Characters / Survivor 41

The Tribes

Luvu

• The Ace: The original members of the tribe either place first or second in tribal immunity challenges, and the one challenge they lose was for reward. They still manage to win an immunity challenge despite moving slowly and actively trying to throw it. As a result, while the other other tribes have been whittled down to around three members, Luvu still has their original six by the time of the merge.
• Badass Crew: The tribe proved utterly unstoppable during the premerge portion of the game and never went to tribal. Even in the pre-merge challenge, the team with more Luvu members won by a landslide. Come post-merge, all six make the merge, three make the finale, two make final three, and one ends up winning the whole game.
• Color Motif: Blue
• Failed a Spot Check: They face massive setbacks in the first two challenges by missing things: The opening reward challenge by not unhooking their boat's anchor, and the first immunity challenge by pushing their cart across the track without realizing not all their sandbags were on the platform like they needed to be. It cost them the win in the first challenge, but they came back to win immunity in the second.
• Out of Focus: Heather and Erika didn't receive much screentime before the merge, as the tribe never lost a challenge, the advantages went to Danny, Deshawn, and Sydney in the first few epodes, and Naseer was a point of focus on the tribe (for his Cassandra Truth in the first episode, his contributions to the tribe in the second, and his fallout in the third). They would finally get A Day in the Limelight in Episode 4... only go to back being this trope for the rest of the pre-merge.
• Willfully Weak: Attempts this in the fifth immunity challenge to throw a challenge, purposely going slow and retying untied knots. It doesn't work, and they win anyway.

Ua

• Butt-Monkey: Inherits this from Yase. They lose multiple immunity challenges in a row and are whittled down to 2 members.
• Color Motif: Green
• Dwindling Party: Due to multiple losses, the tribe is whittled down to two people while Luvu still has six.
• Failure Tribe: Despite having a competent first showing, the tribe devolved into infighting and treachery which caused them to start failing in challenges and lose all but two members- the third in Survivor history to fail so hard.
• Handicapped Badass: Two of the tribe members have degrees of disability, Shan (scoliosis) and Ricard (deafness). Despite this, they are shown finishing first in challenges, and those two members control the strategic portion of their tribe. They become the final members of the tribe.
• A House Divided: More like "A Tribe Divided" but still works as pretty much all six members of this tribe have their name written down in tribal council before the merge (with the exception of Shan in which JD and Brad actually voice some reasons to potentially to get rid of her).
• Total Party Kill: No one from Ua made it to the Final Four.

Yase

• Animal Motif: Likens themselves to baby turtles they found on the beach, struggling to get to the ocean.
• Butt-Monkey: Performed badly in challenges early on and frequently lagged behind the other tribes during challenges, something Jeff lampshades. They got better.
• Color Motif: Yellow
• A House Divided: The original tribe had multiple alliances playing each other. Come the merge, one of them defects to the majority alliance, while the remaining members lose trust in each other despite being able to successfully pull of a strategic gambit against the majority.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: While allied with each other and working well together, a few of them actively plot against each other. Their dissolution at the merge came with the tribe members already making plans to counter each other's betrayals.
• Took a Level in Badass: After being whittled down to 4 members and eliminating two of their male tribemates, they eventually find their rhythm and starting winning immunity challenges.
• Throw the Dog a Bone: After losing the first two immunity challenges as well as the reward challenge within the first episode, they went to all three challenges within Episode 3-5. They even come in first place within the immunity challenge of Episode Four/Five (though the fact that Danny and Deshawn wanted to throw the fourth immunity challenge can somewhat can play a role in that).

Sole Survivor

Erika Casupanan

Tribe: Luvu

Age: 32

From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Occupation: Communications Manager

Vote: 7-1-0

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• Advantage Ball:
  • After the winning half of the merge tribe becomes safe from the merge tribal council, she gains the advantage to "go back in time", reversing the outcome of the immunity challenge, allowing herself and the losers of the challenge to be safe from elimination instead.
  • On Day 24, Erika finds an advantage that shortens the ladder portions for her. It's instrumental in her victory of the immunity challenge.
• Arch-Enemy: Deshawn. Of all the times Erika has been screwed over, it was never personal with anyone except Deshawn, who spent the entirety of the premerge and most of the postmerge gunning for her. After one betrayal too many, their relationship reached a point of mutual disdain.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Is tiny, and has a kind and sweet personality. She also gains a game changing advantage that reverses the outcome of an immunity challenge, forcing all winners to lose their immunity instead. Said winners comprise of four of her own tribemates.
• Birds of a Feather: Forms an unlikely pair with Heather as both are underestimated and prefer playing quieter games. In a meta sense, fellow underestimated and under-edited winners Sophie Clarke and Adam Klein predicted her win long before the finale.
• Born Unlucky: Zigzagged. Ends up drawing the wrong rock twice in a row, sitting her out of two important challenges. However, both challenges came with the opportunity for the player who drew the wrong rock to gain an advantage. Ultimately subverted when she wins almost unanimously over the disliked Deshawn and Failure Hero Xander.
• Broken Win/Loss Streak: Both as the first Canadian winner as well as the first female winner since Sarah Lacina in Game Changers, ending a six season streak of male winners. In addition to her coming out, she is also the first queer winner since Parvati in Micronesia.
• Chekhov's Gunman: She has less screen time than the other players, and her first notable scene is her strategizing against Sydney. Come episode 7, she gains a huge advantage and promptly reverses the outcome of an immunity challenge. In the ensuing chaos, the person eliminated...is Sydney, who she had targeted episodes prior.
• The Cutie: She is a really sweet woman, taking Heather on the final reward and admitting she couldn't have gotten that far without her, and is clearly one of the nicest castaways of the season. While she tells the cameras that her intention was to be The Fake Cutie, playing up her cuteness intentionally so that she would be underestimated, she never really ends up being mean to anyone after all.
• Dark Horse Victory: With the flashy games Evvie, Shan and even Deshawn (in spite of not playing as well in the merge part) were playing. who was expecting the small Filipino-Canadian girl to win it all? Erika even refers to herself as a "dark horse" during her Final Tribal Council performance.
• The Dreaded: Ironically, despite her limited screen time and cute appearance, most of the cast seem to feel this way about her. As it turns out, they had a reason to feel that way.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: She's on the bottom of her tribe due to not being trusted, which is reflected when, once the choice is between her and Naseer, she is the one sent to exile.
• Hidden Badass: She plays well strategically and socially, consistently making good decisions, and always speaking eloquently. Understands that she likely will be underestimated, and plays into it, preferring to make relationships with the outsiders over battling out with the strong players. This ultimately allows her to climb the rankings as the louder players take each other out while she receives a quieter edit. By the finale, every single person she voted for at Tribal Council was eliminated, and she ties the record for most jury votes for a female winner at 7.
• Informed Attribute: Describes herself as a strategist and was targeted by Shan who calls her the "mastermind" behind Heather. However, outside of her strategy session with Deshawn and the Hourglass Advantage, her strategies have yet to affect the game.
  • Specifically with the Hourglass Advantage, despite it being a huge moment that shifted the momentum of the game, with Erika worried of the enemies it would make, most of the strategy and eliminations that resulted from it seemed to occur independently of Erika. She has yet to be shown directly influencing an elimination.
  • This is subverted episode 10, where she strategizes with Deshawn to get rid of Shan. And when Ricard finally convinces the men of the black alliance to vote for Shan, Erika manages to convince the group to split between Liana and Shan, as if Shan played her idol Erika would have been the one to go home. She got her way, ensuring her safety and fracturing the black alliance by having Deshawn and Danny alienate Liana.
• Like Is, Like, a Comma: She adds "like" in a lot of what she says, to the point of a Verbal Tic.
• A Lion in Lamb's Clothing: Her game plan in a nutshell, and how she was able to win Survivor 41. Erika intentionally came into this game knowing she would be seen as sweet and underestimated, and used it to her advantage to slowly build up her threat level. Come the merge and she starts shedding her lamb costume and makes impressive moves, such as breaking the hourglass, orchestrating the split-vote for Liana and Shan, Danny's elimination, finding the final advantage and taking Ricard out at Final Five. This ended up winning her seven out of the eight jury votes.
• Lipstick Lesbian: While not open at the time, Erika eventually came out at the end of 2023 as a lesbian.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Erika revealed in a post season interview that she did, in fact, know how to make fire and was lying to Xander in hopes of getting him to send her to fire making and get one last impressive showing in.
• Odd Friendship: With Heather. Though we didn't get to see much of their relationship, the two had been allies from the very beginning despite the different backgrounds, personalities, and generational gap.
• Older Than They Look: She's 32, and she looks like she's in her early-mid 20's.
• Out of Focus: Didn't receive a lot of screentime prior to her Day in the Limelight moment in Episode 4.
• Purple Is Powerful: Played with, as the "purple" is in her dyed ombre, but over the course of the game, she grows to be a social and strategic powerhouse which allows her to win the game.
• Silk Hiding Steel: She is small, generally underestimated, cheerful, constantly smiles and is kind to almost everyone. She also eliminated everyone she voted for at Tribal Council, and earns the same amount of winning jury votes as Kim Spradlin and Sarah Lacina.
• Small Role, Big Impact: In the first six episodes, she doesn't receive a lot of screen time compared to the other players. Come episode 7, she reverses the outcome of an immunity challenge forcing the winners of the challenge to lose their immunity. Had she chosen differently, the first merge elimination and the momentum of the game may have gone completely differently.
  • Also...she won. However, the way her character was edited caused her to be overshadowed by many of the louder characters, despite playing a 7 - 1 - 0 winning game.
• Smug Snake: Comes across this way as her first attempt at strategizing turns her entire tribe against her, all while she arrogantly brags about how well she is playing. Subverted when it turns out she just needed some leverage to stand on.
• Sole Survivor: The forty-first, and the first ever lesbian and Canadian winner.
• Spanner in the Works: Becomes this to Sydney. She identifies Sydney as a threat early on. At the merge challenge, Sydney earns immunity during a team challenge. Erika then uses her advantage to reverse the outcome of the challenge, causing the winning team to lose their immunity. Sydney is eliminated in the ensuing chaos.
• The Strategist:
  • Shows shades of this in Episode 4, reading that Sydney is a threat and a loose cannon, and realizing that Deshawn is also a fellow strategist. Unfortunately, this show of strategic skill prompts Deshawn to turn on her instead.
  • After she uses her advantage to force the winners of the challenge to lose their immunity instead, she immediately sides with the majority alliance comprising of most of the allies who's immunities she had just robbed. Together they eliminate Sydney, who she had targeted episodes earlier.
  • It was her initial idea to take out Shan, though Ricard managed to get the plan into motion. And when she realizes that she is in potential danger of being voted out if Shan plays an idol, convinces Danny and Deshawn (who have had it out for her since the beginning) to split vote for Liana as well as a back-up plan. The end result sees Shan go home, Liana alienated by her former allies, and Deshawn being called a snake as Shan leaves the game.
  • After Shan's elimination, she becomes the swing vote between Liana and Ricard, and ensures the elimination of Liana, further crippling the once dominant majority alliance.
• Those Two Guys: Plays almost her entire game alongside Heather.
• Took a Level in Badass: During the premerge, Erika was something of a Smug Snake who believed she was much smarter than the other Luvus, which resulted in her being on the outs. However, after a few lucky breaks and gaining momentum, she managed to become a much savvier and more dangerous strategist after the merge. Then she wins the penultimate immunity followed by the game.
• Underestimating Badassery: Is constantly overlooked in favor of the flashier and louder players, despite playing a winning game. Notably, Xander chooses her to join him in Final 3 believing he could beat her despite being warned that he could not.

