RHAP: We Know Survivor - Why ___ Lost: Survivor 49 Ep 10

Episode Date: December 1, 2025

Why ___ Lost: Survivor 49 Ep 10 When Jawan was saying goodbye to everyone, he told Sage, “We tried and we made the wrong decision.” It’s true that they made the wrong decision, but was it the one he was talking about here? What decisions should they have made, and when? And which key player […]

Get no frills delivered. Shop the same in-store prices online and enjoy unlimited delivery with PC Express Pass. Get your first year for $2.50 a month. Learn more at pceexpress.ca. If you lost Survivor and you're feeling down, David and Jessica will turn it around. They'll break down the rules and they'll show you how you're playing yourself and got voted out. This is why Blank Lost

This is why Blank Lost Oh, baby, this is why Blank Lost. Welcome back to the 10th anniversary season of Why Blank Lost. I'm David Bloomberg, and every prediction I made for this episode was incorrect. And I lost my winner pick. Yes, you did, unfortunately. Thanksgiving podcast is my co-host, Jessica Lewis, who would never rub it in, that my winner pick is out while hers is still in.

I mean, I, of course, would not rub it in. It's not like I would put it under my name or anything for this podcast to remind you. Oh, my gosh, I did not see that. You know, I was like, is he going to notice? Is he going to see? No. It has been, you know, a whirlwind weekend and, you know, both of us just got back from different length trips. And so, yeah, it's a good not noticed that.

But yes, my winner pick is still in the game. So thank you, Sophie. Blue Sophie for that. Yes. I appreciate it. We'll be talking a lot more about yellow Sophie. than blue, Sophie, for the rest of this podcast. Yes, we will.

Yes, we will. But I promise I won't gloat too much because we all know how terrible I'm at my winner picks. But the fact that you're going to pick one out before mine, that hasn't happened in a very, very long time, I will say. So I have to enjoy that. Just a smidge, just a little bit. All right.

All right. I'll give you that. Okay. Thank you. Yes. Now, clearly things did not happen as I thought they would. But hey, predictions are just the side dish for this podcast, like the rolls at Thanksgiving. Oh, but often the best, but the predictions are not.

Yeah, the rules just take up space in your stomach, you know, because the real turkey and stuffing, that is us figuring out what went wrong, which, of course, we'll do by following our usual path and comparing Joanne's game to a set of guiding rules for winning. I originally wrote way back after season one and have been updating ever since. And we will do that using all of the non-spoiler information available to us from what we saw on TV, interviews, social media, and secret scenes. Though in this case, when I say interviews,

it's only the older ones because every year at Thanksgiving, the interviews get pushed back to after even our delayed recording time because I guess those CBS people want to take off Friday or something. I don't know. Rob is out there recording podcasts on Thursday, a couple of them on Friday.

You know, R.HAP does not sleep. But, you know, we won't get Joanne's, well, fully into his head on what he and the stage were thinking on the past two votes. I believe that we can pretty well determine it from some of the things said in this episode. But maybe he'll have different viewpoints on it that, you know, they were like, well, we really did it for this reason. And we'll look at that when it comes out and we'll evaluate and discuss as needed next week. Yes. In any case, the newest published version of the rules can be found at rob has a website.com slash yX lost feed where you click on the link bubble for the survivor rules. now before we address how joan did in terms of the rules we always have some other things to discuss

and i want to start with rizzo because i did not fully understand how divisive he was in the fan base until this episode oh my goodness yes yeah some people really really hate the way he's acting and some really really love it Personally, as I would say usually happens in these situations, I'm not at either end of the spectrum. I'm amused by him. I also think he's playing well, though probably not as well in some ways as he believes he has been. In part because he and his allies have caught some lucky breaks, including some we'll discuss later. So where do you stand on the Rizgod of it all?

So he's fascinating to me in a few respects. He came in wanting to play a very in-your-face game, which is the Riz God component, right? He was very clear about that in his pregame interviews, that he had this persona. But he said he wouldn't necessarily say that to the other players. The Riz God would be his confessionals, right? So I can appreciate him wanting to have a persona. However, I don't like the idea that someone is necessarily playing this game because they want to make themselves known on television as opposed to wanting to win the game.

And that's where I struggle just a bit with him because I do think he wants to win. Yeah. Because he is expressing that. But at the same time, it's a little showboaty. And there's some things that he's doing that I'm like, this is just not necessary. Because it isn't about entertainment as much as CBS wants to entertain us. The players should be playing the game because what can end up happening in my humble opinion, is you can rub other players the wrong way, which is what I think about in terms

of the game itself. You don't want to be sitting in final tribal and having people upset or frustrated with you because of how you were acting during the game and the components of the game that they saw you doing those things. So he's not saving that Riz God persona for confessionals alone. He is now interjecting into his game. And I could see that not voting well for him in front of a final tribal council if that's where he's sitting. Yeah, I mean, some people, including a couple of our previous guests, I think, I know Dr. Jeremy Faust has mentioned, I think Sam may have mentioned it too. You know, compare him a bit to Tony.

And, you know, Tony pulled it off. So I'm not saying Rizgaat is Tony. I'm just saying some have compared him to that. And I do think he's been keeping most of the brink. ragging side of his personality to confessionals, which is what we advise. I mean, just take a look at the poster for Rule 5, and you see Boston Rob hamming it up to the camera, which is what Rizzo is basically doing. He's super nice in person most of the time and his real self in confessionals.

But, I mean, yes, I do think he's playing things up a bit as a character. But I'd rather he do it there. than in the game. And, you know, he also came in that way. He proclaimed himself for his God before he even stepped foot on the beach. I think he's having fun and I also think he's playing to win. But like you said, some of that confessional personality did make it into the open this week when he played the fake idol.

But he even said at the start of tribal council that he was there to showcase his game. So, I... I don't know. I don't know exactly what that was at tribal council. I think it was to help show that he's doing things. And one question that has been under debate is whether Rizzo was trying to get a read on people with his fake idol or if he was just grandstanding.

I'm not really sure. I don't know that we'll ever actually know the full answer because Stephen mentioned not knowing else. He may well say in interviews, It was all part of his strategy, even if that wasn't part of his original intent. But personally, I do think that was why he did it to get a read, make sure he didn't need to play the real one, make sure everything was going according to plan, and also as some showman's, that's a hard word to say, showmanship to keep the jury's eyes on him as the primary mover and shaker, even when he wasn't really the primary move. over and shake her this week. So you think that the playing of the fake idol was kind of,

it was a ruse in order to see the response from those who were there as to whether or not he needs to play the real idol. But what's interesting about that is like, Juan told him to just play the real one, right? So like people were a shock that he was playing a fake one. And there was some response of, just play the real one. What are you doing? so it's interesting that maybe he felt a particular way about those that were responding like that

that it wasn't a true concern but there was some rather shocked individuals sitting there who did advise him to play the real one and he didn't i mean but he was being advised that by joan who he knew had all had turned on him sure sure there was no way he was going to listen to juan right was Is there anyone else, though, that was that was pushing him to play the real one at that point? I know that there was, like, audible, like, responses to him. I think it was mostly Joanne telling him that. All right. So what Joanne should have said was play the real idol on me.

He just didn't know that. Which wasn't going to happen anyway. No, that would never have happened, considering he voted for Joanne. Yes, yes. So, yeah, that's where I stand, that it was a combination of things. and like so many other things like I said I fall somewhere in the middle I am not a Rizzo Stan

I am pretty much not in anybody's stand because by definition a stand means you ignore all their bad points and look at their good points you know but nor do I dislike what he was doing in particular I find it mostly amusing sure yeah I'm there with you

I can fall in the middle as well with all of that now his tight ally savannah also put on her own show though i don't think it was caught by the jury as as joan was talking about the person he was going to blindside which she knew was her she was making faces as she looked at him and and that camera got it perfectly you know props to the camera crew and the editing they they did a great job of of capturing that And then when the votes were coming out directed at her, she asked Joanne if he did this pretending that she was shocked

and that thought that she was getting blindsided, even though she knew full well he was going. Now, I don't know. If I were him, I don't know that I'd appreciate that. You know, in the jury, if she's in final three. But maybe he respects the move and didn't quite catch everything. that was happening there because of, you know, just the shock of it all. And he did applaud them and give them hugs at the end after all.

