Survivor Guatemala: Episode Three The Stupid Don’t Live Long, But The Boring Don’t Live At All
by Diamond

Previously on Survive This, TeamJoisey and Gothmog wrote better summaries than this one.

Also, previously on Survivor Guatemala, sixteen new castaways were assembled among the ancient Mayan ruins and divided into the Yuseless and Noclue tribes. Retreads Bobby Jon and Stephenie descended from the ruins like angels from heaven, and they were welcomed as deities by host and tribes alike, never mind that that they were, as we well know, losers. The tribes embarked on a madcap adventure through the jungle, where they battled such demons as scary monkeys, dehydration, and killer trees. In a suspiciously close race, Noclue made it to the end first, winning the fancy camp. However, Yuseless came roaring back to win the immunity challenge, and, to the surprise of absolutely no one, decrepit cripple Jim earned the prestigious title of First Boot.

In Episode 2, the reward challenge gave the crotch-cam a good workout, and Rafe submitted one of the saddest challenge performances in Survivor history. The immunity challenge brought equal parts mud wrestling and naked, blurred asses, while Gary’s brilliant plan to lie about something nobody cares about was busted by Danni. And Morgan the magician’s assistant was made to disappear.

Who will be voted out…tonight???

Day 7 breaks at Yuseless camp. Worker bee Lydia gathers firewood.

Lydia: Last night, Morgan got voted out. But, I really believe my head was on the chopping block.

She’s a perceptive little bugger, isn’t she? I’ll bet it takes a lot of faith to believe something like that, especially when people outright told her so.

In a preview of the fast-paced excitement that is to come throughout the episode, Lydia and Brianna sit around and vacantly discuss the weather. Brianna explains that the two of them don’t get along, although they don’t actually fight. Because god forbid they should provide the home viewers with any sort of entertaining action. Somewhere, Mark Burnett angrily curses Jerry Bruckheimer and his Emmy.

Brian, who delusionally fancies himself a Survivor-style chessmaster, explains last night’s vote:

Brian: That was 100% me. I engineered Morgan’s ouster. It was fabulous.

Okay, “ouster”? She wasn’t a dictator, honey. You didn’t stage a coup. It was a freakin’ tribal council. Please get over yourself. (Actually, as a rule, “get over yourself” should be understood to be a standing order, rather than a one-time admonition. And really, it should apply to pretty much everyone. But anyway.)

Over at Noclue, Judddd bitches about the monkeys. You see, no one told him he was going to be sleeping out in the wilderness, with, you know, animals and shit. Cindy the zookeeper explains the reason for all the noise, but Juddddddd is having none of it. Learning is so not cool.

Juddddd: It’s the most annoyingest noise I’ve ever heard in my entire life.

Obviously, Judd has never heard the sound of his own voice.

Challenge time! Mercifully, we are spared the reading of the treemail.

Jiffy: Let’s get to today’s challenge. Here in Guatemala, you guys are surrounded by ruins that are in various stages of excavation by archeologists, who are no doubt appreciative that we’ve interrupted their work to desecrate the ruins and film our insipid t.v. show. That plays into today’s challenge. You’re going to build an archeologists’ tent, using items you gather while blindfolded. Because blindfolded people gathering stuff equals comedy gold. And also, because we don’t have enough imagination to think up new challenges. Wanna know what’cher playin’ for?

Everyone: Whatever.

Jiffy: Who’s gonna be the signal-callers? Okay, Brooke, for Noclue. And Gary, for Yuseless.

Gary: I’m good at this sort of field-management, play-calling sort of thing. But not because I’m a former quarterback or anything.

Jiffy: Survivors ready? Go!

The challenge plays out as it always does. Stuff is collected. Danni gets whacked in the head a few times, but other than that, the tribes are surprisingly coordinated. Yuseless gets all their items well ahead of Noclue, but they blow their lead, and Noclue surges ahead at the assembly stage, winning the reward of a tarp, pillows, lanterns, and blankets.

