Survive This
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
  Survivor Panama Redux, Episode Six: The Wrong Stuff
by Kimmah
There was a demon that lived on the island. They said whoever challenged him would die. Their faces would freeze up, their heads would buffet wildly, and they would disintegrate. The demon lived at Mach 1 on the annoying meter, seven hundred and fifty miles an hour, where the air could no longer move out of the way. He lived behind a barrier through which they said no man could ever pass. They called it the Shane Barrier.

And so begins our saga of survival on two, no make that three, desolate islands somewhere off the coast of Panama as we trudge through yet another season of Survivor Panama. Others have beaten this topic to death much as Mark Burnett has beaten Panama and snake imagery to death, so I won't belabor the point because the readers here are well-known for their short attention spans.

As our story opens, we meet our unlikely heroes--the plucky Americans (sorry, Cantadians need not apply) who are fighting against all odds to prove that they have what it takes to succeed in one of America's elite training programs to join the ranks of the few, the proud, the Sole Survivors. It is a harrowing journey, filled with tests of strength and cunning and agility as well as the ability to balance buckets of water. Many before them have failed; some, such as Osten and Sue have bowed out in disgrace; others like Skupin and Jessie, went out when the tests and their own ineptness in the great outdoors became too much for them. Who among this group has what it takes? Who has the right stuff?

Frankly? None of them. They are all annoying as hell and I'm ready to give up on the whole damn show, but since I'm committed to this because I'm just that sort of entertainment masochist (I listened to Debbie Gibson way longer than anyone should have), I'll watch.

The candidates who have made it through the grueling rounds of training so far:

Casaya aka SeeYaAsses

This group is led by Shane. Shane is an asswipe. He is a screeching, screaming he-shrew of epic proportions who has quit smoking, drinking, screwing and shooting up various drugs in order to join Survivor. He has various bar codes tattooed on his body from random alien abductions (the various species want to make sure that they don't accidently take him back again, thus they mark him) and he likes to swear on his son's life. A lot (or as my freshmen English class would write, "Alot!!!!!"). That Shane is the leader of SeeYaAsses should speak volumes, nay, epics about this pitiful, dysfunctional team that is SeeYaAsses.

Courtney is another member who puts the fun in dysfunctional of SeeYaAsses. She's a hippie chick with dreads and freckles and the widest most unattractive mouth on television these days. She brays in the manner of Kimmie on a regular basis merely, I think, to hear herself bray and to make Shane shudder and convulse. She and Shane have a bizzarro love/hate relationship that I cannot begin to understand because I can't possibly begin to allow myself to go there. She is very "into" yoga and likes to contort herself into odd positions, which the camera people like to catch because they seem to be under some illusion that she is attractive. Perhaps if the aliens are watching. Maybe.

Danyell is Courtney's sidekick. She is to strident what Courtney is to braying. She doesn't talk as much as Courtney and Shane do (there are, after all, only 24 hours in a day), but when she does, oh God, when she does, the animals retreat and the tides recede because Danyell is as undelicate and unfeminine as one can imagine. She could also eat corn on the cob with her mouth closed, but that's probably unkind of me, so I won't go on further about her unfortunate orthodontia issues.

Aras is the cute guy of the team, but blesshisheart, he's A. weird and B. a pansy ass and C. stuck with the dumbest name ever. I keep thinking his name is Aramis. As best I can tell no one actually listens to Aramis, but he does enjoy talking. He really enjoys hearing himself do the psychobabble and the whole Silas-rah-rah-rah. Lucky for him, he's slightly smarter than a box of rocks, so he doesn't look like a total boob--yet.

Those four have formed the Foursome of Death. They swore on various and sundry lives that they wouldn't vote each other out. As we all know, an alliance revealed is an alliance screwed and this one? Totally ass fucked in a way we haven't seen since Miss Louisana Assfuck herself trotted across America on The Amazing Race (another show which is boring the snot out of me, but that's for another summary which I hope and pray isn't this week).

