Welcome to Inside Survivor’s 50 For 50, a semi-regular feature highlighting 50 former castaways who we think should be considered for a spot on Survivor 50. In a snake draft, the Inside Survivor team selected ten players each, with the only rule being they couldn’t have played more than twice.
PROFILE
Name: Mike Turner
Age: 60
Season: Survivor 42, 2022
Finish: 2nd Place
HIGHLIGHTS
The oldest contestant on his season, retired firefighter Mike Turner’s social game allowed him to build early relationships with his Vati tribemates, particularly with Jenny Kim and Daniel Strunk. Finding the Beware Advantage proved to be both a blessing and a curse: while he eventually secured a full idol, Mike’s lost vote led to his ally Jenny being eliminated in a tie at the Final 15.
Despite losing his ally, Mike turned things around by forming new bonds with his other tribemates after losing faith in Daniel, who had turned on Jenny during the revote. The tribe eliminated Daniel just before the merge, with Mike catching a stray vote from Chanelle Howell. Mike’s reaction to this stray vote revealed the emotion-driven gameplay that would make him such a fun and dynamic Survivor character. However, this same gameplay would eventually cost him the million-dollar prize.
Mike continued to thrive socially in the post-merge, integrating himself into the new majority and building close relationships beyond Vati, especially with Jonathan and Omar Zaheer. After working with this new majority to betray his allies Lydia Meredith and Chanelle and vote out Rocksroy Bailey at the split tribal, a turning point in Mike’s game came at the Final 8, where Omar leveraged his relationship with Mike to drive a wedge between the two remaining Vati members.
Omar lied to Mike, claiming that Hai Giang viewed Mike as merely a “puppet,” leading Mike to betray Hai and vote him out at the next tribal council. After being on the wrong side of Omar’s blindside, Mike played his own idol on Maryanne Oketch at the Final 5, unaware that she still had her own idol in her pocket.
After beating his ally Jonathan in the fire-making challenge, Mike faced an uphill battle at Final Tribal Council as the jury confronted him about his many betrayals and emotion-driven gameplay. While he received a jury vote from Jonathan Young, Mike’s inability to own up to his actions landed him in the runner-up spot behind Maryanne, who secured the rest of the jury votes over him and Romeo Escobar.
WHY HE SHOULD BE CONSIDERED
From the premiere, Mike was an instant star of the New Era. He was likable and, at times, heroic in the pre-merge, which made his post-merge story all the more compelling. He never quite became a full-blown villain, but much of the post-merge narrative centered around “why Mike lost,” a storyline that was hard to look away from.
Even if Mike couldn’t see it as it unfolded, the audience knew exactly where things went wrong for him in the game, making his eventual moment of realization at Final Tribal Council all the more powerful. His story practically begs for a second chapter. How would Mike play the game now that he knows what went wrong?
As one of the older New Era players and the oldest ever contestant to make Final Tribal Council, Mike would be a real contender to go far and learn from his previous mistakes. He proved he’s a strong player in Survivor 42, and his experience at Final Tribal Council laid out exactly what not to do the second time around.
Mike would be in a prime position to approach a second chance at the game as an opportunity to avoid his past mistakes. Whether he would succeed remains to be seen, but he’s more than earned the chance to show us what he can do after coming just short of the win.
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People like Owen and Mike went as far as they did I believe. I don’t see the second chance story arc here,
hmmm just OK, but not for 50