After what’s felt like ages, the time has finally come… We get the Season 50 trailer! Yay! There’s also three hours of a finale attached to it, but whatever. This season’s been an ad for 50 more than its own thing half the time anyway.
Five remain after a season of hardcore loyalties, changing loyalties, and frustrating loyalties. Challenge beast Savannah, weekly idol bluffer Rizo, disaster tribe survivor Sophi, vengeful underdog Sage, and the final Hina Kristina. As it stands, Rizo is guaranteed final four. He’s bluffed with his idol a record amount of times, and he thinks that alone is enough to win the game, assuming he survives fire-making. On the other hand, Sophi regrets not stealing that idol and making a fool of herself in front of the jury, but she’s the swing vote now, so the chance to make a move isn’t snuffed out yet.
But before any moves can be made, we have to grant immunity to one of these five. And before that, we have to dish out an advantage in the challenge. Rizo sees the reward challenge is a puzzle and copies Savannah to stay in it, like he did all the way back on Day 1 with Alex, but his sneaky tactics can’t save him this time when Sophi comes from behind to find the advantage with her outside the box thinking. But clever thinking can’t overcome Savannah’s challenge beasting as she takes her fourth immunity of the season, tying the women’s record set all the way back in Borneo by Kelly Wiglesworth. As a bonus, she gets a steak lunch at the Sanctuary and brings Sage as a plus-one to give her some actual food again.
So… Savannah and Rizo are final four guaranteed. So much for any chance of Sophi flipping to work with Kristina and Sage then. Kristina tries pitching a final three with Rizo and Sophi, and Rizo genuinely entertains it. Sage goes tonight, Savannah goes at four, Rizo wins a million dollars in theory. Meanwhile, Savannah and Sage enjoy a meal without any personal grudges getting in the way. It might be a last supper for Sage, but she’s putting in the work to rebuild this relationship and make up for the drama between them. Strategy is still on the mind, though, and Sage is down to kick Kristina to the jury to remove a strong fire-maker. Savannah agrees, and now we have a couple of options.
But Tres Leches comes to blows over this seemingly frivolous decision. Rizo wants Sage out bad, and Savannah won’t budge on Kristina. So now it’s Sophi’s choice as she predicted. Kristina can’t win the game in terms of jury votes, but she might take Sophi out in fire if Rizo or Savannah wins the final immunity. Sage is easier to beat in these challenges, but she’s far more strategic than Kristina and might have a case to make at the end. Either way, Sophi screwed up at six with her failed advantage theft, and now’s her time to actually have some power and call a shot… even though she’s probably drawing dead with the two biggest threats immune.
Once final pitches are laid out with emotions and all, Rizo finally plays that damn idol to nullify zero votes against himself, and it’s Kristina who eats yet another unanimous elimination to become the seventh jury member. Not the most interesting round of gameplay ever (expected with this season, honestly), but I am glad this Tribal felt like an actual fight to survive between people and not a ten-minute eulogy for Kristina with sappy music covering up a boring, easy vote we knew was coming for a whole week.
After absolutely zero ill-timed and unwelcome interruptions to the finale, we get to our final four and one last challenge between them and Day 26. Obstacle course. Dexterity test. Puzzle. Table maze. Nothing groundbreaking, but better than Simmotion or stacking blocks for the millionth time. Savannah’s going for a record-breaking win while the other three just want to get on the board for once. Despite an abysmal performance in the entire challenge leading up to the puzzle, Sophi quickly assembles it and lands both balls before anyone can blink, going from part of the worst tribe in years to the final three, and beating the season’s challenge beast in the process.
And with that win comes a final choice: who to target in fire-making. Clearly, Savannah should be up there in that challenge, even if she’s Sophi’s island bestie, but who can take her out? Sage? Rizo? Sophi herself?
Well, Sophi won’t plan on giving up immunity tonight. She has no idea how good any of them are in fire, so she’s just letting them practice as she thinks it over without outside input. It’s a choice Savannah can’t stand, though, because this just screams betrayal at the hands of her best friend when the choice should be obvious: Sage goes home so Tres Leches can be the final three. But Sage loves Sophi’s refusal to listen to pitches because she can just let the chips fall where they may. If she gets taken, great! If she has to make fire, great! No sweat. Then we have Rizo pitching a shot at Savannah with himself as the million-dollar assassin, taking her out firsthand. But the choice remains in Sophi’s hands, and she’s making it with her head rather than her heart.
With her head, she puts Tres Leches to rest and takes Sage to the final three as the easy beat, pitting Savannah and Rizo against each other in what’s basically a million-dollar challenge. In true Survivor 49 fashion, the fire challenge is as average, generic, mid, whatever term you prefer, as the rest of the season. Truly one of the fire-making challenges of all time, won easily by Savannah as Rizo can barely get a fire going and joins the jury, promising Savannah his vote. Did he earn the title of Rizgod this season, as Jeff calls him on the way out? Can’t say I’ll be calling him that unironically, but we’ll see how he does the next time he plays in a couple months.
But now we’re down to three women vying for the prize on Day 26, and the jury won’t let them off easy. Savannah killed it as a competitor who came to play and tied records, but she really rubbed some people the wrong way with how hard she played. Sophi was the ultimate underdog who climbed up from the bottom to reach the end, but she missed some big shots and couldn’t knock out all her biggest threats. Sage was super underestimated and played a social-strategic game, but she was driven by emotion and backstabbed people along the way. But as Jawan puts it, only one can be the final girl in this horror picture.
