RHAP: We Know Survivor - Christian Hubicki Recaps Survivor 49 Ep 8

Episode Date: November 14, 2025

Rob Cesternino welcomes Dr. Christian Hubicki to dive into the strategic depths of Survivor 49 episode 8.

Coming to you live from my apartment. It's Rob has a podcast. And now here's the guy who, too, is not The Terminator. I'm Rob Sister Nino. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Rob is a podcast. And what a treat we have here today because one of my great friends and friends of the podcast, friends to all the listeners, is here.

back with us for such a great tradition. We're so honored to have back here with us the great Dr. Christian Hubicki. Christian, how are you? Fantastic, Rob. It's great to be back for another season. I love this tradition. It's my time to vent about Survivor

and just get all the thoughts out there with someone who I can relate to. So thank you for that. And so excited to get into it, of course. I want to thank. We have a sponsor here today. Not that anybody would fall asleep during this podcast, but when it's time to sleep, check out Manta's sleep, all sorts of great

products to help you do so. Get 10% off at MantaSleep.com with promo code RHAP 49. I was telling Christian before we came on, he looks great. He's glowing. You look, you look tan. Are you out in the Florida sun? It's just the filter on OBS, Rob. Is it the filter? Yeah, I say it is. I put the Florida man filter on. You look like a, young Mark Hamill in his prime. Oh, that, that's good. That's good. Free car accident from, I was just going to say from the, or being hit,

just before being hit in the face by, by the, by the, by the, by the, by the, by the, by the, by the wampa or whatever it is, an empire that strikes back. So I look forward to my impending disfigurement. Thank you. Yes. Okay. You have a blazer on. You're all ready to go. Oh, thank you.

You know, this, this, of course, is, you know, the history of this little blazer. You know, I've been wearing this ever since the finale of, of, of, of, of, you know, of Survivor David versus Deliath. I bought it at a at a Brooks Brothers the night before because I was going to be at the live finale and they're like, the jacket you're going to wear is going to moray on camera buy something else. So we're at like the night before the finale, Emily and I went to the Brooks Brothers to buy something. And I was like, and I paid enough for it that I said, you know what? I'll just wear it every day. So here I am. Okay. So Christian, very excited to get the chance to talk to you. How are things? Fantastic, Rob. I am on.

leave this semester, which is lovely. So it's getting some personal time. I figured I could use it after what was a crazy summer for reasons that nobody knows about. Tell me about it. And yeah, I know, I know. This is another person I can relate to here. And so I've been putting out actually some material, some educational material for YouTube. And that's been kind of fun. So what are you posting? So I record some of my talks I'll give in public on robinics. And just this past week, I put out a video on the first ever home humanoid that's for sale. Oh, the Neo. So did you talk with Tyson about the Neo?

Yes, we did. Yes. Were you not a fan or I got to go watch the YouTube video? Well, yeah. I think it's just, it's not a product that would recommend anyone buying for a variety of reasons. But the twist on this robot is like, because as a roboticist, I'm like, I'm pretty aware of the state of the art of how good the controls are for these robots to do things in your home. and they're okay, but they're not very liable.

If you don't know what we're talking about, so that there is, what is the company that has put this out? One X technology has a $20,000 humanoid robot that they say can do a bunch of chores in your house. So basically, you go to work and then this thing will be spending the day at your house cleaning. Correct. That's the gist of it.

And if you want the gist of it, the way that they get it to be hopefully helpful to maybe probably not we'll see is that they have people teleoperate it from palo alto you know that they actually have a person puppeteer it from there if you want to hear more about it you can just check out my youtube youtube video just look google my name and robot or something you'll probably find it okay all right so christian appreciate you being here for some talk about survivor 49 and i thought we had a really fun episode to talk about even though uh some like bonker scenarios unfolding but exciting to talk about looking forward. Lots of entropy, as you might say.

Yeah, there's a lot of, you know, uncertainty, a lot of things that could have happened. I'll tell you, the thing I liked about this episode is I felt I started to feel the stakes of some of the prior votes really congealing into something interesting, like literally stuff that happened last episode, plays directly into the outcome of this episode.

So that is what wraps you in terms of his story. Yes, and this has been as advertised, by Jeff that this season was going to be a slow burn, even though it was a hot burn in terms of the weather in the first half. Now, the weather has seemingly subsided enough that we're getting some very exciting stuff going on. So looking forward to breaking it all down. What's been your take on this season thus far prior to last night?

I mean, prior to last night, I think I was pretty much in the same page as Jeff. Like, and as a survivor viewer for as long as I've been a survivor fan, which is been season one. The pre-merge is table-setting. Interesting things can happen, and during the pre-merge, and that's a bonus, right? But the whole point is to set up something interesting so I can love the merge. There are seasons that I think other people love less because they don't like the pre-merge, and I'm totally fine with. But for me, I'm starting to see what Jeff is talking about, that like, okay, the stakes are coming into play. The actions are starting to make sense based upon this character history.

So I am enjoying it now. I think I was sort of like waiting and seeing for weeks before that. Okay. All right. So here we are. Last night, we ended up having MC go home. I had an exit interview with MC. And we heard from MC.

I don't know. Have you read any of MC's exit press? I have not. I just got out of my, I'm the worst at being on work leave. I somehow have tons of work. meetings in spite of that so i have not seen yes mc's interview um all right well that we got into okay why did mc tell joan about uh that she was going or that he was going to potentially go home uh and mc ended up uh telling us that the reason why was because that she really uh had

it really resonated with her in season 42 when the black players were all getting voted out right before right at the start of the merge and she didn't want to see that happen in this season and that was why she really stuck her neck out for Joanne who in fairness to Joanne gets to play the game however

he wants to play the game ultimately did his own thing wow okay I didn't know that context I mean to me I was watching that as presented it made it still made sense as to what she was thinking even if it didn't work out so you were going to say something no and I you know don't mean to

throw you into a potential like here's unpack this seven minutes into a podcast but yeah that was what MC ended up telling me about her decision oh wow so so it's sort of like what that just objectively that just is just sort of an extra motivation as to why but even in the context of the show i i was fully prepared to just analyze that as just as presented which was she wanted to make things right with joan she wanted to move forward with Joanne. She wants to make sure she has these options. And this was the best way to do that because when you are confronted in a situation on Survivor where you are told a secret that you could really burn someone with, right? You have the choice. Do you sit on that

in order to gain trust with them or do you burn them in order to get trust with somebody else, which is tricky because then you can technically burn trust with both because then you look like you are not, you're not loyal to either. But it's certainly a potentially, we've seen it many times on Survivor, someone says, hey, I'm trusting you. I want to throw a vote on. I want to go after this person. And then you have to make an assessment as to whether or not that, who do you want to move forward with for the long term? And if you go to the person that's being targeted and tell them that, a lot of times people do respond well. Like, oh my goodness, this person was looking out for me. But this time, it horribly backfired because John On had other plans. So I'd love to maybe back up

a little bit and go back to the inciting incident with this rift in the trust between Jo-Wan and MC, and the idea of that Joanne and maybe Sage feeling some type of way that MC played the idol at Tribal Council without clearing it with them or at least not feeling good enough about this seven-person alliance coming together where that she played her idol now famously in david versus goliath you were part of a group that felt so good about each other at least at that particular point in time you were all sharing who has what advantages so that you can outmaneuver the goliaths here we have this group comes together of seven mc is feeling like i heard my name today i'm going to play my idol is joan right to question mc about like why did you play your idol

if you were, you know, I said I was good. Why would you play your idol? I think it's a perfectly great thing to ask internally, right? It's like you're always to be looking for data as to whether or not people actually feel like they trust you or not, right? But at the same time, like, Rob, I've been listening to your podcast for quite some time. And like the advice that I would remember from you is that if you have an idol and you get an inkling, it could be you.

Play the dang thing, right? that like that this is not unless you're ris god unless you're ris god you know you're going to you're going to hoddle that idol you're going to diamond hand zander that thing at least through one tribal council you know it's a but but yeah but here there was actual blowback to just playing it beyond just losing it that that that's that was a new wrinkle that's i'm trying to think of a time where the mere act of playing an idol in a prior season was an indication of distrust that was used against them in a future in a future episode i don't remember that ever happening this might be new yeah and it certainly started this conversation where uh joan was asking mc like why well

why would you do that if if we were feeling so good now we knew that this idol had been outed because savannah had saw about it we also knew that soph knew you like soph by the way i'm not sure Sof likes Sof. So, uh, so, so, so I, that's it. It's canon. They change the credits to sof. The credits say sof now. I believe the credits say sof.

Sure. Let me see. Branded doll. Can you confirm the credits say self now? Unless I was seeing like a Photoshop on, uh, X.com earlier today, but I believe that I saw sof in the title sequence. That's news to me. I mean, like that it reminds me of something that I'm sure every listener remembers, which

was cycle something of. America's next top model where there are two women with the same name. So Tyra's like, one of years got to change. Like they accidentally wore the same outfit. And they picked like a ridiculously different name that is nothing even close, like McKee. And here we just went with Sof, which is, I don't know about the mouth feel on that. I mean, no disrespect to Sof as a nickname in general. Okay.

So we also know that Sof has knowledge as power. And so there's like a ticking clock on this idol from MC. So my initial reaction when MC played the idol last week, like, oh, good. This is just get rid of it because you've got that self is going to steal it. Yeah, I mean, there's all kinds of motivations you can think about you by playing the idol. But, I mean, my first instinct is like someone else had an idol. Now they don't longer have that idol. They are now vulnerable and that idol is back in play.

Unless that person was really your close ally and you were counting on just knowing where it is, which is sort of like the Boston Robb, the BR rule of idols. And you remember he would say things like he would say things like the, the real advantage of having an idol is just knowing where it is. And that's a little bit oversimplified. So maybe from Jawan standpoint, you got annoyed for that. But like, this was on the far end of the spectrum of negative reactions to an idle play. I just hadn't seen that from.

And I think there is value to saying, everyone knows I have this idol. And it's making me a target. I'm going to get rid of it. But clearly, that did not work out. And like, and you got R-I-Z-G-O-D over here. um with an idol sits on it and gets through with an idol for another round yeah so i mean sam has tracked this down okay this is sof in the credits it's i'm assuming this is the other one yellow sophie make the other one yellow sophie

i feel like yellow sophie like the let the cast figure this out they're the ones who have to call them by their names every day they'll figure out a way to differentiate between the two. But that's so funny. You know in a production room somewhere, they're like, we can't have two sofies. And we were hoping, maybe like, we were hoping that one of got voted out pre-merged so we wouldn't have to deal with this. But here they are. We're still dealing with it. Yeah. Still dealing with it. Yellow Sophie is fine. I mean, and ironically, you know, I guess true to history, the, just Sophie, the, just Sophie, the Sophie with a color as a name was getting very little at it. So we could have added a new color

to the purple lexicon. Yes. We could have it. No, now it's so. Oh, she's getting the yellow at it. And on that subject, at least we are seeing more of Sophie, yellow Sophie, and getting more of her motivation in this episode. But I'm sure that's more in terms of everything that's happening in terms of this vote of five. So however we move from here, Rob, is good by me.