Runners-Up

Deshawn Radden

Tribe: Luvu

Age: 26

From: Miami, FL

Occupation: Medical Student

Vote: 7-1-0

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• Advantage Ball: Receives an extra vote in the second episode. He uses it in merge episode.
• Anti-Hero: Cheerful, amiable and fun-loving. However, by the time of the merge, he becomes part of the majority alliance, and comes up with plans to take out fan-favorites in Naseer, Evvie, and Xander. He also greatly dislikes being told what to do and goes on rants on his frustrations with Shan's leadership.
• Arch-Enemy: Erika. Deshawn had been lobbying to eliminate Erika since the merge, and their tumultuous relationship reached the point of mutual disdain by the endgame.
• Backstab Backfire: Deshawn's betrayal of Shan blows up in his face spectacularly, jettisoning him straight to the bottom of the pecking order having created a majority alliance out of the very people he had been planning to pick off.
  • Again in episode 12, where he tries to throw Erika under the bus by ruining her game in either an attempt to get Heather to turn on her or ruin her chances to win before he goes. It goes horribly wrong, as his attempt does end up keeping him in the game, but at the price of losing Danny and ruining his own game.
• Big Bad: By the end of the game it’s clear that he’s the main antagonist of the season based on how many fellow castaways he screwed over with his impulsive decision-making, and how much both the jury and the remaining players disliked him for this.
• Big Fun: He's a bit overweight, but he's also cheerful, amiable, and liked by just about everyone on his tribe.
• Berserk Button: Do not dismiss his plans without listening to them, which he confronts Shan about. Notably he had a similar issue with Erika's early strategizing, suggesting he may have an issue with not being in strategic control.
  • After Shan continues to dominate strategy sessions, he repeatedly tells the audience that he hates being told what to do.
• Birds of a Feather: Forms a close bond with fellow man of color, Danny. By the merge, he forms a strong bond with Shan and Liana as well.
• Blatant Lies: Tells Evvie that he will never write her name down, to repair their alliance. He then writes her name down and eliminates her.
  • Subverted with Shan. While he does consider keeping the core Black Culture Alliance strong, he ultimately turns on Shan the same episode he had reassured her that she can trust him.
• Cassandra Truth: Deshawn explicitly states in episode 4 that Erika was a dangerous player and that if she wasn't taken out then and there, she would go on to win. After failing to throw the challenge and take her out, he was proven right.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: The list of allies he has either succeeded or considered eliminating include: Erika, Naseer, Sydney, Evvie, Liana and Shan.
• Deus ex Machina: Near the end of the game, he is saved by two twists which should have taken him out. The first is getting the lucky draw from the Do or Die twist at the Final 7 and then having a second wind and beating Heather at the Final 4 Fire-Making by mere seconds.
• Fatal Flaw: Wrath. Almost all of Deshawn's problems are a direct result of him getting angry and confrontational whenever things don't go his way, an attitude that pushed his ally Shan away from him and caused him to vote her out in the heat of the moment, pushing himself to the bottom.
• Hot-Blooded: Becomes increasingly like this as his new ally Shan takes control of the majority alliance and continually overpowers his ideas with her own. He's visually shown frustrated, lashes out at tribal, and entertains the idea of turning on Shan.
• Hypocrite: Accuses Erika of wanting to get Sydney out just to make "big moves". Then attempts to...throw a challenge he doesn't need to, just to get Erika out.
• The Lancer: He and Danny work very close with each other, although Deshwawn seems content to advise Danny and the best strategic move to make.
• Nice Guy: Part of the reason why everybody likes him is because he's so easy to get along with. This is eventually subverted, as come post-merge and Deshawn is steadily becoming a rude, lying, backstabbing Jerkass.
• Oh, Crap!: Once he realizes that Xander has managed to outfox Liana and keep hold of his immunity idol, Deshawn panics and diverts most of his tribes votes to Sydney while using his extra vote on Evvie.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The red to Danny's blue, as Deshawn is very quick to get heated and passionate.
• The Rival: He develops an intense rivalry with Shan over who should control the majority alliance.
• Smug Snake: Uses Evvie's advantage that she gifted him against her. Later on he is visibly annoyed with the minority alliance's scrambling, wanting them to just accept their positions at the bottom while his alliance is at the top.
• The Strategist:
  • Is recognized as this by Danny and Erika, who goes to him for planning and mentions how he is a thinker. He is the one who pushes the plan to throw a challenge in order to blindside Erika.
  • Come the merge, he allies with fellow strategist Shan, and pushes for the elimination of Evvie, with Sydney as backup plan.
• The Social Expert: Seems to have good social bonds with his tribemates, has Sydney and Erika confiding in him and feeding him information, has a strong relationship with Danny, and has a potential ally on the opposing tribe in Evvie after bonding with her at a summit.
• The Starscream:
  • Attempts this with Erika. Despite being allies with her, enough for Erika to strategize with him, he targets her after realizing her strategic skill. This was delayed due to his failed attempt at throwing a challenge.
  • After the merge, his new ally Shan takes strategic control, and he begins to resent her not listening to his own plans. His frustration with Shan seems to build each episode with him enterntaining the idea of betraying her.
  • In episode 10, he succeeds in betraying Shan (and by extension Liana). However, as Shan leaves she vocally calls him out by declaring him a "snake" in front of the remaining players and jury. He gets burned alive by the jury, especially Ricard, in the finale, and he gets Danny's vote only.
• The Stool Pigeon: Reciprocates Sydney's earlier actions, by immediately ratting out Erika to Sydney the moment Erika starts targeting her. He later on ratts out Evvie telling him her tribe's dynamics to Xander.
• Team Killer: Early on had plans on taking out Erika and Naseer, and later sacrificed Sydney, all of whom had allied with him at some point. By the merge, he forms the Black Culture Alliance with Danny, Shan, and Liana, but continually butts heads with Shan and eventually blindsides her.
  • Thanks to his actions, Liana and Danny eventually followed suit, leaving Deshawn as the sole remaining member of the Black Alliance as of the Finale.
• Those Two Guys: Becomes this early on with Danny. This bond helps him to secure what turns out to be his only vote to win at Final Tribal Council.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Shan taking leadership position and strategic control in the alliance just rubbed him the wrong way and he became much more irritable, arrogant, and temperamental after the merge.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Early on, Evvie attempts to ally with him and volunteers to give him an extra vote. Come the merge, Deshawn turns on Evvie and uses the extra vote he received from her against her. He later becomes a swing vote and opts to eliminate Evvie over Liana.

