Imagine being stranded on a deserted island with a group of eight people you have never met before. On the opposite side of the island is an opposing group of eight, who have one goal: survive longer than you.
You are put through a series of trials and tribulations ranging from intense physical challenges to difficult puzzles, all while a man named Jeff waves a reward of pizza in your face. If you win, you get to eat, but if you lose, you can expect starvation back at your tribes camp. Some may even resort to eating rats and slugs after losing so often.
In March of 2000, 16 individuals faced this reality, competing on two separate tribes in the hopes of being named the sole survivor. With a cash prize of $1 million dollars on the line, these individuals were willing to sweat and scheme in order to make it to the finale.
In the end, a seven-person jury–made up of contestants who had been voted out after the merging of the two tribes–decided the fates of finalists Richard Hatch and Kelly Wiglesworth. After questioning the two remaining champions, the jury ultimately got to vote for the person who they believed played the best overall game, crowning them the Ultimate Survivor. The winner would then be awarded the million dollar prize.
Since the official airing of Survivor: Borneo, this reality TV show has become a cult classic for millions across the world. The Survivor franchise has become huge, with spin offs of the show being created, including Australian Survivor and Koh-Lanta (the French edition of Survivor).
Now, Survivor has officially made it to season 50, making it one for the history books. Survivor: In the Hands of the Fans has brought back fan-favorite players across the previous 49 seasons, including former winners such as Savannah Louie (Season 49) and Kyle Fraser (Season 48).
The season is particularly memorable due to the various new twists introduced. From three multi-player eliminations to the introduction of the Billie Ellish Boomerang idol, the season has become infamous for all the curveballs supposedly voted for by the fans.
Many fans thought the beginning of the season was lackluster. Prior to the airing of Survivor 50, various bootlists were created suggesting the order of elimination and who the grand winner would be.
One predictions list seemed to get the elimination order exactly right, correctly listing each of the pre-jury players who would be voted out. Fans felt less of a thrill as the leaked list was proven to be more and more correct with each elimination. Where is the fun in knowing who wins?
Luckily for fans, said-list finally miscalculated alongside the elimination of the first jury member. It is believed that the elimination list was only correct up until that point due to a leaked photo with a few of the castaways–the very same ones to be voted out pre-jury–returning from an airport without the remaining players.
With various elimination lists proven incorrect, there is a possibility that the remaining 10 players all have a shot at winning. At this point in the game, it might be time to look back at the contestant’s skills and make predictions for who the Ultimate Survivor will truly be.
Emily Flippen
At the bottom of the board, our least likely Sole Survivor award goes out to Emily Flippen.
Like her last name suggests, Emily has provided for interesting dynamics throughout the season by continuously playing both sides. Up until episode 9, she was doing a pretty solid job of remaining off the chopping block. However, Emily has proven herself to be a liability for her teammates more often than not.
Idols and advantages are sacred in the game of Survivor. They give you some semblance of power in the game, especially when they remain a secret from people outside your alliance. Emily, it seems, does not recognize this reality, having outed just about every idol her allies possess to the other players. Whether this is strategy or stupidity, we do not know.
Even so, Emily has built friendships with a majority of the major players who have, thus far, kept her from being voted off. Her greatest allies were Rick Devens and Christian Hubicki, and she maintained a solid relationship with Ozzy Lusth.
While Rick and Christian are two peas in a pod, Christian and Ozzy had a more unstable relationship. Pre-merge, Christian, Ozzy and Emily were all on the new Vatu tribe together. During this time, Christian blindsided Ozzy by voting out one of his greatest allies, Q Burdette, resulting in Christian and Ozzy’s developing rivalry.
While Emily strongly pushed to let Ozzy in on the vote, Christian did not believe he would have willingly voted out Q. This began a tense relationship between the two men, which regained a semblance of stability when Christian gave Ozzy his Shot in the Dark, a one-in-six shot at immunity exchanged for a player’s vote.