Okay. So if you're not on chat BCC, really one of the highlights on chat BCC, is hearing what Dr. Hubicki has to say every week during the episode, whether he's excited about something, ranting about Big Brother. It's pretty much my two modes. I confess, I do, I don't drink alcohol very often, but when I do, I go on chap E.C. Sometimes, yes, he is talking about how many fingers of whiskey he might be having. look my son is down for bed uh we're relaxing the episodes on i was like i'll i'll i'll make

an old-fashioned get out the smoker get out the butane torch have a smoke that old-fashioned or something but it's it's it's it's it's fun to kind of just absorb the episode as it comes you're not getting always deep strategy discussion that's what this podcast is for that's what this is for okay so this christian what was on your mind in terms of as you watched the episode because I'm sure you must have had many thoughts. What do you want to get into today? Yes. I mean, well, first let's talk about the twist that I put these people in a group of five,

then six, at this tribal council, right? These are always hot button issues, the choice of twists in these seasons. And I feel like every year, like I feel like I have a confident take or the community has a confident take and we're like, oh, we should never do this or we should do that. Then there will be some exception to the rule. And like, I feel like there's a lot of criticism. the idea of taking this big merge tribe. I love a big merge.

I love seeing the big votes go down. And you just split them up again, small vote. But I feel like this episode, they got one of the better possible outcomes out of splitting the tribes up into five or six. Not that that would happen like that every time, but this time it worked out great and having to break down. Yeah, we hate to be results oriented because something exciting did happen out of this. I think that most people would say do not do this.

This was fine. We just had it a very exciting vote. Even though Savannah and Rizzo were on the bottom, there was an idol there. I think it would have still been exciting in terms of the group trying to come together and figure out a vote split. Knowledge is power is in there. There's a lot of ways that this could have unfolded in an interesting way if you left it as 10. But the way that this unfolded was actually very interesting. So I'm not going to say that like I'm sure the producers are a little bit like,

oh, I guess we don't know what we're doing, do we ever podcast? guys you know but this was this was very very fun i just think you that do this sometimes you don't have to do this every single season because then we can plan for it i mean that going back to i think that we've done this every single see i don't think they did it in 40 uh they did it in 39 and then every single season in the new era so um we have done it either 12 or 11 or 10 every single season in the new era. So you don't have to do this. And I thought that we had this great opportunity where we did something different in the pre-merge, where we went into three tribes of four, and we had a regular merge, no merger, like, okay, here we go. But ultimately, we did this.

And I do feel like that it did turn out exciting. And I love the episode, but you don't have to do it every time. Yeah. And I will give them plaudits for finally reverting back to a proper merge. And I think that that as much as when 41, 42 came out, I was like, I was willing to experiment with new ideas. I think that's fine. I'm fine when Survivor does some experimentation, but they kept with this thing for so many seasons through 40. I'm not sure technically how they handled 48.

I feel like they, they soften the mergerary somehow. I forget exactly how. You know, I think that they really came out strong in 41 and 42. And then, and then like they made like minor concessions every single time. It's like, it's still mergatory. It's still mergatory. but, you know, only one person is going to be immune and is going to be merge fees. Like, it was like, but don't get a twisted.

This is still mergatory. And at least, yeah. Yeah, exactly. And I think that, I mean, and part of the thing I had such an annoying, a little annoyance with was just, I don't even know what to call it. I mean, we as people on the online fandom call it mergatory because that's what we decided to call it. You know, and I think that, like maybe Tiffany from season 41 and others called it emergatory at one point.

But that's not the canonical name. Zander did. I forget exactly, but that's not the canonical name. And so, and it's hard to explain to people who are new viewers, which is always one of my things on Survivor.

It should always be friendly enough to new people coming in that they can really pick it up. But I'm glad that they went with a proper merge. That's great. I also, we ever so briefly got two tribes. And I hate to be one of those people.

It's just like, just like you're saying, it's like, look, three tribes can be great. Just mix it up. It can be great. Just mix it up. And unfortunately, in the two tribes, that was also a little snoozy, the two tribes. So for all of us, two tribe defenders, we did not, we were not able to really spike the football on two tribes during this season. No, I mean, the scientists would be like, we need more data.

We need more data lab. We got only the Matt and Jason vote on the two tribes. So unfortunately, being results oriented there, we were not looking so good. No. No. Credit or lack of credit where it's not due in this case. But they are experimenting a little bit with the format. I think some of these twist ideas are pretty neat. I think that it's just, but I do. One thing I think you're absolutely right about is that like just don't make it the exact same every time because again, they can they can plan. And that really saps some of the spontaneity. And it's always it's always such a. fight Rob over like what is a good amount of uncertainty and what's a not a good amount of uncertainty in a show like this like I have a lot of people were like back in the early 40s when people are like oh all of a sudden there's do or die where you can play the Monty Hall problem to instantly lose survivor that's too much uncertainty how many fingers

of whiskey did you have that night preach at BCCC pre-chat DBC well I clearly not so many that I couldn't hop on a podcast with you immediately after with the whiteboard. So I had to be functioning on at least a couple of cylinders in order to do that. But I'll say, but like that was, that was a wild time. What, Monty Hall is happening? Doers or die for you? That's a good reference. Oh, my goodness.

And that's, and when I think that, so, so like, that's like too much where like it's too much of like a change in the format. Like there's an instant go home. That's too much uncertainty. That means literally anything can happen. But if everything is exactly the same, there's too much planning. So what's the right amount of twistiness such that people can't overplan the season? But at the same time, it's not, but also it's not so chaotic.

It's just Calvin Ball. It's just who the heck knows. It's roulette as who wins the season. And I think that changing up whether or not you split down to five so that way the players have to plan for the possibility you can go down to five, but not the certainty of it makes sense. Yeah. And I think that, and Survivor's done this very well over its history. Is there going to be a swap or is there not going to be a swap? There were periods where they were and were not swaps and there was enough uncertainty there.

But then when people started to lean in too hard, like in back in my day, as an old schooler, I forgot my cane, Rob, from the other one, the, like, we would swap all the time. As an old fashioned. As an old fashioned myself, the, like we, like back in season 37, as much as I talked to the people on the tribes, like, you know, we don't know if we're going to, if we're going to swap or not. We knew we're going to swap. We're absolutely going to swap every single freaking time we were swapping. So like we were planning for a swap.

Like, okay, we just had this vote. We get the distinct vibe we're going to swap. And so, and we were right. And so that was too much. They should just have a few where they didn't. So again, so just a little bit of mixing and it'll all be fine. And I'm not exactly sure why it's so exactly consistent. I don't get that.

Okay. Let me give you a hot take, never before. We need a stinger for a R-HAP exclusive. Nate had to die so that the season could live. The season has a lot to go, a lot going for right now. Yes. I don't know if that require Nate's death, but I want to hear why you think so. Here's why.

And with no disrespect to Nate, and I hope this doesn't come across as an anti-Nate take, but I'm sure that some might think that it is. Nate was too stabilizing of a force he was the adult in the room keeping the Riz gods and Jowans and savannas and shannans and stages

like okay listen we're doing the boring vote tonight we're voting out Matt he's from the other tribe that's the boring vote okay we're doing we're voting out Jason that is the like okay we have more numbers than them we're voting them out okay and now he's not there and so it's a little bit now like a free for all like ris god is like hey i'm gonna play a i'm ready to play a fluid game i'm playing loose

i'm ready to go you know uh joan is going to go back and forth that you know i think that he was such a like galvanizing force on one side that he kept things like very Not chaotic. And I think that in his line of work, I think that chaos is Nate's enemy. I think that when you do what Nate does, I think you want as little chaos as possible. And I think that he was probably bringing that stabilizing force to at least as much as he could control of the season and certainly his tribe. That is a, I'd co-sign that point. I mean, I think that that's just how he, that how he operates.

And that might be a really good way to win Survivor had he not gone out. You keep your alliance in line from doing anything too crazy, but you definitely get the sense that that Rizzo is bursting at the seams to do more things. And now that he's been pushed onto the outs and his backs against the wall, but also I think that that's freeing to him, it seems, to like really go out and play the way that Rizzo, it feels like this is how he always wanted to play, which was, you know, I don't care if I'm on the bottom. I'm going to tell people how they should be voting.

and it's and it's and it's and it's fascinating it's like oh i have an idol i can finally pull the malcolm where i'm basically like holding a weapon at tribal council like come at me and like he gets to do all these moments if i'll do all these moments but in a way it's not just a moment it seems at least a little bit effective but i think that um and i mean talking a little bit about rizzo and his relationship with that little tribe of five or six that came in what's fascinating is that Rizzo got what he wanted out of this. And certainly it seemed as though he had an important role in making sure that M.C. went home instead of Sophie,

yellow Sophie. But from the perspective, other members of the tribe, you know, they were like, we were considering doing this anyway. Why is Rizzo telling us what to do? But at the same time, Rizzo got out of it. And did you hear what he said under his breath after tribal council was over? He's like, man, I can't believe I did. that. Like, he was just like, it's all me. It's all me. So like, but everyone on the tribe

probably thinks it was all their decision. And so that's, that's going to make a really interesting dynamic, I imagine in the next vote, you know, would be like, oh, you know, who is responsible for that? Who wants to take credit for it? Who doesn't want to take credit for it? And that's going to be really interesting. Don't look now, but the holidays are right around the corner. And if your place isn't ready for guests, Wayfair has got you covered, whether you need a few extra seats for Thanksgiving, some cozy bedding, or holiday decor that actually feels like you. Now's the time because Wayfair's Black Friday sale is live all month long. Wayfair really is the destination for everything home, from sofas to spatulas and everything in between right now.

You can get up to 70% off. Wayfair is responsible for most of what you can see behind me in my studio. I love how easy it is to find something that fits your exact style. Plus, they're fast. Free shipping makes getting ready for the holidays stress-free. Don't miss out on these early Black Friday deals. Head to Wayfair.com now to shop Wayfair's Black Friday deals for up to 70% off. That's W-A-Y-F-A-I-R.com. Sale ends December 7th. Boating for Flight 246 to Toronto is delayed 50 minutes. Ugh, what?

Sounds like Ojo time. Play Ojo? Great idea. Feel the fun with all the latest slots in live casino games and with no wagering requirements. What you win is yours to keep groovy. Hey, I won! Boarding will begin when passenger fisher is done celebrating. 19 plus Ontario only. Please play responsibly concerned by your gambling or that if someone close you, call 1-8665331-260 or visit Commexonterio.ca. Get no frills delivered.

Shop the same in-store prices online and enjoy unlimited delivery with PC Express Pass. Get your first year for 250 a month. Learn more at pceexpress.ca.c.a. How do you think the fallout from all of this ends up going? Because now we end up with this story of, okay, MC is off on the jury now. She can't tell her side of the story of, all right, well, here's what I was thinking. I was trying to help Joanne, where only, the only part of the story that really gets back is like, oh, MC went crazy. She tried to, like, throw me yellow Sophie under the bus.

Now, it's almost like the four people that come out of that tropical council. Like, maybe Sage is the only one who's maybe not on that united front. Yeah. I mean, Sage is a fascinating agent in this whole thing because, like, one, she was on these original Uli with like the people who are now on the theoretical outs with Rizzo and Savannah and then picked up Blue Sophie. And, but I think that, yeah, but I could. What you're saying is true.

The story will be MC went crazy. She did this thing because that's the easiest way to come back from a tribal and explain what happened. Why is she gone? And it's a shade of the truth. And so you blame the person who went home for doing something. I can't believe that did that thing. That was crazy. She got up at tribal council.

You're not going to believe it. Right. It just you tell the story because they only know the story. And I've always maintained that one of the most powerful things. We were ready to flush Rizzo's idol and M. C, blew it. She told the plan to everybody. Exactly.

And what you can most control, one of the most powerful things you can use to control a game in Survivor is stories. If you tell the best, like I always remember this is how I, like when on my own season, not to be the guy talks about my own season, but just because like I remember this,

like I never saw the infamous, like Natalie, can I have your jacket moment? I never saw that in real life. But everyone knew about it because people were like, oh, you wouldn't believe it. like Angelina asked Natalie for her jacket.

