The latest victim of the game's post-merge pagonging, Parvati Shallow, a 23-year-old boxer and waitress who currently resides in Los Angeles, CA, became the fifteenth castaway voted out of Survivor: Cook Islands during last night's broadcast of the CBS reality show
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Survivor: Cook Islands' thirteenth episode began with the Aitutonga tribe returning from the heated Night 33 Tribal Council session in which Jonathan Penner's past and present allies had returned his earlier betrayal and voted him out of the game.
The next day, Parvati and Adam Gentry realized that despite Jonathan's departure, the game was still being controlled by the four other remaining members of Jonathan's former alliance. "These four are tight, we're gonna need to try something," Adam told Parvati about Yul Kwon, Becky Lee, Oscar "Ozzy" Lusth, and Sundra Oakley's alliance. "Our position of power right now is very limited," Parvati later lamented to the cameras. "We're in a weak spot, it's going to take a lot of smooth talking."
Later that day, the castaways gathered for the Reward Challenge. Once there,
When the ten minute period had ended, it was clear that although all the rest of the castaways were just as mud-covered, Ozzy had managed to gather far more mud than anyone else. Once Jeff weighed everyone's buckets, it became known how significantly Ozzy had dominated the challenge -- he had retrieved 45 pounds of mud, nearly twice the 24 pound total of Parvati, the challenge's second place finisher. Yul (22.5 pounds) edged Adam by half a pound for the reward trip's final slot. After the challenge's results were revealed, Ozzy announced that he was sending Adam off to Exile Island.
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After Becky and Sundra returned back to camp by themselves, Becky began to wonder whether, given his dominance in the game's individual challenges, her alliance shouldn't consider turning on Ozzy and voting him out of the game as soon as possible. "I can't risk him winning every Immunity Challenge and every reward and that's just been lingering in my head... he is a bigger threat than people realize," Becky explained to the cameras.
Meanwhile, over at the resort spa, Parvati attempted to flirt her way into a new alliance with Ozzy. The behavior did not go unnoticed by Yul. "Parvati is flirting with Ozzy only because she's hoping because there might be some strategic option there," Yul explained. "Ozzy to some extent might be reciprocating. If Ozzy responds in some way maybe somewhere down the line something might come up."
By the time Yul, Ozzy, and Parvati returned to camp on Day 36, Becky had become convinced that Ozzy should be the next castaway to go home. "I would like to get Ozzy out sooner than later," Becky told the cameras as she waited for the opportunity to discuss the idea with Yul, her alliance's clear leader.
"I would not be happy going into the Final 2 with Ozzy," Yul -- still, like the rest of the castaways, unaware that Survivor Cook Islands will feature a Final 3 jury vote, not a Final 2 jury vote -- told the cameras after talking with Becky. "Any one of us going against Ozzy would be likely to lose on the jury, Ozzy has been getting a lot of favor with members of the old Raro tribe because they perceive him as being kind of a pure player -- he's doing own thing, he's not strategizing, he's not building coalitions, and he's doing a hell of a job with it." After further discussing the idea of voting off Ozzy with Sundra, the three agreed to see what happened at the afternoon's Immunity Challenge.
Once they traveled to the challenge site and rejoined with Adam, the castaways learned that the Immunity Challenge would require brains, brawn, and balance. To begin with, each castaway would have to -- one bundle at a time -- carry four bundles of puzzle pieces across their own tiered balance beam. Next, after successfully carrying all four bundles across the beam, the castaways would have to use the puzzle pieces to assemble a table maze. Then, once the table maze was assembled correctly, the castaways would have to maneuver two cannonballs through the maze and into two corner pockets. The first castaway to manage to sink their balls around the decoy holes and into the correct corner pockets would win immunity from the evening's upcoming Tribal Council session.
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Although the Immunity Challenge appeared to remain somewhat closer than the earlier Reward Challenge, Ozzy once again quickly surged into lead and completed the balance beam portion of the challenge before Yul, his closest challenger, had managed to retrieve his third bundle. In the end, Ozzy sunk both his cannonballs before Yul could even get his maze put together correctly and became Survivor: Cook Islands' first three-time individual Immunity Challenge winner.
Once the castaways returned back to camp, Adam and Parvati each approached Yul and grudgingly asked that his alliance send the other home. Later, the pair made a final half-hearted attempt to persuade Ozzy to betray his alliance and force a 3-3 tie Tribal Council vote. Their action upset Yul, who despite his earlier attempts to brush off repeated suggestions that he was the game's "puppetmaster," has clearly become more comfortable and brazen about his status as his alliance's leader. "You know, I know you need to play the game, but don't try and get Ozzy against us, OK?," Yul scolded Adam after discovering the pair had ben talking to Ozzy.
"It makes me uneasy the way Yul reacted so maybe I was talkin' more than I should have," Adam, worried that his confrontation with Yul might cause Yul to decide to send him home, contritely told the cameras later. "Tonight I have the most uneasy feeling and I just think the chances are greater that I'll be voted off."
However luckily for Adam, Yul forgave his insolence and decided that given her surprisingly strong performances in the game's individual challenges, Parvati would still be the next castaway to go home. As the fifteenth castaway voted out of Survivor: Cook Islands, Parvati (voted off via a 4-2 vote) now joins Jonathan, Candice Woodcock, Nathan Gonzalez, Jenny Guzon-Bae, Rebecca Borman and Brad Virata on the nine person jury that will ultimately decide which castaway wins the show's $1,000,000 grand prize.