Not only did Eagan native Eva Erickson make it through this week’s episode of “Survivor 48,” she now finds herself seemingly guaranteed to make it to the final four thanks to the two advantages she holds.
Seven castaways remain in the game, and Erickson’s got the numbers behind her thanks to her still-strong alliance of day-one ally Joe Hunter, debate professor Shauhin Davari and lawyer Kyle Fraser. Fraser has a secret and equally strong alliance with software engineer Kamilla Karthigesu. That leaves substance abuse counselor Mary Zheng and physical education coach Mitch Guerra.
Guerra comes across as a nice guy who has no idea how to play the game, so he’s not much of a threat. Zheng is the obvious choice to get voted out.
That inevitability felt even more so when producers chose to show a lengthy discussion of coconut etiquette — which happens to be the title of this episode — between Zheng and Erickson, who called Zheng out for eating the tribe’s last coconut.
“We’re not going to have any food for the rest of the time,” Erickson told her. She then spoke to the camera: “We have very limited number of coconuts left and Mary has been just chopping them open left and right and eating them all for herself. She clearly is just being spiteful and knows she’s going home and so is trying to screw us all over.”
From there, we watched Fraser grapple with his two alliances while lamenting the fact he’ll have to vote out people he’s become close to. “There is no moral escape for me,” he said before wiping tears from his eyes.
Journey to a challenge
Midway through the episode, a boat arrived at camp, which the players knew meant one of them would be going on a journey, where you are whisked away to a remote location to tackle a challenge. At risk is your vote at tribal council if you’re unsuccessful.
Erickson, who is the show’s first openly autistic player, explained it to viewers: “I’m taking a nap and I, like, literally sprint out of the hammock, come running down and we’re like, ‘oh my God, a journey is about to happen.’ But the thing is, we’ve discovered if you go on a journey, you could possibly lose your vote. But you also get the opportunity to gain an advantage. So that’s something that is very scary, because I hold a lot of power in this game and a boat pulling up potentially gives somebody that’s not in my alliance the opportunity to gain power.”
The seven castaways are given the choice of unanimously selecting one of them to go on the journey. If they can’t, they must pull rocks from a bag, with the sole purple rock signifying the winner. Of course, they all wanted to go on the journey and, after a rock pull, Erickson found herself on a boat on the way to challenge.
“I’m so pumped to go on the journey,” she said. “It’s so cool to get to be out in the open water. I’m so excited to see what the journey has in store.
“I feel so pumped because, yeah I might lose my vote, but I have two advantages so I know I’m safe regardless. But the thing is, in a tribe of seven when I’m in that majority alliance with four people, we can run the game. But if I lose my vote, then it’s three and three and anything could happen.”
Erickson must build a house of cards with tiles while perched on a balance beam. Once she gets to four levels, her vote is safe. If she makes it to eight levels before time runs out, she gets the “knowledge is power” advantage, which would allow her to steal an advantage from another player.
“As I’m getting higher, stacking on now slightly wobbly tiles, I’m struggling,” she said. “But I have the ability to be fixated on a goal. I have this mindset of not giving up and getting so focused on something. I get to that level four and I’m like, ‘yep, got my vote back.’ Do I keep going?
“I have a lot of power and the idea of having even more power is very nice, so I don’t want to quit now. Maybe I should go for that eight. Maybe I could do it. But the thing is, if the tiles fall down while I try to go higher than that level four, I’m going to lose my vote. … I’m so competitive, but I know it’s just gonna get harder as I go up, and so for my team, I need to stop being stupid and not be greedy to go after the ‘knowledge is power’ and just let it be.”
‘Care more about my team’
Erickson stayed steady at four levels, won back her vote and, after returning to camp, told her fellow players exactly what happened.
“I have a strong team of people that I can go forward in this game with. I care more about my team than I do about myself in this moment. And so I’m gonna keep my vote so that me and the three boys that I trust with my entire life in this game can make it to the final four together,” she said.
Throughout the episode, Zheng attempted to get one of Erickson’s alliance members to flip and vote out Hunter. But no one bit and after Karthigesu won the combined reward/immunity challenge, Zheng’s fate was sealed.
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During tribal council, host Jeff Probst asked Erickson if her game was shifting from an “us” to a “me.”
“My game has not shifted to a ‘me.’ I still see an ‘us.’ And so the conversations I’m having are ‘what can I do to help us?’ Because I see that there’s no way for me to get to the end without using other people I trust,” she said.
Erickson has a hidden immunity idol that she openly said she’s going to play on herself or Joe. She’s also got another advantage that allows her to walk out of a tribal council. She won’t get to vote, but she’s safe from getting voted out. They both expire after the final five tribal, meaning she is safe during the next two tribals if she uses them.
“Survivor 48” airs at 7 p.m. Wednesdays on CBS and streams the next day on Paramount+.
