RHAP: We Know Survivor - Know-It-Alls: Survivor 50 Ep 4 Recap

Episode Date: March 22, 2026

Know-It-Alls: Survivor 50 Ep 4 Recap Survivor Know-It-Alls is back as Rob Cesternino and Stephen Fishbach break down all the latest moves, blindsides, and outrageous moments from Survivor 50. Today, Rob and Stephen break down Survivor 50 Episode 4. Rob Cesternino and Stephen Fishbach are back on Survivor Know-It-Alls to break down the chaos of Episode 4 of Survivor 50. This week’s tribe swap fractures old alliances, pushing a quiet pair into the spotlight and forcing players to adapt on the fly. Rob and Stephen analyze how the mix-up dismantles a core four, giving rise to a swing duo now courted by both sides. Their conversation explores the delicate balance these players face, showing their cards too early as the middle disappears. Play it right and they could gain serious power heading toward the merge. Key topics include: – The impact of the swap on tribal dynamics and shifting power structures– A messy challenge meltdown and how camp labor becomes late-game currency– The strategic dilemma of the Beware Advantage. Does sharing information build trust or risk a blindside?– Tribal whispers and backup plans, as decoy names redirect attention from real targets Rob and Stephen debate whether an idol is best used as leverage or protection, and whether the swing pair’s aggressive positioning will secure their spot or make them the next targets. They also question if transparency benefits the Beware Advantage holder or if secrecy sparks a pivotal move. As Survivor 50 heats up, the Know-It-Alls track who’s actively driving strategy and who’s simply along for the ride. 0:00 Survivor Know-It-Alls Return 6:45 Christian’s Move: Risk for Ozzy 12:12 Emily Flippen Trust Debated 20:00 David vs Goliath Trio Fallout 26:19 Pre-Merge Strategy: Drew’s Tweet 32:56 Christian’s Alliance Dilemma 36:46 Aubrey’s Idol: Vote Split Fears 44:46 Charlie Versus Rizgod Showdown 53:52 Aubrey’s Slow Start Again 56:46 Zac Brown Reward Critique 1:01:04 Fishy Award: Christian or Emily? To pre-order Rob’s book, The Tribe and I Have Spoken, visit www.robhasabook.com To order Stephen’s novel Escape!, visit stephenfishbach.com Never miss a minute of RHAP’s extensive Survivor coverage! LISTEN: Subscribe to the Survivor podcast feed WATCH:  Watch and subscribe to the podcast on YouTube SUPPORT:  Become a RHAP Patron for bonus content, access to Facebook and Discord groups plus more great perks!

The smartest guys around We're about to break it down Like they've won Actually, they didn't really win the game At all Survivor No It Alls are here And happy Sunday to you, Stephen Fishback. Oh my gosh, happy Sunday, Rob.

It's such a thrill. Survivor No It alls. No Sunday Skates. for anybody because we're here to kick off the new Survivor Week coming up, but we can't move on without spearing a fishy like Zach Brown. Spearing it from multiple sides. This fishy is going to be weighed down with expectations. Get your harpoon ready because we got to talk about this big episode this week.

Of course, Wednesday night had a great chat about it with Sam Phelan, who stepped in, talked about everything and we broke down a lot of this, but it was incomplete without your takes on everything. So we'll get into that. Plus, everything else we can expect coming up next week. Steven, how are you? I'm great. I mean, you know, I never like to come in at like a few days into the discourse because I feel like the things I'll be saying will already have been said or someone will have had a better idea. And I almost listened to the Sam podcast. And then I thought, know my ignorance is my strength. I have to go in, you know, as dumb as I always am. And so, but I am kind of curious what's, because Sam's a really bright guy. Yeah. I am kind of curious

what you know. Well, I never think you need to worry about that because I think that what you could always do is like respond to the discourse and add to the discourse. And then so you're more at risk of saying something that like did, did this already get said? So, you know, when you know what's already been said, then you can add to it. That's true. That's true. But, but then, you know, then your opinion, you're like colored by the takes. Yeah. Okay. All right. So we'll talk about all this. Of course, I also got the chance to speak to Mike White. Mike White and I got to chat for the first time in what?

Seven or eight years? And it was very positive. Were you nervous? I was nervous. I was nervous talking to Mike White because I felt like that, you know, the thing about Mike is that I do feel bad about that I got it wrong the first time through. And I felt like, okay, Mike White, he's not listening. We could take cheap shots. We can joke. Like, he's like on another level. And I'm down here.

He's up there. He's not listening to this. So, you know, I can tear him down and make fun. And he called me out on it. And it was a good lesson for me. And I do feel bad about it. But then I didn't want him to be like, oh, he's just kissing my ass because he's trying to get on the white lotus. Right.

I wouldn't object to being on the white lotus. But that's not what I'm trying to do. Yeah. No, I don't think you were kissing. You were not sucking kneecaps. I thought that it was a good, it was a good chat. But it's almost hard because that he's at such a station where, you know, I can't like make up for what's happened in the past without it feeling like, oh, well, he's just, you know, he has to be nice now. No.

I don't know. I thought you were totally appropriate. You know, you responded to the situation regardless of, you know, his enormous celebrity that could crush you like a bug. But crush me like a bug. And I try to, in these situations, not make it about me. Yeah. Yeah. No, that was great.

It was a great podcast. It was great, you know, hearing his perspective. And honestly, I'm very sympathetic to it. And I know that, like, Reddit is less sympathetic to the Mike White of it all. But, like, I have been in the situation where someone who I thought was a real life friend turned on me, I thought unnecessarily. Like, not like a day, what we used to call day 36, you know, but a day, whatever it was, day 20. 28. And I was really hurt by that because I was like, this didn't have to happen now. And so I absolutely get Mike's point of view and why he felt like, hey, my, like, this didn't need to

happen now. Like, this is like way too soon for this. I also see Christian's point of view from a strategic perspective. So I'm excited to talk about it all. Okay, great. Let's break this all down. And I guess I want to start with you in terms of the move that Christian made. And of course, It was a extremely beautiful, tactical move. No doubt about that. Was this the right move for Christian? I mean, even in terms of the beauty of its tactics, you know, I think you almost have to start

at the end of the episode, where the last words are, you know, Christian is leaving with Ozzy. Christian says, I'll catch you up. And Ozzy says, too late. Too late. What a great little, you know, little bit of dialogue. Mike Light himself couldn't have scripted that.

that would go at the end of a chapter. I mean, it was so perfect. Like, you know, like, how do you do better than that to, like, end a chapter of a book or, or an episode? It's so filled with both judgment on everything that's already happened and then, like, pushing into the next chapter. Like, I can't wait to see what happens. It's such a good little clip. You know, I really do like the way that you, just to stop down for a moment that you, especially coming from you, that you describe a survivor episode as a chapter. And I think that that's sort of the way that I've always described the Survivor season.

as opposed to a Big Brother season, which is just always on. Something's always happening. Like, there's no time to stop down. I think that the thing that has made Survivor to me always so conducive to podcasting is it is you open the book, you read the chapter and you close the book and you put it back on the shelf as opposed to, you know, all these binge models where you just don't get that where that's really where so much of the conversation lies in like, hey, what's going to happen next? And you know it was a good survivor episode, even though, you know, there were maybe some other issues with the episode, lowest rated by many, according to IMDB. But when it's, there is a forward moving action also coming out of like this was exciting, but also what's going to happen next? Can I just respond? So first of all, yes, I absolutely agree.

And like that, and that was always sort of what was so frustrating about when they had Redemption Island almost. you know, kind of like you had this, you always had this big cliffhanger, this big sort of like end moment with like the torch being snuffed and then this sense of like now you've got to go back and figure out the results of this. It was such a great iconic chapter end and then Redemption Island kind of weakened that and that was also one of the weaknesses of Richard Island. This was not, I mean, whatever, we'll talk about it later, but this was not the worst episode of Survivor. No, I know. People respond. Even from the fan perspective like, you know, there are horrific things that have like real world things that have happened on Survivor. Yeah.

