‘Survivor: Philippines’ rankings: The biggest Abi-Maria debate yet
Do you keep a maligned player in the game, or do you do the “honorable” thing and get rid of her over people deemed more deserving? In many ways this is an infuriating debate for the contestants on “Survivor: Philippines” to have, but yet they are doing it anyway.
Let’s try to paint the situation here before getting into our official rankings for the week. We have a set of pairs in Malcolm / Denise and Lisa / Skupin, and if either one of them picks up Abi, they are guaranteed to be in the final three (with the only exception being if Denise wins immunity Wednesday night, Malcolm plays his idol, and Abi had teamed up with Skupin and Lisa). Wouldn’t you want a near-guarantee of the final three over a fire-making challenge and a tie vote in the final four? Don’t you want the best shot at winning in what is a game? Unless one of these duos splits up, this scenario seems all but guaranteed.
We’re basing the rankings on everything that we have seen; and since no one has talked about taking Abi to the end so far, we have to think that it is unlikely.
5. Abi-Maria Gomes (last week: 5) – We hope that Abi is enough of a strategist to take the chip off her shoulder long enough to make a solid campaign for herself as a jury goat. She can figure out how to sell herself in the final three a little bit later on. Her only other hope is to win individual immunity, and she has yet to do that all season save for a challenge where she started with a huge advantage.
4. Denise Stapley (1) – While her alliance partner in Malcolm seems safe for at least a tribal council, Denise could be vulnerable of Skupin and Lisa come to her senses. We ultimately see Denise and Malcolm being the more unlikely pair to make a move here, mostly because they both probably think that they can beat anyone they face in the finale … if they even get that far.
3. Lisa Whelchel (4) – Out of everyone listed here, we genuinely think that Lisa is the most likely person to make it to the end of the game. Why? It’s simple: just about everyone probably thinks they can beat her, and they are probably right. Lisa occasionally makes some exciting moves, but then cancels them out by being more reactive than active. Based on how her “blindside Malcolm” move was prompted by her brother, we’re starting to worry that she is far too concerned with what everyone else thinks to have a real chance at the million dollars.
2. Michael Skupin (2) – Skupin, meanwhile, is also someone that could be defeated by Malcolm in the finals. However, the big difference between him and Lisa is that we could see him winning in the perfect scenario. If the jury is bitter against Denise for whatever reason (silly as it would be), he could be a very dangerous player. Remember, the guy does do a lot of motivational speaking.
1. Malcolm Freberg (1) – If we were looking at a final two scenario, we would rank Malcolm lower given that the odds would be higher that he would have to win his way to the end. As it stands now, though, he has a one-way ticket to the final four and really only needs to win the last immunity challenge to secure his place (and the competition is beatable). In case you are wondering why we know it is a final three, it is because Jeff Probst said so.
Who do you want to see win “Survivor: Philippines”? Be sure to vote in the poll below, and you can check out our exit interview with Carter Williams here.
Photo: CBS