And so we all knew about it. And that's not just that. That's just one of the most powerful incidents from my season and just in an incredible moment, but every season has those things. And so that will be the overriding, the overriding narrative. But maybe secretly, Sage is pulling aside the people she really wants to work with, basically like, Joanne, you and I know what happened. Yeah.

We know what went down. We got to tell Stephen what really went down here. And, um, but where is juan now? Is joan still with the people he voted with last week? Or did juan end up going back home? Is he back with Rizzo and Savannah? I, I, I don't know, it would be great to get a confessional from him next episode as to where he goes. But it really feels like these riffs are deep.

I mean, and also, I mean, talking about whether or not Chauvin, Juan is good with Savannah. Is Savannah good with Jawan? Yeah. It seems like that's not a one way straight with them. But it seems like that Joanne and. Rizgod do have a bond and it feels like that he has an idol and then also when it turned out that okay the other side and that so yellow Sophie was willing to write his name down it seemed like that to me it seemed like that he was willing to come back to Riz God we saw also I thought that Rizzo played

it really well after the vote when he went back to Jawan and said hey you know you You're still my guy. I don't even care about what happened. We still had this connection. And it was prescient on his part to end up then in that small tribe with Joanne. And Joanne, I think, is still feeling good about Rizzo. And I think that Joanne, I was talking about it with Stephen yesterday. I think Joanne is really the swing vote going into the final nine.

Because on one side, you have Rizzo and Savannah and Sof, maybe yellow Sof, maybe yellow Sof, also that way and that would be four and then here's joan i guess yellow sophy and joan are the swing votes here and it's interesting that mc's plan emcee told joan hey yellow sophy was willing to write your name down but yellow sophy could find a home with the old uly people what is going to be the response to from christina and stephen and alex um what are they going to be saying when they hear like, oh, by the way, it was Sophie versus MC at tribal council. Yeah, I would actually be very worried about what happened at that tribal council

from the people who weren't there from their perspective. Specifically, the people who were in power, which were Stephen and Christina. And it's going to be Sage, who's the person who's like telling Stephen and Christina and Alex, okay, here's what it went down from our side. Yeah. And the fascinating thing about Sage is she doesn't seem to be a party line type of person. She's making decisions that she think are good for her moving forward. And I, yeah, what are you thinking, Rob? Well, I was going to say that she's anti-Savana. She, I think her, like, I think her side right now is whatever is the opposite of what Savannah wants to do. This, this is what the more I think about this, the more I talk about this with you, the more fluid the season could be going forward. You know, that, like, the ingredients are, are there. And I think that you, because you had not just one, but two tribe swaps this season,

there's a bit more of this ingredients where people have some connections where they feel comfortable working with each other with otherwise, wouldn't. I mean, we've come a long way from the no swap era. I mean, we went four seasons in the 40s without any kind of swap. Well, I guess we kind of had a little bit of swap in 44, like a miniature swat where we were like we were no swap. And I feel like what we are lacking were things like this. I remember we were, it felt like for many seasons at the merge, it really was just a battle of

which starting tribe ultimately takes control. Is it going to be the rebe before? Is it going to be like something like that? But I feel like that rebefore was sort of like the exception to the rule. I think it was we saw like in the beginning of the new era. It was a lot of people like gunning for people from their own starting tribe of like, okay, Ricard and Shan are, you know, okay, well like, Shan is my number one. can I beat her, you know, that there was a lot of people going, gunning for people from their

own tribe. Mary Ann's tribe and Jonathan and Omer and Lindsay, they did stick together even though they were kind of dysfunctional. In 43, it was kind of a mishmash. And then ultimately, like, somehow like the Tika three ended up surviving like a war between the other tribes that had more numbers. Maybe it was more of mishmash than I'm thinking about. I'm really thinking about the, I'm getting more the vibe data from all these different seasons, what I remember. And I think what happens is the one that sticks in your head the most is what you assume most of these things go by. But the way you describe it there definitely sounds like more of a mix. But I do maintain that swaps are a good thing. I know we talked about this way back in 43, the idea that it just increased

the number of connections, something that one of that I think even, I think Rizzo noted, like how many connections people have. What's their web of connections? I unfortunately, Rob, did not finished my web before I got on the podcast, otherwise I would have brought data for you, but to know if that's true or not, I didn't take a look. Would you rather, like, have somebody who's been, like, okay, I've been with every single person, or is it better to be like a Riz God and Savannah who've been together through every single one of these swaps? Like, is it almost better to have, like, I would have rather have at least one relationship where I've been with somebody for 14, 15 days, or.

Or would it be better for me to sort of be part of like the poo-poo platter of that I have sampled every single player in the game? Well, it depends on how much of a target you are. I mean, I know that I loved being with one person for the entire, like I was with Gabby, basically the entire game. Not only swap tries, but every reward we go on for like an hour or so we'd also be on together. And it's really good to have that baseline of someone to keep you sane. otherwise you can just be gaslit into all kinds of weird new things are normal and they can be a good baseline for you now where it would be a problem would be if like you two are seen as as like the major threats to take out of the game because then people see you as a duo and you have to basically say hey should i be close to this person or be like blue sophie soph as we are forced to call her now and say she's at the beginning of the episode like look i will pitch ridso and savannah under the bus if i have to because i don't want to be tied to them and i got at least or she said i just want to get i want to keep moving forward more or less and so it everything's situational on survivor which is such a

boring answer but literally true but at the same time there is value and just that that having a rock i mean rizzo and savannah are one of the few people that like they're they're the only people who have been through all three swat all three swap tribes together and merge together yeah they're there together they're even on this tribe of five slash six together and you know, like, the thing you would have, the thing you would have to make sure as if you're not one of those two, you have to assume that those two are going to be lock solid, at least for the foreseeable future. You'd have to.

Yeah. Just to go back to one of my old survivor truisms, whoever has like the biggest, tightest number in the game. And sometimes that could be two, that could be three, that could be four like we had in Samoa. but whoever has like the biggest like most indestructible voting block like that is where all the power is and i do feel like that with rizzo and savanna and now sof like that that feels like a pretty solid three and i don't see another group there even though technically the other side coming into this had seven it was a very loose seven yeah there's there's a couple of different add

is in Survivor as to who you target. I mean, Surrey famously played Get the Goat at near the end of season of Season 12. Like, oh, she got a Courtney Merritt because she was taking up a spot for her. There's also an alternative for earlier in the game and you play Get the Glue. Get the glue.

Who's the glue guy? Yeah, who's the glue guy? I mean, maybe Sam is sort of popularized this phrase, but like someone who, if they are not glued to you, but they're glued to a bunch of other people, you'd knock them out and they scatter to the wind because they're keeping these forces together because even if it's imagine you had a group of three probably there's one person in that three that connects the other two more than the other ones well i mean famously Tyson in heroes versus villains

on the villains tribe i mean he was sort of the glue guy that was keeping rob's group of six together and then when he ends up being taken out and now he's gone now all the sudden, you know, Jerry and coach are now, like, going off and now they're not sticking with Rob and Courtney and Sandra. And so I think that is an interesting point. Who is the connector? Yeah, sometimes you want to just hit the core of the Death Star, right? Sometimes, like, and Tyson is a perfect example of that. And I don't know to what degree, I mean, you're going to have Kathy Fabric O'Brien on this week, the great, Kathy. I know when I'm a warm up act for someone. I know I'm a warm up back for Kathy. I mean, she was on the one of the original, the

original big switch the big switch up of the fall of the row two four was john carol the glue guy the glue of the row two four i mean i i mean she might know that better she wouldn't she definitely know that better than me um but i or i'm west why they targeted him whether it was intentional or not the whole thing just collapsed once john is john left it seemed so maybe he was yeah i think personally of the glue guy being the person who's maybe keeping a group together and it doesn't necessarily need to be the leader. It's almost like in the case of Tyson, I like that where it's like Rob is the leader,

but Tyson is the person who's really keeping the group together. And I'm not sure. I think you could go back into like, was it John, was it Tammy? Like did Tammy really have more say and the edit made it seem a little bit more like John? But I like for what you're talking about where we're talking about somebody who's not necessarily like the de facto

leader, but sort of like the person who is like just keeping sure whipping up the votes that we're making sure everybody is on the same page. Yeah, 100%. And I think that the choice of who you target clearly is almost one of the, it's one of the most important decisions you can make in a game like this. Where in a point where like you are making the call, I mean, we saw this with yellow Sophie and MC, you know, like, I'm going to trust you that I'm going to throw a vote at Jawan. And that choice mattered so much.

It basically picked the scab off of all of these, like, all of these trust issues for various reasons. But like, like when you throw out a name, there are inevitable political ripples. And this time it actually led to a really interesting cascade of politics that led to the tribal we saw. Let's talk about what yellow Sophie's plan was where, okay, we are going to put the votes on Rizzo, Riz God is going home, but we will tell Rizzo that the decoy plan, the fake plan is everybody is voting for me, okay?

Did you like that she did this? And she made herself the decoy plan. You said yourself that, okay, throwing out a name can cause all sorts of kinds of ripples. You are able to alleviate that. I mean, I think that very few times in Survivor history that I can think. of a person has said, okay, here's the plan. The decoy vote is me, everybody. It's a bold choice, cotton.

We saw how it worked out for her. It was like, she got out of it. But it really is courting disaster. You have to be really sure that your people in your group are on your side if you're going to put yourself as a name as a decoy target. Unless you hold the idol, I could see, I could see it then. Yes, yes, but assuming you are vulnerable, which she was and without an idol in her pocket, like it's just if people, because you imagine that in any given a vote, it's very rare that everyone is exactly on board as to who we want to go. Everyone has our own little motivations.

Like, you know what, I really would prefer this person. And in and in ever since what we'd call like the modern era of survivor where strategy even became like the name of the game, like there's there are people who know that like you can shift the plan around. The plan that you go in on an episode is unlikely to remain the plan that comes out at the end. And when you put yourself at the name as the target, you're already just one degree closer to being the vote out because there's a name out there and it's you. And so that's why we talk about like, hey, when suggesting someone else should be a decoy target is an incredibly dangerous thing to do and you should take offense if someone does it to you. And so I think that in this case, it happened to work out for her just because Jawan, it seems like, what was it, Sage? You have to remind me of the politics here. Was it Sage sort of talked Juan into taking out MC?

I was trying to rewatch that little segment a couple of times as to how that went down. I'd have to go back to my notes. I'll blather while you pull it out. Sage tells Sophie that MC blew the plan. Do we get Sage and Ju-Wan? I am not clear on that. Yeah, I'm not clear on that either. I should have, but like, and we're getting a small slice of it anyway.

But the point being that there were, the only reason it worked out is because the person who was blabbing was less valuable to keep around than Sophie, apparently, right? And Rizzo would claim some credit in that as well. But I'll tell you, but it is dangerous. I maintain it is still dangerous to have your name out there for any reason. I think that ironically, the way that you'd want your name out there, if you have to have your name out there at any point, it would be early in the day, early in like the episode cycle. Like right after tribal, people were like, oh, maybe it should be you next.

But then there's the most chance that something will get shuffled around and be someone else. Yeah, like Sophie last week when people were talking about like, we should go for her before she won immunity. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so people get all kinds of crazy ideas. And now that I think that there's be a more, especially looking at the ingredients here, pretty fluid season, I think that that actually, like, I could imagine someone being more comfortable with their name being out there early and be like, it's okay. We'll figure out a way to get it to be as someone else. That's annoying.

What? You're a muffler. You don't hear it? Oh, I don't even notice it. I usually drown it out with the radio. How's this? Oh, yeah. Way better.