In episode 9, this tumultuous relationship came back to hit Christian like a truck. When his name was brought up for the next vote, he began whispering Ozzy’s name instead. To the wrong people, that is. Word quickly got back to Ozzy, who was more than willing to vote Christian out once and for all.
Emily made the grave mistake of trying to save her number one ally, Christian, by throwing out Ozzy’s name herself. She was beginning to dig her own grave, and Emily was nearly the one voted out instead of Christian. She had played the middle for too long, and her game had been sloppy at best. While she has lived to see the next tribal council, the likeliness of her lasting much longer in the game feels slim.
While there are ways Emily could be saved in the game, they all seem out of reach for her. In all 39 days she has played Survivor, Emily has only had a total of four wins. Only one of these was an Individual Immunity win, which took place in her original season, Season 45. Therefore, it seems unlikely Emily will win immunity through challenges this season.
In addition to her lack of skill at securing her own immunity, her only true remaining ally in the game is Rick.
Emily could attempt to play her Shot in the Dark, but this will likely not do her much good. Throughout its existence in Survivor, since season 41, only two players have successfully played their Shot in the Dark and won immunity. Even if Emily managed to become a third Shot in the Dark winner, the immunity it brings only works for one tribal council, and she would likely be voted out soon after.
While Emily has a high chance of being the fifth member of the jury, her only remaining ally, Rick, will likely go just as quickly.
Rick Devens
Rick has had a pretty large target on his back for the past few episodes of Season 50. In his original season, Season 38, Rick set a franchise record for discovering and playing four separate hidden immunity idols. He has also been known to plant or play fake idols, a characteristic that has continued into the current season.
Due to Rick’s ability to smell out idols like a blood hound, his name has been brought up for elimination more than once throughout this season. In episode 12, this nearly got both Rick and Aubry Bracco–who he paired with for the duo elimination twist–voted out.
However, earlier in the season, Rick and Christian came up with their master plan to “hide” a fake idol at tribal. Seeing that he and Aubry were likely the next two players to join the jury that night, Rick created a live tribal council by retrieving the faux idol in front of everyone. His story? He found a clue stating an idol was hidden at tribal council, but he had not been able to get it before that moment.
While Rick’s plan to avoid being voted off that evening did succeed, his reluctance in showing anyone else the “idol” made other castaways wonder if it was even real. While he has yet to play the fake idol, keeping it as his secret weapon has only added to other players’ distrust in him.
Rick is only above Emily due to the past episode, where Emily brought up Ozzy’s name to be voted out. Ozzy, who is a member of the strongest alliance — Cirie, Ozzy and Rizo — in the game, has historically not taken his name being said lightly. Rick is also likely to milk the fake idol for as long as he is able to, but eventually, it will fail for him.
While Rick is certainly not a Goliath like other members of the cast, he is more likely to win individual immunity than Emily is. Rick has won a total of five individual immunity challenges across his time in Survivor. Granted, all of those were in Season 38; but, if he could do it then, he might still be able to do it now.
Rick’s real life savior, however, will be if he finds another idol or advantage. It is possible he could find the idol Dee left with in her pocket, as it is typical survivor fashion to replant the idol somewhere on the island. If anyone has a chance of finding a real idol, it is the Master of Idols himself, Rick Devens.
After ranking Emily and Rick, the game is really up in the air. While these two have been shown to be at the bottom, and were the only two to vote incorrectly at episode 9’s tribal council, everyone else is doing pretty well for themselves. Therefore, the ranking of the players in the middle is probably the hardest ones. That being said, the votes do not look too good for Tiffany Ervin.
Tiffany Ervin
Tiffany was very rarely featured in the beginning of the season, and only began having more confessionals due to her name being thrown around multiple times. The editors do not appear to be giving her a true winner’s storyline, which leads to the belief that she will not make it to the final tribal council.
While she has succeeded in avoiding elimination so far, it is not due to her great alliances. In fact, Tiffany does not seem to have any real allies. Once the tribe gets out Emily and Rick, the alliances may want to vote out the players serving as swing votes.
