RHAP: We Know Survivor - Survivor Influencer Experience Know-It-Alls

Episode Date: September 18, 2025

Rob Cesternino and Stephen Fishbach reunite for a special off-season edition of Survivor Know-It-Alls to break down the recently released Survivor Influencers!

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well actually they didn't really win the game at all survival no it was surviving no it owes survival no it oh steveh steva and a rock without her down I've got the game all figured out and no it all. Yeah, that's right.

The Survivor No one alter here to talk about a very special all-influencer episode of Survivor. And here he is the ultimate influencer in the literary world. It's Stephen Fishbag. Oh, my gosh. It's so exciting to be back talking to you. about this. This episode was great. Like, I actually, I came in with medium expectations. I was excited, but you know, who knows? It's one episode. It was really good. Like, a lot happened in this, you know, 48 hours of gameplay that, um, and a really crazy tribal council.

I know it didn't look like it on the surface, but I think like a lot of crazy stuff happened. Okay. Well, this is fantastic news. Stephen has not been podcasting all summer long. So he's shot out of a canon here today to talk about the influencer edition of Survivor. And if you don't know what we're talking about, if you just got this podcast in your feeding, like, hey, hold on, did you drop the Survivor 49 episode a week early? No, consider this episode zero of Survivor 49 because Survivor sent eight influencers to Fiji and film them for 36 hours to give in a Survivor experience. And we're going to break it all down here today with you.

Woo! Yeah. So, I mean, should we just jump in? Where should we start, right? Sure. Well, let's hold on. Let's just set the stage a little bit. So, of course, you can watch this.

I haven't podged out for like five months. If you haven't seen the influencer episode, it should be up on the Survivor on CBS YouTube channel and all the social channels. You can see that. And we're going to have full spoilers of all of that. Plus, I will have an exit interview with the person who got voted out. Did you know this? I didn't. That's amazing.

Yes, I will be doing an exit interview with the first person voted out. Finally, they can settle their scores. And we will hear all of the tea from everything. And so that is what we're going to talk about here today. And then in our regular time slot, Wednesday night after the episode, Stephen, I will break down. Episode one of Survivor 49. And of course, Stephen has been hard at work all summer long, spreading the good word about the new book, Escape. Yes, which you can buy now at Stephenfishback.com.

There are signed copies available. There's a link to them from my website. So please check that out. And I will be relentlessly speaking about that through the next few months until it releases in January. And a big part of the story was for the influencers who all got to experience that they could only imagine what it was like to go and be on a survivor type island. They had dreamed about it. They had watched it for all these many years. but through the power of words and literature,

Stephen Fisherback will bring you that experience in the book, Escape. I actually think, you know, that's actually a great pitch for this. You know, you, you've got a career with this, like, talking about things with your, with your mouth deal that you're doing. Yeah, that's a great pitch for the book. It does, like, the idea is that it does kind of immerse you and what it actually, like, feels like to be on a, jungle reality show in a way that I think, you know, you don't necessarily get from like watching

some of these shows. Yeah, because only what, like, what, 36 people a year get to go do it on. So you got to wait your turn unless you're an influencer, you get to go and try it out. But for everybody else, that you might just have to live vicariously through the characters and escape. Listen, please, please live vicariously. And again, you know, by preordering, that's the best wait to live vicariously but let's talk about this episode let's talk about it okay and yeah this is like a pre-order of the Survivor 49 season of we're

getting a little bit before it's actually released coming up on Wednesday and so this was an exciting idea when I first heard about it I know that you want to jump in and talk about the tribal council because this was a bit of a blind side to me I was not expecting the person who went home

Hannah to go home with four votes and I feel like that I didn't even see Hannah's name being talked about. I thought it was Tommy Smokes and Faith that we're going to be getting some book. And then when Carl Jacobs plays the idol for Faith, I was like,

uh-oh, Tommy Smokes is in trouble here. And then it was Hannah. So that's what I thought happened too, the first time I watched it. So I went back and rewatched the episode a second time because I was like, hold on a second. Hannah, like, I can't possibly talk about this. How could

how did Hannah go home? And when I watched it, the second time like suddenly the whole thing became clear so carl gets it in his mind that hannah and alissa are too close and he wants to split up this duo so he says like what if we do you know one of either hannah or alissa then we see him say it again a little bit later with clits and tommy and it looks like what actually happened was this four-person alliance of tommy clit Carl and Faith pulled off like it was actually kind of an incredible move here. They got the rest of the group to split the votes between two people and then formed their

own voting block majority and the four of them piled votes on Hannah. So what I believe what happened is Hannah and Alyssa voted for, I think they voted for Fade. They could have used the end credits where we saw how everybody voted. Yeah, I know. That would have been really useful to, like, show us. And then the other two, I think, voted. Yes. Yes. And then Davis. Holy, let me get a pen here. So, all right. So say it one more time. So Hannah, so the plan, the false plan masterminded by Carl, Tommy, Clitz, and Faith is that the whole group is going to split votes between Tommy and Faith. But what actually happens, I believe, and I could have one or two wrong here. is that Hannah and Alyssa vote for Faith. Davis and Monet vote for Tommy. And the rest of the group, you know, it looked from the episode, Carl, got credit for this idea.