We'll talk about Zach Brown later on. But let's just stay on this. the Christian of it all. So you feel like that the situation that Christian leaves himself in was maybe reason not to make this move? I'm just not sure that they had to do it leaving Ozzy out of the vote. Like that's my, I have a lot of questions and maybe you already, again, maybe. Try me. Try me. Try me. Okay. So my first question is, why not Stephanie? Yes. Okay. So this is a good question. A lot of people have asked us. I asked Mike White himself this very question because it was an unexplained answer from the show. And what Mike White said to me was that he looked at Stephanie and the way that she, you know,

handled her business, I guess with Q, was that she was, as Mike White said, he saw himself a very loyal player. And he didn't look at her as somebody that was going to be too flip-floppy about what she was going to be. Ironically, she told him one thing and ultimately did another. but he looked at her as sort of like a safe person to work with. And so that wasn't necessarily something. But I do think that Stephanie answers a lot of questions for everybody of like, what's the most

palatable decision that the most of us can agree on? It does seem like Stephanie would have been that answer. Yes. I mean, you've every reason to think she's like bitter from the queue vote and like, you know, doesn't have any particular loyalty to anybody else there. And, you know, Stephanie's played this game a few times. You know, she knows what's up. She's not some like, you know, babe in the woods here to be led around.

What flummoxed me about that first conversation, I mean, it just felt like this almost a comedy of errors where, you know, Angelina is the obvious next target. Everyone wants Angelina out. And then Mike sort of steps up and says, like, this is my friend. I'm not going to let that happen. He goes to Christian and says, like, what, we got to get out flipping. At least we don't see in the conversation with Christian, we don't see Christian pushing. back and saying, no, Christian, I mean, Emily's my buddy.

You know, like, Emily's my ally. Like, I guess like maybe later that kind of comes up. But like, it just felt like in that moment, Christian could have been like, no, I want, I can't be Emily. Like, I got to keep Emily. You know, you want to keep Angelina. I want to keep Emily. Let's find somebody else.

Oh, what about Stephanie. You know, it just felt like there was such an easy conversation that could have happened where Christian could have kept his relationship with Mike and Angelina. He could have kept Emily and not alienated Ozzie. Because I do think that issue of leaving someone. out of a vote is very hard to heal. Like, you have just done the thing. Like, there's very few ways to, like, really prove trust and loyalty on Survivor.

And, like, the way you vote at travel council and how you communicate that vote is really the sum total of it. And they didn't vote against Ozzy, but they left him out of the vote. And, I mean, there's this scene where, you know, that everyone is sort of, like, laughing at where Emily says, you know, Ozzie's coming over and Emily, you know, says, like, hey, they're targeting me now. And Kristen's doing the meme, you know, which is now a meme, I guess, like the zip. it meme. And all over Twitter, it's like, Emily can't keep her mouth shut. Oh, my God. Emily,

you're spoiling the plan. If I'm Emily, that's my move. Like, if I know people are coming from me and I have what is a really tight ally in Ozzie, right? We've seen a lot of scenes of Emily and Ozzie, like being tight. If I'm Emily, like, I don't want to leave Ozzie out of this vote. I want to bring Ozzy into it. You know, he's my ally. I don't want to alienate him. I also think like maybe he'll step up for me, you know, and we can we can work out something together. And I think I actually thought Emily played that very elegantly. You know, she like broached the subject as potentially she should have. And then when Christian freaked out about it, she like kind of like let it go.

She's like, you know what? It's not worth it to me to scuttle this plan, piss off Christian, who apparently is saving me. But like, how do I know Stephanie's voting with me? I would feel much more comfortable with Ozzy. I don't know. Like, what was your take on that scene? Yeah. So to me, that.

That gave away everything I need to know about Emily Flippin if I'm Christian. She's not with him. She's going to go right to Ozzy after this tribal council. She's going to spill the beans to Ozzy. It was all Christian. Emily doesn't care about Christian. She's not invested in him. And then that Christian is pouring resources into this relationship.

And I think that Emily does not look at it as seriously as Christian does. I think that Christian is trying to keep this a group that they put together that felt so good with Christian and Rick and Surrey. And he's trying to get back to it. But I think that maybe at that point, I think that maybe Christian should have reversed course and gone back with Mike and Angelina and voted out Emily at that tribal council. Because I think that Ozzie maybe is not even as upset about getting Emily voted out as he would be getting Mike voted out. Yeah. Oh, totally. Yes.

I agree with that. There's no loyalty there. And I think that just the way that she talks about her relationship with Ozzy in the game, she doesn't talk about her bond with Christian that way. And at the first moment of like, oh, he told me this right away, she completely spilled the beans and did the one thing that Christian told her not to do. So there's just there's, you can keep trusting Emily, but you're going to keep getting burned. And it's not even the same as like what was with Gabby

because Gabby was a great ally to Christian up until the point where Gabby's like, well, hey, I want to win the game too. Emily is not a good ally. And she's not going to keep working with Christian. She's going to keep throwing Christian under the bus. So I don't totally agree with that. I think that's more binary than I would have it.

I don't think it's like Emily's either with Christian or not with Christian. To me, like she can be with Christian and like respect him as an ally, but also see that like from her point of view, if she knows she's the target, it behooves her to, like, bring her other allies into that. Like, hey, like, to share information with her allies to, like, to, and to try to like, keep all of her allies on her same page, which like, yes, that's not Christian's perfect plan. But I think that is a better plan for Emily.

Now, I ultimately, I agree with you because I think the challenge for Christian is he, and I said this to him, like, before he went, specifically about Emily. I'm sorry, Emily. I didn't, I said, like, Emily's great. You know, she is a wonder, we love her. She's a wonderful friend. But Emily is a fundamentally a self-interested player. And Christian, like, this was my fear for him.

I was like, you are a lovely human. You are so loyal to your friends. And I think like that you can almost like get lost in that loyalty. And Emily is maybe a little more self-interested, you know, and will make choices. Again, like, I think the correct choice. Like, I know everyone is sort of like dumping on her on social. But like, I think this was the right move for her because I also think she like sort of backed off of it when when Christian was so mad about it. But like, this was my fear for Christian.

I mean, honestly, kind of what Mike is saying, you know. And obviously Christian reacted very badly to that. And he didn't like the sense that Mike was, you know, using Gabby against him or like this wound. And I think Christian, even from the very beginning of the season, you know, he said like, Mike is the expert at narrative warfare. Mike is the expert storyteller. I want to be that person. And so I think he's particularly both sensitive to Mike's role in it, but also wanting that for himself.

I think makes him more likely to want to vote out Mike. Like it's also I said kind of not to bring this back to me, but like what I said about Spencer in Cambodia, right? Like Spencer could have voted out Joe or he could have voted at me. Did Spencer want to be the challenge guy or did he want to be like the brains guy? So he voted out me so that he could fill that spot. And I wonder if part of why Christian wants to vote out Mike here is like he wants to be the narrative guy. And we've seen him, you know, even in that last tribal council where Jeff was like,

you just stepped on, you know, one of the great storytellers. you're replacing his metaphor with your metaphor. Like I do think like from Christian's perspective, like this is the thing I need to fix. It's like I got narratively screwed. Now I want to be the big storyteller. And maybe subconsciously part of that is getting rid of of the other storyteller. Now the thing we haven't talked about yet after this month. Can I respond to that quickly?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't think it's quite that Christian looks at Mike White as blocking his role that he wants to play in everything in the same way that maybe Spencer Ryman wanted to take your spot in everything. I do feel, though, that Christian never forgot that the reason he went home in David versus Goliath wasn't because of what Gabby did. That the reason he went home in David versus Glythe is because of what Mike White did and how

Mike White turned people against him and made that narrative against him. And so I do think that when people come back with other players from. their original season. And I don't believe you had that with anybody from token sheans and second chances. I do think that there is a little bit of like, hey, well, I'm going to get you this time. And I think that for Christian, it was just too rich of an opportunity to not only take out the person who nobody else sees is as dangerous as Christian sees. He knows just how deadly Mike White can be in this game. And then when Mike brings up the specter of Gabby, to me, it was like, well, how dare you there. How dare you? Like, that's not, that's, you know, that's you, you know, and to do it from like,

hey, I'm just looking out for you as a friend. I don't want to see this happen to you again. I think Christian was offended that that happened. And so when he has the chance to turn it back around on Mike White, I think there's just too many other factors that line up for Christian to make this too enticing to pass up. Yeah. And thank, by the way, thanks for correcting Spencer versus Ryman. Like I still, talking about the season, I'm in like Spencer mode, but obviously, I know that he's moved. Sure, sure, fine. That wasn't, yeah.

