Do the Survivor Players Have a Strong Alliance?

This week, we saw a handful of cast members set a target on Jay’s back, he got four votes at the deliberation, but ultimately, he remained safe.

So far this season, the Survivor duo and their allies have been sitting pretty. No one has been voted into The Arena — aside from Asaf, who was Corey’s direct vote. Sure, Michele faced Cara Maria in The Arena, but that was thanks to chaos (and perhaps a bit of Laurel’s influence).

After 13 episodes on the show, it’s quite impressive to see that Jay and Michele are doing so well socially, but it seems people are catching on to their shtick.

On one side of the house, Colleen has figured out there are layers to Jay and Michele’s alliance, and if you’re not in the “core,” you’ll get sacrificed earlier — which she and Ravyn have experienced. On another side of the house, we have Kyland and Horacio, who are actively avoiding the Survivor alliance because they’ve been voted in. Yet, it’s not enough. These people can’t get their act together to vote for Jay or Michele.

Here’s the problem — people are piecing things together, but no one is actually leaving. We’ve watched four consecutive episodes where the champions lost in The Arena, sending the contender right back into the game. If this was Survivor, Jay and Michele would be exposed and people would be actively targeting them. On this season of The Challenge, people know Jay and Michele are running the game, but the easy targets aren’t leaving, so most people can skate by without disrupting the status quo.

Perhaps this is an unexpected flaw with this season’s format. With a fresh cast, most relationships aren’t that deep, so bonds can be broken easily. We could have had a season where new alliances emerged as numbers were shed and targets shifted around. Instead, it’s the easiest game of Survivor Jay and Michele have ever seen. They can survive without much work because no one has to go home.

There’s no doubt that Jay and Michele came onto this season ready to manage an alliance and rely on their relationships to survive. But, like Corey said, a lot of their “social game” was being lucky enough to be cast with pre-existing friends.

If more people were leaving, we’d really see the cracks in Jay and Michele’s strategy. The outer layers of the alliance would have realized they’re not valued as much as the core, and they would have targeted Jay and Michele.

If we’re being honest, I think Colleen has identified the way the game would be played if champions were sending people home. Instead, progress has been stalled, and we’re just left to talk about what could have happened. Our only saving grace would be for a non-alliance member to win a daily challenge and send in Jay, Michele, or a core ally. At least in that scenario, there’d be a 1/3 chance of their name getting pulled in The Arena.