Survivor season 35: Why did Alan Ball get voted out in 15th place?
A secret “advantage,” a contentious camp and a Hidden Immunity Idol are just some of the reasons why Alan Ball was voted out fourth in Survivor season 35.
This article discusses why the player voted out in Survivor season 35 episode 4, “I Don’t Like Having Snakes Around,” was taken out of the game.
There’s nothing more chaotic in Survivor than the switching of tribes. Just when everything goes your way, suddenly you’re put into a minority vote position. Other times, you’re escaping the clutches of defeat by swapping into a favorable position. For Alan Ball of the Levu tribe, he just happened to have many things go wrong at once, hence his elimination in 15th place.
Why was Alan Ball voted out in 15th place in Survivor season 35, Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers? There are quite a few reasons. First off, with the tribes switching things up, Levu had two Heroes, two Healers and one Hustler. With an even split and a swing vote on one tribe, it became a simple numbers game; try to bring Devon into your fold in order to diminish the other tribe’s members heading into a merge.
After a series of episodes where Alan Ball could not get along with his tribe, he couldn’t open coconuts and went damn wild on challenges, things needed to change. He made a truce with Ashley Nolan in order to solidify numbers after a Reward Challenge where he couldn’t hook a platform needed to pull over puzzle pieces to his tribe in an efficient format.
As Alan failed to hook the platform, Jeff Probst peppered in some banter with, “Is this a sign of the new Levu tribe?” Any time you start to see that kind of foreshadowing, you know things aren’t going to go well for whoever Jeff’s talking about. Surely enough, the Reward Challenge saw Jessica get a Secret Advantage where she could block someone’s vote at the next Tribal Council.
Wanting to help the Healers as much as possible, Jessica took out the swing vote’s power by blocking Devon’s vote. She could not have known that Devon was going to vote with the Heroes, however, as without the correct idol play we could have seen a 2-2 stalemate that goes to a rock draw.
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That’s where Joe’s duplicity came into play. Lying to Devon about Alan and Ashley targetting him at Tribal Council, Alan blew up Joe’s spot as much as Joe drew attention to himself. Joe knew that Devon flipped, so he made a scene at camp, then further tried to fuel the fire at Tribal Council. Alan knew that Joe and Desi were going to write his name down; he told her right before they headed down for the fateful vote.
“If he pulls out the idol and we go for him, one of us is going home.” Those ominous words rang true, as Joe saw through their actions and subtle cues at Tribal Council and used the Hidden Immunity Idol on himself. With two votes from Alan and Ashley negated and Devon’s vote blocked by Jessica, Alan was sent home in a 2-0 vote.
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The “not crazy, but confident” Alan Ball got out-“confidented” by Joe Mena. A Survivor episode where Alan comes out as the rational one cannot go unpunished, as it were.