Well, I feel like Joanne is going to be the type of person who's receptive to that because he is going to look at it as a game move. It's going to be a pat on his back, right? We're like, oh, they had to take me out and they had to jump through all of these crazy hoops in order to remove me from the game. So, yes, I think that he would be someone who wouldn't be. bothered by that he would be which is why he asked who raise your hand if you did that because I think in his mind he wants to know who to give the credit for because he thinks that he was like

the top and that he was playing the best game and so whoever took him out he wants to give credit to so I I could see him being that way I can see that the part that I didn't like was her egging him on like Juan did you do this to me you know at knowing full well she was blindsizing him right and then you know kind of just that overall attitude that was all unnecessary it was funny but right but i don't think i found it funny if i were joan sure but i'm wondering and i just had this epiphany as as i'm sitting here that right that perhaps she was doing that because she wanted the jury to understand why joan was being voted for that she had sussed it out that she had figured out that he also had turned on her. And so this is why they ended up targeting Joanne.

So perhaps she was doing the same thing. We're like, hey, jury, look what I did. Like, I figured this out. And I want to make it very clear that I knew what was going on, that Joanne was the one leading the charge against me. And so this is why we had to target Joanne. Because I do think that sometimes when people are voted out, this is why we have a podcast, right? Why they lost. And so sometimes people might be like, well, I don't understand why they targeted this person instead of that person. And so she perhaps wants the jury to know exactly in full well why they targeted Joanne because he had actually turned on her. That's certainly possible. I think personally, I think it's just because she tends to be confrontational.

You know, we've seen that plenty of times. Sure. I mean, she's pretty much in your face when she's asking questions and people on the spot. So sure. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I don't think she's handling the rule five of it all nearly as well as Rizzo. He's keeping it mostly in confessional. She's letting her full personality fly as she does things like grilling poor Christina. Now, you know, Christina should have been ready for a simple question like, who are you voting for?

But, you know, she knew Christina was lying to her. I just don't think that's the way to get jury votes potentially later is by getting in her face and being like, okay, who are you? voting for her. You know, to the point that Christina felt like she needed to back, literally, physically back away and say, give me a minute to recover from this. Well, and I do think that there is much to be said about how she is being perceived because there's been mentioned about the mean girl energy or the mean girl vibes. And I don't know to what extent that is actually having an impact on how they're playing the game with her. But again, if you are looking for jury votes. We've talked about this a lot. If there's a split between a couple of people, oftentimes the jury will vote for who they like more. And if they feel better about that person. And so if there's

any part of Christina that's feeling a particular way about Savannah, if Savannah is sitting there in the final three, there might be an issue for Savannah actually getting her vote. So that's one of those components where I think Savannah is thinking, I'm approaching this game the way I approach my life and my job, which is great if it works. But if it's rubbing people the wrong way, then it might cost you in the end. Yeah. Yeah. I mean,

Christina was not a politician lying to her that she was interviewing for, you know, a news program. I mean, she was lying to her, but not, you know. Right. Oh, yeah. Handle it a little differently. Yeah. The editors didn't drop all these mean girl references

in there for no reason. It is going to come back to bite her at some point quite possibly in final tribal council sure so i did really when you want to talk about editing i so so appreciated the cut from savanna to sage when savanna was talking about how she had joan and sage and that they were actually like working together and then they cut to sage and she just was sitting there silent and went no yeah it was because the music they had this like kind of like like creepy music that was playing and there was just this little bit of a pause before she dropped the now I like that was

beautiful editing it was it was very very classic so thank you for that for the editing as well you were speaking about editing earlier yeah I'll I'll have something else about the editors later people who watch my video about it already know but I'll I'll have something else They did a very good job in this episode, I have to say. Yeah, I do appreciate the editing very much. Yeah. Now, do you have anything or anyone else you want to discuss before we move into the rules for Joanne? No, I think we can certainly get to.

Oh, I will mention one thing. I do love that there was an introduction to a new component to one of the challenges. Now, the fact that Jeff has to mention that this is a new thing you've never seen, before maybe maybe we need to stop eating things just saying you mean the teeter tunnel yeah which was awesome i mean that it was i mean i don't know how people didn't crack their noggins when they were going down on that and that's the one thing that should have been designed differently they should not have had the support bar right above their heads oh yeah i was like it should have been injured themselves yeah it should have been off to the side uh you know they they got away with

it this time. But if they redo it, maybe adjust that, you know. Maybe adjust that. Maybe put a little something on the inside to protect their noggins. But I did think it was, it was amusing that he had to point out it was something words. Yes. All right. Well, there were. Yeah, I'm good. Yeah, other things going on. And I'll have some of it, uh, and already did on my TikTok and YouTube at David Bloomberg TV. But also before we get to how Jawan did, we want to mention that the. rules we just discussed or we just discussed we're about to discuss come in a people think wow

I just missed the whole podcast uh how is it 23 minutes yeah uh come in uh shorter a much more colorful version in poster form go to rob has your website dot com slash yx lost feed scroll down to the poster click on it order it and give it as a gift to yourself or your favorite survivor fan that's right And I apologize to the individual who ordered one recently. I promise you it's going in the mail tomorrow. Okay. Holidays. Holidays.

Threw things off just a bit. Yes. So also you can scroll down and get the poster on a T-shirt and keep scrolling and get the poster, I'm sorry, the checklist on a T-shirt. So go ahead and grab all of those. And you can just get all your holiday shopping done that way. That's right. All of it.

Yeah, Rob has a website.com slash YX lost feed. That's a great idea. When Jawan was saying goodbye to everyone after Jeff read the votes, he told Sage, we tried and we made the wrong decision. Now, it's true, they made the wrong decision. But was it the one he was talking about there? What decision or decisions should they have made and when? and which key player ensured his demise in the game.

At RHAP, we know Survivor, and we know why Joanne lost. Now, before I start with the rules, I do want to preface it by saying something I mentioned previously, but want to reemphasize. And that is that I, like pretty much everyone left. And of course, like Joanne, my winner pick quite a bit. But our job here is to talk about what players did right and wrong. And we don't go easy on someone just because. we like them. So everyone, I mean, it's not like we're going to beat him over the head with a hammer or

something, but just remember that as we go through the rules. Now, first and foremost is, of course, to scheme and plot. And Joanne had a bit of a roller coaster here in Rule 1, almost from the start. He was doing everything he could to strategize and help out the people he thought were his allies. And the problem was they weren't his allies. Nate, Rizzo, Savannah, and Shannon. formed a core for and excluded him for reasons we'll get into in later rules. But he believed he was right in there among them and continued believing that all the way until Sage eventually opened his eyes on the second swap tribe. Before that, even on the first swap tribe, he was convinced that if they went to tribal council

again after Matt and Jason were voted out, Sophie would be next. But the adopted tribe member was actually in a better position. then he was with his original tribe mates. All of this, despite the fact that he worked so hard to make Matt and Jason both feel comfortable so they wouldn't play their shots in the dark. And despite him going so far as to rig the rock draw to ensure that Jason wouldn't get to go on a journey, he was working hard. He was just doing it for people who would have tossed him aside if the opportunity

presented itself. Yeah, so I'm curious if he just wasn't able to read the room or if the people around him were just scheming and plotting better than he was because he certainly felt very comfortable. And we did see that other half in all of the confessionals talking about Joanne and how he would be the next to go home and that there was some dislike of Joanne happening. And he just seemed blissfully unaware that any of those beliefs or thoughts existed. And I think that when you're playing the game, you usually get a sense from how people are. And I don't think he was getting that sense at all. So I don't know if he didn't have the spighty sense thing happening

or if the people around him were just really good at keeping it under wraps. I think probably a combination of both. I mean, we know that unlike we just talked about with Savannah, when it came to him, she did keep that hit. She even talked about that. Like I, you know, and we saw some. scenes early on of her being nice to his face and then as soon as he left you grumble rumble grumble uh so so you know and i think rizzo was very close to him and i will discuss that

even more later uh when it came to some of their later decisions in the game so yeah i i just think they did a good job of hiding it from him and of course it's always a lot easier when you don't have to get to that vote. That is very fair. Yes, that is a very fair point because when you're not going to tribal council, no one is really learning

where those lines exist. It's like being on a team. You know, it's great to have team spirit and everything and, oh, we're going to, we're going to, you know, beat that other team and we're going to do a great job. Until you and your pal are fighting for the same

position on the team and one of you is about to get cut or benched right and then suddenly you realize oh we're a team but not really fully a team yes you know that's that's what i'm thinking of you know it's uh you know i i remember experiencing that with some fellow high school uh team parents you know where yeah they were all for the team except then they would complain to, well, to us when their son didn't get as much playing time without realizing that, well, if your son gets more playing time, that means one of our sons gets less playing time. So, you know, we're not really on the same side here when it comes to that.