Carl, Clitz, Faith, and Tommy all vote for Hannah to split her up with Alyssa. And it's actually like, I love this alliance. Like this alliance of Clitz, Carl, Tommy, and Faith, like, that feels like a classic Survivor for some. You have, like, Clitz, like the big character leader. He's out there doing too much. He's a big target.

He's like, you know, Aaron from China. You have, you know, Carl, who's like, he's got these individual connections with everybody. You know, he's kind of like keeping it cool, like being more in the background. So kind of like Todd, you know, um, faith is Courtney, right? Like, I mean, I don't know, it's more of a Courtney or Carol. Like, like, I can see it in terms of like, okay, that is in the challenge, people are like saying like, oh, is Faith really even doing anything? And she's like, I would have quit except like, you know, except Carl, like gave me

a sweater last night. Now I'm like loyal to him forever. Tommy smokes as the Amanda. I guess Tommy's, I mean, Tommy does like, Tommy feels more like a Stephen or a Cockburn. Like, you know, I, you know, he's worried about ticks. I was worried about ticks. You know, he has to pee a lot. I had to pee a lot. Um, but. Ironically, I don't think that ticks are that. that big of a deal on Survivor? I don't think so either. Yeah, it's more like, it feels like a U.S. thing. That they tell you in Scotland, you really have to watch out for ticks.

Ticks are scary. There's like the diseases from Ticks are a big deal. Yeah. Oh, no. No, Joe, we don't need to, you know, I don't want to minimize it. Yeah. It's just I don't know if in the tropical location of ticks are a big concern. Yeah.

I've never heard of anybody getting a tick on Survivor. As far as I know, I'll take a bite. So, yeah. Less of a thing. I googled it. Survivor Africa that there was an issue where that Lindsay had a tick and Big Tom needed to really expect her rear end. Check out her tick bite. Oh, wow.

Different biome. Yeah, right. Okay. That makes sense. But apparently there are ticks in Fiji, but it's not as big a deal as like mosquitoes. Okay. Yeah. I wouldn't know.

I've never been. No, I just Googled it. Okay. I was curious. I was like, could I ever, maybe I really could never go on Survivor now if there's like a big tick problem. Okay. Yeah. Tick on your bucket list to get Lyme disease.

Yeah. Okay. So, all right. So interesting. So there was this alliance of, because we saw a little bit of it, but we never really saw the four of them together, I don't think. Right? There might have been one moment. We saw them in groups of three.

And it was like the scramble was very hard to keep track of because we, you know, we kept on getting these like very quick cuts of little groups of twos and threes. I don't know if we ever saw that for I mean there was you know for Faith did talk about to that group I think specifically like she wanted would be willing to be a decoy target and then make a big move yeah it's an interesting

setup here where it was basically going to be like one tribal council and so basically it was like one person was going to be voted out but nobody was going to win so it was sort of like that everybody was kind of like incentivized to just like well what what

sort of fireworks can you set up off here in this one shining tribal council yeah and i mean carl playing the idol for faith which again like in this hypothetical world where this season continues like it was sort of a misplay because he didn't need to play it but i actually think with faith specifically that that's going to buy him a lot of loyalty down the line you know faith was like i can't vote for carl he's the guy who made the fire he's the guy who kept us warm i think faith is going to be like loyal to carl um so even though it seemed like he didn't necessarily need to play the idol, I think it could have been a big hypothetical good move.

Yeah. And so then the Hannah, Alyssa, pair is broken up. Yeah. Right. And so Alyssa, who was, you know, I feel like they were very confident in their duo where they, you know, didn't think people were on to them, but Tommy knew instantly.

