Eden Porter: "The Interview"

0:11 [Music] [Music] a [Music] [Music] welcome back to the nullified te Channel on YouTube or wherever you listen to your audio podcast we've got Eden Porter in the house all the way from Australia and Australian Titans versus Rebels Eden how you doing oh I am great mate guys thank you so much for having me on this is so awesome listen to the podcast a lot so to get here to have a bit of a chat it's really fun and it was such a great season so it's a good season to talk about as well it's you know what it's it never gets easy hearing that from survival players that you actually do listen to some of the podcast because obviously we're very critical at times right and like we've got we're very opinion for people who nevered the what

1:31 Was it like guess you would have prob been a podcast listen prior to play the you have had some preparation going into it but what was it like you know having people criticize players games obviously we go off and edit like what's it like sitting on the other side of it yeah so it's funny because I would always consume I'd consume all podcasts all like I'm in Reddit I'm reading everything when there's a normal season Survivor so when my season went on I was like oh I'll just continue doing what I've usually been doing and I start to that ADM it's hard like rdit at the best of times can be very toxic so when you when you're jumping in there and there is a lot of stuff and like you said it is an edit there is a version of stuff there's a bigger story being told and people do disconnect from that they just go oh this is this and this person's and so I had to stop I had to actually take a step back and my wife Rachel I got her to do a bit of like collating for me so she would look into stuff and be like oh yeah this is this is the sort of stuff that's happening because I just yeah it was hard just dealing with some of the stuff and it's funny how much it switches on a dime as well like I remember after episode one everyone was like oh invisible hand Eden Mark these guys rock this is really cool ra and at episode two it was suddenly like oh this guy's paranoid he's terrible he's the worst player ever get him out of here this Eden guy Wast of

2:52 Space I was like wow how did that happen so quickly yeah so for me it's been the other way like I've been podcasting now for this is going and like we've done this channel for two years and I did with a different with a different channel for about half a year as well and I've interviewed quite a few players from Survivor South Africa Survivor us obviously Australian Survivor and one thing it's done for me as a fan it's actually given me additional appreciation when we do this like I think I'm the one in the group that always would say hey remember we're seeing like an edited version there's probably things we don't know about because I've interviewed a lot of players like and you hear all these stories after the season I feel like it makes you more aware was that similar for you in your own experience sort of playing the game now if you look back at other seasons do you feel like it gives you an even bigger appreciation maybe the edit was at play with making some players look like Geniuses other players you don't come across as Geniuses on some of the shows to be polite yeah look honestly like looking at other Seasons you do start to wonder how much is missing and how much are play because we are victims of it ourselves from watching the show you go oh this person like oh Caroline she never Smiles she's really mean oh we don't like Caroline and then you meet these people in real life loveliest person in the world absolutely amazing and we're talking I'm like they are literally never showing you smile ever Caroline she's

4:12 Like I know it's wild and that's just the perception that goes out there and so for me talking to other players was really good as well so the community of evx players is so supportive and a lot of them reached out to me before the before it aired and was like hey just want to say if you want to chat about stuff like let me know and it was actually really nice and really encouraging and that was really interesting because they really gave us the heads up of hey it's going to be hard there's going to be things that and look some of my moves were attributed to other people and I I've got a good enough understanding of the game and the fact that it's a TV show to understand that yes it's I didn't go as far as some other people and so in terms of Storytelling sometimes it's more beneficial for other things to fall in other directions and look at the end of the day was a pre-jury boot so I'm lucky that I did get an okay edit for some of the time that I was there and I did get some confessionals and stuff which was really great for someone that left before the jury and so that I'm lucky in that sense but yeah some of the things I did understand that some of the things would be would go in a different context or some of the moves would come from a different act different angle because at the end of the day they edit it in reverse like they know who wins and they build the show based on that so you can sort of understand that but yeah it

5:32 Look it is it is really tricky sometimes to watch but I got advice so as soon as we finished the show I got advice to write down like your memories of your experience and have them really clear in your head and then because when the show airs it will be the ver it'll be a can that will be the Canon version of the show that everyone remembers so that will be the one that everyone has their head around and you will actually start to think that is what happened and that is your experience so you needed something to hold on to be like no I actually did get along with winner okay and me Mark had this and stuff like that because then when you watch the show you're like oh wow this person really hated this person or this person said this about them and it's not always true so I was really lucky that I did spend a bit of time writing stuff down and you do have that memory in your head of like yeah no I did this and this and this and this so that was a really good piece of advice for me as well and that obviously helps with podcasts afterwards as well if you can like recall back to certain things that happen because you know podcasts love to dive into the what didn't we see on TV kind of thing as well so good and the Deep Dives like I love talking about Survivor anyway so doing deep Dives and going into all that stuff was really fun I can imagine I want to I want to say hello to my co-host here tonight as well Tom you know Tom is someone who chose you as

6:52 His pre-season winner pick I don't know if you know that but he was he was a little bit upset because we've got a St from his audition video last year here and he feels like you may have taken his spot you had his hairstyle you had the mustache so he's going to have to change it up this season he can't do the same anymore dud that hair is bang on that is exactly my hair and you've even got this happening you've got M this is good it's gone now is it coming back no well I needed it for a film so I didn't have much time to grow it I mean I don't know how long you've had that one on your face but that was like two months sto story about this bad boy right yeah I grew this to look more interesting in my Survivor interviews so I literally so I at the start of lockdown so 2020 I was like you know what I've got I've auditioned for all these years I'm just going to change my face up a bit I'm going to grow a mustache do something different stand out a bit more let's see how this goes and I grew it and then I was like you know I'm just going to keep it now for these auditions and I kept it kept it kept it and then and then I got married so all my wedding photos I've got this mustache now and so now I'm like well I've got to sort of hold on to it and now I've had a kid and Phoenix knows me with my mustache so now it's sort of just become a little bit of me but it literally started off because I wanted to sort of stand out more in

8:12 Survivor this I got very deep into the Survivor audition process like I was that's amazing well everything yeah it gives us like a point of reference like if you want to get on the show this is the level you have to go to get on maybe you should still you know double down on this and see if they think you're you know Eden's little brother or something you know maybe you could be you could be the what was it Russell hans's nephew that went to go play Brandon you could be the Brandon to evened Russell I can have a mental breakdown on Survivor yay you could throw the rice out you could yeah exactly this is good stuff who would be who would be my Phillip like who's an Australian version of philli maybe Kelly would make me go crazy put you out there with maky mate I reckon half a season with Mony you'd go crazy for sure he'd be the phip sh of Australian Survivor he would be he'd be the specialist he'd be coming up with nicknames for everyone yeah good how do you deal with the mustache because the thing that killed me was having to continuously keep it off my top lip that the wor I did some mad I did some mad trimming before I went before I went on the island and then just yeah it just started getting out there getting out there getting out there but it does get annoying it does really get annoying but we're only eating rice and beans so it's not too bad on the old strainer yeah Fair we've got a few people in the life I just want to say hello to as well we've got Oreo in the Life