Bruce is also part of the SeeYaAsses, but only by a thread. He's the whacky Mr. Miagi (you don't need me to spell that correctly, now do you?) of the crew. At first he was their life force--now they've realized he's bat shit crazy, but like everyone's bat shit crazy uncle, he's got his little following in the crowd, so was saved instead of Bobby last week because it always makes sense to keep the nutty little uncle who builds rock gardens instead of the brute strength cuz when you're fighting for immunity. Right? (that it didn't screw them is pure luck, but we'll address that later).

Rounding out this crew is Cirie. I will admit that I hated her the first week. She is mouthy and arrogant and just irritated me to no end in her confessionals in the first weeks, but now I adore her. She is the lone voice of reason amongst these utter and complete loons that surround her. While she is absolutely playing the UTR game, she is doing so with a plan and for once we are getting to see that plan and I am enjoying it. I'll be able to decide how much I like her when she isn't around such loathsome and all around weird folks.

Meanwhile, the other crew is fading fast. Somehow, despite the dysfunctionality of SeeYaAsses, Team La Mina, aka Lament, has been pulverized lately. They have muscular men, agile women and appear to have the only brains within shouting distance at any given moment, yet they suck in the clinch all of a sudden. It's disheartening, but it makes for good telly, folks, don't you forget it. The losers of Lament are:

Terry who looks for all the world like Tom II. The only thing he is missing is the white hair and the really obvious accent. He's a FIGHTER PILOT for chrissakes. We are supposed to immediately fall in love because he clearly has the Right Stuff. There is no doubt that he is the leader-even the buffoons that are SeeYaAsses can pick up on that, thus Terry has spent boocoodles of time on Exile Island and has his very own little pocket pal to prove it should he ever need it. Terry bores me because we've already had Tom. Yawn.

Terry's right hand is Dan. Dan the Man. Dan Fuego. Dan can make fire with a piece of bellybutton lint and a shoestring. Everyone loves Dan. Dan loves everyone. Dan has a secret past, much like Gary Hogenwho from last year, but unlike Gary, Dan was actually successful in his secret career. Dan, you see, was an spaceman. For some reason that I cannot fathom, call me simple--you wouldn't be the first--he thinks that people would hold this particular fact against him. The hell? It's not as if he was John Glenn or Neil Armstrong or Sally Ride or Christa McCauliff. He's Dan.....Dan. Dan Whoever the fuck he is. Quick! Name a current astronaut! Does he think he is famous? Dan, Dan, Dan.

Austin is the cute guy of the crew and the narrator for Lament. He's very chatty. I think Austin would talk to a tree, which, come to think of it, pretty much sums up every.single.Austin.I.know. I like Austin. He's cute, he's nice to old people, he has game and he's cut. There's really nothing NOT to like yet---he'll do something mean eventually like piss on a zen garden and then maybe I'll hate him...or laugh.

Nick is also a member of this crew. He is essentially invisible and does what Terry and Austin tell him to do. That's all you need to know about him.

Sally is the lone girl on this crew and I can't help but like Sally even though I started off by saying that I didn't like anyone on the show. She commits the single worst fashion faux pas in the history of Survivor with her unbelievably hideous socks, but her overally pluckiness makes up for it. She is blond and sunny and perky and cute and essentially all that Courtney and Danyell are not--perhaps this is why I like her so much. My television positively glows when they leave and the lithe, blonde Sally illumniate the screen. Since she is a girl, she isn't able to be a member of the He-Man Lamenters Boy Club.

This is our scraggly little group. They are trying to hang on until the merge and things are looking grim for some. The lack of food is getting to them because MB has actually made them work for food this time instead of providing his usual Panamanian buffet for the participants. There is no weight gain happening around these camps as various people eat nasty little bits of fish that I wouldn't eat for love or money.

Night 14
Shane comes back after TC and is wracked with second thoughts over the vote to axe Bobby. He proceeds to ream Danyell a brand-new asshole over "her" decision to get rid of him and just rakes her over the coals right in front of Bruce, Aramis and Cirie. Courtney is spared the Wrath of Shane because she is down "sleeping" with the sea turtles on the beach. Needless to say, a lady as dainty and retiring as Danyell isn't going to take this one lightly. She repositions herself and takes it from Shane for a bit, but eventually realizes that it is pointless to continue and goes to sleep, plotting Shane's demise.

Day 15
The next morning, she is still seething and makes throat-slitting motions in an all-too-familiar motion (methinks she has "connections" back home) for Courtney and Cirie as they decide that he has to be the one to go ASAP. Danyell confesses that she wants to use a "gill-a-teen" on Shane. They all realize that he is crazy and they can't depend on him. Yada. Morons---why did they enter an alliance with him in the first place. Stu.pid.

Shane, in case I haven't mentioned it, is a stark raving loon. He wakes up the next morning and in his early morning hallucinations decides that his best approach to staying in the game is to continue to ask to be let out of his Oath of the Son so that presumably he can vote for either Danyell or Courtney. Before he can even get the words out of his gaping pie hole, Courtney and Danyell oblige him (and not in the way that they generally oblige men, either).

Thank you, MB, we go to...

Lament

Everyone loves everyone here. Dan is one with the Sun and is remembering when he came (((this))) close to touching it back when he was in 'Nam or some such tale. I'm sure it was supposed to be touching, but it just made me want to slap Dan's mouth shut as did the next scene where he "confessed" to Nick during their fruitless fishing trip that he had, in fact, been an astronaut. As if he was telling him that he was actually Jesus.

Nick: Man, I can't believe there aren't any fish out here. If only we could find ONE!

Dan: Yes, you know, Nick, once I helped feed hundreds of people with just two fish.

Nick: No way!!

Dan: Yes, my son. I did.

Nick: That is so cool! You were really Jesus?

Dan: I didn't want to tell you guys because I was afraid you'd hold it against me or something.

Nick: Are you kidding? We are the crew of love! We're going to vote out the girls, dude! Let's go back and tell everyone your story!

Dan: Yes, let us spread the word.

Nick: Can I see your scars?

And so they return to tell the news. Austin is flabbergasted that he is in the presence of a real-life-by-golly astronaut, so much so that he can barely speak a coherent, non-Silas-like sentence. Terry just grins, much like the proud father-of-the-tribe. I'm ready to vomit. I need some tension or some sniping. This is Survivor, not effing Leave it to G.D. Beaver, dammit. Thankfully, it's time to go back to SeeYaAsses.

After Shane and Danyell screech at each other some, Aramis tells Shane that he's an asswipe, idiot, fucktard and shouldn't go popping off at the mouth and endangering the Deathwish Alliance by asking to take back The Oath of the Son., only he doesn't use profanity and he says it in some psychobabble/zen-speak way that is meant to calm Shane and help him find his center or something. Shut up, Aramis. Go tickle someone.

Treemail arrives at Lament--it is, in a total surprise for this, the season of the skull, a SKULL!!! The Lamenters are all moaning and well, lamenting about how they are going to be fucked in the manner of the aforementioned Miss Louisiana Assfuck should they lose this challenge, specifically the young and perky Sally since she is noticeably female and thus, not a member of the He-Man Lamenters Boy Club.

On to the challenge. They arrive to find Jiffy wearing a dingy, washed out purple(the fuck???? Julie is trying to make sure that no one looks at her man, isn't she?) denim shirt where he announces that the teams are playing for both reward AND immunity. Oh, and the winning tribe gets to choose who goes off to Exile Island and is thus granted immunity. A cool twist if we'd not already been beaten over the head with the forshadowing fuckover stick by MB and we didn't already know that either Shane or Sally was going to be voted off, but will now be saved when sent to Exile Island.

It's important for Survivors to show their dexterity, both mental and physical. You never know when you will be called upon in the final days of jungle survival to untie a knot, run on a well-marked course or solve a puzzle, so naturally, this is the challenge for the Survivors. (MB is an effing puzzle and knot WHORE lately, isn't he?) Just to make this challenge more, well, challenging, he makes the puzzle pieces really big and heavy. Wowsa.

The teams take off and a much mouse-in-a-maze running ensues. Go folks, go. There is a bit of drama when Shane smacks into Terry/Tom, but that's about it for the excitement on the course. Shane has trouble with the knots and falls behind early on. His teams struggles to catch up. In a surprise to no one, Danyell uses her considerable overbite to help her gnaw through the knots, but her considerable boobage hinders her carrying the puzzle piece on the course. Lament has their pieces quite quickly, and the NASA-trained engineer and the perky young thing set to work on the last phase: solving the puzzle. Lament appears to have this one in the bag.

