As we get ready for the Survivor 49 finale, our Final 5 castaways are reviewing their resumes in anticipation of the Final Tribal Council when they plead their case for $1 million. At this point in the game, I don't think a single one of our finalists doubt that they will make it there—though we know two of them will be on the jury side for it—but there's one player who's already the closest to the end from a technical standpoint.
Rizo Velovic snuck through yet another Tribal Council without playing his "hidden" immunity idol which means—unless he suddenly has an extremely uncharacteristic error in judgment and misplays it—he's already guaranteed himself a spot in the Final 4 and confirmed that, minimally, he will not be voted out of this game.
And in a first look clip at the upcoming finale, a few of our final players are a little annoyed that he lied about his idol only being active through the Final Six—namely Kristina Mills and Sage Ahrens-Nichols. Because not only is that a move he can put on his resume, but it's also one for the Survivor history books. Watch below.
Rizo is the first player in Survivor history to survive 8 Tribal Councils with the same, universally known, immunity idol in his possession
In the clip, Rizo claims, "Survivor record, nine Tribal Councils without having to play it with everyone knowing about it."
If you remember, he first found the beware advantage in episode 3, "Lovable Losers" after everyone learned of Jake Latimer's sudden exit from the game and the Uli tribe decided they should all look for it to protect their group. Then after the first tribe switch in episode 4, "Go Kick Rocks, Bro," when he and the new Hina tribe lost immunity, he raced to find the idol to reclaim his vote at Tribal Council.
Since he found it, there have been nine Tribal Councils, eight of which Rizo has attended and been vulnerable at. And while Sage revealed the existence of Rizo's idol to the original Hina members, he still managed to keep a trick attached to it by making everyone believe it expired at Final 6 rather than at Final 5. Though Kristina should have been more doubtful of this claim considering she herself found an idol that explicitly stated the last time it could be played was with 5 players remaining.
And now, Rizo has all the ammunition he needs to make a clean sweep at Final Tribal Council. Despite having guaranteed safety in his pocket for 100% of the Tribal Councils he attended, he never once had to use it because he instead utilized his ability to strategically socialize the vote conversation away from him and onto someone he or Savannah considered a threat.
He did it with MC Chukwujekwu—deciding it would be better for his game to keep Sophie as she'd be more likely to work with him—as well as Alex—knowing he was growing suspicious of Rizo and could possibly sway people as a middle player. And then again, when he blindsided Jawan by convincing Sophie he was a bigger threat to her than Savannah before turning right around and helping Sage lead the revenge mob straight to Sophie's elimination in Jawan's honor.
At this point, it's Rizo's game to lose, and the only way I see that happening is if he doesn't make it to the Final 3. We'll just have to wait and see what happens this Wednesday, Dec. 17, when the Survivor 49 finale airs at 8 p.m. EST on CBS and Paramount +!