Commercials. Contrary to what Verizon wants you to believe, paying them for cell phone service is not actually the same as winning the lottery. Ooh, an ad for The Amazing Race, just to remind you that there’s a better reality show than the one you are watching.

Stephenie: The reward challenge was soooo easy. We were totally in the lead, and then we all start building like lunatics, and it was like a big cluster…mess.

Come on, say it, Steph. You know you want to. Cluster…fuck!

Stephenie: I’m just hoping that it’s so early in this game that we can pull it out. I believe that can happen, I really do. I’ve been in worse situations. But it’s not like I’m a professional loser or anything.

Stephenie tells the girls that it was the easiest challenge ever.

Amy: Yeah, but we lost it.

Straight-up and to the point. Don’t let the Reveah accent fool you. Amy may be the smahtest one there.

Amy washes out her grimy, mud-caked shirt and complains about the less-than-pristine conditions. Though, to her credit, she does it good-naturedly. For some reason, Lydia finds this knee-slappingly hilarious. Steph just rolls her eyes all, god, this is so old already, these people are such amateurs.

Back at Noclue, the tribe is going crazy from the heat. They need to cool off in the lake, even if it means swimming with the sharks, I mean, crocodiles.

Cindy: I’m not getting in there. I work with alligators, and they behave just like crocs do, and even though we can’t see ‘em, there’s probably hundreds in this lake, if not more. I don’t want to take the risk that one of ‘em could bite me and puncture an implant. These things weren’t cheap.

Brandon (or, if you’re Tim McCarver, “Bronson”) says you eventually have to say screw it and take a chance. Who cares if you lose a limb or two? Live on the edge, you know?

Yes, “edgy” is the first thing that comes to mind when I think of Brandon.

Anyway, Brandon, Juddd, Bobby Jon, and Danni take the plunge. It’s riveting. Unfortunately (for us), despite all the buildup, absolutely nothing happens. As usual, Burnett promises carnage and doesn’t follow through, leaving us feeling empty and betrayed.

Who would you most like to see get eaten by a crocodile?
Judddd
Cindy
Brandon
Danni
Gary
Brian
Rafe
Stephenie
Probst

Back at Yuseless, Brianna, whose most notable characteristic is that she looks a bit like a poor man’s Rachel Bilson, wants to make sure the tribe has a reason to keep her around.

Brianna: I’m pulling my workload around camp.

See? She can screw up simple expressions with ease. That’s a skill!

Brianna: I want to be considered an asset on this tribe. You have to be considered a provider. And I believe. I am.

First of all, grinding corn does not make you a provider, unless you grew the corn yourself. Second, girl is creepy. She sounds like she’s reading from a script. And not well, either. This doesn’t bode well for the acting career I’m sure she’s angling for.

It’s mealtime at Yuseless, which is always a constant source of excitement. Steph fills us in:

Stephenie: Dinner’s the same old corn mush. It’s similar to oatmeal, but not as good. It’s sort of crunchy, like a crunchy, soft…ish, stuck-in-your-teeth kind of meal, I guess you could say…?

How…articulate.

Anyway, Rafe wants something else to eat, anything, as long as it’s different from corn. He’ll even eat dirt. I wonder if there’s any paste in the jungle, because I’ll bet he’d eat that, too.

The tribe finds a log covered in termites. Rafe and Gary (Ace and Gary?) decide to sample them live. Steph freaks out, saying she won’t be friends with them anymore if they do that. Because she’s in junior high. If she doesn’t want to eat them, fine, but why the hell does she care what anyone else does? Can someone remind me again why we ever thought she was so awesome? And anyway, sure, termites are not exactly my ideal meal, but if I’m starving, I think I’m eating what’s edible.

Would you eat termites?
I would and I have. Yum!
Probably. What's the big deal?
Maybe, but only if I was really, really hungry.
Oh hell no.

At Noclue, the tribe tries to figure out what to do with the tarp they won at the reward challenge. Margaret has the gall to try to tell the tribe how to best build a proper shelter. The manly-men on her tribe just want to have fun, though, and damned if they’ll be ordered around by a woman. Who cares if the shelter falls apart the first time a stiff breeze hits?