Xander Hastings

Tribe: Yase

Age: 20

From: Chicago, Illinois

Occupation: App Developer

Vote: 7-1-0

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• The Ace: Is shown to have good challenge performance, is described as the tribemate that everyone trusts, has good social graces, early advantages, strategic skill, and potential allies on opposing tribes. Interestingly enough, he describes himself in his bio as a "jack-of-all-trades". Also was the last person standing during the endurance competition that had two winners, thus winning his "team" chicken soup, giving the guy his first good meal in a while. Subverted when it comes to social skills though, clearly not thinking the Jury would give Erika the million over him.
• Advantage Ball: Receives an extra vote in the first episode as well as an immunity idol in the second episode.
  • Notably, by Episode 10, he still has all his advantages while every other player with advantages have either been eliminated are used up all their advantages.
• Arch-Enemy: Becomes this to Liana, who grows obsessed with eliminating him. After Liana's failed attempts at eliminating him, she tries again to manipulate him into using his idol on her. He notably says he may use the idol, just not on her.
• Batman Gambit: Fully expects Liana to use her "Knowledge is Power" advantage on him to get his idol in Episode 8. Because of this, he gives his idol to Tiffany before tribal council so that Liana can misplay her advantage.
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: With Liana. Liana had been gunning for his elimination since the pre-merge, and her failure to eliminate him grows into an obsession. A secret scene in Episode 10 has Xander telling Shan that he finds Liana really attractive, lamenting if only he knew about his true feelings for her.
• Blessed with Suck: Zigzagged. He gains an extra vote in Episode 1, but then in Episode 2 he is the first recipient of the Beware Advantage, an idol that is useless and prohibits him from voting until the other tribes find the respective idols on their beaches, so all he has gained for all his advantages is a target on his back. Subverted in Episode 5 when Shan and Naseer find their tribes' versions of the Beware Advantage, activating all three idols and allowing Xander to vote again.
  • His Triple Threat status, idol, and extra vote haven't really saved him that much. The only reason he survived was due to Evvie and Tiffany being taken out to weaken him.
• Born Lucky: Every time he's been seen as a target, someone else goes. Either by his hand, or by being saved by some crazy twist, or last minute scrambling.
• Call-Back:
  • He uses Malcolm's signature move of bluffing his use of an idol in order to trick the vote off of him and his allies.
  • He later fails to find an obvious advantage on the sit-out bench, like Michaela in Gamechangers.
• The Chessmaster: Ultimately Subverted past the merge. Though he's shown to leverage his idol to great effect around the merge and successfully dodge Liana's Knowledge is Power advantage, afterward he's shown to have no real sway or agency whatsoever, failing to mastermind any votes and largely being dragged along to the Final 5 with his idol being basically forgotten. It also becomes obvious by that point that he's misreading his threat level and everyone else's perceptions of him.
• Decoy Protagonist: The show’s editing gives him and his journey the most focus, which makes him seem like the main protagonist and led many in the audience to assume that he would win, but he ultimately loses to Erika despite the editing keeping her Out of Focus.
• Failed a Spot Check: Like Liana earlier in the season, and Michaela in Game Changers, he fails to find an advantage on the Sandra Bench despite him looking for it.
• Failure Hero: Positioned as the hero of his tribe early on, doing an early challenge for camp supplies, building good relationships with his tribemates, is described as the tribemate everyone trusts, easily gains potential allies on opposing tribes, and starts to stack advantages. Then his advantages remove his ability to vote, his two most trusted allies turn on each other, he found an idol too early and has to wait until other tribes find theirs, his potential ally Brad on the opposing tribe is eliminated, and he becomes the last man left against an all women's alliance. By the merge, he has regained his ability to vote and his advantages. However, his ally Liana defects to the majority alliance in order target him, his advantages, and his closest ally Evvie. He manages to save his advantages and Evvie, but is still in the minority alliance. While things do look up for him, especially him winning the final challenge, he fails to find his grip and thus ends the season in third place.
• Fatal Flaw: Arrogance, Hubris, Poor Communication resulting from his age, and poor reads on the Jury's opinions. He severely underestimates how much the jury respects Erika's game, and thus brings her to the end while leaving Deshawn and Heather to fight over the third FTC slot. Shan and Liana even comment on how poor a read it is as he's saying it, and it leads to him getting zero votes to win while Erika gets all but Danny's votes.
• Formerly Fat: Mentions he used to be quite pudgy as a teenager, and only recently during his post high school days, lost enough weigh from doing track and field to be confident with himself.
• Genre Savvy: Has previous game knowledge, pulled off a strategic gambit reminiscent of earlier players, namedrops past seasons, looks for advantages in previous season's hiding spots, and correctly sees through strategic plays to get him to waste his advantages during the early merge. Unfortunately, this gets subverted later on, as he misreads his threat level and goes to the end with too many threats, including bringing Erika with him to the final tribal council instead of sending her to fire due to not thinking she is a threat.
• Hard Work Hardly Works: While playing a strong flashy game and going in with the best resume he manages to lose to even Deshawn. He didn't get any votes!
• I Work Alone: Ultimately what his strategy is for, all the times he allies with the Yase is more out of convenience and plays a game that gets him farther which could backfire.
• The Hero: The closest thing to a heroic player in this season after Naseer's elimination aside from Danny, being the underdog who always seems to find a way out of a sticky situation, including still having an idol as of Episode 11. Of course because of his likeability, genuinely nice nature, and challenge skill have made him too big of a threat compared to more under the radar players like Heather or Erika. He's aware of this, and after Shan's elimination made an alliance with Ricard to use as a shield. Unfortunately, he incorrectly believes Ricard is the only threat to him, which he finds out the hard way at the final tribal council.
• Last of His Kind: He's the last man on Yase after Evvie and the two girls formed an alliance that took out the other two men. After Evvie gets voted out having Xander won immunity, he's the last originay as a teenl Yase member who didn't defect to the other side. With Liana's elimination, he is the last member of Yase in general.
  • By episode 10, he is the last person to still have both of his advantages (Extra Vote and Hidden Immunity Idol). Every other player has either already used their Extra Vote or was eliminated with an Idol in their pocket.
• Magnetic Hero: What he has become after his Failure Hero status ended. Everyone wants to work with him, even Deshawn begrudgingly if the trailer for Episode 12 is anything to go by. He's also one of the most well liked players after Shan's elimination remaining.
• Manipulative Bastard: Openly tells people about his immunity idol and makes a show of it at tribal council, saying he plans to play it to save Evvie. This prompts Liana, who they had guessed would betray him, to use her advantage to steal his idol. He then reveals that he had faked his idol to trick Liana into wasting her advantage; he had already given the real idol to Tiffany. He later volunteers to give away his spot in the reward challenge, to both look for an advantage on the sit-out bench and to bond with the losers of the challenge.
• Nice Guy: He's an easy-going, honest, decent guy. Come the merge, he volunteers to use his idol to save his ally Evvie, despite her having played both sides. One episode later, he gives up his chance at winning a reward so that Erika doesn't get screwed by luck twice in a row and gives up a shot at immunity to give the whole tribe rice. Also, during Liana's boot episode, he admits he can't possibly understand what Liana is going through, but he honestly respects her as both a player and a person of color, and buries the hatchet with her after voting her off.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: He comes across as a bit of a surfer bro and doofus, but he is surprisingly insightful and cunning.
• Poor Communication Kills: In some of his answers in the final tribal council, especially to Liana's question, he got very tongue tied and struggled to articulate his gameplay. It was the final nail in the coffin that led to him getting zero votes at the end.
• Tagalong Kid/The Drag-Along: What he ultimately becomes to the final five, with none of them fearing his idol and instead seeing him as an inexperienced kid who ultimately doesn't have a good social read on people, and while he did take out the biggest threat remaining (Ricard), that was not by his own hand and he failed to realize just how strategic Erika was.
• Tall Poppy Syndrome: His advantages, likeability, strategic skill, and challenge performance has made him too big of a target. The early part of the merge has been focused on eliminating him, or eliminating his allies to weaken him.
• Too Clever by Half: Unfortunately what seemed like a smart strategy in his head is what did him in. He knew Erika was a threat, but thought if she won firemaking that could put her over the edge and beat him not realizing Erika was already beating him in Final Tribal Council.
• Underestimating Badassery: The critical flaw in Xander's endgame was neglecting how much respect the jury had for Erika, as he had assumed she had a weak strategic game.
• Villainous Crush: Inverted. Xander admitted in a secret scene for episode 10 that he was attracted to Liana, despite the fact she betrayed their tribe and wants him out.

The Jury

Heather Aldret

Tribe: Luvu

Age: 52

From: Charleston, South Carolina

Occupation: Stay at Home Mother

Vote: N/A (Final 4 Fire Challenge)

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• Cool Old Lady: The oldest player on the season. Her gambits indirectly lead to the elimination of Tiffany and Naseer.
• Determinator: Despite being unable to perform a required task for a reward challenge, she never gave up and kept trying
• Dying Moment of Awesome: Heather was one of the worst challenge performers of the season, so when she was set to made fire against Deshawn, and he was the first to get flames, it looked like she would be on the receiving end of a Curb-Stomp Battle. However, Heather quickly rebounds and manages to go out in the closest firemaking challenges in Survivor history.
• The Load: Often sits out on the Sandra bench. Her poor performance during the first reward challenge actually leads to her tribe's first loss.
• Manipulative Bastard: Talks to Tiffany just before voting starts at Tribal Council and then pulls in other allies into a live tribal. This causes enough confusion for Tiff to get eliminated, and increases the tension between Shan and Deshawn.
  • After allying with Ricard, she pretends to be sad and despondent at the tribe's decision to seemingly eliminate her, which manipulates Naseer into not playing the idol on himself and blindsides him.
• Out of Focus: She doesn't have any confessionals in the majority of episodes despite making it to the finale.
• Poor Communication Kills: Her confronting Shan over using her name as a decoy, and then causing a confusion by pushing for a live tribal puts a target on her back and alienates her allies Shan and Naseer. Naseer would later decide to side with Shan and Ricard over her.
• Those Two Guys: Plays almost her entire game alongside Erika.
• Took a Level in Badass: After spending the entire season in the background, on Episode 8 she finally puts her foot down at Shan's attempts to control the majority alliance and trying to use her name as a bluff. Come tribal council, she uncharacteristically delays the vote and starts privately whispering to multiple players. This causes enough chaos and pushes the tribe into disarray, with the minority alliance too confused to defend themselves from elimination.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: Despite her closest ally being the season winner and ultimately finishing in 4th place, fans lament at the fact that her character was given barely any screen time.

