Previously on Survivor: Russell Gone Wild…20 castaways were “marooned on the tiny island nation of Samoa”, split into two tribes (Galu! Foa Foa!), and Russell somehow procured enough fishing line to create nine full sets of puppet strings.  That wascally Wussell even had enough time to burn up some socks and attach said puppet strings to his tribemates.  Marisa fought the stringing-up and consequently, went home.

Russell is quite proud of his coup d’etata, as he rightly viewed Marisa as a threat.  Snarkwife say, the best way to get rid of the strong is to rally the weak, right?  Officer Betsy sees what’s going on and asserts, “I’m not afraid to stand up to him…at all.  He knows where I’m coming from and that I have no faith in him.” She expresses this lack of fear by essentially repeating everything Russell says back to him, then walks away after he questions her trust and confidence and his professed Ned Flanders-esque need to just do the right thing for the tribe.  Be. Aggressive.  Be Be Aggressive HEY!

Back over at Galu, Yasmin is complaining…about everything.  About how everyone looks better than her, about the cold, about how much love in the outdoors sucks, about the pitiful sleeping arrangements, about having a stick up her butt.  From what I can gather, people were comparing Survivor to Detroit (now that’s a show idea) and according to Yasmin, that is categorically…inaccurate! “The hood’s not the wood”.  Let me write that again.  The hood…is not the wood.

Jaison addresses Russell’s hatred of Marisa and WHOA WHOA WHOA, Russell didn’t hate Marisa…he just thought she was a powerful player.  I mean come on, would Russell lie about something like that?  I mean, he survived the Katrina floods for crying out loud!  Russell, in fact, is such a stand-up guy that he expresses interest – to Jaison –  in looking for the Immunity Idol, boasting that no one has ever found it without a clue.  So…he starts sticking his head up trees looking for the idol and tells the rest of his tribe exactly what he’s doing…while they all sit around and watch.  At this point I’m thinking, how totally awesome would it be if he spent about three days looking for the idol and then didn’t find it.  That would show him!  Knock his obnoxious little ego down a notch.  Yeah!

No!  Damn if that obnoxious little jackwad (my goal is to come up with a new derogatory term for Russell each week) and his sidekick Ego didn’t find the freaking Immunity Idol.  The hell? That’s not really the idol, right?  The Survivor PAs littered the camp with fake idols, right?  Russell proudly carries his kill up to Jaison and presents it like the good pit bull he is, and JUST LIKE THAT Jaison totally trusts him.  Sigh.  The funny thing about Russell having the Immunity Idol, is that he has to use it if he thinks he’s on the chopping block.  But…is he ever going to feel that insecure?  When Russell does go, I suspect it will be a blindside of epic proportions (I’m starting to sound like The Bachelor…the most romantic Tribal Council ever!).  Side note:  I didn’t realize until right now that there’s another Russell in the game.

Tree Mail!  Mike and Betsy make the walk and Mike announces that this will be his day, that he’s a strong player.  Wait, that’s not right…technically he said he “wasn’t the weakest player” and I suppose I shouldn’t be so bold as to suggest any level of strength can be derived from that statement.  What Mike doesn’t know, is that we replaced his strength with that of Folger’s crystals and the other tribemates have already decided they’re going to get rid of either him or Betsy.  Why?  ’Cause they’re old.  Sound strategy.

Foa Foa discovers that the immunity/reward challenge (don’t they do these separately anymore?) consists of a rumble and everyone immediately starts oooohing and ahhhhing and points to Mike because, I guess, they think he was in West Side Story or something?  He’s from Marina del Rey by way of New York City, so he knows how to handle himself in a gang-type situation?  I don’t know.  Either way, the tribes have to warrior themselves up for the challenge…and Mike declares himself a “mean motor-scooter and a bad go-getter”. Man.  To me, there’s just nothing particularly tough about a man who uses the word “motor-scooter”. I’m just saying. But wait, he isn’t done.  ”I’m gonna take him downtown to Chinatown, man.”

The Challenge!  The challenge involves rugby and basketball or more specifically, wrestling over the possession of three balls and then passing those balls to other team members who will try to shoot baskets.  First to three wins.  The reward is fishing gear.  ”If you can’t catch fish with this, go home,” Probsty says, as the camera cuts to half of the Foa Foa tribe.  And there’s another twist but Probsty, that sneaky dog, won’t divulge it until after the challenge is completed.

