Foil in the Oven: The Tribe Has Spoken

The counting of the votes last night revealed that Parvati Shallow (above) was the winner of Survivor Micronesia.

As I do with any of these shows, I picked my favorite early on. I decided that I would go with Amanda Kimmel because she seemed to have all the qualities that you need to make it far in the game. She was very athletic, she had played the game before, she was attractive (which helped her ally herself with some of the stronger males in the camp), and her overall personality made her someone that was liked by all of the members of the tribe. She was easy to root for, and I really felt that she had a strong chance of winning. Going into last night's finale, I was feeling very confident. Unfortunately, things began to unravel a bit. Although she made it to the final two, she was not able to win over the jury in the final vote.

I really do believe that a poll of the jury before last night's finale would have showed Amanda as the clear choice. However, I believe that the pressure of the game got to her, and she made two critical errors that cost her the championship (a prize of 1 million dollars). Before I recount those critical errors, I'd like us to revisit the highlight of Amanda's season:

Let me set the stage: We're deep into the game. There are only two major physical threats left, Erik and Amanda. The rest of the tribe knows that they need to vote those two out if they are going to have a chance to win. Erik wins the immunity challenge, leaving no doubt that the tribe will vote Amanda out. However, she is very resourceful, and is able to blindside her competitors:


She never looked back from here. Erik went next, and then she won the all of the remaining immunity challenges. Once the final two were determined, the vote was left up to a jury of the last eight competitors to be voted off. I thought this would play into Amanda's hands because Parvati had been incredibly deceptive and manipulative in order to make it as far as she did. I never imagined that those people that she had manipulated and deceived would vote for her to win. And, I think I would have been right if Amanda had played it a little differently. Here are her two key mistakes from last night, as I see them.

1) Here is mistake #1: The final three have just had their immunity challenge (and the final immunity challenge of the game). Amanda wins, guaranteeing her a spot in the final two. However, along with this victory comes a difficult decision: she must decide who will be the other member to join her in the final two and who will be eliminated. The final three (Amanda, Cirie, and Parvati) had been an alliance ever since the start, and had grown close. So, it was hard for Amanda to choose which one to send home. Rather than simply announcing her decision in that night's tribal council, she began crying and talking about how hard the decision was. This really turned off the jury for two reasons. First, they would all kill to be in the final two and to have a shot at that million dollars. They resented the fact that she was crying to them about her "tough" position. Second, it's been well known that she and Parvati have become best-friend like on the island. For her to cry and wax poetic about what a hard choice it was, and then to choose her best friend on the island, makes it seem like all that emotion was just a show. The jury also didn't appreciate that.

Now, I believe that Amanda made the right move, and I don't think that she was crying only because of the decision (although I do think it was a hard choice for her). She had started to have emotional breakdowns the night before as well. In the past 6 months, she had played all the way to 2nd runner-up in Survivor China, returned home for a few weeks, and then headed out to Micronesia. The game was finally starting to get to her. But, the jury didn't know that. They thought she was just trying to put on a show about how hard her decision was.

2) The second mis-step came right before the final vote. Each member of the jury has the chance to ask one question to each of the finalists. Cirie, who had been with Amanda and Parvati in the final three, essentially asked Amanda "why did you choose Parvati over me for the final two? Why do you think she deserves a shot at the million dollars more than I do?" (paraphrased). Amanda responded by pointing out things about the way Parvati had played that were better than the way Cirie had played. This was a BAD MOVE, because I really believe that this changed Cirie's vote. Amanda should have said "She doesn't deserve it more than you. I chose her because you were more of a threat. You are a very good speaker and you know how to convince people to do what you want. I didn't feel secure bringing you to the final two with me." This would have given Cirie an ego boost, and I really believe she would have voted for Amanda. Amanda said before tribal council that she thought Cirie was a very good speaker and would be dangerous, but she didn't say it when confronted with that question. That was the pressure of the game getting the best of her.

For these reasons, Parvati defeated Amanda. Amanda's only three votes were from Ozzy (her love interest), James (her close friend from Survivor China, and someone who hates Parvati because he was manipulated by her), and Erik (who made the dumbest move in survivor history just last week).

Also, congratulations to James Clement(pictured below), a gravedigger from Louisiana who was named the most popular player (voted on by fans) for the second straight season (he also won in Survivor:China). He was given 100,000 dollars for each of these wins.

I don't think the fans could have picked a better player. James was a strong player, and one that I think everyone wanted to see do well. It was too bad that he was forced to leave the game for medical reasons.


So, it's always frustrating when you're favorite team (or in this case, player) makes it all the way to the end and doesn't win. But, luckily, tonight's critical game 4 and the overall excitement of the Celtics playoff run will make it easy for me to put this defeat out of my head.




Here is a preview of Season 17 (Survivor: Gabon), which begins in September.