Survivor Ghost Island cast: Brendan Shapiro is ready to hold up the sky

Built like Atlas, seasoned in life experience and already changed career paths, Survivor Ghost Island’s Brendan Shapiro is good to go.

Rarely do you get a season where the oldest player of their gender is also arguably one of the strongest of the entire cast. It’s only in Survivor Ghost Island where you have the cast’s average age being under 30, making Brendan Shapiro stand out in more ways than one as both a parent and a natural leader among young adults. That could hurt him or harm him, depending on how he plays his cards.

Brendan may be ready to be an adaptable Survivor player if his life reflects the kind of player he can be. According to his CBS bio, he left his well-paying desk job during the recession to make his own business. Then, last year, he sold his business in order to pursue his lifelong interesting in teaching, becoming a physical education teacher near his hometown of Herndon, Virginia.

That shows a strong ability for risk assessment, personal confidence and the ability to convince his family it will work out alright (which it did). Brendan aims to bring those skills and put them to the test in Survivor Ghost Island, as he’ll need to find himself a great alliance and know when the time is right to flip the switch should things not shape up properly as the castaways dwindle down in numbers.

We already know due to early press footage that Brendan Shapiro is selected as an early tribe leader as part of a new marooning twist, meaning he was selected to the role by his fellow Malolo tribemates. He does exude the appearance of a leader, and certainly can exemplify the strength and determination that such a person should own in a game of Survivor, but easily could a person be voted out at or right before the merge due to how much of a threat level they possess.

That could be said of any physical threat, and Brendan is a longtime fan of the show. He has been applying for 16 years, meaning he’s been following along with every story beat and knows the ins and outs of this game. He should be aware of what the physical threat winners did to further their game, and his risk assessment abilities should help guide him through to, and beyond, the merge.