'Survivor' recap: Chanelle Howell gets voted off after Mike Turner deems her "truly unloyal"

Survivor featured the newly-merged Kula Kula tribe voting out Chanelle Howell after Drea Wheeler found another advantage and four people sat out of the Individual Immunity Challenge during the Season 42 episode that aired Wednesday night on CBS.


Chanelle, a 29-year-old executive recruiter from Hamden, CT, who currently resides in New York, NY, was voted out of Survivor 42 on Night 16 of the game in a 7-3-1 vote instead of Romeo Escobar, a 37-year-old pageant coach from Los Angeles, CA, who currently resides in Norwalk, CA.

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Hai Giang, a 29-year-old data scientist from Gia Rai, Bac Lieu, Vietnam and Atlanta, GA, who currently resides in New Orleans, LA, received the one rogue vote from Romeo.

"Man, I should've seen this coming. I know when a vote is too easy that that's never really the case," Chanelle said in her final words.


"I think my biggest takeaway is I think I was playing a little bit too lax when clearly the game is just running full speed. And so, it seems a lot harder than I thought. But at least I made jury and now I get to decide who's going to win the game."

The Survivor broadcast began on Night 14, with the new merged Kula Kula tribe returned to camp after voting out Lydia Meredith.

Mike Turner, a 58-year-old retired firefighter from Hoboken, NJ; said the castaways who appeared to be on the outs following the previous vote were Chanelle; Romeo; Tori Meehan, a 25-year-old therapist from Tulsa, OK, who currently resides in Rogers, AR; and Maryanne Oketch, a 24-year-old seminary student from Ajax, Ontario.

The group scurried away to talk after Tribal, and Chanelle was upset about being on the wrong side of the numbers post-merge.

"I think in my head I realized I was playing chess while everyone else was playing checkers, and it was a huge wake-up call to get my head in the game," Chanelle said in a confessional.


Drea, a 35-year-old fitness consultant from San Antonio, TX, who currently resides in Montreal, Quebec, said Romeo had been her closest ally but things changed once the tribes merged and he was acting totally different as "one of the most paranoid players" she had ever seen.

"If Romeo has to go, then Romeo has to go," Chanelle noted.

Maryanne also realized she was on the bottom of the tribe, and she cried about being "too weird" to be a part of the cool kids.

On Day 15, Mike was determined to be someone the castaways could talk to and trust as an older player. Mike was interested, for instance, in Omar Zaheer's Islam faith and the pair talked about it.

Omar, a 31-year-old veterinarian from Kitchener, Ontario, who currently resides in Whitby, Ontario, called Mike a "lovely" human being who embraced learning something new.


"His empathy is so strong that he's somebody I could align with long-term," Omar said.

The tribe then received Tree Mail, seemingly teasing a Reward in the form of a favorite childhood meal.

It then became time for the Reward Challenge, and Survivor host Jeff Probst hid a package underneath a bench, hoping a castaway would find the "beware advantage."

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On Season 41 of Survivor that aired last year, the package was hidden in the same place but no one found it, and so Jeff admitted he'd be "surprised and disappointed" if history repeated itself.


For the challenge, the 11 remaining castaways were randomly divided into two teams.

Each team was required to leap into the water, maneuver a buoy through a series of obstacles, gather five buoys on the dock, and then attempt to land those buoys in a basket.

The first team to finish would win "a little taste from home," also known as peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with potato chips.

Maryanne unfortunately drew the gray rock, meaning she could not compete and had no shot at Reward. Drea then announced she'd be willing to switch with Maryanne because she doesn't like PB&J.

A switch was therefore made, resulting in Drea sitting out of the challenge on the special bench.


The first team was comprised of Chanelle; Mike; Tori; Jonathan Young, a 29-year-old beach service co-owner from Gadsden, AL, who currently resides in Gulf Shores, AL; and Rocksroy Bailey, a 44-year-old stay-at-home dad from Brooklyn, NY, who currently resides in Las Vegas, NV.

The second team consisted of Hai; Omar; Romeo; Maryanne; and Lindsay Dolashewich, a 31-year-old dietitian from Morganville, NJ, who currently resides in Asbury Park, NJ.

Drea did, in fact, see the advantage under her bench during the challenge, and so she grabbed it and stuffed it inside of her shorts. Drea felt she really won the reward even though she had opted not to participate.

Omar single-handedly sunk four buoys in the basket before Jonathan could sink a single one, but then Omar kept missing his fifth shot, which allowed Jonathan to make a major comeback and sink five consecutive baskets.

Jonathan won the challenge for his team, and Jeff announced that's why a person or team should never give up in this game.

After the challenge, Omar was proud of himself for doing well, even though he couldn't win it. Jonathan joined the losing team after eating, and the group discussed targeting Chanelle and then Romeo.


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Omar, however, told Chanelle that people were planning to split votes between Tori and Romeo and then send Tori home.

"Because I didn't have a vote, people still think I'm on the bottom and I'm still going to work with them. And they think I was left out, which is brilliant, because then I have Intel coming from every side of the game," Omar boasted in a confessional, adding how knowledge was the most important thing in the game at this point.

Omar told Maryanne that everyone was going to try to get her to flush her hidden Immunity Idol and so she should listen to his cue on whether to play it or not.

Drea then opened up her package and discovered a "clue to a secret advantage" that could offer her power in the game.

"It's hidden five paces from your water well under a coconut. You must move quickly and cover your tracks or you risk being caught red handed," Drea read. "This is why the advantage says 'beware.'"