And, you know, they became a big target. And this was a good move because then I feel like then the next round of voting, like had this continued on, I think that there's going to be a lot of people trying to pull for Faith to come back and try to be the, there'll be like some sort of like counter movement towards Clitz and Carl and Tommy is like, hey, Faith, are you really going to vote with them? And then Faith is like, hey, Carl's just played an idol on me. Exactly. And, you know, gave her a sweater. Like, I feel like that's like that you, she was that kind of swing vote because you know we heard about like there was the girls in the gays alliance they had five

and then there were like the let one thing they called like themselves like the leftovers and they the others yeah the others yeah and there were three of them now suddenly there's four of them on a seven person tribe instead of three and an eight person tribe that's that's better yeah and seven okay Stephen i'd love to just talk a little bit about the fact that survivor did this and what does it mean that survivor did this and jeff talked a little bit about like okay this is the first ever survivor influencer thing. And maybe it might be the last, depending on how you guys do. But it really did seem like that by tribal council, Jeff had been pretty one over about the

idea. Yeah, he was, you know, it does feel like Survivor has entered the cultural conversation in a really new way in the last couple of years where, you know, I mean, you know, I always go back to that Gabby tweet about like, you know, how people are like, oh, I discovered this obscure show, you know, certainly with the pandemic, obviously kind of like. its profile was raised, but now it seems like it's, you know, really suddenly taken on again this mainstream role. And I think that, you know, Survivor as an institution is being really smart with finding new ways to engage their best advocates, you know, and reach out to people

in, you know, across these new media. And I feel like a lot of, you know, having come from MTV, you know, we really struggled with that question of like, you know, you can't just take a viral it was Vine at the time, a Vine Star and put them on TV. Like, it doesn't translate. But, like, finding ways to, you know, use these people in, like, you know, like, tangential and related, you know, fashion is actually, like, kind of brilliant. Yeah, it is something that is bears watching in terms of, like, the future of Survivor, because that Survivor, you know, the incredible legacy in history, 25 years,

and, of course, going into Survivor 50, you know, has often tried to case. to Jeff had said in the past like, hey, we're just making a show for our fans. We're not trying to find new fans. We're here. We make the show for the people who've been watching us for 25 years. But in recent times, it does seem like that there is a more embrace of the people who are discovering the show recently and, you know, that they've made overtures to cater to younger people and you know we have the embrace of all the influencers here i i'm i suspect this is something

that you're not aware of but over the summer jeff appeared on a video for a very popular YouTuber ryan trahan to talk about that uh he made a video and ryan train was traveling to 50 states and 50 days and was watching survivor along the way and uh that he was raising money for st jude and jeff made a and paramount made a donation to st jude and appeared in a ryan train hand video. So I do think that there is this reaching out to influencers to try to get people to discover the show by way of these social media stars. I think you're right. The barriers sort of are coming down, you know, more and more. This show is sponsored by Better Help. Whether you're doom scrolling before bed or zoning out during the workday, we've all been there. It's hard to

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you know, this is like a little hermetically sealed bubble, I think is, that's what the, I mean, it might have made sense 10 years ago. And now it makes much more sense to kind of be aware of the broader cultural movements. Yeah. And so do you think that this could ever be a part of, like, if not like a full, like 26 day season of Survivor, that do you think that we could ever see some sort of like influencer edition or even like a full-fledged like celebrity season

of Survivor that maybe isn't and we just saw with the success of Australian Survivor versus the world a like 12 day 10 day celebrity season of Survivor because it had always been talked about and Jeff

I remember specifically saying like no we would never do that because that for us to do it we or maybe I could have been Mark Burnett also because we would want it to be like A-listers, we want like Tom Cruise and George Clooney to do

this and if we couldn't get those people that's why we would not we would be against it but like I kind of feel like that in a world where if you take a look at some of the other reality success stories in the world, you know, that

I think a celebrity season of Survivor, like, these probably would be the types of people that you would see on a celebrity season of Survivor. And I think it would get a lot of attention. Yeah. I mean, you can see that they're being even freer with a format, like with this, you know, Survivor Cafe that's opening up

where it's like, you know, you can, like, clearly they're being more open with the idea of Survivor as being, you know, a format and like kind of a vibe that you can translate to other places and, you know, have success with. In my head, I have the idea that they or someone is making a kind of like mini-survivor, like, place, like thing that you can do. Like, am I wrong about that other than the Survivor Cafe? Like, there's like some sort of like Survivor, like, mini, like game somewhere. I don't know. I'm just making that.

I mean, there's like off-brand, like, you know, reality games. Like any, like, on. I was thinking of, in my head, it's there, but it really, I haven't, I didn't sleep much less. I just wonder if this could be sort of like a test balloon of, like, I don't think that this would, like, replace, like, okay, survival. 53 is going to be all influencers, you know, that's what's normally going to be up. But I wonder where we've seen in the, with the challenge, you know, challenge all stars. Yeah, on Paramount Plus, this summer, it's going to be, you know, some kind of like, you know,

whether it's celebrity survivor or however they wanted to do it. And it would be whether it's influencers, housewives, other reality stars, different, you know, celebrities that would go out and who have been Survivor super fans who would go do a thing for 10 days, put it on Paramount Plus. I feel like, you know, I think Survivor would like this. And I think that the fans, as long as it did not replace, like, what would be a normal season of Survivor, I think people would like this. Yeah.