Ricard Foyé

Tribe: Ua

Age: 31

From: Sedro-Wooley, Washington

Occupation: Flight Attendant

Vote: 4-1

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• Awesomeness by Analysis: Reads people by analyzing their body language, reading their lips, and determining their intentions.
• The Chessmaster: Is shown to strategize early on, and other players tend to be suspicious of him. He along with Shan form the strategic force of the tribe.
• Disability Superpower: Is deaf in his right ear and has to read people's lips during conversations. This actually allows him to become very good at analyzing body language and understanding the nonverbal cues his tribemates give off.
• Dragon Ascendant: After helping eliminate previous Big Bad Shan and her dragon Liana, he is a prime spot to take the role of main antagonist.
• The Evil Genius: Serves as the brains of the operation in his alliance with Shan, coming up with the strategies she executes.
• Final Boss: Ricard was the last true threat towards Erika's chances of winning the game.
• Glory Hound: One of the frustrations he seems to have is the fact that Shan's skills allows her to both execute his plans and take credit for them.
• Handicapped Badass: He becomes the first contestant with a physical disability since Christy Smith to get to the final 6 and is shown to ace both immunity challenges and the strategic part.
• The Lancer: Serves as this to Shan, as they tend to strategize and vote together. Whereas he tends to be more openly strategic, Shan tends to focus more on building relationships.
• Last of His Kind: Ricard is the final member of Ua left in the game.
• Manipulative Bastard: Manipulates Naseer into siding with him and Shan over his Luvu allies, then works with Naseer's Luvu allies to blindside Naseer.
  • Is seen attempting to manipulate Xander into wasting his idol, and attempts to get Shan to surrender her Extra Vote Advantage to him or to help him blindside Naseer.
• Mean Character, Nice Actor: Outside of the game, he makes Xander an honorary uncle to his future kid with his husband. Inside of the game? He rips into Xander for taking out the biggest threats (himself) and not taking out the second biggest threat (Erika).
• Only Sane Man: In his alliance, he is the only one who is planning for the long game, rather than voting over vendettas or targeting players who are already powerless.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: Despite being a good player strategically, actively working in the background during plays, he is overshadowed by Shan's more upfront strategic style.
• Properly Paranoid: Refuses to return Shan her advantage, knowing that Shan turned on JD after doing so.
• The Resenter: He seems to resent Shan for taking credit for his strategies, even though it is true he came up with the moves, Shan had to execute them.
• The Starscream: He spent most of the game as Shan's number two, but after deciding he had no chance of winning if Shan made it farther, betrayed her and took her place as the dominant strategic threat of the game.
• Straight Gay: Has absolutely no stereotypically gay traits whatsoever.
• The Strategist: Is this alongside Shan. Notably, he comes up with strategies that Shan later executes.
• Those Two Guys: Becomes this with Shan, as they control the strategic dynamics of the tribe. They eventually become the last two members of their starting tribe.
• Treacherous Advisor: To Shan. Despite being her closest ally and strategist, Ricard was always planning to betray her and not bring her to the end. In episode 10, he follows through with his agenda.
• Twofer Token Minority: Three-fold. He's Hispanic, gay, and partially deaf.
• Ungrateful Bastard: Shan warning him that he was in danger caused him to pull out all the stops in the next immunity challenge, guaranteeing his safety. He decided to repay Shan's loyalty by arranging her blindside.
• We Used to Be Friends: With Shan at Ponderosa. While they were a tight duo in the game, once Ricard's voted out and reunites with the jury at Ponderosa, Shan just completely ignores him after feeling betrayed about his involvement in her blindside.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Rips into Xander at Final Tribal for not only getting him out when he trusted him but for choosing to take Erika over Deshawn or Heather to final three.
• Worthy Opponent: He and Shan are this to each other, as the last surviving members of Ua who are both strategic powerhouses. When he finally participated in Shan's blindside, her reaction was to praise Ricard and tell him no hard feelings while unloading all her venom at Deshawn instead.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Suggests voting out JD before the challenge in case they were sent straight to tribal council right after losing the challenge. Unfortunately for him, this wasn't Cambodia.
• Younger Than They Look: Only 31 and has almost completely grey hair

Danny McCray

Tribe: Luvu

Age: 33

From: Frisco, Texas

Occupation: Ex-NFL Player

Vote: 3-3; 4-0 revote

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• Backstab Backfire: Betraying Shan sent Danny to the bottom of the game, with Deshawn as his only ally.
• Berserk Button: He's generally a chill guy, but he turns against Shan hard the second he hears that she chose to protect Ricard over their alliance.
• The Big Guy: As expected from an Ex-NFL Player. He is easily one of the best challenge performers in his tribe.
• Big Good: Serves as this for the tribe, he is a natural leader, attempts to play an honorable game, and considers throwing a challenge "a sin."
• Bittersweet Ending: While Danny was evicted after a revote from a tie-vote between Deshawn and himself, he made several friends and he's arguably made it the farthest of any professional athlete so far.
• Blatant Lies: When his tribe has to decide which player from their own tribe has to go to exile, they choose Erika. Danny claims the choice was made through "Rock, Paper, Scissors," even though it's obvious no one on the team played "Rock, Paper, Scissors," and did this right in front of her.
• Boring, but Practical: What amounts to his strategic style. Dislikes going along with flashier moves like throwing a challenge or siding with people at the bottom to take out a threat. He would rather create a majority alliance, and vote off people outside of it, and does not mind Deshawn or Shan taking up the majority of strategy sessions. This has become a simple but effective strategy for him.
• Cool Big Bro: Deshawn admits that he sees him as one.
• Demoted to Dragon: Once Shan became the ringleader of his alliance, Danny became content to simply go along with her plans.
• Disappeared Dad: Danny notes that his father was killed in a car accident when he was 8 years old, and for many years he resented his father for not being a part of his life. It just so happens that the anniversary of his dad's death happened to take place during filming and he finally managed to come to terms with the loss.
• Failed a Spot Check: Failed to notice the idol which lead to his eviction.
• Genius Bruiser: The reason he is Luvu's leader is because he is both good at challenges and has sound instincts on how to play the strategic element of the game.
• Honor Before Reason: He's the only player at the first advantage who doesn't risk his vote, because he doesn't want to lose his vote or cause the others to lose theirs. His selflessness gives both JD and Xander advantages.
• The Leader: He sounds off on all of Luvu's major decisions.
• Morality Pet: Tends to reason with Deshawn and hold back his fantasies of turning on their allies.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The blue to Deshawn's red. Danny is very calm, quiet, and introspective.
• Properly Paranoid: He became convinced early on that the women in the game were planning to create a dominant all-women's alliance to remove the men. In the case of Yase, Evvie was spearheading an effort to do just that.
• Sore Loser: Mild example. Considers throwing a challenge a sin, and is later visibly upset when Erika's advantage causes him to lose his immunity while Deshawn handles losing his better.
• The Stoic: Danny has a very calm and self-controlled demeanor.
• Those Two Guys: Becomes this early on with Deshawn.
• Token Good Teammate: With Naseer's elimination, Danny is the only member of his alliance not to engage in backstabbing or self-serving ego trips.

Liana Wallace

Tribe: Yase

Age: 20

From: Washington, D.C.

Occupation: College Student

Vote: 5-3 (Xander voted twice)

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• Action Girl: She's easily the most physically capable female on her tribe, and is consistently shown excelling at challenges.
• Advantage Ball: Obtains an advantage that lets her ask any player in the game if they have an advantage, and she'll be allowed to steal it if they say yes. She misplays it in Episode 8 in order to try to steal Xander's idol (who gave it to Tiffany prior to the tribal council that episode).
• Arch-Enemy: Xander. Liana is determined to get rid of him no matter the cost. Her disdain for him is so obvious that her Yase allies are able to anticipate her betrayal and trick her into burning her Knowledge is Power advantage against Xander after he'd already given his idol to Tiffany.
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: Some viewers read Liana's obsession with Xander's elimination as a highschool-like crush. A secret scene from episode 10 shows Shan saying that Liana and Xander remind her of being a pastor to young adult couples. Xander then tells Shan that he does find Liana very attractive, and wonders if only Liana knew about his feelings for her. Liana is shown blushing and laughing at the idea, but insists she is still going to try to eliminate him.
• Broken Ace: Is physically capable in challenges, has good social skills, and is in the majority alliance. However, after failing to assert herself and push the vote towards her intended target, as well as failing to pick up an easily retrievable advantage, she is seen being angry and upset with herself, suggesting that she pushes herself too much and has too high expectations of herself.
• Birds of a Feather: Forms a quick relationship with Shan after meeting her at a summit, bonding over being women of color in the game as well as their personal experiences. She later forms this with Deshawn and Danny as well.
• Bittersweet Ending: Things didn't work out the way Liana hoped for in the game. She wanted to play strongly and assertively, but her moves were overshadowed by other players. She excelled at team challenges but did badly at individual challenges. She betrays Evvie for Shan, and both end up eliminated before her. She fails repeatedly to eliminate Xander, her biggest move using her Knowledge is Power Advantage was countered by the very allies she betrayed, and Xander ends up outlasting her. However, she formed strong friendships with Shan, and together with her creates a powerful alliance with other black players that dominates most of the merge. Her Black Alliance served as an inspiration to other black viewers, and her speech before her elimination was among the most powerful and emotional of the season. She ultimately ended the game not as the best player, but as a complex and human character.
• The Dragon: After the tribes merge, she defects to the majority alliance and basically serves as Shan's right hand woman.
  • Dragon Their Feet: She lasted longer in the game than Shan.
• Evil Former Friend: Becomes this to the Yase Tribe especially to Evvie. After finding kinship in Shan, and then later Deshawn and Danny, she betrays her old allies and becomes a power player for the majority alliance.
• Evil Is Petty: Her vendetta against Xander makes her act rather childishly at times.