Tiffany is currently in the very middle of the tribe. There are three sustained alliances left in the game, and Tiffany is not a member of any single one of them. While this could play to her advantage, it feels more likely that the alliances will attempt to vote her out before she can choose a side.
Alongside this, the chances of Tiffany winning individual immunity does not seem great. While she has won before, it was with the help of Joe Hunter, when they played as a pair for a double-elimination challenge. She has yet to truly win an immunity challenge on her own.
Despite this, Tiffany has proven to be one of the stronger remaining players, especially in episode 9 where she helped win rice for the tribe by outlasting host, Jeff Probst, in the immunity challenge. The issue is that she is not the strongest of the remaining players, so while she can outlast Rizo or Rick Devens, winning against Ozzy or Jonathan may prove to be more difficult.
However, Tiffany’s greatest chance to survive longer in the game is potentially Joe himself. After winning the immunity challenge together, the two also had the opportunity to speak one-on-one over pasta. While the alliance is weak at best–if you can even call it an alliance–Joe may be able to add Tiffany’s swing vote to his own alliance, which will in-turn take her further in the game.
With the idea of the “middle people” being voted out pre-Final Five, Aubry Bracco is likely to leave just as quickly as Tiffany.
Aubry Bracco
Aubry is considered one of the biggest threats in the tribe. Like Tiffany, she does not have any strong alliances; but, unlike Tiffany, this may prove to be her greatest strength. Aubry is well known for being able to maneuver out of the bottom of the votes, and she has continued this trend in Season 50.
In the first episodes of the season, Aubry was placed on a tribe with another player named Genevieve Mushaluk (Season 47). Despite Genevieve’s initial attempts to ally with Aubry, Aubry did not seem to like Genevieve’s vibes. The two were quickly pitted against one another after that.
Aubry’s saving grace was that her tribe was not the one going to tribal council pre-merge. If they had, she likely would have been voted out, as Genevieve had more friends within the original tribe. However, Aubry managed to flip her luck when she allied with Rick to vote out Genevieve in the final vote before the departing members joined the jury.
Since then, Aubry has been on the right side of the votes a majority of the time. Instead of her name being thrown around as it was pre-merge, she has been able to navigate herself to join the majority for each subsequent vote.
However, her luck is bound to run out at some point. The few alliances she appears to have made are not strong. No one would take her to the final tribal council, because she would be a threat to win. While she may be able to continue playing the middle under the radar until Tiffany is voted out, once the tribe gets smaller, she will have no place to hide without real allies.
Like many of the previously mentioned players on this list, Aubry has a very limited chance of winning individual immunity. Despite being a four-time Survivor player, Aubry has only won two individual immunities.
Being a four-time player has also made Aubry a bigger threat. Time and time again, she proves to be good enough to return to the game of Survivor. While the other castaways may not have seen any great moves from her this season, the reminder of her previous great plays may be enough to put them on edge. While other alliances may keep her as a vote up until the end of the game, once the final few roll around, Aubry will certainly be joining the jury.
By this point, the only remaining players will be split into their two alliances. The first alliance, “Cirie’s Rizzard of Oz”, consisting of Cirie Fields, Rizo Velovic and Ozzy Lusth, have remained a solid alliance since the beginning of the game. On the opposite side, Stephanie LaGrossa Kendrick, Jonathan Young and Joe Hunter have also been working together throughout the post-merge. As the players love to say each and every episode, they will be going to war.
Of the six players, the one who is likely to go before the final episode is Jonathan.
Jonathan Young
Jonathan is a physical beast amongst Survivor standards, having even been called a giant by his fellow players. He has been portrayed well with a good storyline and even believes himself to have beaten out three major players in the game, most notably Dee Valladares.
With Jonathan being considered such a major physical threat, and having a good story to tell the jury at the final tribal council, the other five remaining players will eventually get him out.
Why not vote him out sooner then? Young has maintained a close game with both Stephanie and Joe, both of whom have an old-school survivor mentality.