9:32 Saying hello to all of us we've got Gabe there saying great to see Eden and Chris and not Tom why are you not okay you don't know this about Gabe Eden but Gabe and Tom have a rivalry so if there was ever a rival season Gabe would go there because apparent you know to Gabe loves Pikachu but Tom is more of a is a Charizard fan anything but Pikachu I'm not basic you know mate Squirtle boy over here the Squirtle Squad squir squad's gonna come for you as well Eden and he's super effective against you know electric Fe super effective we've also got on Twitter we've got P gaming say here that saying here that Eden you're great IGN Northern buddy you made it to the Moose most people can't say that very nice mate yes datable now I made the merge I was happy with that yeah and Mark is asking you a question who's your favorite us player yes so I would two I'd love I absolutely love Jonathan Penner I thought Jonathan Penna was someone I love his narration I love how he can tell a story and there's a big influence on me going there because I've also trained in acting and stuff like I've seen myself as a bit of a Storyteller out there and that I really resonated with and the original SE Rob C Rob Cino Amazon I felt I felt a

10:52 Kingship to him and someone that studied the game that came in board that wanted to play big and do things and came up with sort of new and he was someone that I S A lot of myself in they're probably my two up there but I have like yeah I there's a like I'm a day one Survivor fan and there's so many of the old school guys that I like I love Lex and like this yeah it goes back to the original Johnny Fair playay like blew me away imagine watch I remember watching that like as a kid being like this is this is wild I absolutely love and you got to meet him didn't you when he came over with George how was that experience for you it was look honestly I this is this is so crazy so I posted so he posted that he was in Melbourne and we were like oh we've got to go to this screening and on the airport he basically posted a photo of him at the airport being like Johnny Fair plays landed in Melbourne and then so I basically linked that and I said oh lock up your lock up your grandma's Johnny Fair plays in town right and he saw that and he just private messaged me and was just like hey in you're on this season how you going do you want to catch up for a beer and I had Johnny fa like this is this is like me as a 17-year-old losing my mind being like Johnny Fairplay is video calling me right now like this is what I was

12:12 Like I'm just I told my wife I said I'm sorry I've gotta go I've gotta go have a beer with Johnny Fairplay so just went out and it was oh he's such an absolutely Legend like so muching I was so I was so got at so I moved to Melbourne about 7 months ago so new to Melbourne and I had Shannon messaged me when they were all in Melbourne with Johnny fa play and George and she's like hey are you going to come hang out because I've spoken to Shannon a few times as well she's also been on the podcast and I said to I can't like this weekend because I planed way in advance I was in the Gold Coast it was my first time going to surface Paradise so I couldn't I wasn't even here to be able to go and I felt like I really just missed out so big so I think going into next year don't plan any trips away around the premiere any of the two or three weeks you think that is going to be premier for Australian Survivor if I'm not on the season obviously well yeah that's exactly right that's what I'm still hoping for to be real but what a what amazing what an amazing experience we've got Oro here he's kind of interested besides the M the mustache game that you had to grow out and prepare for survival what else did you do when you started going into the process and I guess when you get past that first casting call you know that there is a possibility that you're actually going to get on the season what prep did you do going into the season so give you a bit of context gentlemen so I've been applying my the whole time like eight

13:32 Years every single year I put in my application I did my video I did so I over my entire lifetime even back in even back when it was in America I was telling the story on another one I started applying for the Green Card Lottery which is to get a green card in America because to be able to play American Survivor so I was I thought that would be really good I thought Jeff propes would love that this guy like basically getting a citizenship in America just to play Survivor I like youu before then when it came back in 2016 I was like I've got to do this so I started basically applying and that first year I got all the way through all the way through to the very end did every round and that's back in the day when it was like so we had a video no so started off the video that you and then you put in a written application then we did a Skype it was a Skype and then we did a phone call then we did a group and the group was really fun because they did a mini episode so they had a huge group of us and they split us into two tribes and we did like we actually did some challenges and then we did a mini Tribal Council and that was really fun and I tell you in that this is 2016 so not a lot of people knew what was happening right and so they did in the group they said okay go around and what's some first impressions of someone some people in the group and being Australians everyone is quite like nice and like oh this

14:52 This woman looks she looks pretty good this guy would be good at getting his F sh and this guy looks pretty friendly over here and it got to me and I just started eviscerating people around me I was just like this girl next to me is going to break a nail and have a meltdown I can't have her on my tribe this old woman looks like she's she can't hack it mentally out there she's gonna break that and the producers were just like oh yeah and everyone else in the room was like who is this guy that and went to the one-on ones but this was back in the day when they really wanted like a survive like what have you survived they really wanted like a so story and I never had that and so they were drilling down like hey were your parents divorced or did you have any trauma and all I'm like not really I've had a quite a good childhood and all this sort of stuff and ultimately if you remember season 1 26 do you remember Evan yeah so he basically was my equivalent so he ended up getting on so he was the Melbourne Drama teacher sort of young guy loved the show and everything like that and so he end up getting on and I lo lost out and then for the next seven years didn't get past the video round couldn't didn't get contact or anything like that so I was keep sending it in keep sending it in and then all that time I would be making like I've got Survivor puzzles I've got like I said 3D printing this is before it became cool to 3D

16:12 And I'd make like you know the one where you hold the pole up and you put the ball on top you know the one where you hold ropes and you move the ball up the St so I had all this stuff and I would just sand bag throwing I'd always just chip away stuff like that so I always had puzzles and like things that I'd use to train with and then when it got to this time man I was like this has to be it this has to be my time I'd got married I'd had a kid we just bought a house I'd done all this stuff in my life and I just felt like it had all come together and so then when I put my application in that's when I really started to write down like my strategies that I would practically use out there I came up with nine pillars to win Survivor and I really started to drill down on the pillar aspect I didn't spend a lot of time on physical preparation one thing I did I started I did a couple of weeks where I practiced like eating less food and that but I didn't my this is where it gets a bit funny because I actually didn't get on this season I got cut again from Titans versus re yeah so I got I thought I was on I was like this is happening and then I get the phone call and they said look Unfortunately they just don't think you fit the theme you just don't fit into the Titan Rebel theme I'm really we love you but you just don't fit in and I said what did I get down to they said we take 24

17:32 And you're number 28 and I was like you I missed out in by four spots this is wild and so then I went back to my normal life I was like okay I'm done see you later fine another dream shattered I'll try next year and then five weeks later so everyone else got told yes then right they're all prepping and doing stuff over five weeks five weeks later on Friday night at 7 pm I get a phone call saying hey someone's dropped out are you still Keen to go can you still go I'm like yeah they okay we're going to repit you as like the Titan of Pop Culture so we know you love movies and film and all that stuff so we're going to repit you as that stay by the phone an hour later at 8 o'clock at night on Friday I get a phone call and it was just you're going to Samoa and I like lose my mind so I'm in tears Rachel's in tears Phoenix wakes up he's in tears and then I'm like when do I leave and he goes 8 AM Monday morning I'm like are you kidding me so I had 48 hours to prepare everything to go from not being on to go to be on to like on a plane and then I'm in Samoa like that Monday night it was wild and so at that point I couldn't do it I had so all the past times I was like well if I know I got on I've got like six weeks or so to really ramp up my prep and start doing stuff and so I just didn't have that