And I do think that that's a fair analogy because you do have to be a team for as long as you need to be a team until you go to tribal council. And then you're like, who do we not need on the team? anymore. Right. John. Yeah. Yeah.

So. But then, of course, at the second merge tribe, as I mentioned, his eyes fully opened. And he and Sage became tight number ones. Though Sage had a confessional in which she said they were number ones since almost day one, which is rather confusing because we saw none of that at the time. So I'm not sure if she was exaggerating or maybe kind of, you know, re-moving things around.

in her mind or they just didn't show it to us. I don't know. Right, right. But in any case, the two of them and Stephen formed the bottoms up alliance and tossed Shannon's bottom up and out of the game and then made a big story about her to convince everyone else that she had lost her mind, which, let's face it, was easily believable. But also unnecessary.

I don't think so. I think they needed a reason. No, I think it was, okay, they needed. a reason, yes. But I think that they could have, essentially they were telling them what actually happened. So it's not like they were creating this ruse. Like, oh, we voted

her out, but it could have just been more simple where it was like, yes, she did want to actually target other people who were, you know, and they could have still utilized that same thing. But it just seemed like it was like overdone. Like it was a little too much like I feel like they still could have accomplished the same thing but it was it seemed like a little

too much which made it a little suss I mean to me the details sold it you know especially since they all knew she was a little out there so you know why not you know why not add on to that and you know whatever it worked and that you know it got it did it did but I was just at the time I'm like this feels like it's a little overkill but I did try. truly appreciate them not coming out of the fort or whatever you want to call their makeshift home when everyone showed up for the merge. And they were like, do we need to go down there? Wait, I can hear them.

This is terrible. Yeah. Now, the story got him and Sage back into the good graces of their original tribal allies so they could turn around and binaide them by joining with the original Hina to vote out. Nate. And I noted in the why Nate lost podcast that Nate thought it was logical for Joanne and Sage to stay with them because it guaranteed them final six. But I agreed with those two and disagreed with Nate because it did not make sense to go with a guaranteed six when you know there's a super tight four within that six. Yeah. Yeah. It made more sense to go with an alliance of seven that had different factions you could work with or against. Sure. Mm-hmm. Yeah. That was great scheming and plotting. Yes. Now, I should say at least that was the theory, because what actually happened was much different because they were out-schemed by Rizzo and Savannah or partially out-schemed themselves to Rizzo and Savannah's advantage and ended up doing their bidding rather than playing their own game.

Joanne and Sage swung back to work with those two in voting out MC without forcing Rizzo to play his island. and then we did it again by deciding to vote out Alex because Rizzo helped convince them that Alex was a bigger threat even though that was clearly not the case. As I said last week, Rizzo did a good job of shifting everyone to Alex, but I can't give them all the credit

because I have to give others so much of the blame. And also, as we discussed last week, Alex said in confessional, who are Joanne and Sage going to believe? Are they going to believe me? or are they going to believe Rizzo, someone who's desperate and at the bottom and scrambling to get to the top? It seemed like that should have been an easy answer. And yet, we know what happened because Jawan became convinced that Alex was a bigger threat to his game than Rizzo was.

Now again, I'm sure he'll have more information about why he went that way for both the MC and Alex move in his interviews. But as we sit here and record right now, we can't see inside his head to figure it out. And it just doesn't make any sense to me. Honestly, it may not make sense to me even after those interviews. I think, again, though, what we have happening is this idea that Joanne had about himself. And I think Rizzo saw that. I really truly think Jowan thought he was on, he was the mastermind and that he was running the show and that he was playing the best game. You look at some of his confessionals and he's very high on himself and the game that he's playing.

And he's really putting himself at the top and as the most threatening player. And perhaps Rizzo saw that and then leaned in on it where it's this idea that like, well, Juan, like you're playing such a great game. And you are, you know, this is why Alex's threat to you. And this is why MC will be a threat to Austin. And it's like it's those moments. And I think about like the final tribal council when you want to try to earn someone's vote. What do you do?

You build them up. well, they're sitting at the jury. Like, of course I had to vote you out because you would have beaten me if you were sitting here, right? Like, you have to make that person feel better about themselves because then they're going to be like, oh, look at me. I was so good. I would have beaten that person. So I'm going to vote for them because they know that I would have beaten them.

And it's that kind of idea that I could see Rizzo sensing and realizing about Joanne. And it's this, I'm going to build him up, which is why maybe he never caught on to anything that happened at the beginning when they were actually wanting to target. him because they kept making him feel so good about himself and his game that it was easier for them to then convince him of things that we look at and go my gosh why would he ever have like gone along with what they were saying to him but if he's feeling that good about himself maybe that's why yeah it's possible it's possible i if i had to put money on it as to the reasoning right now I would say that you know he and say and we may get more into this that he and sage believed they had time and that they could swing they could do the will wall pendulum yeah you know and and swing

back and forth and that that's my thinking on it but well you know we'll we'll we'll see what he has to say and later what sage has to say so now I I mentioned that Joanne told Sage when saying goodbye, we tried and made the wrong decision. But no, the actual decision or the actual situation was they made the wrong decision last tribal council. And the tribal council before that. Yes.

Even though Sophie said to Rizzo that Chowan could have just gotten Stephen out and been safe this week, he both couldn't have and shouldn't have done that anyway. He couldn't have because of Christina Zidal. and he shouldn't have because it doesn't do any good to keep knocking out your own soldiers like I said last week about Alex

now of course it was obviously too late to worry about losing more soldiers anyway all it would have done if Joanne had done what what Sophie said your Sophie said would have been to

extend his stay a couple weeks before they knocked him out it would have changed the order that's all yeah now he needed to do things much different two boats ago for sure. Yeah.

So leading into this tribal council, Joanne felt like he was in a great position alongside Sage, like you've been saying. And as, you know, they seem to be the decision makers. And at one point, he even said, all roads lead back to the two of them. But the problem is, those two didn't realize their actual position.

And clearly it was not nearly as good as they thought. They kept wanting to vote out Savannah. she kept winning immunity. They said they wanted to vote out Rizzo or at least flush his idol, but then they didn't. And then they found themselves in a situation that Sage described

by saying, we are getting down to really critical numbers. If we don't break up this trio, we are screwed. The problem was by the time they saw it as an issue, they were already screwed. It was too late.

They had a chance to do it the previous two tribal. councils and they did. Yeah. Yeah. Just put all your votes on Rizzo. Last vote. Last time. Let's do that. Just do that. It would have been fine. But no, they didn't. No.

You know, Sage also said, I think it's really important that we take this shot while we have the chance. I've been saying this almost every tribal. Guys, I don't think we're going to get another shot. Now, this is interesting to me because it suggests someone else

was overruling what she wanted to do in taking the shot against the threesome. Who else would that be? Joanne. Seems that way. I mean, maybe Sophie with an E played a part in it too, but I don't know that she

would have necessarily listened as much as she did to Joanne. Plus, there was a scene this time where it looked like she was working hard to convince him that they had to do it now. And why would she have to work hard to convince him of that, unless he had been, maybe

the one pushing back previously and this takes us to something we all said quite a bit about last week which is they did not realize how bad their situation was because they didn't know about the extra vote or the knowledge is power or even that sophie with an eve was going to stick with rizzo and savannah and sof right but even though they didn't know the details again as we discussed last week, they should have known something like that was possible. This is Survivor, right?