I mean, you know, obviously the Traders is doing like the reality star traders and then like the normal people traders. And it does make sense. And like, you know, challenge, of course. Challenge All-Stars are, of course, also challenged competitors. But it really does make a lot of sense because I think you're right. the people, the audience for Survivor has a big appetite for more Survivor. But that, like, that kind of thing also brings in new fans who, you know, want to watch the show.

And I think there's something fun about them feeling a little freer with it. You know, this episode was one of the reasons that made this episode so fun was that, like, it just felt like they were having fun. Like, they have this amazing format. The format is phenomenal. And it doesn't like, you know, sometimes you feel like this is such a serious endeavor. We're on Survivor, which is great, you know, and you want that for like, you know, know the main survivor like this is you know huge and titanic and you're on a journey of self-discovery pitting you but like there's also something with like fun jeff you know hey guys like

you know mixing it up with the kids fun jeff and you know it's not necessarily that they would be like doing it for the money but like that their charity like sort of like going back to the old like celebrity apprentice days of like that they are playing for five hundred thousand dollars for their specific charity and they're doing it for and jeff could get into like tell like why are you doing this and they could talk about like their cause that they believe in and and what they're trying to raise awareness for and so i think it's kind of like a win win win to do it at sort of like a like mid year like over the the long summer survivor uh hiatus to be able to do this in you know a short season version of survivor yeah um yeah i mean it's i i'd really be

fun i would i would watch that yeah yeah or or even like we're spitballing here of what if was a season of survivor that was you know influencer celebrity types versus all stars that would be great like that would be very fun by the way though I feel like some of these influencers could actually you know they could hack it out they might even be into it like I mean I feel like you know Tommy smokes I could absolutely see him on you know 26 day survivor like what do you want I mean right like sure I think that he would definitely there would be the question of would he want to do it? I think.

I mean, same with like Carl, like, could thrive. I mean, a lot of these people could just absolutely kill it out there.

It's, I mean, you know, I would watch him. He was fantastic TV. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So I think that's an interesting question

in terms of like what they are going to be doing with this. Because it seemed like that they, it seemed like everybody had a lot of, like it remains to be seen like how much does the audience respond to this? Because they just posted it. But I think. that it certainly seems like a really good idea. Yeah.

And like this is a fun group. Yeah. I mean, it's hard because, you know, I actually thought when I heard about it, that it was going to be a 48 days like, like six travel councils,

you know, just like bam, bam, bam, bam, kind of like you go to these events and it's like a one day, you know, thing. You get it all in. You said 48 days,

48 hours. 48 hours. Yeah. Wow. Like that would be, when you first heard about it, like, you thought it would be like twice the length

of a regular season. Longer, longer than normal. Yeah. Twice as long. No. And so there's something like about a single vote where to your point earlier, like there's no ramifications, right? There's there's no real reason not to want to get voted out. In fact, you may want to get voted out because you want your torch enough.

I think that it did seem like everyone was playing in as pure a way as possible. Like nobody was volunteering to be voted out. But I do think it takes sap some of the dynamism, you know, of it, just the very fact that it's a single episode. And maybe that will affect how people view it. But like, if it were, you know, six episodes, that would be fun. Do you think they should have formatted it that there was some sort of like you voted for a winner at the end or that that wouldn't have made any sense? That would be like that's like not, you know, you got to get you got to get a torch snuff in there. Like someone's got to get their torch enough.

Someone's got to get interviewed by Rob the next day. Yeah. Okay. That's got to build that into the format. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Stephen, then there was no winner of the show, but as a keen observer of the winner of the winner's edit, who did you feel like got the winner.

who did you feel like got the winners edit from this is actually sort of like an easy one I think and again like I wanted to check myself because I only knew like two or three of these people coming into this you know um I knew Carl from Mr. Beast obviously I knew I knew Tommy you know he's super active on Twitter obviously from Barstool and then I I knew of Monet um and so I wanted to be like am I just like focusing on the people that I'm familiar with so when I rewatched I really like held myself accountable and um i have to really just give you a fishy for just your dedication to this of like that like i thought okay maybe stephen's going to phone it in on this one but really that you uh i can't believe like the work that you put in well the dedication to the craft

i didn't expect to watch it twice but truly that vote was so flum mixing i was like i've got it i've got see you know i got to know um what happened here so i really think that carl is getting the winners edit you know he has this confessional early on talking about like how survivor meant so much to him and he watches it with his dad you know that's like the classic winners edit confessional of like take you know your life story outside the game mona also got one of those you know but that was more focused on the challenge and being picked first so that felt like it was more like directly story driven rather than kind of like outside the immediate story which is why i think carl might be getting the winners edit, and, you know, talk about how he'd be smiling the whole time.