18:52 Time but luckily enough over the past like eight to 23 years I had done enough stuff to know my strategies how to approach it what to do and things like that so that's really what I did fire like practicing fire is obviously really important like that's a big one you can see Caroline she had practiced so much fire at that and it came in handy basically it got her into the final when she got past R so that was that was a big one that's really easy to practice I think going to the gym starting to put on some more muscle starting to put on some more weight in preparation is really important as well because you could see Mark did it Mark's a perfect example he bulked up and he just burnt through that fat when he was out there on the island and that actually gave him a lot of staying power out there that I think that's the best some people say like stop eating to get yourself ready but then I'm a firm believer in that if you can at that point try and put some more weight on and then the other one is interesting is get off get off coffee get off if you drink a lot of like sugary drinks get off them like smoking's obviously another one it's really hard like they're the sort of things you got to think about if you're used to having couple of red wines every night like you need to get off that stuff because there's nothing some of the guys had coffee withdrawals out there they had coffee headaches and things like that and it's just not if you're dealing with a game where you try it's all about relationships and you're in a bad mood because you haven't had your coffee for four days

20:13 That can really impact your game so these the sort of things I'm making note of the coffee for sure like that is my advice you know so like I would have to like cut off the coffee go decaf Go De for a while yeah exactly it's I feel like it's more the habit but yeah I can see how it can give you headaches and things like that but what a story I mean going from being an alternate to such a short period going out there playing the game finding out that you're a Titan and even when we were looking at you in the Titans tribe we were like how does the Titan sort of theme fit but they do this in every single Survivor season right they kind of stretch a little bit with making but I'm so grateful that we still have themes in Australian Survivor because I do think that it makes Seasons memorable at least what was it like you get on the show you meet your fellow Titans did you feel like immediately like I am fitting into this tribe like were you like sort of trying to find your feet a little bit with the personalities you had honestly with me get coming in coming in so late and having to like switch on there was a bit of imposter syndrome like I was like I'm not a I don't think I'm a Titan like I just I don't see it and there was a bit of that and then I had to get to the point where I'm like no let's just own it this is like they've chosen you for a reason like you've got on you've been trying for so long like this is your time to do it and so had to sort of shut that part of my brain out like no you're not an imposter this is here

21:33 You're here for a reason I automatically started like categorizing people and obviously I know the archetypes so I'm already putting people into all the archetypes and everything like that and how deep How deep did you go did you go like you know what was what is what they call the winners edit that they do on Reddit Ed that you go Ed there's some yeah you can go really deep with some of that stuff but I was defitely like okay this guy's the mad scientist this guy this guy's obviously going to be like the Jock yeah all this sort of stuff so I was breaking everyone down as much as I could and instantly like going into the game there were two things that I wanted to do one was I didn't want to broown like meet try this is I wanted the season I wanted to impact the season in a way that we could get to the end with players that knew the game that understood what it was and that wanted to play and make big moves I didn't want to have any goats at the end I didn't want to have any broown mhip like alliances at the end I wanted it so it was going to be I really wanted to be part of one of the best seasons of Australian Survivor and I'm like the way to do that is to get some really strong people in the end game and just have this crazy end game and that's sort of what I went in there talking and me and Mark thought the same thing Mark and me were really on board with that and we had a few conversations that was one thing I wanted to do another thing I wanted to do was make

22:53 An alliance or a connection with an older woman out there because in historically older women are targeted really early especially in the in the tribe portion of the game and it's not until they make it toerge that then they can sort of go into the background a bit and maneuver and they usually get quite deep so I thought they'll be very they'll be very on board and loyal at the start of the game so if I could make some connections with that and build an alliance around that I knew I had these people that's within their best interest to stay with me whereas in a me meat tra situation like those people are gone early and I could see myself like I was honestly out of all the guys I was on the weaker end of the guys on the Titans tribe so I knew if we went down that route eventually it would get to oh yeah we can we can lose Eden we can lose Eden as well and so I needed to establish power straight away so I made a connection with Caroline the Caroline sorry I remember it was like day two and we were out collecting wood and Caroline just sort of looks over to me and she just and I'm not sure whether you know this about Caroline but she has a potty mouth like she is yeah she looks at me she goes when are people going to start talking about alliances huh and I was like wow I did not expect that from Caro and mate let's do and we were both fans car's a big fan and we just talked that and we're like okay this is good and then we brought made a connection with Kitty

24:13 Brought Kitty and then me Mark connected up then Mark had the v's and that was the big thing about the visible hand we didn't want to be seen as the one person pulling everyone together but if we could pull a few here and Mark pulled in a few and we could get basically a majority from that and no one no one could point to me or Mark being like that's the guy that's running this thing that was the ideal situation but everyone you just it's a game when you get out there you get told this again and again it is a social game you just have to talk ask questions form connections like me and Mark we started talking he's a diplomat he may have mentioned it once or twice on the show a couple of times and I apparently he was a former diplomat I don't know if he's still at that level of being a diplomat you know he used to be a diplomat so we started talking and I was telling him a story I was like oh that's funny you're a diplomat I used to work with someone at the cinema who went on to become a diplomat and I was traveling around Argentina and she saw it on Facebook and she messaged me and said hey do you remember me we used to work together about 10 years ago and I said oh yeah CL she goes your taxes pay my accommodation like my house over here so you should stay with me I was like awesome so I stay with her and I told Mark as like a funny little story he's like was her name Claire and I was like

25:33 Yeah and he's like I'm really good mates with her and you could not get a more perfect connection and from that me and Mark it's just a little thing like that we were we were okay we're going to work together we've got a we've got a connection here so it's about finding those connections because one thing is you can ask questions all day long but if you're not engaging or if you're not like ask like asking the right questions if you're just there going okay are you married do you have kids what do you do for work BL blah like there's that aspect of it but then when you actually get a conversation you actually get deeper that's when people start feeling connections and that's what builds like alliances straight at the start of the game so that's what you really got your focus on that's what I was doing anyway I'm just going to bring a comment up really quickly here before we go into the next one hello welcome to the live says that I'm a little bit late but loved Eden who was my favorite on the season best narrator of any season ever loved watching from his point of view so obviously H you missed the beginning of this but Eden kind of modeled his narrating a little bit on Jonathan Pena so obviously showing that you know that was an aspect of the game you focused on and definitely fans they sort of noticed that as well when they were watching the season you mentioned here you formed that connection with Kitty and with Carolyn and then Mark obviously had the v's when did the v's become an issue in your mind with Mark