No, no, no, it was a good correction. But I agree with you. I mean, but there is this sort of idea that when players come back, they play the game of the winning player from their season. And obviously, Mike White didn't win David versus Goliath, but he was maybe the dominant strategist, ultimately. There's some, a lot suggests that maybe he could have won or would have won if he really wanted to.

and so I think that maybe Christian is in some ways, again, like wanting to play that game. And so I agree with you that there's also the sense of like he's really maybe more defensive about it too, where he sees it happening to him and becomes more indignant, even than he necessarily would have just with, if it was somebody else who brought up Gabby, right? And I don't know, do you think that, so you're saying that's not a fair comparison. You think Gabby is maybe, or is that a fair comparison?

Did Gabby to Emily Flippen? Yeah. I think they... In terms of how Christian is viewing that person. I don't think that he necessarily is viewing Emily and like, oh, first of all, I don't think he viewed Gabby as the person who sank his game. I think that he viewed Gabby as a person. And he even said in the episode, she and she had perfectly logical reasons for doing what

she did where they have a friendship. I think that Gabby has explained, hey, nobody was ever going to vote for me to win the game as long as you were there. I was always going to be in your shadow. I had to take you out. I had to have my resume move if I was going to win the game. So I think that Christian understands why Gabby felt compelled to ultimately take Christian out of the game. I just don't see that as the same story with Christian and Emily. I think that there are way more ways that Emily is going to tank Christian.

game. And I think that Mike White was correct about the conclusion, but I think that it was the wrong way to go about it was to bring Gabby into it. Yeah. Now, the one thing we haven't talked about, and maybe you guys have already talked about this, is this perception of the David versus Goliath three, where the fundamental issue, I think, for Christian in some ways is he's not just a part of this trio with Mike and Angelina. He's perceived to be a part of this trio. perhaps even more than he is a part of the trio, right? So there's this awareness of this trio, but Mike and Angelina are super close.

And like he's always going to be number three in that group. Yeah. He's going to be a huge target because of that trio and probably the biggest target, right? Because no one is going to target Angelina once you get closer to the end game because they have this perception of her, you know, fair or not as maybe someone you could take to the end and win and beat. And then nobody's going to target Mike because everyone wants the white. Lotus cameo. Yeah.

So who's, who's the big target in that trio? It's Christian who already went through a season as the biggest target out there. And like,

so getting rid of Mike really also like, if he's, you know, also like opens up a lot of options. And honestly, maybe even for Christian, I don't even think he was,

we certainly didn't see this articulated. But if Emily and Ozzie are going, getting close and this creates a wedge between Emily and Ozzie, this like separates him. from the David versus Goliath people. It brings Emily closer to him, and it creates a potential bond with Stephanie.

In some ways, it's a very, very elegant move. So the David versus Goliath three was a real lose-lose for Christian. Because if you listen to the preseason interviews, I know you didn't do too much of the preseason mother load that we dropped. But Christian wasn't necessarily so thrilled to work with Mike and Angelina. And I'm sure they're all that he's friendly with all of them. But Mike and specifically Angelino didn't seem like that, they were dying to work with Christian.

I think that Angelina even said about Christian, like, oh, we'll work with him for a while. You know, she wasn't really dying to like, hey, I want the final three to be, you know, subout Nick Wilson for Christian and let's run it back from season 37. And so for Christian, there was the threat level that you illustrated. And then also there wasn't necessarily the loyalty coming from them. He was the third wheel. And so his threat level was escalated. So I do think that he looked at this as an off ramp to potentially get out of being part of the David versus Goliath three.

I just hate the situation that he's in moving forward where pissed off Angelina, pissed off Ozzie, and his life is now in the hands of Emily. And I hope it's not coming across like I'm piling on Emily too much in terms of what she ends up in a better spot. I think ultimately, certainly like she's able to not get voted out. And then I do think that she's going to throw Christian under the bus to Ozzie. and I think she'll be set up once again in her classic Emily Flippin' swing vote position, which is ultimately kudos to her. She's getting what she wants.

But I don't like the prospects for Christian of in a five-person tribe with Angelina who's pissed, Ozzie who's pissed, and basically his only chance of moving forward is keeping a three of himself, Stephanie LaGroza, and Emily Flippin together for a vote. Yeah. But I think like enough people want Angelina out

where like they only need one more vote, right? Like, and then they're, then he's in an okay spot. Like, and if they can- Well, I think, I mean, well, how many people are left in the- I guess there's five in the tribe. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I guess we have no idea how many votes they're gonna have as a tribe together.

But I think they're gonna go to at least one. There's two tribes going to tribal council this week. So you feel like, okay, that this group- They're definitely gonna lose. They're gonna lose. This group, which is lost and lost, will most likely vote again. And I just hate the prospects of, like,

Like, I'm trying to tell myself, okay, well, maybe, maybe Christian can pull out the Rick Devin's fake immunity idol from tribal council. Maybe that's what he's going to need to save him. That would be cool. Wow. But honestly, like, I feel like he's got at least a buffer with Angelina, right? Like, nobody, like, we don't know. We know Ozzy doesn't particularly care for Angelina. Stephanie obviously has wanted Angelina out since the jump.

But Ozzy's pissed. I think Emily, he just saved Emily. So Ozzie's pissed, but he's not going to vote out Christian. piss off Emily further. He wanted Angelina. out so he could be closer to Mike White. And then he felt like that, hey, this is great. Me and Mike White are going to have this bond.

And this is going to be, I'm going to be Mike White's best friend. And then he took Mike White out of the game. And so that he's- But Ozzy's a smart enough player. Like, there's a trio that just voted together. He's not going to, like, jump ship to Angelina's group and then, like, go against, you know. And Emily, like, she's, you know, I hear you that she's not, like, necessarily going to, like, sink, sink, go down with a Christian ship.

But she's ultimately going to be with her ally. Like Christian just save her. Forget. Okay. So let's, we'll have it your way. Emily Flipping is suddenly super loyal to Christian. She'll be so appreciative. I have every guarantee that that's 100% going to happen.

Let's let's give you that. Okay. You think Stephanie Lagrosa is going to go down with this ship? Like if Ozzy and Angelina say, hey, we're voting out Christian tonight. Stephanie's like, fine. I don't care. But then on the other hand, you have Christian and Emily. you were saying, no, we're voting on Angelina. Stephanie wanted Angelina out from the go.

I think Angelina is like the much more obvious next target than Christian is here. Okay, we'll see. Okay. And especially because like, you know, there's at least some challenge upside. Like they really don't know how much they're going to be together. Like there's some challenge upside, right? Where is this to having Christian around in terms of like, you know, puzzles all this? Yeah.

