Welcome to episode 7 at the Redman Stadium! We begin with Michael and Silas returning from Huskey Island. Nineteen players have officially been eliminated from Survivor while the other nineteen still remain. The perfect midway point. What does this mean?

            The merge is finally here!

            Yet, before the merge begins, the castaways with the possession of the tribe monkey mascots are assigned a task. They’re told to race out to the bleachers on the opposite side of the stadium. What do they find? Idols. One for each person. The people who earned these idols were Danielle, Holly, Joe, Jay, and Scott. This is a massive advantage for these players.

            When they wore the new green color for team Grivet when they returned. Everyone now wears one color to mark the beginning of the merge. It’s an individual game now. This is the point where the line is drawn between alliances, and the game reaches a new level of intensity.

            The first challenge consisted of three separate parts: kicking, throwing, and catching. The first segment was a field goal kicking in which Evan won. The second was throwing a dart-javelin. Hope won this challenge. The last was a Kendama ball race where Kelvin won. Evan, Hope, and Kelvin where safe for the first tribal.

            The votes stood as so: Jay—4 Brandon—6 and Michael—9. Making Michael the first to leave Grivet.

            For the next challenge, players were divided into two teams to play ‘Turf Bucketball Derby.’ The team that won this challenge went on to compete in a boomerang catch contest. Logan claimed immunity. The next was a challenge was rolling numbered disks onto the husky logo on the fifty-yard line. The players with the most points won immunity. Those players were Cade and Blaine.

            The votes for the second tribal were less scattered. Kelvin—4 Brandon—14.

            The last challenge of the night was an endurance challenge where players ran around the track attempting to pull the flags off each other’s belts. This ended up being a tie for Evan and Kelvin, making them both immune. The second was a skull detective game. This was won by two castaways: Connor and Dane.

            This last vote was a simple one for most. Hadden T. had developed a reputation from Husky Island, and players wanted to take him out. A few block a votes were used here, making the vote against Hadden unanimous.

            To conclude the night, players were informed that from here on out, any players voted off would officially make the jury. The jury is responsible for voting for the winner in the final three.

            This is what makes tensions so high in episode eight. No one wants to be the first member of the jury. To top that off, this is the last episode for idols and advantages to be played. At least, from what castaways have said, they expire this episode. This means we can expect a lot of idol shenanigans.

            The first challenge of the night was human checkers in which the red pieces won. The red team competed in the next stage where Dane and Blaine won a bolt stacking challenge. From there, it was a wig snagging competition. The winners of the wigs then had to close their eyes and try to time when they believed three minutes and thirty-three seconds passed. Holly and Joe managed to win this.

            The first member to join the jury was Kelvin. The votes stood as: Cade—5 and Kelvin—11.

            The first stage of the next set of challenges was balancing on a beam while balancing a ball in a tube. This challenge was over quickly with Dane as the winner. The final level of this challenge was a board-based game where pairs had to cross to the other side. Each turn they could either move or place a barrier block. Connor and Silas were the winning pair, earning them immunity.

            The next tribal was trickly because everyone knew of the idols out in play. However, most decided it was time for Joe to go. Here’s how it played out. Joe played an idol, however, Dane played a nullifier. Just a reminder, idol nullifiers strip the idol of its power. Joe then played another idol. Cade played a nullifier. And then, get this, Joe plays a third idol. Then Evan steps up and plays another nullifier. No more idols are played. Votes for Joe are still cast and unfortunately, despite his efforts, he goes home.

              With such a nerve-wrecking tribal, most castaways are determined to win the immunity necklace. The third challenge was broken off into pairs. Each pair would have to build a puzzle, however only one player per pair was allowed to look at the sample puzzle. When both players had the correct puzzle, they won. Those players were Blaine and Jack.

            The next tribal council was a split vote between Silas and Cade. However, Jay played an idol for Cade. Silas became the third jury member.

            The final challenge was a Survivor Bloomsburg classic. It’s trivia. This has shown up in all three seasons. The questions were only Survivor Bloomsburg related. The winner of this challenge was Jack.

            A lot of different idols and advantages were played. To the point where I don’t even know how things played out in that tribal. Here’s what you need to know. The majority of the votes fell onto Blaine. However, Blaine played an idol. Cade had two votes cast for him which sent him packing.

            Now that so many idols and advantages have been played or expired next episode will rely on player’s strength in alliances and challenges. Episode 9 will be interesting because castaways are required to bring a friend with them. It is said that they will compete in challenges together. This is a first for Survivor Bloomsburg, so stay tuned for how it plays out.