Save on insurance by switching to Bell Air Direct and use the money to fix your. car. Bell Air Direct, insurance, simplified. Conditions apply. Let's get in the weeds here. I got a question for you. Should Rizzo have played his shot in the dark? I mean, that dude, well, that's a good question.

The thing about the shot in the dark is that one in six chance. And I mean, like, basically what you're suggesting is the shot in the chaser, popularized eyes. Is this not what Rachel did in Survivor 47? to great aplomb, is that right? And shouldn't he like, then it's like a fake out of like, all right, I got the thing. And then does everybody like, see the look on everybody's face? And then everybody's like, oh, who cares?

Yeah, I mean, so like it wasn't a one vote margin here for, like they weren't splitting the vote. Like, I think that he should have played the shot in the dark. Yeah, I think that that's an interesting way to because the shot in the dark is like, it's such a niche tool. It's not like you're like, man, I really wish I had my shot in the dark later. You can only play it to, what, seven? So, you know, like, I mean, what are the chances?

If he wasn't going to play it, he's only has two more chances to play the shot in the dark. Like, this was as good of a time as any. That's, that's a good idea. And it would make him seem a little less cocky to his, to the people who are calling him cocky in the episode. Yes, this worked. But it doesn't mean that it wasn't like a. very ballsy, dangerous thing that he did to go through this tribal council and not play his idol.

Like, it was just like a little bit of insurance that he wasn't going to be the person who got blindsided at this vote. That's interesting. I mean, it's, and like, I think the only defense would be like, how confident was he that he was not the vote? And I mean, and how confident are you in your confidence? It seems like he's confident in his confidence. And maybe he's feeling like, hey, I still need to, okay, I'm going to get through tonight.

It seems like everything is, like I'm feeling 100% certain about this. I still need to get through tomorrow's vote and maybe I end up using this as a tool at the next vote where I'm going to, you know, have the idol and determine if I need to play the idol at that tribal council by playing the shot in the dark first. Yeah. And I think that like the thing about the shot in the dark, as I've said multiple times with you, the issue I have with it is that you forget it exists because like no one brings it up or talks about it unless it might be about to be used.

I do not believe it has been played this season, right? Or did somebody play it? I don't remember anyone playing it. And I don't think Jason played it. So like, as far as we're concerned, like hasn't been mentioned in the episode. Like, I genuinely don't remember. I think they mentioned it before, but I'm not sure. But so anyway, that's just sort of my thing.

It's like, it's a mechanic that like an average audience goer who pops in is like, do they know this thing's exist and what is it? And it's got weird rules. But, but it does have. the chance to spook people, like, especially at a tribe, and this brings up another point, that on a tribe that's so small, it's only six people, five people are vulnerable. I think one of the reasons that Rizzo had more, even more leverage at this tribal council is because it was so small that if people tried to knock them out with an idol and if

bounce back, there's a much higher chance of bouncing back on them, as opposed to a group of 10 where your odds are more than, or less, less than half that you're going to, that's going to bounce back on you. And so I, so I think, so I, and similarly, uh, if you're at such a small tribal council and all of a sudden Rizzo plays a shot in the dark and then there's going to be a revote. If, uh, if they're all the votes are on him, that's scary. And, you know, like, like, I, I think that that might, he might actually provoke a real reaction at tribal council. That, that's interesting. I'm, I'm sure someday we will, we will get that answer as to whether or not he had thought of that but that's a interesting thought rob okay

there was another really fun moment in this episode where before tropical council we see mc and sophy and sophy has already been talking to riso and that she's already been okay going back and she knows now that mc had told joan and they're in the like uh shelter together and mc says to Sophie, you know, is everything, I'm getting a really weird feeling. And Sophie says, yeah, I'm getting a weird feeling. She's like, no, I'm getting a weird feeling from you. That's a good moment. It was a great moment.

You got a lot of glimpses as to how survivor strategy can go. You've got plans being upended. You have people with threats of idols. You've got people leaking plans to other people to help the board. Weird energy. Weird energy. I want to be sure I get the thing right. The word,

thank you for getting the quote right. I'm sure we'd be fact checked. And I think that, but I think that that's, but that's another flavor of the plotting around camp, that while sometimes people are completely oblivious as whether or not people are, I'm targeting you,

that's frankly probably more common than anything else. Sometimes it's obvious. People don't want to talk to you they get weird vibes but it's weird it's off it's very uncommon to have it called out so like good at mc for picking up she is absolutely right um that to point that out my question would be does it make sense for mc to say that out loud and if yeah go on it's it's it's really interesting because then that it's going to flip on its head at tribal council when that we have the moment where yellow sophy says Hey, I'll tell you what's up.

It's either me or MC tonight at tribal council. So why? So let's do the Rizzo question for MC. Should M.C have played her shot in the dark at that point? I mean, it's different than the idol situation. She doesn't have the idol as a backup. So it's far less powerful. But like, if you go to tribal council and you're like,

I think that I'm being targeted and everyone is, I guess, and I guess she's getting a vibe just from. Yeah. So from Yellow Sophie. So I hit. asked her about what she had talked about with joan i think that joan at tribal council we didn't get to see and i think that joan had said no everything is still okay it's still going to be sophy but in that instance and i know that joan didn't like it when mc just played her idol he would

probably really not like it if mc played the shot in the dark probably not a bad play for mc to play the shot in the dark there it's not like that this is one of these scenarios where it's a one vote margin where we're talking about okay Rizzo is going to play his idol and so the one vote cast on Jawan is going to be the difference and so you know it would not have mattered her one vote 100% no and I and I think that I mean I agree with your analysis there I mean there is I think that getting into the head of these players when they're throwing these shot in the darks out at shots in the dark I figure which one it is like it is it is it does have have more of that sort of trust vibe? Do you want to show trust moving forward? And when I listen

to exit interviews from previous season, people like, oh, why didn't you play your shot in the dark? And it was like, well, the one in six shot that is going to matter and hit wasn't as important as the slightly greater chance that I'm not being, that I'm not being lied to. And I want to move forward in a way, in a trust, in a trustworthy way with these people. And as a result, people end rarely playing it. I mean, this is me grossly extrapolating to many people. I think John love it from 47 since something to that effect, if I recall, in the first episode. Right. And, you know, it's a calculus that, yes, you have the scenario where Jawan gets mad, somebody played an idol, but I can't really think of the time in the show's history where not that the

shot in the dark gets played too often. And it's actually exceedingly rare for somebody to play the shot in the dark and then survive to live to tell the tale, especially when when it did not turn out to be a successful shot in the dark. But I think back to my own time in Survivor All-Stars, where I was starting to feel a weird energy going to tribal council. And I really was thinking, I was contemplating like, hey, like, hey, everybody here. Like, it's not me, right? And this is a pre-shot in the dark, pre-iddle, whatever.

Like, they could have just all said, you know what, Rob? Frankly, it is you. and there's not much I could have done except like really like have a tantrum at tribal council but what fun that would have been so but I really thought about I'm like uh but like okay

maybe it is me but I don't want to like freak everybody out moving forward and that's a regret that I have like I feel like I really do and knowing how it worked out who cares if people are a little freaked out no no and I think that if I recall

from your evolutionary strategy Evolution Strategy Chapter 8 where you're talking Josh Wigler about this. Remember, I think you said like, the thing I would do differently is I would pick a fight with Sue Hawke. And like, I remember you saying something like that. Well, if we really want to revisit

that I think that if we would have gone to tribal council earlier, like I think that I was a victim of the success, I really don't think if we would have gone to the first tribal council, I don't think I would have been the first person voted off i i think that either sue maybe alicia like her and rob had like i i think that as the game

went on i ended up like falling out of position and i think that had i gone to tribal council in the first three days or two days i forget how long it was um that we were there before tribal council i think i would have survived the first tribal council there's and i think that's interesting because what you're describing to me i sort of think of like as a homeostasis like you're sort of like, you feel like you're in a position and you sort of lock in your mind. This is my position in the tribe. But then little by little, this is me putting your words in your mouth, things can shift and you're not, maybe a little bit of conscious of it, but you're like, eh, it's no big deal.

I'm still fine. And by the time you realize how much it shifted, it's too late. I can imagine something like that being challenging. I felt like it slipped a little bit where I felt like, I really did feel good with Rob and Tom early on. And even Amber, and I kind of feel like I just, I fell out of favor as the days wore on there. Interesting. Interesting.

So it's, now, here, there's all the dynamics are so shifting, though, you know, in this season that it's, like every, you know, every vote might be some new kind of twist, right? Like, like, oh, we're going to a tribe of five. Maybe hopefully we get a vote at nine. I certainly hope so. Nine is a odd number, as mathematicians would tell you, and therefore is going to be good for a vote. But yeah, I mean, so like, and so I think that those things are shifting enough here that I don't think we have to worry about that particular scenario. But here, going back to the question about the shot in the dark, playing the shot in the dark, look, just living to fight another day, the more fluid a game is, the more important is just to make it through that day. And I feel like that that's been a lot of those consistent story of the new era is that especially when the twists got very, very twisty, just, you know, why plan for the final?

three when a do or die could come your way or knowledge's power could swipe your idol away, you know, like those kinds of things. So we'll see. How much did Savannah showing up affect this vote in your mind? I mean, certainly it gave Rizzo a power amplifier here that what Rizzo, it made Rizzo's will mattered more because Savannah has no, has. has no risk or danger here to herself unless she somehow screws something up for Rizzo, her closest ally.

So I think that that really helps. And also it starts to pile on the votes more. Now, like, shifting the vote around is going to be harder because whatever, whichever way the vote's going to go, it's not going to have to go. Savannah is going to have to be on board or or it could go some other way. I mean, we talk about, you know, this vote wasn't going to be close. It wasn't going to be close. But like, now it's a, now it's a six-person tribal council with, as far as everyone knows, six votes publicly, right?

And final six, and votes with six people can be crazy. There's, you know, like, like, there are all kinds of weird inside straight draws that you can pull at a six-person vote. We talked about this over the years, Rob. And, and so now she's now with Rizzo, with a two-sum. And that Toosome has an idol. I think that really helps Rizzo at a bare minimum. And she's immune. You gave up for her.

And she's immune. So like that is terrifying. So it's actually a really impactful twist. I'm not sure to what degree we even felt how impactful it was from the screen. But that's just my memory of it. Yeah. It ends up being sort of like 2-2, where you have the Rizzo Savannah block, Joanne and Sage Block, and then Sophie and MC, and they are like, they've, they've turned their

weapons against each other in this 2-2-2. I mean, it really, this twist could not have worked out better for Rizzo and Savannah. It just could not have. There's something like, I mean, yes, Rizzo ended up going to tribal, but he ended up being there with his closed ally. He had an idol. She's immune. People were scared of hitting the idol.

It just worked out fantastically. So anyway, so it definitely about. mattered a lot. And also, to the point where Savannah was so confident, she banked her vote. Yeah. And so she walks away from this with an extra vote. So coming into this next one, I mean, talk about like the David's tribe, that this three, this trust cluster, which Rizzo, Savannah, so, like, can you make a damn alliance name, please? So we have something that they're coming in. They all have an advantage, an idol, and knowledge is power and an extra vote now. Yeah. Yeah. And does anyone know about the.

knowledge is power. Is that fully secret? No, she has not told anybody. Though, and the idol is public. And in theory, everyone should be able to figure out that Savannah has a bank of vote. You think so? Yes, mathematically, they should be able to figure that out. So why? Because she left tribal council without voting? Well, well, yeah, well, it should be theoretically, they should know that she did not vote or someone did not vote at that tribal council. Everyone should know that from the vote counts. And in case people need to remind. Did Savannah leave tribal council or she went and sat back down. She went into the voting booth. Maybe she voted. Maybe she didn't, didn't, but sat back down. However, by how Jeff reads the votes and at its particular tribal council, you can infer that

a vote was lost, that a vote was that. And we talked about this in the past Rob, back two years ago, versus hour of 45, there were some voting shenanigans with lost votes. And people like Emily Flippen were able to figure out, hey, somebody didn't vote based on the fact that Jeff will always read just enough votes and were to clinch a majority. That's a really good point. I don't even think I would think too much about that. So, MC, Sophie, MC, MC, and so had Savannah voted that Jeff would have read a fourth MC vote? Correct.