Liana: [about Xander] I hate his...look at his face. I hate his face. I could die.

• Fatal Flaw: Her desire to get rid of Xander no matter causes her to betray the Yase tribe for some other allies that she spent less time (who would go on to betray her and eliminate her at the final seven) and misplay her advantage.
• Failed a Spot Check: Reminiscent of Michaela in Game Changers, Liana fails to notice an advantage placed by the firepit, despite tending to it earlier in the morning. The advantage was later picked up by her uneasy ally Tiffany, and Liana privately laments that she should have noticed it.
• Hidden Depths: Despite Deshawn betraying her and eliminating her close friend Shan, when Deshawn breaks down about his mixed feelings over it, Liana is the first to comfort him. Liana then delivers an emotional speech about despite her accomplishments, she will still be seen as a black woman first, and talks about how being black in the U.S. can literally kill you. She had wanted for the Black Alliance to be a showing of how there are different kinds of black people, and while she has mixed feelings over the alliance turning on itself, she understands the complexity of wanting to be both an inspiration and a good player.
• Irony: She receives an advantage called "Knowledge is Power" in the game...only to misplay it because others have the knowledge of the advantage. Knowledge is power, indeed!
• Karmic Elimination: Liana betrayed the Yase alliance to start up another, dominant alliance with Shan, in the hopes that she could get Xander voted out of the game. After voting out everyone from Yase except Xander, Liana's alliance falls apart, Shan is voted out, Xander joins the new majority alliance, and votes her off with one of his advantages, many episodes after her failed attempt to use an advantage on him.
• She Who Fights Monsters: Her single minded pursuit of trying to snuff Xander's torch has caused her to betray everyone on Yase, including Evvie. It's also made her incredibly unwilling to work with anyone outside of the majority alliance.
• Team Killer: Defects to the majority alliance at the merge. Part of her motivation was wanting to make a move against Xander, and is talked into betraying her closest ally Evvie, both of whom were her allies and tribemates. She later succeeds at eliminating Evvie.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Is visibly annoyed with Tiffany's paranoia pushing her to switch targets, and is upset when Voce is eliminated. Despite her reservations, she still maintained her alliance with Tiffany and voted alongside her. Naturally, she betrayed Tiffany and the rest of Yase at the first opportunity...only to find that they'd been expecting it because of her attitude.
• Those Two Guys: Forms this with Evvie as they become close allies, bouncing ideas off each other. After bonding at the summit, she becomes this with Shan instead.
• Undying Loyalty: To Shan. When she discovered that Danny and Deshawn were planning to blindside Ricard, Shan's closest ally, Liana told her the plan specifically because she couldn't bring herself to betray her, even if it cost her the game.
• What the Hell, Hero?: She rips into Danny and Deshawn for their shortsightedness in voting out Shan, as doing so has left them all vulnerable against a new majority alliance consisting of their enemies and Ricard.

Shantel "Shan" Smith

Tribe: Ua

Age: 34

From: Washington, D.C.

Occupation: Pastor

Vote: 3-3-2; 6-0 revote

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• The Ace: Is the most strategically gifted player on her starting tribe. By the time of the merge, her strategic skill outmaneuvers Evvie and Deshawn, and she takes control of the majority alliance.
• Advantage Ball: JD gave her his extra vote in Episode 4 which she voted him out so that she wouldn't have to give that advantage back to him. She also takes Genie's Beware Advantage, an immunity idol.
  • Ricard realizes the amount of power the advantages give her and attempts to convince her to leave the Extra Vote Advantage with him.
• Affably Evil: Dubs herself the “Mafia Pastor,” and her gameplay thus far certainly fits the bill. Tends to hum her personal villain song when she starts scheming against her allies. Subverted when she Took a Level in Jerkass around the merge though.
• Berserk Button:
  • Do not starve her for fifteen days and then try to have a bite of some of her food, Ricard.
  • Also stop making moves without her approval. Just go along with her plans.
• Birds of a Feather: Forms a quick relationship with Liana after meeting her at a summit, bonding over being women of color in the game as well as their personal experiences. She later forms this with Deshawn and Danny as well.
• Butt-Monkey: Hasn't gotten to have any of the food rewards since making the merge. The one episode where she finally gets one is the one where she is blindsided.
• The Chessmaster: She is one of the best strategists this season, and come the merge, she is able to manipulate and outmaneuver other strategists from other tribes, despite coming from a tribe with only two members.
• Control Freak: By episode 8, Shan has controlled who gets eliminated in every single one of the Tribal Councils she has attended. Her need to control her allies is so strong that simple suggesting a different target irritates her and causes her to shoot down the plan. Her need to control everyone is quickly noticed and commented on by the merge tribe.
• The Cutie: Oddly enough, despite her villainous playstyle, she manages to come across as a sincerely adorable person most of the time, and it seems that she’s probably like this for real outside of the game considering her job as a pastor. It does get Downplayed toward the end of her time as a castaway however, as the effects of hunger clearly take a toll on her and cause her to get more snippy (especially when Ricard tries to take a sample of what little food she has), but she’s back to being fully sweet again once she’s on the Jury.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: To players like Rob Mariano and Kim Spradlin who have an aggressive and dominant playstyle, controlling the entire tribe. While her high level gameplay got her deep into the game, her chokehold on the game caused people to turn on her. While a dominant playstyle may have worked with less skilled players, she was stuck with players who resented her power and were skilled enough to blindside her.
• Defeating the Undefeatable: Before her blindside Shan successfully eliminated all her targets, voting correctly at every single Tribal Council she attended.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Downplayed in that she made it halfway through the merge but Shan was the dominant force in the game, running it for ten straight episodes, getting her way at every tribal council, and perfectly set herself up as the Big Bad of the season. Unfortunately for her, everyone became wise to her game and once her closest ally Ricard chose to cut ties with her, everyone but Liana covertly arranged a blindside against her, and ensured she won't be in the game for the last couple of episodes.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Clearly adores Liana and is extremely sweet to her every time they interact. Unlike most other contestants, she never once seems to consider turning on her either. She also cared enough about Ricard to try to save him to her own detriment. And she also genuinely wanted to take Danny and Deshawn to final four with her despite her and Deshawn’s personalities clashing, though Deshawn lost her respect when he turned on her.
• Fatal Flaw: Shan is a control freak. By episode 8, her need to control her allies and their strategic moves causes friction in the relationships she has put so much effort to build. Deshawn and Heather show visible frustrations with her need to control their moves. Her unwillingness to give up her alliance with Ricard while demanding total loyalty from Deshawn and Danny is what ultimately leads to her blindside.
• Good Is Not Soft: She is a pastor and is shown to be sweet and playful with her tribemates. She is also shown to be a strategic force, with her getting a final say on who is eliminated in her first few tribal councils.
• Hoist by Her Own Petard: Saving Ricard from being eliminated by her alliance caused Ricard and everyone but Liana to turn on her and vote her out.
• Honor Before Reason: Recognizes that she would eventually need to take Ricard out for being a strong player. However, when Liana lets her know about a plan to blindside Ricard, she ultimately decides to warn him due to not being ready to eliminate her friend. Ricard himself is surprised at this, and he promptly blindsides her.
• Hypocrite: As JD points out, Shan was upset at JD for keeping the extra vote JD has a secret from the other tribemates even though she kept information about Brad's advantage secret from JD.
• Irony: For all her high level gameplay and ruthless strategic decisions, she was ultimately eliminated the one day she acted as a friend, warning Ricard instead of turning on him.
• The Leader: Everyone on Ua defers to her plans and decisions on how to move forward. She has also dictated every the vote of her first four Tribal Councils, and people point out how she is in the position of power. She later becomes a power player of the majority alliance by the merge.
• Leitmotif: A short, unnamed melody that Shan says plays in her head whenever she's doing something villainous. The actual background music occasionally joins her when she's humming it.
• Light Is Not Good: She is a pastor, but by the merge, she has a chokehold on the majority alliance and is built up as the villain of the season.
• Loose Lips: She unwittingly lets slip that Liana has an Advantage Stealing advantage, which the other players are able to use to make Liana waste it.
  • She actually started humming her villain song outloud for Heather to hear, when she was considering going up against Ricard.
• Manipulative Bastard: Acts emotional and paranoid to JD convincing him she is worried he will blindside her. She successfully manipulates him into surrendering to her his advantage in a show of trust, and then immediately proceeds to form a new plan to vote him out. She later successfully convinces, Liana to turn on her former tribemates and closest ally Evvie.
• Ms. Fanservice: While her clothes are usually conservative, she gets scenes strategizing in her underwear.
• My God, What Have I Done?: She felt genuinely guilty about betraying Genie's trust, as doing so went against her moral obligations as a pastor.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Shan's only true display of loyalty, warning Ricard that he is in danger, is the move that gets her voted out.
• Older Than They Look: It's easy to forget when you look at her with Liana, Shan has the same age as Sarah Lacina, she even was the 2nd oldest person in the final 8 when at first impression you could think she may not be that much older than Deshawn.
• The Rival: Identifies Evvie as this for her strategic and social skills, and targets Evvie and her allies two tribal councils in a row. She notably states she wants Evvie eliminated before anyone else.
  • She and Deshawn also quickly begin to butt heads over the direction of their alliance.
• Sanity Slippage: It's subtle but there. As the game has gone on and lies and betrayals has piled on top of each other, Shan's gameplay and personality has become increasingly erratic and frantic. While in the beginning she was seen as stable and reliable, after the merge multiple other competitors began describing her as a domineering, paranoid wildcard. Part of this may be due to starvation and the mental toll constant strategizing takes on her; by Episode 9, she has yet to win a merge food reward.
• Sexy Priest: She is both a pastor and attractive.
• Sinister Minister: A Rare Female Example. She uses the trust implicit in being a pastor to build relationships, but it's made abundantly clear that every move she makes is to increase her position in the game and will not hesitate to betray allies who have put their faith in her.
• The Social Expert:
  • As befitting a pastor, she has a good relationship with everyone on her tribe. This is in contrast to JD who despite socializing often, he fails to gain the trust of his allies, whereas Shan succeeds.
  • By the merge, she is able to form a majority alliance consisting of different members of different tribes, with her at it's center (her and Ricard from Ua, Liana from Yase, Deshawn and Danny and their allies from Luvu).
• Sore Loser: Zig-zagged. Shan heaped praises on Ricard for eliminating her, even telling him she loved him... but as she left, she snapped at Deshawn, calling him a snake in front of the remaining players and the jury.
• The Strategist: Uses her social connections to build trust with various members of her tribe. She analyzes which of her allies are more of an asset or liability to her game, and ultimately decides the boot order of her tribe. Ricard is shown leaving the decision making to her. Upon making the merge, her strategic skill pulled in members of the other tribes who follow her lead.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Due to her Sanity Slippage, she starts to become of a more bossy Control Freak.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Had she not mentioned Liana's advantage in front of Tiffany, Xander would have been helpless to save Evvie as he would have lost his idol at the merge tribal.
• Villainous Virtues: Surprisingly enough, loyalty. While Shan was a manipulator who betrayed multiple people who thought she was their ally, Shan stayed true to her two closest allies, Liana and Ricard to the bitter end. In fact, it was her loyalty to Ricard that ultimately got her eliminated.
• Villain with Good Publicity: She is a pastor and is shown building strong relationships with her tribemates. More than one tribemate tries to become close allies with her. Strategic decisions are left up to her. Despite this, she plots the elimination of various players she has bonded with and targets some mere days after they offer to share their advantages with her. Subverted by the merge though, while her allies are still willing to work with her, some of them have begun to resent her strategic control.
• We Used to Be Friends: With Ricard at Ponderosa. They were a tight duo during the game, but that bond shattered after Ricard organized her blindside, something she only found out through Liana and Danny after they were voted out. So when Ricard was sent to the jury and entered Ponderosa, Shan cut ties with him and completely ignored him during his stay.
• Worthy Opponent: Mutually with Ricard, the other cunning strategist to survive Ua. When she was taken out, Shan openly told Ricard that she accepted and respected his game, while putting all her ire onto Deshawn's shoulders.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Acts paranoid to JD in order to convince him to give her his advantage to show that she can trust him. It works.