I want to bring in, this is why this is fun to do this on Sunday. I want to bring in, Sam, could you bring up the Drew Bacil tweet? And I wanted to get your take on this. I thought this was pretty interesting. Drew posted to Twitter a couple of tweets talking about Survivor Strategy, particularly in the premurge. Drew says the Survivor premerge is like primary campaigning. Your goal, as you inch towards the merge, should be to amass as large a base of support

as possible, allies, connections, advantages. As a rule, the flashy premurge move is almost always the wrong. wrong one. Okay, let me have you address that and then and then we'll do part two of this. All right. Well, I mean, I generally agree with that idea for new player seasons. Like you want to sort of like, I mean, that's always been my attitude. It's like you keep around the people who are, you know, feel positively towards you or, you know, neutral towards you and you get rid of the people who are working against you. That seems like a pretty good baseline. You know, you obviously favor people you can trust over people you can't trust, you know, within that. So yeah, I mean, that's sort

of good and I agree like there's there's so much narrative these days on Survivor generally like I got to turn on my best ally you know in order to like set up my resume which is dumb in any we've talked about that a lot dumb in any context certainly dumb in the premurge we've seen people do that in the premerge and never works out for them I don't know never never as far as I can tell um that said and I'm sure maybe part two addresses this the uh returning player seasons there's a lot more going into it okay yes that is what he talks about on seasons like 50 where social dynamics are predetermined by one, pregame alliances and two, social media personas, it's far more difficult to assume rational decision making, making slash play from your opponents. To avoid these unknowns,

you should try to keep the game as stable as possible. I mean, in general, again, like as a rule, I think like stability in the game favors smart game players. Like, you know, the more, the less, the more you make things, and that was all, you know, more. You know, more. You know, more. we make things predictable for yourself, the easier it is to exert control, especially in a pretty chaotic game with constant twists and turns. I mean, but this doesn't take into, I mean, I guess it sort of takes into account, but like more just like other players' perceptions of you. Is that it? Is it just these two? I believe it's just these two. I think I think we're good with the, with the Drew tweet. So is, um, is that, is that an argument against Christians?

I think both of those were an argument against Christians move. Because the problem, I mean, So what should Christian have done then according to? What's the natural result of that? Is that that he should have voted out, Emily? I think vote out Emily or potentially get a consensus against Stephanie. I mean, Christians plan, these first three votes was, hey, we want a clean vote. We don't want anything flashy. We want to come back and have tribe cohesiveness.

It feels like this week he got away from that. Yeah. Again, like I just think the issue of the David. versus Goliath 3 is so dangerous to him that like, you know, the other thing that Drew's not talking about is people's perceptions of you. Well, I guess that's sort of like the social media put, you know, there's maybe a corollary to like pregame, you know, pregame alliances and the other people's perception of pregame alliances. But like you have, I think for Christian's point of view, liberating himself from the baggage of the David versus Goliath three definitely outweighs

eliminating an actual like real world friend slash ally in Emily. flip it. But was it a mistake to not break up the David versus Goliath 3 where perhaps he would have had less blood on his hands where there was a critical mass of people who wanted to vote out Angelina

after the first tribal council and instead he went along with the plan to vote out Q. Well, but if, you know, we're saying Mike White is this like dangerous mastermind, they vote out that mastermind's best ally who is not herself a threat and keep the

mastermind in the game super mad at you, you know, that everyone wants to please? I don't know if that's the optimal move. Fair enough. That's fair. Okay. Any other angle you want to explore from this whole fallout, Ozzie, Emily, Christian? Yeah, I mean, look, I'm ultimate, like my gut when I watched the episode was, why doesn't Christian just say Stephanie, right?

That sort of serves Drew's primary directives here. keeping the game stable, keeping as big a base of support as you could possibly have. You know, probably Ozzy goes along with that vote because he's tight with Emily and he's tight with Mike. And then you've got this group of five or five that is all relatively cohesive. The challenge, of course, there, too, is like what happens at the next vote? Who goes next? It's going to be Emily, right? So, like, if Christian is versus in this, like, so Christian then potentially, you know, loses Emily at the next vote. But also, you know, and then like still in the third of the David versus Goliath group,

Ozzy is tighter with them. Suddenly he's at the very bottom of this instead in the center of it. I ultimately, as many reservations as I have about it, I think this was the right move. Okay. Yeah. I just feel like that no matter what happens here, I feel like that Christian is coming away with this with a like real. target on his back from multiple people

who are going to be trying to come after him after this and I hate that for him. And I wish that he was in such a good position in that first tribe. I just feel like he's trying to chase it and keep that group together as much as possible

and reconnect at the merge and that he has visions of him and Rick and Surrey and Emily running things after the merge that I think even the whole idea of, hey, let's tell everybody that I gave Aubrey an idol was probably in, and this was like the root of these things, too much of a, hey, we have to try to do as much as we can to protect this group moving forward.

I just think he's too invested in this group. And just like Tyson in Survivor, Blood versus Water, where he ends up going to a different swap tribe. And he's like, okay, well, you know, forget Aris here. This is the group that works for me in this new tribe. I think Christian is still too much playing the game of his first tribe. Yeah, I hear you. But like truly, like, I think that's a really astute read of, you know, what's going on here.

But truly, what happens at the next vote? Emily, right? Let's say that because you have to be presuming there's going to be a next vote, right? You've already lost, you already lost a cue here, who was the biggest guy in the group. Now you're going to, I mean, whatever, like, Emily's not necessarily like the challenge beast. But like, you have to assume there's going to be a next vote. lose Emily. So now Christian's got a tribe of him, Mike, Angelina, Ozzie, and Emily. Emily's going home next, right? So then it's him, Mike, Angelina, Ozzie. He's in the bottom of that group.

So fair points. I'll say that if there's a scenario where Emily does vote with Christian at the next thing, at the next vote, perhaps it's also the same thing that saved Emily on this vote where there's maybe a feeling of, okay, Rick Devons is going to say to me, hey, Christian, why did you vote out Emily? She was with us. Saria is going to say, why did you vote out Emily? And if anything saves Christian at this next vote, maybe Emily is going to say like, hey, I'm going to go to the merge. Rick Devons is going to be pissed that I voted out Christian here. I'm going to say I didn't have a choice. Or Surrey, I voted out Christian from our group to keep, you know, well, yes, I wanted to keep Ozzy happy, but we kept in Angelina for this. So maybe that there's some thought of,

Like there are other people in the game that there are other stakeholders who will be upset if we don't do this. I don't see. And I don't believe the premise that Emily is this like total mess of a player. Like I have seen Emily play these strategy games. I understand that clock tower is very different than Survivor. But she is real, real good. You know her much better than me. And she plays like a messy chaotic game.

But she does very well. And again, like I think her trying to bring in Ozzy, like my biggest complaint with Christians move is that he didn't bring in Ozzie. Like to me, that's where this went wrong. Like, why not? just have the conversation with Ozzie and being like, this is what's going to happen. You don't want to be part of a split vote. Like, you got to get on board with this. Emily tried to do that.

Yeah, I was just want to put a finer point on what I'm saying. At no point have I said that Emily is not a good player. What I'm saying is that you cannot bank on Emily. Like, if your life is on the line, you do not want your life in the hands of Emily flipping. Yeah, I agree with that because like she's going to make the rash. She's going to make the self-interested move for herself. in that moment. And I think that's what makes her so sharky and an incredible player.

And also, you know, I mean, again, like, I thought Mike's point was very good. And I'm sorry. Like,

I know that it, like, pissed off Christian. And I, I see why it pissed off Christian. But I do think there is some element. Like, Christians is like an incredibly like loyal, wonderful human.

And he wants to like stick up for his buddies. And, you know, and again, like, I understand two mics, Mike's, the pain, the pain for Mike here.

It happened to me. Why, why now? Like, this is like, we've been on a tribe for two days. Like, why do you have to do this now? Like, there's plenty of game left.

I totally get that. Like, I really felt that acutely. And, but I ultimately, I think I do, I would, I do. It's a game of choices, right? Like, it's a different bad choices for Christian, essentially. And I think, like, among the bad options for him, I think this was probably the best bad option. Although, again, like, I do think kind of getting rid of Stephanie would have been maybe even better.

