Survivor 48 winner Kyle Fraser dialed up the perfect recipe to win the season, but there's one player who Kyle feels like was standing in his way of $1 million. Luckily for Kyle, that player was eliminated without receiving a single vote cast against her during her 25 days on Survivor 48.
Of course, Kyle was talking about his No. 1 ally in the game, his partner, the bus driver, Kamilla Karthigesu.
Kyle explained why he knew that Kamilla had to be voted out for him to win Survivor 48. Here's what he told Entertainment Weekly about that move and how the jury's cues at Tribal Council tipped him off:
"Every single Tribal Council, they were nodding with Kamilla at every single thing she said. They were not nodding along with me or maybe other people in the game at that time. And I think that Kamilla and I played the same game. She's one of my closest friends. She's going to hate that I said that. I really do have so much respect for her. But if she had gotten to the end, I know that she would've gotten those votes over me, and that's why she had to go."
As we all saw, Kamilla won the immunity challenge at the Final Five in a stunning comeback to basically take control of the game. Had Kamilla won the final immunity challenge, been taken to the end by Kyle, or won the fire-making challenge against Eva Erickson, Kamilla likely would have won Survivor 48. The jury knew it. Kyle knew it, and that's why Kyle had to find a way to get Kamilla out of the game.
In this instance, Kyle basically played this situation perfectly in the eyes of the jury. The only thing he could have done is put himself in for the fire-making challenge, beat Kamilla, and make that case that he was the person responsible for playing the best game. Obviously, he let Eva take a stab at it, and it worked, but it could have easily blown up in Kyle's face. After seeing how much the jury wanted to vote for Kamilla, it's almost shocking that Kyle didn't take that final swing to take out his ally in the fire-making challenge. That would have been incredibly poetic.
From my perspective, there was good reason for Kyle to be worried about Kamilla, who was basically controlling the game from the bottom in a way that I don't know if we've ever seen on Survivor. Part of her game was aided by Kyle looking out for her and feeding her information, but she really did play her part brilliantly. She also won two immunity challenges, tied for the second most this season with Kyle.
I thought Kyle was getting the winner's edit basically since the merge, while Kamilla kind of faded into the shadows, but there's no doubt that if she wins the fire-making challenge, she wins Survivor 48.
Ultimately, when it mattered, Kyle made the right moves, pushed the right buttons, and pulled away from the pack he was so desperate to stay in throughout the game, right at the right time. It was actually brilliant Survivor gameplay from Kyle and Kamilla for the whole season. It was great to watch!