'Survivor' 46 Recap: Emotions Will Be Your Downfall in This Game

It's week two of Survivor 46 and the honeymoon stage of the game is over. As we get to know these players, we're starting to see aspects of their personalities come out that we didn't initially see when we first met them last week. Sure, we're still getting to know them, but like, now we're really getting to know them. And it turns out some of them are ruthless.

Before we get into that, just a reminder that all season long I'll be recapping every episode of Survivor 46. Make sure you're subscribed to the Parting Shot podcast and my newsletter For the Culture for all things Survivor related. (And everything else entertainment related.)

Make sure you read my recap from last week but in a nutshell: We met the players, established the tribes—Yanu, Siga, and Nami—and said goodbye to Yanu's David Jelinsky, who talked a big game but ultimately couldn't play a big game. That left Nami with an immunity win and a ton camp supplies, Siga doing fine but not necessarily on top, and Yanu feeling like l-o-s-e-r-s.

Because we're early in the season and now that the episodes are 90 minutes, we get lots of camp time, which I personally love. The challenges are fun, but I'm a sucker for those gossipy camp moments. And whoa nelly is there a lot of camp gossip going on. Let's break it all down by tribe, shall we?

YANU

So, Yanu is feeling it this week, and not in a good way. They are on the bottom, literally and emotionally. They've got no supplies, zero flint to make fire, and barely any food. I mean, Tiffany said it best, "No matter how much blind optimism people have, we are losers."

Because of their desperate situation, they all seem to be turning on each other, talking about one another behind everybody's backs.

Kenzie is the instigator and topic of a lot of gossip. She established herself last week as someone who builds relationships—she's a salon owner, chatting is part of her literal job—but some of those people she initially established a relationship with are starting to question her motives. Q and Tiffany, two people who are in an alliance with Kenzie, see Kenzie chatting up Bhanu on the beach. They don't know what she's talking about with him, but they know they don't like it.

Well, turns out Kenszie is trying to work Banhu and later Jess, setting up a potential blindside in the future against Tiffany or Q. When she tells them this, both Bhanu and Jess are less than thrilled, and basically just shrug her off. Just then, when Kenzie turns her back on them, Jess mouths to Banhu, "We need to vote her out."

Jess, for all her troubles, is secretly a good player. Last week she talked about suffering from ADHD and not being able to connect with people, and this episode she makes an effort to open up. But in a game like Survivor, once people have a certain idea about you, it's hard to shake that reputation.

SIGA

Siga is doing fine. They aren't on top, but they aren't on the bottom, and they seem to be just fine with this scenario. Right now their focus is on alliance building and fire.

Things start off with everybody circling around Ben who is attempting to start a fire for the first time. This is one of his Survivor "bucket list" items, and he's determined to do it. When he eventually does it, the tears of joy start to flow. "I didn't even cry over meeting Nicholas Cage," he says, once again proving is the heart and joy of this season. There is literally nobody more authentic than Ben on that island. Except maybe... Charlie.

Charlie, a law student, knows all about convincing people to believe his argument. He knows he needs alliances, because he doesn't have Ben's personality or Maria's strength. He's already part of the Charlie's Angels alliance with Gem, Maria, and Moriah, but he also has something brewing with Tim and Ben. But that's not enough for him, so he turns to Maria.

Speaking separately, Charlies pitches a quiet alliance with just Maria and him, and she's on board. They even discuss the similarities of their alliance to Malcom and Denise from season 25 of Survivor—like Malcom and Denise, there's an age difference between Maria and Charlie, something that could work to their advantage as the game progresses because few would expect the two of them to be in an alliance.

So yeah, things are brewing, but honestly the best moment from Siga this week was the artist vs. artist game Charlie and Ben played. Last episode we learned that Charlie is a big Taylor Swift fan. We also learned Ben is a musician. Charlie and Ben each take turns listing songs from their faves, Swift for Charlie and Metallica for Ben. They get to 107 songs before Ben goes blank. Charlie wins. It was a weird moment but seriously fun TV.

NAMI

Nami is feeling good. They're on top of the game, got food and supplies, like they're just having fun at this point. The only one who isn't enjoying their time on Nami is Venus.

She's clearly on the bottom of the tribe, and she knows it. Nobody seems to want to talk with her or go over strategy. Because of this, she keeps to herself, unable to find a way to connect with anybody. She knows Tevin and Soda are at the top of the tribe because of their personalities, and everyone is just following their lead. The only one close to her on the bottom is Randen.

Cut to Randen and Venus hunting for an idol. They know they need it. Even Hunter, arguably the most valuable member of Nami for his strength, feels like he needs an idol because he doesn't have the personalities of Tevin and Soda. In the end though, only Randen finds something, but it's not an idol.

Like last week with Yanu's Tiffany, Randen finds a Beware Advantage. In order for him to open the box with the immunity idol, Nami will have to lose an immunity challenge. Rats.

But, noticing how far on the bottom Venus is, Randen decides to pair up with her. He tells her he has a Beware Advantage and wants to work with her. This moment was actually sweet, because both of them felt on the outs, which is so rare to see on a winning team. We'll see how it works out, but it was nice to see this week.

IMMUNITY CHALLENGE

The other tribes are shocked to see that Yanu voted out Jelinsky, and start to crack jokes about the tribe. This leads to Yanu's Q and Nami's Soda to have a playful—or maybe it wasn't, it's hard to tell—back and forth. Soda even asks, "How's the food?" (She knows full well they haven't had any food.) This leads to Yani's Bhanu talking about Gandhi and a hunger strike, and honestly everyone has clearly just gone a little insane.