But who's to say? I want to start to look ahead. This week we're going to have two tribal councils and so that we have not spent as much time strategically with the other two tribes. But in those other two tribes, we have two very interesting riffs that have been highlighted by the show and two riffs that share that one person in the group has the hidden immunity idol. The person who seems to be the most likely person to get voted out also has a Billy I. Irish boomerang idol. So I'd love to just talk through those two situations with you and sort of maybe give a little bit of a preview as to what we might see if one of these groups goes to tribal council. Let's start with Genevieve and Aubrey, where this has really been the story

for both of these characters as really going back to episode one, there's something off between Genevieve and Aubrey and then it seemed like Aubrey had an idol. Genevieve went through her bag. And then it turns out Genevieve is finding idols, also searching Aubrey's bag. but then doesn't find anything, but Aubrey does have the Billy Elish boomerang idol. It does seem as though Genevieve has the numbers to put the votes on Aubrey this week. Aubrey does seem to know that Genevieve is coming for her.

Stephen, how concerned are you that Genevieve finder of two Billy Elish boomerang idols could herself be boomeranged out of the game when Aubrey plays one of said boomerang idols? knocking Genevieve out of the game. It's so crazy. Literally she's found, can you imagine, like someone who's found two idols

being idled out by someone who's found zero idols? But, like, it's kind of what I like. I mean, does that make the boom ring idol a better or a worse twist? Obviously, like, you have less, it's not, because it's not like randomly being assigned to the recipient, right?

Like, it's tactically being assigned to the recipient. And so, like, I'm really on the fence. Like, it would be so tragic for Genevieve, who truly is, like, apparently like an idol-finding bloodhound to be idled out by Aubrey who was literally gifted this idol. Yeah. But there's something very elegant.

I mean, something like that I like as a mechanical element to and the chaos component of it. How do you feel about it just generally as mechanics? I had not had a problem, but I do feel like that people will be upset if Genevieve, who has found two idols, has nothing to show for it. And then ultimately. And is in a much better socially position on the tribe. Yeah.

It's done everything right so far. And then to ultimately be. idled out of the game does feel a bit unfair. I mean, I think you could sell, if you really want to get into it, say like, for off socially that she made Aubrey feel some type of way and Aubrey wouldn't have written her name down if Genevieve had played an even better social game. So you could certainly make the argument, but it doesn't feel not right. Tiffany, we saw, is a loyal Aubrey friend for now.

Yeah. Has Tiffany done enough to show the. rest of the group that she's such an Aubrey loyalist where has she put herself in the position where we could see, and I'm trying to think, how many people, is it six? Could we see potentially a vote split in this tribe, potentially where Tiffany ends up being the person who goes out due to a vote split on Aubrey? Oh, interesting. They're just because they have searched her bag. They know about the boomerang idols. So there's a world right where they split the vote. Tiffany goes out and Aubrey keeps herself in the game from the idol. Wow, that would be,

that's a really interesting scenario. So let me just say, but they don't know Tiffany's on Aubrey's team, though. Is it, no, or do they have seven? So I think that they actually may have seven in this group. So this group is, and this is the group that went to go see Zach Brown, Genevieve, Tiffany, Chrissy. Then they have Joe, coach, Colby. is it is a yeah is there anybody else that I'm missing

Joe Joe Coach Colby I've got I've got a little Genoves Chrissy Genevieve Aubrey Tiffany so four women Joe Joe Colby coach and then Chrissy Tiffany Aubrey Genevieve yeah

yes okay so there's seven so you could do you know put three on Aubrey two on Tiffany yeah but again like we don't they don't necessarily know they don't know

is on Aubrey side So, you know, Genevieve went to Tiffany said, like, we got to get out to Aubrey. Tiffany's like, great. I'm with you. And then, like, we go to Aubrey. But, like, they don't know she went to Aubrey. But Tiffany easily just like may not be as much in the alliances of, you know, the Joe coach Colby. Like, she could not necessarily be a seen as such an Aubrey loyalist, but could you just be seen as, okay, she is just the other person that's on the bottom.

Not necessarily that she's so tight. Yeah. We're just going to put them on. put them on. Although they also might feel, I mean, speaking of Drew's strategy advice, Drew was very against splitting the votes, right? So they might just be like, let's pile votes on Aubrey. We'll tell Aubrey the plan is Tiffany. Yeah. And if Aubrey happens to play an idol, then it's Tiffany who goes home. But there's so much smoke on Aubrey having an idol to the point where they already searched her bag. Does that change the calculus for splitting the vote?

Well, I'm just saying, like, if they know or if they think they know who Aubrey's voting for, They might not care. And even if they know Aubrey's voting for Genevieve, they might not care, right? Because she's not a part of that core group necessarily. Like, you know, Genevieve was with Colby at the, you know, on original VATU. But they still might be willing to lose, like take the risk that there is an idol and lose Genevieve. was braiding coach's hair. And if you go back to, you know, elite survivor social game players, Sarah Lassina, I believe, was she,

braiding Tyson's hair way back when. So, you know, you see somebody braiding hair of a survivor tocha chin's that, no, you're making like Oh, no, no, that's interesting. Yeah, no, I'm just wasn't there a thing with like Laura Morrette though, where she was like, I don't know, giving massages or something and people were

like, like, that's too much. She's playing too hard. I do feel like that way. She was giving them, R.S. a massage. When women are braiding, you're letting, you know, a woman braid your hair. Like, I feel like that that is like, that person's playing a good social game. Okay. All right. I guess that's like as close as you can get. It's just like so it's real

animus. Yeah. Yeah. Physical, human. Yeah. That's fair. That's fair. They might, but again, like we just don't, you know, we don't know that they, that they're not close with Tiffany. We know so little about them, but we know they love Zach Brown. Yes. Okay. Is it possible that Chrissy could be a recipient of the vote split? I don't think so. I think Chrissy and Coach are legitimately tight. I feel like coach is going to rep for Chrissy there. And coach is a big voice in that tribe. I think like that he's, you know, I think that he's going to be decisive in, and who goes home. Yeah. Do you think that we will have two distinct tribal councils? I know we need to start getting rid of people. Is it possible, though, that we have maybe with the merge looming in the following week,

or at least a mergerary looming in the following episode? Is it possible that we could have like a Malcolm-esque double tribal council, two tribes going to tribal council, only voting off one person? Oh, no, I mean, they got to get rid of. start getting rid of people in this giant season. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right.

Let's look at it from the Charlie and Rizzo. I think this is actually a lot more unclear, where it does seem as though where everybody is talking about Aubrey. We've seen Genevieve really go to work on Aubrey. Here, we have seen a very one-sided feud between Charlie and Rizgod, where Charlie has called Rizzo, his mortal enemy. but we really don't know if Charlie has the numbers to be able to take a shot at Rizzo, who also similarly has the idol and could potentially idle Charlie out of the game.

So in this tribe, we have Rizzo, Charlie, Jonathan, Rick Devons, right? And then Saree, Camilla, and D. I believe is this tribe. That's right. Okay. Yeah. And, you know, if we're going at all by original groups, groups, Charlie, D, Jonathan, and Camilla were all together on original Kalo.

Rick and Surrey were on original Sela, and Rizzo is the sole member of Vatu. Mm-hmm. Okay. So do you feel like that the group of D. Camilla, Charlie, and Jonathan are tight enough that they will stick together and potentially go after Rizzo? Well, I mean, Rizzo did win the talent show. So he's obviously, like, accruing a lot. of, you know, a lot of goodwill.

I saw on Reddit someone making this comparison between Rizzo and Charlie as kind of being sort of like mirror images of each other. And they do kind of have, what? Well, they're both like, you know, or sort of like warped versions of each other or like like sibling. You know, there's something very similar about them, right? They both played. They're both kind of fit the same archetype.