Evvie Jagoda

Tribe: Yase

Age: 28

From: Arlington, Massachusetts

Occupation: Ph.D student

Vote: 3-2

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• Badass Bookworm: Is a PH.D. student, and has considerable strategic and social skill from researching past seasons. At the merge, they win a reward challenge in record time due to practicing the same puzzle at home, and later win the second immunity challenge.
• Badass in Distress: Is the strategic leader of the Yase Tribe, juggled multiple alliances, made allies in the opposing tribes, won the second individual immunity challenge, and "retired" a challenge puzzle by finishing it in seconds. However, by the merge, the majority alliance recognizes them as a threat and attempt to eliminate them/weaken them by eliminating their allies. They are left to scramble for any allies willing to help them.
• Bittersweet Ending: In a metasense. While they fails to crack the majority alliance and make it into the endgame, they still were able to play well in the game, take the loss gracefully, and is able to earn their PH.D. a day before the airing of their elimination episode.
• Cool Big Sibling: Functions as this to Xander, to the point that he volunteers to use his idol on them when they are up for elimination.
• Crazy-Prepared: Quickly wins a reward challenge puzzle due to watching previous seasons and practicing it at home. They mention they aren't actually good at puzzles, but are good at doing homework.
• Fatal Flaw: Playing multiple sides and not sticking to one alliance. This causes their allies on Yase to be suspicious of them, and may have contributed to their closest ally Liana defecting to the rival alliance. Their attempts to become allies with Deshawn on the rival tribe only leads to him ratting out their actions at tribal council, and then him using the advantage they gave him against them. They later note that they had overplayed.
  • This also was likely the reason Xander has not used his idol on them. That, and he doesn't want to be on the bottom with no advantages.
• Genre Savvy: Quickly adapts to the games new twists, attempts to make multiple allies, and later recognizes when they gave harmed their game from overplaying.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam: All their double-dealing came to bite them at the merge, forcing them to start working to rebuild lost trust. During this time, they became much less of a schemer and more on trying to redeem the tribe's image of them. They became the third member of the jury anyway.
• Irony: Evvie had early plans to establish an all-women's alliance as they were aware of how, despite making the same moves, male players tend to overshadow female players in the endgame. This strategy backfires as the remaining men realize the women begin to outnumber the men, and opt to targeting female players over male players. This leads to the elimination of their allies Sydney and Tiffany, with their closest ally Liana betraying them for the majority alliance. Their last remaining allies being two men, who either betrays them or chooses not to protect them.
• The Leader: Established themself as the leader of the dominant alliance on Yase, and thus, the leader of the tribe by default.
• Late Coming Out: Evvie passed as straight for 23 years before coming out as gay, and eventually as genderqueer/non-binary after this season filmed. (The editors didn't have time to change things over, so Evvie is presented as female within the edited show.)
• Living on Borrowed Time: They lampshade this in their elimination confessional. By the merge, they are targeted by Shan who is leading the majority alliance. While their gambit with Xander, and later their immunity win, did allow them to outlast 3 other merge players, they are still eliminated as soon as they aren't immune.
• The Mole: They infiltrated Xander and Voce's alliance so they can keep tabs on them and deliver information to the girls on their tribe.
• The Narrator: Tends to narrate the happenings of her tribe, sometimes complete with editor's montages.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Evvie attempts to ally with Deshawn during a summit, and volunteers to give him an extra vote. Come the merge, Deshawn turns on them and uses the same extra vote against them. Deshawn later becomes a swing vote and opts to eliminate Evvie over Liana.
• Playing Both Sides: While is more inclined to their female alliance, they keep up a good relationship with Xander despite eliminating his close ally, Voce. This tendencies causes others to be suspicious of them. They notably also have a potential ally on the opposing tribe in Deshawn.
• Queer Colors: Wears rainbow colored shorts. Some of their other clothing options have LGBT colors as well.
• The Rival: Functions as this to Shan, as Shan steals their closest ally and targets them for being a strategic threat.
• The Social Expert:
  • Describes temself as an extrovert, and is able to quickly socialize and make bonds with the other players. This allows them to have options with multiple alliances, and gain an ally on an opposing tribe.
  • This becomes a double-edged sword by the merge. They have multiple people targeting them for their social expertise, and multiple people trying to protect them for the relationships they had built.
• The Strategist: Is the most strategically sound player on their starting tribe, infiltrated opposing alliances, gained a potential ally in Deshawn on the opposing tribe by volunteering to give him an extra vote, and put themself in a power position in the first seven days. By the merge, they are targeted by rival strategist Shan for their skills.