While in more recent seasons, Survivor players are willing to play with their enemy to get just a little further in the game. The old school way is to stick with who you say is in your alliance. Stephanie is one of the original players, playing her first season in Season 10, and while Joe is a new-era player, he preaches being moral and keeping your word.
Joe may be Jonathan’s downfall in the end, though. Within the last two episodes, Joe appears to have become closer to Cirie’s Rizzard of Oz and even helped them vote out Coach Wade and Chrissy Hofbeck, who he was supposedly allied with.
While Joe will not want to write down Jonathan’s name, he is smart enough to know that Jonathan is probably the biggest physical threat. If Jonathan fails to win immunity even once, not taking the opportunity to vote him out may mean future wins, and the possibility of Jonathan deciding who comes to the final tribal council with him.
With Jonathan being booted out, we have reached the finale. Our remaining five players consist of Stephanie, Joe, Ozzy, Cirie and Rizo.
Of these remaining five players, Ozzy, Joe and Stephanie are the only ones expected to win individual immunity and make it to the final four. Rizo has yet to win an individual immunity challenge, and Cirie has only won one across six seasons of games in the Survivor franchise.
Therefore, the second to last member of the jury will likely be Stephanie.
Stephanie LaGrossa
Of the remaining five players, Stephanie will be largely on the outs. Cirie, Rizo and Ozzy have all been working together throughout the season, and Joe would have just assisted in getting Jonathan eliminated. This leaves Stephanie with no allies, and with Cirie’s Rizzard of Oz ruling the game, her only option will be to maneuver to vote out Joe.
She has two potential ways to make it to the final tribal council: win individual immunity or try to get Joe voted out. While Stephanie is a great physical player, she just is not as good as Joe or Ozzy. So, her chances of winning that final five immunity challenge is slim. Meanwhile, there is no possible way for her to get Cirie, Ozzy or Rizo to vote against one another, so her only remaining option is to vote for her longtime ally, Joe.
The greatest fall back to Stephanie’s survival here would be if Joe wins. On the off chance that Joe beats Ozzy, thus winning individual immunity and being ineligible to be voted out of the game, all four votes will fall on Stephanie. Her chances of making it to the final four fail here.
With that, we have no more eliminations to vote for. Season 35 introduced the final challenge of the game: making fire. The person who wins individual immunity gets to choose one person to bring with them to the final tribal council, while the other two are forced to make fire against one another. Whoever builds a fire that burns through a rope faster is the one that joins the final three, while the other player becomes the final member of the jury.
Once again, the only two people in the last individual immunity challenge who are threats to win are Ozzy and Joe. Of the two, Ozzy statistically has the better chance of winning.
With 9 wins out of 18 total individual immunity challenges, Ozzy has won 50% of the total games he has played. In comparison, Joe has won 6 out of 14 individual immunity challenges he has played, resulting in a winning average of 43%.
With Ozzy expected to win the final immunity challenge, that means the remaining three players – Joe, Cirie and Rizo – will need to plead their case to him to take them to the final three. However, Ozzy likely already knows who he is taking with him to the end.
Since day one of Survivor season 50, Ozzy and Cirie have been working together. Cirie has saved Ozzy more than once in the game, being the one to tell him when he was being voted out and being the one to turn the votes onto someone else when Ozzy’s name has been mentioned.
Due to Ozzy’s previous history of loyalty to his greatest ally, even refusing to vote for his allies at the final four in his original season, Cirie will probably have the privilege of joining Ozzy for the chance to win it all.
This leaves Joe and Rizo to earn their spot in the final three.
R.I.Z.G.O.D.
For Rizo, this is the moment that could make or break his game. Despite being a major player in many votes, such as the most recent vote in which he convinced everyone to vote Christian instead of Emily as they had been planning, Rizo has come across as lazy to many of the other players.
Rizo’s greatest asset has been his ability to know and control the votes. However, the same can be said for Cirie, who is the more prominent of the two due to her ability to easily sway votes with just a few words. While Rizo may be a force to be reckoned with against any other player, Cirie is like a hypnotizing snake who looks at you once and you are listening to her every command.
