The last person to leave the game, the person so close to the end they can taste the money but has their opportunity to plead their case taken away at the very last moment. That person becomes ingrained in their respective season as the final recipient of “The Tribe Has Spoken” and earns a place in a very special group in Survivor history: The Day 38 Club.
Inside Survivor contributor Ian Walker continues the countdown of the updated and revised Day 38 Club rankings. The list takes into account the strength of a player’s game, character, and the power of their story.
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No. 31 – Scout Cloud Lee (Vanatua)
In terms of underdogs who made it to Day 38, Scout Cloud Lee may be one of the biggest. One of the oldest women to ever play Survivor, at 59 years old, Scout had an uphill battle just based on perceptions alone.
She was detrimental in challenges to an alarming degree and butted heads with the younger tribe members. But behind that grizzled exterior, there was a sharp and cunning player who knew how to push people’s buttons.
Scout also had a good sense of timing, knowing when to move from one alliance to another. For a player who was so handicapped physically (she had a legitimate knee issue), she indeed proved that it takes more brains than brawn to do well in Survivor.
In the all-women tribe of Yasur, Scout naturally fell into the role of the respected elder, at least to some of her tribemates. She chaffed with some of the younger “bowheads” of the tribe but was wise enough to keep those feelings to herself, which allowed her to move through the first part of the game without being targeted.
Playing up her elder stateswoman role was enough to get her entrenched in the female alliance led by Ami Cusack, and by the time the merge rolled around, the women went into action, wiping out the men until there was just one guy left, and that’s when Scout made her move.
Scout, along with her close ally Twila Tanner, had grown discontent with how much control Ami was amassing. So, at the Final 7, they turned to the only guy remaining, Chris Daugherty, to shake up the game in a major way.
The trio of Scout, Twila, and Chris were all set to work together to topple Ami’s grasp on the game, but the problem was that the fourth vote they needed was that of Scout’s nemesis, Eliza Orlins.
From the very beginning of the game, Eliza was the person that got on Scout’s nerves the most, and she wasn’t afraid to share passive-aggressive comments to her other tribe members. Fast forward to Final 7 and Scout now needed Eliza’s vote to gain control of the game.
Luckily for her, Chris put in the work to get Eliza to flip. They took out Ami’s closest ally, Leann Slaby, and were able to ride together until the Final 4. From there, Chris finagled his way into the Final 2 with Twila sitting next to him, leaving Scout on the outside looking in on Day 38.
Scout didn’t play a flashy game, but it was an effective one, biding her time and making enough friends until finding the right moment to strike, propelling her almost to the end. That trajectory, plus her cutting soundbites (seriously, some of her voting confessionals are downright savage) made for a memorable underdog story, and considering this group she’s in, that’s saying something.
Stay tuned to Inside Survivor as the Day 38 Club rankings continue over the coming days. Check out the previous entries here.
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