Naseer Muttalif

Tribe: Luvu

Age: 37

From: Morgan Hill, California

Occupation: Sales Manager

Vote: 3-3; 4-0 revote (Shan voted twice)

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• Advantage Ball: Finally finds the three-way idol, activating its power on all tribes.
• Apologetic Attacker: Towards Heather when he believed she was going home. Naseer didn't want to vote her out but felt it was his only move due to his loyalty to Shan and Ricard's alliance.
• Ascended Fanboy: Spent years watching Survivor with his family and played games finding idols with his daughter.
• Being Good Sucks: Ultimately he lost the game by being too nice, when you are too trusting in the game of Survivor people will ALWAYS take advantage of you even players like Christian in David Vs. Goliath was self-aware when his tribe didn't want anything with him. He is so nice that he can't even do a blindside properly and tells Heather about the plan and they end up blindsiding *him*.
• Cassandra Truth: He catches Deshawn and Danny idol hunting while they were supposed to be doing a challenge that would grant the tribe a machete and flint. His attempts to warn his tribe only lead to them being suspicious of him deciding to strategize despite hours earlier promising not to strategize, especially since Danny and Deshawn succeeded in their task.
• Crazy-Prepared: Growing up in a poor rural area made him well-prepared for camp life in Survivor. It's also revealed that his daughter had made her own versions of idols and regularly made him search for them around their area, which later leads to him finding the three-way idol.
• Diabolus ex Machina: Him stepping in to take Deshawn's place in the challenge is what ultimately caused the latter's plan to throw the fourth immunity challenge to take out Erika to fail. The two people immunity challenge forcing two people out is an example for him, as it cost him the game.
• Jack of All Stats: Naseer is good at camp life, does well in challenges, and has good social graces. His only struggles is English not being his first language, and having a tendency to overplay that at times causes friction with his tribe.
• Locked Out of the Loop:
  • Is completely unaware of his tribe's plan of throwing a challenge, and ends up carrying the entire tribe to victory.
  • Subverted, as they later confide with him about wanting to throw the challenge, possibly because he likely would carry a challenge again.
• Nice Guy:
  • He's nothing but positive at every turn, always being optimistic and praising his family back home and tribemates alike.
  • Despite not being as affected by the starvation as the others, he still goes out and gets papaya for the losers of the reward challenge. He also volunteers to step down in an immunity challenge so that the starving tribe can get an extra portion of rice.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Works his hardest to win the fourth immunity challenge when Danny and Deshawn wanted to throw it out of fear that the other tribes might try to come together to get rid of this tribe when they merge.
• Tall Poppy Syndrome: Ricard blindsided him specifically because he was too likeable, good at challenges, and had an immunity idol.
• Taught by Television: Learned English by watching Survivor.
• Tempting Fate: Agressively tells Heather that he has an idol and that he isn't going home. Later, Ricard works together with Heather and Shan to counter his idol and blindside him, sending him home.
• Token Minority: The sole castaway this season to be born in Sri Lanka.
• Tragic Mistake: Ultimately, his decision to side with Shan and Ricard was his downfall. During Tribal Council, the original Luvu outnumbered the original Ua, 3 - 2. He decided to side with the Ua members despite knowing his Luvu allies longer, not realizing that Ricard planned on blindsiding him.
• Undying Loyalty: To the Luvu-Ua coalition. Naseer is completely opposed to backstabbing his alliance and willing to go as far as possible. Unfortunately, his loyalty was not returned.
• Working-Class Hero: Is shown having grown up in a rural area with trees and a river, which allowed him to develop a lot of the skills needed for camp life.

Tiffany Seely

Tribe: Yase

Age: 47

From: Plainview, New York

Occupation: Teacher

Vote: 6-2-2-1

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• Cool Old Lady: Grew into as the game went on. While her paranoia and forceful personality caused tension between her and the other players, by the merge her she is pivotal in helping allies Xander and Evvie with their gambit against the majority alliance. She then refuses to play Xander's idol without his blessing saying it isn't hers and promptly returns his idol to him without a fuss after Tribal Council.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Somehow went from a really weak first two episodes to being one of the most strategically active cast members in the game, only for her to be taken out shortly after the merge because her ally Evvie managed to win immunity.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Despite having friends on her tribe who are willing to vote and ally with her, a lot of her tribemates have spoken about their annoyance with her challenge performance or her paranoia. This seems to change in episode five, however, as Liana is seen working with her and Xander wants to form an alliance with her.
• Forgetful Jones: Subverted. She initially seems incapable of retaining information for longer than a few hours, seeing as she has to be constantly reminded Xander's idol has no power, but come the merge episode and she perfectly remembers Liana's advantage and tells Xander and Evvie when she betrays them.
• Honor Before Reason: After Xander gives her his idol in his gambit against the majority alliance, she refuses to claim it for herself and allows him to decide whether she plays it or not. After tribal council, she returns the idol to Xander without negotiating, as she believes it was never hers to claim.
• Large Ham
• Living Lie Detector: She quickly realizes when her tribemates are lying to her, best demonstrated with her conversations with Xander
• The Load: To the point where she was targeted twice because of how terrible she was at challenges. At least until she Took a Level in Badass in Episode 4.
• The Paranoiac: She got David voted out due to Xander having an idol that was (at that time) completely powerless with Evvie and Liana keep on reminding her about Xander's powerless idol.
• The Social Expert: This initially appears to be subverted, as in Episode 2 she's shown to irritate her alliance-mates with her paranoia to the point where they consider turning on her, but she's able to avoid this and ultimately play it straight once Voce is voted out. By Episode 5, she's shown to be Liana's closest ally on Yase, and even Xander attempted to forge an alliance with her by telling her about his idol and admitting his lies when she catches them. Liana does the same thing come the merge episode when Tiff catches wind due to Shan, which ends up working out to the Yase Three's favor when Liana betrays them.
• Took a Level in Badass:
  • While she is regarded as The Load in the first three episodes, she actually did quite well in the fourth episode's challenges. Both challenges involved tossing different objects, balls and rings respectively, and she aced each easily.
  • By the merge, her feeding information to Xander and Evvie and then holding Xander's idol is pivotal in their gambit against the majority alliance. After their plan succeeds, she is seen playing just as hard as the others when scrambling against the majority.
• Xanatos Speed Chess: As soon as Tiff heard Evvie's name, she quickly came to Evvie and Xander to warn them about the plan and Liana's advantage so they could find away around the majority's plan. It pays off, as Liana wastes the advantage and former Luvu vote out one of their own.

Voted Out

Sydney Segal

Tribe: Luvu

Age: 26

From: Brooklyn, New York

Occupation: Law Student

Vote: 5-4-3 (Deshawn voted twice; Sydney used Shot in the Dark)

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• Action Girl: Of the three girls in her tribe, she tends to participate in more challenges alongside the men. She also nearly wins and comes in second during the first immunity challenge.
• Badass Boast: Declares herself "the threat of threats."
• Cassandra Truth: During the early days of her tribe, she would warn Deshawn and Danny of Naseer's suspicions of her. Deshawn and Danny would later sacrifice her by the merge vote. She correctly predicts that the majority alliance would sacrifice her as a backup plan and pleads for the minority alliance to play their idol on her. They do not, and she is promptly eliminated.
• Deadpan Snarker: Perhaps her most notable trait is her acidic dry wit and constant disparaging comments towards her teammates.
• Dramatic Irony: Sydney happily aligned with Deshawn and Danny from the beginning, considering herself one of the boys and was ready to vote out Naseer or Erika. Come merge, and Deshawn and Danny then sacrifice her once Erika or Evvie is no longer an option and even bring the not-safe Naseer into the plan too, because they wanted a woman out.
• Fall Girl: In what seems to be a recurring trend for the season, she isn't voted out because of any bad gameplay or mistakes on her part, but simply because the original plan to vote out Evvie got derailed and she happened to be the most convenient available alternative to vote out.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Subverted. While she was never truly disliked by her allies, all her allies seemed to have higher priorities than protecting her. With Erika and Heather safe and the rival Ricard winning immunity, her former tribemates chose to sacrifice her over any of the male Luvu tribemates. Her new allies in the minority alliance then choose to keep their idol over protecting her despite her pleas.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Sacrificed her vote for an unsuccessful Shot in the Dark. Had she kept her vote, and turned on her ally Evvie, she and Evvie would have had a tie and gone to tiebreakers. She lampshades this, noting in her elimination confessional that had she not used it, things may have gone differently.
• Hot-Blooded: Tends to be brash and is described as emotional. Her failed attempts to practice making fire causes her to angrily walk off in tears. Erika describes her as "a loose cannon."
• Ms. Fanservice: Most of her scenes are her in her underwear. Her challenge performances tend to have blurs in strategic places. The bikini she wears in her cast photo is also notably...tiny.
• The Narcissist: Sees very highly herself, and correctly assumes that others see her as a threat.
• The Narrator: Tends to narrate the current mood of her tribe, and the various attitudes they have towards each other.
• Never Accepted in His Hometown: Despite her Action Girl Status contributing to her tribe's many wins, as well as quickly telling Danny and Deshawn about Naseer's suspicions in their early days, by the merge her entire tribe is willing to sacrifice her, with her only allies being the minority from the other tribes. She notably was not included in the majority alliance huddle despite it being comprised of her former tribemates...who call on Naseer to join them.
• Sacrificial Lamb: Is this to Luvu. With their original target Evvie, possibly having an idol played for her, Sydney's original tribemates choose to sacrifice her over notable members Deshawn and Naseer.
• Sore Loser: She was extremely salty over her elimination and used her final statement to go into detail just how much she hated the other players and how she was happy to not have to see any of them again.
• Spanner in the Works:
  • Naseer's early attempts at strategizing against the other male members of their tribe are undone with Sydney immediately informing the others about his scheming. She also picks up an advantage expressly to keep it away from Naseer and other players.
  • Falls victim to this as well. Erika choosing to reverse the merge immunity wins, robbed Sydney of the immunity she had earned, and indirectly leads to her elimination.
• Small Name, Big Ego: She was convinced she was a masterful player that everyone was scared of, but in the end, she was betrayed and voted out simply for being the only girl beside Evvie who was vulnerable at a tribal where the dominant alliance was specifically pursuing a girl.
• The Stool Pigeon: Ratted on Naseer to Danny and Deshawn immediately. Deshawn later reciprocates, immediately ratting on Erika to her.

