Survivor 45 | Ep. 13 Finale
PREDICTIONS
FINAL 3 - Katurah Dee, Julie
I don’t think Katurah has gotten a vote yet, so why start on finale night? She doesn’t present a threat to Dee or Julie in a final 3. And Jake is well, Jake.
As far as Dee and Julie, I think their cover gets blown on their secrecy, but it won’t matter. Austin won’t win the final 5 challenge, nor will Jake save him with the idol. I think the final 5 vote ends up on Austin leaving Jake (plays his idol for himself), Katurah, Dee, and Julie. Either Dee, Julie or Katurah wins final 4 immunity and Jake is ultimately left to battle it out in fire.
FIRE - Jake vs. Katurah
Dee wins final 4 immunity challenge and takes Julie to the end. Her loyalty to Julie remains, plus she knows that she has Austin’s vote to win anyways. Jake and Katurah battle it out and I think Katurah wins fire making and finally puts Jake out of his misery.
WINNER - Julie
She may not have played as great a game as say Dee has, but I think Julie outplayed Dee in the relationship department of the game. Everyone loves Mama J and even those she went after, like Kendra and Emily, will still vote for her to win in the end. If Dee gets targeted and eliminated at some point tonight, I think Julie has an even greater chance of winning.
HERE WE GO!!!
JEFF’S INTRO
I mean come on folks, does it get any better than Jeff Probst??? The guy does a monologue to intro the finale better than anyone in the business. He sets the stage better than anyone. Give the man his Emmy now!
DAKUWAQA - NIGHT 23
Austin has met his first does of adversity in the game. Dee apologizes to Austin for not telling him beforehand, but chalks it up to the game and that’s it. WHAT?!?!?! This is crazy. Dee is the girl that can do no wrong in the game and definitely in Austin’s game. Austin is willing to lose $1,000,000 in hopes that him and Dee will go beyond the island. I think Dee feels that but not as strongly. I think she sees the end in her sights and is willing to do whatever it takes to get there. Austin is not. He has a weakness, and it’s Dee.
ADVANTAGE CHALLENGE
CRABS, COCONUTS, BAMBOO
Each of the 3 stations are far apart, they are tired, they have one guess, and they are running to beat one another for an advantage in the next Immunity Challenge.
Julie, Austin, Dee all get there and put in a wrong answer.
You all remember the tortoise and the hare right? Well, we have 4 hares and one tortoise in this game. The hares may get to each station first, and get their chance to pull the advantage first, but they would be mistaken. Instead, like the tortoise and the hare story, the tortoise of this challenge wins too. Jake and his slow and steady strategy combined with associating Survivor winners with the numbers to remember earns him a win and advantage in the upcoming Immunity Challenge!!!
It ain’t over yet for Jake folks. It ain’t over yet. Could be an ‘03 Red Sox like comeback story in the making.
IMMUNITY CHALLENGE - DAY 24 (FINAL 5)
Crawl under obstacle, dig up a machete, untie the machete and use it to release sandbags.
Untie gate to get to toss sandbags into 3 nets at staggered distances.
Use the 3 revealed numbers to open a combination lock and release a key.
Climb a wall with the key and complete a 3 tier puzzle.
REWARD - Sanctuary with steak dinner, baked potato, carrot cake, and wine.
Jake’s advantage of having 2/3 sandbags already done was HUGE in getting him into the lead, but as only Jake could, he gives it away to Austin by forgetting his key back down the wall.
Austin gets done with the first tier of the puzzle first, followed closely by Jake, and with Katurah looking over in 3rd place and Julie catching up quickly. Julie went from dead last to 3rd.
Austin nails the 2nd tier of the puzzle and onto the 3rd. Not far behind is Jake, but IS IT POSSIBLE THAT HE IS FORGETTING ANOTHER PIECE?!?!?!?! Unbelievable. So Jake. Even with an advantage, he blows it. Then, Probst comes over and kicks dirt in his face by pointing out the piece he was missing. Brutal, but I LOVE IT!!!