They absolutely would have. And it could be very easy to get in your head. Some people are very natural with these kinds of numbers. Because if there were six votes, that the next two votes could have been Sophie. correct and it's easy and you can sort of work through those options in your head it's but it's but it's it's good to have an easy formula and back two years ago I brought one to the table okay so actually I've got my oh I'm sorry here we go I apologize I'm sorry I'm backwards oh so no I'm no am I backwards yes sorry I look backwards you know it looks it looks perfect

oh fantastic it just looks backwards on my screen I'm gonna like I'm gonna put Christian full frame and let's see maybe I can give us a small me so you could have my rena that is not it okay uh sometimes we'll figure out i sometimes people in rob's defense change up my uh my stream yard okay i'm throwing this at him without any possible like warning so he's doing doing the lord's work right here figuring this now so we talked about this back in season 45 rob right around thanksgiving episode and he was flip it perfect great that's and uh that that the formula is pretty simple the question is like you are going to vote and you can either maybe play an extra vote or you've lost a vote

The question is, will people figure that out, okay, or can you do that safely? Like here, there's a perfect opportunity because she is an option to bank a vote, all right? And the formula is like this, that everyone going to that tribal council expects some kind of vote margin. In this case, people expect it to be 5-1, right? 5-1 against MC. All right. So what's the margin between those? You know, 5 minus 1, 4, 4, okay?

So if that number is even, you can gain a vote. throw on an extra vote and get away with it. No one will have any clue. All right. If it's an odd number, you can lose a vote or bank a vote, right? And no one will have any clue. But because the number was even, you can gain a vote but not lose a vote. All right.

So I had a little acronym for this. It was GE. So you can gain on an even vote. Lose on an odd vote. Jello, right? Just burn that. You know, you can just burn that into your mind, right? Yeah.

So in this case, so, so, so, So in this case, because it's a 5-1 vote, margin is four, she could have gained, throw, played an extra vote for MC, and Jeff wouldn't have read it. It wouldn't have mattered. No one would have known. It would have been a waste, but she could have done it, right? But because she lost a vote, it changed the number of votes Jeff had to read in order to clinch the majority.

So it should be detectable. This is something that Emily Flippin did in, like, episode two or three or something. I want to make sure that we are all on the same page with you on this. So this, okay. Right. So when it is the, it's not the number of people in the tribe. It's the expect, what the vote margin is going to be. If that vote margin is going to be an even vote margin, then I can play my extra vote and I could do that undetected.

Correct. Correct. So I can bring up as an example. Let's just assume for a second that, sorry, I'm going to put you through your paces here. Let's assume that Rizzo was not on that tribe, and it was Savannah, and she had the ability to bank a vote. So in which case, we would expect it a 4-1 against MC, right? So 4-1 is 3. That's the margin, right? So that's an odd number. Now, in this case, could Savannah have banked her vote and not being detected? Yes, because it's an odd number. Three's an odd number. The margin's odd,

So she can lose a vote on an odd number and not be detected. And you can work this out because in that case, doing this on the fly here, that there would have been one vote for, who is it, Sophie, right? Okay. Then Jeff would have read one vote for it, one vote for MC, okay? And that would have been enough to clinch it. Irrespect. So anyway, sorry, I'm going off the dome here.

but that's a but so in this case people should have absolutely been able to uh in the case in the episode been absolutely able to figure out that there was one vote lost so that's a that's a trick i really recommend that anyone going into a vote at tribal council uh this is a trick i learned from playing in an orchestra all these years i literally count on my fingers okay i would really recommend because like if you're like sitting around in orchestra and you're like i have 26 measures of rest just count on your fingers because you're nervous you know you have to perform You know, you have to come in in exactly 26 measures. I started to try to do this on the squid game.

It didn't go great. Oh, I never watched. This is the new squid game? People try to count. The game, colon the challenge. The quick, so is this the second season? I haven't seen the second season yet. Yes.

Okay. All right. What happens in the first 10 minutes of the second season. Okay. Apparently that doesn't work out. But seriously, like, if you're sitting there and Jeff is reading out votes, you would be like, okay, one vote, Sophie, one vote MC, one vote MC, one vote MC, that's it.

Then you can lead tribal council. What if three people are getting votes? Take your shoe off. Take your shoe off, you know, and you do that right. That got a little complicated. What you do is alternating pinkies, thumb pinky, is what you do in that case. So anyway, so that's, so, so anyways, that happens if five people get votes. No one wants to know that answer, Rob.

Okay. And so, so anyway, sorry, that was a little bit of a detour. I didn't, I didn't prepare you for it. But like that's interesting. I had never, this is news to me. So Savannah really could have said, hey, Rizgod, play your shot in the dark tonight. Do me a solid. Yeah.

That would help me get away with it, Scott Free. The question is, will Yellow Sophie or Joanne or Sage catch it? Well, now that, look, every future survivor player watches your podcast, and especially this one, so now they all know the trick, so no one will get away with it. Okay. All right. Very interesting. Let me thank our sponsor for this episode of the podcast.

Of course, those are our friends over at Manta Sleep. I'm sure that sleeping is no problem at the Hubicki household these days. And you have no need for sleep aids from Manta Sleep like this amazing, adjustable, Manta Sleep mask that is 100% blackout fit with premium features galore. great for side sleepers as well. They've also got the ability to get a Manta Sleep Mask with a Bluetooth

where you could listen to your favorite podcast as you drift off into slumber. And you could check it all out and get 10% off with the promo code RHAP 49 over at mantasleep.com. Okay, Christian, you are such an authority on these things. Let me ask you, how do you feel about do it yourself deli sandwich? I've never heard it labeled DIY deli.

Do it yourself deli sandwich. Nothing says luxurious reward then do it yourself. They're really big for whatever reason on do it yourself blank. Like you could just say it's sandwiches. Nobody is like, are they pre-made sandwiches or do I have to do it my like do it like do it yourself P.B and J.

is another one they always do I think they're in search of adjectives I guess what they're going for they need it's like they got it can't just be deli do it yourself sandwiches Subway is asleep at the switch they missed out on the chance for do it yourself deli sandwich what did Jeff say ham

pepperoni was mentioned it's look it's just calories at some point like like literally like the way I would look at it is like okay one is it going to fill me up and it's going to give me calories and it will come out in the other end. Those are like the two major considerations for how you handle a reward.

So like if I were thinking like, if I were there for do-it-yourself deli, I'd be like, okay, how much bread? Yeah. Is there an infinite amount of bread or close to it? And they get some carbohydrates in that. Do you think that pastrami was there? Could you make a do-it-yourself Rubin?

The problem with the Rubin sandwich is that they would require some kind of sauerkraut, and some kind of Thousand Island dressing. The bread, some people are specific about Pumpernickel being on a Rubin stamp. I've heard some people are big on the pumpernickel. Rye bread, of course, is very common. I wouldn't mind a white bread Rubin sandwich. What the thing that you want is, frankly, it's a little bit of the sourness of the sauerkraut

and a little bit of the sweetness and the tang from a thousand island dressing. That's what you need to effectively recreate a Rubin. Everything else is an enhancement. Mm-hmm. Corned beef is good. Corned beef is good. All right. Let's look forward to this next vote.

How do you think it's going to go? I mean, it's being sold to us that there's like a power threesome. And Rizzo is starting to look like, like, like, this is like the most important threesome in the game right now. And so this could be a bait and switch where like, you know, we're going to take control and then it backfires. But really, I wonder how the Stevens and the Christina's of the game are going to react to that last vote. Are they going to feel like the politics have shifted for those reasons that you stated because Yelow Sophie is right, because MC is now gone when it didn't make any sense to them

that she would go. So we will see. I think if you come back, I think you're livid of like, wait, he didn't play his. His idol? Yes, yes. That's another big thing. I mean, because, like, he came, he lived through the scenario still with his idol's intact.

They'd be like, and I imagine this is just going to focus their eye or either more directly on the people on the outs or people are like, I just can't deal with my people. My people are so incompetent. This is what they might be. They can't even get him to get rid of his idol. So, but I, but I, so I really am curious what the narrative is going to come, coming back. And we will find out before the first commercial break, I feel. Could this next vote come back around on Joanne or Sage?

It could go, as far as I concerned, it can really go any direction. I know it's like almost a trivial thing to say. But I think that there is enough fluidity, enough reasons that people would be upset about the last vote for it to go in any direction. You could easily see how I could go for any of the three on the bottom, Sophie, Rizzo and Savannah, for obvious reasons. And you see enough people with enough connections with each other that they cobble together some kind of new alliance and go for any one of them.

It could be Stephen. It could be Christina. It could be Joanne. I mean, I feel like I'm saying nothing by saying everything. But I really do think there is a lot of uncertainty as to who could go. And I think it's actually a really good thing at this point in the season. Who do you think? This is interesting.

I want to take Risgod and Savannah. and Sof out of the equation. Could we do a draft of the remaining six people? Who's most likely to go home next? Is that interesting? Is that an interesting conversation? It is. It is.

Take them three people that we know that they're tight. They have an advantage. Like I don't know anything about Alex from this episode. I feel like I didn't get much Alex this episode. I could be wrong. has really his part of the story has really fallen off the cliff it's just are there any chickens left for him the murder i i don't know if i can get him back in the edit somehow i think all the amazing race i think it's still chickens okay all right so we have so looking at so so who has the

where is this the most animosity that might be just the simplest top of the six well where does yellow sophy fit in like and and could we see the ooli people throw yellow Sophie to the wolves like what could they yeah is the old Sophie to blame for this chaos like I mean the only she's only to blame to the sense that she threw out joan's name right and so that so you have joan having a reason to go after sophy now sage did as far as that concern came to sophie's rescue here um so at the same time you have sage and savannah right and knowing that so like of who's going to go home of this of these remaining six other than the three i mean who are the three going to go for and savannah is going after sage and sage was one of the reasons that like i'm

is she the glue is who the glue is sage the glue sage the glue she managed to keep that vote together to go on to mc might be eating the glue fair enough i think you're probably right i think you're right it's not sage i don't know what i was thinking i don't know i just don't know who Who is Sage's closest confidant? It seemed like it was Joanne, but I don't know if they're on the same page after this. Well, I'm trying to come up with the reason as to why she wouldn't just be a target by Savannah.

Because she flipped on those guys. Well, her and Stephen and Joanne were the bottom feeders. I'm sorry, or the bottoms up. So, I don't know. And Christina has an idol. don't forget. Well, I mean, here's the thing. Like, I think this is actually, like, I think Philish has clarified something.