26:53 Obviously because we saw the rift in the beginning moments there and we could see Caroline she was like onto it from the start like according to the edit you know but when did you start getting worried where you were like is I actually his closest person are we the middleaged mafia his Allegiance or is he a little bit too close to the V's in the game so that really good really good pickup because there was it is hard to hide genuine alliances out there because you can say to someone hey let's be a secret Alliance but let's not be too close but then what happens is because you're not too close you actually then start distrusting the person being like well we're not talking as much and you don't get to know them as well and so it's really hard to have a secret sort of Alliance whereas everything else is plain as day like Mark and the v's they would sleep next to each other every single night and we just very quickly were like okay these guys are locked in together and they didn't try and hide it at that point they were just together and me and Mark I knew me and Mark were tight me and Mark made a commitment to each other right at the start we said we will never vote each other out we didn't say anything about not voting out people around us but me and him would basically not shoot at each other but we shoot at other people may there'd be some collateral damage during this journey I knew I could Silver Line Mark and I knew I had Caroline Kitty what ended up happening was

28:13 There was a conversation where Viola did go this is like after the Jess vote and we were sort of trying to figure out where the voting was going to go next and Viola did have a conversation with Nathan about her going in with some of the strength people and targeting a Caroline right and Nathan actually had an okay relationship with Caroline and I actually had an okay relationship with Nathan as well and Nathan told both of us that oh Viola's actually thrown your name out there and Viola then sort of backtracked it and was saying along the lines of oh I was testing Nathan to see whether he would buy and I didn't actually mean that and that didn't that there was definitely alarm Bells there so we were like we're not 100% soul in that and talking to Mark afterwards there was an aspect of if you it's like half measures you got to go full measures if you're going to take a shot at someone you have to make sure you hit them because if you do if you test the water and be like hey I wonder if people don't like these people and that gets back to people you are in you're in a lot of trouble and that's sort of where it started me and Mark had one really good conversation where we were trying to ascertain whether we would turn on our perspective groups and it was like it was very much like a mafia Dawn family coming together because we didn't want to say it out loud we didn't want to say Mark are you g to vote out the

29:34 V's and he didn't want to say are you going to turn on them but we were like so if it came to it do you think there'd be an opportunity to maybe lessen the number of people around us and we were like oh that would be interesting and that because neither of us wanted to say it out loud and I did say to him at one point I said are you running the v's are you like basically saying this is the strategy this is what we're doing he was like no I'm just mat with them I'm with them ultimately he was he was the strategy behind like a lot of their Maneuvers and stuff but you didn't want to sort of say that out loud again in case it gets back to those people the worst thing that could happen is you go back to and be like Oh Mark's walking around saying that he's running you guys and he's bossing and your because that's when cracks can fall so we knew that there was something there and then when it came to the viola vote it was something that I like if you if you study the game a big part of the game is timing right and it is knowing when to strike and such a good example of this is actually last season where you see you see shie and Liz talking about eventually turning on George and going yeah we'll eventually turn on George and then George getting early getting to them early and so I went into this game one of my pillars of success was if you're going to turn on someone go after them the tribal council before it's logical to go after them and I sort

30:54 Of put that into practice with the swap so we did the Swap and I saw mentioned to Kitty I said Kitty you know what a logical player would do now a logical player would establish Power by voting off one of the rebels and then after that they would then vote off a Titan that they wanted to get rid of because you've established power that the rebels are in the minority and then you can turn on one of your Titans so a logical player would do that so if we want to avoid that happening then I think it could be interesting idea if we thought about voting off someone now and she was like oh really oh my God I don't wow that's cool I didn't thought about that and I was like oh yeah Kitty you take that you run with it so then I planted the seed and that was another thing that I wanted to do I didn't want to be the person coming out there going hey this is what we have to do and eventually I did have to do that later on in the game but at this point in the game I was like I'm fine planting seeds and people letting those seeds it was at this great my final trouble council speech it was all about planting seeds in my very own Garden of Eden to manipulate and so Kitty then went off to Caroline and she talked to Caroline about it and Caroline was just like I'm on board I'm already suspicious I don't y let's do it ra so then they came back to me and they were like guys Eden we've got to do this is a great thing we're gonna do this move and so at that point this is perfect for me because

32:14 Now they are feeling ownership of this move they're going out they're recruiting Riri they're recruiting Sarah they're doing all of this stuff and I'm not going to get hit with any of the collateral damage because and you saw what happened it was all about getting revenge on Kitty and I ended up basically maintaining my strength weakening Mark a little bit because I wanted to work with Mark and I didn't want him to have other allies out there so I wanted him to be able to work with it because there was a definitely a situation where Mark was really close with winner with Val with Valia like he was getting some a lot of momentum which is great but ultimately I wanted to still have that really strong relationship with him so at that point all the collateral damage comes back on those two and me and Mark still managed to maintain our relationship so that's was a really interesting scenario how it went down yeah very interesting and for me you know the edit was interesting because it kind of showed you as being reluctant to make the move you were kind of like hey I don't know if it's the right time to make the move right now they were really honing in on your nervous energy which they did earlier in the season as well so it made me feel like you were less on board with the plan and that you know Caroline and kitty were sort of running the vote there but clearly there was a lot more happening behind the scenes like said with the subtle game that you were playing yeah I think I think what ends up happening is sometimes you do things

33:34 Too well like if you're too subtle or if you're too behind the lines then again this is getting pretty in the weeds but then you start looking at the edit and maybe it's like it's too confusing or it's too there's too many layers to it and it's just like you know what's easier the Revenge that this person hates this person this person goes out there and gets it so sometimes I was a bit too tricky for my own good and ended up biting me in the butt at points but not taking anything away from the girls like it was a great move for all of us but it is funny how things get positioned yeah in the world and yeah that second Jess vote again they turned my paranoia up to like 11 and it's pretty easy to do that when you're out there but again I think that was more to do with the fact that they wanted to make the episode a bit more interesting because we and they're really good at what they do right like know to like hook us even at the of some of the players that are playing we've got Gabe actually talking about that V here he asking Eden at the J vote why stack so many votes on Nathan wouldn't one vote on Nathan be enough to protect against the idol gab it's good question mate so basically we weren't 100% sure that we had Jaden and Nathan so then it became Jaden Nathan and

34:55 And Jess which is potentially three votes so felt we needed at least three votes because I wasn't 100% on those guys Jess I know she throwing out there Nathan I thought he was feeling like on the out so he could just go in with that winner I felt okay with because Mark had a good connection with him and so what ended up happening was winner was not meant to vote for Nathan winner at Tribal Council was just like oh wow every like Viola was massively attacking Nathan at Tribal Council it was blowing up and called an audible he was like oh I think things are changing I think I think everyone's jumping on the Nathan bwag so he put another vote on Nathan so it ended up being four on Nathan which was not which honestly it could have blown up a lot of the plans and things could have really happened but like ultimately it yeah and that's a really good pickup and really good question so we didn't actually want that many in there but I wasn't sold on Nathan Jaden and Jess at that point so that's why we needed three and then the winner one was just out of the blue and you know what's funny was after that Nathan was like who voted for me like he wanted to really know who voted for him and I sort of said to him I said who do you think voted for you and he goes I reckon it was the v's and Mark and Charles and all these sort of people and I was like yeah I think it was as well mate I definitely think it was and then that

