Fake Survivor: South Pacific
A Final Chance?
Welcome to Fake Survivor: South Pacific. This season, two returning players will have another chance at glory. They have been chosen to lead their specific tribes as mentors, showing these new players the ropes in the game. But make no mistake, these two also have a chance to win and both will be hungry to get another shot at the million dollars.
First, the established rules of this series:
- I have not altered any player’s profile to make them better or worse than anyone else on the season. I have not adjusted any player’s relationship to other players in any way to impact a season’s results.
- For simplicity’s sake, we will assume all players are the age they were the first time they played real Survivor. Otherwise it would be weird to imagine an infant Will Wahl on like Survivor: Africa or something like that.
- No restarts if a player I like in real life ends up being an early boot, that’s just the reality and likely kills his chances to return in the future. That’s life man.
To follow along, here is the link to the simulation: http://brantsteele.net/survivor/southpacific/r.php?c=en5Iudu6
Okay, let’s get to it. Here are the two tribes:
First, we can address our returning players. Both should be plenty familiar to long-time readers. Colby Donaldson will lead Savaii. He’s on his fourth chance at Fake Survivor after Africa, All-Stars and Heroes vs Villains. In each of his previous seasons, Colby has fallen one spot short of final tribal council. In each of these seasons, he would have been a contender to win the game. Will this be Colby’s chance to break through and figure out that last round? In the meantime, the Savaii tribe can rely on his challenge acumen and survival skills.
On Upolu, Jenna Bowman will assume the leadership position. She’s the most robbed player in Fake Survivor history, something I’ve never let go. After playing an electric game in Palau, she lost to Jimmy Johnson, her alliance-mate who didn’t do much during the game. Since then, she has had two disappointing returns in Micronesia, where she just missed the merge, and Heroes vs Villains, where she was a first boot. Jenna knows that this is likely her last chance at this game. She can’t afford another early exit. She’s hoping that her Heroes vs Villains performance will distract her tribe from the skills she does have in the game, leaving her some breathing room to find some footing.
(I would also like to apologize to Jenna for putting her on Coach’s body in that picture above… it couldn’t be helped.)
So those are the two returning players. They also share the honor of becoming our first two 4-time players of Fake Survivor. They are among my personal favorites to have played this fake game, so this feels well earned to me. Don’t think there won’t be a few more additions to that list down the road.
Let’s also quickly run down the two tribes these players will be spending their time with.
Savaii has a few real-life big names. Sonja Christopher, the real franchise’s first ever first boot is finally making her appearance on Fake Survivor. Can she come out of this with a better fate than real-life? We also have a real-life winner in Sarah Lacina. Let’s see if her elite social skills can somehow translate into this simulation. There’s also Spencer Bledsoe, a fan favorite for his time on Survivor: Cagayan and Cambodia.
The rest of Savaii is made up of lesser known but still fun players like Becky Lee, Holly Hoffman (who should have won fan favorite in Nicaragua over Jane freaking Bright), Coby Archa and Mike White. The only real-life player who was a complete dud in their season is Matt Quinlan. And who knows? This is his chance to rewrite history.
So, that’s Savaii. Now let’s see what Upolu has to offer.
They have their own real-life winner in Denise Stapley. That’s another player whose best skill in the game is in making friendships. That’s always tough to deliver on Brant Steele. Denise is somehow cursed with starting the game with Zane Knight in both real and fake Survivor. If Savaii gets an iconic first boot, it feels right that Upolu should too. Zane is certainly iconic. Mix Zane with Shane Powers, and that’s a terrifying concoction that should also deliver on the entertainment.
The rest of Upolu, like the “fodder” for Savaii, is still pretty fun. Pascha is an old-school legend and he kind of counteracts Sonja’s elderly presence on Savaii. Jefra was a lower key personality on her season that is stocked to the brim full of loud voices. Jason had potential but went home too early on his disaster of a season. JoAnna will be there to praise god.
That’s our two tribes. Colby and Jenna are set to lead their people to victory. Redemption island is back, presumably to give the returning players an extra shot. I’m excited to see how this will go.
Episode One
The Alliances
Right off the bat, Savaii seems very splintered. Becky, Mike and Sonja have formed a trio. Coby, Sarah and Spencer are another three-person crew looking to oppose the other alliance. Holly and Matt have not yet found an alliance to call home. Neither has Colby, our returning player who has never put too much stock in strategy to find success in the game.
It’ll be interesting to see how this tribe works out their numbers if they go to tribal council. Neither side has the numbers advantage, but the stragglers don’t either. It’s like an even 3–3–3 split but we know by now that stragglers very rarely work together consistently in Brant Steele simulations.
Over at Upolu, things have broken down a little differently.
As you can see, Jenna isn’t trying to be the first one out a second time. She’s found some room in a four-person alliance that includes Denise, Jason and Paschal. Jefra, JoAnna and Shane, an interesting trio, form the counterstrike. That leaves Zane and Janu on the outskirts of the tribe.
It’s interesting that Zane doesn’t have an alliance considering that in real-life, he had made alliances with everyone on his six-person tribe. It doesn’t shock me that Janu hasn’t made any alliances yet because that was her story on Palau. She ended up on the winning tribe but other than Coby, she was never able to find inroads. Let’s see if that remains true here.
Colby and Jenna face off in the first challenge of the season. The winner of this challenge gets flint. Colby immediately shows his worth to the tribe by winning the challenge.
As a form of revenge, Upolu gathers themselves and wins the first immunity challenge of the season. Savaii will have to go to tribal council and figure out their messy tribe composition. This could be a dangerous spot for Colby to find himself given Brant Steele alliances’ propensity for going after stragglers.
Before we can go to tribal council, we get a quick scene at Upolu. After getting into an alliance and winning immunity, Jenna wasn’t done with her stellar premiere. She also goes out and finds the Upolu hidden immunity idol. It appears Jenna is hungry to prove that her Palau game wasn’t a flash in the pan and she’s come out swinging.
At Savaii, Spencer and Sonja have a minor fight before tribal council. They sit on opposing sides of the tribe. Might this be a sign of how things might go at tribal council? It seems incredibly risky for these two alliances to take shots at each other when there are so many undecided voters on the outskirts, but Brant Steele players aren’t known for their incredible decision making.
Nobody on Savaii finds the idol in this round.
From the Sonja and Spencer fight, we go straight into tribal council. It’s clear that these two alliances are butting heads and much of tribal council is spent on this subject. Sonja and her alliance are locked in on Spencer. Similarly, Spencer and his group will be voting for Sonja. The power falls in the hands of Colby, Matt and Holly. If they want, they can all vote together with one alliance but what really matters is two of these three votes.
Probst goes to the voting urn and starts reading the votes. The first six are predictably split between Spencer and Sonja. Then we get to the three unknown votes, “Sonja, four votes Sonja… Sonja, that’s enough votes, the tribe has spoken.”
Heartbreaking! Sometimes, art imitates real-life (and make no mistake, Fake Survivor is pure art) and in this case, it surely did. The first ever person voted out of Survivor makes her first appearance in this series and becomes a first boot. Like Final Destination, you can’t outrun your fate and Sonja seems fated to always go out first on Survivor. I’ve got the Survivor blues over this one. That said, Sonja could still come back in this game via redemption island. Maybe they’ve awoken a sleeping giant by voting her out.
The stragglers all voted together in this round. It’ll be interesting to see how Becky and Mike react to this vote. Will they try to stick together and appeal to the stragglers, hoping to strike at the other alliance? Or will they become free agents and leave Spencer, Coby and Sarah as the lone solid alliance left on Savaii?
Episode Two
Having felt the sadness of losing a member of their tribe, Savaii came back with a vengeance in episode two. They win their first immunity of the season and in the process, will even the tribes with Upolu having to send one of their own out of the game this time around.
Following their immunity win, Sarah goes out and looks for the Savaii hidden immunity idol. She is successful in her search and pockets a bit of extra protection. That’s good for a tribe that is currently very unstable.
While things are going well for Sarah, it goes considerably less so for her alliance parter, Coby. He has chosen to isolate himself from the tribe and nobody wants to align with him anymore. That means he will likely be out of his alliance by the start of next episode. That means Savaii would have two pairs (Becky and Mike, Sarah and Spencer) and four players who haven’t aligned with anybody. Bit of a mess.
As he is known to do, Shane gets into a minor fight with Jefra, a member of his own alliance. Maybe she will be Shane’s Courtney Marit for the season. It seems like if you want to have a peaceful relationship with Shane, it’s best not to be aligned with him. Also stay away from him when he’s talking on his blackberry, you wouldn’t want to disturb his important phone calls.
To reset as we head into tribal council, Upolu has two alliances. Jenna, Denise, Jason and Paschal are a foursome. JoAnna, Shane and Jefra are a trio. Zane and Janu have no alliances. If Shane and co want to take a shot at the alliance with the bigger numbers, they would be smart to rope in both stragglers, this is the only shot they will get.
Unfortunately for people looking for some dramatics, that isn’t the way tribal council goes. In fact, both alliances actually get together and vote for the same person, Zane. He might not be the season’s first boot, but he is the first boot on his tribe. Like Sonja, Zane just isn’t destined to survive even a single tribal council on Survivor. At least he will get a chance to fight for his life on redemption island where he will surely not go crazy.
Episode Three
At the top of the episode, it’s confirmed that Coby is no longer part of Sarah and Spencer’s alliance. He has joined the unaffiliated bunch that now makes up half the tribe. Seems sustainable.
Then the main event of the episode, our epic first boot matchup between Sonja and Zane. One would be the first completely out of the game, the other would continue fighting for their lives. When I picture Survivor gladiators, the two that come to mind immediately are Zane and Sonja, so this makes sense.
This challenge was one that required balance and hand eye coordination. Given that Zane probably has a massive case of shaky hands by day seven or whatever, this seemed like a foregone conclusion. Sonja may have been the first boot, but she will not be the first one out of the game. Zane takes that prize and feels the same shame his real-life self felt in Philippines.
Possibly inspired by the former tribe-mate’s redemption performance, Savaii came into the immunity challenge jacked up. For the second episode in a row, they laid waste to the Upolus and secured their safety for another round. They also won some chocolate. No word on if Colby was willing to sample the chocolate before the competition or if he just wanted to compete.
After the challenge, we go back to Savaii to highlight that Holly is starting to annoy her tribe. I hope everyone keeps an eye on their shoes, especially if they are expensive and made out of alligator leather. We all know what Holly is capable of at her peak.
Meanwhile, on Upolu, Jenna’s alliance of Denise, Jason, Paschal and herself has graduated to a strong alliance. They are one vote away from gaining complete majority on their tribe and Jenna has an idol. She is one tribal away from essentially guaranteeing herself a spot at the merge. So far this season, Jenna has played a very impressive game.
Unfortunately, despite the solid game Jenna has been playing, her alliance makes a tactical error at this tribal council. They decide to target Janu, also known as the only person on the tribe without an alliance. As it stands, Jenna’s alliance has four people. Shane, Jefra and JoAnna are the other alliance with three. Given that Janu is being targeted, it’s easy to see with which group she’s going to vote. Those four put their votes on Denise, forcing a 4–4 tie.
On the revote, nobody decides to flip their vote. A ballsy decision for everyone, but especially Jenna who is still sitting there with an idol in her pocket that might be flushed if she happens to draw the wrong rock. Still, she takes the calculated risk of escaping this round with her idol and her alliance unscathed. It’s a risk Devon Pinto once took, and it paid off with a legendary win, can Jenna repeat that feat?
The six eligible players draw rocks. Whoever has the dreaded purple rock will have to leave the game. The players all open their palms simultaneously.
Jenna’s gambit has paid off. She keeps her idol for another day. A member of the opposing alliance has drawn the bad rock and her group now has complete majority on the tribe. Talk about risking everything but winning big.
I can’t see a world in which Shane goes out in this fashion quietly. He must have cursed up a storm when he saw that purple rock sitting in his palm. He may have even taken a swing at Jeff Probst. It’s a tough draw for such a big personality to go so quickly but for Upolu, it might help keep them drama free the rest of the way. Unless of course, Shane battles his way back into the game.
Episode Four
The first thing to get to in episode four is our redemption island duel. Sonja, fresh off the biggest win in her Survivor career, is now going to have to face Shane, a fearsome and angry competitor. They will toss bags onto crates and they will have to land a bag on each crate to win. Our winner of the second duel of the season is…
Queen Sonja has done it again. She has slayed Shane in battle and secured her spot into the next round of play. After winning her duel, she turns to the tribes and yells defiantly with her arms stretched out, “are you not entertained?”
Shane definitely tries to burn down the entire duel arena on his way out of the game. He is now on the fake Survivor blacklist for attempting to murder all his fellow castaways.
The next immunity challenge is shoulder the load. A classic challenge where three players must hold up increasingly heavy poles for as long as they can. One might expect that Savaii, with choices like Colby, Coby, Matt and Spencer would dominate over Upolu, who is forced into putting up Jason and Paschal as two of the weight bearers, but nope. Upolu stops Savaii’s winning streak in their tracks and gets an upset victory.
Before tribal council, the alliance between Sarah and Spencer downgrades to a very weak alliance. They haven’t yet voted out a member of their alliance, but they did lose Coby, who isolated himself from the tribe. So far, the pairing of Becky and Mike, who lost Sonja in the first vote of the season, seems like the strongest alliance on the tribe. The thing is, they can be as strong as they want, two is hardly the majority of an eight-person tribe. This vote could potentially be a mess.
At tribal council, it quickly appears as though some of the stragglers are in trouble. Holly’s behaviour has been highlighted in the past, negatively. She is one of the main targets at this tribal council. So too is Matt, for reasons unclear to anybody. It appears the two duos have agreed to hold off on going after each other for the time being, given that there are so many people left in the game who could vote however they want.
Colby and Coby (this is confusing) join Holly in voting for Matt. The two duos join together and place their four votes on Holly. This makes Matt the swing vote and he obviously isn’t going to vote for himself. So, in a 5–3 vote, Holly becomes the fourth person voted out of the game. Colby of course is keeping his trademark game of voting incorrectly and making no enemies.
Episode Five
Sonja comes riding in on her dragon to compete in the next redemption island duel. She’s dealt with Zane and Shane, two of the more frenetic players in Survivor history, now she must test her skills against Holly, another player who has shown the ability to fly off the handle from time to time. Can Sonja keep her reputation as the slayer of the crazies?
Not this time. In a competition where players must keep catching balls that pop out of their chute, aka the Stephen Fishbach and Kelley Wentworth memorial challenge, Holly comes out on top. This will mark the end of Sonja’s run on the show. It may not have gone the way she wanted, but at least this time around she got to show her worth. Two duel wins at her age isn’t something to take for granted and Sonja really showed her competitive side. Bravo girl, bravo.
The immunity challenge in this episode is disgusting. It’s the one where castaways can only use their mouth to rip off as much meat from a pork roast as they can. It’s a dentist’s worst nightmare but probably pretty exciting if you have a saliva fetish (I’m sure that’s a thing but I’m not going to Google it).
Possibly from his time as the host of History’s “The Butcher”, Colby and Savaii are able to collect the most pork meat in the ten minutes allotted. They win immunity and get to keep all the spit meat they ripped off the pig. I’m not sure I would be starved enough to eat that unless it was burnt to a crisp on the fire first.
Holly has just been voted off Savaii for rubbing the tribe the wrong way. Showing a severe lack of social understanding, Becky begins to do the same thing to her tribe. Maybe she ate too much of the spit meat and didn’t leave any for the rest of her tribe-mates. Whatever she did, she needs to watch out because this tribe is quick to send home anyone who makes a faux-pas.
We then go to Upolu’s tribal council where things are very straightforward. Jenna’s alliance has the majority now. They wanted Janu gone last time and weren’t able to get it done because they didn’t have the numbers outright. Now that they do, even Jefra and JoAnna join the chorus of Janu votes, sending her to Redemption Island in a unanimous 6–1 vote.
Do we think Jenna is running a religious, cult-like alliance on that tribe? They are all very loyal to each other. If so, you would think JoAnna would have wanted to be part of that action. I guess it’ll remain to be seen when we get to the blind fold challenge if Jenna makes them all pray after the challenge before they can even take off their blindfolds.
Episode Six
Time for an exciting game of redemption island shuffle board. Holly and Janu face off. Two women enter, only one can come out. This ain’t your grandma’s shuffle board.
It’s a short-lived Redemption Island stay for Holly. She took out Sonja but didn’t have it in the tank to win a second duel against Janu. She will go home and Janu will remain in the game, inching closer to the merge where someone will return.
With momentum back on their side, Savaii kept rolling in the immunity challenge. Upolu will once again face tribal council where it seems very likely that one of JoAnna or Jefra will face the music. Maybe Paschal will want to target Jefra for being too much of a temptress. We all know Paschal has some affinity for younger women.
At tribal council, Jefra and JoAnna put up a good show of solidarity by voting together against Denise. Whom, by the way, has been soaking up all these opposing votes, she might be seen as a big player in this game and my bias towards Jenna as a returning player might be leaking into the game. Oh well, not like Probst is able to keep his own bias out of producing the real show, so call this extra realism on my end.
Those two votes are meaningless because Jenna rolls with a crew of four people, all of whom place their votes on Jefra (I’m giving you the side-eye for this one Judge English) and she goes home in a 4–2 vote.
Episode Seven
Having been the first ever visitor of the real-life exile island, Janu is accustomed to spending time on Survivor alone. That might have given extra strength going into her second redemption island duel where she battled against Jefra and dominated her. She may have been a quitter in real-life but on Fake Survivor, Janu is but one redemption duel away from fighting her way back into the game.
In the main game, Upolu managed to stop the bleeding by winning the next immunity challenge, the blindfolded challenge. No doubt that Jenna’s prayer circle after their victory was touching and had every fan watching at home cheering out of their seats.
Before tribal council, Coby and Matt, both players on the outside of any alliances, get into a minor fight. It could be that Matt isn’t impressed that Coby was one of the people who voted for him at the last Savaii tribal council.
To me, there are a few potential targets going into this vote. Becky has been highlighted as rubbing the tribe the wrong way. Holly was voted out of Savaii for doing the exact same thing. Matt has received votes in the past and isn’t part of any power structure, I think he could be in play. Similarly, both Colby and Coby might be in some trouble for voting incorrectly the last time around.
After voting together at their last tribal council, the two Savaii duos decided not to do the same this time around. Sarah and Spencer, hoping on the “Becky is annoying” train, put their votes on Becky. Becky and Mike put their votes on Matt, since he just started an argument at camp before this vote. Coby, who was involved in the argument with Matt, sides with Becky and Mike in voting against him. Obviously, Matt is going to side with Sarah and Spencer, hoping to save himself.
That puts Colby square in the middle of this vote. Our returning veteran who doesn’t like voting people out because it makes enemies has become the swing vote. Whoever he votes against will 100% go home and it will be because of him.
Sensing that leaving alliances in the game won’t be great for his own survival at the merge if he wants it to be Savaii strong, Colby places his vote on Becky. I agree with Colby’s decision in this spot, better to break up a duo than vote out someone who has no alliance, much like Colby, and leave less room for Colby himself to maneuver.
Episode Eight: The Merge
Yes, we’ve reached the merge already. But first, we have some business to attend to at Redemption Island. The winner of this duel will return to the game. The loser goes home empty handed. Becky will represent Savaii in this battle. She has not yet experienced the arena. Janu holds the Upolu flag. She of two duel wins, she’s hoping to make it a hat-trick and return into the main game.
It’ll come down to who has the stronger pole, a Survivor classic.
Janu is quicker at constructing a long and strong pole. With her resilience and refusal to lose, she has won her back into the game. What an inspiring battle for somebody who has never found her footing in the game. Now she’ll have a second chance.
Both of our returning players have made it to the merge without breaking much of a sweat. Jenna is part of a dominant Upolu alliance while also holding onto a hidden immunity idol. Colby doesn’t have an official alliance, but he’s been a rock at Savaii in the challenges and has never been considered as an option to vote against.
Now, it’s an individual game. Both tribes enter the merge with six members per side. It’ll be interesting to see if Denise or Janu are willing to work with the Upolu majority that has dictated their game. Likewise, is Mike going to want to stick with Savaii after losing his only actual ally? Really, how will most of Savaii operate given that Sarah and Spencer are the only actual alliance left on that tribe?
Our first individual immunity challenge will see two players win immunity. One man and one woman. Spencer wins the necklace for the men. Our returning mentor Jenna wins the necklace for the women. Considering her alliance might get some looks as potential targets in this vote, this is a key win for her.
Before tribal council, we are informed that the dominant and very loyal Upolu alliance has suddenly downgraded into a very weak alliance. Is this a sign that these guys are going to get some votes tonight? I think it very well could be. It’s also worth noting that nobody has found the merged tribe idol in this round.
Despite both tribes being on shaky ground with each other, it became clear at tribal council that this was going to be two distinct sides. Savaii on one end, Upolu on the other. Both tribes seem to be playing chicken with each other, hoping to goad the other side into flipping to avoid a potential tie vote situation.
Savaii smartly chose to focus their votes on Janu. They predict that since she’s been voted out in the past, Upolu wouldn’t be too keen to risk their own lives to go to rocks for her. Following similar logic, Upolu kind of detects that Coby is maybe at the bottom rung of the Savaii hierarchy and thus place their votes on him.
It’s a 6–6 tie. There will be a revote. On the revote, not one but two people break on the Savaii side. Matt and Mike are both unwilling to risk their own lives in the game for Coby. Matt has gotten into a fight with Coby in the past, it’s not like he likes the guy. Likewise, Mike has just had his closest ally voted out by the Savaii tribe, he doesn’t feel too much trust with them. They flip their votes and in a 7–3 revote, Coby becomes the first post-merge Redemption Island guest.
With this vote, it seems like Upolu has managed to claim the numbers in the post merge. They’ve shown loyalty to Janu by not flipping given the opportunity, that might strengthen their bond with her. Let’s see how this plays out moving forward.
Episode Nine: Part One
JoAnna kicks off this two-part episode by winning the individual immunity challenge. Then, back at camp, Sarah decides to isolate herself from the rest of the tribe. That means that Savaii will no longer have any alliances other than the entirety of the Savaii tribe against the Upolu tribe. Maybe she’s trying to bait some votes her way because she has the idol. Maybe she wants to Ben Driebergen someone out of the game.
Once again, no one finds the merged tribe idol in this round. These people must not be looking very hard.
At tribal council, Savaii decides to take a shot at the Upolu majority and vote for Jason. Spencer, Matt, Colby and Mike all vote for him. Meanwhile, because they have the numbers, the Upolu alliance foolishly decides to turn on their own and target Janu. Why the hell would they go to rocks for her only to turn around vote against her the very next round? That means four votes on Janu.
That leaves Sarah, JoAnna and Janu to swing the vote. Janu is obviously not going to vote for herself, so she joins Savaii in voting for Jason. JoAnne decides to stick with tribe loyalty, think of her as the Edna Ma of this tribe, and votes against Janu. Sarah could simply go with her Savaii tribe and get one of the power players but she just isolated herself from the game and she wants to do what she wants to do. And apparently, what she wants to do, is allow that Upolu another chance at staying alive, as she votes against Janu.
That has to sting for Janu. For one round, she thought she had found some footing in this game and almost immediately, the people she thought she had turned on her. This was a big mistake from Savaii in the last round for not going after anyone else on Upolu, Janu might have voted with them. They gave her no chance to do so by targeting her.
Now she gets to go back to Redemption Island, where she will have to fight for her life once more.
Episode Nine: Part Two
In the back half of this episode, Jenna continues her strong showing on the season by winning her second immunity challenge of the season. Back at camp, Mike and Matt get into a minor fight. Maybe over the fact that their names sound so similar. That’s been my qualm with both as I keep having to go back and fix my mistakes when I write the wrong name.
As well, the merge idol still has not been found. I’m shocked that Jenna or Sarah, holders of the other two idols, haven’t put their hands on this thing. You would figure that three rounds into the merge, somebody would have stumbled onto the idol. Russell Hantz is probably turning in his grave.
After a one round reprieve, it becomes clear at tribal council that the game has once again reverted to tribal lines. Five Upolus, five Savaiis. Sure, it’s weird that Sarah bounced over to vote with Upolu alliance last time around, but Savaii can’t be chooser in their current situation. They have to roll with what they are given.
The five Savaiis go after Jason one more time. Upolu decides to target Colby, who had done a great job up to this point at staying below the radar. For yet another vote, we get a deadlocked 5–5 tie. On the revote, unlike last time, everyone stays loyal. For the second time in the game, we are going to draw rocks.
This is especially risk for our idol holder. Sarah hasn’t dealt with rocks yet in this game and she’s taking a big risk. Jenna also holds an idol, but because she has the necklace around her neck, she doesn’t have to worry about much.
This is stellar decision making from Jenna and if it works, she looks like a genius. If, for a second time in a row, she can hold onto her idol, not lose a member of her alliance and gain the majority in the numbers, it’ll be spectacular luck mixed but it’ll make her look great to the jury when she reveals her idol.
As the players all draw their rocks, they are asked simultaneously to reveal what they are holding. Unfortunately for Savaii, Sarah is holding the purple rock. Not only do they lose the numbers edge to Upolu for a second time, they also lose a potential idol as Sarah’s will go out of the game with her. Brutal for them.
It must be especially painful for Sarah. She broke away from the Savaii crowd in the last vote. Suddenly, she has a change of heart in this episode and comes back to them. She even goes to rocks for her side. All she ends up getting out of it is a trip to redemption island where Coby and Janu await to challenge her.
Incredible for all of Upolu and especially Jenna. Twice she has gone to rocks with her alliance and twice they have come out on top. She must start feeling like this game is destined to be hers. Still, she can’t get too comfortable because there’s a long way to go.
Episode Ten
In this season, redemption island is a little more cutthroat. Only the winner of these three-people duels will stay in the game. Janu might have a slight edge, if only because she’s battled through the gauntlet before. It’s an endurance and balance challenge.
Coby ends up being the winner of this challenge. Sarah and Janu’s journey on Fake Survivor will end here. They both gave it their all and can leave with their heads held high. Janu especially, given the amount of fight she had to show to get as far she did. Unfortunately, she was not able to connect with people socially and that is a huge aspect to Survivor. Without that skill, it’s always going to be an uphill battle.
Back in the main game, Jenna continues her dominance by winner her second consecutive immunity challenge, third overall. She’s really started to kick things into high gear, putting some separation between herself and the rest of her alliance. If it comes down to them at final tribal council, Jenna will have some things to point to that the rest of them won’t have on their resume.
In fact, there might be some jealousy brewing between Jenna and the rest of her tribe because back at camp, she has a minor fight with Denise. As we might remember, Denise was soaking up a lot of votes on Upolu beach. She was the leader by the Upolus not in the alliance. Since the merge, it’s been the Jenna show as far as Savaii can tell. It seems like Denise does not like taking a backseat and having her thunder stolen. By a veteran of the game no less.
Finally, someone goes out and manages to find the hidden immunity idol. It’s Matt! That gives Savaii the idol that they lost when Sarah went out of the game. That is, if Matt is willing to share the idol with the rest of his tribe.
At tribal council, it remains clear that things are still split down tribal lines. In a stroke of genius, Matt is able to goad the Upolus into casting their votes for him. He is then also successful in sniffing out that the votes are coming his way and playing his idol, negating all five Upolu votes. The remaining four votes all belong to Savaii and finally, they have a clear shot to take out Jason.
Jason likely would have survived this round had Jenna not won immunity. She has clearly become the biggest target in the game by continuously winning these challenges but winning them also means she can’t be touched yet.
I have to say, for a season that features only one solid alliance, this game has gone back and forth between tribes very fluidly. It’s exciting to see.
Episode ten is the episode of South Pacific that features an immediate second vote after the original tribal council. Before they can get to vote, an immunity challenge must be played. JoAnna breaks Jenna’s streak and wins her first immunity of the season.
The question now becomes, is Savaii aware of Jenna’s idol? If they throw all their votes on Jenna, there is a very big chance it’ll come back to bite that in the same way that Upolu got stung by Matt. It would be such a gigantic 180 in momentum if Upolu was able to quickly turn the tables on Savaii.
Instead, both Savaii and Upolu were somehow able to come to a consensus. Savaii doesn’t want to risk getting idol’ed out of the game and they throw Mike to the wolves. Upolu, having suffered their first real loss, is more than happy to simply piggyback on that sentiment and vote Mike as well. In a 7–1 vote, Mike is unanimously voted out of the game.
That’s gotta stink for him. Savaii had just struck a blow on Upolu. They seemed like momentum was swinging over to their side. Mike had to feel good in his position because it’s not like he’s the first target in Upolu’s mind and if Savaii can find a way to get the numbers, he’s got a clear lane to the final four. Instead, he was on the bottom of the Savaii hierarchy and in an unexpected vote, that meant his number was up.
Episode Eleven
Episode eleven opens up between a redemption island duel between Coby, Jason and Mike. The winner of the duel will move on. The other two will be eliminated for good. In yet another balance competition on redemption island, Jason emerges as the victor. His first experience in the duel is a positive one as he buys himself another day in the game.
As the season is starting to enter the endgame, Colby feels the need to start showing up. He wins his first immunity challenge of the season. He also gets the opportunity to share a shower and massage with somebody. Colby smartly offers that to Denise, reaching out to someone on the other side who has had some bristles with her alliance in the recent past.
After that relaxing reward, Colby goes out and gets his hands dirty to find Matt’s idol that has been re-hidden. He’s spent much of the season trying to stay below the radar, but now it seems like Colby is gearing up for yet another late game run. Both of our returning players currently possess idols.
If things stick to tribal lines, Spencer and Matt are in serious trouble now that Colby is immune. Upolu holds a 4–3 majority thanks to Savaii giving up Mike with little to no fight. Now, that decision might come back to bite one of these two guys.
At tribal council, Jenna is agitated enough by Savaii that she plays her hidden immunity idol. Maybe she thinks Colby was able to pull Denise over to his side after their shared reward. Whatever it is, she gets a bad vibe and doesn’t feel safe.
She’s right that some votes are coming for her. Savaii has decided to take a shot at Jenna, but they only have three votes. The rest of Upolu remains loyal to their tribal lines and vote with Jenna, for Matt. That means that Matt is voted out with 4 votes. But it also means that Jenna played an idol she didn’t need to play. After playing so well for so long, this is the first huge mistake on her part.
For Matt, it’s been a good run. If it ends in the next duel, he can at least know he played hard and had a fun idol play that gave his tribe some hope. Even if that hope lasted all of fifteen minutes.
Episode Twelve
This duel has extra stakes for people in the game. For one, Savaii must be hoping that Matt can knock Jason out. They’re already down in the numbers and having Jason so close to coming back into the game would only reinforce the Upolu alliance. As well, whoever wins this duel will get to choose some people to spend time on redemption, where they will see their loved ones.
Jason wins his second consecutive duel and sends Matt to Ponderosa. He then chooses Spencer, Colby and Denise to see their loves ones. Reid Donaldson gets to be yelled at Colby at least one more time.
Energized by getting to yell at his brother, Colby wins his second immunity challenge in a row. There’s something about Fake Survivor end games and Colby. Maybe it’s like that confessional he had back in Heroes vs Villains (the real season). He just can’t quit.
Unfortunately for Spencer, this probably means it’s curtains for him. Unless a miracle happens.
Yep, no miracle here. Quiet game for Spenny so far. Maybe he can win his way back and give Colby some much needed backup.
Episode Thirteen
This is our second to last duel. Jason and Spencer will compete to be the final challenger to the final five vote out. Colby must be wishing it’s Spencer. Upolu is obviously hoping it’s going to be Jason.
In a tight duel, Spencer is able to defeat Jason. Colby must be thrilled with this development. Everyone else is probably just sad to see Jason officially get knocked out of the game. The first member of the Upolu alliance to be fully out of the running. They’ve run an impressive ship so far this season.
Having played an incredibly silent game to this point, Paschal picks the right time to win his first immunity and stop Colby’s streak. Like Colby, he also wins a shower and massage and this old dog shares that reward with Jenna. We know what you’re up to Paschal, quit it bro.
At tribal council, it becomes clear to Colby that votes are coming his way and he plays his idol. Upolu stupidly doesn’t split their votes and goes all out for Colby. The idol play turns out to be a good decision. He then puts his vote onto JoAnna. This seems like less of a good decision. Jenna was right there, vulnerable as she is ever going to be. Why would he take out the lowest ranking member of Upolu? He didn’t even target a member of the actual alliance. That’s like if Savaii had gotten a clear shot at Coach in the real South Pacific and taken out Edna instead.
Finale: Part One
In the first part of the finale, JoAnna will duel Spencer for the right to return to the game. Colby needs it to be Spencer so that he can get some breathing room. Upolu is obviously rooting for JoAnna so that they can finish the Savaii genocide appropriately and move into final preparations for final tribal council. Either way, I feel like this alliance of three is locked in with each other and JoAnna isn’t getting any further than four even if she does come back.
This one is all about endurance. Both players are hanging onto a pole and whoever lasts longer gets back in the game. How bad do these people want it? I don’t know how long the competition lasts but eventually, we’ve got ourselves a returning player…
Spencer has fought his way back! It seems like short of winning immunity, he might find himself on a one-way trip back out of the game but for the moment, let’s let him enjoy his victory. Moment done? Okay, because Jenna immediately squashes the good vibes by winning her fourth immunity of the season. You had your chance Colby.
