The moment we've been waiting for is almost here! The Survivor 49 finale is closer than ever and all five of our finalists have definitely laid out a very clear path to get them to this moment.
So much so that it's almost clear to see exactly how this season's finale is going to play out...or at least how we predict it will play out based on all the moves our castaways have made to get here.
Down to our Final Five players, we're likely going to see them faced with an immunity challenge made up of an obstacle course and a puzzle like we've most recently seen on Survivor 48, Survivor 46, and Survivor 45. Based on past performances of similar challenges, Savannah Louie and Sage Ahrens-Nichols will be the first to make it to the puzzle portion, but all players will catch up and be in it by the end. It's highly unlikely that anyone will be able to fully take on Savannah's challenge prowess, and she will take home her 4th individual immunity win, tying her for the record of most individual wins in a single season by a female player.
With Savannah safe and Rizo Velovic's idol still in play, Sage Ahrens-Nichols and Kristina Mills are both going to be pitching themselves as the core three of why they should stay over the other. Sage might bring up the idea of working with Kristina to try and convince Rizo to take out Sophi Balerdi, but with the numbers where they are now, her best bet is to lie low and act like she's not a threat to any of their game.
But regardless of whether she pitches a strategy of blindsiding Sophi or not, Rizo and Savannah both know that of the other three remaining players, the only person who hasn't made a major public misplay is Sage. She also has a huge advocate on the jury in Jawan Pitts, which means she is currently the most dangerous person in the game to make it to the end with them.
Sage will be the 14th and final player voted out of Survivor 49 and become the seventh member of the jury. I could also see a world in which Rizo—who's already demonstrated a love for the Tribal Council theatrics—doesn't play his idol and instead makes a big showing about how he'd rather take it home as a souvenir or something, while still making it through the vote unscathed, as always.
Survivor 49 Final Four predictions
If Simmotion is the final immunity challenge of the season, it's very possible that Sophi—who has demonstrated good concentration and focus skills a few times this season—could give Savannah a run for her money here. Though the most likely scenario is that Savannah wins her fifth individual immunity, breaking the record for most individual wins in a season by a woman and making her the first woman in Survivor history to tie with the current men's record.
With Savannah safe, she will have to make a choice of whom to take the finals with her and who to put up for the final fire-making challenge. Similar to what we saw with Kyle Fraser and Kamilla Karthigesu in Survivor 48, Savannah knows that her biggest adversary at this point in the game—and the only person who has a chance of beating her in the end—is her closest ally Rizo. She needs him not to be at Finale Tribal Council to ensure her victory.
Savannah's going to choose to take Sophi to the end with her and put Kristina against Rizo for fire. Now, something you might have missed way, way back in episode 1 was the Hina tribe's initial attempt at making fire after winning supplies at the marooning challenge. Kristina mentioned that one of her Survivor bucket list items was to make fire, but that day was not today. Kind of feels like foreshadowing of when we finally do see her make fire on the show as if it will be extremely impactful to her game. Like, I don't know...the final fire-making challenge?
I predict Kristina will beat Rizo at fire making, securing him as the eighth and final member of the jury.
Survivor 49 Final Tribal Council predictions
With our Final Three players and full jury established, our castaways will make their way to Final Tribal Council where they will plead their cases. Savannah and Sophi will both have similar underdog stories with Savannah's focusing on making every move possible—whether winning challenges, securing bonds, or crafting narratives—to ensure she always made it to the next day and Sophi leaning more into the social angle of joining up with the right people at the right time and always letting others believe she was open to create trust.
Kristina's pitch will be that she made it to the end because of the loyal bonds she built from the very beginning with her Hina tribe mates, but the jury is not going to be fans of this argument. At least one of them will likely bring up the fact that she wrote down Steven's name when she didn't have to, so how does that demonstrate loyalty?
The jury will spend a lot of time attacking Savannah for her method of gameplay, likely calling her out as mean, manipulative, a bully, but she will argue them each step of the way doubling down on her case that her strategy was to fight to get to this spot and not everyone is going to like the way someone on the bottom has to claw they're way up to live another day.
In the end though, even though it will seem like the jury is against Savannah, the majority of them will vote in her favor. The only vote I might see Kristina getting would be from MC Chukwujekwu as they were allies and she might feel she saw a different side of Kristina's game than everyone else. And for Sophi, I could potentially see Alex Moore—knowing how hard it was to get from the disaster that was Kele to the finals—and maybe Sophie Segreti—for being the last Sophi standing—voting in her favor.
But Savannah is destined to be the Sole Survivor of Survivor 49 and even her fellow castaways who spent the entire season wanting her out will have to agree by the end. Watch the finale this Wednesday, December 17 at 8/7c on CBS and Paramount+ to see how many of our predictions come true!