A semi-surprising double elimination rocked Survivor 50 last week, causing alliance and trust faction lines to be revealed and changed. After Chrissy Hofbeck and Coach Wade collectively became the latest members of our jury, some players are left feeling on top of the world, some are in doubt of their position, and some are ready to try and pull off something big.
So as we dive into episode 9, “I Deserve All of This,” we’re most curious about the fall-out of Rick Devens’ fake idol reveal—though not everyone knows it’s fake—and where Jonathan Young and Stephenie LaGrossa Kendrick are going to flock now that their top allies are out of the game.
And while those three seem the most likely to be in danger, we all know that Survivor is never what it seems. And with two ring leaders gone, it’s time to aim the target not at the player in the spotlight, but the one behind the scenes pulling the strings…
The Tribal Council fallout is immediate and a lot
Returning from Tribal Council. Jonathan is upset at Devens for being too cocky for finding an idol. Joe Hunter approaches him wondering why he didn’t know about the clue to the idol, despite the fact that he and Devens aren’t exactly aligned. Then Devens turns around and tells Emily Flippen the truth: that it’s fake. This upsets Emily that Devens was willing to put a target on their whole alliance just to blow up a Tribal Council.
Stephenie, Jonathan, and Joe Hunter connect about what moving forward with the three of them together means now that Coach and Chrissy are gone. Ozzy Lusth, still undercover, approaches them and while Stephenie acts like everything’s fine—though she wasn’t included in the vote and only put the right names down because of Devens idol play—she’s the angriest she’s been so far in the game and is ready to come for the people who betrayed her.
The next morning, Ozzy and Rizo Velovic connect about how lucky they are that Devens made a big show at Tribal Council because it takes the eyes off of their idols. Ozzy notices that Joe, Stephenie, and Jonathan are all wandering around camp, talking to everyone rather than keeping to their core group like before and believes that the “honor & integrity” alliance is officially gone.
Cirie Fields, Ozzy, and Joe discuss picking a back up target for Devens in case he does play his idol. Then Joe and Jonathan meet up to strategize about getting people together to push ahead with the, “hope that good people can weather this.” Aubry then approaches Jonathan about working together with the goal of distancing herself from Devens.
Joe sits down with Devens and tells him he didn’t vote for him, he never voted for him, and Devens tells him straight that’s not how it looked from his perspective. Joe is proud of himself for not getting riled up when Devens “tried to provoke him.”
Christian Hubicki and Emily go on a walk to confirm Devens told Emily the idol is fake. Christian knows he has to do damage control with Jonathan and Stephenie because he told them he was voting for Devens and then didn’t. When he talks to them though, Jonathan is clear that he isn’t sure if there’s a world where he can trust Christian again.
Similar to his situation with Ozzy, Christian says he’s willing to do whatever it takes, including giving them his shot in the dark as a sign of trust. Jonathan immediately turns around to tell Joe that if that does in fact happen, they should blindside Christian and flush the Devens idol while he’s defenseless.
Christian checks in with them on the beach and they barely talk to him, setting off a red flag for the David vs. Goliath player. He realizes that people perceive him as playing the middle when in fact Ozzy’s the one playing the middle the hardest. He then turns to Cirie and Devens and says he’s worried Ozzy—now calling him “he who shall not be named”—is getting a little power hungry and might need to go next. Either him or Jonathan.
Of course Cirie is aligned more closely with Ozzy than Christian, so she turns around and tells him about the conversation. She also tells Jonathan about what Christian said, which just confirms Jonathan plans to take Christian’s shot in the dark.
Jeff’s best negotiation yet
Our players arrive at the challenge arena which is set up for “Wrist Assured,” a challenge Joe won individual immunity for back in Survivor 48, but didn’t last the longest in. Jeff Probst is standing next to a large crate and tells them that in addition to a challenge, today is also a rice negotiation. But because the fans voted for players to earn their rice, they can’t simply sit out for it this season.
So instead, he reveals that he’ll be running the challenge today too, and instead of sitting out, players will make a side bet that they’ll outlast Jeff in order to win rice. He needs five players who will outlast him in order to win—if even one of them drops before him, they lose. Jonathan tries to wager four players instead of five—offering himself, Joe, Ozzy, and Tiffany as the side bet players—and Jeff agrees.
