Most memorable moments from Survivor: Fiji

Survivor: Fiji was the 14th season of the series and while not the most popular season, it had its fair share of memorable moments.

Before Survivor started filming in Fiji full-time in 2016, they filmed there for the first time for the show’s 14th season. Survivor: Fiji, which aired in the spring of 2007, is usually ranked near the bottom in a lot of fans’ season rankings, but it does bring the nostalgia factor that older seasons are known for.

Let’s take a look at the most memorable moments from Survivor: Fiji.

19 Castaways

For the first time in the show’s history, an odd number of contestants were stranded. Rumor has it that there were going to be 20 castaways on season 14, but one had an anxiety attack minutes before the game was set to begin and there was no time to replace her (look up Mellisa McNulty if you don’t believe me).

There was also a rumor that prior to this contestant quitting, the producers hoped to repeat the twist of dividing tribes by ethnicities like they did one season prior in Cook Islands. Thankfully that didn’t happen.

Haves vs Have Nots

Survivor: Fiji is responsible for the worst twist in Survivor history – The Haves vs Have Nots.

How this came about was the contestants were stranded together on an island for two days and during that time, had all of the supplies they needed to build one kick ass shelter. When Jeff Probst arrived, he had the tribes divided into two teams and explained that the winning tribe would get to stay on the beach with the awesome shelter. The losing team would get to start all over.

It’s no wonder why the Haves – Moto – won all but one challenge. They were living in paradise while the Have Nots – Ravu – could barely stand on their feet for more than a few minutes due to being so dehydrated.

Thankfully, the Haves vs Have Nots has not been attempted again and it still goes down as the worst twist ever to appear on Survivor.

Edgardo Blindside

There’s a good video on YouTube from Idoled Out that explains how there are contestants who came up with huge Survivor strategies, but never get the credit for it. Stacy Kimball was actually the one who invented the idea of targeting the player who the alliance with the Hidden Immunity Idol who wasn’t the threat.

In building up to this, we have to mention the Four Horsemen alliance, which consisted of Edgardo Rivera, Mookie Lee, Alex Angarita, and Dreamz Herd. Dreamz ended up flipping to the majority alliance and now that group had to decide who to vote for between Mookie and Alex because they heard the idol was being passed back and forth.

Well, Stacy came up with the brilliant idea of rather than voting for one of those two and risk someone from their own alliance going home, why not just target Edgardo? They’d never play the idol for Edgardo because he wasn’t the biggest threat in that group!

So, with that strategy in mind, Survivor fans were treated to one of the best blindsides in the show’s history, especially to that point. Edgardo went home and the look of shock on not only his face, but Alex’s and Mookie’s faces when more Edgardo votes were read was priceless.

To this day, Edgardo’s blindside is still one of the best in Survivor history and who would have thought that Stacy’s strategy for this vote would become a staple in show forever?

Car Controversy

For the first 14 seasons of Survivor, it was tradition for the final five (though it was final six in Fiji) to play for a car at a reward challenge. Fiji very well was the reason the car challenge was discontinued because there was controversy with it in season 14.

It was common knowledge heading into the challenge that Dreamz was the only one remaining in the game who did not own a car. Yau-Man Chan ended up winning the challenge and offered to give the car to Dreamz, but it’d come at a price – If Dreamz won final immunity, he’d have to give the necklace to Yau-Man.

Dreamz agreed to this deal. He took the car, went on an awesome reward, and lo and behold – Dreamz won the final immunity challenge. He opted to keep the necklace, however, and that sent Yau-Man to the jury and Dreamz to the final tribal council where he got eviscerated by the jury for his decision.

For those of you who miss the car challenge, you can thank Dreamz Herd and Yau-Man Chan for why it was discontinued. Chances are it’d have been discontinued shortly after anyway, but it’s more fun to blame it on Survivor: Fiji.

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Survivor: Fiji is a bottom tier season, but one of the bright spots from it was the game play by winner Earl Cole, who had never seen the show when he was casted as an alternate. The fact that he had never seen an episode of Survivor and was able to make it as far as he did (while being a part of the atrocious Ravu tribe) is impressive.

Earl is highly regarded as a top tier winner and it was a bummer that he couldn’t be on Winners at War. He’d have been a lot of fun to watch on that season and might have helped old school thrive a little more.

What were your favorite moments from Survivor: Fiji?