I’d like to take a moment and talk about my hatred of the word “strategize”.  Take three extra seconds and just say, “Come up with a strategy.”  ”Strategize” is such a Twitterfied word.  Twitterfied is such an adjective that’s oddly derived from a noun.

What ensues next is nothing short of brutal.  Heads are literally cracking.  Women and men are getting knocked around, knocked to the ground, hit in the face, and choked.  Probsty isn’t having any of this, and says that warnings are over.  If he sees anything resembling a “cheap shot”, that person is out of the challenge.  What’s funny is right after that I saw Yasmin basically get Ashley into a headlock but Probsty praised that, so I guess that shot wasn’t cheap enough?  Then Ben bites John and Probsty again thinks that’s fine.  To truly find out what a cheap shot is, we have to wait for Ben to kick The Other Russell in the leg Cobra Kai dojo style.  Probsty tosses Ben out, and we hear cheering.  With one tribemate down, Foa Foa loses.

The “twist” (I’d totally forgotten about it by this point) is that The Other Russell has to pick someone from the Galu tribe to head back to camp with Foa Foa and “observe” them at camp and at tribal council.  He picks his “homegirl Yasmin” and I just have to wave my arms and yell “STOP, STOP, STOP”.  Okay.  Between this and Dave snapping his fingers and telling Yasmin she “was funky, baby” earlier in the ep, I’m collectively taking all of that as the all-clear to myself start picking on Homegirl Yasmin.  FYI…there are a lot of class action suits gearing up against her, so if you’ve been in contact with Yasmin and have been injured, contact a lawyer.

Once back at Foa Foa, Mike conks out like a motor-scooter and is effectively removed from the game by the Survivor Medical Team.  I totally recognize all of them, which means we’re seeing way more of them now than in seasons past.  Now, I do feel bad for Mike because he did bust it out in the challenge.  Since Mike did not get a rose, Probsty tells everyone to say their goodbyes and Mike is helicoptered out.  I told you…watch out for Yasmin, it’s dangerous!

Because Survivor is what it is, and because Probsty is psychic…you had to know that Galu wouldn’t be able to catch any fish with their new fishing gear.  Shambo – who is an expert in spear fishing, I presume, because she was a Marine and she did it when she was in Nam? – completely fails at fishing.  She can’t catch anything in the ocean, can’t catch anything in the nasty, dark, murky pond (uh…duh?) and to make matters worse, breaks the snorkel.  After an unproductive fishing trip and some Baloo-type floating, Shambo heads back to camp with the predictable “Do you want the good news or the bad news” strategy to try and save herself from being speared and roasted alive.  ”The good news is…you’ll never believe it…there’s fish in the ocean!” Laura says, in reaction to Shambo’s declaration that there are “hundreds of thousands of fish on the reef”…none of which she was able to catch.

Yasmin wastes no time in starting her “observation” of Foa Foa, and it’s pretty much like Nanny Jo’s “observation” time on Supernanny, minus the silence and lack of interference.  She beckons everyone to come closer, so we can have a round-robin introduction.  ”My name is Yasmin and I’m a professional hairstylist.”  She goes on to say she isn’t the enemy (remember, she’s a hairstylist), and that she’s here to help them strategize because she doesn’t want to feel like she’s taking candy from a baby.  Wow.  That don’t boost her self-esteem, and she don’t like walking on cakes, or caking on walks…or something.  Honestly, half of what she says is completely unintelligible.  Jaison isn’t having any of Homegirl Yasmin’s nonsense. *finger snap*

I’d like to also add that anytime someone starts a sentence with the phrase “Now don’t get offended, but…”, people are likely going to be offended.  For me, that’s right up there with “Let me be very clear…”  She follows up with more team-building and synergy-enhancement to the tune of, “Personally off the rip, I’ve noticed that strategy may be, um, something you guys are lacking. And I don’t know his name (*points at Ben*),  Ben?  I’d like to talk to you in private. Yeah.  For sure.”  For the first time in an episode and a half, I’m actually cheering Russell on.  I want him to take Yasmin, dig up the Immunity Idol, and replace it with her down under the dirt.  That’s how much I’m disliking Yasmin and her hands-on approach to observation.