Yeah. The others, if you had said no, I would have been like, what are we talking about? The others didn't even have to use all those game pieces like I predicted they would. I mean, even though Savannah used her extra vote, which they didn't know about,

even Rizzo using his idol on Savannah would have had the same. effect as as that extra vote anyway and they knew about that item what they didn't know was that sophy with any was going to spill every single beam well and i i think that this really goes back to and i i hate to keep repeating myself but i just i feel like he is just being outplayed by all of these other people who are convincing him of things that aren't true and i think this is really going to be the first tribal council where you absolutely see that group. I mean, we've seen it. We've seen the three. But Joanne and Sage thought that they were controlling things. They thought

that they were the ones making all of the decisions. Clearly, this is an eye-opening moment for both of them because Joanne's going home and Sage is now realizing, yeah, I said it was going to be too late. And now it's too late because there are no more numbers for them to necessarily do this. Rizzo still has an idol that nobody's been able to flush because they can't figure out how to do that either. And so it really is just a matter of circles are being run around some of the other players. And I'm very curious. I would love to hear what Joanne was being told by Rizzo and the little sweet nothings that were being whispered to him because clearly it was having an effect. And the way that Joanne was approaching this game, I think, directly was impacted by all of

those conversations that we just don't know the details of. Yeah. And like I said, you know, the, the Sophie with an E of it all. Mm-hmm. You know, they were not accounting for those relationships. Right. And didn't know, did not know where she stood. And that turned out to be the main issue.

She stayed with the Rizzo crew and passed along all the information that the people on the Sage and Jawan side have. gave to her, allowing them to craft an almost impervious plan that Joanne, Sage, Stephen, and Christina never saw coming. Yes. I mean, we don't know yet why Sophie decided to go with the other side, but since it has more to do with her than Joanne, we'll get to our thoughts on that in Appendix A. What we do know is what happened and that Joanne and Sage were not taking into account this

possibility. Yeah. All right. Well, we can move to the second rule, which says not to scheme and plot too much and to keep your scheming secret. Unfortunately, Jawan has had issues with this rule pretty much all game. It started early in his original tribe. And one reason he was left out of the core alliance was, as those in that group said,

he seemed overly strategic and was busted looking for idols. Then as time went on, he gained a reputation for. for having loose lips. Indeed, MC told Rob that the reason they voted for Nate at the initial merged tribal council was they decided on Rizzo, but Joanne found out, and they worried he would tell the other side. And then the same thing happened with Savannah,

so they finally settled on Nate. Of course, there were other reasons to go with Nate, which we discussed at the time. But people wanting to switch the target just because you found out about it, when you're supposed to be working with them, it's not a good sign for what they think of you. Yeah, no, and this is why I really think that he was looking at it as I have relationships with everyone. Everyone's telling me everything and I'm sharing information with other people and he's not considering the fact that those people are having conversations with other people too.

And so, you know, certainly that whole situation with Sophie, I think really put her in a position where that that solidified her. her decision there with what she was going to do and what she wanted to focus on as far as the group that she was going to work with because she had this idea and presented it. And then it all just came right back to her because, yeah, he had loose lips. He was sharing the secrets that everyone, I'm sorry, seems to be continuously doing on this season. Everyone is sharing everyone's secrets. Yeah.

And that's the thing. He wasn't even the one that shared the secret about Christina's idol. I was sure it was going to be him, but Sage was the one who told her. But prior to that, he added to his loose lips perception by telling people when MC let him know about Sophie's plan to throw a vote his way, even though she told him in order to try to help him and she asked him not to tell other people. Right, right. If he had just turned on Sophie at that point or better yet, take it out Rizzo like they should have, this vote against him would not have happened and he'd probably still be in the game.

Sure. I agree. Now, at the beginning of the episode, this is the other editing moment I wanted to mention. Rizzo told us that Alex was visibly playing the middle and he wanted to be in the best position. So if he sees someone in a better position, he wants to get them out of the game. This was his explanation as to why the vote went that way. It turns out that was foreshadowing of what would happen. Now, you wouldn't know it by watching. Sometimes we can catch foreshadowing.

But in this case, you have to rewatch and be like, ooh, this is a really cool scene now because, of course, Jawan was basically playing the middle with Sage. And he arguably did have a better position than Rizzo, or at least would have if Sophie didn't spill the beans. And so this was a really another good editing choice by them to show us the scene of Rizzo saying, this is the person I want to get out. And lo and behold, hey, look, they get out Jawan, who also fits that bill. Right. You know, given everything that we've seen, I just, he just, he, like I said, loose lips sink ships. And even though it was Sages, loose lips that sunk this time, I think he, he undid a lot of the welding in the, in the ship with his. Yeah, I mean, when you're playing this game, you really have to choose those moments carefully with when you are going to share information and how much information you're going to share because one time might be all it takes, but if there's multiple times that they can associate back to you where secrets are being shared, then certainly you are going to be more of a hindrance than help to any plans moving forward and they're not going to include you in those plans.

or, as you mentioned, they're going to have to change plans because you know about something. And that is certainly not how you want to be playing the game of Survivor if you have to question those people that you're playing the game with and how much you can trust them. But I also thought it was fascinating too how I'm trying to remember if this was the commentary that he added to this, but where he decided that this person was lying to him and this person wasn't. And I just thought that it was very interesting that I was like, how do he, how does he know that this was. is lying and this one is not and how it seemed to be a very like matter-of-fact moment for Joanne and I just can't remember the context of it but I just remember thinking to myself well that that's interesting you know that he would that he would make that determination

when he's been lying to people and saying things to certain people and sharing information and so it just seems peculiar I guess I mean I think that's fairly common to reality shows we see that on the traders quite a bit, you know, where someone will be, I am 100% certain that you are lying to me and they're telling the truth the whole time. Or I am 100% sure that we are best buds and you are telling me the truth the whole time. And no, they're absolutely stabbing them in the back. So. Right, right. Yeah. Yeah. It's just bad reads. Well, and that's what I think Joanne really was suffering from. He just, he couldn't read the room and was putting too much faith in what certain people were telling him as opposed to really putting together all of the

information that he had. All right. Well, the third rule tells players to be flexible. Now, we talked about Joanne playing the middle, of course. So was that enough flexibility or did he need more? Well, clearly it was a problem for him because, look, what ended up happening? The flip-flopper had to go home, right? He was in the middle.

Rizzo didn't want him to be in the middle. So I have to respect his idea and his desire to do this because he wasn't locking himself into a particular idea or person or path. He was willing to shift back and forth. So in that regard, he did great as far as being flexible because he was open to various ideas. But it put him in a really bad spot because people saw he was very flexible and saw that he was willing to go back and forth. and that did not bode well for him. Yeah, I mean, I think I understand what Joang was trying to do in playing the middle and trying to keep relationships, you know, good relationships with both sides.

Mm-hmm. I do think, like you said, he overdid it and he misread his flexibility as we, you know, just discussed in the first two rules. Yeah. Mm-hmm. so the fourth rule tells players not to let their emotions control them i think joan did well here uh because you know he repeatedly voted out people he liked because he felt it was good for his game such as nate and alex he was wrong on alex but you know he at least he was uh doing it for

a non-emotional reason, I guess. But on the, and on the flip side, even after he was blindsided, he wanted to know who did it so he could congratulate them. Yeah. One question I have is how much his affinity for Rizzo might have contributed to the decision to repeatedly not vote him out when he should have. it seemed like they were very friendly in the game and this is another situation

when the interviews may help clarify things a bit because it seems like if Savannah had been available to be voted out that's what would have happened but since she wasn't they didn't go after Rizzo even though it was clearly the play they should have made plus it would add some context

as to why Jouan listened to Rizzo when it came to Alex even though, again, he obviously should not have. Yeah. Well, one of the things that he actually talked about in his pregame press was that his biggest struggle is that he really cares about people. And he wants to be able to sleep at night if he cuts people. And so I am very curious if that was a component of his game. He did say that he was willing to vote people out that he liked and people that he was

friendly with. And was that a problem with Rizzo? Was he unwilling to take that additional? step with Rizzo because perhaps he thought that there would be some type of a relationship with Rizzo moving forward. Maybe they talked about getting to the final three together. And again, we just haven't seen that. We just don't know that yet.