36:15 Started a cycle of distrust between Nathan and the v's and Charles and so again I managed to get myself in this middle sort of position and it was funny because Nathan kept going up to Charles and saying to him mate I know you voted for me just admit it's fine I don't care but just admit it and Charles was like dude I actually didn't I like I'm being honest Nathan was like look I know you did and it they got more and more hit and Charles started to genuinely get really pissed off he was like dude I didn't do it I didn't vote with you and now I wish I had because you're really annoying it's really good it's really good yeah I love every now and again every now and again I'm checking Instagram live sadly Instagram does not allow for comments to come up in our feed like it would for anything else but we had Stephy on the brink who is one of the South African Survivor players Stephy played two seasons and she said wow what commitment to the amount of times that you applied to get onto the show so very impressed by that I'm kind of curious you know obviously you do go into the swap situation and like Gabe said he was kind of worried that you know having so many votes against them that would like sort of put Nathan and jayen at the bottom of the hierarchy and let them know that they're on the outs with the votes but you obviously explained why so many votes ended up going on to Nathan in that instance but you do end up in a tribe with Jaden when it gets to the swap and he's

37:35 Someone that's very interesting a bit of you know like out there having fun it was clearly a part of his strategy as well according to the edit in any case and but he does become like an integral part of the middle-aged Mafia and being able to move in that new tribe can you talk a little bit about the relationship that you had with Jaden and how he sort of fitted into your plan I guess when you when you got to that swap tribe yeah so Jaden was a really interesting person like he'd never seen the game before never had been any exposure to it at all he was someone that does his Instagram does his Tik Tok and everything like that and was like hey do you want to go on a TV show yeah great so he came in there pretty fresh and it was very evident to me like playing the game if you can figure out people's motivations You can predict how they're going to react in the game right so if you can align yourself with people's motivations they're more incentivized to work with you and not to betray you so talking to Jaden and after that after that how we got swapped I knew his motivation was get back to winner so I said to him straight up I said mate let's work together let's vote the same way and I'll help us get back so you can hang out with winner again and he's like great and I feel like that was the building blocks of our relationship and he was like you know what just tell me tell me who to vote for if this gets us through just tell me who to

38:55 Vote for and I'll do it and look I know it came across at time I know in some of the edit it came across of like Nathan sorry Jaden felt that he's like oh they just told me your name and they just didn't want to like do that look I'm a smart enough Survivor player to know when I'm patronizing people and when you don't just hey mate we're doing this now we're doing this I spent so long hey so who do you want to work with like who's some of your targets what's your ideal situation or who do you eventually want to be in the final five with and who do you feel comfortable working with I tried really hard because I know that's what you do you don't dictate votes you get people to come up with names and you work with that and then or you make them say the person that you want them to say but Jaden was an interesting one like he's not unlike he's unlike other Survivor players where he was just like no mate just what whatever you want to do just yeah just tell me tell me what you want to do tell me what I'm doing and I'm like okay and it wasn't until and this is interesting it wasn't until he lost winner that then that motivation to get back to winner wasn't there anymore and win wasn't there anymore and at that point that then he started to be like well I'll just do whatever and then it was harder to predict like ultimately I didn't see him turning on us at that point and realistically he did vote with us that first round so it wasn't like there was this big plan there to like no superseded things or that it was literally

40:15 He was Voting with us if Ray's votes had gone like differently Ray would have been gone home and that we would have just moved on together as a group but he saw an opportunity there to change that but I that first vote with Viola bringing Jaden in because the girls weren't sure about bringing Jaden in and I knew if we didn't bring Jaden in to that first vote there was a possibility that the three Rebels which included Alex could get in his ear Mark annoyed with us Jaden wants to work with Alex Mark suddenly over there and then meet Kitty and Carolina in a minority yeah which would very easily happen so I knew I've got at least build something with Jaden keep Jaden strong with us and incentivize mark to want to get rid of a revel after that and that was that was my thinking with bringing Jaden in and trying to solidify that because he was Alex is another broown guy and there's a big possibility that those guys could start getting along then Mark is annoyed with us for getting rid of Viola so I thought look let's bring him in now make him feel part of this group and then we'll hold that power moving forward yeah it's interesting because once again it just shows the element of Randomness that comes with certain players playing Survivor you can't predict them they're not chess pieces that you can easily move and I'm glad you sort of made it clear in regards to the amount of work that you had to put in to get them on votes

41:35 Because when we had the podcast my co-host Kahuna actually said I don't get why no one wants to work with this guy and I'm like well you know if you're in an alliance you need that person to bring something to the table they also need to add value to be in the inner onion of the alliance right it's just one of those things so if they're not bringing it and I think it's kind of what you were alluding to it's very hard to predict or plan for the end game with because like you said outside of the win motivation what other motivation did he really have there we've got a couple of fun comments being made on Jaden we've got Brendan from Australian memes welcomeing the live saying Lord jadden has never seen the game before I'm Bamboozled very good by that and then mcky is in the live as well saying being a Star Wars fan did you know that having Jayden as your Apprentice most SI apprentices go after their master of course mate it's the rule of two of course I know the rule of two and it was definitely Poss abity there but there is mate Gabe Dude tell me about it like Gabe says Jad Australian honestly yeah again there was this is again something that came up a lot of those guys didn't know what a rock draw was like Ferris didn't know Ferris didn't know what a rock draw was re didn't know what a rock draw was like Jaden wasn't sure about it so it's again it's really hard to predict people's

42:55 Moves because in my world like the vote that I went out and we might get to this later but I'll jump into it now the vote that I went out I was thinking okay if this goes pair shaped logically the thing for those guys to do would be to put votes on Caroline because then Mark Jaden and Viola sorry Valeria no so yeah they all flip on Caroline instantly there's no way those guys are going to rocks for Caroline like markk Mark and Valia are not going to rock for Caroline they're just not after all that stuff so I thought they'll put votes on Caroline we'll probably flip to Caroline and then we'll move forward in the game not the fact that the votes went on me the one person that had the relationships with nearly everyone there that wanted to like all like Mark Valeria Kitty and Caroline all were willing to go to rocks for me at that point like they were they knew exactly what going to rocks were and they like yep we're gonna put out games on the line for this and then there were other people that maybe didn't quite understand that and were just like we'll just we'll vote and then we'll SW swap our votes I'm like no the second vote is when you swap your vote you can't you then have to have an unanimous decision after that and Ferris was never turning on Ray so yeah once you get to that point Ferris was never turning on Ray and kitty was never turning on me so we were going to rocks at that point if that second vote didn't Swap and that would