You know, Charlie's the sort of like competent older brother and Rizzo's. sort of like the goofy youngster. But like they also sort of played like inverse games to each other. I mean, in this thread on Reddit, you know, he talked about the difference in their backgrounds. Rizzo talks a lot about being the child of immigrants coming from a really working class background. You know, Charlie leads with being like, you know, I have, I have so much privilege.

I'm, I'm a Harvard lawyer. You know, Charlie plays a very understated game, you know, exerts control that way. Rizzo is like much more flamboyant. So like while they like they kind of have a sibling-esque like, vibe to them in the sense that they're both the sort of same archetype. They're sort of like opposite versions of that in a way that I find really fun. That's interesting to get them compared that way. The one way that I think that's really fun to look at these two is that Rizzo, his whole thing in

Survivor 49 was he went to a lot of tribal councils, showed his idol, didn't play it, live to tell the tale. Charlie went to a lot of tribal councils in Survivor 46, voted out people who had idols and didn't play them. That's funny. That's a great comparison. So that's really, I think, what makes this a very fascinating matchup where Rizzo, Charlie's favorite thing in the world to do is vote somebody out who has an idol.

And so this could be what boomerangs the idol, unbeknownst to, and Charlie doesn't know that Rizzo has, he didn't always know in Survivor 46, but Charlie doesn't know Rizzo has the idol, but that could be what boomerangs the idol back to Genevieve. Was that an off-the-cuff observation? That was fantastic. This came up, I believe, in the patron call on Friday. That's great. Let me ask you this question where, and we assume that the Christian tribe is going to be

going to tribal council, but in the order of operations, okay, if let's say the Charlie Rizzo group goes to tribal council first, Rizzo gets blindsided at. the tribal council. Does Genevieve then before her tribal council begins, would she get the Billy Elish Boomerang Idol where could she come into tribal council with the idol that gets received at the first tribal council? Maybe they'd have to let the second group watch the first tribal council. And then like a producer's like, hey, Genevieve, Genevieve, get in here.

Jeff's like You know they grab Idol from Rizzo Jeff throws it to Genevieve But wouldn't that be interesting I mean probably zero percent Chance this happens Because you would imagine

The Christian group is gonna be in there Yeah Yeah But that's a really fun I love that I wonder if they thought through it at all Like you know I mean sometimes they put these things

You know they're not necessarily like working out The finest details of these mechanics I do wonder if they thought through like that There's probably they never thought it would happen in actuality like that way, but I'm sure, like, once they realize, oh, okay, we've got two groups going to tribal council. And even if it's like just arbitrary, I think they would have the Charlie, or maybe they would put the second tribal council first to make it so they didn't have to deal with

those logistics. Yeah, but I mean, what a great, I mean, what great, you know, how fun would that be? A little interesting thing to watch for Wednesday night. Okay. For Rizzo's perspective, is there any chance that he could get out of this? Are we just assuming too much of like, okay, it's a little Brant Steele to say, okay, well, D, Camilla, Jonathan Jarley, they were on the same starting tribe, so they're going to vote together. Yeah. And especially in this group.

I mean, yeah, I think Rizzo absolutely could get out of it. I mean, Rizzo is super good at, you know, brandishing an idol. Also, nobody's seen him play that way. So, you know, it's not like these people have seen him do that brinksmanship before. Yeah. So if he does it now, like, it's very likely that they might be a little more cautious. about it than they would have they seen his season. Yeah.

One thing we didn't talk about, by the way, vis-a-vis this Charlie Rizzo, and I do think this has become conventional wisdom now, but when we were talking about it last week, was it last week? Good Lord. Was that the live show? Yep. It feels like a lifetime ago. Was that, you know, we were like, why did Rizzo say he liked Sophie, but then voted for

Savannah? Of course, at the time we were, you know, still processing. But, he and Savannah obviously had played down their relationship. He can't then go back and be like, actually Savannah was my number one ally. I was lying to you this whole time. So he kind of like is in this weird position. He paid to himself in the corner. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, he did it. I think he did it as well as he could have. But it does make sense. He should have said, hey, we're not allowed to talk about Survivor 49. They told me I couldn't talk about it. I wish I could tell you. It's going to be a really good.

Nobody's ever going to say it sucks. It was a really good season and everybody's going to love it so much. But they told me I can't talk about it. I kind of feel like, you know, Charlie's in the good grace. Charlie's so charming. I mean, Rizzo obviously is so charming as well, but I feel like Charlie's got more in the good graces. Although, again, like he did lose the fight. I thought, you know, that Mickey, I mean, the Mickey Mouse was good.

But as I noted on Twitter, he says, it's a me, Mickey Mouse? Like, who are you? Who are you? What is this impersonation of? It's a me? Yeah. I would say. Maybe Mickey Mouse Alini.

Yeah. So for Riz God, he's just in such a tough position. where not only does nobody know him, he's the only person now from his season. Savannah is gone. So is the only person from Survivor 49. He's a complete unknown. He comes in and then is also the only person on this new tribe from his old tribe. So the only people that knew him are also not here.

So he's always just starting over by his lonesome. I do wonder maybe if there's a thought, if there's any saving grace, they're like, he has nobody. But it also that that also makes it like, okay, well, I could pick him up. Or does it, they say, like, well, nobody will be mad if we vote him out, as opposed to taking out anybody else. They're going to have friends on the other tribes. I think it's more the former that people are going to be like,

his one ally is gone. He doesn't know any of us. He hasn't had time to meet Mingle. You know, they've all seen Charlie play, right? Charlie is, they know he's real good at the game. You know, he's got other people, you know, Tiffany's still in the game. They were on 46 together. So I would be more worried, just like,

about Charlie than about Rizzo. And again, like, I think Charlie could get out of the game. So he could. Yeah. Or just like kind of like bluffed out of the game. Again, like they haven't seen the Rizzo Bluff magic work yet. Mm-hmm. Wow.

So would there be any sort of poetry in Charlie who is blinded by rage of I need to, I have this vendetta against Rizzo because he did the type of thing that I'm mad at Maria for doing. and that that drives him to lead a vote against Rizzo, which causes Rizzo play his idol and take out Charlie. It's such great storytelling that they really lean in to the way that everybody is sort of trying to fix the traumas from their first season. I mean, that was obviously Christian's narrative so much this one.

And then, you know, Charlie's two here a little bit. Yeah, I do think that there's so much interesting scar tissue from the players that we've been able to explore in this season. And I really do think it's just such a great, reason to keep bringing these players back and exploring this because it's so much more fun than exploring their other traumas from their life that we don't. Oh, I had, you know, I had, you know, blah, blah, blah, and that changed my life. And sure, like, it's a nice story, but it doesn't give us the payoff that these other survivor wounds have. Yeah. And we should talk, I want to talk a little

bit more about Aubrey because I have been really surprised by what the game she is playing. She's, you know, every time she's played, she had a rough start, right? For sure in Survivor Co-Rong. But she's always been like right in the mix. And it's been interesting to see. Sam brought this up on the podcast on Wednesday that she has always been a slow starter. I think that maybe the best start she got off on was the edge of extinction and it was like sort of like a sugar rush because then everybody started comparing notes and it ended

up going but sour. Was she also a slow starter and game changers? Yes, that she was on the bottom famously that Sandra like really like iced her out. Oh, right. Yeah. I mean, I do think there's something to that. I saw this great interview that Kelly Wentworth did with Phil on the Survivor Specialist where she was like, you know, like when I, talking about her own third time out and really

resonated for me for my second time of like, you go out there, you think like, oh, I'm going to have so much fun. I'm going to go play. It's going to be awesome. And then everyone's literally, you know, suddenly for just bad luck, you're on the bottom of your tribe. Everyone's out to get you. There's all the cool kids are hanging out. You hear your name coming up all the time.

