5 Interesting Things From Survivor Game Changers Episode 1

Is Michaela Hinting At Sneaky Gameplay?

Going into this season, Michaela was aware that she’s very expressive of her emotions, and that she has trouble hiding what she feels or lying in general. When Ciera walks away from the group and Michaela asks who Ciera thinks is going home, she does not react well to knowing she will get a vote. It may have certainly been edited in a way that purports higher drama than there actually was at camp, but for a second, it looked like there were doubts about Michaela going home first.

How does Michaela respond to this possibility? While everyone was focusing on her saying “Bye, Felicia” to Ciera with her vote, she actually had the letters “Mi-” scribbled out first. It turned out that it was a 9-1 vote and Ciera went home, but it’s clear that Michaela wasn’t sure if there were two groups of alliances in the early going and that one could have been close to voting her out.

That’s clearly a sign of weakness to not know where the vote is going to lie (she certainly does know by Night 6), but how she handled the adversity hints at her ability to change the game early on. She may have faked someone flipping their vote to Ciera in order to indicate unease between alliance lines.

Of course, it didn’t work and this moment was ultimately cast aside because it didn’t fit into what actually happened, but sneaky Michaela is way more interesting than “aggressive early boot” Michaela. It will be interesting to see how her gameplay adapts should she make the merge.