44:15 Have been wild and I was so excited about going to rocks like honestly the first time in I was like this is happening this is happening oh my God we're going to go to rocks and the best thing about it is me and Ray are then safe at that point so me Ray re and Jaden are all safe which is crazy and that was the other thing that Jaden was actually safe in The Rock draw because he had immunity so again doesn't quite make sense that yeah you wouldn't want to just do something crazy but ultimately I think he I think he ended up thinking that I was more on board like more pushing the winner vote out than I was because that was actually that was actually Ferris and Ray that really wanted winner out I was actually trying to get Valeria out at that point and they were like no it's got to be winner it's got to be winner and I was like okay that's fine and then however Jaden never took that but he was like well you voted for winner so I'll like Target you now so yeah it would have been crazy well what you should have done is like before because obviously half the cast don't know what a rock drawer is you should have like whipped out the chalkboard and be like now kids if it goes into a tie again we all draw a rock and one person's going to get the magical White Rock then go home and they can't win the money anymore okay it was like honestly it was a good like Ferris From feris

45:36 Perspective it was actually the right person to Target like in terms of the move that they did they were like well Eden is holding these guys together and he's a key part here but I just think from a game bot perspective it was not the right person because that was the one person that could have probably gone to Rockall because no one was thinking no one could see Jaden's move coming but like it helped them out at the end because it really fractured a lot of those groups and then we started from that point on we really started this voting blocks aspect of there was no really big group it was okay these guys are together these couple are together these couple together and then it was just all about combinations of which groups which made for a very fascinating rest of the merge there because everyone could just jump on yeah and if you notice no one actually because of this very few people had to actually like cut their right or die or their really close allies just because the nature of okay well now wol will move over here and will all vote off Valeria or will all vote off rir so Kirby didn't have to vote off rir like Ferris never had to cut Ray like Mark never cut a v Kitty never and Caroline never cut each other like it was really strange because when in most seasons it gets to the point where you have to Blindside one of your closest like allies and

46:56 That didn't really happen in our season there wasn't there wasn't much of that at all which I found again as a fan something quite fascinating yeah it was it was very interesting to watch I do have a question about the middle-aged Mafia because we do end up seeing three of them get into the final six how surprised were you when you saw that because it was also the three that you probably wouldn't have guessed would stick together to some degree getting into the final six like was that surprising when you watched the season play out like it was like honestly I knew I knew they were all good Savvy players for different reasons I knew Mark was super pragmatic and super like he had the ability to be and this is again another thing the game you never you never fully burn a bridge you always need to go you know what we voted against each other but let's make up and again if our motivations align let's vote together this time so I knew he could do sleep next to them you know if they' betrayed you but you know you need to work with them till the end in any case exactly but car to her credit car came she came to the same she knew like yeah look I've got to vot with people that I don't fully trust but we've got to try and ourselves and kitty in a way look Kitty was interesting Kitty again didn't know the game never seen it before in her life and did rely on us sort of chatting and being like hey we should do this and that so I knew Skitty was strong enough that she could win some

48:16 Challenges and get and get through a few I knew Caroline once she got to the merge with Alex re like a couple of these other big strong players Jaden she Caroline could be quite hidden in terms of the challenge be's threat so I knew she could get quite far Mark I knew was smart enough that he could build relationships in duck and dive so they all had the ability to get further than I thought not than I thought so that I knew that they could get quite far in the game and they all had really they could all understand the game or at least with Kitty had someone with them that could help her sort of okay this is what we're going to do next so I wasn't actually surprised they went deep I was surprised that I wasn't still with them to go deep yeah I mean I can imagine that would be devastating like you're missing out one spot to the jury you know you could have been the mayor of the jury Villa but I guess like you know we messag each other as well like when it happened and I think I said to you like just know that you were out there you played the game when so many people would love to play like I mean you know and I really mean that sincerely like I mean we like we' obviously all of us would love to make the jury or even the game but reality is that amount of people can but there's only a select few people actually get you know chosen in the beginning to go play this game which is incredible in itself

49:36 But now you're on the radar I do think you're a character that is unique you're someone that when they do a return e season I would be shocked if you're not at least in the conversation just based on the work that you did when it comes to the narration the work with the middle Mafia I think that in itself like you had a story arc you know and I feel like it's incomplete so for me personally I would love to see you on a Second Chance season to go out there and play again is there like any themes that sort of stands out for you where you're like I know you'd probably play any but like if you could choose if you had the ability to choose like second chance or any other type of season what would you what would you like to do i' love I love a Second Chance season I like let's not look at like three time players or two Time Players let's look at everyone that's had to go I love that format of second chance I thought that would be really fun I actually a couple of the other ones I actually really like a Millennials versus Gen X sort of situation I think would be quite fun as well I would obviously fall into the older category but I'm sort of young at heart and I think that would play into some strengths in that sort of situation whereas I can get on with both age groups and I'm would be seen as a bit of an asset in the old like King of the Season yeah oh mate so good love and then and then there other fun this other fun like we were we were joking about if we ever did if we ever did a ghost

50:56 Is season in Australia Nathan's jacket could come back as an idol that you could wear 100% yeah stuff like that but yeah it look it was such an experience out there and you know you know what I've really tried to focus because when you're watching it you see everything you missed out on and the fomo is real like there are CH there's Sim motion there's like the domino effect challenge that I'm like oh man I love these challenges and I would love to be part of this and part of the end game and all that stuff but I found that the thing for me was really focus on what you did get to do focus on those 31 days of that great experience be thankful in the fact that you didn't get voted off fourth because there were people Frankie had two days on the island and she went home like that was a real possibility and so be thankful for what you got for what you got to experience out there and remember those like great moments and like chatting with jlp and having some banter with him and all this sort of really fun stuff because that's the stuff you come away with try not to dwell too much on oh I didn't make this I didn't get to jewelry and I didn't get to do this so look I do feel that there is a part of my Survivor story that hasn't quite been completed yet like didn't get to find an idol didn't get to win individual immunity didn't get to the jury so there's definitely some bucket list items that I'd still like to have a crack at

52:16 Yeah well hopefully we do get to see you out there on fans versus favorites with myself Eden all the fans all the fans all the fans of this podcast know that I've said so many times like I bet you I've made peace with it that the one time like Fan's favorites is my least favorite theme but if I had to go play that'll probably be the theme that they would end up putting me on being a podcaster I mean does it get D bigger than podcasting about your favorite show all the time I don't know if it does to be hon then you look at then you look at like some of the some of the fans versus favorite SE seasons though some of those the term fan was very loose defin some of those people that came so it would be cool to actually have a season of fans like actually legit fans but yeah I feel like look Heroes is villain Jaden can't wait I feel like Jayden can't wait to put us arm Che critics in our place if he was able to get to play the game as a favorite oh God but if you if you look at if like yeah if you look at some like last season with Heroes this as villains the new bees it was it was lamps to the slaughter really like I agree for me hero vence is not as high as some other F like a lot of fans is like best season ever I'm like yes if you like to see a steam roll definitely but I like a competitive season which your season was competitive in my mind your season was better than Heros of this as villains and my favorite season 2017 is up there definitely but I also love I've got a special place