Ok, so my predictions from earlier are totally wrong. Fine, oh well.
RESULTS
AUSTIN - guaranteed final 4 and guaranteed not being voted out of Survivor 45 no matter what happens. Kind of a cool thing to hang onto. Still could get his torch snuffed with a loss in the fire making challenge, but he’s the “challenge beast” and clearly the most athletic so my guess is that he is money at making fire too. Don’t think anyone would challenge him there.
JAKE - gets taken on the reward with Austin which is probably a strategy move so that Jake can’t pull any hanky panky back at camp, but he has his idol and he will be using it.
DEE - left out of the reward by Austin and is back at camp with Julie and Katurah to “spy” for Austin, but also will likely sell the Jake vote.
JULIE - time to reconnect with Dee for their next move.
KATURAH - has to be thinking of making a move at Dee. Now is her chance to at least try and talk to Julie about it. There is no more time for her to wait. She has to make her case. (get it? she’s a lawyer).
DAKUWAQA - DAY 24
Katurah is looking to take out Dee and Julie isn’t interested. Julie is looking to show loyalty and is making her pitch to the jury to show loyalty in one relationship? Huh? It feels like Julie not voting out Dee will cause her to lose because Julie still thinks she is this honest person and though that’s true in every aspect of her personal and professional life, it’s not in Survivor. She thinks the jury would reward her for loyalty in one relationship, but they won’t. The jury is only interested in you owning your game. Julie isn’t owning her game. If she voted out Dee and owned being the trustworthy mom that nobody could actually trust, I think she would win hands down.
Instead, we have Katurah wanting to get out Dee, Julie uninterested, and Jake as the easy vote. Dee loves the sound of it and those veneers are showing. Of course she does. Everything has gone her way to this point, so why should this be any different?
ENTER JAKE’S IDOL!!!
My hope now is that Julie, Dee, Austin, and Katurah put their votes on Jake and he whips out his idol and makes his big splash. I hope his 1 vote gets out Julie because at least Dee is playing an aggressive game and not a scared game like Julie. I think Dee will own her game, Julie won’t. Let’s go Jake, your moment is coming soon, DON’T BLOW IT!
SANCTUARY - DAY 24
Why Jake? Why? He tells Austin about the idol and shows it to him. Plus, he spills the beans on everything else he wants to do. I think Jake is aware of the game he’s been dealt and the story of it. The problem is he still thinks that he needs to control a vote to make a power move. His idol needs to have an impact and I’m not smart enough to know what to do with it.
I LOVE how Jake acknowledges that he can’t leave out a puzzle piece. He’s so aware. He knows he has wanted power and control, but it feels like he may make the connection of his best move is playing it for someone else.
We are left to have ABSOLUTELY NO CLUE who is going to get voted out. Could be anybody except Austin.
PREDICTION: Jake plays his idol for himself. Katurah votes Dee, Dee votes Katurah, Julie votes Jake (doesn’t count), Austin votes Julie, and Jake votes Julie. Julie gets voted out by Jake and Austin. Jake gets what he wanted. I do not feel confident at all in this prediction. Sorry Jake.
TRIBAL COUNCIL - NIGHT 24
Jeff recaps in punishing fashion how Jake won the advantage and squandered it. Brutal again.
A quick Tribal and we are off to the races at the voting box. Jake is voting for Dee, Julie is voting for Jake, and Dee is voting for Katurah.
JAKE PLAYS HIS IDOL FOR KATURAH
He understood his story and made the right move. Will it pay off? Will it blow up in his face?
VOTES
JULIE - 2
JAKE - 1
DEE - 1
KATURAH - 1
Jake’s idol was a dud.
Julie is voted out by Austin and Katurah. Jake swore on Nana and was duped again. Jake would have never played his idol on Julie, so his idol misses it’s mark. The mark is instead hit by Austin and Katurah. Austin does what is best for his game and so does Katurah. Austin makes a move on Julie without Queen Dee’s knowledge and approval.