And so, again, there's like a lot of, like, more of his, like, personality. And again, I just think, I mean, just from a pure game state perspective, you know, he is the lynchman of that group. You know, he's the guy who formed the alliance. Carl's the glue guy. He's the glue guy. The real glue guy. Yeah.

No offense, Sam Phelan, but, you know. Yeah. That's interesting. So, yeah, Carl, winners edit for Carl, because we see that Carl and Clitz, he, they have the relationship through the Mr. Beastiverse and, you know, where Clitz is the person who's out there and is really like going for it in terms of looking for the idols and everything, that Carl has social game that Klits ends up giving him the advantage to play. But it's also Carl who has the relationship with Tommy that they have that bond.

And so the strength of that is enough to where faith, I don't know how the faith ultimately comes to them. Well, I think she wanted to do something different. You know, I think part of it was there was this sort of like five-person alliance. And then I think she wanted to like, you know, mix it up a little bit. But I do think too that it was because of Carl building that bond. You know, she said like, you gave me the sweater. You know, you built the fire. And I think that kind of, you know, gave her. But I also think she wanted to do something fun with the vibe I got. But, you know, I think that that, so, you know,

he's the one who's who's brought them all together. He also, like, built fire, like, P.S. You know, he's, he's the biggest threat on the beach, but, like, nobody is targeting him because he's got this huge meat shield with clits who, like, everybody is focused on. He's out there, you know, looking for idols. You know, he gives the idol. He's, like, you know, dominates the challenge, you know, along with Davis. And so I think that he's in a really good spot. Like, you kind of want to be the guy next to the guy, you know, the guy who everybody's got the relationship with.

Yeah. So going forward, I do feel like that Clitz would be that meat shield. Also, you know, Tommy knows what he's doing, that he's been through, you know, God knows how many bar stool survivors at this point. And so he seems like somebody that I think he would be set up pretty well to play the long game. Yeah. And I think actually, like, I was thinking too, like, you know, be he really could, you could, you could see him, you know, when he comes on that group and like, he was like,

oh, someone says like, oh, speak of the devil. You can, like, see all of, like, the processing happening. Like, I really feel like we can see some, like, big strategic moves from Tommy. And I don't think he's going to wait to be that person who gets, you know, shut out at the end. You know, I think he's going to make his move before that happens. Yeah. You mentioned Monet and Monet getting a really good edit. Monet gets the first confessional of the season.

Yes. Really opens as, like, the narrator. Yeah. First confessional, you know, first picked in the challenge. does seem to be, initially to me, I thought Monet was going to be the one who was moving between all of the groups. I was kind of surprised that Monet was the one left out

or not one of the ones left out of that vote because it seemed like Monet was in everybody's ear. Monet is a very social player. Also, very good in the challenges as well. Really good shape. Monet posting on Instagram about getting stopped by security, trying to bring pounds and pounds of protein powder into different places and then getting stopped by the, you know,

whatever airport officials thinking that that's like a huge bag of like cocaine or something. Yeah. And then, you know, Davis is someone who we didn't really see a lot from, but I feel like playing a slower game might serve him really well where, you know, we have that scene where I think it was, who went and spoke to him? Was it, was it Alyssa, like went and talked to him and was like, someone came and talked to him and said, you know, you've got, you're the, you've got to make a, you know, choice here. Like, you've got immunity. And he was like, oh, you know, I'm just listening.

I'm just, you know, I'm just here. So, you know, kind of really playing it cool. Yeah. It really did throw the dynamics off a lot where that we had our, you know, we have to do our challenges in three tribes, of course. And we then had two people with immunity. So it really did funnel the votes down to only a couple of people because I think that Clitz would have definitely attracted some attention had he not been immune for that vote.

Oh, yeah. Someone said like Clitz was the, I think it might have been fair. Someone said like Clitz was the decoy vote or the default vote. And now like they're not stuck with Tommy or something like that. Yeah. So it was interesting to have, you know, in just a small tribe of eight where two people were immune off the bat. yeah right really focuses i mean honestly like you know it's a good good mechanic you know suddenly

we've got you know really the people you know there's a lot focus focuses in on just a few okay stephen um who in your mind you said carl got the winners that it does he also get the fishy yeah he gets the fishy because i went back and i was like who's the first first person to bring up hannah and it was car we actually saw like all of the times that hannah's name was mentioned it was coming from carl it did sound in a few places like it It was a plan that a bunch of people were talking about. But he, from what we saw on screen, was the one to bring up Hannah and, you know, separating her from Alyssa. I have to give a lot credit to the influencers who did survive.