I think this is a really good point for the season because I don't know which way it's going to happen. But at the same time, I do have some information as the way things could go, right? It's not like I know nothing about these people. I know no things about the relationship. We got so much, I feel, of Savannah Joanne in the pre-merge. And so we got a lot of that. and so the yeah go on yeah as i said uh i had talked about this a little bit with stephen yesterday

where you know fair or unfair the people that we have spent the most time with that i had said you know it's when we're looking at the two sides that we have one side that features savannah rizzo se uh soph um joan maybe like the people that we have spent the most time with And on the other side, we have most of the people we have spent the least time with. So hard to really get a sense of where they're coming from. Who's calling the shots on that side? And that's sort of a bias of like, yeah, I mean, one in terms of, you know, air time because they went to a couple of tribal council.

Actually, I didn't count on how many who went to most tribal council. So maybe that's a silly point. But yeah, I get what you're saying. So the attention is more diffuse. on the other six and therefore it's hard to pick out an obvious target that's why and that's why i'm saying i don't know and it's a good i don't know there have been seasons where like i don't know i don't know and i don't even care i'm starting to care how these things line up like i want to know who wins the battle of sage v savannah or or or even so how does the sophy and joan thing

How does that shake out? And specifically, I like how this episode, the fact that MC played her idol, played into the fact that, again, on screen, we know there's more to it behind the screen, played into her relationship with Joanne, she tried to replay her that relationship with you want and created consequences. There are consequences to actions. I think that there have been plenty more actions right now that will lead to more consequences. And that sounds like such a silly and dumb thing to say, but it's hard to convey on an unscripted

reality show, but I think we're getting it. But this is, I talked about this coming into the merge. where I thought that this could be a Kagayan-esque merge vote. And it didn't quite deliver in terms of how exciting that was. But this is setting up to be a really interesting final nine vote because we talked about the two sides. And what's interesting is we still have two sides, maybe like a Big Brother season or an old school survivor season.

And both sides have an idol. And I think that there is definitely going to be some, spy games in terms of like is Jawan in double agent territory where are both sides going to be vying for Jawan and we're vying for Jawan but do we tell him the real name because he is he with us or is he with them or is he just with us to try to get the name of who we want

so that we play the idol incorrectly and now the Uli side doesn't doesn't know yet that Christina has the idol, but they know Rizzo has the idol. And so how much can you trust the people that are in the middle? I kind of teed me up for this, Rob. I want to see Blue Sophie, Sof, go on a recon mission to figure out who has the idol,

because she has the knowledge as power. And nobody knows there's even a knowledge of power in the gage and Sof talking, this week and Sage feeling like, oh, maybe I could trust self. That would be astonishing. Like, like, I mean, if, like, imagine. Or self could get that information from Alex, too. She can get that from all kinds of different people.

Lots of people know who that is. It's going to leak. It's going to leak. And there are other signs. I mean, one of the classics, like, even if she, in that it doesn't leak, there are lots of ways to infer, at least give you a good probabilistic guess as to who has an idol. And frankly, one will be who is least interested in looking for an idol.

So, like, I'm at, they all, everyone knows an idol is still out there. I'd be shocked if people like Savannah and Rizzo and Blue Sof didn't go out to look for an idol. You don't have to say Blue Sof. Oh, you don't say Blue Soff? I, I'm, fair enough, I don't want to call herself. I don't want to do it. I want to call herself. Just do it.

Just do, oh, God. Anyway, so. Sof. Like, like they're all looking for I don't too. I love it. I love Sof so much. I'm going to call Sophie Clark is also self now.

Is she, oh, God, okay. But like, but, but for Sof, this mouth feel is just,

ugh. Anyway, like, like, she, she knows that they're looking for an idol too. And so everyone's probably giving off, trying to still give off the vibe that they're still an idol to find.

But, I mean, you heard Christina talk about it. It's a lot of work to go out and looking for an idol. So is she going to put up this charade knowing she already has it? She might be able to figure out with just that alone. And could you imagine if she steals at one of these tribals? You have this trio that is sitting on a bank of vote and two idols.

They like, how do you handle that? That is genuinely difficult. All of the playbooks that I would think going into a season of a survivor, like, oh, how would you handle a person with an idol that, Everyone knows about, like, and it's a problem. They have a lot of power. And this is something I remember from my own season, blah, blah, blah. I remember my own season.

Like, at one point, we thought Nick might have two idols. And the plan I was going to go with is like, look, we don't want to bend rebergen this or where we just constantly target him and just have him keep playing idols and Ben bombs and he looks more and more powerful. Let's just not target him. Make it look like he has no agency in this game. And it won't matter how many idols he sits on. But now you have two out of three people sitting on idols.

What are you supposed to do that? Yeah. Like that's crazy. Okay. We'll give you one other scenario that could be interesting this week. Final nine, we have this trio of Sof, Rizgod, and Savannah. Assuming that everybody knows that they're a trio, I think that Sof is doing some good work of trying to me.

I'm not with them. They're like, like, I'm not going down with that sinking ship. But we know that there are a trio. could we see a 3-3-3 vote split or does the implications from the idol take that off the table? Or is that the way to defuse the idol? That's how you defuse an idol with a vote split. We haven't seen a 3-33-attempted vote split since what? Heroes versus Villains?

Redemption Island, I think, against Russell. But like it's something like that era. That was an attempted 3-33 vote that wouldn't ride. You better not even start with calling it your dumbass girl alliance. Okay. Don't even try me today, Rizzo. Don't make me come down there, Riz God, okay? You know, that'll be really disappointing to all of his loyal followers of Rizmatarians if he does that.

So don't do that. I will end you. Do not even try that. So when when it makes, so it would make sense to do a. three three votes but with the six right but here's the thing ain't gonna work right because if they because of the extra bank of vote right and that would actually that would diffuse it right so um could you imagine that they do three three three and then and then Savannah would have the presence of mind to play the fourth vote and then it's everybody's heads would explode it's it would like

the thing is like the three three three vote split it's almost completely old school now it's wild like we didn't like like we don't often vote with nine they're fair enough but like even just like but even just typical votes they are it used to be standard play you know we have we've we've we've we've we've besmirch the legacy of cowboy by getting rid of the vote split and the operation voodoo but i but like and i to the point where like do these new players you are actually you know what i will say that was there a three, three, three at the final nine in Philippines, uh, when artists and Pete and Abby were together.

Oh, my goodness. If only we had Brandon Donlin somewhere listening, then he might, he might know the answer to that. I don't know if he necessarily is a, a vote count guy. Oh, then I, then I think far less of him than I did before. Like he might know whose luxury item is what, um, but I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if he knows the vote counts.

Maybe it's more of an Omer question. Omer might know that. Omer would know. Text Omer. Yeah. So, yeah. So I think that that, but like we don't see these three three. I remember like they're so like feel like unthought of that like when we were talking before

about the new tie break rules with extra votes and lack of extra votes, how do the new tiebreak rules work with a three three three vote split? Because chronically, um, on a three three vote split, the people who are targets of the vote split, do not revote. However, that is no longer the case, as we learned from Survivor 47, that if there are extra votes or lack of votes in play, people do revote. So like, we might actually would get an answer to that question if there actually was a tie. So just talk me through that because I myself am a little lost. Okay, let's say, all right, it's three votes on Alex, three votes on, I'm sorry, so they would do it. It would be three votes on, so three votes on

Savannah, three votes on Alex? Yes. So in that, so the votes, let's assume there's no extra votes played. This should, unless the rules have changed, play through where in that case, the targets of the vote, which would be Savannah, Sof, and Alex, do not vote on the revote. Now, six people vote on the revote, and it will now be presumably a five versus, it would be a, my goodness, a five versus one vote against a, uh, uh, uh, a five versus one vote against a, uh,

against one of those three targets. You can only vote for one of those three targets. That's how the three-three votes should work. I'm pretty sure that's how Russell got voted out, maybe, or someone like that. So the... And that's true. He lived by the 3-33 vote split in Survivor Heroes v. Villains and died by it in Survivor Redemption Island.

I'm sure I'm sure I must have had that. This is like one of those ones that was like, yeah, Rob, you've already been amazed by that. like five different times in the history of Rob's the podcast. It's my, the hero version of villains. That's a little bit like my personal notebook where it's like, okay, oh, tell them about how Russell ended up going out by the three, three, three votes split. And then like, wow, oh my God.

That's incredible. Live by the sword, die by the sword. I mean, that Tyson episode where Tyson goes on with my favorite episode of Survivor. But really, yeah, it is for that vote alone. Banana etiquette. I love banana etiquette. It's my favorite episode. But the question now is that in the era of new and with extra votes and lost votes, how do you handle a revote?

And it surprised me that in Survivor 47, this is going really into the weeds, folks, that like there was a vote where this is where Sierra went home from Survivor 47, where Sam did not have a vote, I believe. And as a result, there was the ruling on the field was that in spite that all of that the two targets who were Sam and Sierra will revote because the idea is that like Sam and Sierra were the targets, there's no point of them voting again. There's going to have to vote for each other anyway. So I have them vote. But now Sam can't vote. It's now asymmetric.

Sierra can vote for Sam. So it's now then revealed that, hey, Sam, you don't have a vote. therefore you can't go up for the revote sierra will and this is a highly controversial ruling i i went back and forth with shannon guss uh about this a little bit we talked about this and um it it is it is a it is a bit crazy and what was specifically crazy about it is how it affects a three three three yeah was it was with shana i thought that you were on with me that week that i offline i talk with shannon gus oh okay yes yes yes i think that that was the night that i was in the whole hotel after the gardener cut my internet cable.

And I was, I was, I was so mad that I think you guys clipped it into like, like a, like a, like one of those shorts things like Christian is mad about rulings on survivor. But anyway, so we, I've gone on way too long about this, but my point is that the rules gets shockingly complicated when you have tie votes, idols, extra votes and revotes. They, and lost votes, like, and to the point where you literally should work out like a chart, blackjack as to what you should do when i highly would recommend that to to players in the in uh going forward christian let's take some questions that we have for you from the listeners by the way uh you're on fire today oh thank you thank you one of your best spots well it's it's it's the

complexion is what it's you're at the top of your game yeah you got all these rules down oh it's it's been fun it's like i i do i do love survivor and i i love that i love that i love these I love emergent strategy from these rules and that's and it's a lot of fun and and I mean I don't want to peel back any any curtains but like you know I know it's you know I'm I'm on season 50 and so I had a reason that so surprise but like you can tell us probably who the people from Survivor 49 are I could but I can't I'm allowed to say I'm on Survivor wait CBS said I was on Survivor 50 so I'm on say they said so but like but like we call you a two-time Survivor yet or not yet?

I'm not sure technically what you can do. But like it was... I guess you could be, if you are Medevac before the season starts, are you a two-time survivor? Well, we'll leave that to the answers to the future. But I will say like, you know, it's been always been fun. Well, I, hold on, hold on. Let me text Jeremy Collins.

Is Christian a two-time survivor player? Find out. He's the arbiter of all opinions, right? About Survivor, right? Okay. But like, he said, well, he said, Christian is a good player, but right now he's a one and a half times player. Look, I would take it.

I would take it from Jeremy Collins. It's fine. He, he knows he's played more times than me regardless. He said. That's good to hear. That's good to hear. And when I, but like, so like, I'll do all these podcasts with you. And it's a lot of fun.

And I always enjoy doing it. And, you know, and it's just, and as you know, I have a bait. and it was very hard to concentrate on math. But then as soon as I'm leaving for Survivor 50, I can think about like, oh, survivor math again. And I can just suddenly think about all these rules. So now I'm reasonably read up on the rules. Okay.

Holly Elaine says, can we get a baby Michael slash new dad update? So my baby Michael is doing great. He's adorable. He's, I just bought a new bouncer for him. He's teething now. He's now, like, so like, which is like, oh, what does this I feel in his mouth? The little teeth. No, but he's great.

