Survivor Edge of Extinction: Victoria breaks down crazy Tribals on RHAP

The most strategic player of Survivor: Edge of Extinction sat down with Rob Cesternino and provided plenty of insight on key votes throughout the season.

We have already covered two of Rob Cesternino’s long retrospectives with the cast of Survivor: Edge of Extinction. Devens and Chris were fun to listen to, but only Victoria has a comprehensive understanding behind each vote prior to the Final Six since she was on the right side of all of them.

Victoria spoke nearly three hours with Cesternino, analyzing some of the most significant moments in the season and giving us information the edit didn’t reveal. If you haven’t done so already, I encourage you to give this RHAP feature a listen. Here a few of the more intriguing details she spoke about.

Gavin wasn’t her closest ally

Especially towards the end of the season, the edit portrayed Gavin as Victoria’s best bud. Although they were close at times and did strategize together, it wasn’t always like that. Victoria made it clear that her best friend in the game was by far Julia.

Gavin had a working relationship with Victoria, but that broke once Julia was voted out at that insane Tribal Council. In fact, there were times where Gavin would completely avoid her. When Victoria wanted to speak with him Gavin would tell her bluntly that he didn’t want to be seen with her! That changed towards the end of the game, but this was never a Day 1, BFF pairing.

Why and how she pulled off the Aubry blindside

Victoria spoke about the dangers of letting Aubry stay in the game. She mentioned how Aubry is never really seen as a target until it’s too late. Pre-merge she possesses Survivor experience, putting her above the weakest links. Post-merge she isn’t a threat to win immunity.

With the recent tribe swap, Victoria wanted to plan on losing twice. If they took out the easy vote first, which was Wendy, it would be a lot harder to go after Aubry if they went back to Tribal a second time… which they did! She realized this and decided it was time for Aubry to go. She actually searched through her bag but wasn’t able to find anything.

In order to convince Aubry that it wasn’t her, Victoria decided to first tell her the obvious plan, which was Wendy, and then later give her a more daring target in Eric. This brilliant play made Aubry feel like she was in on the big move, which caused her to let her guard down and hold onto her idol.

Julie and Ron’s paranoia led to that crazy live Tribal Council

When you think back to that chaotic live Tribal that sent Julia home, you might recall how the majority Kama alliance didn’t inform any of the Lesu people of a voting plan. Victoria shed light on that lack of communication.

This happened right after Eric was blindsided, so Ron got incredibly nervous, and that freaked out Julie. That entire day leading up to Tribal, Julie was crying and worrying that Kama was going to flip on her. So whenever Victoria, Gavin or Julia tried to get a message out to any Lesu member, Julie began panicking beyond their control.

For most of the day, the young Kama crew was tied down to consoling Julie and Ron, trying to persuade them that their trust was not broken. That caused the confusion at Tribal since none of the former Lesu castaways knew who to vote for.

She developed an intriguing logic based strategy

In one of Victoria’s confessionals, she mentioned how no one should trust her. Instead of playing the loyalty card, Victoria focused on basing every decision on logic. She convinced people to vote with her by making them see how she benefits from the move.

Her theory is that if a suggested plan doesn’t benefit that player’s game, then they are lying. This fascinating reasoning enabled Victoria to understand everyone’s motives behind a vote, which resulted in her being on the right side of every vote until she got the boot.

Losing Aurora was a huge turning point

Another relationship the edit left out was between Victoria and Aurora. In fact, Aurora told Vic that she would take her to Final Tribal if she won the Final Four challenge. However, Lauren convinced Gavin that Aurora needed to go, and there was no way Vicotria could change his mind. That left one less number to work with, shifting the power to Devens and Chris.

Here a few other interesting details that the edit left out:

• Was tight with Devens and was the one who started clapping for him after his torch was snuffed
• The new Manu tribe came into the joint Tribal Council knowing they would turn on Wendy but wanted to make it seem like it was a spur of a moment change
• Joe really did sit in camp all day painting the merge flag!
• She was convinced of the plan to vote out Eric after hearing about multiple Final 3 deals he made
• The Eric blindside wouldn’t have happened without Wardog suggesting it to Julia
• Would have voted for Gavin at Final Tribal Council if he pulled off one big move that he could have explained to the jury
• Wasn’t a fan of any of the Final Three, wanted Devens to win
• She would definitely want to play again!

There were several other points I wasn’t able to squeeze in this article, so be sure to give this podcast a listen. Victoria’s retrospective was a perfect supplement to having no exit interviews during the season as she broke down every vote in a way that made the events much clearer than the edit portrayed.