It’s time for Survivor! The Malolo tribe got rid of Brendan at the last tribal council, which shocks everyone at Naviti. But, there’s no time for pity. It’s time for the Reward Challenge.

This challenge involves sandbags and flag poppin’. They’ll be playing for coffee and pastries, which look delicious. “Food is scarce,” Dom says, noting that even though they have fishing gear, it’s still not enough. Anything they can get is a bonus.

At the end of the challenge, Chris and Sebastian are neck and neck. And unfortunately, my least favorite of the two wins. “I want those pastries!” Chris yells, with cheers of “Cinnamon rolls!” following. Chris admits he had a background in sports, as a pitcher in college. Or in his words, he used to “toss the rock.” Nobody knows what that means, Chris. Instead of choosing who to send to Ghost Island, they rely on the rocks. Stephanie grabs the white one, so she hops on board  boat to (hopefully) find some advantages. No matter what, she’ll be back in time for the Immunity Challenge. I know y’all were worried.

Hanging Out At Ghost Island

While on the island, Stephanie finds the “Smash the Urn” display and pulls the “no game for you” card. “Damn it, I needed an advantage!” she says. She mentions that her heart sank reading that, but that when she has moments when she has to be brave, she wants to show her kids that she can do it all alone. She also talks about how she used to be a Mormon and is now divorced. As a single mom, she can only rely on herself. And she’s ready to go out there and kick some ass. I will say, I do enjoy these Ghost Island testimonials. Sadly, nothing is written in the sand this time like it was last week.

“We have now won back to back to back challenges,” James says as he celebrates the pastries. He said that it’s good to have Chris on the side of the Malolo four, since now they can call the shots. “At first I was excited that we won,” fan fave Donathan said. But the coffee reminded him of his grandmother, so he got sad. “My life right now is my grandmother,” he says.

Uh, What?

Yes, that happened. Well, great. Now I can’t enjoy coffee without thinking of Donathan’s grandmother. Whatever. I love him anyway and think he’s a sweetheart just like his tribe does.

Chris saw Donathan’s coffee tears as an opportunity to talk to him. “My mom’s in an assisted living home,” Chris says. He was feeding her medications and helping her go to the bathroom, so he gets it. “I felt it was a good way to relate,” Chris says.

“This is the time that I have to start thinking about Donathan,” Donathan says after saying that Chris’s pep talk made him feel a bit closer to him. Guys, I’m calling it. He’ll be in the final three. Chris will be out soon.

The Immunity Challenge

It’s already time for the Immunity Challenge, which seems a little early. 8:24? Either this challenge lasts forever, or the Tribal Council is going to be hot tonight. The challenge involves cranks and a puzzle.

After getting some time to strategize, Wendell from Naviti and Chelsea from Malolo are the first to take the bodyboard out to the ocean. After untying bags, their team needs to crank each player — on their board — back to base. It kind of sounds like the best summer sport ever.

While Desiree does well, she manages to lose her board for a bit. But she manages to come back and hang on in a way that severely impresses Jeff Probst.

Since it’s really hard to recap challenges that happen so quickly, I’ll tell you this fun fact: I just googled “Jeff Probst height” out of curiosity, since it seems like he’d be way shorter than you’d expect. He’s actually 5’10”. Know who else is 5’10”? Me. So now I’m really not sure why he and I aren’t friends, as we’ve got a lot in common.

Now it’s time for the puzzle. The teams are even at this point, and the puzzle is a slide puzzle. “The puzzle is not over until every piece is in its place,” Probst says. Because yeah, that’s how puzzles work. All puzzles.

It’s painfully obvious that “Ghost Island” is what the puzzle says, so I’m hoping the contestants figure that out. Naviti did, and once again, win Immunity. It’s safe to say they’ve had a pretty solid episode. Malolo, however, look pretty beat up — Kellyn, especially. “I mean, there’s really not a lot of hope for us,” Michael admits, regarding the leftover Malolo-Malolos.

Jenna Attempts To Flirt

Jenna over at Malolo notes how she tries hard to be likable, but based on her resting bitch face, it’s kind of hard to blend in with the rest of her tribe. But she still tries. “I want to try to work my way in with Sebastian,” she admits, before asking him if he wants her to braid his hair.”I need braiders in this tribe,” Sebastian says in a confessional. He totally knows her gameplan.

As for who’s out, Stephanie’s name is getting thrown around. She tries hard to make amends with Bradley, because she has two children, damn it. She needs that cool million. “It blows my mind thinking about that moment,” she says, envisioning the reunion moment where she gets to run down the aisle with her giant check. In all honesty, her saying that made me not want her to win. Since I know they’d play this exact clip at the reunion before it happens.

My gross young crush, Michael gets screentime by crying over how much he wants to keep playing in the game. I feel like he might be spared. But while he’s crying, Desiree is actually seeking through Stephanie’s bag to see if she has an idol from Ghost Island, which makes me feel uneasy. Is this the first bag search on Survivor? Of course not. But it’s not even sneaky. It’s messy and in open daylight.

Tribal Council

At Tribal Council, Jeff Probst mentions that Stephanie, Jenna, and Michael are probably up on the chopping block tonight. Stephanie worries since she was on Ghost Island, so she has no idea what may happen with the vote tonight. Others feel like she potentially got an advantage. “We got to get rid of the last three in our non-alliance,” Sebastian says.

Stephanie thinks she should stay because it’s her dream. And she’s been wanting to live this out for so many years. Which is sweet, but surely everyone feels the same way. I don’t think anyone went through this just because they were bored that day, right?

“I feel like I’m playing this for my kids,” she says. “I’m not ready to go.” She thinks there’s a lot of game left, and she has a lot of game left in her.

Jenna, also known as RBF, notes that she wants to be better at making relationships. Sebastian sees where she’s coming from, but notes that there are “multiple angles for everything.” Michael says he’s been a fan of the show since he was 13, so…five years. Not very impressive, dude.

Jeff goes to tally the votes. The first vote is for Desiree. Stephanie’s name is next. Followed by…no other names. Well, we know who voted for Desiree.

In total, Stephanie gets five votes read, which is enough. Just think — if she got a game at Ghost Island, things might have been different.