We’re ready for another new, action-packed installment of Survivor 50 as we continue the season with episode 3, “Did You Vote for a Swap?” on Wednesday, March 11 at 8 p.m. ET on CBS and Paramount+. And if you couldn’t tell by the title, we’re definitely in for a big game shakeup this week.
After Survivor 49 winner Savannah Louie was voted out last week, we find the Cila tribe hanging on at the bottom while Vatu is down one member due to Survivor 48 winner Kyle Fraser’s medical evacuation. Kalo, meanwhile, seems to be strong as ever.
However, the first two episodes ended with us saying goodbye to our two most recent winners. So as we go into episode 3, we can’t help but wonder about the fate of our last remaining winner, Survivor 45’s Dee Valladares, who also happens to be on the only unaffected tribe thus far. With 21 players remaining and only 20 days left in the game, we might also see more than one player go home tonight.
Two players are massively celebrating as they return from Tribal Council
While the entire Cila tribe checks in on Christian Hubicki after he fell at Tribal Council, he and Rick Devens are secretly laughing in the jungle for completing the greatest “heist” in Survivor history—planting a fake idol at Tribal Council.
But the celebration is quickly over when Joe Hunter reads out tree mail that Emily Flippen assumes is related to a tribe swap. Immediately, Christian approaches Devens about what would come if they get split up during the tribe swap. In case either of them or their ally ends up on a tribe with Aubry Bracco—the recipient of Christian’s Billie Eilish Boomerang Idol—they need to get a story straight to ensure they remain strong.
Christian recommends they tell their allies Cirie Fields and Emily Flippen about, but convinces Devens it’s best to say that Rick found the idol, not himself. So Rick tells Cirie and Christian for the “first time” about him finding the idol and gifting it to Aubry. However, there’s no time before leaving for the challenge to loop Emily in, so Christian has to whisper it to her on the mat after they drop their buffs. Unfortunately, this makes Emily feel outside of the alliance rather than included.
Jeff Probst drops the first Survivor 50 track
After arriving at the challenge arena, Jeff decides to share a few bars, opting to rap the tribe swap announcement. Everyone drops their buffs and randomly chooses a new one, putting them on 3 tribes of 7 players. Meet your new tribes!
Cila: Jonathan Young, Kamilla Karthigesu, Cirie Fields, Charlie Davis, Rick Devens, Rizo Velovic, Dee Valladares
Vatu: Christian Hubicki, Mike White, Angelina Keeley, Ozzy Lusth, Q Burdette, Stephenie LaGrossa Kendrick, Emily Flippen
Kalo: Aubry Bracco, Joe Hunter, Genevieve Mushaluk, Coach Wade, Chrissy Hofbeck, Colby Donaldson, Tiffany Ervin
The most noticeable change is seeing all three David vs. Goliath members now on one tribe together. All three comment on it, with Christian specifically calling out that it’s not necessarily a good thing, especially for him, since Mike and Angelina both tried to vote him out multiple times—until finally succeeding.
Restarting the get to know you game—at warp speed.
Back at Kalo, Joe approaches both Coach and Colby about working together—the two being on his list of people he wanted to play with before the game even started. Coach is 100% in on this alliance, additionally including Chrissy—his original ally—in the plans. But his one worry is that if there was a Tribal Council before the swap, Chrissy would have gone home.
So he decides it’s best to “coach” Chrissy on how to socialize, telling her bluntly that everyone at the old tribe thought she talked too much and didn’t like her. This visibly upsets her and Chrissy pulls Genevieve and Aubry aside to the beach to talk to them about likeability in the game.
Over at Cila, Cirie is nervous about the numbers with her and Devens the only original Cila players on a tribe of four Kalo and one Vatu. Dee and Jonathan immediately start talking about Cirie’s threat level and knowing she needs to go if they end up at Tribal Council.
The Vatu tribe immediately connect, though Mike is just as worried as Cirie was. However, he happens to know three of his new tribe mates well—not just his former season players, but also Ozzy. But Q pulls Ozzy aside and tells him that Genevieve sent him the idol, grabbing the people he needs to ensure the numbers.
He pulls in Emily, who decides she can trust them both, telling them that she doesn’t trust Christian after he told her that Aubry has an idol. This confirms Q’s previous suspicions about Aubry having an idol. He pulls aside Stephenie and tells her what Emily shared as well, the two deciding they need to keep Emily feeling safe while they plan to cut out the David vs. Goliath threesome one-by-one.
But the more Emily talks to Q and Stephenie, the more she realizes that they might not be the right people for her to work with as they’re driving the ship and not giving her options, but directions. She sits down with Angelina to get a feel on her two new allies, telling her that she was on the bottom at the other tribe and they are still dropping her name,
Foot in mouth social strategy strikes again.
