Survivor: Winners At War Episode 12 Recap
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For the second week in a row, we got to watch Tony put on another masterful performance on Survivor. Not since Cagayan itself have I been so invested in watching a single person play this game. It’s why Tony is such a compelling character. He draws you in and makes you pay attention. Once again, this was another round in which paying attention to him delivered.
It’s not just the moves that are being pulled off but who the targets are too. Last week, Tony took out Sophie, a player that is highly regarded for their strategic mind. This time around, he set his sights on Kim, a player almost everybody would say belongs in the GOAT tier of players. So, Tony is taking out these high-level players and honestly, he’s making it look easy in the process. Boston Rob said it himself at the end of this episode, Tony is a boss.
This week, we got some more whispering at tribal council before the vote. The stark difference between this week and the second Tyson boot is that production gave us subtitles. I’m still not the biggest fan of the whispering at tribal but with subtitles, at least we can follow along the action. I still think that Jeff needs to reign people in once and for all but if he’s not going to do that, I can live with how this tribal council goes down.
I think the pivotal moment of that vote actually happened during tribal council. I’m fully ready to be proven wrong by future secret scenes or contestant interviews, but it seems to me like Ben went into tribal ready to vote for Jeremy. I think Tony knew Ben was leaning in that direction and I think Tony started talking to Jeremy hoping to change the tide. The moment that actually did change the tide is when Tony suggested to Ben that Kim’s side might now be going after Sarah.
When the options were Kim or Jeremy, Ben was never going to vote for Kim. It’s been well established that Jeremy and Ben are at odds. We don’t know why, especially from Ben’s point of view (Ben voted against Jeremy and yet Ben is the one who is far angrier in this feud? It doesn’t make sense), but we know they just do not get along. It wouldn’t have made sense for Ben to go with Tony to save Jeremy when Ben has wanted him out for at least two tribal councils now.
The change came when Ben learned that Sarah might be in danger. I think that Ben’s closest relationship in this game is to Sarah. We know they bonded on that tribe of 5 with Boston Rob. We know that Adam felt like he was on the outs after the Rob vote because Sarah and Sophie were very close to Ben. I think Ben and Sarah are almost as close as Tony and Sarah, we just hear less of it.
So, when Ben heard from Tony that Sarah might be in play for the other side, that changed Ben’s mind. He still wasn’t a fan of Jeremy but was he willing to risk throwing a vote at him and seeing Sarah go home? To me, that’s where he flipped firmly back to Tony’s side of things, bringing Nick along with him because Nick has just been voting with the majority this entire season and certainly wasn’t going to go to rocks for Kim or Jeremy.
If that’s the case, Sarah deserves a lot of credit for this move too. Tony was never going to convince Ben to come off the Jeremy trail without Sarah’s bond with Ben. I really believe that is what ultimately convinced Ben to flip. It wasn’t for Tony. It definitely wasn’t for Jeremy. It was to save Sarah. If Tony threw in Sarah’s name as a lie to help flip Ben, that’s a brilliant last second move. If Sarah’s name was truly thrown into the conversation at tribal council, it became a happy coincidence for Tony and Sarah.
What probably shouldn’t have been allowed was the extensive dialogue after the vote. Tony got to ask Sarah if she wanted him to play his idol on her. Like, they had a full-blown conversation. I don’t know how Jeff didn’t shut that down.
But, because Jeff didn’t shut it down, I love this move from Tony. Sarah probably knew she wasn’t really in danger but Tony extending that offer to her and showing her, he was really willing to play the idol if she said yes was huge for him. After blindsiding her in the Sophie vote, this was the best way for Tony to show Sarah he was still 100% loyal. Words mean nothing, actions reveal your true intentions. Especially on Survivor. With his actions Tony found a way to show Sarah he was still on her side fully.
On top of that, this was also Tony letting everyone else know he was packing heat. This is a classic Cagayan Tony maneuver. Better than the Survivor advantages is the knowledge of the advantages. How many times did Tony threaten people with his bag of tricks in Cagayan? This is the same concept. It’s letting his enemies know that he’s geared up and that if “you come at the king, you best not miss.”