It's hard to feel like you're having fun. It's hard to be gregarious. It's hard to be your best self in these conditions where like naturally you're being worn down. And you sort of like get to your weakest worst self. And I do feel like that's happening a little to Aubrey. And I do kind of feel like if she gets to connect with some of those other people who want to play with her, you know, if she gets to, you know, connect with Christian. If she gets to like connect with,

you know, Ceree, who she obviously played very closely with and game changers, I think that could be really, like totally changed the game she gets to play. Yeah,

one ally, that's really all she needs is like, you kind of just need like a little bit, a little bit, just like someone to like buoy you up, like feel like, okay, I'm a part of something here.

Versus like, it really does suck to just all, to just constantly feel like you're on the outs of this thing. And you really like, and maybe for high school nerds more than anybody, it just like takes you back. You know,

you just like instantly go. I was like, How I'm like a, when I went back my second time, I was like a corporate executive. I had like a whole team of people under me. And then I'm like, how have I become this like anxious nerd in the cafeteria? Like not sure where I should sit and it happened instantaneously. It is really remarkable the way the game kind of like brings that out of you. Let's talk about Zach Brown and the reward because we hadn't get your thoughts on it.

I mentioned how on IMDB it became the lowest rated episode of Survivor of all time. But that's the thing that happens where people just rating bomb the IMDB ratings for things. Hopefully, it never happens on escape. Don't even put that out there. We edit the Sam. Sam, edit this out. No. They don't have a rating on MDB.

Give great, go rate escape fives, fives, fives, in order to, you know, to stop this, this horrible thing that Rob is as like birthed into the universe. And if you want to, you know, review bomb someone that tribe and I, have spoken, you know, coming out in May. No, don't, please don't review on either of us. Five stars only, please. Five stars only. Yes.

And five stars. You know, and if you really, really hated my book, four stars is fine. Fine. Yeah. The, the, I will say that it's an hour and a half episode. You know, they gave us the extra half hour. So if they want to squander it, that's, it was not, it was not my favorite segment. CBS, give it, CBS take it the way.

Who would be your Zach Brown? Who would be your, who has, who has? written the soundtrack? Arcade Fire has written the soundtrack to your life? I don't know. I was just listening to them this morning. Like, you know, I feel like if that, if they came out, I'll be like, yeah, let's go. Let's like, let's do three songs, Arcade Fire. You know, one is not, two is not enough. What's the number one arcade fire song? Oh, I mean, like, Mountains Beyond Mountains is such a classic.

Okay. I think that was from their first album or a sec. I don't know. Anyway, one of the early albums, but, you know, I was, whatever, I was like such a, you know, your normie Brooklyn hipster. So what you would say is. that arcade fire represents your life? This is why you're the best. This is why you're the king, Rob. That's so good.

Just off the cuff. Yeah. That didn't come up in the patron cast. No, that's new. Yeah. So, this was new because Survivor has tried something here. And I think we can, as the Survivor know at all's, like we can workshop what worked and didn't work here.

Okay. So we have a celebrity. they come out, this is probably more specific to Zach Brown, but he's going to catch a fish, cook it for them, and then play some music. But you could see maybe a world

where either a different musical artist or celebrity comes out, performs, hangs out with the tribe. Would you like to see more of this? You know what? I thought it was cool. I actually liked, I mean, I don't really know,

Zach Brown, I enjoyed listening to those songs. And I didn't like, would I have rather had strategy? Yes. But, you know, it felt like those songs could have almost been a backdrop to a strategy scene, you know, or like to a tribal council scene. Like, I almost wish they had like intercut it in a way, you know, where like you've got Zach Brown singing. And, you know, it almost felt like it could be the lead into tribal council.

Like, oh, you know, these tough venturers are going in alone, you know, and each of them has to make a choice or they'll never come home to their mamas, you know, like it felt like It could be like a country song, right? You know, it felt like if we got the singing but also got it as part of the episode, it kind of might have been a nice little, instead of like him singing and they're all sitting there. And they're like, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I would not be opposed to like them trying this with a deal. So I think a lot of people just were like not country music people, not Zach Brown people. And so I think that they may, but might have been just out from jump. But hypothetically, if Billy Elish showed up and, like, performed at the sanctuary, I think that maybe the fans might have had a different reaction or somebody who, and don't ask me for the right pop culture person who comes in and that everybody's going to be excited to see them. But if the K-pop demon hunters showed up, you know, what would, like, what would it be if it was like a different artist that maybe was a little bit more with, like,

the people who are complaining the most if they ended up finding somebody who was a little bit more celebrated. Yeah. Who's your number? Who would be your arcade five? Well, I said it would be Billy Joel and people said, oh, Rob, what are you 100 years old? That's great, though. I mean, if Billy Joel came out, I mean, you know, and Piano Man, like, plays them into tribal council? Oh, my God.

Cinema. It would be great, but he's not going to spearfish anything for you. I didn't love the spearfishing because it was like so high tech. It's on this like yacht. You know, he's got this like super spear that looks like it's like a military piece of equipment. It felt like counter to the survivor ethos.

It's like if he had gone out there with like the flippers and the Hawaiian sling, I'd be like, this is. Yeah. Yeah, this is cool. But ultimately the main complaint that I read seemed to be just how long it was. Which I sort of agreed. So it felt long. I checked the runtime.

It was about 11 minutes of running. time from when we go to the sanctuary with Zach Brown. Zach Brown, I think, now has more confessionals than Tiffany also this season, thanks to the Survivor Fact Checker for putting that together. So it was like a lot of Zach Brown. People felt like that, okay, it was too many songs. I just think that, like, it was too passive for the players. I think that I understand why you want to have him at the sanctuary.

But I do think that when Christy's like, oh, you should come back to our camp, I do think that there would have been more opportunities for fun. is Zach Brown goes back to camp with them and then goes, it's like, oh, this is where you live? This is like, you know. And like even if they're like strategizing, they're like,

hey, Chrissy and I aren't and all, you know, like, they kind of like loop him into it. And he's like, oh, I don't like that. You know, I saw him on his season. You know, that could, I mean, maybe that would have like violated

the sanctity of the, of the show. But it just seemed weird that if you're going to have a mega country star come out on Survivor, you know, it's right there. Like how, how do we not have Chase Rice? You know? The fans voted for no rice.

This is why you're the king. I'm doing best stuff. I'm doing it. I already said that joke. But yeah, I wonder if they even put the ask out. Yeah. I mean, it sounds like no. Jeff kept saying Zach Brown came to us.

Like as though like any celebrity who comes and is like, I'd like to do a shake on that. This was his idea. He thought of this. His idea. He loved, Zach Brown loves sphere for sphere version. It's like Anthony Jezelneck was like, I'd like to do a set on Survivor. And let me like roast all of the contestants. That might be fun.

That might be, that would be like a little on. You know, that could be like you could drive strategy. As Survivor goes into the 50s, maybe we'll see more of the celebrities coming out and doing. Don't put that out there. You and these cursed ideas today. Okay. All right. Stephen.

Could we find out finally after days of speculation, who won this week's Fishing? Oh, gosh. Well, we've talked through the strategy endlessly. And I do think that I'm still inclined to give it to Christian, even as I think it's like a flawed move. But like, tell me who you think. Who played the best? Who deserves the fishy from your point of view here?

You know, I think that just from a technical standpoint, I think there's a strong case to be made for Christian. I just really don't like the situation that he ends up in. I think actually, you have made a compelling case to me today that maybe Emily Flippin should be deserving of the fishy. I mean, my issue has been that I, if, as somebody who is like a very invested in Christian,

I don't like the position. I'm like the Mike White. Like, Christian, I just don't want to see her ruin your game. But I think that Christian is putting too much stock in Emily. But I think that Emily comes away from this tribal council, like in an incredible position where that for whatever reason, even after everything she did last week, Christian feels compelled enough to go to bat to save her.

