This article contains spoilers for Season 42 of “Survivor.”
It’s finally here. The recap you’ve all been waiting for. After weeks of hating on Jonathan’s heroic buff-guy performance, hyping up this season’s queen bees Lindsay, Drea and Maryanne and applauding Romeo’s rice-stealing efforts, my grand Survivor 42 viewing experience is over. But that’s okay, because, trust me, this finale episode served, slayed and stuck it to the man. (“The man” in this case being Jonathan.)
The finale opens with the final five contestants – Lindsay, Romeo, Jonathan, Mike and Maryanne – sent to a different beach than the one they’ve been living at for the last several episodes. They’re left with no shelter and no tarp, leaving most of the contestants feeling defeated and disappointed. Not Maryanne, though. She’s glowing in her glorious triumph of blindsiding Omar in the previous episode, with just herself and Romeo voting for him. Plus, we find out Mike gave her his word that he would use his idol for her at the next tribal council. Plus, Maryanne has her own secret immunity idol that she can use for herself or for one of her allies at the next tribal.
So, Maryanne’s looking good. But what about our other superstar, Lindsay? She’s doing okay, but it’s pretty clear she needs to win the next immunity challenge to have a chance of getting to the final four. Luckily for her, the producers set up a riddle for the final five to complete before the immunity challenge. Lindsay solves the riddle first, and it leads her to an advantage for the challenge. Go Lindsay! She’s already a challenge beast so, with an advantage on top, this should be easy for her.
Lindsay does really, really well in this challenge, but she fails to consider the genius strategy of putting together the edge pieces first, so Mike pulls ahead in the puzzle-solving portion of the challenge and wins final-five immunity. At this point, it’s over for Lindsay. Everyone collectively views her as the biggest threat left in the game (except for maybe Jonathan, who probably thinks of himself as the biggest threat in the game).
Mike is still attached to the idea of playing the game “honorably” *eyeroll* so he sticks to his word and gives his idol to Maryanne at tribal council. Technically, this would leave Maryanne with the chance to save her friend Lindsay with her own idol, and it seems like she will save Lindsay up until the last second, when she watches Lindsay go and it’s revealed Maryanne herself voted for her. I mean, damn. Maryanne knows what she’s doing, and she’s not about to save her biggest competition when she’s so close to the end.
With four players left in the game, it’s time for the final immunity challenge. Whoever wins this challenge has a guaranteed spot in the final tribal council (FTC) and gets to choose one of the other players to bring along. This will leave the remaining two players to compete in a fire-making competition for the third and final spot in the FTC. Essentially, a lot is riding on this challenge.
The challenge is a classic: Simmotion, where contestants roll balls through a contraption with multiple courses, slowly adding more and more balls until they drop them. It’s kind of like the game “Marble Run.” Mike and Maryanne quickly lose control of their balls and fall out of the challenge (and consequently get bullied by Jeff Probst, who keeps saying things like “A child could do this”). Jonathan and Romeo are head to head, and I know what you’re thinking: “Oh shit, Jonathan’s gonna win and have all the power, and we don’t like Jonathan.” But then, out of nowhere, Romeo wins! Romeo of all people – widely known for his laziness and lack of participation – won the final immunity challenge.
This is great news for me personally, as the number one Jonathan hater (besides Lindsay, of course). Not only does tough guy Jonathan lose immunity to the scrawny pageant coach he’s been trying to vote out for the past several tribal councils, he’s also humiliated later that night when he’s forced to make fire against Mike and fails again. That’s right – Romeo decides to bring Maryanne to the end with him and leaves the two other men to battle it out at fire-making. Presumably, Romeo is scared of Mike beating him in the FTC and figures Jonathan will get Mike out when they compete at fire-making, but despite all his boasts, Jonathan is not that great at making fire. Ha! Take that, Jonathan.
This makes Jonathan the final member of the jury, leaving Mike, Maryanne and Romeo as our final three.
I know Jonathan’s voting for Mike to win, but I have my fingers crossed that the rest of the jury will side with my bestie Maryanne. Based on confessionals from the jury, most of them are willing to vote for Mike if he admits he was a snake this season. (I feel like I don’t even need to say this, but no one is going to vote for Romeo to win… obviously.)
Predictably, Mike is not willing to admit that he played a sneaky, strategic game and insists that he was honorable and loyal the whole time. Still, I’m nervous about the jury picking him as the winner over Maryanne because she’s so young and the jury might be more empathetic towards Mike, a father of two. But Maryanne did not let me down. She had an epic moment in the FTC where she revealed her secret immunity idol and explained how she had an almost guaranteed spot in the FTC after orchestrating Omar’s vote-out.
So yeah, Maryanne fucking won the million dollars, bitches. Jonathan’s petty ass was the only jury member who didn’t vote for her to win after seeing that, further proving that he’s the worst. I could feel it in my bones that Maryanne was something special from the start, and if you don’t believe me, go back and read my previous recaps. I know you want to.
I’m so proud of Maryanne and honestly, even Romeo. These two slayed the Survivor 42 finale, and it made all the hours I spent being aggravated over stupid Jonathan worth it in the end.