Genie Chen

Tribe: Ua

Age: 46

From: Portland, Oregon

Occupation: Grocery Clerk

Vote: 2-1

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• A Death in the Limelight: Doesn't get much screentime, but like her ally Brad before her, her elimination episode gave her ample screentime.
• Determinator: Despite constantly being overlooked, she pushes hard and ends up as the third person to the Shan-Ricard alliance.
• Gamer Chick: Mentions that she likes gaming in her bio.
• Hot-Blooded: Increasingly becomes this after repeated tribe losses and the eliminations of her allies. Culminates in a heated argument with the tribe after Brad's elimination. She then considers rolling her dice due her distrust towards her tribemates.
• Hope Spot: Both Shan and Ricard are shown considering turning on each other, and both view her as a loyal ally. It ultimately doesn't help.
• Locked Out of the Loop: A contributing factor in her frustrations. She had voted incorrectly multiple times during tribal, with her allies voting for someone else. Ultimately, she only voted correctly once in the four times she was at Tribal Council.
• Out of Focus: Didn't receive a lot of screentime in the first three episodes.

Jairus "JD" Robinson

Tribe: Ua

Age: 20

From: Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Occupation: College Student

Vote: 3-1

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• Ascended Fanboy: Idolizes former players Ozzy, Malcolm, and Woo, and mentions he tailored his look on them. Does impressions of former players. When players start talking to each other during a tribal council he lampshades that they are having a "Live Tribal."
• Advantage Ball: Receives an extra vote in the first episode. Subverted when JD gave the extra vote to Shan who proceeds to vote him out afterwards.
• Bad Liar: He's a terrible liar. His lies about his advantage were so bad, his whole tribe wants to vote him out.
• Butt-Monkey: Most of his attempts to become a legendary player end up failing. He loses trust with his tribe early on, his attempts to look cool in challenges leads to his tribe losing, is outplayed strategically by his allies, and is talked into giving away his advantage despite knowing it's a bad idea. Ultimately he admits that he has been playing badly, and his Survivor dream ends after 9 days.
• The Charmer: JD has a natural charm about him that allows him to quickly get close to people. This has saved him from elimination twice.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: JD is what happens when someone tries to force themselves into the mold of Ozzy, Malcolm, or Joe. His attempts to be a "triple threat" in challenges, strategy, and social skills cause him to be severely lacking in all three, and he winds up creating the impression that he's putting on an act, rather than being his genuine self, which in turn, causes his tribe not to trust him.
• Decoy Protagonist: He received heavy focus in the first five episodes, serving as the focal point of his tribe, implying that he would either become a major player or be taken to the end as a goat. Instead, he is unceremoniously voted out fifth.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: While the Ua tribe manages to keep him around twice, him being a Paper Tiger within challenges, blatantly lying about his advantage (and eventually getting caught in said lie), and creating an impression that he's putting on an act cause his other tribemates not exactly trust him. This would lead to him getting voted out fifth.
• Hero-Worshipper: States that he wants to be like Ozzy, Malcolm, and Woo, and tailored his look on them.
• Hidden Depths: Mentioned that despite having a lot of confidence now, when he was younger he was bullied for his looks, body and personality.
• Irony:
  • States that Shan won't fool JD a second time...when Shan manages to do just that.
  • He pretty much wants to be like some of the greatest players of all-time such as Malcolm for example...only to end up looking like Erik Reichenbach (i.e. the guy who makes one of most infamous blunders in the show) as they both gave away something they should have kept to themselves (the immunity necklace in Erik's case and the extra vote advantage in JD's case) to a female castaway that was manipulating them to get said things who would proceed to vote them out shortly afterwards (Natalie Bolton in Erik's case and Shan in JD's case).
  • He does end up being just like Malcolm, Ozzy, and Woo ... by being eliminated in the premerge due to the result of a bad decision (JT betraying his tribe, Ozzy volunteering to go to redemption (although he returns), keeping Spencer over Woo (the former of whom later flipped).
• Keet: Tends to talk a lot, crack jokes, smile, and generally has a lot of energy.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Gives Shan his extra vote after he genuinely thought that Shan thinks she was in trouble (in which she didn't really think she was as she just wants JD to think that). Unfortunately for him, Shan didn't want to give said advantage back to JD as she proceeds to vote him out because of that.
• Paper Tiger: He looks like an athlete, and for the most part, he is, but he is nowhere near as skilled as he thinks he is, which often causes him to fall short of the tribe's expectations, especially whenever he starts showboating. To give an example, he cost his tribe the immunity challenge in Episode 3 because of how tries to show-off while the other people from the other tribes focuses on winning the challenge and nothing else without trying to be a show-off.
• This Loser Is You: JD (at least early on) seems to be a stand in for Survivor "superfans" who would be a good player in theory, but bad in practice. While not truly bad at the game, he has struggled a lot for someone who has intimate knowledge of the game. This is notable as Evvie and Xander, who also have been noted as fans, managed to do better in comparison. His attempts at socializing resulted with his tribemates being annoyed with him, something he is unaware of. He has been considered for elimination more than once, and lost the trust of tribemates early on. He attempts to be Ozzy, Woo, and Malcolm, but has thus far failed to be impressive either physically or strategically. His tribemates have noted that he has a tendency to "oversell and underperform". All this lead to him becoming the fifth person voted out this season.

Brad Reese

Tribe: Ua

Age: 50

From: Shawnee, Wyoming

Occupation: Rancher

Vote: 3-1 (Brad unable to vote)

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• Advantage Ball: Subverted. Despite obtaining a Vote Steal advantage as well as a potential idol, the latter would screw him over and aid in his downfall in Episode 3, and he never even got to use the former.
• Blessed with Suck: Obtained the same useless idol that Xander got that prevented him from voting the moment he got it.
• Cannot Keep a Secret: Whenever Brad has an idea, he spills that idea out to the whole tribe.
• A Death in the Limelight: He got ten confessionals in the episode he was voted out.
• Dramatic Irony: Would rather vote off either Sara or Shan over JD. In their next Tribal Council, Shan would vote off Brad over JD.
• Hard Work Hardly Works: Is noted to be the hardest working member at camp, and does chores while other tribemates bond. He also puts a lot of effort to gain advantages and get ahead in the game. Despite this, he is voted out early on.
• I Coulda Been a Contender!: Brad was a strong challenge competitor, is noted being very good at camp life, had an aggressive playstyle, and was beginning to stack advantages. One could wonder how well he could have done during the merge or on an earlier season.
• Spanner in the Works: He stubbornly breaks off from the tribe's plan to blindside JD, which in turn forces the tribe to turn on Sara to maintain some semblance of tribe unity.

David Voce

Tribe: Yase

Age: 35

From: Chicago, IL

Occupation: Neurosurgeon

Vote: 3-1 (Xander unable to vote)

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• Butt-Monkey: From the marooning to the end of his stay, nothing went Voce's way. All of his decisions were ignored or overruled, and he wound up going home third despite not really doing anything wrong.
• Diabolus ex Machina: Xander's second advantage wound up being this for him. Once Tiffany found out about it, she panicked and forced the others to vote for him even though he wasn't the target until a few minutes before Tribal.
• Fall Guy: The reason why he was voted out as while Evvie and Liana wanted to vote Xander out due to advantages Xander has, Tiffany got extremely paranoid of Xander using said advantages even though Evvie and Liana told her that Xander can not use said advantages. Because of Tiffany's paranoia, Tiffany's allies ended up having to target David instead.
• Last-Name Basis: Goes by Voce instead of David.

Sara Wilson

Tribe: Ua

Age: 24

From: Boston, Massachusetts

Occupation: Healthcare Consultant

'Vote: 4-1-1

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• Break the Cutie: Watched Survivor with her mom when she was having health problems, and is visibly in tears when opens up about this to the audience. Later on, she and Shan loses a puzzle piece during a crucial point at her first immunity challenge, where coming in second still sent the tribe to tribal council. She blames herself for losing the challenge. Her closest ally then turns on her and she is blindsided.
• Didn't See That Coming: Did not expect Shan to blindside her.
• Fall Girl: Why she was the one blindsided. JD was the initial target until Brad unexpectedly decided to target Sara instead. Because this would deprive both JD and Ricard of votes they needed to get their way, they settled on Sara, despite the fact that she hadn't really done anything wrong.
• The Load: Part of the reason she was voted off was because of her poor puzzle performance.

Eric Abraham

Tribe: Yase

Age: 51

From: San Antonio, Texas

Occupation: Cyber Security Analyst

Vote: 5-1

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• Bookworm: Mentions that he likes reading in his bio.
• Control Freak: His attempt to take control of the tribe and dictate the vote just after the marooning is what pits his whole tribe against him.
• Didn't See That Coming: Was completely blindsided by his own tribe on the first vote.
• Last-Name Basis: Went by Abraham instead of Eric.
• Two First Names: Both "Eric" (his given name) and "Abraham" (his surname) are common first names.