Yasmin was given a clue before heading to Foa Foa, and of course the clue is related to the Immunity Idol and explains how to find it.  Too bad it didn’t say something like, “Whitney Houston had trouble Waiting to Exhale.  Follow her movie’s beloved around to find the idol, and joy you will regale”.  Think about it.  Looking around trees is too tough for Homegirl (“Have you seen how many trees are around here?  Too many, so, you know.”).

She doesn’t have the energy to do something productive like look for the idol, but she does have enough energy to take Ben to task on his “cheap shots” and the utter nerve he had to pick on a girl!  A girl! Now, I think Ben’s a hot-head…and a dangerous one at that, but Yasmin’s total lack of persuasive argument has me raising my hand in favor of Ben.  The altercation escalates and elongates, ending with Ben calling her ghet-to trash and telling Russell she needs to go back to eating ketchup (I’m assuming he doesn’t spell it catsup) sandwiches and “drinking Kool-Aid and doing whatever else she does.”  Russell taps his fingers together and thinks, “Exxxxxxxxxxcellent.” Clearly, Ben can’t seem to add the two cells he has on the left side of his brain with the two on the other side.  He just doesn’t get how he’s destroying much chance of getting anywhere in the game…or, he gets it and just doesn’t care.  Hey, I suppose it’s a strategy.  And here Homegirl didn’t think anyone on Foa Foa knew how to strategize.  I think they know how to <del>strategize</del> create a strategy, they just don’t know how to do it well.  That’s important to note.

What happens next is just…surreal.  Ben sits up all night, sharpening his ax and whacking away at wood.  I know, sounds dirtier than it actually was.  He kept everyone up all night, whacking at wood.  Yuk yuk yuk…everyone got it out of their system? I kind of thought Ben’s tribemates would be a little more visibly annoyed than they seem to be but, who knows with these people.  What I do know is I love the morning scenes on Survivor, because they sort of remind me of what it was like at summer camp when I was a kid.  It’s cold, you didn’t sleep well (despite the sleeping bag, fifteen blankets, and wool socks)…and you really wish Shambo from the next cabin over had caught some fish yesterday so you could eat and have enough energy for the All-Camp Olympics later in the day.  Wait?  That wasn’t your experience?

Officer Betsy doesn’t want to go home at all, at all…at all…AT ALL.  AT. ALL.  Mick makes an appearance for the first time – oh hey there, Mr. Tribe Leader.  Guess you’re more of the Management By Sitting Around type?  Officer Betsy confronts the Dumbass Blonde Alliance and tells them they need to trust their intuition.  Wait, let me sound that out…in…too..ih..shun.  Go with the police officer, the mother…or the outlaw who’s a pain in the ass?  You choose.  These are young women.  I’m gauging they’re still young enough to still hate their own moms a bit, and find pain-in-the-ass bad boys to be kinda sexy.  Au revoir, Officer Bets.

Tribal Council.  Because Probsty is a funny guy, he points out that Marisa was ousted because she allegedly was causing problems in the camp…and gee, are things better in Brady Bunch Land now?  Absolutely!  Hugs!  No one liked Yasmin being there, and Ben didn’t like her calling him a sissy.  She’s ignorant and has poor grammar skills, and it was “like talking to an idiot.” Now, based on my personal understanding of the word “idiot”, Ben probably should have used a simile instead of a metaphor.  Officer Betsy makes a desperate plea, telling everyone that Ben’s the distraction and the liability…not her.  Probsty takes the bait and asks Ben if he has any regrets – at all?  His response is so poignant…”First of all, you never said we were playing by your kind of sissy rules” and then he points out that everyone else was crossing the line, which…I sort of agree with.  But, he’s also kinda…delusional.  Can you imagine this guy being up there in the final two?  Short story long, he has no regrets but at this point, I think he needs to be voted out simply for saying “sissy” twice in one Tribal Council.

Everyone votes, Betsy goes home, and Russell carves another metaphorical notch.  Props to Betsy for saying, as she writes Ben’s name down, “Don’t use my  name if you ever get stopped in New Hampshire.”

Next week, a tribe goes yogalicious and Russell plants his seed.  Eww.