Margaret: Am I impressed? We were supposed to build a lean-to, and instead we’ve got a circus big-top. What a joke. I’m surrounded by morons.

And can I just point something out here? Remember back in the first episode, when we were led to believe that this was the better camp? What’s better about it? Obviously there’s no natural shelter, or we wouldn’t be watching this idiotic exercise. Sure, it appears to be at the base of some ruins, but if they can’t sleep inside them, who cares? Once again, we have been played for fools. Damn you, Burnett!

Commercials. Heeeey, look, it’s my boyfriend, Tom Brady. I’ll be seeing you tomorrow, dear. I’ll blow you a kiss from the Low-Earth-Orbit level seats. But ew, there’s Elijah Wood, most definitely not my boyfriend. How on earth did this little cretin get famous, exactly?

Time for treemail again. Except, what’s this? It’s just a description. What happened to the hokey poetry? The writers are clearly going soft on us.

Do you miss the treemail poetry?
Of course! It was genius!
God, no. Good riddance.
I didn't even notice.

This treemail brings tales of Mayan basketball and jars of warrior body paint.

Danni: Before we go to football games, we always paint ourselves up, so this is right up my alley. Because I’m a football chick. Like it says right here on my shirt. See? “Football Chick.” I’m a chick who likes football. Isn’t that wacky? Who ever heard of a girl who likes sports? I know!

Over at Yuseless, Brian tries to psyche the tribe up with a creepy pep-cheer-just-do-it thing that I don’t even know how to parody. Jamie has the only appropriate reaction, which is to place his hand in front of Brian’s mouth.

And it’s challenge time again!

Jiffy: Glad to see everyone took today’s challenge to heart and adorned yourselves as warriors, unlike those other losers from that other season who couldn’t be bothered to humiliate themselves with the disneylandesqe fakery we try to force on you all. Burnett was going to be all over my ass if you didn’t cooperate, so let’s just say I’m relieved. Let’s get to today’s challenge. We’re playing the oldest and the most popular of Mayan games, which looks suspiciously like basketball. At stake? Well, when the Maya played, the losing tribe sacrificed a member. You’ll do the same.

I momentarily get excited at the prospect that the losers will actually kill someone, but Jiffy clarifies that he just means they’ll vote someone out. Damn.

The tribes square off in rounds of three-on-three, first team to five points wins. Jiffy provides ridiculous play-by-play, as always. Amy sprains her ankle. Lydia gets called for traveling (so it’s actually not like basketball after all. Or at least, not like NBA basketball). In a dazzling show of challenge competence, Rafe actually manages to score. The skeletal Danni and her Abs of Death wipe the floor, er, the net, with the other women. At one point, Jiffy says “well-played,” which doesn’t seem quite right, because for some reason, I expect that expression to be used only by people who some semblance of wit.

Before the last round, Steph tries to instruct her team on how to set a pick. And, okay, I get her desire to compete and everything, but seriously, that’s like, not exactly a beginner skill. You kind of need to know the basics of a sport before you can really even try to implement picks. Especially if you’re trying to teach it to your team moments before taking the court. Again, I have to ask, why is it we ever thought she was so awesome? She has no idea what she is doing.

Eventually, the most important development is the fact that Brianna is completely and utterly useless. She just stands there the whole time, and doesn’t even bother to make any semblance of an attempt to move anywhere or give her teammates any help. She doesn’t even say anything when her teammates yell at her to move. The hell? I mean, Lydia might suck athletically, but at least she tried. Brianna just sucks.

Needless to say, Noclue wins, and Yuseless is going back to tribal council. Gee, I wonder who they’ll vote out?

Commercials. Buy a Survivor buff, because you don’t look like enough of an idiot already. From Sony, the new Bravia television, for men and women. Huh? Hey look, it’s one of those Royal Caribbean commercials that always make me think of Landru. On the next episode of CSI: Miami, it’s a rip-off of the Natalee Holloway abduction, because you can never have enough stories about missing white women. Also, for those keeping track, David Caruso is still a terrible actor. And still orange.