As soon as the challenge begins, Jeff reveals that him competing in the challenge was Jimmy Fallon’s idea. Emily’s bucket starts to fall, but Rizo’s hits the ground first, then Emily. Devens falls out and Jeff tells him to take over as the host. Emily starts trash talking him a little bit and Ozzy joins in. We then get a montage of Jeff trash talking players in challenges over the last 25 years.
Jeff is clearly struggling, asking Tiffany how she’s so zen. He asks someone off camera how long it’s been and finds out it’s been six minutes, right then, Cirie drops. Jeff is on his last legs and Christian is trying to make a new, outside the game, side bet with him. Players start yelling, “you gotta dig, Jeff!” But he drops out after 7.5 minutes.
Christian falls after reaching his mini goal of beating Jeff. Aubry’s bucket starts falling and she begins to crank it back up, but it slips through her grip and she falls. Stephenie and Tiffany both fall out at the same time, leaving Ozzy, Joe, and Jonathan remaining. Twelve minutes and Jonathan falls. If Ozzy wins this, he ties for most individual immunity wins in Survivor history. But he can’t outlast Joe.
Jeff then tells Joe he has to send someone on a journey. Joe asks if anyone wants to go. About half the tribe raises their hands, so Joe has them play rock-paper-scissors tournament style to decide who goes. Christian wins and leaves separately while everyone else returns to camp with their rice.
Rice and revelations
With the new bag of rice, everyone is excited to eat, but as Cirie prepares it, Emily is very concerned about how much rice they’re cooking. Cirie is so annoyed she says if Emily doesn’t shut up, she might just vote for her at Tribal Council tonight.
Tiffany approaches Devens, thanking him for keeping his word at the last Tribal Council, but warns him that people are tossing around his name and that if he has an idol, he should play it. Devens strategically says, “don’t worry, I don’t leave with idols in my pocket.”
With Christian off on the journey, Jonathan is campaigning at camp for Christian to be the next to go as the most dangerous person in the game. Joe gives him his full blessing to blindside Christian now that Christian has put Jonathan’s name out there and Jonathan makes the rounds, telling everyone how dangerous Christian is and that he needs to go.
Another journey, another new twist
When Christian arrives at the journey, it’s on a barge, similar to Survivor 47’s when winner Rachel LaMont got the idol that changed the game for her. He sees a note from Jimmy Fallon that says he has to complete the classic Survivor logo puzzle before all the anchors drops in the water and time is up.
If he wins, he gets a new advantage called the “Jimmy Fallon One in the Urn” which allows him to place an extra vote on the journey so a player arrives at Tribal Council with a vote already cast against them. If he doesn’t make it, there’s an envelope he has to take back to camp and read out loud to his tribe.
He is so close to finishing the puzzle, but the anchors fall and he isn’t able to finish in time. He grabs the envelope and gets on the boat back to camp.
Flips and flops
Christian arrives back at camp with his “note of shame” and gathers everyone to read it out loud. He announces that he is now the first player in Survivor history that has to write his own name at Tribal Council. Not only does he lose his vote, but he’s given an extra vote on himself. He connects with Devens, getting nervous.
Because he has to vote for himself, there’s no use for his shot in the dark tonight, so he gives it to Jonathan as a showing of trust. Emily, in an attempt to save her ally Christian, starts dropping new ideas and pitches Ozzy to Cirie and Tiffany. Immediately, they tell Ozzy and all three agree that they need to vote out Emily.
When they tell Rizo, he says tonight is the perfect night for Christian because he already has his own vote against him. So now there’s two camps: one for Christian and one for Emily. With Christian’s vote confirmed for himself, and Emily’s vote on Ozzy, the majority could really go either way.
Who was voted out of Survivor 50 episode 9?
Though Christian was forced to vote for himself and it could have been an easy majority vote, it was still a split 5-3-2 vote, but ultimately Christian Hubicki became the 14th player voted out of Survivor 50 and the 4th member of the jury, with Devens and Ozzy receiving the additional votes.
Next Time on Survivor…
While this week’s move was big, it was also easy. And with votes going in so many different directions, we can imagine that next week is about to be a mess and a half of names being targeted and minds being changed. Plus, in our catalog of celebrity appearances, we’ll finally see what Mr. Beast has for our Survivors in his briefcase. Tune in when episode 10 airs next Wednesday, April 9 at 8 p.m. ET on CBS and Paramount+.
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