Deal or No Deal Island Recap: Snakes and Eels Everywhere

In a game like Deal or No Deal Island, it’s never enough to go after what you want — you have to be good at convincing others that what you want is also what they want. Without a tight grip on your priorities, you’re liable to get swept up in someone else’s strategy only to get spat back out whenever it best suits them.

I’m still trying to decide if that happened to Phillip, who went home this week in vexingly predictable fashion. On one hand, I do think he trusted Australian Survivor champ David Genat when he shouldn’t have. On the other, it’s also plausible that Phillip simply weighed the odds and decided to walk away with a guaranteed consolation prize.

We’re into the Final Five, which means, as Phillip put it, there are “snakes and eels everywhere.” He and Lete have played pretty honest games, but everyone else has been in Machiavellian mode. David still has everyone but fellow Survivor deity Parvati Shallow convinced that he’s just a regular guy from Australia. Parv has gone full Black Widow. And C.K. Kim is telling everyone what they want to hear — promising David and Parv that she’ll take Lete out first chance she gets while also telling Lete that David and Parv, the last vestiges of the once-powerful alliance “The Family,” are her main targets. In this treacherous jungle, no one can be trusted.

Two people had to go home this week, so everyone was scheming. David sidebarred with Phillip to say it was their “time,” not Parvati’s, and they promised to take each other to the end. C.K. promised everyone the world, and everyone half-believed her. Parv wondered if it was time to take out David. So much for a happy family!

This week’s excursion, “The Banker’s Fire Pit,” was a test of priorities. Each player had to hold a bag of money above a burn pit. The sacks were calibrated to weigh one-quarter of each player’s weight. Whoever held on the longest would automatically win $75,000 to take home, even if they lost the game. At the same time, our host, Joe Manganiello said, players had to watch as our case models opened a bunch of cases with randomly assigned values. To claim a case, they had to burn their money.

Whoever secured the highest-value case won automatic immunity. If two players dropped their bags for the same case, they split its value. The two players with the lowest value were automatically at risk to face the banker, and even worse, the winner would send the other one home immediately — no banker, no passing go, no collecting $200. And with that, it was time to find out who’s been skipping arm day.

Going into the game, only Phillip seemed to be considering the $75,000 and the “stability” it could give him. Everyone else wanted their chance to compete for the multimillion-dollar final briefcase, and they were ready to let their biceps burn to get it.

Lete lost her grip first, after the 30-minute mark. Luckily for her, she happened to give out on a pretty good case — $2.5 million, the third-highest possible. Manganiello prompted her to add her weight to someone else’s load, so naturally, she chose her in-game nemesis, David. Then came the funniest flub this season of DONDI has seen so far.

Both C.K. and Parv were getting tired, so when the $3 million case came up, they both wanted it. But after agreeing that they needed to communicate to avoid accidentally splitting it, they both announced they were claiming it and dropped their money at the same time. This could have been a brilliant act of sabotage on C.K.’s part to end Parvati’s weeks-long safety streak, but alas, she admitted (furiously) that it really was a simple mistake. Parvati, meanwhile, looked ready to eat her alive. When C.K. tried to smooth things over, she cut her off with a “Girl, it’s too late — it’s done.” No kidding.

That left us with David and Phillip, who, lest we forget, had just last-minute pinkie promised to take each other to the end. Did any of us believe either of them would keep it? Anyone? Bueller?

Like any good gamer, David knew it was time to try some inception — and Phillip had already said he was considering the money. It didn’t take much convincing. Both of them were getting shaky, with Phillip holding his own weight and Parvati’s while David struggled with his, Lete’s, and C.K.’s.

Still, David drove it home by saying he’d “give” Phillip the money if he dropped after him — a pretty obvious manipulation, given that Phillip would get the $75,000 regardless if David dropped first. By letting David take the $2.75 million case — the highest left — Phillip would be the one giving him something. But again, this game is all about convincing people you’re doing them a favor when really, you’re stealing from the palm of their hand — and David’s very good at it.

Also, here’s the thing: Phillip probably thought he could hold on longer than he did. After David dropped, if Phillip had held on for three more cases, he could have claimed $1.75, which would have left Parvati and C.K. in the bottom two with $1.5 million apiece. Instead, he gave out soon after David and wound up with $1.25 million — the lowest case value in the game.

And so, instead of a bottom two, we got a bottom three — Phillip, plus C.K. and Parvati, who tied for second lowest. David had to pick who would go home and who would face the banker.

This is where things got really messy. C.K. tried to explain herself to David and Parv, who didn’t want to hear any of it. She promised to take out Lete if she faced the banker, but this game’s power “couple” wasn’t born yesterday, so of course they didn’t totally believe her.

Naturally, though, the most interesting negotiation here was between David and Parv. David knew this would be the week to take Parv out, and he had a clear shot to do it. But would he have the stomach for a move like that? A quick little montage of Parv putting her head on David’s shoulder and burying her face in his bare chest reminded us of the bond these two have built on this deal-making island. Could he really betray her now?

Then again, what does “betrayal” mean here? Parv wanted Phillip out because she was convinced if he beats the banker, he’d take her out — and she was right. Still, did she want to face the banker when C.K. is promising to cut Lete if she wins?

Because C.K. cannot pass up an opportunity to make things weird, she went back on her promise and told Parvati in the showers that she would probably “have” to eliminate her if she won against the banker. With that, Parvati pulled a middle-school-bully move on her, asked if she really wanted to face Lete in the finale, and told her to “get a life.” Guess that fake alliance is over now!

In the end, David did the predictable thing and took out Phillip. It’s a bummer, but at the same time, Phillip had to know this was a possibility — even if David promised him safety. If that truly didn’t occur to him, frankly, he deserved to lose. As for who will play the banker? We’ll all just have to sit here burning on the edge of our seats until next week, because these cruel editors left us on a big ol’ cliffhanger.

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See you all next week!