So I'm very, I guess, still curious how those conversations will be provided or when they'll be provided. Yeah. There was one other situation when Jaman's emotions, Jawan's emotions got the best of him. Back in episode one, he got really frustrated at himself because he couldn't start a fire. and he was visibly angry, even though he, you know, he again, angry at himself, not anyone else. And even though he tried to walk away. And of course, Savannah saw it and got worried about having him as an ally going forward. At the time, I poop poohed this as being silly. Like the

editors were playing something up that was on nothing. But then it came up again later. So that one brief instance of not controlling his emotions may have helped put him on the outs in his original tribe. But really, I think Savannah, like, had it out for him from the get go anyway. And this was just one reason out of many. Like, much like she said, you know, she didn't, she wanted to vote out Matt. So she decided you had to be a sociopath to do financing at his level. I think she, she was already against Rizza, I'm sorry, Juan. And therefore, she, uh, you know, said, oh, I can't be his ally he gets mad at he gets too emotional about starting a fire and he took her bag to go get wood how does that happen well let's talk about the fifth rule then you know uh because it reminds players

they need to pretend to be nice and play the social game now i saw a mix of good and bad here you just mentioned a bad and uh so what what did you think of him here well i think he thought he was doing a great job being friends with everybody and forming relationships with everybody. But he, and I said it earlier, he was blissfully unaware as to what was actually happening. You're using someone else's bag to collect wood. That's bad. You have very few things that are actually your own when you're out there playing this game. And to have someone take your bag and not only take your bag, but take your bag that has your clothes in it, all of your personal things, and they walk away with it and they start putting wood in it to carry it back now. No, I think it's, I, I think it's kind of

worse. I think he dumped out the bag. No, she was pulling out. She was pulling out her clothes because there was stuff all over her clothes too. So there was, she had, yeah, she had stuff in the bag. I thought he dumped it, which made me think, how can you dump out someone's bag and not realize that's not your stuff? I'm remembering seeing her. like when they were taking wood out, she was pulling out like a shirt or something of hers. And I just remember thinking to myself, what do you do that? Because as someone who played the game, you were very aware of where your stuff is. Because again, you have so few things.

And for you to take someone else's bag, then he took someone else's torch. Well, I mean, he also took a water bottle. And then, yeah. Took her water bottle. Right. So it's, so there was, there seemed to be just this unawareness of like personal space and like other people's things. And so I think that he thought he was doing a great job. And I think he thought that he had all these relationships that were that were strong, which is why I think the Rizzo thing exists the

way that it does. But what was really happening is people were getting annoyed with him or seeing these things that he was doing. And it was frustrating them because we're going to make Joanne feel a particular way. But we really want Juan to go home because he's just getting under our skin and he's doing things that are, that are frustrating us. So I think he thought he was doing very well, but I don't think other people necessarily thought the same. See, I think you kept saying people. I think the correct word is person, because I think that, I think that Savannah was the only

one really mad at him. Well, okay. And I will add this then. So, because here you have, if Savannah is the only one who's really mad at him. Yeah. she can start pushing this narrative right she can start saying well look he took my water bottle he took my bag he put wood in my bag and so in this game you're looking for any reason to target someone you're looking for any reason to go after someone and savanna has uh she's got she's got a group right

she has rizzo she has sophie lucy and so she has like a little posy right that that will that will support her in this idea and they'll be like yeah we're with you savanna we're not with joan joan had sage but i don't feel like joan necessarily had the same type of support system that savannah has savannah seems to have a much different type of support system than what we see happening with joan and even with sage in the confessional you've already mentioned where she's like telling someone you know that like we need to take savanna out we need to break up this three but I keep getting told no or that I, you know, I'm not, she's essentially being told that they're not going to do that. Well, that's coming from Joanne.

So you're losing people's support if you are thrusting your ideas upon them, your beliefs upon them and acting like you are in control of certain things as opposed to we're a group or a team and we are going to actually work together on this. So I think he thought that he was really doing a great job, but I don't think that it was coming across the way that he necessarily thought it was. Yeah, I had a totally different read on that. I think he was able to maintain good relationships socially on both sides, even when he kept flipping against people, you know, he turned on Shannon, but the bottoms up alliance convinced his original tribe mates, as we talked about, that it was necessary and they trusted him and Sage again. They totally trusted them again, which gave them the opportunity to blindside Nate.

And then even after they blindsided Nate, Rizzo and Savannah. we're happy to work with Joanne to get MC voted out at the split tribal council. And then Rizzo and company worked with them to take out Alex without even without even John telling Stephen and Christina. And then yet they continue to trust Joanne and Sage enough that a blind side of Savannah was in the offing until Sophie revealed the truth. And, you know, and when I say they at that point, I mean, Rizzo and Savannah, but also Stephen and Christina, who had just been left out of the last vote,

trusted him enough to work together on that very plan. So I think his social game, as far as getting people to want to work with him, was generally pretty good. I think the only one who didn't like him was Savannah. And then other people voted him out for other reasons that we've been discussing. well and i don't think that his social game was was bad i don't want it to be to come across that i thought his social game was bad i think that juan was looked at differently that joan was more of a number this is a guy that we want to work with because he's a number and this is a guy who's going to share information with us and this is someone that we can make feel very comfortable and so it was

more of how other people were reacting to him and then his perception of these people reacting to him like i think juan thought i'm in with everyone and i'm on the top and like everyone's coming to me and i'm making the decisions and it's all sage and i are making all of the decisions and it's all it's all me i'm doing this right whereas i think other people were and when i say people it is riso sophy and savannah who are like we have to work the numbers and how can we work the numbers and and who can we convince to work with us well joan worked with us before sage worked with us before. So let's try to pull them back in so we have the numbers. So I think it's this weird combination where he definitely thought that he was a people person and that he was very good at

it. And I do think that he was. But I also think the others saw that in him and almost took advantage of it and utilize that in order to give themselves another vote because now we've got Juan and Juan's coming with Sage. So now that's two instead of just one. Yeah, I definitely think there was a component of that. I mean, in some of the votes that I mentioned, yeah, he was a number but they still had to trust him not to flip back again oh sure and and you know like I said you know Christina and Stephen welcomed them back with open arms I mean Christina earlier felt so bad and you know loved him so much that she gave up her reward for him yeah that was crazy yeah that's a good point that is a good point because that food thing happened and then there was something

else that came up um I don't think it was something that we saw but there was some discussion about maybe it was Rizzo talking about how good it was that Jawan was going to be getting food so that there does seem to be a genuine like yes, mm-hmm, that they did care about making sure he ate. So there's that too. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think he was good, like I said, in good

with everyone from a social perspective, except for Savannah, who definitely wanted him out for many reasons that being among them. Mm-hmm. I agree. So

all right, well, we could go to the six rule, which warns against being too much of a threat. And since we've talked about Sophie with an E being the deciding factor here, let's begin with a quote from her. Joanne is a good player. He's extremely likable and I don't think I want to sit at the end with him. And then plus when she voted, she said, today I realized what an incredible strategic threat you are in this game.

Excuse me. I will never beat you in a final tribal. I have to admit, maybe that's why I cough. It was a little hard to swallow because it was a bit of a head scratcher for me. I don't get me wrong. As I said, I really liked Juan. What did he do to give this impression? Because it was not presented that way in the edit.