As Jeff called it, like a real storm out there where that is the worst part of Survivor. I've said, and you can attest to this, I'm sure, that the rain is no joke. And for, you know, you think, okay, well, I'm only going to be out there for 36 hours. Where are the chances I'm going to get rained on downpour? On, yeah, I mean, absolutely. Were they burning? Were they using their socks? I didn't understand.

Are they drying their socks or are they using their socks to feed the fire? Interesting thing that you wouldn't have in a normal season of Survivor where it seemed like they had backpacks and they had maybe a lot of stuff. Whereas, okay, you're a normal survivor. And it's like, okay, well, what are we going to do? We're getting rained on where these players were just like, hey, let's burn some of our clothes. We don't have dry firewood.

But our clothes are flammable. So we just need to get through the night here. Yeah, yeah. But still, I mean, a brutal night like that. I mean, in a way, it's funny, like Hannah, for being the first one out, which she handled very gracefully, was the only one to actually get the full survivor experience, you know, like she had her game. She had like going to the beach, the challenge.

She had sleeping in the storm and she got getting voted out. The rest of them, it's all a question mark. Like what might have happened? Yeah. But Hannah got her the whole, she had a whole survivor arc. at a whole survivor arc and, you know, it's rare for us to have a hand on go out first that is

not just quitting. Yeah, well, that's, that's very funny. Yeah. Yeah. And nobody even talked about quitting. No, well, apparently Faith said she would have quit, you know, except for that sweater. So that sweater was a big second fishy for the sweater. Second fishy.

No, no, no, because it was, you know, the sweater doesn't really get agency. I just was, you know, I know that there's a lot of ire when I give a fish, fishy to an inanimate object. Yeah. You haven't done that in a while. No. The influencers were on it when Clitz tried to name the tribe. Oh, yeah. Idiots backwards?

Yeah. And everybody's like, no. What is that? You're, that's not a real thing. They don't do it. It's good on him for trying, you know, but it does feel like people are now their path. That phase of survivors in the past. Yeah. The only thing I will say is that I'm pretty. sure the Bula tribe has been used. And I think even like, have we even done like Bula Bula?

Like I think we're a little overusing the Bula tribe. Oh yeah, Bula Bula was the merged tribe on Survivor Fiji. Yeah. Okay. And then, yeah, so we've done that before. Not clear. Yeah. Wait, there is a Bula tribe.

Was there a Bula tribe last season? No, I don't, I mean, who knows? I, you know, even I lost track of the merge tribe names. Yeah. What are you going to do? Stephen, all right. As somebody who's watched this twice, was there anything else that stood out to you? Um, I mean, these were all the big points, I think.

Um, you know, it was fun to see the enthusiasm. And it really did seem like they, they, they, you know, they, it was a real, uh, Jeff was fun. Jeff, Jeff was like, Jeff was like, Kevin, some, you know, I like, I like this version of Jeff, like casual kind of mixing it up. Um, yeah, it was, it was, it was like a real episode of Survivor. I mean, truly like, that's a good. move like creating a fake split vote and then like doing a voting block that that then piles votes on another person that that's a that's a great move yeah okay now is there anything that you want to know from hannah when i saw when i speak to her oh that's a good question i mean i'm curious like

did she see it coming you know did she know did she know that she was on the block you know did she was she worried about her relationship with alissa that it could create a target for her on her. And who are the people who she thought were her allies, you know, who didn't come through for her. Yeah. Okay. Stephen, is there anything that you felt that going into Survivor 49 that this was like anything that was going to give a little glimmer into what we can expect to see in Survivor 49? I feel like that we got some shots of the Tribal Council. Oh, that's interesting. I didn't think about that. Yeah, of course. That's a great call. Yeah. I mean, honestly, it's just like, what a great format this is you know it's like it's just like such like a pure wonderful format it works so

beautifully um and it's just like exciting it's always fun to watch it's always exciting to watch okay are you any survivor 49 thoughts going in have you looked at the cast i have really not gosh you know you're really exposing me here rob i'm not trying to expose you no no i just was like interested just to know your process i mean i do you go in fresh i feel like so many people have analyzed the cast so many different ways that ignorance is my strength. What I bring to the table is ignorance. I don't think it's ignorance. I mean, I think that you can really get as deep as you want to go. I mean, you know, Mike did all the interviews with everybody in Fiji. And of course, you could do all the reading and watching of that. But, you know,

when you turn the show on, it's a 90-minute episode. I think even a two-hour premiere probably coming up on Wednesday. And let's confirm that. I'm not sure if it's 90 minutes or two hours for the first episode. But I mean, I mean, they're going to show you what's important well sort of my feeling is i like to see it like through the lens of the show itself because i feel like you know that's you know it's like it's like too much of knowledge about the people um it's it's like it's harder to something can be harder to see the show you know you i mean i i don't know i'm just making up excuses for for having not having had the time to do it all yeah two hour episode for i do like i like to like i like to like see what the show

has to tell me you know i like to you know i used to like to analyze the winners at it before i had you know, became incompetent at that. Yeah. So, Carl was really heavy-handed. I feel like it was over the top. It was an over-the-top. Carl, winner at it. And that confessional on the beach.

