Tandang: the Joy of Secrets

Kalabaw has Jeff hiding his fame, and Matsing has Malcolm hiding his education... but that has nothing on Tandang's tribe of charlatans.  Lisa and Pete have the secret fame and education covered, RC's lying about her career, Abi's fibbing about her age, and I'm pretty sure that Artis is concealing his history of cancer.  Skupin's the only one who is being open about who he is, and he doesn't have any choice in the matter!

Of course, out of all the tribes, Tandang is probably the most eager to play.  Artis has been applying since season one, Lisa and RC have been avid fans since then and Michael's been wanting a second shot since his med-evac.  Abi and Pete are probably newer to the show, but they are no less enthusiastic about kicking their game into high gear.

The latter two and RC set right about the business of playing their social game with each other.  Abi got RC alone and promptly proposed an alliance to her, turning her charm up to eleven.  RC returned fire with a barrage of charisma as she accepted.  There was a lot of bubbly hair-flipping, giggling hysteria and jumpy hand-holding before the pair were satisfied that they could move onto their next targets. 

May the Battle Royale of Flirting commence!

In Abi's case, that was the only guy under fifty, Pete, for the flirting side of her game.  He soon picked up that she was making eyes at him and eagerly seized the opportunity to start his flirting game.  This mutual exploitation is not going to make for a compelling showmance, but I am entertained.

For now, at least, they're all succeeding at their self-portrayals.  I suspect that 24 year old Pete would not be so ready to flirt with a woman eight years older than him.  If nothing else, he must think Abi-Maria is more naïve than she actually is (she's made her accent and cultural differences work for her; respect).  Meanwhile, the two women decided that Pete was dumb, so he's succeeded in passing himself off as nothing more than a model.

As ever, I doubt they can really keep up the deceptions in the long term (except RC's executive assistant lie, which is unlikely to get disproved unless they strike up really in depth conversations about their careers).  However, with a group this gregarious, they might be having so much fun by that point that they won't care.

... And then there's the fourth member of their alliance: Michael.  The most iconic of the returning players, he's the only one thus far whose status has helped him, since superfan RC was delighted to bring him into her alliance.  Out of the quartet, he is the odd one out; not because he has nothing to hide, not because he's so much older, not even because he's a returner.  Michael, alone of his alliance, was not ready for it.

In Australia, Michael hunted and killed a wild pig single-handed, then painted his face with its blood. In Philippines, he faced the full onslaught of RC's charm and looked... not outright afraid, but certainly apprehensive.  It was like introducing an old dog to a hyperactive puppy.  Still, he also literally jumped off a cliff in Australia; he can do a metaphorical leap into the deep end here.

Michael made perhaps the wisest observation of the returning players when he said that you have to go at the game's pace.  This game is moving a lot faster than his previous time--it's not clear if he was ever in a formal alliance in Australia.  He's now answered one of the big questions I had about Michael: he has accepted that the game has changed since he played originally and he's ready to adapt.

RC and Pete finally stopped smiling when
they lost their chance to go to Tribal Council

My new question is if he can handle his eager, young allies.  One of the problems we see in Survivor when aggressive players get together is that they come blazing out of the gate, do too much, too soon and bring each other down in a strategic implosion (see the men of One World and just about everybody on Heroes vs. Villains).  Michael would do well to be a calming influence on them (as hard as it is to watch Australia and think of Michael as a calming influence), but I'm not sure if he's got the confidence to over-rule their proposed strategies.

Right now, it seems that RC is in the driver's seat of the alliance, although most of that is because the editing used her for their narration.  However, it was notable that while Abi-Maria initiated the alliance, RC immediately started enforcing her narrative in-game with the observation that they should bring Pete in because he's brainless muscle and they should be wary of Lisa because she's suspicious.  Neither of those things is exactly accurate, but that doesn't matter.  Survivor is largely defined by perception.

RC also took the initiative before the challenge, in the Tandang Treemail clip on the CBS website.  While Lisa was away from camp, she gathered the others and, with Abi, told them that Lisa would be going home if they lost immunity.  No blindsides, cut and dried.  This smartly forestalled any scrambling after the challenge and gave people like Artis confidence that they were not on the chopping block.

Nobody spoke up to disagree, because obviously nobody wants their name put up instead.  If anybody had any discreet pro-Lisa conversations later, we didn't get to see it, although we do know that Michael wants to keep Lisa around.  He's a fan of hers, just as RC was a fan of his.  However, he's not ready to stick his neck out for her.

It's unlucky for Lisa that she's being targeted so soon, especially since her secret really is irrelevant to the game.  Her celebrity days were more than twenty years ago, she's not using Survivor as a platform for rebooting them, and she no longer has the money she made from The Facts of Life.  As she observed to Michael, nobody's talked about what they did as a child.

Michael thought that she should tell them because it would impress them, but she disagreed.  I'm with Lisa on this one.  If the younger members of the tribe are unfamiliar with her show, revealing that she was an 80s celebrity is more likely to elicit a "So what?" reaction.  Followed by: "Why are you telling us now?"  If it comes up naturally in conversation, that's one thing, but this crew is going to be very suspicious of a big announcement.

One of the things Lisa's mentioned in a few different interviews is that before filming began, when the castaways would see each other around but weren't allowed to talk, she wore a T-shirt she'd purchased off Ebay saying "June Lake 2010 Triathlon."  It was one way to fake them out that she was more physically fit than she actually was.  I wonder if that bit of trickery backfired on her, becoming the basis for RC's suspicions.

Either way, Lisa is on the outs and although Michael is in her corner, he's not actually stepping in to try and protect her.  It's always a dicey prospect, speaking up against your alliance in favour of somebody else, but letting them get voted out isn't good either.  In One World, Jonas regretted letting Bill get voted off, because he had been closer to Bill than anybody else.  In South Pacific, Coach got Mikayla voted off instead of Edna, because Edna was closer to him, while Mikayla was closer to his allies, (and fellow finalists) Albert and Sophie.  In Heroes vs. Villains, Cirie fought to save Candice, got herself voted out for her pains, yet had no regrets.

Michael sticks his neck out for Lisa.
Not quite what I had in mind.

Etc.  I've always been of the opinion that it's better to stick your neck out than to let somebody you trust completely get voted off.  Lisa could be a tremendous ally for Michael, much moreso than the cut-throat younger group.  That's worth fighting for.

The same applies to Artis.  I wonder if any of the older players tried to start up their own alliance.  RC's swift appropriation of Michael probably wrecked any chances of getting one off the ground, but I'd like to think somebody tried.  We don't know what Artis is doing game-wise, but he's not in the alliance and, unlike Lisa, he doesn't even have somebody rooting for him to stay.  If Michael does decide to stick his neck out for Lisa, it will almost certainly be Artis going under the bus.