‘Survivor: Philippines’ review: Jeff Probst is one tricky man
After watching Wednesday night’s new episode of “Survivor: Philippines,” there was really one thing that we realized above all else: Jeff Probst is not only a great host, but he is also a great executive producer. He’s never been one afraid to call someone out during a bad challenge, but regardless of whether or not it was intentional or not, we applaud the man for calling out Katie during the challenge. She was bringing absolutely nothing to the show, and the guy had to realize that her leaving the game would not be the worst thing ever. Was he trying to sandbag her game? Not really, but he did do a great job at pointing out the obvious.
Before Katie absolutely stunk up the immunity challenge (otherwise known as her first real contribution to the season), we saw another member of Kalabaw leave not long after Denise’s arrival to the tribe in Dana, who was just too sick to continue. We’re not going to call her a quitter because she really did seem to be ill, but we would have loved to see her stick around and fight for a little while instead. Personally, they would have had to carry us out alive.
At the end of the day, Jeff’s comments actually did not influence the decision very much at all, which is really a testament once again to the fact that one bad challenge does not change the way “Survivor” as a whole is played (even though Malcolm being on the other tribe is pretty much big trouble for them). The only thing that is worse than someone stinking during a challenge is someone potentially being a problem around camp, and this is where Sarah Dawson (otherwise known as Probst’s biggest groupie ever) got herself in trouble. We don’t know if she would have went home had she not sat around and given Jeff such a hard time about sports all of the time, which she did as a mindgame since she knew what his past really was … but it didn’t help.
Based on what we saw next week, the show is going to continue to shake things up. For the first time since “Heroes vs. Villains,” we are not going to have a merge at 12; instead, we’re going to watch these tribes continue to battle it out for at least one more week.
What did you think about this episode, and do you think a part of Jeff was unconsciously desperate to get Katie out of there?