After her conversation with Angelina, Emily approaches Christian and confesses to everything she did, including telling basically everyone on the new tribe that Aubry has an idol. He explains that he was trying to tell her sooner, but there wasn’t a chance back at camp and she immediately feels so guilty. But now Christian—upset, but thinking clearly—decides if Emily is willing to work with Angelina, they could have power with the two of them and his two former David vs. Goliath players.
At Kalo, Genevieve is trying to rectify her original Survivor 47 game by approaching everyone to instill her trust in them. But she’s still worried about Aubry, so she starts telling her new tribe mates about how Aubry was going behind her back to attack her. Joe, Coach, and Chrissy all agree with her that Aubry should be next to go. But Tiffany isn’t on the same page.
She chooses to approach Aubry and let her know what Genevieve has been spreading about her around camp—confirming her suspicions about Genevieve. Aubry is thrilled to get this information
Rizo, on the outside of Cila, starts trying to gather tells on the rest of his players to figure out who is the right person to share his information with. He decides the right person to work with is Charlie, who is seeking redemption after losing Survivor 46. He tells him about the Billie Eilish Boomerang Idol and that Ozzy has it.
But Charlie’s not wanting to play with Rizo after he said that his no. 1 from season 49 was Sophi Balerdi, but he voted for Savannah to win. Charlie views Rizo as someone he cannot trust, but even more so, someone he doesn’t want near a seat on the jury.
New tribes shake up challenge performance.
In a communication-based challenge, our three new tribes are fighting for immunity during “Blind Leading the Blind.” Each tribe chooses a caller—Kamilla for Cila, Christian for Vatu, and Chrissy for Kalo—who has to give direction to their blindfolded tribe mates.
Vatu’s the first to get to a station—needing to unlock a ring—with Kalo right behind, but Cila is actually the first to head back with their ring. Cila keeps their first place lead as they land two rings ahead of Vatu’s one and Kalo’s zero. Cila gets their third ring and Kamilla guides them through the obstacle course.
Rizo and Charlie for Cila start on the puzzle—with Kamilla still calling—before Vatu or Kalo even get their third rings to the starting line. Christian does a good job of leading his tribe through the course, but Chrissy accidentally lets Colby take a hard hit as she navigates.
As Vatu and Kalo arrive at the puzzle mat, Jeff calls out Cila as the winner. Christian struggles to direct his tribe to get even one piece set while Kalo finishes and takes second place. Both winning tribes get chickens, with Cila getting their flint finally. Vatu loses their flint and Christian is upset about failing the challenge and returning to Tribal Council for the third time in a row.
Who is really on the chopping block tonight?
After all the miscommunication and chaos produced by Emily earlier, Vatu has a few different alliances working on the vote.
Mike decides to be honest with his tribe mates, so he tells Q, Ozzy, and Stephenie that it’s going to be really hard to write down Christian or Angelina and straight up says he’s probably voting for Stephenie. When they approach Christian, he says he’s definitely willing to vote out Angelina, but Stephenie doesn’t necessarily trust him,
Mike then approaches Emily and tells her that the best option is to tell everyone they’re voting for Stephenie, but actually vote for Q. He fears Q’s ability to hold a grudge will come back to haunt him in the future and he needs to go now. He pulls in Christian and Angelina on this plan as well.
Emily asks Ozzy his thoughts on the vote and Ozzy declares that Angelina is the best vote right now. She isn’t sure whether to go with Ozzy’s plan or Mike’s plan.
Mike tells Q he was being honest about voting for Stephenie and that Angelina will also vote for Stephenie. But Q goes into Q-mode and tells Mike to vote for him instead—in an attempt to even out the votes since he doesn’t have a vote. He also makes up a story about himself having an extra vote, which Mike shares with Emily.
Emily then goes back to Ozzy and pitches eliminating Q instead of Angelina. Ozzy begs her to wait one vote as he doesn’t want to vote out a strong member. And Emily wants to work with Ozzy, but she also thinks Q is the best target tonight, so isn’t sure how to vote.
Who was voted out of Survivor 50 episode 2?
Tribal Council brings lots of discussions about the evolution of players returning and if they’re playing a new version of their game or the same game. And in the end, the majority decided the biggest threat to the tribe was someone who was repeating a game that had the potential to jeopardize their future individual gameplay. So Q Burdette became the third person voted out of Survivor 50.
Without a vote, he didn’t have a chance to combat the numbers, especially with Emily convincing Ozzy to go with her strategy and vote with the other David vs. Goliaths.
Next Time on Survivor…
There’s a clear pattern of strong social players exiting the game now, so depending on which team loses next time, there are a few players who could be in danger. We’ll see if this strategy continues to unfold next Wednesday on Survivor 50!