WARNING: THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR SURVIVOR 47.

In my Issue 7 Article about Survivor 46 (which you should definitely read here for more context about what Survivor is as a concept), I wondered if Survivor 47 would top it, but in the weeks leading up to the Survivor 47 premiere, I was hesitant to say that it could run against 46 in popularity. Yet, with the first immunity challenge, all my expectations were blown out of the water. Firstly, during the challenge, the boats that the contestants had to paddle to get to shore capsized multiple times. Then, contestant Andy Rueda collapsed from heatstroke in the middle of the challenge. Once he had recovered, in the midst of a panic attack, he proceeded to spill the beans on literally everything going on at camp, even admitting that he planned to turn on his only ally Jon Lovett (yes, that Jon Lovett, the one who hosts famous podcast Pod Save America) in front of him. AND HE STILL WASN’T VOTED OUT. JON WAS.
That first episode sums up a good portion of the season. Chaos ran rampant, loyalties flip-flopped, and each vote-out seemed questionable to fans. Every character in the endgame, whether it was the strategic genius Genevieve Mushaluk, social and challenge powerhouse Rachel Lamont, or vest-wearing underdog Sol Yi, had someone rooting for them. New twists never seen before on Survivor were created, such as a temporary tribe swap used only for a reward challenge. And crazy strategies were created, such as using a fake idol to cause the majority alliance to split their vote on two targets, where one member of the alliance (Andy, of course) flipped to blindside another member. And the episode when that happened? It’s now become the highest-ranked episode of Survivor ever.
However, despite the wild nature of this season, I found myself growing increasingly bored. Even with all the fun and exciting strategies and the chaos running wild, everything became predictable. “Now, if these plot lines were as exciting as you make them out to be, how would that be the case?” you may ask. Well, let me introduce you to Rome Cooney, a 30 year old E-Sports commentator from Phoenix, Arizona.
From the start, Rome’s tribemates knew he came to play hard when on the first day they found him diving headfirst into the tribe’s well, searching for advantages and immediately running away once seen. It was pretty much a consensus that Rome was on the bottom of the tribe standings after that, with only Genevieve talking to him to try to make an ally in him. However, things turned on its head when Rome found multiple advantages. As soon as tribemates Teeny Chirichillo and Kishan Patel found out about them, they flipped to Rome’s side, and voted out fellow tribemate Aysha Welch when she wouldn’t join them, as well as Kishan when he attempted to throw Genevieve under the bus. After that, Rome went on a power trip, even going as far as to follow around tribe outcast Sol Yi all day to make sure he didn’t find any advantages.
However, after the tribes joined for Mergatory, Rome wasn’t fully sober from his power-high. He attempted to weasel his way to power by shoving a wedge between major players, attempting to paint Sol as a major threat, and spreading rumors about challenge beast Kyle Ostwald saying sexist things about his tribemate. However, Sol caught word of his lies, and quickly debunked them amongst his tribemates. Although Rome was confident Sol was going that round, he was shocked when he was voted out instead.
In the episodes following Rome’s vote-off, people began to notice something suspicious about his exit interview. You see, in one of the podcasts, the hosts had the contestants do word associations about their fellow castaways. And people began to notice that after Rome’s boot, the remaining castaways were getting voted off in the order that Rome had listed during his word association. From Tiyana, to Sierra, to Sol, one by one they left. There was a slight bit of relief when Gabe went out, as another player had been the projected boot, but it turned out that the next three boots had been shuffled, as they were all from the same original tribe. And after that, the boot order would be of no doubt, from 6th all the way to the winner.
Whether it was intentional or not, this Easter Egg spoiled the rest of the season for many Survivor fans. Now, does this take away from the fun of the season itself? Well, for hardcore fans who were watching the season play out live (and had nothing better to do in between weeks than watch the exit press), maybe, but now that it’s over I feel like it doesn’t take away that much. If you want to binge watch the season, the leaks aren’t that much of an obstacle to pass over unless you’re specifically looking for them. Besides, there are way more fun things to focus on. For example, in Episode 1, Andy has a crashout over the tribe not cheering for him when he cut open a coconut, leading to multiple memes. Survivor 47 also had the first successful immunity idol play since the previous season, where ⅓ of the cast went out with an idol in their pocket. As well, Rome’s boot happened in Season 47 Episode 6, which coincidentally are the same digits in 476 AD, the year of the fall of the Roman Empire. And with Survivor 48 being released soon after this issue releases, we know that we’ll get to see how this season will affect later players real soon. Will they pull off crazy challenge wins like Rachel? Will they pull off complex strategies like Andy? Will they intimidate their tribemates into voting with them like Rome? All we know is this: we’re not going to get any more leaking in the exit press any time soon.