I do think that she's going to have a ton of options coming into this next tribal council. I think that she is set up extremely well to be the swing vote moving forward. And I think that she is not necessarily like on an amazing trajectory for the game, but I kind of like her positioning moving forward better than Christians. And I do like how she played that brief interaction we saw. I mean, you know, we see so much of this from Mike's perspective and Christian's perspective. But I really did like the way she played that thing where she told Ozzy, she's like, I think it's completely reasonable for her to try to bring in this person she's been recruiting as an ally into a seminal vote when she's the target.

I thought she was reasonable for her to try to do that. And I thought it was good for her to the way she backed off when Christian reacted that way. Was that intentional? Was that, did she do that? No. And this, maybe this is Galaxy Brain. Did she do that in front of Christian, knowing that Christian would shut it down so that she could have the plausible deniability to go to Ozzie later on in the night and say, Chris, I tried to tell you Christian wouldn't let me. That's funny.

I don't think, I think she did it in front of Christian because she didn't want to piss off Christian. You know, like, well, you were right there when I told Ozzy Christian. You could have said something. You know, like, I think she could have pulled Ozzie aside and been like, hey, they're coming for me. And then they gets back to Christian and then Christian's mad. but if she does it with Christian right there, then she's like, oh, look, we were all in the same room. You know, like we were all just chatting.

Like I said it. You were there. It blows up and she backs off. I think that part maybe was deliberate. I don't think she was trying to like set up Christian that way. But I do kind of like, I mean, I really came into this thinking I was going to give it to Christian. I think, again, like, I think this was the right call for him. You know, it's a tough position he's in.

I think he made the right choice. I do really like your idea of. of the Emily Flippen Fisci just for the chaos of it in honor of her chaotic game. So Fisci for Flippin. Okay. I'm not saying give her the fishy because of the chaos. I'm saying I like what you said about how she ends up, you know,

coming out ahead. And I think it's to Christian's detriment that she ends up, where he goes out of his way to try to save her. And no good deed goes unpunished with Emily Flippin. Yeah, no, no. I know that it's not for the, you're not worried giving her to her for the chaos, but I do think it will be read as like a slightly

chaotic award and and she is the ultimate uh you know or the second ultimate chaos player after uh after her uh you know you go back to her original casting and if you if we go back and play the interview from with mike bloom with emily flippin way back when that they told her originally hey you know who you have the exact same psychological profile as Cass. Remember, we kind of forgot about that. Oh, no, yeah. No, she, I haven't forgotten about that.

She's totally chaos flippe. I forgot about that. And now, you know, like, now that you brought up the spectrum of Cass, it's like, you know what? This was the prophecy all along. This was like the email that says, hey, a chaos agent will be born. And it was Emily flipping. Is it, is the Christian Emily dichotomy like the, uh, the, Reimann cast icon or, you know, rivalry?

Not really. No, it's not the same. I'm trying to think of, like, there wasn't one person that would repeat. But I think it's maybe a little bit of the Spencer Ryman Tony dynamic. Yeah, I see that a little bit. We're like one, yeah. Okay, I can trust you this time, right? Right?

You're not going to do the same thing to me again that you kept doing over and over again, right? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I promise. I promise. No, this time I'm not going to do it. But then she keeps doing it. Okay. All right. Stephen, anything else on your mind from the survivor world? No. I mean, this is, I feel like we really, we really had it all.

We gave it. Sorry. Fun chat today. This is great. This was very fun. You know, the weekend afternoon is lovely. You know, we gave the fishing to Mike last week and Mike got voted out. But I do think Mike kind of like tread into the waters to save a friend. And that's kind of beautiful. You know, like, you were safe. He chose to sort of like get into the mix here. And that was all to save a friend.

I have tried to pile on this group to figure out what they could have done instead of voting out Q. And other than just let Angelina go if you're Mike or Christian, I don't really know. Like the Q losing his vote really did screw everything up. Like in this challenge, they were uncompetitive. You really needed Q there pushing the boats. So I don't know if it is the difference maker. But in hindsight, for the group overall, I think it was very hasty to get rid of Q. yeah you know you're looking at this group and like with cue mike and ozzie there like pushing that boat

like you know you still got jonathan over on the one side joe and you know joe and colby is in the next group but um and coach who looks great i mean it couldn't even complete the challenge yeah like you do think with cue there it would have been a very different uh game would have been and that's the problem we talked about this all the time you know in terms of like voting out your strong players early on of course we're not talking about like post swap and that does change things Yeah, all right. Stephen, let's talk about what's coming up here. And the first thing, let me show you, okay, of course, the tribe and I have spoken.

And when I was on stage with Stephen, last week we announced to you that the special bonus for pre-ordering the tribe and I have spoken, you will get the digital chapter of the ultimate survivor rights of passage. My salute to 751 players for pre-orders of the tribe. and I have spoken. That's crazy. Busy working on that. It's taken up a lot of time, but we're working on that for you.

You can pre-order at rob has-a-book.com. Then we've got a brand new merch collection, including the much-belly hood. Hobnobbing with the glitter-oddy shirt is finally here. That's great. I got to do some hobnaving last week. It's great. I see why you're always hobnaving, Rob.

Yeah. So check it out. Rob has a website.com. slash merch. Escape. Oh, yeah. Actually, there is some escape news. I will be in Toronto at Queen Books on April 8th at 6.30 p.m.

I don't know why I keep scheduling these events on Survivor nights. It's a Wednesday. But come to the reading. Why do you keep doing that? It's really terrible choice. It's like scheduling on my behalf. Well, the reason is that like I'm there for some press the next morning, which is going to be, you know, post-show Survivor. So it was like basically the only night I could do.

it. But anyway, come out and then go out with your friends afterwards and watch Survivor. Okay. All right. Then, okay, this is, if you missed any of the podcast, check out Sam Phelan. And then Tina Wesson had a fun chat. Tina Wesson had a clip that broke me. And if you've seen it, you've seen it. I won't even spoil it for people because it was absolutely wonderful and insane. And check out everything else that we have going on in the We Know Survivor feed. where we've got more Survivor podcast than

Zach Brown could harpoon in one sitting. Yeah. Okay. And then on Monday, I'll be back with Chappelle to talk about everything from Club Condo.

Episode 4, we had such a fun club condo this past week. I think we'll have more of the same live at 7 p.m. Eastern for the patrons only of Rob has a podcast.

And then, Stephen, I love Paradise. I've been breaking down season two. Do you know anything of Paradise? Just that you and Rick, I'm going to watch it because if two of the people I love the most,

you and Rick love it so much. Yeah, I know. And now he's loving it. I'm an influencer. Yeah. Check out Paradise and two episodes left of Paradise. I'll be talking about that again with Chappelle this week. So if you're following Paradise, a very fun show, check it out. And then also every Wednesday night, join us over on Chat BCC where, oh, there was so much. Fifteen thousand members now. Wow. Going strong. And people that find out what the alumni are saying that they're not posting anywhere else so you could be hop-knopping with the glitterati too when you go for free to rob his website.com slash VIP chat to get in on chat BCC. All right. Stephen, fun times today. Looking forward to getting back together just a couple of days

from now. Look at us. I know. It's so soon. I can't wait. Can't wait. All right, Stephen, anything else for you? No, this was a delight, Rob. You were just in fine form as always. much. The podcast is tea. Podcast is tea. And then looking forward to reading what you have to say in the comments. Take care everybody. Good one. Bye. Hi. Hi. I'm always looking for those tips and tricks to help optimize my life. Ways to save money, travel better, and make life a little easier. That's why I love all the hacks. The podcast

hosted by Chris Hutchins, that's all about practical tips you can actually use. Every episode breaks down strategies around personal finance, productivity, travel rewards, career growth, all the stuff I wish I learned earlier. What I like is that it's not hype or gimmicks. It's real advice you can apply right away. And honestly, if you like optimizing anything in your life, this show is for you. So when you support podcasts like all the hacks, you're supporting creators who are putting in the work to bring you useful, actionable content week after week.

So if you want smarter systems for everyday life, check out all the hacks wherever you listen to podcast or head to chris Hutchins.com slash promo to learn more.