I did not see him in the edit as an incredible strategic threat. And this was her telling us this. She wasn't trying to convince anyone else. She was passing her vote. So it was something she truly believed. I don't get it. yeah and i'm i'm wondering if that goes back to the i have to try to follow the with the mc component where it was the vote that was going to be on him and i you know i don't know if

if that was part of it as well where sophy thought that she had come up with this plan this idea and then that completely was yeah but she said today she said i know and that's true so today I don't know I mean that's very interesting because I do think that I mean Sophie I'm going to say it Sophie had a choice right and she had to decide which side she wanted to go with and for some reason she was she believes and this is what she did tell us in one of the confessionals that keeping Savannah was a better idea for her because Savannah could be like a shield for her right I have thoughts on that when we got through appendix i and i'm and i'm sure that you do and so i'm i'm curious if she's and i don't mean that a bad way um but i'm curious if she is looking at comparing savannah and joan and if we're looking at strategic gameplay of the two if if juan is as you've represented and i do think that it's true that people liked him but they also thought he was a number of sorts that that puts him in a better place in a strategic gameplay and in able to like argue his game right but like

i didn't need all these tricks and these extra things i didn't need immunity necklaces or extra votes i it was me it was coming for me and the relationships that i was making was all of you whereas savannah is in a different type of a position and so i think maybe for sophy she's looking at it saying okay do i want to sit next to savannah who i say i kind of held my own against on the fifth physical component or Joanne where it's more of a strategic thing. I don't know if maybe that's what that meant is that she's comparing the two. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I was mulling this over on Blue Sky and David B himself, not to be confused with

David B myself, noted that there could have been a better perception among his tribe mates than the one given by the editor. You know, he voted correctly each time, mostly because he and Sage were basically determining how those votes would go, which could make him look like a strategic threat as well as a social threat because of what I just talked about. So I also wonder if

like maybe Rizzo and Sof and Savannah, much like they talked up Alex as a threat to Juan, maybe they talked up Juan as a threat to Sophie with an and said, look at these things he's done. And that's what she means by realizing that that's that's my best guess on that that's a good guess considering we already know

that Rizzo has an ability to do that and to spin things to people in a way that convinces them that it's true so I'm curious if maybe that was part of it too since she did specify today so I'm wondering if that did come down to a conversation because we only saw kind of the latter half of the conversation between she and Savannah and I think it was, I don't know if Rizzo was there, he might have been, but when she's like, they're flipping, they're

flipping. So there had to have been like a lead up to that of some sort because they were all, it wasn't like she walked up to them and said, oh my gosh, they're flipping. They were all sitting there conversing. So we didn't see the beginning of that conversation. So who knows? Yeah. I mean,

as far as whether he really was that much of a threat, it appeared to me and watching the show that Sage was the one kind of directing where the two of them would go, or at least had greater than 50% input. But, you know, all the things we've talked about, that may have been an incorrect portrayal from the edit. Yeah. It seemed like we already mentioned this.

Joanne was overruling what she wanted to do in terms of taking the shot against Rizzo. It's possible that, you know, like I said, Sophie saw this. and that's part of what contributed to her seeing him as a threat who needed to be dealt with. Mm-hmm. Yeah. All right. Well, the seventh rule covers idols and advantages and game mechanics. And we previously discussed one reason that Jawan was on the outs and his original tribe was because of his obvious idol hunting. One detail about this was that he would go, quote, looking for firewood with his bag or sometimes Savannah's bag, we talked about and Savannah immediately knew that meant he wanted to be able to find an idol and

stuff it in there without interviews yet we don't know if that really was his plan or he just innocently thought it was a better way to carry firewood but i suspect she was right yeah that that certainly seems to be the situation now can i i'm certainly this is not about joan but it is about idols because we did have Christina's idol that was a consideration and I'm imagining you saw the secret scene and the post perhaps

by Miss Sophie blue Sophie No oh okay okay so this is this is worth a mention here because we are I heard that there was a Sophie post that may have been somewhat spoilery so if it's

that don't no this was it was a secret scene and um but it was she went through christina's bag oh yeah no i saw that yeah yeah right yeah yeah so so i'm so i'm so i'm wondering how much of that played a role as well in their decision as to because there seemed to be like um you know as to why they were targeting juan and why they decided to do what they did because they clearly at that point knew that christina has what appears to be an idol because she had the two string beads, not just the one. And so there is some other, you know, game components that were part of this decision, which was inclusive of a confirmation

that Christina had something. And so the Stephen vote didn't necessarily seem to be the best play, I think, at that point, because they knew if we're all targeting Stephen, she might play it for Stephen, but she won't play it for Joanne. I mean, that's, that's an appendix A thing, Jessica. Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry But Yeah, I mean, I didn't see Like I said, I didn't see the post Because it probably was posted on that evil place

Unless it was in a video She does a lot of videos on TikTok So, but I don't catch all of them necessarily But So, so yeah, you know I'll have more to say Okay, we can wait, I'm so sorry, I jumped ahead We were talking about idols and advantages.

I thought perhaps I could talk about that here. No, no, you can't. Bad, bad, bad. Now, in the area of game mechanics, one thing we discussed with Sam last week was how it seems like nobody noticed Savannah didn't actually vote at the split tribal council. When Jeff said, that's three, that's enough.

They should have realized. And that should have given them a clue that maybe she had something else going on, which takes us back to Sage and Joanne not adequately planning ahead for the unknown and waiting too long to go after Rizzo. If they had noticed, they might have seen that waiting would be a really bad idea. Yeah. Well, and I did, somebody mentioned this, that perhaps they thought that she walked up there and sometimes there's a little mess.

Like, you don't get to vote. You know, like you get to come and watch, but this is all a ruse, you don't get to vote. But still, the math should have been mathed and they should have figured it out and made some determinations. And when you are at this number configuration, right, it becomes much more significant as to who votes for who and how many votes you actually have. And so any chance that someone has an extra vote is certainly going to throw a wrench in the works. And so, yeah, the math should have been figured out. It didn't even have to be an extra vote. vote. Even if they said, even if it was the situation you said where she didn't really get to vote,

she just got to come and talk to them. She still lied directly to them. Sure. Which should be an indicator. You cannot trust her or Rizzo. So stop doing that, you know. Right. And even if it wasn't an extra vote, it could have been an idol. It could have been some other advantage. You don't know. the problem is the unknown get rid of this alliance before they can use whatever unknown thing that is against you 100%. Yeah. And then although we mentioned it earlier, I do want to again bring up Juan rigging the rock draw against Jason here because it was a great example of using game mechanics to your advantage.

He set it up to ensure Jason wouldn't be the one going on the journey and possibly getting an advantage and Jason was never the wiser. No, rigging a rock drop only. Yes, yes. Painful. All right. Well, Appendix A. Oh, okay. Here you go.

I'm very excited about it. Discusses players keeping their end goals in mind when voting and we talk about voting out the week than the strong and the week than the strong. And as we've said for the past couple weeks, at this portion of the game, you typically want to get out someone who is strong

on the opposing side. Of course, Rizzo said everyone there is a threat, so that would mean all of them. But I disagree because, like, I'm sorry, I like Christina. I don't see her as a threat to win the game. As just one example that comes to mind. In any case, I think this goes, but of course, Rizzo wasn't going to say that in the game.

Almost everyone here is a threat, except for you, Christina. You know, that's a good way to get on some positive side. Mm-hmm. In any case, I think. this goes back to what I mentioned in the second rule about Rizzo wanting to take out anyone he sees as being in a better position than he is. In other words, a strong opponent. And even though Sophie theoretically was the one who chose the name, Sophie with an E, it made sense for all of that group

because they knew Christina had an idol and there was a possibility she'd play it on Stephen. So much like the move against Nate, it made sense to go for someone who the idol would definitely not be played on. Yes. That was not the only reason they decided on Jawan, but it was a good reason. Like, Christina was either going to play it on herself

or Stephen. There was no world in which she was playing it on Jawan unless Sophie was a double agent and, you know, walked it back to them and told them specifically. Look, they told me they're voting for you, Jouan.

Right. But now, who told them that Christina had the idol, though? I mean, Sage was telling... Sage told Sophie with an E. Oh, and she did tell Sophie was an E. Okay. Yes. Yeah.

So even without that bag search, and this was why the bag search was a secret scene, they didn't need it because the information they had was pretty strong. I mean, Sage said it in a way like, I'm pretty sure. I have a strong feeling. And, you know, that turned into, yes, she has one. So... Well, yeah. And here's the thing.

telling people things okay like I am so proud of a blue Sophie because she has not told even her closest allies what she has she is holding on to that on her own and she even gave us a little nugget she goes if only I could take it she even said it out loud but it was like a little tease this is when you know knowledge is power and if you're the only one who knows it then nobody can use it against you and nobody can run around and there's this whole like like, you can't tell anybody because I'm not supposed to tell anyone. Guess what? There's that old saying about three people can keep a secret if two of them are dead, right?

