dump the two remaining men and give the win to someone who's won before? Will Russell be taken to the final three as a pawn to attract a couple votes once again, considering he's made a jury full of enemies?
The endgame isn't obvious to us right now, but we'll know in just three days.
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