Survivor 51, episode 7, ”The Girl at the Prom”: who was voted out?

We did it, folks, as the merge is finally here! Survivor 51 is about to enter its next phase as the remaining 13 players are set to become one tribe moving forward, where only one of them will become the season’s Sole Survivor.

Last week, we saw multiple players preparing for their next steps in the game. Then, a Summit was announced where Kristin Flickinger earned a Tethered Idol after volunteering to remain at Exile Island. Afterwards, while the Savu tribe was the clear underdog to win immunity, they unfortunately couldn’t, sending them once more to Tribal Council.

While Ori Jean-Charles tried his best to split the dynamic duo of Devin Way and Angelica “Jelly” Loblack, he ultimately couldn’t. After his Shot in the Dark also failed to protect him, Ori was unfortunately eliminated. With that in mind, let’s recap what happens next on the seventh episode of Survivor 51.

The merge is here!

It’s night 12 on Savu, and then there were two. Jelly and Devin live a bittersweet moment: they survived the vote but have to say goodbye to Ori. Both are ready to play, with an immunity idol, an Extra Vote, and an apparently real-looking fake idol, so they’re willing to use them in the upcoming slaughter.

On day 13, Survivor host Jeff Probst greets all three tribes and announces… THAT THE MERGE IS HERE! Everyone is delighted and ecstatic to have clean, new, and blue(!) buffs. Jeff also announces that Survivor is going old school, as a merge feast will be next… but with the caveat (not caviar, as someone said) that they will have to earn the merge.

Just as everyone is having a Vietnam War moment from the New Era about “earning the merge,” Jeff pulls another trick by announcing that by earning, he meant the players will have to eat the nasty, yet iconic, Survivor grubs that go way back to Survivor: Borneo. Now, that’s how it’s done on Survivor.

Out of nowhere, Brady and Eric (the latter, who is in tears at the memory of this scene playing out all the way back from season one), each eat a grub just for funsies, since the challenge hadn’t even started. Jeff then reveals that only ten spots are available, so three of them will not participate in the feast.

With that, a nasty scene ensues where everyone starts chugging and vomiting grubs. Kristin is the first ot bow out, followed by Cristian and Sharonda, leaving the other ten making it to the feast. Brady even eats another one like a popcorn, so suffice it to say, he’s already had plenty of protein so far.

The Survivor feast is back

During the feast, Brady keeps gorging himself all while Eric shares his life story to everyone’s annoyance. Meanwhile, Kristin, Sharonda, and Cristian reunite at camp, where Kristin tells them all about the Toka dynamics, including the tidbit about Mike being on the outs.

As Cristian walks out, Kristin tells Sharonda about the Tethered Idol’s second twist (if she gets voted out, it becomes a regular idol). Kristin then decides to give the idol to Sharonda as a sign of ultimate trust, and declares there won’t be any secrets between them. Sharonda is ready to play with Kristin; however, Sharonda doesn’t tell Kristin about the Helicopter Alliance.

The scramble begins

Once everyone is reunited, an apparent divide emerges between OG Toka (8 people) and OG Savu (5 people). The OG Savus also surprisingly forget all about Carter’s mutiny from Savu to Toka earlier on, but maybe the grubs ate their memories away or something.

Jelly and Sharonda reunite to reform the Helicopter Alliance, where Jelly says she wants to work with Sharonda, but also with Mike, who was with her from the beginning. Mike tells Jelly he’s completely on the outs; therefore, Mike and Jelly decide to stick together and form a coalition with OG Savus to take on the other OG Tokas. Mike also starts paving this path by talking to Eric, who immediately agrees to having more numbers.

Maggie and Kilby also talk about working together, especially after Maggie saved Kilby back on Dina. Kilby also states that he can pull in Brady, even though Brady voted against him back in the early Toka days. Brady and Kilby decide to form a group alongside Thien An, Maggie, Carter, and even Eric (according to Kilby). Brady also declares that Mike’s days on Survivor are coming to an end.

The first individual immunity challenge is here

Jeff greets the final 13 players and announces that the jury phase is about to begin, starting with whoever is voted out next. An endurance immunity challenge then begins: at set intervals, players must adapt to harder circumstances to balance a whale totem at the end of a long pole while standing on a progressively narrower beam.

Sharonda is the first to drop, followed by Thien An. At the second stage, Eric drops first, then Cristian. At the third and final stage, it’s a race to see who is the last standing. Carter falls, followed by Kilby, Devin, Maggie, Jelly, and Brady. Mike, Kristin, and Lewis are the final three standing, with Mike ultimately winning the first individual immunity of the season, much to Brady’s chagrin.

Now the real scramble begins…

Mike is overjoyed not only to be safe but also to potentially gain more social capital. Eric mentions Brady as a potential threat, and Mike agrees that Brady and Kilby lead the Toka coalition. However, Eric starts getting messy by mentioning Kilby to Brady as liability for him, which immediately makes Eric the Toka target.

Maggie then starts steering the group toward Kristin by saying she’s too powerful to continue in the game and probably has something from her time on Exile. (Maggie, I need you to stand down as there are only four other women left besides you!) For their part, Jelly and Mike want to take out Brady for bringing toxicity to the game and they bring on Devin and the other Savus to get a majority.

Jelly tells Sharonda about her idol and about the Brady plan. Kristin is shocked by this information once Sharonda tells her, but almost agrees to it when Mike (who’s on a high after winning immunity) threatens her to vote his way (meaning voting out Brady) or she will be next. Kristin is obviously put off by Mike’s demenour and wants nothing to do with him.

A still-stunned Kristin goes to Brody to vent, who immediately then confronts Mike. Both agree they’re pissed at each other, and Brady tells Mike he feels like a girl left at prom because of all the lies he keeps spreading. After this never-ending mess, the Kristin vote is out of the window for Maggie because of the information leak, which shifts the target conversation back to Eric vs Brady.

At Tribal Council

At Tribal, the conversation centres basically on no one being able to keep their mouths shut. While multiple people try to engage with Jeff, who confesses he’s downright confused, much like the audience has been for the past 20 minutes, plenty of other conversations also come up to make this Tribal Council go live, and it’s basically like trying to watch 10 tennis games at once. In the end, the players finally cast their votes, and it comes down to a 9-4 between Brady and Eric. Brady/Brody is blindsided and becomes the first jury member of the season.

With that, the lines are drawn, leaving Thien An, Carter, and Lewis as the only three left out of the vote. However, the faction that voted Brady out doesn’t seem like a solidified group, so we’ll have to wait and see who will thrive and who will sink at the next round.

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This article was originally published on www.survivingtribal.com as Survivor 51, episode 7, ”The Girl at the Prom”: who was voted out?.