53:37 In my heart for Champions versus contenders too I've always loved that season I'm a big PR fan I've gotten to speak to PR on a podcast before as well so you know for me that was just a great season and obviously we've had Luke Toki David Gard so many big characters that season as well you know but yeah I agree with you I don't like the steam roll Seasons at all and you know maybe it makes it harder for someone like you to play the game when the level of competition is so much higher we spoke about this a little bit before we went live but it'll be interesting to get your feedback on it you know if you look at you mentioned you nearly went to go play the first season which maybe you would have been ahead of the game back then and you would have been seen as the Nick adania snake of the Season most likely you would have been but I feel like it gets harder every season when players become more and more Savvy even if they're kind of casual fans they kind of know a little bit of game strategy so it must be way harder now to play the game with a competition that is out there that is just at a different level compared to I think season one 100% like season one there's people playing like Lee getting to the final trouble Council never seen final trouble Council before had no idea what it was had no idea how to pitch his story and so that is that's hu like you can you can steamroll people back then I think the interesting thing about Australian Survivor is it's like it's American survivors Journey but on steroids

54:57 Like over 10 seasons of ours you can see the Strategic developments of the game yes that first season was very rough there was only a couple of fans on it everyone was like oh what happens and people the voting's sort of all over the place but then you see it catch up you're like okay it's all about mateship and every the strengths together and that sort of Falls away and then it's about no really strong alliances or then the underdog alliances come back or then it's about and now we're at to a point now which is actually I feel like Australian survivors sort of caught up with some really interesting gameplay like we are deep into the shields strategy now like keep big plays around the lies and hyenas the idea is you're a big player I need other big players around so we're not the only target as soon as soon as Kirby goes Ferris is next like this is the mentality that we've got to which is the type of game I wanted to play I didn't want to be in the one where like if you look five seasons ago anyone that made a move they were the next Target oh guys this is what we're doing we're voting someone out cool you vote him out move went great they blindsided someone next time oh he's making all the moves get him out that to me is a very uninteresting season whereas now we're at this point now where big players are keeping big players around and lots of blindsides lots of people realizing they're on the bottom I'm not sure Shannon did a podcast with David Foster

56:17 DF the executive producer I'm not sure if you listen to yet I would highly recommend it is really interesting and he talks about basically not throwing people to the wolves and when he casts people he gives them a pep talk of like this is what you should this is how you should play these are the go watch these episodes like this is how you should prep like absorb this is the tactics that you should sort of think about when you go because he wants everyone to have some sort of understanding and then when you hit the beach at least you've given them the tools look people won't use these tools all the time but at least they've got them and they've got the ability to be like you know what I should do now I've got to manage my Threat Level because I've done this and this and the people are looking at me as a threat or hey I think I'm at the bottom of this Alliance maybe I should flip to someone else because I'm just gonna get like that's actually fun when people start thinking about that sort of stuff so that's that's that's a really interesting point and I think it's I think it's only shows how quickly Australian Survivor has had to catch up to some interesting tactics and now it's a great time to be on the show I think I think that Australian Survivor like a season or two ago I was still critical of it based on it's edit and I would say it's lopsided we it's too easy to know Mark is going to win it's too easy to know George's theme rolling Until the End but they really did a good job and they gave everybody a little bit of screen time this season obviously there was

57:38 Still some main characters that had a little bit more screen time than others but I do think that they're starting to get that balance right and then like you said the amount of strategy and the interesting like every single Tribal Council this season was good like we were interested in every single outcome of every single Tribal Council we can't say this about Survivor us currently and you know I really hope that Australian Survivor doesn't follow down that Direction with just throwing too much onto the game to the point where it's almost breaking it and not allowing players just to play the game but you know I'm really interested in your own thoughts because obviously you're a fan you're similar to myself I'm assuming you've watched it since season one even for the us as well what's your thoughts on you know the 26 days of it all the current sort of twists that are being thrown into it like and I know obviously you're a player and there's a certain level of respect that comes with that for the franchise but you know where does this sit with you like if you were if you were chosen to play the game again would you rather play the current Survivor us or would you rather go back and play a second season of Australian Survivor at this point the like honestly as a fan and I know we're in the same the same boat here Chris but the classic Survivor of like up until season 40 that's the Survivor for me that is that encapsulates the game that's what it's all about I do feel the new era is something different over there I one thing that Australian Survivor is doing at the moment

58:58 Which it is really trusting the cast it is going you know what we've cast these people for a reason let's just let them play and let them expand and let them come up with their own like we don't have to throw a million twists at them I really like this season the point where you can even break the box like marked it and get an idol like I mean that would never fly and survive us no never and the other thing is like we didn't have a non-elimination after merge yeah which I thought look honestly I would have loved one in that third episode after merch would have been great for me but ultimately I think for the game get those non- eliminations out of the way get some more time to see some more people early on get some more stories and then let the game play out as normal because looking back as friend Survivor some of those non-elimination things like the vases remember the vases like yes like what are we doing guys like no like no so I the clever twist that they do now with you know sending chaos cell over to your tribe to come and like that's fine and you know look ultimately like in a perfect world we wouldn't have any non eliminations because I do I do feel like they changed the game like for me Alex's non-elimination really hurt my game because me and him had a quite good relationship and we were tossing up like me and Jaden didn't really want to get rid of him and we were tossing up whether the girls really did because they wanted to keep re

1:00:18 And it was really difficult ultimately he didn't get voted out and he went to the other tribe but kitty talked to him later and basically told him oh yeah you were de the water mate you were you were gone which is Kitty's honest to a fault and so Alex then gets personally quite upset with me going mate I thought we I thought we would have looked out for each other and I was like well no we still wanted to I was still trying to think of ways to save you and everything like that but to him that just sounds like me bullshitting and trying to get out of it and so that really hurt our relationship and so and that comes back to if someone now you have to deal with the Fallout you have to deal with so if that doesn't happen yeah if that doesn't happen you can things can happen like that oh look I don't want this person to go but ultimately I'll stick with my alliance and they've gone it doesn't really hurt me but when they don't go home and then it gets out and things like that's when it can hurt and that sort of impacted my game so I don't I don't love that American Survivor the new era look there are definitely some I like it how they've moved to 90 minute some like longer episodes I think that's actually fun you get to know people a bit more yeah you get to see people practice jumping for instance you know like great yeah all so I thought that was good but look that's the getting to know the characters and connecting with the characters

