‘Survivor 49’ Premiere: Was [Spoiler] the Right First Boot? (POLL)

The Tribe Has Spoken

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[Warning: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for the Survivor 49 premiere.]

Jeff Probst warned that the Fiji heat hit the Survivor 49 cast fast, but this is a uniquely funny bunch even without weather-induced delirium driving their behavior. The first episode of Survivor 49 proved as much. This charismatic bunch had memorable characters on tribes Hina, Kele, and Uli, resulting in one of the more memorable first-boot players of the new era. It was also a disappointing first elimination for a couple of reasons (stay tuned for our exit interview with this player tomorrow).

The two-hour Survivor premiere aired on Wednesday, September 24, on CBS. There are always standout personalities on this Emmy-winning competition series, but Season 49 definitely has more per tribe than usual.

On the Hina (yellow) tribe are Steven Ramm, Kristina Mills, Matt Williams, Sophie Segreti, Michelle “MC” Chukwujekwu, and Jason Treul. MC and Jason are the two alternates. Notably, Jason revealed his alternate status during his first interview with Probst pre-marooning challenge, and MC didn’t.

On the Kele (blue) tribe are Alex Moore, Kimberly “Annie” Davis, Jake Latimer, Jeremiah Ing, Nicole Mazullo, and Sophi Balerdi. With his wife’s blessing, Jake left his 9-months-pregnant wife behind to compete in Fiji. As of Episode 1, he didn’t know if she had given birth yet, and he won’t find out until his time in the game is over. Jake and his wife accepted that he would miss the birth of his first child in the hopes that he would win $1 million for their little family.

On the Uli (red) tribe are Nate Moore, Savannah Louie, Rizo Velovic, Shannon Fairweather, Sage Ahrens-Nichols, and Jawan Pitts. Rizo competed in the post-marooning solo challenge for resources, fighting against Alex from Kele. Rizo — who, at 25, is the youngest contestant of the season — was slinging Gen-Z slang throughout the challenge that required finding puzzle pieces hidden in fake coconuts, solving said puzzle, and digging for the wheel of a ship buried in the sand. The puzzle was a map to the wheel.

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Alex had a huge lead, not only because Rizo was self-admittedly horrible at puzzles but also because he didn’t realize there was one coconut left to crack open. He used Alex’s lead and Survivor‘s lack of strict challenge rules to his advantage by running over to Alex’s solved puzzle while his opponent dug for the wheel. Rizo placed his unsolved puzzle on top of Alex’s to copy his work and gave hilarious live commentary of his moves throughout. Alex’s lead shrank by the second as he struggled to find the hidden treasure. Rizo went from saying his team was “cooked” if he had to solve a puzzle to winning the challenge, thereby snagging supplies for his tribe.

The immunity challenge saw Hina victorious again. Nate (a Marvel producer) and Nicole (a financial crime consultant) tried to lead their teams to second-place victory and avoid Tribal Council. Nate’s leadership won it in a nail-biter finish, but Kele struggled to communicate effectively throughout the last leg, so their loss wasn’t too surprising. Based on deliberations back at camp, neither was who they ended up voting out. But it didn’t make their justification for the elimination any less disappointing.

You have to make a plan with allies before Tribal Council. There are no guarantees in the game, but trying to survive on your own, especially in week one, is going to get you voted out faster than working with a team. Annie and Nicole became easy targets for the alliance formed between Jake, Alex, Sophi, and Jeremiah, but Alex was inclined to protect Annie, with whom he teamed up in secret.

Robert Voets / CBS

Annie campaigned more than Nicole, who spent a lot of time observing the behaviors of her teammates, looking for clues of deception. Nicole’s career in investigating financial crimes made her confident in her ability to spot a liar, but that skill proved to be underdeveloped. It’s possible that there were conversations left on the cutting-room floor that made Nicole think playing her Shot in the Dark wasn’t necessary. From what viewers saw, Nicole did a whole lot of observing and no strategizing to save her skin. In fact, she didn’t realize that her skin needed saving until sitting in front of Probst at Tribal, but even those red flags from specific comments from Jeremiah didn’t make her use the one potentially lifesaving move at her disposal.

In the end, the team voted Nicole out because they viewed her as too physically weak, and they wanted to win challenges. Challenge performance is always considered when deliberating on eliminations, but it is not often the deciding factor in recent seasons. A savvy player concocts a plan to show their tribe that they’re a strategic asset they don’t want to lose. Nicole wasn’t the sole reason Kele lost the immunity challenge; her direction on the puzzle was strong enough to keep the competition with Uli relatively close. But her lack of strategic talks after the challenge made her an easy target. It’s a shame, as Nicole was a very entertaining personality on this tribe from the jump.

Survivor is meant to be a cutthroat game. Voting someone out based on challenge performance is, frankly, a boring choice. Jake and Alex orchestrated this vote with help from a semi-reluctant Sophi and Jeremiah. With their selection, the Jake and Alex “bromance” took control of the tribe’s narrative, and everyone else let it happen. Hopefully, the easiest and obvious moves won’t continue to win the hour in 49’s Tribal Councils. On the other hand, Nicole didn’t fight hard enough to stay (from what we saw). Every suspicious look she gave and paranoid question she asked during the pre-vote interview made me beg for her to cause a live Tribal to shake things up. But alas, the tribe spoke, and Nicole didn’t.

Do you think Kele voted out the right player? Cast your vote in the poll below.

Survivor, Wednesdays, 8/7c, CBS

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