Like, you can't, like, and you're playing survivor. Like, that's not happening. You, if you were telling one person, the reason for telling them better be, like, I have to save my game in this moment. And that's why I have to share this information with you, because otherwise, I'm a dead man walking. So this is the time I'm going to share this information. But if you don't have to share it.

don't share it. And I feel like this season, people are just sharing. And there isn't that in reason to share anything with certain people in the moments are being shared. Yeah, I think the problem here was, which maybe we'll discuss more next week, the problem here was Sage was trying to do too many things at once. One, she trusted Sophie with any way more than Sophie, way more than she had any reason to believe she should.

Mm-hmm. And two, she want, she, I think she mostly said it because she wanted them to get Christina to play it. Right.

So that idol would be out of the game. Right. She wanted to flush the end. Focus on getting the person out that you want out. Right. You don't need three different things to happen at this tribal council. Yes.

If anything else happens, it's a bonus. But you're spreading yourself too thin trying to do all these things at once. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And she even talked about that, that there was so many things that she was hoping came out of this tribal council. No, the biggest thing that should have come out of this tribal council is Savannah or Rizzo end up getting voted out.

And that Rizzo's idol. I mean, if you want something extra, Rizzo's idol gets played. Like that's, but these are things that existed two tribals ago, last tribal. Like, and it's still the same, it's the same story. And it's just a different day. And it's really unfortunate that that, I don't, I mean, at this point, I think it's kind of determined with what things are going to be. Possibly. Yeah. Yeah. Now, I mentioned, of course, that the group left the decision up to Sophie

with an E, which was a smart move on their part to make her feel like she had an actual saying things with them. Like, we've seen this before. If you are trying to get someone in new and you're like, we're voting for this person, it's not going to work. The way to loop them in is to say, who do you want to vote? Yes. Yes. And so, and of course, this was blue Sophie's idea as far as we saw. And even though Savannah thought Sage was a bigger threat, Sophie wanted it to be Joanne. And of course, did Savannah really think Joanne was, or Sage was a bigger threat? Probably because she actually wanted to do something that wasn't voting out, Jawan.

So, you know, here is one person who doesn't think Jawan was the bigger threat. and yet Sophie with an E was convinced he was. Anyway, you know, as I mentioned in Rule 6, Sophie said Joanne is a good player. He's extremely likable. I don't think I want to sit with him at the end. But, of course, before she even got to that point, she was in the middle of the two groups and had to decide which to go with. She really opened up in terms of going into gamer mode. Now, maybe she's been this way the whole time, but she's been purpled a lot in the edit for much of the time.

but she told us this is a game for a million dollars be ruthless be strategic and make nice when you're a millionaire back home i endorse this message yes me too very much so i think that sums it up nicely and this is why i think people need to remember that everyone is playing their own game but in order to play the game you have to play with the people around you and so i do feel like sophie with an e her goals are different than someone like joan and this is why she's in this decision and this choice that she has to make. She's weighing what's going to be best, what she thinks for her own game, even though we might be looking at it and going, oh, my gosh, what is, what is she doing?

But it's based on the edit. And these are the things that we're seeing as opposed to what she's feeling and experiencing and being told by the people around her during the game. I mean, I do think she made the right decision for herself. Yeah. You know, as I said in Rule 1, we don't know for sure why she made this choice. but we can look at some of the factors involved. She decided to go with a foursome rather than a group of five.

So that puts her in a better position, especially with Final Four firemaking. If they say solid, we've talked about this for several seasons now. You only need a final four. Because then what happens? You worry about it at firemaking. And maybe more importantly,

she probably and rightfully doesn't feel she can trust Stephen and Christina after they showed their cards but they're surprised at the MC vote result. Yes. Yes. And so that in particular is a big reason I don't understand why Sage was

so sure. Sophie was with her. Clearly, Sophie is doing some seriously good acting here. Yes. Oh, yes. She must be because it does leave us scratching her heads for sure. Now, A couple other reasons that factored in, I believe, is that Sophie brought up something you already mentioned, that she wants to keep Savannah as a challenge shield.

I'm sorry, I know I just heavily complimented Sophie, but this is silly. She has as many immunity challenge wins as Savannah does. She came in second to Savannah in Savannah's two wins. Plus, she was already thought to be a challenge threat before the merge. someone is going to look to eliminate a player just because of challenges she is the more likely target than Savannah she is Savannah's challenge shield not the other way around yes and I don't disagree with that and I do think that

because we've already seen that whole discussion had as to why she was being targeted was because she is a challenge beast and because she's doing so great in challenges so yeah it is definitely to Savannah's help if you will and to have Sophie stick around because Savannah's probably looking at the same way that she is going to, she's going to be my, my meat shield that I need. So, yeah, I mean, I know it's, it's a term that we, that we've often utilized for other players in this game, but I do think that both of, both of those women are doing incredibly

at the challenges and they are both finishing either first or second. And so, yeah, it's certainly to Savannah's benefit to keep Sophie so that way she doesn't become the target. Right. But, you know, I think that Sophie, although I agree with her decision on who to go with, this I think was a bad reason. You know, this is the wrong reason for it. Yeah. Sophie also brought up to us that Joanne and Sage have been calling the shots and it's time for her to take control. She can't really do that if she's working with them. So she needs to get rid of them. That makes sense. I'm still not sure how much shot calling and control she'll be able to exercise going forward when she's the fourth member of a four-person alliance.

But like I said, at least for now, they were letting her get her way. So make sense. Sure. Yeah. All right. Well, Appendix B discusses the jury phase. On the one hand, I don't think this move was specifically made to put Joanne on the jury for motives other than those we've already discussed.

But on the other hand, with his reaction, he isn't going there mad. and indeed seems willing to give credit to whomever out of his group can claim it at the end. And he could have some sway with the other jurors in that regard as well if he gives those people points for getting him out. And then, you know, it could encourage other jurors to give them points as well. If they had voted out, Sage, I'm not sure she would have handled it in quite the same way. No, I don't think so. I don't think Sage is going to be a happy juror. I don't think so, but I do think Joanne is going to want to give credit.

I anticipate that Joanne's question from the jury will be about himself and why he needed to be targeted. I just anticipate that being the feel of the question that he is going to pose. Okay. Well, we'll see. All right. Well, it is about time to wrap things up. So what are your final thoughts on Joanne? so three boys on a bench is no longer it's now two boys on a bench so we won't have any more

musical notes from joan relative to the lovely music they were trying to remind a huge loss to the music world huge huge loss but i do feel for joan because i do think that joan came into this game really believing that he was going to be a great survivor player He had a lot of positivity about himself. He described himself as friendly and fearless. And so I do think that coming into this game and having those components of yourself and feeling that you are going to be able to represent those is a key component to being a great survivor player.

But I do think that there is part of Jouan that got a little too comfortable because I feel like Jouan was being built up a bit. I really do have to blame a lot of this on Rizzo because I do think Rizzo was doing a great job of making Joanne feel that he's in a better place than he is, making Joanne feel that he is more in control than he actually is. And I love the point that you made about Sophie and that final her voting statements that she made about learning today that he was so strategic. And so I do think that Rizzo had something to do with that. Jawan definitely knew that he wanted to play this game. He wanted someone to play the game with and he had Sage. He did.

build relationships he needed. But unfortunately, I do think he just lost sight of how everyone around him was doing the same thing. And when everyone around he was doing the same thing, you have to be aware of that ripple effect and how something you do can certainly affect what the next person is going to do. Sharing secrets, talking about what someone told you, spilling the beans, if you will, all of these things can negatively affect the game that you want to play as soon as others find out. And for Joanne, this just seems to be a season of let's share. Let's tell everybody everything we know all of the time, unless your name is Sophie without an E. So, Joanne, I give you props for coming into this game, wanting to play fearless and trying to do so.

