Despite being arguably the biggest target coming into Survivor: Winners at War, Boston Rob is making it to the first tribe swap thanks to his performance in last week’s action.
In returning player seasons, many castaways comeback Survivor with the potential to reach legendary status. The one thing we know about the greatest of the greats is that even if they do go down fairly early because of their threat level, they still showcase why they are legends. We saw that with Sandra in Game Changers and Tom Westman in Heroes vs. Villains, and now Boston Rob is putting on his own show.
In his sixth Survivor appearance, coming to Fiji along with his wife and a ginormous statue of his head, Boston Rob entered season 40 with the biggest target imaginable. His name has already been thrown out there, but his uncanny ability to play this game silenced that threat early. However, episode 3’s vote saw Michele and Jeremy take control and vote one of Rob’s closest allies out of the game.
It’s true that these savvy winners like the idea of keeping Rob around as the perfect meat shield, but on a tribe that could not win immunity, Michele and Jeremy were running out of options. Rob and Parvati needed a tribe swap badly to stay alive. But even before the Immunity Challenge, Rob wanted to have a plan in place in case they lost.
After Adam was blindsided, he realized the mistake he made. When he went to talk to Parvati and Rob, you could tell that Adam didn’t want to reveal any further info to these devious players. Once this duo realized that there was no way Adam was going to join them, they decided to lay the groundwork for his blindside.
Boston Rob went to Jeremy and Michele and slyly informed them that Adam was back at it. Based on the confessionals we saw, it looked like Jeremy and Michele bought the lie, building up their distrust in Adam. We’ll never know if Adam would have actually ended up being the target, but Boston Rob planted the seeds in the other castaways’ minds to feel like Adam would not be loyal in a swap situation. In an episode where the Tribal Council was a straightforward vote, this was the biggest social move.
With that plan in motion, Rob still went into the Immunity Challenge with full focus on winning to survive the night. Once Adam finally grabbed Sele’s last key, it was up to Rob and Michele to save the day. This blooming duo didn’t get scared off by Dakal’s large lead and just kept putting puzzle pieces together. Thanks to Rob and Michele’s incredible efforts, they pulled off a surprising comeback and won a much-needed immunity and reward.
After struggling with a puzzle in episode 2’s challenge, Rob got back to his clutch Survivor self and created a memorable Winners at War moment. With the swap happening in the next episode, this proved to be a super crucial challenge performance that might have saved his season.
Considering his strong Godfather-like play and huge target level, he still doesn’t have the greatest future prospects, but for episode 4, Boston Rob proved why he’s a legend and preserved his life in the game for another 3 days.