Julie is eliminated and as she hugs Katurah, she says to her “go to law school”. My first reaction is this is a foreshadowing of Katurah winning 45. I immediately picture Katurah telling the jury and telling Julie that she is a lawyer as part of her final Tribal pitch and how she kept that secret to eliminate a threat she perceived there to be. Plus, a lawyer at Final Tribal seems like a tough person to defeat in an arena they would likely feel most comfortable in.
Julie being eliminated also has her hug Dee and say to her “go win this” and it combats the entire picture I just described. Feels like Julie is voting for Dee no matter what. Plus, Emily was voting for Julie and so her vote is back on the market.
In the end, it feels fitting that Julie got voted out. She was never the aggressor and even her voting Jake, aka the easy vote, for the 3rd time, shows her missing the boat on how to play the tough calls in Survivor. She’s the mom that everyone loves and she couldn’t separate the relationships in the game with the relationships in real life. She should have voted for Dee. She missed her opportunity but then again I think she had been playing with house money for quite a long time.
DAKUWAQA - NIGHT 24
The 2 lawyers are at it. Jake wanted to make a splash and Katurah wanted to protect herself. Jake wanting to make a splash meant playing his idol for Katurah, but he didn’t tell her. Katurah protecting herself meant lying to Jake, making him swear on his Nana and in the end throwing her vote at Julie anyway.
Who wins?
Probably Austin and Dee. They ultimately are safe, still have each other, and have trust. If Dee or Austin win the final Immunity Challenge, they take the other one with them to the end. If Jake or Katurah win, all bets are off. They would be smart to take each other and let Dee and Austin battle it out in fire, but that leaves them out of that being part of their resume too. Still think that if given the chance, Dee should be the target for Jake or Katurah. If they are given that chance and don’t, then they are confirmed terrible players.
FINAL IMMUNITY CHALLENGE
The challenge is stacking bowls but doing it with a rope obstacle to go through each time. 17 bowls to stack is a lot of bowls. This challenge is brutal. No room for error and no room to make up time except for another player’s mistake.
Dee and Jake are neck and neck at bowl number 10.
We may be back at another edition of the tortoise and the hare. Our previous tortoise Jake and the new contender Dee. Austin feels out of it having dropped twice and Katurah lagging behind. As quick as I could type this is as quick as Jake drops his bowls and spirals.
Jake literally breaks his challenge and is ruled out. 25 days of frustration showing itself. It’s the story of his game personified.
With Jake out, Dee is able to take her time and tortoise her way to victory and a spot in the final 3. Dee wins and is guaranteed a spot at Final Tribal and a chance at $1,000,000.
WHO SHOULD DEE SAVE AND SEND TO FIRE?
Save AUSTIN - shows loyalty, shows REBA can still be strong, and she can annihilate him infront of the jury with all the moves she made including the Drew vote which she left him out of. Austin may only get Drew’s vote.
Save KATURAH - doesn’t have many friends on the jury, doesn’t have any REBA votes, and played the middle game. Could be a fear of “former BELO” voting for her but that ship has sailed.
Save JAKE - he is the goat of the season and has come up short every time all season long. He won’t get any votes to win.
Ultimately, Dee is going to win and there’s nothing the other three can do about it. Dee has played a strong game and has played her game from the front the entire game. Plus, she has the most immunity wins. Now, Katurah has only herself to blame. She knew Dee was the one to take out and she switched her vote to Julie. Stupid. Foolish. Scared.
It’s going to be Jake vs. Katurah for the final spot.
Unless, the fear of facing Katurah in the final is too great and Marvel Superhero Austin has to swoop into the fire making and take out Katurah. Dee doesn’t want that because it’s an extra splash for Austin infront of the jury. Dee isn’t going to send herself in. Lastly, Jake sucks at making fire too. I feel for the guy. His Survivor journey has been a constant beat down and pile up on him. To the very end he is going to be piled on and likely have his last chance of having something to go his way and work out for him - fire - be taken from him by Dee saving him. Heartbreaking.