Like, that was like Tommy Wendell level of like, you know, okay. The irony is that Beast Games is at least from season one, really had, did not have winner at it. Yeah, it was interesting. Well, that's what sort of made it exciting, right? It was that it was like, who knows? Literally impossible to track what's going to happen next. It was fun It's funny that like Clitz who designed it

Well it came out so hard with like all of the game stuff You know he found the idol He won the challenge You know he really like clearly is a lover of these games And wanted to like have it all Yeah it was real like a bucket list stuff for him So all right Steven so we'll be back on Wednesday night

To talk about Survivor 49 Oh my God that's soon Wednesday geez Wednesday night it's all it's all coming back Survivor Week is going to be here. Check out my interview coming up with Hannah. We'll find out what she had to say. And hopefully she really like trashes the other influencers. That wasn't the vibe I got off her.

Maybe she'll do it. I think they all got together in New York on Wednesday night. They had a whole thing. I saw Surrey was there. Oh, cool. Yeah, they did a whole premiere party with everybody's. They got everybody back for a reunion show. Oh, wow.

Wow. Air the reunion show, you cowards. Yeah, let's see what people really had to say. Let's see what their hopes and dreams are. I always like that part of the reunion show. Okay, all right. So check that out. I'll be talking with Hannah.

Then also on Thursday, it's a look. Bryce Isaiah is back. He's going to tell us what we can learn about the Survivor 49 contestants based off of their cast photo. So we'll continue our annual or bi-annual tradition of, is it bi-annual? I mean, you know, I feel like that's almost tricky. It's like biennial could mean twice a year or every other year. I never know what to say. Okay. Every six months, we do us a look with Bryce.

And then on Sunday night, you can jump in with the Survivor 49 preseason draft. We'll get the team back together and we'll be drafting for the winner of Survivor 49. That's going to be at 7 p.m. Eastern on Sunday night. Of course, live shows are going to be with the Glitterati rubbing. elbows, Stephen, in New York City on October 8th. And we just announced the tickets are on sale for everybody for Survivor 49 in San Francisco coming up on November 5th. Go to Robbins website.com slash events for ticket info.

And then, Stephen. Oh, we got to get a new. I got a cover. I've got a cover, though. We need to give you a new. Let's get it. Well, this is, you know, the good thing about the influencer season, it was sort of like, all right, every, for the camera people, for the editors.

This was like, okay, the warm-up. And this was like a warm-up, no-dalls for us because we're going to get... I actually feel that. I feel like I've got like, you know, talking about it, talking, you know, using in my mouth to talk. It's still a little rusty. Yeah. All right. So we're going to get the updated cover art for Escape.

That's something to look forward to. And there's updated pre-order links, too. As I mentioned, you can go to Stephenfishback.com and order a signed copy signed by me, not somebody else. Mm-hmm. Yeah. That's pretty cool. but if it's somebody I know I can probably get it signed by this

like somebody local like my neighbor Todd I bet he would sign it okay not Herzog no just like you know my neighbor Todd he's a lovely man here it is yeah the updated yeah cover art oh my gosh

yeah um there it is okay looks like is that pasted into like a word document or something yeah we'll get that all straightened out for everything coming up next week and then of course

we also have some blood on the clock tower action going on. People are loving this new episode of Survivors Play Blood on the Clock Tower. Do we have a slide for that? Yeah, hold on. Just look at the Kings. Oh, wow. Look at that. Look at that handsome devil. Look at all those handsome devil.

Yeah, literally a handsome devil. Yeah, look at Sam Phelan here. He's like the Rizzler. Yeah. He's got to. My kids do that. The influencers do that. I think that they did. Did Carl Jacobs do that at some point? He was like, play the idol. Yeah.

Um, yeah, very, very, very fun. And people are saying this is maybe one of our most fun ever, which I agree with. Um, and yeah, a very fun episode. So I highly recommend if you're into the clock tower thing, that's, that's an episode of watch. Okay. Then Tuesday night, I've been doing something fun with Pluto TV. I've been doing a stream along on my Instagram. You can watch me and watch along on Pluto TV.

I will be live on Tuesday night. What is that? Uh, 8 p.m. where we're going to do it. I'll be watching an episode of Survivor David versus Goliath. I don't even know which one. Is it just a random episode? Like, how does it work?