That is why winning fire would be a major opportunity for Rizo. He can make this a comeback story of sorts. After playing an amazing game in the previous season, having been able to keep an idol that everyone knew about until it was going to expire, his downfall came in the form of fire. He ultimately lost to his ally Savannah Louie, who went on to win the season.
Successfully winning the fire challenge could help Rizo prove that he is not lazy and has been working to win. He can tell the story of how he lost in season 49 but worked and worked on his past failures — specifically of previously losing at fire — so that he could beat Joe now. This may help him to win against Cirie, who has a similar game strategy.
That being said, Rizo’s chances of winning fire are slim. With only two weeks between his original season and season 50, Rizo had a very small amount of time to practice.
While he could have been practicing behind the scenes throughout season 50, jury member Chrissy stated that Rizo had been very sick at the beginning of the season, due to little time he had to rest from Season 49. Then, once he was feeling better, we have not seen anything to suggest he has been practicing, which would probably be mentioned considering his failure from the prior season.
Therefore, Rizo will probably be the final member of the jury, leaving Joe to join Ozzy and Cirie in the final three.
From here, the choice moves from the remaining player’s hands to that of the jury. It will be up to the final three to sell their story of why they should win and appeal to the jury enough to win the majority of the votes.
Ozzy Lusth
Of the three, Ozzy will probably have the least amount of votes, if any at all. Ozzy’s story will likely be how he decided to leave the pure physical game behind and play a more strategic game.
In the past, Ozzy has put little effort towards making alliances with as many people as possible, often sticking with a group he deems his final five, and then being blindsided by people from that same group.
This season, Ozzy has made a greater effort towards building alliances, and has done so with nearly everyone in the game. Additionally, he has not been as overly emotional with being blindsided. While he has maintained his tradition of having his greatest allies at the beginning of the game remain his number ones through the end, he has focused less on purely winning every challenge and more on his social game. This marks a major shift in Ozzy, which would have helped him make it to the end instead of being played for a fool like in past seasons.
While the jury would probably love to hear about this change in Ozzy, the biggest drawback to his strategy and ability to win is that his social game is centered around Cirie.
Multiple times he has changed his vote because Cirie told him too, and he has been saved a number of times from being voted out because Cirie took the target off his back and pinned it to someone else’s. The jury is smart enough to realize this, and Cirie will likely say this in her message to the jury as well, resulting in very few votes for Ozzy.
Joe Hunter
In second place comes Joe. While he has not played the most strategic game, and he is on par with Ozzy in his physical game, Joe has a number of friends who will be on the jury. In fact, at this point, every member of his alliance will be members of the jury.
While some may be bitter about his role in getting them voted out, such as Stephanie, others like Coach and Chrissy will probably go the old school route and vote for the person who played the game with them. This garners Joe one or two votes but not enough to win the million dollar prize.
That means the title of the Ultimate Survivor goes to Cirie Fields.
Cirie Fields
Cirie is the Queen of Survivor. For six total seasons in the Survivor franchise, Cirie has been constantly voted out in the beginning of the game because everyone collectively agrees that if Cirie made it to the final tribal council, she would win. In a world of fist fighters, Cirie survives through her powers of speech.
Cirie has some incredible feats to her name throughout her time playing Survivor. The most notable was in Season 16: Fans versus Favorites when she convinced Erik Reichenbach to give up his individual immunity necklace, resulting in his boot from the game.
She has continued with these feats in Season 50, where she has controlled the vote for a number of people, namely turning the vote from Rick and Aubry onto Coach and Chrissy. Cirie has correctly voted at every single tribal council so far in the game, knows the location of every idol and advantage and is a cherished ally for nearly every player left.
In the end, Cirie will finally have her very first Survivor win. After playing for six years in the Survivor franchise and over 121 days of the game, Cirie will win the biggest season yet. Her ability to control the game without putting a target on her back will be enough to gain the majority of the votes from the jury and will land her the title of the Ultimate Survivor.