TRIBAL COUNCIL - NIGHT 25
Dee is bringing Austin to the Final 3. She puts Katurah at risk and gives Jake his chance to make something positive happen for himself. I’m happy for Jake. Now all he has to do is actually beat Katurah. It’s lawyer vs. lawyer. This should be fun
KATURAH vs. JAKE
Jake gets the early flame and doesn’t cut his finger off.
Katurah is talking to herself but has no flame.
Jake’s fire is growing. Could it be?
JAKE WINS FIRE AND MAKES THE FINAL 3!!!
It’s hard to believe but Jake is in the final 3. He’s living and breathing a dream and it’s incredible to watch something work out for him for once. He deserves that. He really does.
Katurah is eliminated and she finally spills the tea about her being an attorney. But, what I loved about her parting words is that she wanted people to get to know Katurah for who she is and not her profession. I wonder if I would ever be able to keep my profession a secret and not have it be part of my story and my game and keep that part of my life out of the conversation. It seems so impossible and improbable. Having said that, I am also someone who hasn’t married my identity to my profession. Perhaps that is the way I would treat it. Somewhere in the middle. Credit to Katurah for not letting that secret out until she was safe to do so, but too bad it wasn’t final 3.
DAKUWAQA - DAY 26
The final 3 breakfast is the chance for the jury reflection. Kaleb may vote Jake, Kelly respects Dee, and Kendra points out Austin being a big threat and never getting his name written down. Bruce wants you to own who you are - the good, the bad, and the ugly. Emily recognizes Jake’s game of being a dark horse and a number in everyone’s game. Austin gets emotional talking about Drew and it’s easy to see how Drew will pick Austin. Dee is confident in her relationship with Mama Julie and points out how Dee insulated herself with the REBA tribe around her. Finally, Katurah is looking for who played the strongest gameplay.
PREDICTION: Dee wins 7-1-0
FINAL TRIBAL COUNCIL - NIGHT 26
First off, it’s great how the final 3 and the jury understand, embrace, and nerd out over the magnitude of the experience they are about to go through together.
Kendra - is here with an open mind and is looking to feel your truth and how did you make this opportunity yours. Jake gets this first question and I can’t tell if he is saying everything that he wants.
Dee talks about her family and taking care of her loved ones. Plus, she talks about attaching herself to the outcome but taking it day by day and having fun.
Austin drops that he was the alternate, not knowing he was going until 72 hours prior. That question teed up for Austin and his story.
Katurah - asks about fears that you conquered
Austin executing a blindside and it taking 3 times to finally take out Juile.
Dee piggybacks on that and shares her support for Austin in his decision to vote Julie out.
Jake has always been afraid of failure. Failing and to know it was ok and that he kept smiling. He faced failure and wasn’t afraid.
Drew - how did REBA stay together and what you brought to the core 4
Dee loved it and stuck through it the entire time through open conversations and voting together. Dee acknowledges the luck in being put in REBA.
Austin echoes it and adds on how he stepped up in challenges and keeping the alliance together. He also goes back and walks through much of his game. The Kelly vote and strengthening his amulet, the tribe swap and bringing Emily in with him and Drew.
Emily - wants to hear an example of Dee using her head, not her heart.
Dee says it’s one in the same and the strategy will come from the relationships. She didn’t really answer Emily’s question.
Kaleb - asks Jake what was working
Jake focused on the relationships and through some help from Drew, he begins to sell the game he played of taking swings and they never worked out. Feels like he swung and missed again here on selling it.
Kellie - advantages
Austin sells the idea of not having to play his idol to show strength and Dee uses the opportunity to seize the question and say that she kept Austin out of the Drew vote and that’s why Drew got eliminated and Austin’s idol didn’t get played. Dee needed to slam that point home.
Julie - for Dee and Austin, is the showmance real and how did it influence gameplay?
Dee plays up him being attractive and developing a natural relationship with Austin. Austin agreed it was real and that they were playing together despite the information not always being shared amongst one another.