Kim going out the way she did doesn’t hurt her legacy in any way. She still had the correct read: Tony is dangerous and needs to be dealt with. Last week, she was the only one who was really onto Tony’s gameplay. The reason she is voted out this week is because Tony saw how dangerous she was to his game and he happened to get the jump on her. That doesn’t mean Kim played badly. It’s just that Tony played a little better than her (and had immunity). If Tony doesn’t get that necklace, things might have gone differently.
And I’m not here to judge Kim on her immunity challenge decision. She was never going to stand in Tony’s way in this challenge. Her performance was going to have 0 impact on his results since this challenge was going to reward a man and a woman. If she felt like she wasn’t going to last any longer, why not get some calories out of it?
If you’re looking to blame anyone for this outcome, blame Nick. He knew about the potential Tony blindside that was in the works before the challenge. When he ended up being head-to-head against Tony in the challenge, he just gave up his chance for immunity for a fire token. Nick handed Tony the immunity on a silver platter.
Then, when Ben stupidly revealed the blindside that had been in the works (Ben had a brutal episode too, he played this round all wrong) and Tony confronted Nick, Nick couldn’t have been less convincing. You don’t think the cop was going to sniff out that Nick was lying to his face? At that point, everything was pointing back to Kim as the leader of a rebellion and her only mistake was having allies that imploded on themselves. Given that we don’t have that many people left, she didn’t have much of a choice in who she was going to make this move with.
I loved the difference in language between Nick and Tony at the end of that specific scene. Nick asks Tony for the fire token that he’s owed. After Tony pays up, Nick says, “we’re still good”, a tone of hopeful optimism for their continued partnership. Tony replies, “we’re all squared up” (or something close to that) because he knows Nick is lying to him and has been planning to get rid of him. In Tony’s eyes, this duo is on its last legs. For his part, Nick thinks he’s talked himself out of a bad spot and continues to work with Tony (even voting with him at the end of this episode).
That’s the difference between Tony and most. His perception of the game is on point and he’s honest with himself. Tony even tells Ben that Nick is lying straight to his face. A lesser player might convince themselves that someone like Nick is still with them, but Tony knows right away that this trust is broken. And Tony isn’t someone whose trust you break, he breaks yours. Meanwhile, Nick leaves that conversation thinking he still has something there with Tony. They’re operating on different levels of perception.
It’s also interesting to see Jeremy’s evolution. He spent so much time in Cambodia talking about meat shields and how that strategy was going to win him the game. At this point in Winners at War, he’s become Tony’s own meat shield. You either die a hero or live long enough to become a meat shield. As they always say, time is a flat circle.
As for Michele, I feel like this was a tough episode for her. She didn’t get her way because challenge god Tony came through again. And she was left in the minority (even if she was still also working with Jeremy). I think giving her coin flip to Jeremy was the right move when she did it. But then, Tony came charging in, saved Jeremy without needing any advantages and left that coin flip in Jeremy’s hands. Not only that, Jeremy vocally almost played it, leaving everyone knowing he had something in his pocket. Is Michele now going to ask for that thing back? People know expect Jeremy has some sort of idol or advantage, that puts a target on his back. He’s not going to be so gung-ho about just handing it back to Michele. And Michele paid 4 fire tokens for that thing, she’s not going to want to just leave it in Jeremy’s hands. It’s an awkward situation for her.
It’s crazy how quickly this season has flown by. We are two (longer) episodes away from not having any scheduled Survivor for the distant future. It’ll be the first time in decades that we don’t know when the next season will air. In a way, it almost feels right to leave more breathing room after this season. But in another sense, it’s going to be weird being in this limbo because Survivor has been an escape for the oddness of 2020. My advice is just to enjoy the episodes we have left, let the Tony energy consume you to your core and make these last two episodes count.
P.S: I would like to note that Sophie is a beast. She kept up with Natalie, queen of crossfit, in that edge challenge. She beat Tyson (not at his prime, but still)! It’s time we put respect on her name as a challenge beast and put her in that elite tier. She’s physical, she’s smart. There’s not a Survivor challenge she can’t slay.