I'm sorry, but your winner pick is now gone, David Blumberg. And so I have to just say that one more. But I understand why he was your winner pick because he certainly had all of the capabilities. is to get there. So, Joanne, I think you really just got, you got outplayed by the people around you who are certainly taking advantage of your friendly nature and how they approach this game

and the information that they're sharing with you. Oh, oh, oh, no, you're muted. We can't even hear you crying. I didn't want to accidentally make noise over you. Yes, I was just saying, Joanne, my pre-game winner pick. I didn't want people to hear me sobbing. That was the real

It's so sad. Yeah, I had fun watching him play because he clearly had fun playing. Though, as I mentioned earlier, his game was something of a roller coaster ride with highs and lows in his position. At the end, as I mentioned, Joanne told Sage when he was saying

goodbye, we tried and we made the wrong decision. And that's true. Just not for the decision he was talking about. It was the previous two when they had the opportunity to vote out Rizzo. Twice they didn't do it and voted out their own numbers instead. We saw it coming and we even spent a fair amount of time last week talking about how it could come back to bite them because they seemed to think they had plenty of time when they really didn't. MC was not the threat. Alex was not the threat. Rizzo was the

threat but they decided to try to work with him at those points instead. I suspect it was at least partially due to Joanne's friendly relationship with Rizzo. And if that's the case, it was a clear situation where he needed to put that aside and take a more objective look at the overall game board. If it was due to other reasons and they had a grand plan, then they didn't take into consideration all of the moving parts that they needed to for that plan. Again, as we discussed last week, there is uncertainty in the game of Survivor, both in exactly how relationships line up and also in what trinkets players may, have that you don't know about in addition to the ones you do. But Joanne seemed to think he was in prime position no matter what, which unfortunately for him was not the case.

Dewan worked hard to put himself in the right positions, but people kept turning on him, his supposed allies in his original tribe to start with, and then Sophie with an E, along with those very same people at the end. Other people saw how hard he was working and that worried them. Plus, on top of that, he was one of the most likable. people there, unless your name was Savannah. And that was a different story. It all came down to Sophie's choice, which was not an actual Sophie's choice, but because

it was a matter of which option was best for her, not too horrible options. So for one of those options, it was indeed the worst possible outcome for Joanne. And that's the one she went with. Juan just appeared to be too much of a threat for her liking, which agreed with Rizzo's thoughts as well. And Joanne allowed that to happen by waiting too long to make a move against that group. And that is why Joanne lost. There we are. There we are. All right. Well, before we move on to our predictions, I want to let everyone know that next week, we will be back to our regular time. And we will have Omer Zahir, joining us once again and fresh off of the Traders

Canada. So, you know, he will, he will, you know, not talk Traders Canada with us, but he'll, you know, he now has played that game as well in addition to survivors. So maybe that will give him even more insights. He already had a lot of insights. But I know. He's so enjoyable. He's so enjoyable it's going to be very exciting to have him join us for sure and we want to remind everyone that the rules we just discussed and i mean it this time unlike the first time i said it are available in a shorter uh more colorful version in poster form and in t-shirt form and in checklist t-shirt form uh so go to rob has a website dot com slash y x lost feed to find all of that yes and now it's on you oh it's on me oh okay so are we going to talk about where they can find us is that

what we're doing now that would be their thing we talk about next i know i always forget like the transition right they have to figure my dogs are distracted me just a smidge right now but you can certainly find me at jessca lewis 89 on blue sky and also on that other thing that used to be called twitter i am also on instagram at jessica lois six seven eight nine but my social media is nothing as it used to be and nothing compared to the guy who sits next to me, David Bloomberg, who has a link tree that allows you to find all of his social media content very easily. So David Bloomberg, why don't you tell them all about your link tree? So that is at link tree slash David Bloomberg. You can find all of my various accounts there.

You could find me directly on Blue Sky is at David Bloomberg. Not David B himself. That's a different person who I also talk to on Blue Sky. And I encourage everyone to, you know, join in those conversations there. Also, of course, I am on TikTok, YouTube and Instagram as at David Bloomberg TV, where I've been posting around two or three reality TV short videos every day. Holidays, it was down to the Thanksgiving weekend was down to one, but it'll be back up shortly. And most of them are, of course, about Survivor 49, plus some from the Traders' Canada Season 3.

And I'm co-hosting the Trader podcast for the Traders Canada each week. That's T-R-A-I-D-R. You can find that wherever you get your podcasts or on YouTube. So, you know, I was talking about Omer Zahir

on that podcast as well. Mm-hmm. All right. Now we can do predictions. And the preview tells us Sof claims to Sage

that she wants to turn on Savannah and Rizzo. I'll believe it when I see it. She does still have her secret knowledge is power and Rizzo still has his not-so-secret idol. So I guess if she really wanted to make a splash, she could do that now and take his idol and help vote him out. It would be really fun to see.

I just don't think it's going to happen yet. I mean, yeah, I don't think so. Meanwhile, Sage is very upset at other Sophie for the huge smile she had on her face while turning against Sage and Joanne. And Sophie says she's not going to apologize for that. Sage says when you piss her off, you go home. Do you, though? Because I can't imagine.

Sophie's newfound allies suddenly flipping against her unless, again, it is your Sophie. But if she does that, she's obviously going to vote out Rizzo. Why would she take someone's idol and then keep that person in the game? It wouldn't make sense. So I do not see Sophie with an E going out in any way, shape, or form. I'm afraid it will be the more obvious target, Sage. It would only make sense to vote her out since she was Joanne's partner in crime. And she was trying to get rid of Savannah.

And we know how Savannah feels about that. So I'm afraid it's going to be the obvious. Yeah, I have to go with the obvious as well because she just doesn't have the backing that she needs to pull anything off. And I think when you just start looking at the numbers, do I think it would be a beautiful thing for Sophie without an E to steal Rizzo's idol and then vote about? Yes, that would be incredible. But now I don't think is the appropriate moment to do.

that because she just, the momentum for that to happen doesn't need to happen yet because you do have Sage. You have what is technically the easy vote, right? And the easy vote is to vote out Sage as opposed to trying to coordinate something and somebody sharing that information because we've seen what Sophie with an E does do and she shares information. And so if Sophie without an E decides to try to gain some followers and momentum for that to happen, it's not going to

bode well for her, considering what we know about Sophie with an E, wanting to keep particular people around in order to protect herself. So I unfortunately agree that I think we are losing Sage. All right, well, we will see if

my predictions in particular are any better this time than they were last time. it couldn't be worse. As we wrap up, I want to encourage people to check out the RJAP patron program at rob has a website.com slash patron.

You can get access to all of the special podcasts that are put out just for patrons, plus the Facebook groups and Discord, and of course you support shows like ours and everything on the network by going to Rob has a website.com slash patron and signing up. Also, you can go to we knowserviver.com

like it says down there and subscribe to all the RAP the RHAP Survivor Podcasts. You get, of course, us and the No-at-alls and the B&B and Survivor Global and more. Anything that's in the Survivor feed, you get it. So make sure you're subscribed if you aren't already. And we would like to thank everyone at RHAP for all of the incredible content that you do create, not just the YBlink Lost podcast, but all of the content.

But mostly the Y Blank Lost podcast. Mostly that, though. We really appreciate that so much. So thank you to Scott and Jess for the editing. you do thank you for the team that supports you and supports why blithe loss and all of the content that you are creating and editing thank you to will from america for the theme song that you created for the wybling clause podcast that you hear on the audio version and david it's been a long

time since it was just you and i bantering about survivor and why particular people lost this is a nice little change up for us so a little lovely as always a little holiday change up on things you know you eat differently about holidays you see different people at thanksgiving so yeah yeah my mother was very concerned she was like have you done the podcast because you couldn't find it yet I'm like no more doing that today so she was she was very concerned so mom here you go yes yes all right well thank you of course jessica for you know rushing home and jumping straight on to the podcast to accommodate my rather strange schedule uh today and uh you know like we said uh omer will join us next week and we will see you

all then bye if you're a survivor and you're feeling down david and jessica will turn it around they'll break down the rules and they'll show you how you played yourself and got voted out And this is why blind glass. Oh, baby, this is what black glass.