Ah, but appearances can be deceiving. Dan sucks ass at puzzle solving. Sally? Great at hauling buckets with water, but terrible at puzzles. Meanwhile, Cirie and Bruce cruise through the puzzle and make it look like shooting fish in a barrel. Lament wins in a puzzleslide if there was such a thing, which there is now because I said so.

Dejected takes on a new look as Lament gathers 'round, but you can see that the men are hopeful as they try to sheild Sally from the view of SeeYaAssas. There is hope, still, that they won't have to make the hardest cut. Yet. But the other team isn't as stupid as Lament hopes and they send Sally off to Exile Island, which ensures that one of the He-Man Lamenters Boy Club most certainly, positively, absolutely going home. Gee? Wonder which one.

I won't bore you with the details of the SeeYaAssas reward--it was a party with Panamanian children who are surely scarred for LIFE. The SeeYas had tons of food and Shane got drunk from a ciggie, much to the dismay of Aramis who treats his body as a temple and thinks that Shane should as well (the aliens didn't want it, Aramis, why should Shane?). In a really uncomfortable makeup scene, Shane and Courtney come to some sort of truce that make my skin crawl and causes me to throw up a little bit. They can make up, you see, because it doesn't matter that Bobby was shitcanned last week; they somehow managed to win and now they have nutcase Bruce to bring to the merge, which is actually brilliant and they don't even know it beacuse they don't know that Bobby was going to flip on them. Shane, Courtney and Danyell personify Dumb Luck.

Back at Lament, Dan is reviewing the mission and trying to figure out what went wrong. Ad nauseum. He goes over the details with Nick. With Austin. With Terry. With the torches. With the shelter. With the trees. With the shells on the beach. With a confessional crew. With the foliage. With anyone who will listen. No one has the heart to tell the geezer that it isn't brain surgery--it's a g.d. puzzle--they just let him prattle on and on as they set about plotting his demise, which Dan himself points out would have come already had they been in space today and the puzzle been a vital part of their survival (this is where I could make a really inappropriate Christa McCauliff joke, but I won't).

Dan is toast. You know it. I know it. Everyone in the Southern Hemisphere including the tadpole that Austin is going to eat for brekkie tomorrow knows it EXCEPT for Dan at this point. He? assumes that they are going to go to Tribal Council and let it be 2 v.2, which he pronounces two VEE two over and over much to my annoyance. Austin has other ideas. He realizes that a tie is a bad, bad idea because a tie breaker could put him in jeopardy OR he could be the other 2 in the 2 v. 2 scenario. Austin may act like Silas, but he's not as stupid as Silas. Dan's edge was that he was the thinker of the group, but he just failed miserably at the thinking task, so he has to go-he certainly won't be a help in the next physical challenge. Terry and Nick aren't stupid (I bet they could have worked the puzzle). They see he has to go.

He-Man Lamenters Boy Club are tight in the manner of Lex and his homies, so they decide to tell Dan before Tribal that he is toasted in the manner of Gus Grissom. He takes it well and agrees that he sucked, although he does continue to press for two VEE two. They gamely play along, but it ain't happening. They are off to TC.

Oh, before I forget, Sally is off on Exile Island looking for an idol that isn't there in the place that it once was. Cruel, but I love it.

At TC, Dan makes one last plea for two VEE two just in case someone was under some sort of spell from the torch fumes and forgot his sucktaclarly shitty performance at the challenge that lead them to the seats there tonight. No one does. He's out like a light and the even leaner He-Man Lamenters Boy Club is sent back to camp to prepare to slap Sally's ass and get ready for the big merge (what's the over under on someone calling it the "merger"..I hate that!!!) next week or tonight since I am so fucking pathetic and didn't get this done over the weekend when I should have but there were "issues".


 
Comments:
Nicely done - one doesn't often get a Gus Grissom joke...
 
I love you Kimmah.
 
Very nice, Kimmah.
 
Loved the Dan as Jesus dialogue. Smackfuckintacular.
 
I liked this summary Alot!!!!!!
 
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