Drea believed her only chance to get the job done was immediately, and so she headed to the water well and started flipping over coconuts, without finding anything.

Drea found the advantage in an opened coconut, and when she reached inside, red paint got all over her hand and wrist. She tried to remove the paint with water from the well and then read her actual advantage.

"The Knowledge is Power Advantage" allowed Drea to ask one player either of the following two questions: "Do you have an advantage or do you have an idol?"

The player could not lie, and so if he or she answered "yes," that person must give Drea the advantage or idol and it would become her own.

Drea already knew that Maryanne and Mike had idols, and so she considered this to be a huge advantage in the game. She was ready and willing to blindside one of them and snag an idol.

Drea was pretty rich in the game at this point with her Amulet, Idol, Extra Vote and "Knowledge is Power Advantage." Drea needed to figure out how to utilize all of this power without becoming a threat to her tribe.


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Tori noticed there was red on Drea's arm, and so she asked her if she was bleeding. Drea claimed she had been painting their flag, but Tori could tell there was no red paint on the flag.

In addition, Tori noticed a bulge in Drea's pants and that Drea was acting strangely and covering herself with her backpack.

Tori therefore warned Maryanne about the red paint, and Drea could tell that Tori suspected something.

"I don't trust Tori in this game. Every time I have tried to trust Tori, Tori has tried to blindside me or tried to get me out of the game," Drea said. "So she needs to go."

On Day 16, the Kula Kula tribe gathered together and met Jeff for the next Individual Immunity Challenge of the season.


The players were required to balance on a narrow perch while holding a buoy between two handles. If at any point a person fell off the perch or his or her buoy dropped, the player would be out of the challenge.

The last person left standing would win immunity and be guaranteed a spot in the Final 10. The next person voted out of the game would become the first member of the Survivor 42 jury.

But before the competition commenced, Jeff announced how a player could trade his or her spot in the challenge for an individual portion of rice. But if enough of the players were willing to give up immunity as a group, they would be given rice to last them for four days.

Jeff started the negotiation and said how six people seemed to be a fair number since it was more than half the tribe. (However, Jeff settled on four people last season, which these castaways were unaware of).

Lindsay and Drea immediately spoke up and said they would sit out, and then Maryanne opted to sit out as well. Jonathan and Mike asked Jeff if they could settle on four people sitting out, and Jeff obliged.

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Maryanne begged in tears for someone who felt comfortable to sit out of the challenge, and so Omar offered to be the fourth.

Maryanne admitted how she felt she was in trouble and this move could get her voted out, and she was using emotion as a weapon to make people feel bad for her.

Once the four castaways sat down, Jonathan thanked them and said he'd make it up to them.

The challenge came down to Tori vs. Jonathan and Tori ended up winning her second Individual Immunity back-to-back.

Drea was pissed off about Tori winning the challenge, so she said she had to choose between Maryanne, Romeo or Chanelle at the next vote.

Once Kula Kula returned to camp after the challenge, Hai revealed that his plan was to take out Chanelle, who hadn't been loyal to him. Mike then told Omar, Lindsay and Jonathan to make Chanelle feel comfortable.


Mike said Chanelle had been "truly, truly unloyal" to him, like when she voted for him unnecessarily.

Hai, however, told Chanelle that the tribe was voting out Romeo so that she wouldn't play her "Shot in the Dark."

Chanelle planned to play it cool and not scramble, which Romeo noticed. Romeo started to panic as a result and feared that he was going to be blindsided.

"I thought I had an alliance with Drea and Rocks, but Drea doesn't even look at me anymore," Romeo lamented. "She hasn't even talked to me."

Drea told Romeo that he was acting paranoid, and Tori told Romeo that she had heard the vote was going to be between Chanelle and Maryanne. Tori also warned Romeo that Rocksroy had brought up his name.

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Omar told the cameras that Chanelle had been the real target but Romeo was going to play himself out of the game due to his overwhelming paranoia and starting chaos.

Omar pitched to Hai that they switch the vote to Romeo, and Hai definitely seemed to consider it since Romeo would prevent him from controlling his environment.

"I don't think it's too late to change," Jonathan agreed.

Hai and Jonathan attempted to get Lindsay, Mike and Drea onboard. And they also had Omar with them for six people, which would be the majority.

But Mike really wanted Chanelle to go home because "she's a snake," and so he told Rocksroy that he was sticking with the plan and didn't care what anyone else thought.

Mike attempted to convince his allies to keep the vote on Chanelle, saying that voting out Chanelle would keep Rocksroy on their side longer.


"It's us three at the end," Mike told Hai and Jonathan.

On Night 16, Kula Kula attended Tribal Council, and Jonathan announced how the tribe agreed they shouldn't vote out either of the four players who had volunteered to sit out of the Individual Immunity Challenge.

Romeo declared how the tribe was a unified group, but Hai determined one or several people were out of that group and everything was based on perception.

Hai pointed out how if someone was walking around all paranoid, that person was likely not in the group.

Mike said he was going to follow his trust and gut in a game full of lies, and then it became time for the castaways to vote.

After no one opted to play an advantage or idol, Jeff read the votes in the following order: Hai, Romeo, Chanelle, Romeo, Chanelle, Romeo, Chanelle, Chanelle, Chanelle, and Chanelle.


Chanelle was therefore eliminated from Survivor 42 with six votes.

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The episode's closing credits later showed that Hai, Mike, Jonathan, Lindsay, Tori, Rocksroy, and Drea voted for Chanelle.

Maryanne, Omar and Chanelle voted for Romeo, while Romeo voted for Hai.







About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski