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Survivor Winner Rankings - #37/38

 

07-04-19 07:41 PM
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WARNING - This series of rankings will contain heavy spoilers for the TV show Survivor. Don’t read if you don’t want to get spoiled.

Hey there. For those who don’t know I’m a huge fan of the CBS Reality TV show Survivor and I devote a lot of my time in watching and analyzing the show and its players. In this little series I’ll be sharing my Survivor winners rankings in which I analyze and rank the 38 winners we’ve had and the games they played. I will try to be critical of their gameplay and refrain from letting bias interfere, though I can’t promise to be 100% unbiased towards some of these winners. I’m starting from the bottom and we’ll go up my ranking from there.

Today I’ll be covering the winner I have ranked #37 out of 38.
Check the thread description to see what season they were on.

Previous winners - #38

With that said let’s get started.


#37 / 38 - Ben Driebergen (S35 - Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers)



Oh boy. This might be controversial but I don’t care. Up until this most recent season I had Ben at the worst winner spot, and now he’s moved up a spot. Ben 100% won the game due to luck, and nothing else. You could argue he’s a good player, and I don’t necessarily disagree with that, but a good player doesn’t equal a good winner. I just have him ahead of Chris because, well, Ben never got voted out. Which single handedly puts him here.

But, let’s rewind it back to day 1 of Survivor: Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers (btw hands down the worst season title we’ve ever had). Ben finds himself on the Heroes tribe, consisting of 6 members (Ben, Alan, JP, Chrissy, Katrina, Ashley). After seeing JP and Ashley sort of pair up, as well as grouping older women Chrissy and Katrina somewhat together, Ben decides to link up with Alan. I think this was a good idea on Ben’s part as Alan seemed like a level headed, nice guy who was down to go deep with Ben.

Only, Alan didn’t exactly turn out to be as level headed as he initially seemed. He got super paranoid over the Ashley/JP duo and at one point even forced JP to strip down to make sure he didn’t have an immunity idol. Keep in mind this is like day 1 or 2. Ben rightfully concludes that Alan is too unpredictable and he’s now looking at Chrissy as a long term partner. After the Heroes lose the first immunity challenge all eyes are on Alan, but because he is really physically fit they decide to vote out Katrina, the older woman on the outs, in a 5-1 vote.

After a shaky start, the Heroes actually manage to pull through and win the next two immunity challenges, though at camp tension rises between Ashley and Alan. Ben is in a great position here as Chrissy is his #1 ally and Alan will choose to vote with them over Ashley and JP. In episode 4, with 15 people left, the tribes get reshuffled and Ben now finds himself on a new tribe of 5 along with 3 former Healers (Jessica, Cole, Dr. Mike) and 1 lone Hustler (Lauren). Just numerically speaking Ben is at a disadvantage here, with the Healers seemingly having full control over the small tribe of 5. He does manage to bond a lot with Lauren, and the two even form a small connection with Dr. Mike, who was on the outs at the original Healers tribe.

Now their tribe does end up winning the next 3 remaining tribal immunity challenges so we’ll never know for certain if Ben would’ve gone home had they gone to a tribal council. It’s possible the 3 Healers just vote out Ben & Lauren, it’s possible the two outsiders can pull in Dr. Mike to target either Cole or Jessica. For the sake of keeping this as an analysis instead of asking a bunch of what ifs, we’ll just say Ben could have pulled something to stay in the game but he didn’t need to as they won everything.

After winning out the remainder of the challenges Ben has now made it to the merge, where he is able to immediately link back up with Chrissy, and together with Lauren they pull in Ryan, Devon, Ashley and JP to form a 7 person Heroes/Hustlers alliance against the 5 remaining Healers. Ben is in a great position here, and after Desi (a Healer) wins immunity, they all agree to vote out Jessica in a 7-5 vote (with Chrissy being on the receiving end of those 5 Healer votes).

After some hidden immunity idol shenanigans, Cole is in hot water after he lost his closest ally Jessica, as well as blowing up his game around camp by openly sprinting in hopes of finding the idol that Ryan already found. Chrissy especially wants him gone bad, but after Cole clutches out an immunity win the alliance of 7 decides to split the vote between Desi, who was physically fit, and Joe (Healer) who had already played 2 idols at that point, out of fear of another Joe idol being in play. It ends up being a 4-4-1-1 vote, with Lauren trading her vote for an extra vote later on, Desi voting for Lauren and Joe voting for Ben, giving Ben his first vote. At the revote Desi gets voted out 7-1, with only Dr. Mike voting for Joe. I personally find voting out Desi a questionable decision as the whole reason they went through the trouble of splitting the vote was to ensure Joe didn’t play an idol. Why not get rid of him at the revote when he is unable to play an immunity idol on himself?

Nonetheless, after Lauren wins the next immunity it’s pretty much game over for Cole. Dr. Mike tries a last ditch effort to trick the majority alliance into voting for him, followed by him playing an immunity idol for himself, but it was not enough to save Cole as he gets voted out 7-0-1 after Dr. Mike only managed to steer 2 votes his way. Cole did vote for Ben here giving Ben his second straight vote and clearly making him the minority’s target, due to him being seen as the ringleader of that alliance of 7. You’d think that’s a compliment but Ben is already starting to stand out as the leader of the pack, which at the same time makes him a huge target in the game if his alliance members want to turn on someone.

And turns out that’s exactly what happens here. Lauren wins a reward challenge where she can take 3 other people out for a dinner. She chooses Ben (her #1 ally), Devon (her closest relationship from the Hustlers), and Ashley (due to her strong bond with Devon). The four of them then make a pact between themselves that obviously excludes the remaining 3 of the alliance of 7 (Ryan, JP, Chrissy). They realize that Joe and Mike are now powerless, with Mike having wasted his idol, and now Ben has found said idol after it was rehidden (though he doesn’t tell a soul about it, which is the smartest thing to do). Therefore the two remaining Healers would make good votes to take out one of the 3 new outsiders. Devon however knows that Ryan still has an idol so they would need someone to basically act as a spy to make sure who the two remaining outsiders after the vote were gonna vote for next round, as well as who they would play the idol for should it still be in the game. Ben ends up being the one who has to play the part of the insider spy, which of course he eagerly accepts. I mean let’s face it, if it works he has a gigantic boost to his resume and a really great argument for the million, and if they catch wind of it he just runs back to this new alliance and is still in control (though he’d definitely turn into the target).

With the plan set in motion all that’s left is for them to figure out who to vote for, and who to have the outsiders (+Ben) vote for. They decide that Ben should act like the alliance of 7 is splitting the votes 4-3 between the 2 Healers (Joe and Dr. Mike). Ben convinces Chrissy, Ryan and JP to do this and after Ashley wins immunity, the new secret alliance decides to target JP for his physical strength, in case Ryan did play his idol. Turns out he didn’t so JP goes home here in a magnificent 5-3-1 vote, leaving Chrissy and Ryan completely in the dust. There is honestly so much more to this vote and it is one of my favorite votes in all of survivor, due to all the layers that went into it and the fact that it was purely social gameplay and manipulation of numbers, instead of the usual idol or two.

Anyway, coming back from the vote Ben now obviously has to continue playing his role of the spy, so he temporarily links up with Ryan and Chrissy to “figure out what happened”. The only problem for Ben at this point is that Chrissy manages to win immunity, and due to Ryan still having an idol this means that the outsiders are essentially safe from the vote. The core group of 4 realize that it’s inevitable that one of the two remaining Healers go home. They decide to put their 4 votes on Joe due to him both being a threat who can find idols as well as just being obnoxious around camp. Joe does end up going home in a 4-2-0 vote as Ryan managed to negate the two Healer votes with his idol, while he and Chrissy voted for Ashley. With both sides of the outsiders to the core 4 weakened Ben reveals that he was in on it all along. I’m not sure if I agree with the way he did it though, as he really made himself stand out to everyone, further increasing his threat level with Joe now gone.

And that increase to his threat level really was a detriment it seems as now his own alliance is starting to deem him as both too threatening as well as too much of a loudmouth and a “dictator”, as they put it. Though they do all realize that Ryan’s wasted idol is probably going to be rehidden, so the whole group ends up looking for it. Lauren manages to find it and shares this publicly among the group, though the idol came with a note that she had to find a second part of it at the next immunity challenge. No big deal, she can just snatch that away at some point without the outsiders noticing. What she doesn’t tell others however is that she is giving the second part to Dr. Mike in an attempt to mend that relationship they crafted on their shuffled tribe. Ben already knew about the fact that Lauren has an extra vote, and now with this idol in her hand he deems her as too threatening to move forward with. He starts to sniff out that everyone is going to target him for the vote, and especially after Dr. Mike threw the second part of Lauren’s idol in the fire, making it essentially useless, Ben knows it’s her time to go. He correctly plays the idol he found a few rounds ago on himself and after negating all other 6 votes, Lauren is idoled out of the game in a 0-1 vote. I must say, after making himself too big of a target Ben did manage to stay cool enough to sniff out that he was getting votes, as well as the fact that Lauren was too dangerous to keep around as an ally. Overall I’d say this is one of his greater moves of his game, though it does put him completely on the outs as he is now the common enemy between Ashley/Devon, Chrissy/Ryan and Dr. Mike.

Now Ben knows going into the next round that he either needs to win the immunity challenge, or find a new hidden immunity idol. He fails to do the former as Chrissy once again wins immunity, so he sets all his eyes on scouring the island for an idol, which to his credit he does end up finding. Now normally people in this position might try and bluff the idol play in order to fake out the rest of the tribe, allowing them to then play it at final 5 instead to ensure a spot in the final 4. Not Ben, he wasn’t having any of that. Before they even went to vote he just stands up, walks over to Jeff Probst and hands him the idol, saying he’s playing it then and there. Now, I wasn’t aware this was within the rules, and neither was the rest of the community, as idols come with a list of rules that clearly state it’s to be played after the vote takes place, but Jeff accepts it anyway and tells Ben that if he does this he can then not change his mind later after seeing he has no votes. I’m not sure if this is because Jeff was caught off guard here and had no clue what he was supposed to do, or if this was an unspoken exception to the rule, I have no clue. All I know is that it seemed pretty suspicious from the POV of a viewer, though that’s irrelevant here as we’re discussing what happened on the island. Obviously no one is going to vote for Ben when he has already played an idol, so they end up voting Ashley out in a unanimous 5-1 vote due to her being a physical threat. Good for Ben, he managed to save himself yet again here.

Now this next round is when it starts getting increasingly more controversial. Ben yet again knows he’s completely on the outs and needs immunity again in some form, shape or matter. He yet again loses out to Chrissy in the immunity challenge and knows he needs an idol. Now Chrissy had actually received an immunity idol from Ryan all the way back in episode 1, that could only be used during that tribal council, so it was powerless. However, it looked like any other immunity idol, so she went up to Ben and showed him it, telling him she found the new rehidden idol in an effort to get him to stop looking. Now I get why she did this as Ben was clearly good at finding idols, but she should have also realized that there really is nothing stopping Ben from looking for it anyway, as it won’t make a difference in the long run if she does indeed have the real one. So while the other 4 people just hang around camp, Ben is off looking for this idol that may or may not be there. And, contrary to the last round, he just can’t find it. It’s already turned nighttime and he is still looking for it. And right when he’s giving an interview telling us that Chrissy was “probably telling the truth”, and “that he was done for”, he just so happened to look at his feet and notice the giant “DIG HERE” sign written right in front of him. Now don’t get me wrong, there’s been idols hidden like that in the past, but this one was hidden right at the spot where Ben has been doing his interviews since the merge happened. This, in my opinion, is a clear example of production interference. They flat out gave this idol to Ben in all ways except the literal one. But I digress, we’ll get to that later. Anyway, Ben rightfully realizes that Devon has been playing a killer game and has yet to receive any votes, so he sets his eyes on him. Now you’d think this would be a repeat of two rounds ago, with Devon going 0-1, but Devon being the fantastic player that he is sniffs Ben out completely and decides to throw his vote on Dr. Mike, knowing that Ben was still getting ⅗ votes, and essentially guaranteeing himself safety should Ben play an idol.

Which is exactly what happened. Ben plays his third idol and smugly watches as he thinks he’s about to eliminate Devon, and after the Dr. Mike vote is revealed he tells Devon “Your fate is in those two’s hands now” (referring to Ryan and Chrissy). However it’s here where Devon smugly looks over and delivers the most savage line of the season, and the line that should’ve made him win the game, namely “I know.” Devon knows that Ryan and Chrissy, who he was on good terms with, would keep him due to his superior physical strength over Dr. Mike, who had been on the outs the whole time. After an initial 0-1-1 vote, they revote and Dr. Mike gets eliminated in a 2-1 vote. Some might say Ben once again saved himself, which I guess he did, but this is the first time where Ben doesn’t get his way at tribal. Devon is still in the game, with a real strong case as well. So all in all not a great look for Ben and his “Ben Bombs” (idols).

And that’s when we get to the final 4. This is it, one step away from a potential million dollars. No idols to hide behind, just one immunity challenge. And it’s a hard one, having to balance tons of letter blocks while also balancing the beam they’re placed on while also having to avoid tripping. Ben is the first to complete his set of blocks, and just as he thinks he’s won the game, Jeff tells him he placed one upside down and he has to turn it around. And as he tries to do this he loses balance and all his blocks drop, which gives Chrissy the window she needed to pull off her 4th immunity win. Now naturally Ben is devastated, having just lost the game right before the finish line.

But that’s when Jeff drops the news that changed Survivor from what it once was, and the news that unleashed fury among the viewers. Turns out, starting from this season, they have removed the vote at final 4 and replaced it with a mandatory firemaking challenge between 2 people. The immunity winner, in this case Chrissy, gets to decide who participates in the showdown. Here’s the kicker - Ben was a marine. The guy knows how to make fire. The guy has done it numerous times. This is the second straight example of production interference, in my opinion. Chrissy knows Ryan can’t beat Ben at making fire, so she has to throw Devon out to the lions and is forced to watch as at tribal council Ben just got a free spot in the final 3 over Devon, resulting in Devon becoming the final member of the jury.

Now after this Ben, Ryan and Chrissy face the jury and even after what should be a great resume, Ben still struggles to convey to the jury how to plead his case for the million. In fact, if Joe hadn’t been such a huge Ben supporter I think it’s possible he still loses the game. But that’s another what if, and Ben does eventually get it together and wins the game in a 5-2-1 vote over Chrissy and Ryan.


So, that concludes my analysis of Ben’s game. Ben is a great player, and started the game really well. He might have dodged a bullet after the shuffle but we don’t know that for sure. It’s just that while he was a great player, he shouldn’t have been anywhere close to that final tibal council. From the suspicious idol find to the sudden change of rules when in any other season he would’ve gone home, I just can’t write his win off as anything but luck. And this is why I have him so low. He just shouldn’t have won. But hey, at least he made it 39 days right?



Anyway that’s all she wrote for Ben. Next winner I’ll be talking about is someone who clearly loves the dance floor. Find out who #36 is in my next post.
WARNING - This series of rankings will contain heavy spoilers for the TV show Survivor. Don’t read if you don’t want to get spoiled.

Hey there. For those who don’t know I’m a huge fan of the CBS Reality TV show Survivor and I devote a lot of my time in watching and analyzing the show and its players. In this little series I’ll be sharing my Survivor winners rankings in which I analyze and rank the 38 winners we’ve had and the games they played. I will try to be critical of their gameplay and refrain from letting bias interfere, though I can’t promise to be 100% unbiased towards some of these winners. I’m starting from the bottom and we’ll go up my ranking from there.

Today I’ll be covering the winner I have ranked #37 out of 38.
Check the thread description to see what season they were on.

Previous winners - #38

With that said let’s get started.


#37 / 38 - Ben Driebergen (S35 - Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers)



Oh boy. This might be controversial but I don’t care. Up until this most recent season I had Ben at the worst winner spot, and now he’s moved up a spot. Ben 100% won the game due to luck, and nothing else. You could argue he’s a good player, and I don’t necessarily disagree with that, but a good player doesn’t equal a good winner. I just have him ahead of Chris because, well, Ben never got voted out. Which single handedly puts him here.

But, let’s rewind it back to day 1 of Survivor: Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers (btw hands down the worst season title we’ve ever had). Ben finds himself on the Heroes tribe, consisting of 6 members (Ben, Alan, JP, Chrissy, Katrina, Ashley). After seeing JP and Ashley sort of pair up, as well as grouping older women Chrissy and Katrina somewhat together, Ben decides to link up with Alan. I think this was a good idea on Ben’s part as Alan seemed like a level headed, nice guy who was down to go deep with Ben.

Only, Alan didn’t exactly turn out to be as level headed as he initially seemed. He got super paranoid over the Ashley/JP duo and at one point even forced JP to strip down to make sure he didn’t have an immunity idol. Keep in mind this is like day 1 or 2. Ben rightfully concludes that Alan is too unpredictable and he’s now looking at Chrissy as a long term partner. After the Heroes lose the first immunity challenge all eyes are on Alan, but because he is really physically fit they decide to vote out Katrina, the older woman on the outs, in a 5-1 vote.

After a shaky start, the Heroes actually manage to pull through and win the next two immunity challenges, though at camp tension rises between Ashley and Alan. Ben is in a great position here as Chrissy is his #1 ally and Alan will choose to vote with them over Ashley and JP. In episode 4, with 15 people left, the tribes get reshuffled and Ben now finds himself on a new tribe of 5 along with 3 former Healers (Jessica, Cole, Dr. Mike) and 1 lone Hustler (Lauren). Just numerically speaking Ben is at a disadvantage here, with the Healers seemingly having full control over the small tribe of 5. He does manage to bond a lot with Lauren, and the two even form a small connection with Dr. Mike, who was on the outs at the original Healers tribe.

Now their tribe does end up winning the next 3 remaining tribal immunity challenges so we’ll never know for certain if Ben would’ve gone home had they gone to a tribal council. It’s possible the 3 Healers just vote out Ben & Lauren, it’s possible the two outsiders can pull in Dr. Mike to target either Cole or Jessica. For the sake of keeping this as an analysis instead of asking a bunch of what ifs, we’ll just say Ben could have pulled something to stay in the game but he didn’t need to as they won everything.

After winning out the remainder of the challenges Ben has now made it to the merge, where he is able to immediately link back up with Chrissy, and together with Lauren they pull in Ryan, Devon, Ashley and JP to form a 7 person Heroes/Hustlers alliance against the 5 remaining Healers. Ben is in a great position here, and after Desi (a Healer) wins immunity, they all agree to vote out Jessica in a 7-5 vote (with Chrissy being on the receiving end of those 5 Healer votes).

After some hidden immunity idol shenanigans, Cole is in hot water after he lost his closest ally Jessica, as well as blowing up his game around camp by openly sprinting in hopes of finding the idol that Ryan already found. Chrissy especially wants him gone bad, but after Cole clutches out an immunity win the alliance of 7 decides to split the vote between Desi, who was physically fit, and Joe (Healer) who had already played 2 idols at that point, out of fear of another Joe idol being in play. It ends up being a 4-4-1-1 vote, with Lauren trading her vote for an extra vote later on, Desi voting for Lauren and Joe voting for Ben, giving Ben his first vote. At the revote Desi gets voted out 7-1, with only Dr. Mike voting for Joe. I personally find voting out Desi a questionable decision as the whole reason they went through the trouble of splitting the vote was to ensure Joe didn’t play an idol. Why not get rid of him at the revote when he is unable to play an immunity idol on himself?

Nonetheless, after Lauren wins the next immunity it’s pretty much game over for Cole. Dr. Mike tries a last ditch effort to trick the majority alliance into voting for him, followed by him playing an immunity idol for himself, but it was not enough to save Cole as he gets voted out 7-0-1 after Dr. Mike only managed to steer 2 votes his way. Cole did vote for Ben here giving Ben his second straight vote and clearly making him the minority’s target, due to him being seen as the ringleader of that alliance of 7. You’d think that’s a compliment but Ben is already starting to stand out as the leader of the pack, which at the same time makes him a huge target in the game if his alliance members want to turn on someone.

And turns out that’s exactly what happens here. Lauren wins a reward challenge where she can take 3 other people out for a dinner. She chooses Ben (her #1 ally), Devon (her closest relationship from the Hustlers), and Ashley (due to her strong bond with Devon). The four of them then make a pact between themselves that obviously excludes the remaining 3 of the alliance of 7 (Ryan, JP, Chrissy). They realize that Joe and Mike are now powerless, with Mike having wasted his idol, and now Ben has found said idol after it was rehidden (though he doesn’t tell a soul about it, which is the smartest thing to do). Therefore the two remaining Healers would make good votes to take out one of the 3 new outsiders. Devon however knows that Ryan still has an idol so they would need someone to basically act as a spy to make sure who the two remaining outsiders after the vote were gonna vote for next round, as well as who they would play the idol for should it still be in the game. Ben ends up being the one who has to play the part of the insider spy, which of course he eagerly accepts. I mean let’s face it, if it works he has a gigantic boost to his resume and a really great argument for the million, and if they catch wind of it he just runs back to this new alliance and is still in control (though he’d definitely turn into the target).

With the plan set in motion all that’s left is for them to figure out who to vote for, and who to have the outsiders (+Ben) vote for. They decide that Ben should act like the alliance of 7 is splitting the votes 4-3 between the 2 Healers (Joe and Dr. Mike). Ben convinces Chrissy, Ryan and JP to do this and after Ashley wins immunity, the new secret alliance decides to target JP for his physical strength, in case Ryan did play his idol. Turns out he didn’t so JP goes home here in a magnificent 5-3-1 vote, leaving Chrissy and Ryan completely in the dust. There is honestly so much more to this vote and it is one of my favorite votes in all of survivor, due to all the layers that went into it and the fact that it was purely social gameplay and manipulation of numbers, instead of the usual idol or two.

Anyway, coming back from the vote Ben now obviously has to continue playing his role of the spy, so he temporarily links up with Ryan and Chrissy to “figure out what happened”. The only problem for Ben at this point is that Chrissy manages to win immunity, and due to Ryan still having an idol this means that the outsiders are essentially safe from the vote. The core group of 4 realize that it’s inevitable that one of the two remaining Healers go home. They decide to put their 4 votes on Joe due to him both being a threat who can find idols as well as just being obnoxious around camp. Joe does end up going home in a 4-2-0 vote as Ryan managed to negate the two Healer votes with his idol, while he and Chrissy voted for Ashley. With both sides of the outsiders to the core 4 weakened Ben reveals that he was in on it all along. I’m not sure if I agree with the way he did it though, as he really made himself stand out to everyone, further increasing his threat level with Joe now gone.

And that increase to his threat level really was a detriment it seems as now his own alliance is starting to deem him as both too threatening as well as too much of a loudmouth and a “dictator”, as they put it. Though they do all realize that Ryan’s wasted idol is probably going to be rehidden, so the whole group ends up looking for it. Lauren manages to find it and shares this publicly among the group, though the idol came with a note that she had to find a second part of it at the next immunity challenge. No big deal, she can just snatch that away at some point without the outsiders noticing. What she doesn’t tell others however is that she is giving the second part to Dr. Mike in an attempt to mend that relationship they crafted on their shuffled tribe. Ben already knew about the fact that Lauren has an extra vote, and now with this idol in her hand he deems her as too threatening to move forward with. He starts to sniff out that everyone is going to target him for the vote, and especially after Dr. Mike threw the second part of Lauren’s idol in the fire, making it essentially useless, Ben knows it’s her time to go. He correctly plays the idol he found a few rounds ago on himself and after negating all other 6 votes, Lauren is idoled out of the game in a 0-1 vote. I must say, after making himself too big of a target Ben did manage to stay cool enough to sniff out that he was getting votes, as well as the fact that Lauren was too dangerous to keep around as an ally. Overall I’d say this is one of his greater moves of his game, though it does put him completely on the outs as he is now the common enemy between Ashley/Devon, Chrissy/Ryan and Dr. Mike.

Now Ben knows going into the next round that he either needs to win the immunity challenge, or find a new hidden immunity idol. He fails to do the former as Chrissy once again wins immunity, so he sets all his eyes on scouring the island for an idol, which to his credit he does end up finding. Now normally people in this position might try and bluff the idol play in order to fake out the rest of the tribe, allowing them to then play it at final 5 instead to ensure a spot in the final 4. Not Ben, he wasn’t having any of that. Before they even went to vote he just stands up, walks over to Jeff Probst and hands him the idol, saying he’s playing it then and there. Now, I wasn’t aware this was within the rules, and neither was the rest of the community, as idols come with a list of rules that clearly state it’s to be played after the vote takes place, but Jeff accepts it anyway and tells Ben that if he does this he can then not change his mind later after seeing he has no votes. I’m not sure if this is because Jeff was caught off guard here and had no clue what he was supposed to do, or if this was an unspoken exception to the rule, I have no clue. All I know is that it seemed pretty suspicious from the POV of a viewer, though that’s irrelevant here as we’re discussing what happened on the island. Obviously no one is going to vote for Ben when he has already played an idol, so they end up voting Ashley out in a unanimous 5-1 vote due to her being a physical threat. Good for Ben, he managed to save himself yet again here.

Now this next round is when it starts getting increasingly more controversial. Ben yet again knows he’s completely on the outs and needs immunity again in some form, shape or matter. He yet again loses out to Chrissy in the immunity challenge and knows he needs an idol. Now Chrissy had actually received an immunity idol from Ryan all the way back in episode 1, that could only be used during that tribal council, so it was powerless. However, it looked like any other immunity idol, so she went up to Ben and showed him it, telling him she found the new rehidden idol in an effort to get him to stop looking. Now I get why she did this as Ben was clearly good at finding idols, but she should have also realized that there really is nothing stopping Ben from looking for it anyway, as it won’t make a difference in the long run if she does indeed have the real one. So while the other 4 people just hang around camp, Ben is off looking for this idol that may or may not be there. And, contrary to the last round, he just can’t find it. It’s already turned nighttime and he is still looking for it. And right when he’s giving an interview telling us that Chrissy was “probably telling the truth”, and “that he was done for”, he just so happened to look at his feet and notice the giant “DIG HERE” sign written right in front of him. Now don’t get me wrong, there’s been idols hidden like that in the past, but this one was hidden right at the spot where Ben has been doing his interviews since the merge happened. This, in my opinion, is a clear example of production interference. They flat out gave this idol to Ben in all ways except the literal one. But I digress, we’ll get to that later. Anyway, Ben rightfully realizes that Devon has been playing a killer game and has yet to receive any votes, so he sets his eyes on him. Now you’d think this would be a repeat of two rounds ago, with Devon going 0-1, but Devon being the fantastic player that he is sniffs Ben out completely and decides to throw his vote on Dr. Mike, knowing that Ben was still getting ⅗ votes, and essentially guaranteeing himself safety should Ben play an idol.

Which is exactly what happened. Ben plays his third idol and smugly watches as he thinks he’s about to eliminate Devon, and after the Dr. Mike vote is revealed he tells Devon “Your fate is in those two’s hands now” (referring to Ryan and Chrissy). However it’s here where Devon smugly looks over and delivers the most savage line of the season, and the line that should’ve made him win the game, namely “I know.” Devon knows that Ryan and Chrissy, who he was on good terms with, would keep him due to his superior physical strength over Dr. Mike, who had been on the outs the whole time. After an initial 0-1-1 vote, they revote and Dr. Mike gets eliminated in a 2-1 vote. Some might say Ben once again saved himself, which I guess he did, but this is the first time where Ben doesn’t get his way at tribal. Devon is still in the game, with a real strong case as well. So all in all not a great look for Ben and his “Ben Bombs” (idols).

And that’s when we get to the final 4. This is it, one step away from a potential million dollars. No idols to hide behind, just one immunity challenge. And it’s a hard one, having to balance tons of letter blocks while also balancing the beam they’re placed on while also having to avoid tripping. Ben is the first to complete his set of blocks, and just as he thinks he’s won the game, Jeff tells him he placed one upside down and he has to turn it around. And as he tries to do this he loses balance and all his blocks drop, which gives Chrissy the window she needed to pull off her 4th immunity win. Now naturally Ben is devastated, having just lost the game right before the finish line.

But that’s when Jeff drops the news that changed Survivor from what it once was, and the news that unleashed fury among the viewers. Turns out, starting from this season, they have removed the vote at final 4 and replaced it with a mandatory firemaking challenge between 2 people. The immunity winner, in this case Chrissy, gets to decide who participates in the showdown. Here’s the kicker - Ben was a marine. The guy knows how to make fire. The guy has done it numerous times. This is the second straight example of production interference, in my opinion. Chrissy knows Ryan can’t beat Ben at making fire, so she has to throw Devon out to the lions and is forced to watch as at tribal council Ben just got a free spot in the final 3 over Devon, resulting in Devon becoming the final member of the jury.

Now after this Ben, Ryan and Chrissy face the jury and even after what should be a great resume, Ben still struggles to convey to the jury how to plead his case for the million. In fact, if Joe hadn’t been such a huge Ben supporter I think it’s possible he still loses the game. But that’s another what if, and Ben does eventually get it together and wins the game in a 5-2-1 vote over Chrissy and Ryan.


So, that concludes my analysis of Ben’s game. Ben is a great player, and started the game really well. He might have dodged a bullet after the shuffle but we don’t know that for sure. It’s just that while he was a great player, he shouldn’t have been anywhere close to that final tibal council. From the suspicious idol find to the sudden change of rules when in any other season he would’ve gone home, I just can’t write his win off as anything but luck. And this is why I have him so low. He just shouldn’t have won. But hey, at least he made it 39 days right?



Anyway that’s all she wrote for Ben. Next winner I’ll be talking about is someone who clearly loves the dance floor. Find out who #36 is in my next post.
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