Survivor S44E09: Under the Wing of a Dragon

© CBS

Survivor delights in trolling the contestants, especially the one just sent home.
by Jeremy Fogelman

The latest episode of Survivor is called “Under the Wing of a Dragon” but I also think it’s a sneaky way to troll the nerdy Kane, the voted out player this episode -- who previously knelt to Probst and sometimes play-acted like the game was a high fantasy adventure. The final votes against Kane were our Tika Trio (Carson, Carolyn, Yam Yam) and 2 out of 3 of the Soka alliance (Danny and Heidi).

The other Soka, Frannie, voted against Jaime in a “just in case of idols” situation except that nobody played an idol. Sadly we were robbed of the amusing moment Kane might try playing Jaime’s fake idol -- which means we are three for three in terms of fake idols not being used. At least the Survivor editors did get to troll on Jaime laughing delightfully about still having an idol (as the chyron slowly faded in “One Fake Idol”).

© CBS

Heidi got three votes from Jaime and Lauren, as Lauren gave Jaime her extra vote -- a sort of pointless effort, as per usual with the advantages in general, and especially this season. And of course, the lone anti-Danny vote from Kane, who was completely blindsided by the vote out, if not entirely shocked -- as he had noted earlier that he was not nearly as confident as he had been.

Now the Ratu 4 is a Ratu 2 and in the minority -- Lauren and Jaime seem pretty aligned, but will they be able to survive or utilize their position without losing? It’s not hard to see why Kane was voted out -- Tika and Soka were already allied with the last vote against the former majority Ratu, and since Yam Yam and Heidi wanted Kane out, things were swinging that way.

Yam Yam’s decision was highly emotional, counter to what Carolyn wanted, which was admittedly also an emotional decision to vote out Danny (as she tells us, she’s sick of him). But she still has her secret idol which no one knows about. The other idol holder Heidi focuses on Kane, perhaps because of Jaime’s idol, perhaps because he seems to be a capable challenge player. After all the episode trolls Kane when he calls himself the Strategist this episode.

Finally the Knowledge is Power twist was used successfully though, in getting the players to freak out about the possibility of it being there when it wasn’t. Carolyn tells us she’s successfully integrating with people finally, sharing stories of her sobriety and keeping anyone from realizing she’s actually fairly aware of what’s going on.

Her fellow Tika ally Carson struggles a lot this episode, post illness he’s completely starving -- and the dude has been a narrator for basically the entire season. He’s not played a perfect game, but it does make you wonder about him. The Tika Trio are still the most entertaining players left in the game though, although we’re now getting a bit more from others.

Jaime is the victim of the editors, the “fool” edit, while Frannie is shown with the potentially savvy idea to break up Tika before it’s too late -- Danny is shown with the arrogant edit, shooting Frannie’s idea down and later complaining to us about people not competing in the challenge to get rice.

At least we do have a set of interesting players left, although I do still feel like some, Heidi and Lauren specifically, are a bit too calm and collected to really stand out. But now that we’re in the endgame, there’s always the potential for a big, interesting move. Overall I’m still a bit in the “eh” rating on the season as a whole.

Next time on Survivor, the era of alliances is over, and someone will be betrayed.