Stephenie: Yeah, here we go again. I’m on a tribe that can’t win. I’ve already done this. I can’t do it again. I’m frustrated. We’ve got Amy, who’s strong, but can’t run. We’ve got Brianna, who’s a makeup artist. After the first round, she’s got her head completely up her butt, and I’ve got to literally pull it out!

Except, not literally at all, because I’m pretty sure that’s anatomically impossible. But no matter. No one ever said you needed brains to get on this show. Tune in next week for a new episode of Adventures in Reality Show Grammar, where we’ll see Steph use the word “irony” when she really means “coincidence.”

Stephenie: Part of me just wonders, why can’t I just once be on a great tribe?

Part of me just wonders, maybe Steph kind of sucks a little bit herself. I don’t know. I could be wrong.

Stephenie:
She's awesome. You don't know what you're talking about.
Maybe a little overrated, but I still think she's pretty cool.
She's okay, I guess.
I'm with you. She sucks.

As tribal council looms, the pre-TC maneuvering takes place. Amy makes the rounds, trying to ensure that they all know she will not be going on the disabled list. I doubt she has anything to worry about, since a bum ankle is still better than one that doesn’t get used at all. Lydia tells Jamie she tried her best. Brianna tells Steph she knows she can do it, never mind that it’s not whether she can, but whether she will. It doesn’t matter what you’re capable of, if you can’t even be bothered to try. Idiot.

Tribal Council.

Jiffy: Steph, is it too early to call Yuseless the second coming of Ulong?

Stephenie: I’m on a tribe of losers. Again.

Jiffy: At the immunity challenge, you were looking around, like, why can’t everyone be as awesome as me?

Stephenie: Who doesn’t know what a pick is?

Jiffy: Brianna, is it fair to come down on you for not knowing what a pick was?

Brianna: I don’t think anyone was coming down on me for not knowing what the terminology was. They were coming down on me for not giving a shit.

Jiffy: Lydia, I’ll give it to you, you were trying. But you stunk up the joint almost as much as Brianna. Why shouldn’t these jokers vote you out?

Lydia: Yeah, I did stink. But at least I made an effort, Brianna.

Jiffy: Brian, are you outmatched by the other tribe?

Brian: Maybe they’re more athletic, yes, but we outmatch them in spirit. Go team!

Jiffy: Hey, here’s a thought - maybe if we have a pep rally challenge, you’ll win! Idiot. Amy, you’re a gimp. What’s up with that?

Amy: When I first went out there, I just turned my ankle, but it’s okay. I’m good to go.

Jiffy: Gary, are you buying that?

Gary: Injuries will kill you, Jiffy. Not that I would know, not being a former professional athlete or anything.

Jiffy: Amy, how frustrating would it be if they voted you out tonight?

Amy: Lay off the ankle! I’M FINE!

Jiffy: Okay, time to vote.

Brianna votes for Lydia.

Jamie votes for Brianna.

Jamie: You’re a girly-girl. You need to go back to the shopping mall, leave the jungle.

And…he’s really kind of a jerk the way he says it, but he’s also kind of right.

No other votes are shown.

Jiffy: Tally-ho.

Surprise, surprise, the tribe unanimously votes out Brianna, except for her own vote, of course, and off she goes to the great makeup counter in the sky. Or at loser lodge. Whichever.

Jiffy: Your strategy seems pretty clear – keep the strong, vote out the weak. But in a game this unpredictable, voting based on physical strength can be risky. Which means, next immunity challenge is totally a mental one. You’re all fucked. See you next tribal council, suckers.

Brianna’s last words: I’m going to reel off a bunch of clichés because one of the many talents I lack is coming up with original thoughts.

Next time on Survivor: Noclue is looking rough. A croc attack is promised, but I’m not falling for that again. Fool me once, shame on…shame on you. Fool me twice…can’t get fooled again! And it’s the most.dramatic.challenge.ever!

Oh, and I almost forgot: corpse-fucking.  ¶ 11:33 PM