He's good at sitting up. He's, what we've enjoyed most is banging on the piano. I bought a piano, a little electric piano for the house, and he just bangs on it. And I just wanted to make noises, and I'm, and it reacquaints me on, on how to play the piano. It's been, it's been a, so, so that, that's been fun. And it can change it to all kinds of noises. It's a good time. It's a good time.

And now he's aged out of the robot baby bed. so I've had to move to the analog bed. Analog bed. Oh, my God. Okay. Let's see. Andy, Andy Stillerman wants to know. Did you have an opinion on the MC Savannah Keyes scene from last week?

The Keys scene. So that was funny. That's like a prank that they played on MC. So like here's a thousand keys. And she, and to be clear, like this was like she had been saying. sitting on this Beware Advantage for a long time, right? And never got a chance to actually, like, use the keys, right? I just assumed that the keys just multiply from day to day, like, the producers just keep

adding more keys onto the ring as one day goes by. Oh, but like, the funny part was like that Savannah was like talking to her, like during the whole process. That was, that was a lot of fun. But like the absurdity of just sitting here, like, imagine like you have to concentrate, you know, putting these keys in. It sounds like a simple thing. And probably in principle of the simple thing.

But when you're starving and you're paranoid and you're nervous, you're probably like, I have to pay attention to this person who's talking to me while I'm trying out these keys. It's wild. I like that the editors sort of dissolved away from Savannah talking to MC concentrating on doing the keys. I'm glad that they still get play out of that. I remember specifically as a big survivor fan going to Survivor Dave versus Goliath saying, hey, whatever I do in terms of talking, they have never done a crossfaded montage. or someone's talking.

So I can just talk as long as I want. That's just not part of their video editing. They're not going to do that. They're not going to do that. And boy, did they. Boy, did they. Yeah. Okay.

Here's a question for you from Noah, who said if they were going to sacrifice MC anyway, why not vote for Rizzo and get rid of the idol? So I think that we're worried about like, so you had Rizzo and Savannah voting together, right? Potentially, but I think that everybody that was there was felt like that they were sort of like benefiting from Rizzo still having the idol at that point. I think that Sophie was like, okay, I guess if I can't beat him, join him. And then Jawan was like, hey, my guy has the idol. I don't want him to flush it.

So maybe other than Sage, I don't know if there was anybody left who still wanted to see Rizzo. flush the idol. So what is the game of chicken here? Because is this a game of chicken where like imagine so, so let me just make you clear. I understand what you're suggesting. You're suggesting that the majority say, hey, we want to get rid of MC anyway. But let's just vote for Rizzo. We're going to tell Rizzo and Savannah to vote for MC.

So we're best case scenario, Rizzo doesn't play his idol. He goes home. It would have to, yeah, Juan and Sage and, but then they would have to also assume that Savannah is not voting. So the only people that would be willing. to do that, I guess, or maybe tell MC also that you were going to, that you were going to do it.

So I guess MC, Sophie, it's back to the original plan. MC Sophie, Joanne and Sage are going to vote for Rizzo in that spot. And then Rizzo doesn't play his idol and then goes home. You still have sort of like the animosity between MC and Sophie.

The danger. Is Juan going to not tell Rizzo that you're going to do that? this is why votes at the final six or vote six people are so tricky because if you do something like that where you're telling different people to vote for different people, you have a Surrey situation. Surique and 321 you. Like what is you tipped off in that case? Let's say you, let's say you tipped off, you wanted to tip off Savannah and Rizzo that was not going to go down the way they wanted to. You want to tip off Rizzo to either play as idle or say, hey, there's an opportunity

here. You can pull together three. And if the other two, three, our split, it's a three, two, one. And then all of a sudden, anyone's on the table to go home. James Hall wants to know. Do fish know when it's raining? We've really teetered into Ask Dr. Hubicki territory. It's fair enough. Do fish know when it's raining?

I never heard that question. I never heard that question. I think they might. I think that they could tell from like sort of like the sun isn't out. Yeah, I mean, like, they have to be able to see, I mean, fish see, they would see the surface. I mean, like, they may not be able to internalize the concept of rain, but certainly the temperature of the rainwater is going to be different than like the rest of the water. So you're going to have that old temperature gradient that's going to come from the water coming in. And also, you can you can see the ripples.

They definitely have the visual acuity probably to see them. How they internalize that, they might only be relevant to how they experience the world. they're like, hey, it's colder up here. You know, I imagine they'd sense that. Got a question for you from Luke Bird, who says, what would you mutter to yourself if you had a chance to be in a challenge like this again? Oh, my goodness, mutter to yourself. Deli Meets, Deli Meets, DIY Deli.

But this was not a scenario where people weren't talking during this. They were in too much pain. missed opportunity, missed opportunity. This is one of the few challenges that makes sense to talk. Because a lot of these individual challenges that are somehow endurance-based, they're rarely pain-based, okay? Like that's the beautifully, the thing about the uncomfortable numb challenge is that it's not a balanced challenge.

It's not a, you're not holding a bucket of water over your head. You're not holding a thing on the end of a stick or whatever they do these days, right? You just got to get through the pain and just keep pushing. So, and there's no, and there's, and I guess you're against these things. There's probably not that hard to balance. So yeah, this probably would be a good thing for something like muttering through a challenge. I think it actually would be a good one. It's one of the few that actually might make sense.

I think uncomfortably numb is one of them. This is one of them. If they ever did a hand on a hard idol, that would be another one. But I don't know. Who knows if they would ever let it go on that long? Also, the one where you're under the, water and the water's coming in until the point where you're going to be gasp last gas until the point where the water's about to hit you right if you're starting to panic you want thing to

calm least me down would be to just keep talking okay how about is it better to have arches or flat feet that's from the great eric barger uh i mean arches uh feet are incredibly complicated in their bone structure. I know this only as a, I'm not an expert in, in the science, but I do know people who are. And like,

so I'm actually the, part of a large National Science Foundation grant for, what it's called the Institute for, the Integrative Movement Sciences Institute. It's about the science of movement.

I'm actually their outreach director. So we do all kinds of science outreach. And we have a lot, it's a consortium of faculty from all over the country who work on this thing. And when you have an arch in your feet, it adds a little bit of springiness to your gate. And like, because you're, you think of your foot is maybe just skin on than bone, but like your bones are deflecting and moving and there's tendons and there's

scratchiness that that actually is helpful for your gate. So when you're running, there's spring storage. It's something that it's very much relevant in human locomotion and humans going around but is very right now very underutilized in robot running right now there's fantastic humanoid robots coming out with robots are running but they're not built in a way that's structurally similar to the bone structure of people and they don't have things like that spring like like that springiness in their foot that you would get from an arch they really came down to it really great battle between savannah and yellow sophie and soph was in there some people were really so happy and so enjoying that challenge last night, that famous amazing race contestant

Rex Ryan tweeted, best challenge ever. Oh, who am I to question the wisdom of Rex Ryan? It was just so, so tense, so many close-ups of like the feet barely holding on. So he really loved it. I would never question it. I can't think of any challenge in the history of the show that was more dramatic than that. That's for sure.

I tell you, they did try to ring a lot of drama using the editing, right? Like they did like those fate. They did those dip to black effects. Yeah. And like, you know, if you, it was like, it wasn't edited very well. It was dramatic. Yeah.

It was a real show down. They really, I will say like the show really, like they don't, they're not lazy in the editing room. They're always looking for new, for, for new techniques. to make it more dramatic to the point where I'm like guys you could just take a little bit of a break in this scene like they're just walking into the challenge you can just you know let it play a little quiet I actually think it would be great I'm saying this is just what the heck do I know I just edit videos on YouTube every once in a while but like they're like on occasion one thing that's been very effective is silence on the show like we've talked about this in previous see in previous seasons that like like there's just it's just sad and then just the editors you're just let it play for silence when they come back to the camp that they have lost again. And so I hope that they use that, they dial up the variety in addition to their production values on the, on the effects.

Okay. Let's see. Any other questions for you? Let's see. Did you have any thoughts on the secret and the bite that Jake, the dry bite? The tribe, I was so confused by that. Like, at first I was like, oh, my God, this is so dangerous. This is a snake bites, it's been of a sea, but I mean, like, we can, and we've known this

from going back to Survivor 14, the original season in Fiji, you know, the snakes are misunderstood creatures. We have an understanding now how dangerous these sea snakes were that Earl was chopping them with a machete. I don't know exactly what, if that was a sea crate per se, but like, that was really dangerous. But I think I was like, I was surprised by like how it went from there. Like we got to see like him with the doctor and the doctor was like it became the reasoning. I was surprised that it ended up being about like, oh, he's emotionally not in the right place.

And I was like, oh, I would have been perfectly satisfied if he said, look, we don't know for sure if he's going to die. Let's pull him. And that's it. You know, I thought that because that was really dramatic when he got bit by a snake. I was really, like, I saw after that episode that your tribe mate, Pat Cusack, had posted about how that he was especially like reminded of like how traumatic it was to get pulled out of the game like that. I didn't see him say that, but I totally believe that.

I mean, he had just, I mean, Pat had just such a raw deal of the whole thing. It was, again, it was something that just happened in the moment. And then all of a sudden, you're on a helicopter off the island. And I think they put, I'm not sure, they did not helicopter Jake over to the other island. I think they put him on a boat. But like it, the, that, I mean, I was sitting next to Pat at the time. And when that happened, it is just terrifying for everyone involved. I really, I would be curious to hear from future players who, I didn't listen to their exit interviews or what they say.

Like, is this something that impacted their thinking weeks into the game? or is it something that happened and it was so long ago they had forgotten about it in the haze because that really was quite an ordeal. They announced season four of the White Lotus

is going to be filming in, I believe, in France. Is there any talk for your character to reprise your role in season four of the White Lotus? Well, nothing I would be able to disclose at this time

about the reprise of that character. But, you know, we'll see. I mean, the White Lotus is, an excellent show. I actually had a student come to my office the other day. And he said, and he said, yeah, I bumped you to the hallway. And I didn't know who you were at the time. I'm like, oh, okay.

It's like, who did you think I was? Like, I didn't know you knew Mike White. And I'm like, oh, okay. Yeah, it's like, yeah. And he gave me his review of the seasons. I'm like, I didn't ask for any of this. What are you here in my office for? Are you here to talk about your homework?

So you think there's a chance. Okay, keep an eye out for season four of the White Lotus. Speaking of fours, Corinne weighed in this week and said there's not enough hot people anymore on Survivor. Did you, in all of your mathematical formulas, have you done any work in rating the hotness over time of Survivor contestants? Well, of course not, Rob, but I think if I did, I would accidentally invent Facebook. so maybe made a few billion dollars. But so if I went that way, look,

you can make whatever arguments to want about this. But, you know, these, there's some attractive people on this season. I don't know. I wouldn't take a stand on that matter.

I value my life. What else have you been noticing from this season? Oh, my God. Corinne said drop the fours. Keep the tens. it's the new era oh my goodness i it's like it's um it is it is fascinating to me like it like it is it is reminding me a little bit of the structure of kagan of Cambodia i'm sorry i mean

like in terms of the number of swaps that they had or maybe it was that they have two i'm trying remember my goodness i'm starting to lose my my memory of these different seasons but like but i definitely swaps in cambodia yeah exactly they had two swaps in cambodia they had two swaps if i recall in game changers it reminds me of the early 30s when it was when they were really trying to dial up the twists to keep people on their toes that's when they started introducing extra votes steagull of votes right yeah um so it all started with dan foley got an advantage of i think that was at the auction that he had an extra vote in season 30 and really it was the first season of the 30s and it really did kick off the advantage era oh god so like it really did and you can read more about

that in the tribe and i have spoken by rob sister dino available for preorder now at rob has a book and you can buy my book escape it's about uh yes and i think you know i talk about you in this book oh now now i have to pick it up of course i mean i don't know how many men find out well i'll find out i mean look i have not heard i've been mentioned in escape so therefore you have that over stephen so there you know like so people that's true i mean i feel like the Christian Hubicki. Some would say that he was an old era five, but a new era eight. There we go.

