Following last week’s elimination of Elisabeth “Elie” Scott from “Survivor 43,” only 12 players remained in the running to win the $1 million grand prize. The numbers were evenly divided at the merge proper, with four members each from the old Baka (Mike “Gabler” Gabler, Owen Knight, Sami Layadi, Jeanine Zheng), the old Coco (Cassidy Clark, Karla Cruz Godoy, James Jones, Ryan Medrano) and the old Vesi (Cody Assenmacher, Noelle Lambert, Jesse Lopez, Dwight Moore). So who won the first individual immunity challenge of the season, and who had their torch snuffed by Jeff Probst at tribal council?
Below, read our minute-by-minute “Survivor 43” Episode 7 recap/live blog of “Bull in a China Shop” to find out what happened Wednesday, November 2, 2022 at 8:00 p.m. ET/PT. Then be sure to sound off in the comments section about your favorite castaways on CBS’s reality TV show, who annoys you the most and who you think will ultimately join the “Survivor” winners list and take home the $1 million grand prize.
Keep refreshing/reloading this “Survivor 43” live blog for the most recent updates.
8:00 p.m. – “Previously on ‘Survivor’!” In the sixth episode, the 13 players drew rocks to determine which team they would compete on for the combined reward/immunity challenge. Dwight, Gabler, Jeanine, Jesse, Karla, Ryan and Noelle won the merge feast and safety, while Elie, Owen, Sami, Cassidy, James and Cody lost and were eligible to be voted out at tribal council. After a monumental scramble session, the combined tribe voted 7-2-1-1 to send home Elie. Who will be voted out tonight?
8:01 p.m. – The blindside of Elie left Jeanine reeling, unsure of her own position in the tribe going forward because of how she was left out of the majority vote. Noelle was the first to approach Jeanine, reassuring her that the same thing happened to her when Justine Brennan was voted out and it turned out okay. From there, Jeanine went on a campaign to the other players to tell them that she’s committed to working with them and doesn’t want her game to be tied to their impressions of how Elie was playing. Everyone, including Noelle, told her that this is “better for your game.”
8:03 p.m. – The next morning, Dwight spoke with Owen about a group of people they could have as an alliance: Sami, Jeanine, Gabler and Noelle. Owen said he thinks that could be a good six to work with, but still considered Gabler a “loose cannon” and “bull in a china shop” that would be tough to keep wrangled. Gabler’s move against Elie raised questions for Owen about how smart it would be to keep him in his alliance. Meanwhile, Gabler was content with having gotten Elie out and had a plan to lower his threat level and disappear into the background for a couple votes.
8:05 p.m. – The tribe received tree mail that morning with a warning that they’d compete in pairs, but only one of them would win. The instructions asked them to choose their own pairs, but no one wanted to stick their necks out to name the person they’d like to work with and so instead of choosing each other, they all agreed to draw rocks to randomly select pairs.
8:11 p.m. – At the site of their next challenge, Jeff learned that the pairs would be: Owen and Gabler, Cody and Dwight, Noelle and Sami, Ryan and James, Karla and Cassidy, and Jesse and Jeanine. As pairs, they’d compete in three stages. The first stage was a twisted net in a mud pit to crawl through and only the first four pairs to finish would advance. The second stage was a cargo net climb to a rope bridge that they’d use three planks to traverse with only two pairs moving on. In the third stage they’d compete as four individuals to be the last person holding up a bucket on a pulley that weighs 25% of their weight at the start of the game. As prize, no reward but immunity at the next tribal council.
8:15 p.m. – James and Ryan were the first pair to finish the first stage, followed by Karla and Cassidy. Owen and Gabler finished the first stage in third place, with Cody and Dwight digging for their planks while Noelle and Jeanine were both stuck in the twisted nets. Cody and Dwight finished, securing their spot to advance.
8:23 p.m. – In the second stage, Cody and Dwight flipped the script by working really well together to get across the rope bridge quicker than the other pairs. With the other three pairs basically even, Karla and Cassidy ruined their chances of advancing when Karla fell through the planks, requiring them to start over. Then, at the very end of the bridge, Ryan dropped one of the planks from the ropes on his way off the bridge, requiring them to have to start over as well. That made enough room for Gabler and Owen to easily cross the finish line as the second pair to finish.
8:25 p.m. – For the final round, Owen, Gabler, Cody and Dwight had to hold the bar keeping the pulley from dropping the bucket. Slowly, Dwight’s bucket began to drop, making it harder for him to keep the pulley from slipping through, and eventually he couldn’t hold it up any longer and so he was eliminated. After 23 minutes, Owen lost control of his pulley and dropped his bucket as well. At 24 minutes, Jeff let Gabler and Cody know that the record for the challenge was 25 minutes. As the challenge continued, Gabler began to tell stories about the different people in his life that he was drawing inspiration from in order to compete. He ended up mentioning many people minute-by-minute as he kept hanging on beyond 25 minutes and to the 38 minute mark when Cody could no longer hang on and Gabler held on to win immunity.
8:39 p.m. – Back at camp, Noelle was the first to strike by suggesting in front of Owen, Jeanine, Jesse and Cody that they “keep it four and four” by joining Baka and Vesi together against Coco. Her idea was to split the votes between Ryan and James. They all agreed that “socially it’s James” and “physically it’s Ryan” in terms of threat possibilities. Later, James was with Sami, Owen and Dwight at the water well when they found an advantage together. James pulled it out, asking if anyone else wanted it, and they all agreed he should keep it. The note said that there’s an advantage hidden under the shelter for anyone brave enough to snatch it. James went and took it.
8:41 p.m. – When word got out that James got an advantage, Noelle continued her campaign to target James as the next one to go. Jesse was not happy with that route though, feeling a better bond with Karla and wanting to work with her instead of Noelle. Jesse and Karla went to their own people in order to turn the tides against Noelle, but Cody thought that they should keep Noelle because her closest ally Dwight is much better at the game and a bigger threat. Jesse didn’t want to get rid of Dwight, but he thought it was more important to allow Cody the space to make the decision and agreed that getting rid of Dwight would still be a blow to Noelle’s strength.
8:44 p.m. – James found out that he earned the Knowledge Is Power advantage. Instead of keeping that information to himself, he did what many have done in the past by using it as a tool to build trust by telling Karla and Cody the advantage he found. With so many advantages and idols known by many people, all the players with powers of their own decided to “transfer everything around” by passing idols and advantages to other people so that James wouldn’t be able to know who has what when. Jeanine gave her idol to Dwight. Noelle gave her Steal-a-Vote advantage to Owen.
8:51 p.m. – At tribal council, the consensus was that as a merged tribe the original tribal lines were no longer a way to associate alliances. Jeff also asked about what role the threat of idols and advantages were playing in the game, to which Noelle said it requires alliances build multiple plans to execute in case something is played by their opposition. Cody said that they’re still at the point of the game where people are deciding if it’s safer to sit back and watch or if it’s time that they jump in to the fray and take bigger risks.
8:55 p.m. – Once the votes were cast and no one chose to play an idol or advantage, Jeff read the votes: James, Dwight, Ryan, James, Dwight, Ryan, Ryan, Dwight, Dwight, Dwight, Dwight. The vote left half of the tribe on the wrong side and the other half in a potential majority alliance going forward.
NEXT TIME: The seven that voted out Dwight were in high spirits thinking they could “skip” their way to the end of the game, but Sami, Owen and Jeanine thought there were enough cracks for them to “do damage” and “start an uprising.”
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