Depressingly for Spencer and Colby, they are unable to find Colby’s rehidden idol. In fact, nobody finds it and it will go out of the game unused. There’s no way production would allow this to happen nowadays, but it’s fun that a potential idol just went unfound. Sometimes things don’t work out the way you want them to.
Upolu is crazy if they allow Colby another day in this game. They need to take him out ahead of Spencer because Colby has fought and clawed his way through this end game. He’s finally out of bullets in the chamber, they need to finish the job.
Wildly enough, maybe out of respect for him letting her get through last round, Jenna and her alliance go for Spencer instead. Maybe they were worried about the comeback story but man, there’s an even bigger underdog left in the main game and its name is Colby. If Colby finally breaks through and wins this next immunity challenge, he’s probably got this game locked up. I don’t think Spencer beats Jenna even if he were to do the same thing. Interesting decision making here by the alliance.
Finale: Part Two
The stakes are clear: if Colby wins this next immunity, he probably wins the game. If he doesn’t, it’s lights out for him. It’s insane that Colby has played four times and has gotten to the last immunity challenge each time. All he’s had to do was win this challenge to win any of these seasons and so far, he’s been unable to do it. Is fourth time the charm?
Unfortunately for any Colby fans, it isn’t. His fellow returning player Jenna wins her fifth immunity challenge of the season, likely locking up her win in the process. I can’t imagine how much it must kill Colby to continuously come up short in this final challenge. Some people have the clutch gene and some people don’t. Fake Survivor Colby clearly doesn’t have it.
For Jenna, the fifth immunity win is a new record for a single season. She has completely dominated this post-merge on a physical level. Nobody has been able to match that kind of success in the challenges and that is impressive.
Predictably, Colby receives three votes from the Upolu alliance and gets sent home in his patented robbed goddess spot. At this point, we may as well start calling it the robbed Colby position. If this is it for his Fake Survivor career (and I’m not ready to say that it is), we can’t say that Colby didn’t fight as hard as he could to get to the end. Like always, he came up just a little short. At this point, it feels like he needs some black magic to win that final immunity.
We’ve got a final three made up on an alliance that was formed on day one. Jenna, our other returning player who had gone through two seasons of disappointment after her initial season, is back where she ended her first time on Fake Survivor. Last time, her social bonds failed her in the end and all of her hard work ended up getting credited to someone many believe didn’t deserve the win. Has she learned from her first final tribal council? This game seems like it’s all hers for the taking but that doesn’t mean she can’t show up in front of the jurors.
Her competition will come from Denise, who the other Upolus seemed to view as the leader back in the pre-merge. Unfortunately for Denise, those Upolus aren’t sitting on the jury and won’t have an influence on the winner. She’s been very quiet in the post-merge and might be seen as someone who rode coattails on the way to the end.
The other competitor is Paschal. This guy has been mostly silent throughout the game. He had one big immunity win to derail Colby’s potential breakthrough and he can lean on that over Denise. I don’t think he has anything he can hold over Jenna though.
Honestly, this should be a unanimous vote for Jenna, but I said that about Palau too and we all know how that went. So, there’s only one way to find out…
She’s finally done it! Jenna has gotten the crown that eluded her 13 seasons ago and now she gets to join the elite tier of players who have won the game. A wrong has been righted. It wasn’t unanimous or as easy as she would have liked it, but Jenna did well enough at final tribal council to convince the jurors that she deserved the victory over her two allies.
It sounds like Denise did a good job with her final tribal council performance and stole at least one vote from Jenna to finish second. I like that all three players received votes in this final tribal, which is not something you ever see on real Survivor.
Jenna put together an impressive performance in her fourth time out. It wasn’t without its mistakes here and there, but she was such a dominant performer in challenges, a clear leader in her alliance and even found an idol. It’s hard to say that she didn’t play the best game out of the members of her alliance and that alliance dominated the game. She comes down as a legend on a tier with people like Devon and Vecepia, just a step below the GOAT status currently held by Tom Westman.
Matt Quinlan wins the fan favorite award. He had that exciting idol play that struck the only blow on the Upolu alliance. But in reality, let’s not act like Colby isn’t the fan favorite of this season. I think you can’t go wrong either way.
I’m stoked with how this season ended. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t hoping that Colby would pull the monkey off his back. Still, seeing him fail at the very last opportunity for the 4th time in a row is something you can’t really make up. And Jenna getting her win is so well-deserved and helps redeem a lot of the bad feelings I had about Fake Survivor: Palau. Not to the point where I’ll consider Jimmy Johnson for even two seconds when we do All-Winners, but at least that means Jenna will get to play a 5th time in 17 seasons.
Next week, we tackle our third version of men versus women. Let’s see if we can find a new player as dominant as the real One World winner ended up being.
