Joe Hunter has absolutely dominated the physical portion of Survivor 48. Since the merge, Joe has won four individual immunity challenges, none more important than his win in episode 12, "Icarus Time." It extended his life in the game, and now, he has a chance to set the all-time Survivor record for immunity wins in a single season.
With two immunity challenges remaining, potentially, Joe has to win one more challenge to tie the record held by five former Survivor players, including Colby Donaldson, Tom Westman, Ozzy Lusth, Mike Holloway, and Brad Culpepper. Those five players each won five individual immunity challenges during one season.
If Joe wins the immunity challenge at the Final Five and then wins the immunity challenge at the Final Four, he will become the only player in Survivor history to win six individual immunity challenges. He will also become the first member of the Final Three. If he does that, and wins both immunity challenges, I don't see how Joe wouldn't win Survivor 48. That would be such an impressive feat; I don't know if any of the other four remaining players could top it.
What's also remarkable about this is that Joe came one twisted block away from winning his fifth immunity challenge of the season already! Had he twisted his last block in the puzzle arch correctly, he would have won. Jeff Probst even called Joe as the winner of that challenge before realizing that Joe's puzzle was actually wrong. Kamilla Karthigesu had the puzzle correct, and she won that immunity challenge.
That was also the episode when Joe yelled, "Got Fun Betrale," and thought that was somehow, inexplicably, the answer to the Survivor puzzle. I don't know how that wasn't the title of that episode; it was so funny!
I didn't think we'd see anyone come close to those records in the new era of Survivor, but it's happened quite a lot, actually. As I pointed out earlier this season, we've seen some challenge beasts in recent seasons Kyle Ostwald and Rachel Lamont each won four immunity challenges on Survivor 47.
It's going to be an incredibly tough task for Joe to win the last two immunity challenges. Usually, there is an endurance element along with some puzzle or game that the players must solve or play, so it will be really interesting to see how it goes for Joe. I mean, at the Final Six immunity challenge, Joe was really only competing against Mitch Guerra, Kyle Fraser, and Shauhin Davari. Eva Erickson couldn't knock her rope off the platform, and Kamilla couldn't walk on the rolling barrel, so they got left way behind. Now, Shauhin is gone, so if we see a big endurance challenge like that again, Joe might have a 50/50 shot to win.
If Joe loses, he has to be voted out. It's too late in the game for Kyle, Kamilla, and Mitch to keep him around, even though there seems to be this perception that Joe can be beaten at the end of the game. If he wins two more immunities, he has this season in the bag.
We'll find out if Joe Hunter is going to win Survivor 48 and/or break the Survivor immunity record during the season finale on Wednesday, May 21, on CBS and Paramount+. It's going to be a three-hour episode, so bring your snacks and beverages.