When Jeff explained this Immunity Challenge, it certainly didn't sound easy, but I did not expect it to be as stressful as it became. Basically, they have to build this cart and dig up trunks to put on it. They then push that cart through an obstacle course. Once through the course, they open the trunk to take out some puzzle pieces that spell "persistence." With those pieces they build an arch. Simple enough, right? Nope. The winners of the challenge won immunity from tribal and got a ton of fishing gear. The second-place tribe gets a little fishing gear. The last place tribe gets nothing and will go to tribal.

This was one of those rare commercial break immunity challenges, meaning that it's so epic and so intense that they couldn't fit it all into one segment. When they came back from commercial there was a series of slow-motion shots of the players struggling to hold up the pieces for this puzzle arch.

Honestly, no team was in the lead, because right when they almost had it, once piece would drop, then all of them would drop. Eventually Nami, continuing their winning streak, won the challenge. This left a race for second between Siga and Yanu. For a bit there it looked like Yanu might pull it out, but alas, it wasn't meant to be. Siga came in second and once again, Yanu loses.

After the challenge, in a chat with Jeff, Jess says she knows she's going to get a "spanking" back at camp. "Everyone's been yelling at me," she says. While it didn't seem like she was the weakest link, it's clear the rest of the tribe sees her this way. Things are not looking good for my girl, Jess.

PRE-TRIBAL

Everything pre-Tribal Council is about how is Jess going to avoid being voted off? Because at this point it seems like everybody is ready to write her name down.

But before the tribe talks strategy, they first must contend with Tiffany breaking down. She's upset about losing control of herself during the challenge and doesn't like that part of her personality. It's a real moment that can only come out when you're pushed to the brink. I'm so glad Tiffany was open enough to share this.

Once she's settled, her and Kenzie went to work figuring out a plan to get Jess out. They feel like they need to trick her somehow—even though everybody already seems to want to vote her out. They decide to create a fake idol and lead her to it, tricking her into playing it. This way, if she plays the fake idol, she can't use her shot in the dark at Tribal, which could potentially backfire on one of them.

Well, they make the idol and talk her into looking for one. Tiffany is literally leading Jess to where her and Kenzie hid the idol, but Jess keeps looking in the wrong spots. Eventually they rope Q in to help, and he literally just gives her the idol. But Q has something up his sleeve.

You see, Q is still on Kenzie. He wants her out because he thinks she's a danger going forward. But he needs to convince two unreliable players to vote Kenzie: Jess and Bhanu. The problem with working with Jess and Bhanu is that the two of them get in their heads, which, after Q talks with them, is exactly what happens. To help further his plan, he attempts to get Tiffany on his side. In their chat, Tiffany sees the danger in Kenzie, but isn't sure now is the time to get rid of her.

It all is going to come out at tribal, and whoa, this tribal is worth watching.

You know what? You should actually listen to Jeff Probst's On Fire podcast about this episode this week. He talks about the stakes of a high pressure game on low energy. It's really fascinating.

TRIBAL COUNCIL

It's so rare for a Tribal Council to be this juicy so early on in Survivor. Like this Tribal Council right here is a gift to Survivor fans.

It starts off normal. They talk about their long-term game, blah blah. But then Jess starts to talk... and doesn't stop.

She all but calls out Kenzie, saying that the two haven't talked and she knows Kenzie is a danger. It's so rare for someone to be this blunt at Tribal. But in a weird turn of events, Bhanu was like, 'Oh, Jess is going all out, I might as well.' And boy does he ever!

If Jess had verbal diarrhea, Bhanu had a full-on medical emergency. He started to talk about how being emotional is a strength for his game, and then just says everything. He reveals his alliance with Q, Tiffany and Kenzie, which they appear to be learning about for the first time. Meanwhile, Q is looking around at everybody basically begging with his eyes for Bhanu to shut up. Even Tiffany whispers, "What is happening?"

Addressing the emotional dump Bhanu is dropping, Q says, "The emotions don't have to come out all the time. Being able to control them is just as powerful." Honestly mic drop. Q is such a good player, and we need to be talking about him more.

Well, when it comes time to vote, Bahnu gets up to whisper to everybody, asking what to do.

He goes up to Tiffany, asking what to do. Tiffany looks him dead in the face and says, "Stop making the block hot." Q + Tiffany = Dream Team. She's everything.

They vote. After all votes are cast, Jess plays the fake idol. Once she learns it's a fake idol, she looks to Q and laughs. (I love that. She's not bitter. She recognizes it's a game. Jess is so good.)

Because of the blow up of emotions, any plan Q had in place got torn up. In the end he voted for Jess, and so did everybody else. Jess got voted out. But she took it in stride. In her exit interview, she talked about how happy she was, but that, "I don't have enough calories to smile." What a class act.

For a second episode, this was pretty stellar. I'm eager to see a new tribe lose in the near future though, because Yanu doesn't have that many people left.

Who Needs to Get Snuffed?

I'm kind of with Q here, I think Kenzie needs to go. I'm not enjoying her game play and feel like she's playing a little too hard.

Who Should be the Sole Survivor?

While Hunter and Soda still very much interest me, there's something about Q and Tiffany I can't shake. They're just so good at this, and I want to see them win something soon. I've also got my eye on this Maria and Charlie alliance, that's an interesting combo.

Watch Survivor every Wednesday on CBS or anytime on Paramount+ to follow along as I react to every episode this season.