Emily - not keeping secrets
Dee just walked into her victory speech. Austin didn’t know the secret of Dee telling Julie about the idol, telling Julie to play it, and the Drew vote. Dee turns to Austin and shares with him for the first time the move she orchestrated without him. In this moment, Austin is looking at Dee in this moment and he knows he loves her and he knows she just beat him.
Checkmate.
WINNER VOTES
Dee - 5
Austin - 3
Jake - 0
The winner of Survivor 45 is…DEE!!! Dee wins in a 5-3-0 vote over Austin and Jake.
If I may, once again, Jeff Probst bookends his Emmy award by delivering a synopsis of the season, the storylines about to be touched on in the after show, and does it all as the crew is setting up the after show and he is craving champagne. Wow!!!
FINAL THOUGHTS
Dee is a deserving winner.
Dee was put on the right tribe and with the right people to start the game. REBA was perfect. Early success kept them out of Tribal longest. At the swap, Dee kept the numbers advantage and avoided getting swap screwed, so did her alliance members Austin and Drew who by being together were able to bring in the lonely Emily and work together.
After the merge, Dee used her alliance with Julie and showmance with Austin to her advantage at every step and dictated much of how the game played out. On top of that, she won 3 Immunity Challenges including the final one when she needed it most. Plus, her move to get Julie to play Austin’s idol and take out Emily combined with keeping Austin in the dark for the Drew vote was the cherry on top.
Ultimately, she faced little adversity throughout the game, but when she did, she crushed it. Finally, Survivor is a strategic game but you also need some luck on your side and Katurah switching her vote from Dee to Julie in the last moment at the final 5 vote was the luck Dee needed. She took that drop of luck and never looked back. Well done Dee. Impressive. Very impressive. You deserve to be the Sole Survivor for season 45!
Austin almost won.
The vote from Drew was a no brainer. We knew that Drew was a lock to vote for Austin and keep Dee from sweeping the board. Bruce makes sense to vote for Austin. Think Ozzie voting for Culpepper. The Kendra vote from what she said in the voting booth was about how proud she was of Austin, but I think she couldn’t bare to vote for Dee who got the best of her. One more vote and it would have been a tie and thus put on Jake.
Thank God it wasn’t a tie and Jake didn’t have to cast the winning vote.
It wouldn’t have been fitting for Jake’s story to end that way. He got his closure by winning fire and having his one feather to stick in his otherwise very damaged cap.
Emily should have won.
Every season there is someone that I am rooting for most and I truly believe to have earned the title of Sole Survivor. I think Emily is that person this season for sure. She stuck her foot in her mouth from the first seconds and was only able to stick around because of Hannah quitting and stuck her foot in her mouth after pulling off the best move of the season in getting Bruce to not play his idol. She transformed over the course of her 18 days on Survivor and it made the season greater at each growth point.
How did they let Dee and Austin pull this off?
They all saw it happening. It wasn’t a secret. They weren’t hiding it. Yet, it didn’t matter. Dee and Austin still made it like Rob and Amber all the way to the end. Incredible how they were able to pull it off.
Austin being the alternate was a huge storyline to leave out.
It definitely worked out in the end to hold onto that secret. It paid off that he made it to the end and perhaps they sat on that info because he made it that far. Either way, I love it and loved that angle for Austin. Very fitting.
Survivor Auction.
Definitely a major highlight of the season. Glad that it was put back into the game and the advantages were taken out of it. It will be back again soon.
My favorite part is the end.
I don’t mean the final 5, the fire making, the blindsides, or even Final Tribal. I mean the end when the entire cast, crew, and Jeff are all able to realize that they have all taken part in creating something spectacular together. 18 people made a dream come true through telling their story, making themselves vulnerable and facing fears. They collectively were part of something bigger than any one of them and actually bigger than the $1,000,000 prize. I’m fulfilled to have been part of it too.
Thank you Survivor 45 for an incredible season. Congrats to Dee on the win and I will be back in February to cover it all again for Survivor 46!!!
The blog has spoken!
