Welcome to Season 50’s Next Time On Survivor weekly feature on the Inside Survivor site! If you’re new around here, I’m Steph from sunny, tropical, humid Singapore. This is a tiny space where I give my best attempts at understanding preview trailers and make my predictions for the show’s next episodes.
As Jonathan reminds us at the start of the NTOS trailer, there are seven players left in the game. Just two episodes left for the season! The next few shots show a series of players talking strategy and calling out different targets. First, Tiffany reminds us that “Rizo has an idol”. This has been brought up a few times before, as players seem to be guarded against idol antics, especially after hearing Rizo held onto his idol for many episodes last season. As the players near the endgame, I think they’re bound to try to flush Rizo’s idol in the next vote to level the advantages.
Next, we see Joe tell Aubry, “Tiff is the most dangerous,” followed by Jonathan sharing, “I do believe Aubry’s a snake”. The latter is contrasted with a secret scene that depicts Aubry and Jonathan after the tribal council, in which Jonathan shares that he hopes to work with Aubry. I find this somewhat interesting to consider whether Jonathan is outsmarting Aubry here by gaining her trust, then dumping on her. However, I believe Aubry will be able to hide behind bigger targets to get any of this heat off her.
In any case, the secret scene is very much focused on Aubry, crediting her for successfully pulling off the Ozzy blindside last episode. She then reflects on her experience on Survivor: Kaoh Rong, where she lost “because I was sitting next to the wrong people”. So far this season, Aubry’s had a number of similar confessionals referencing her game 18 seasons ago. It’s an obvious reminder for us, setting up a payoff that alludes to her righting her wrongs. At this juncture of the season, it’s pretty clear she’s an apparent contender because of these scenes and confessionals.
Finally, another interesting part of the NTOS trailer highlights Cirie and Jonathan sitting on the hammock, where Cirie reveals to him, “You got a rat. I know everything.” Her tone here is rather calm but also somewhat overawing as she calls Jonathan out. Perhaps Jonathan believes it’s an ideal stage of the game to start getting big threats like Cirie out rather than keep them around as shields. It’s only a matter of time before he and more people target Cirie before it’s too late.
What do you think will happen in Episode 12? Leave your predictions in the comments!
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