This next merge episode had the immunity winner make it to the finale. This one is:
EXILE ISLAND!
Now on paper, this had an argument for the worst merge episode in survivor history. The set-up really didn't help. We had what was kind of a dud tribe in La Mina losing the final 11 immunity which clinched them being in the minority for the merge. They voted out Astronaut Dan and were down to 4. Their only hope was Terry potentially flipping Bruce who was an outsider on Casaya and started the game on Terry's tribe.
This leads to the actual episode. The tribes merge and despite Casaya being a huge clusterfuck before, they have a solid pack to stick together and not let La Mina get to them. The immunity challenge became a battle of the alpha males on La Mina. Interestingly, Austin drops out in order to not become the biggest threat (which was smart since this landed him a jury spot). Then Terry defeats his young conrad Nick. This seems to spell doom for Nick and on paper it's a clear cut vote-off. There are 2 things that make the post-immunity interesting to me. The first is Terry's attempts to lure Casaya. I love the guy but these were downright hilarious. The selling point was to have 2 Casaya flip to 4 La Mina. Cirie laughs in a confessional to how terrible of a deal that is and Shane gets openly annoyed with his proposals. The second interesting story was whether or not Terry would use his HII on one of his allies. I feel like if he did use it, they would've been picked off anyway but for this tribal it was the question if this would get delayed. In the end, it was Nick that got voted out. I feel like this hurts the episode since his boot really meant nothing to me and 99% of the viewers.
It's harder to determine what impact this episode had to me. I don't really think Nick's boot really had a huge impact on the rest of the season besides the fact Terry didn't use his HII on him which he never used anyway. It was really just the start of a La Mina pagonging which again, hurts the episode. Though I will say this episode was the start of Terry's incredible immunity run which does very slightly help it.
I think in the end, some of the humor moves this episode up from deadlast but unfortunately it still can't escape the fact that there was really limited drama about who would win out this episode.
Stay tuned for #25! Hint- this merge episode had close to a unanimous vote
29. Thailand
28. Guatemala
27. China
26. Exile Island
Borneo
Australian Outback
Africa
Marquesas
Amazon
Pearl Islands
All Stars
Vanuatu
Palau
Cook Islands
Fiji
Micronesia
Gabon
Tocantins
Samoa
Heroes vs. Villains
Nicaragua
Redemption Island
South Pacific
One World
Philippines
Caramoan
Blood vs. Water
Cagayan
San Juan Del Sur
flamingjoe Honestly I look at Terry a lot differently than most other fans. I found his antics rather entertaining and thought he showed a strong competitive nature which the show needs sometimes. Plus his rivalry with Aras was awesome. One of the most underrated ones imo. This is just me but I felt like he might've saved the post-merge from being more boring. You should know I'm a fan of him by now lol.
yankeeman311 He is such a gigantic douchebag, though. Moments like him yelling at Cirie after Shane was voted out prove exactly how awful he is. He was so fucking arrogant the whole time. Also, Aras was clearly 100% accurate when he called him misogynistic; lines like "There wasn't much sleeping" in response
to being asked how your time with your wife was disgust me. You can tell he treats his children like shit as well; he obviously has hit them at some point as he told Cirie she'd "be slapping her kids" if they did something bad. Tbh, I know that's a shit summary of how awful Terry was, but I think most of his awfulness is pretty self-explanatory anyway.