Sophi begins her pitch, presenting herself as the adopted puppy of Savannah and Rizo’s little duo. Savannah was the muscle, Rizo was the brains, and Sophi was the social butterfly who laid the social groundwork for the trio’s blindsides. If she weren’t there, those moves might not have happened. She’s worked odd jobs here and there to get by, sacrificing time in her life to care for her grandmother, so the million would be life-changing. When it comes to smaller moves, she listened in on conversations that eventually got Jeremiah blindsided by her own hands. And for her key move, she names her social game across the board that helped her trio overcome a massive majority of seven at the final ten onward.
Savannah owns her challenge wins as not just her own achievements, but something she did to protect her own alliance. She came to play for herself and her future, but her personal reasons for needing this win shouldn’t dictate her chances when her game speaks for itself. But this self-focused mindset comes back to bite her when Kristina calls out her lacking social game, asking her to name a family member of everyone on the jury, something she can’t really do. But her move to get Kristina out when her allies wanted otherwise was potentially a winning one, so Savannah’s not afraid to butter her up here. Savannah’s key move though? Flipping Sophie to her side when her vote had been taken for granted by her old tribe, protecting her when she wasn’t immune and people wanted her out bad.
Sage reveals she spent ten years in the military, so she’s not just the quirky little crier getting emotional at everything. She’s actually pretty smart, and nobody saw her coming when she made her plays. But as an emotional person, she opens up about the people in her life she’s lost and gained and loved along the way, proving those emotions aren’t just messy and chaotic, but genuine and heartfelt. She cites Steven’s blindside and how she flipped Kristina, a move that managed to get her to the end despite being outside the dominant trio. Steven hates that answer, though, because it just comes across as senseless flip-flopping that shot an entire alliance in the foot. Her key move was gunning for Sophie after Jawan got blindsided, slaying her nemesis to remove a key threat. But it was a unanimous vote, so… can you really claim that one for yourself?
Sophi went to an insane amount of Tribals, voted so many people out, and survived without needing idols, necklaces, and advantages to get to the end. Savannah adapted, built the right relationships, and won challenges to get herself to three, so no coattail riding here. Sage played as her authentic self, playing a messy strategic game that defied expectations across the board. Three solid cases with some weaknesses to call out, but only one can earn the title and the million that comes with it.
And after a whole season of expecting nothing else because of some questionable Survivor 50 casting decisions, Savannah wins Survivor 49 with a five vote majority, Sophi takes second place with two votes from Kristina and MC, and Sage settles for third with Jawan’s vote preventing her from being another zero-vote finalist. I love endings where everyone gets a vote instead of it being a 7-1-0 sweep, but man, can we have that kind of even result in a new era season that isn’t a chore to watch, please?
That being said, congratulations to Savannah, one of the more fun characters this season, if not the highlight of the cast. It’s been a while since we’ve had an outright villainous winner who didn’t get whitewashed in the edit, and Savannah brought the heat between the snarky confessionals and cutthroat attitude. But she had her sentimental moments, too, showing us a well-rounded personality with strengths and weaknesses alike.
It’s not the most impressive victory if you crave big strategic winners who outwit everyone with huge plays like a Tony or Natalie Anderson, because this win really is the story of everyone else imploding as she cruised to the win. But she earned her win regardless, not just in these challenges, but in the small moves that let her survive against what seemed to be insane odds at the early merge. And if you don’t like her win, blame the others for not voting her out when they had the chance, I guess.
But as this season finally gets put to rest, Survivor 50 is on the horizon with a record 24 returning players (including Savannah and Rizo who honestly didn’t need to return so soon if you ask me, even if they’d be good picks for a New Era All Stars). Despite the underwhelming fan vote gimmick (I don’t remember voting to have a “Billie Eilish Boomering Idol” but okay), the fairly uninspired cast with so many notable old school snubs left at home (justice for Jerri Manthey and Sean Rector), and a format bound to be incredibly rushed needing to cull so many players in 26 days… I’m still pretty excited! Except for the celebrity tie-ins that just come across as pathetic, desperate pandering for ratings. Screw that nonsense all the way up the wazoo and never let Jeff cook again.
We haven’t seen a true returnee season that wasn’t dedicated to winners since Game Changers. So now, even if I could wish for a million changes to the season we’re getting from the cast to the format to the day count, I’m just intrigued to see a season that feels like a genuine milestone again and not assembly line New Era Survivor. It’s something new, and given Jeff’s reluctance to change anything substantial about the show these days, I have to appreciate a shakeup in some form. Because for all we know, 51-59 is about to be the same old repetitive show we’ve grown tired of as of late.
But with 49 in the books, hopefully this season being such an uninspiring nothingburger inspires some actual change once the Season 50 keys can no longer be jingled in our faces. I’m not talking about tweaking the journey gimmick or doing a two tribe swap for a couple of episodes. I mean actual changes. Bring back themes, for example, even if they’re cheesy and stupid, because we need the seasons to feel distinct again if we ain’t leaving Fiji. Cast more villains so we can avoid ho-hum kumbaya tribes like Hina. Ditch the New Era disaster-tribe formula and make things fairer so we don’t have to spend a month wondering what two-thirds of the cast is even thinking. It’s not going backwards, as Jeff would say, but moving forward with old ideas turned new and fresh again.
Or maybe we’ll just get awful Mr. Beast cameos every season, and the show finally dies. Who knows?
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