Pluto TV is just streaming 24-7 Survivor episodes. So whatever's on, I could talk about it. I'll talk about that. I'll talk about the commercials. And we'll have a lot of fun on a Tuesday night as we get ready to kick off a new season of Survivor. So follow me. Speaking of...

Yes. Follow me on Instagram and then watch it on Pluto TV for free. like speaking of Survivor kind of like taking you know being part of the cultural conversation Rob Sester Nino is part of the cultural conversation you're everywhere you're on you're on Pluto you're on American Airlines

I'm not on Pluto I'm just watching Pluto and talking about it but yeah you can listen to me and Stephen Fishback talk about many seasons of Survivor currently on American Airlines flights but you so are you like greeting can you explain to me because I don't get to fly

American that much because I don't have yeah so we have a great relationship with American Airlines and they reached out earlier this year and they said, hey, we want people to be able to listen to Rob is a podcast on American Airlines flights. And so right now, and I don't know for how long, that when you go on an American Airlines flight, I will greet you with a message welcoming you to your American Airlines flight. Are you serious? And telling you, like, when you sit down, like, when does it play?

So it plays when, every time you go to start a piece of media on the entertainment device. So if you watch like six TV shows, I'm getting six videos of Rob. I bet you're getting recognized a lot now, huh? I don't know. So it's, it is a great opportunity, although some people, some, I have heard from some folks that they, You know, we got it, but, you know, listen, that maybe everybody needs to see it more. No, of course, it's like, you know, it's an advertising jingle, you know, now you're in their heads. Now people are going to, like, crave that greeting from you.

Well, I'm hoping that, you know, be people who did not know what Robbins' podcast was or, you know, it's like, hey, you know, come join our tribe of, you know, us Survivor, reality TV fans around the world. That's unbelievable. Like, probably a lot of people who would, like, love something. like this are now discovery. Have you noticed that? Have you seen like an, I haven't heard from people like I didn't know who you were and then I flew on American Airlines, but I do, anybody I do know who flies American Airlines will text me and say like, hey, I just saw you. Yeah, that's crazy. That's so fun. I feel like I want to ride an American just to do that. Like, what a welcome comforting presence. It was a surreal experience for me when I came back from,

I took my wife on our anniversary trip. We went to Paris in August. And August 1st was the first day that it rolled out and I didn't know necessarily what the rollout was going to look like and I sat down on the flight and I sat down I sat down to my seat and I saw like a picture of me like on the seat in the seat back like on the I was like does it connect to my Bluetooth? How does this work?

Yeah, yeah. And then I looked at Nicole and I said that she also had it on there and then I pushed the button and then I pushed the button and then I started talking in the seatback chair and the people next me like, is that you? That's amazing. That's like a real celebrity moment. That's like they're like

be like seeing yourself on the billboard in Times Square, except like there's a thousand billboards across 100,000 planes. That's amazing, Rob. And then so I had gone to the restroom at one point and I was walking back and it was very weird that I'm seeing like people watching me like on the seat back as I'm walking back to my chair.

But it's also like us people like also trying to skip the ad and like I kind of thought I was going to get. They're hallucinating when they see you. They're like, oh my God. I was a little worried I was going to get beat up in the terminal. of like, oh, it's the guy that we have to watch him like his ad a million times. Now he's coming to my seat

to give me the personal spiel. Yeah, hey, I noticed that you were trying to skip the ad. Does you have a problem with that? Yeah. So, yeah. That's awesome. That's so exciting. I will say it was a little deflating

when my wife has to watch the ad and it's like, ugh. She'd get so much of you, you know, at home. The rest of us only get you in little bursts. Yeah. All right. Well, you'll be getting more than little bursts when we are back with our full-fledged Survivor 49 coverage kicking off next Wednesday night.

Stephen, of course, everybody's pre-ordering the book. Well, what else do you have going on? That's really it for right now. I mean, truly, like, my life. So, like, Monday is my final, final, final, final deadline. There's been like six final deadlines. I hope I said seven finals. I don't know.

for copy edits, like all the little minutiai, and it's crazy going through copy edits. You're like, oh, my gosh, like, do I even know the English language? Like little like mistakes that I made and things like that that you're like, what is wrong with me? But they won't be there in the final book. So that's all good. Thank you. Thank you. Copy editors at Penguin Random House.

But yeah, and that has just been like all consuming. And then, you know, that and blood on the clock tower are my identity. And, of course, like having a family whom I love very much. Yeah. Okay. All right. Well, it's been great to podcast with you once again. And looking forward to our weekly standing appointment.

We're so back. Make sure you're subscribed. Go to, of course, make sure you subscribe on YouTube. Search for RHAP wherever you get your podcasts. And thank you so much for joining us. We love to hear what you have to say in the comments. Take care of a good one. Bye.

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