Survivor: One World – Ranking the Final 11 Survivors (or, Dirt Happens!)

For those of you joining the ride for the first time, briefly, here’s how this series of articles works. Using just the episodes themselves and other authentic web-posted material (including RealityNewsOnline’s own exit interviews with dismissed players), I prognosticate each competitor’s chances for success in this game and rank them accordingly.

Now that the merge has finally come to pass, the focus of these rankings shifts toward making the endgame and winning it all. One thing that does not change: Never to be ignored is the Golden Rule – NO SPOILERS!!

Last week, I ranked our contestants based on the incorrect assumption that the gender-based tribes would return. My bad. Instead, the Football Team and the Cheerleaders still rule the school, while the Chess Club and the Cross-Country Team anxiously attend Tribal Councils to find out which among them will be ingloriously stuffed into a locker.

I enjoyed this episode immensely, because we saw a lot of the scrambling that transpired after the immunity challenge and before Tribal Council. Specifically, we saw:

1. Jay suggested to Chelsea that Jonas, as strongest of the weak, be voted out first;
2. Jay also proffered the alternative of Leif;
3. Sabrina and Kim were found and they also agreed to target Jonas;
4. Kim proposed voting out Jonas to Alicia, who, glad it’s not herself, agreed;
5. Kim revealed she would keep Alicia and Christina around as a backup plan;
6. Kim told us getting out any Manono male was her real aim;
7. Kim told Troyzan that the plan was to vote out Jonas; Troy wasn’t impressed;
8. Riskily, Troyzan told Jonas that the others were gunning for him;
9. Jonas suggested Big Mike as an alternative;
10. Jonas apologized to Tarzan, and they became buddies anew;
11. Tarzan named Kat as target of the original four male Misfits (which included Troy);
12. Laundress Chelsea had her fill of Tarzan, and wanted Jonas to stay and keep cooking;
13. Jay agreed with Chelsea that the four “dead weights” ought to go.

And all that happened before Tribal Council! For me, that was a righteously exciting sequence. Add in that Tarzan blew up again at Tribal Council and it almost seemed like it could be anybody going home, which is the way it should be.

That’s enough chatter – let’s get to them!

Tikiano (Black Buffs)

Okay, how about that name? “God-Year?” Couldn’t anybody fake the name “One World” in some bastardization of Samoan? Or Spanish, or whatever? Like, say, “UnoMundo?” Sheesh!

At any rate, with the choice of Tikiano, the handwriting was certainly on the wall for the current Salani tribe. As the one who coined it, Troy told Probst the name meant “The year of the Gods.” As Colton had already anointed the Salani tribe as “Gods,” this name was an unsubtle warning that this year, the game was not for the common people.

1: Kim (was 1 on Salani)

I am concerned that in clip “All Time Physical Low,” Kim reported feeling dizzy and weak. She added, “Today I'm thinking, take a step back and let some other people have their opinions come out really strong, and vote how the majority wants to vote.” That’s dangerous. You have to keep the pedal to the metal in this game, or it can slip away.

But her position remains strong. As the episode-ending preview indicated, the next move is Kim’s; it’s all in her hands.

2: Troyzan (was 4 on Salani )

Troyzan proved that a little effort can go a long way in this game when he got up early and found the newly hidden idol. I hope the others enjoyed their million-dollar nap!

Troy has a fan in the game, one who had mentioned him favourably before. It’s Sabrina, who said in clip “I Surprised Myself,” “I don’t think there’s anyone on this island that hates or dislikes Troy… we all genuinely love him. It was good he won the first challenge.” Mind you, she was smart enough to add, “We don’t want to keep seeing him win, or else he’s going to have to get off the island pretty soon!”

In clip “Too Close for Me,” Jay observed that Troy was “super-good on puzzles.” I guess it helps if you have Tarzan on the other side and overtly sabotaging his tribe’s efforts, but I agree that Troy has done pretty well at puzzles.

Troy told us in Insider clip “Dream Come True,” “All the Survivor seasons I’ve watched, I’m taking little pieces of it, putting it together.” He’s definitely extracted the right parts so far.

I just hope that Troy hae’s not gotten ahead of himself, as the line “I plan on sitting there at the last Tribal Council; I’m already going over a speech” from that same clip might indicate… or else, he may be composing a question instead. And after winning reward, pounding the completed puzzle and proclaiming, “This is MY ISLAND!” probably didn’t buy Troy any jury votes.

3: Chelsea (was 2 on Salani)

A minor change at this stage – but as Kim’s BFF in the game, Chelsea stays near the top. However, I can’t place her above the idol holders.

Chelsea had a good Insider clip called “Tarzan’s Underwear.” After recapping the situation I like to refer to as “PoopGate,” she said, “You just have to mentally prepare yourself to be annoyed at times.” Very mature. The easiest way to beat the crazies is to retain your sanity.

4: Jay (was 5 on Salani )

Jay has taken on a bigger role in this game. He set the new order clearly when he denied Tarzan coffee. To Chelsea, he was the first to put forward Jonas’s name as the voting target and name the other four misfits as next to go. Jay seemed to be in a comfortable place in the game.

But suddenly, in the end-of-episode previews, the abrupt realization that he’d engineered a male minority seemed to generate a spasm of paranoia about getting voted off. However, he and Troy were both in the scene where Chelsea first discussed taking out “a big threat.” I’m going to assume neither Jay nor Troy was being targeted.

5: Sabrina (was 11th)

Yeah, I was afraid I had Sabrina ranked too low…

Not only did Sabrina’s current tribe take control of the game, but she was shown to be a more integral piece than I had thought. In his Insider clip “Too Close for Me,” Jay said, “we had me, Chelsea, Troy, and Sabrina together – we love working together, and we’ve been solid (together).”

Sabrina was rather lucky to end up on reward, as her performance was almost as bad as that of Leif. But Sabrina’s position in the game, as a member of the two primary alliances, is great.

6: Kat (was 6th)

In her clip “Tarzan Is Out Of Control,” Kat compared Tarzan to Philip Sheppard from Season 22. Very sharp reference, that!

Kat is definitely not an insider in any alliance, she’s just being dragged along for her vote. But she is not a huge immunity threat, nor is she a serious threat to win the title, so she has a good chance of sliding through the next several weeks.

7: Michael (was 12th)

Wow, how does a big physical threat like Michael get this far up the ladder with 23 seasons of history indicating what folly that could be?

But for now, falling as he did into the right tribe, Big Mike survived a threat to his game life and seems well positioned.

Now, the end-of-episode teaser about targeting someone “big” just might mean, “Big Mike.” I’m going to guess that the teaser is a false lead, but I can’t rank his as ‘perfectly safe,’ either.