~*~Episode #3~*~
I'm cutting out the smorgasbord of an episode summary and in turn, for now, will just provide character summaries. It's way easier for me time-wise and will hopefully prove to not diminish any from what needs to be touched upon.
Some notes to mention before the character summaries are this:
Upolu was featured way more this episode than Savaii and yet Savaii was the tribe that went to tribal council. For the first third of the episode we saw nothing from the red tribe. In my mind this seems to tell me that the important things to focus on come from Upolu - possibly even the winner. If Upolu is to lose the challenge next episode look to see if Savaii gets an extra screentime or if it's mainly blue-centric like it was this episode.
Dawn's mentioning of the alliances not feeling locked in stood out to me. For the first two episodes we'd been given two core alliances of 5 on both tribes. This episode, however, it seemed like we were being prepared to see a shift. The "next time on" does indicate that may happen, so maybe then it won't, but for now it struck me as worth noting.
The biggest event worth talking about on the blue tribe is the Brandon vs. Mikayla battle over on Upolu. I get the impression that the story is less about Little Hantz and more about how certain characters cope with his behavior. We've seen Coach comfort and appease him, Mikayla confront him and get on his case, and then Sophie stand from a distance and analyze the situation. Everyone else seemed irrelevant. That's something to take note of.
The biggest story on the red tribe seems to be "how will Cochran survive?" and deal with his underdog status. Despite Papa Bear going we heard a lot of the dilemma from Cochran, indicating that he'll most likely make it out, it's just a matter of how.
-Characters-
Deadweight:
It saddens me to say this but Papa Bear will probably be losing the duel to Christine. He left with practically no future connections and it seems his story has run its course. Christine has a direct connection to Coach and is proving to be his current folly, so that gives me reason to expect her to stay a little longer.
Albert/Edna/Rick/Stacey all received nothing. That's pretty bad! Albert at least looked good in the challenge, but overall he's just another Grant. I would not be surprised to see Stacey go next if Upolu were to lose immunity. She has absolutely no story as of yet despite going to the first duel and seeing her only connection to the game (Christine) win the first duel.
Elyse narrated the bit about Papa Bear searching for the idol, but otherwise there's nothing here to look for.
Whitney is most likely not another Natalie White. Shame. 0 confessionals, though she's shown to be aware of Ozzy's idol and this tidbit does connect her to a story in some way. If nothing comes of her by next episode it'll be enough to tell us she's not one to root for (Natalie's big breakthrough episode was ep. 4 fyi). I don't really see it though.
Lightweights:
Keith is shown to be actually playing his own game. When you consider his position it would seem that he holds all the power on Savaii, knowing where Ozzy stands and has control over the numbers (instead of Jim). The problem with his edit though is that we have no character substance to him, which leads me to believe that he more than likely doesn't succeed with this leg up.