There we go. That's a quote from Corinne, right? She wrote the forward. I feel the show is asymptotically going. I'll let you continue before I go back to a strategic talk about. What about the Hot Grim Reaper? Should the Grim Reaper be hot? I am, oh, here's a funny thing from the season

before I talk about anything about the overall structure of the seasons of the overall. But like, the people- The Carolina Reaper is very hot. I don't know if I had that. But I am enjoying my spicy foods. But there's- Corinne says it's a nine million Scoville.

That's how hot. Indeed. Indeed. I mean, like, but people, the Hot Grim Reaper, Hot Grim Reaper. So, like, I remember I was watching. I was like, there are people saying things in confessional that, like, again, people say things are confessional off the cuff and you don't expect them to be,

haunt you for the rest of your days. So I get it. But, like, I would never think to call myself hot. And I remember, like, Alex said, it's like, we're the lovable losers. And I'm thinking, like, would I call myself lovable on TV and just assume that, that about about myself? But in terms of the show format. It feels like the ground state of Survivor that things are kind of shuttling back to is the early 30s.

I feel like that and that's, I think when Jeff really had complete control over the creative elements of the show, I feel like that's what's going back to in terms of the choice. I mean, I think that's what it should be. And it has not been lost on me that Australian survivor like really seems to live in that world of a there's not a ton of. There are twists, certainly, but it really does sort of like live in a world of sort of like Kagyan era rules of survivor. That's basically sort of like late 20s, early 30s, and Australian survivor just lives there. And so they have sort of like wacky, non-elimination stuff and things like that. But it's like a general state of the rules, they sort of just live there.

And it's fine. We figured it out. Like that's what it should be. Yeah. And like I said before, I don't blame them for experimentings because you never know what you might find. And I think that people, you try a thing here, you try a thing there. And I think, but I feel like as they're trying these things, they are coming back to that era. I mean, the mergerary is no longer a thing, at least at least as of this season that we're watching. But I really think that was having more to do with the medical evacuation based off of like what Jeff had said on the on fire podcast about it. I think it was more an exception. I mean, maybe you know more than me. But I feel like that it was in, for four, as far as season 49 goes, I think had we got, had Jake not gotten bit by the snake, I think there would have been merchandise. Yeah. That's, I mean, that's interesting.

And I mean, but, but in terms of the twist, I'm actually surprised to see knowledge his power is back. Yes. I'm surprised by that. But they brought it back. They tried to bring it back last season for season 48. That was, Eva had a chance that she could have like doubled down and gone for it. So that Jeff seems like that he did want to bring it back. It had not been an active place in season 43.

Indeed. Yeah, that is, that is wild. I mean, because one thing we talked about in the past is how when you establish the breadth of uncertainty in terms of twists, you just by establishing that uncertainty, you can change how the game is played. I mean, Jesse is a great example. Yes, there was knowledge of power is that season, but it was the threat of knowledge of power, which allowed Jesse, to make that crazy move. That, oh, maybe there's knowledge is power. You should give me that idol to make me do crazy things.

But it is surprising to me that they are reinforcing that level of uncertainty. It's like, no, it really still can be in play. Let me ask you a question. This came up on the patron Q&A. A patron had asked me, I thought this was a great question. Do you think the unused advantage that MC did not go forward to go back to my original take of Nate had to die for the season to get exciting? Nate's like, hey, let's just.

just let's just not go for the advantage. Why don't we just like chill? And MC says, okay, fine, I'll do that. Was that knowledge is power that was hidden? Would that have been the advantage that MC would have gotten? Because I did think it was just odd how the, and we've seen before where groups win a reward and stumble into an advantage. But I wonder, had MC gotten the advantage,

Would that have been knowledge of power and would Sof not had gotten the knowledge of power sort of randomly for being on a tribe that wanted to reward? It's hard to know because like I'm sure that they have the way, not to put my finger on the scale. I would believe that I'm trying to think about what else it could have been because, I mean, like now that we have this menu, not to have advantage is not the literal advantage menu from 38, but like the like this like what what is it, what are the things that we have not seen in the season, which are now canonical advantages. There's a bank of vote, right?

It could be an extra vote. Extra vote is better than bank a vote. And it could be a steal vote, which is better than doing that. You know, we never saw again that Sarah Wade, I believe it was Sarah Wade, in terms of the last name, she got the inheritance advantage, which sounded very cool and interesting. She went out of the game with it, didn't play it. We never saw that at one again. what was what was the inheritance advantage it's not obviously it's not the legacy advantage i think it was like if you play it you get like any advantages that get played at that tribal council

i forgot about that is that a garbage collector yeah garbage collector advantage that is wild oh my goodness they like i i would have completely forgotten about that and i think that there's also like uh safety without power that's another one that they kind of dribble in there it's that's less exciting I feel than some of the other ones when they played. Probably best used when Saul played it on Rachel.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. A couple other things. How are you feeling about Uncle Jay, Uncle Jeff? We're making it happen.

This is what we're doing. I mean, like I feel like there are memes on the island that are funny to them that don't always play at home. I'm like, why is this Uncle Jeff? Maybe this is a cultural reference. I don't understand. Maybe this is a thing.

Do they say unc? Yeah, is that what they said? Yeah. Okay, maybe this is just a youth thing. Yeah, youth thing. Right. I think that like, I think that like Riz God could have called Nate Unk in Gen Z slang.

Oh, it's, oh, this is a pre-established Gen Z slang as Unk. Yeah. That's what you're saying. Yeah. Oh, okay. So I really think that this was first on Big Brother. I think that there was Auntie Julie came up. And then I think that it has, like, gone over.

I think that Star might have called Jeff Uncle JP in season 48. Not sure if that had been seen by the players who are calling Uncle Jeff and Uncle Jay. Yeah, I don't think that that the timeline makes a lot of sense there. But like, typically people will will play, will overplay response into the last scene. I think it's both things. I think that the uncle, the aunt, I do think that that is cultural. but onk, I think, is more of a generational. That's more of a Gen Z thing

of like a young person would say, call me unk. Well, lay it on, as people got to lay this harm me. I need to know these things because when I'm teaching my classes next semester, when I'm back from leave, I have to very cringially say them to my class

and so they can all snigger as me pretending to be culturally relevant. So I need these in my arsenal. Okay. All right. Anything else on your mind, Christian? I mean, I think that's, I think that's it. I mean, I, I, I am hopeful.

I feel like I always come on with you, Rob, right around the merge, and it's a fun time to talk. And I, and I, and always, for the most part, it's just like, it's at an inflection point of the season. Like, is it going to get like real good right now. Well, I think it certainly is an inflection point of the season. Yeah. And I think that that, so, so I'm hesitant to make, to make predictions.

They've always been really, really poor. I remember, I feel like one season I predict is like, oh, my God, they are perfectly set up to do a minority vote split next tribal council and it was just like a normal vote it never happened so i i'm giving up on the prediction game as to how the actual flow of the season will go but like i i think there's it could be exciting here okay well we've got so much excitement coming your way kathy vabrick o'brien the christian was a great warm-up act but we will talk with kv o coming up later on this weekend be on the lookout for that i'll have a patron q and a not to mention everything else here in your Survivor podcast feed

over at we know Survivor.com. I also covered a week two of Squid Game with Chappelle if you have a chance to put that one on. It's a fun watch always. Oh, indeed. So I got to check this out. Last time, the Squid Game, the challenge, I only liked some of it.

Hopefully this one will be even better. Yeah. Okay. What else is on your mind? Oh, man. So like I've been played, I should say. Am I plate? Well, so I've been trying to do the garbage plate of an advantage that I'm giving.

Sarah Wade got. I've been starting to put out more material to YouTube on robotics. And that's been a lot of fun, something I always wanted to do. And now that I'm tenured, I'm doing it. You can, so you can check me out there talking about a lot. If you're interested in a robot robotic stuff, I've been, I've, Rob, I finally did it. Why? I finally subscribed to Apple TV Plus.

Oh, okay. Is that, are you going to say what I think you're going to say? well well i'm not sure what you it could be one of two things i think you're gonna say i have not yet i'm on my plate i'm now gonna watch from all for all mankind like i promised i would i feel like you're already i think you're already covering it uh but which is fine but i had to because pluribus is out oh okay because yes okay i have not watch pluribus oh so like so i i am it's vin skiligan right vince gilligan i mean vince gilligan through better call saul has been one of the few show writers that i will have to just give him a shot at whatever it is he throws my way and the two first two episodes

of pleuribus are out i won't spoil anything uh i'll just give my impressions i was i was i'm glad they dropped the first two episodes because after the first episode i was like i don't know if i could watch this because it was really tripping over a lot of it's a it's a science fiction show that's all i'll say and um it was really tripping over a lot of the things i just these personal things that weird me out and i couldn't take it but by episode two i'm like i'm like i I'm all in. This is amazing. I have no idea what it's about. Should I just jump in? Yeah, I would just jump in. Every week. 100%. You're, you have, my phone is open to you always, Rob, as you know. Okay. All right.

Well, maybe we'll fall in love with it. Maybe we'll have to podcast about it. Look, if that's the case, I certainly would, it is interesting enough that I would actually want to talk about. At least so far, just from two episodes. All right. Is my wife going to like it? Ooh, does your life, life like sci-fi? I don't I well so she I would say likes fantasy not like that you sick people okay believe me not like that okay she likes Game of Thrones but she doesn't like Star Trek she doesn't mind Star Wars it takes place on earth is not a fantasy it takes place in modern day earth okay it's a science that's a science fiction premise it takes from that if you want we can talk offline I can give you

Some more information to let her let you know. Maybe I'll watch a little of the first episode and see what she's, but she does not necessarily love the, uh, the sci-fi, but I don't think she's a hater like that. The emotion that you, I get most out of this show is creepiness. Creepy. Oh, I don't know if she's going to like creepy. Okay, there you go.

Okay. Interesting but creepy. All right. Well, what else? Anything else coming up for you? Oh, I guess. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I'll be on Survivor 50 starting next next, next, you know, next year.

All right, that's good to know. I wasn't sure if I was going to watch it or not, but I will watch it because you're on it. Okay. So there's that. I feel like I have to say that. Like I'm talking about all these other stuff that I'm like, I'm doing on my own. I'm like, oh, yeah, also that's coming out. So yeah, you want to watch it?

You can watch it. Okay, we'll check it out. Will you watch the traders? Of course I'll watch the traders, Rob. Are you kidding me? Okay. Are you kidding me? Have you watched all of them?

Have you watched all the seasons? I've, I've watched all the seasons. I'm currently watching the Canadian one that Omer is on. Yes. Yes. So like it's a, no, it's a, I'm, of course I'm going to watch you on Traders. Are you kidding me? Okay.

It was the wildest thing. When I came back from my sabbatical, I finally get my phone and I see my, like, all of my YouTube feed is your face. Like, oh my God, you're on Traders. Yeah. What a surprise it must have been for. for you. No idea that I was going to do that.

So lovely. It was so lovely to see. Okay. All right. Thank you so much for joining us. This was a really, really fun podcast. I hope that the listeners enjoyed it, too. Let us know what you have to think in the comments.

I read them every day. Love to know what you think. Take care, everybody. Have a good one. Bye.