1:01:39 And feeling and getting to know the reasons behind people's decisions I think is really important and it's not just about the twists not just about oh now you don't have a vote now this so I yeah I do long for like original Survivor days but they've made decisions and look it comes back to the thing maybe they can't do longer Seasons because it cost too much money and if it cost too much money CBS is just going to cancel it like and then you have no Survivor so is this version of Survivor better than no Survivor yeah probably so you've got to take that sort of stuff into account as well yeah look it's tough and I don't want to put you on the spot when it when it comes to it fully for me sometimes I wonder like you know what is what is it that they're spending all their budget on because we know that they've got such a like if you look at Australian Survivor and what they can put out there at a fraction of the budget that Survivor us has got then I feel like we're just giving Survivor us an easy pass by saying oh we'll budget this and that maybe Jeff was a big paycheck obviously he's been there for 46 Seasons and like anything else like I love like listen Jeff is the first host ever as a host he's great I don't know creatively if he's gone in the direction that I would have necessarily gone in but again Survivor and Australian Survivor wouldn't have existed if he wasn't the pioneer of the franchise really so there's some respect that comes for that did you hear did you

1:02:59 Hear the original idea for 41 how yeah I did it was hilarious like Rick devans being out there I thought it was funny like and then apparently it wasn't fun in his mind and that's why he changed it yeah well apparently he had conversations with like Mike White and stuff and they were like is it fun is this Trading Post and tokens and all this stuff fun they're like oh maybe not let's just throw some random challenges at so like I don't know maybe it would have been T but the show they felt the show needed to evolve to have legs still and so it is something I do see it as something different like it is it's a different type of show you have to play the game differently now Hey look it's our old friend Al hey got El in the chat here hello alen love it yeah so I am struggling and the other thing is can you really identify between 41 and 46 the seasons in the players like I could tell you every person every I was like oh this season up until 40 I could I knew I would struggle with these new there's some great casting there were some awesome people but I would struggle the only other thing that I think that we're doing as well that American Survivor has sort of fallen off the wagon in they're all in on the Super Fan right they're all in on the fans that's on the show now is on the fans I love that we're doing more fancasting in Australian Survivor I think it's fantastic but you need that balance of

1:04:19 Recruits and fans you got to have like look I got burnt by Jaden that's part of it but think it's better to have some people like that and I think it does lead to interesting Maneuvers and things like that in the game when you have a whole bunch of people that are all game Bots and they're all just doing The Logical move in this moment to get them through one more round it stifles Innovation and it stifles gameplay and everyone is just like okay now we all do this does everyone get that yep that's all good okay that person goes home and I think you need people that are no my heart in my heart I don't want to votee this person off because like they remind me of my daughter so I'm going to keep them here but no that doesn't work I think that makes for a more interesting season and I think right now we are nailing that in the casting like the casting department for us is nailing that mix of Super Fan like you've got eile you've got me you've got Mark you've got Ray you've got these people you Caroline big fans you go back to I was talking to Nick about like season one he's like there was probably three of us that would be counted as a fan whereas our season probably the cast like maybe not super fans but half the cast would definitely like Charles like he's like yeah I really like Survivor I've watched it like heaps and stuff like that but he wouldn't cast himself as like a super fan but there are all these people that were like no we're fans of the show

1:05:39 Yeah for sure I'm kind of interested like and I do want to bring up Kahuna's comment here saying Eden is a brilliant podcast to take my spot for all the US Recaps that we do on the nullified Tech Channel because he podcast with me I was also going to say it feels like you've listened to us because everything that you've just said is pretty much what we've already tune into we were and play there the balance needs to be right for the game to be interesting and for there to be a certain level of unpredictability in the show as well and I was going to say you know like as a fan playing the game how much of a Target do you think in the current Australian Survivor climate does it put on your back if you go out there and you admit to being a fan cuz at one point people were kind of hiding it a little bit where they're like oh I don't want to be as the are think more what I do yeah I think originally there's only one or two fans on the and you're like I'm the Super Fan I know everything about Survivor and you've got the majority of everyone else going well let's get rid of that person they know too much let's all us figure out by the say I think it was a big Target on people's backs I think nowadays with more of us and I'm sure probably felt the same way like you've got some more people that are fans and as a result you got more people backing you up you've got more people to hide in amongst as the fans so it's no longer just one person the other thing

1:06:59 Like I actually I didn't want to come out there and be like I'm the biggest fan ever I knew I couldn't hide it because I'm too much of a fan and I would be like oh my God oh my God this is so cool I just didn't want to be like Oh I'm the biggest fan of all time and I remember the first mat chat that we had we got out there we met jlp and he BL he points to me he goes look at this guy here this guy here has not stopped smiling the entire time he must be one of the biggest fans we've ever had on isn't that right like than for blowing up my spot J from that point that point forward I just had to own it on Titan Beach and so I just fully embraced it and people responded quite well people were like oh in man and they would just ask me questions hey when does merch usually happen hey what happened on this hey has this have we ever gone to rocks before hey has this ever happened I'm like oh this has happened and I just and it was sort of fun story time when I would I would say oh the episodes episode seven on this was really good and that was actually quite good I actually think the back end of the game could be when it becomes like just after that merge period that's when that can become a Target and you're like okay you've got your team through this first stage now it's a one-on-one game it could be very easy for people to feel threatened by oh yeah Eden's got a really good grasp on this game and it's going to like come back to bite us if we'd leave him in for too long and that can definitely happen when the when the numbers get

1:08:19 Down to it could be a reason for getting rid of people but again having a lot of fans there really helps like you'd be able to hide and maneuver in that regard I know that Tom you know being a very big fan himself has always said like if he was out to go out and play this game he would be targeting the young athletic females early on because they just Beast out the end game was that something that you were aware of Eden going into the season that you think you know another reason why you didn't want Viola or Valeria or any of these girls sort of getting to the end because I feel like Australian Survivor sort of tailored to young athletic females when they play the game especially when you get to the merge when you get to the merge there is a lot of balance challenges and I knew Valeria like anyone that's a d That's a dancer background that's got some sort of dancing that's fit they're going to be threatening in all those Balance challenges and there's a lot of them so I definitely knew that getting up to that point that was one of the reasons why I wanted to actually Target Valeria before winner out there because I think she like she just won that 60k set for life challenge like she had the ability to go pretty far on some of those challenges so it was definitely in my head as well and you know that the final challenge is basically an endurance challenge so you need to prep your endgame to know who do I want to stand next to in that final challenge to give me the best like position moving forward because

1:09:40 If you can sit next to someone in that challenge that maybe has really big feet or maybe doesn't have the best balance you've got a way better chance of winning in that regard the other thing with like with Riri amazing like honestly like absolute out there but there was a lot of holding rope challenges like there was the one on the ball where you standing on the ball then there was the one where you had to have like hold your legs over in sort of their own version of Last gas where you duck in the water then there was the one where you had to hold with two hands so there was a lot of that and that doesn't play into my wheelhouse I would have loved some more like Puzzles and stuff like that but they're the ones they're those challenges with those ropes that anyone with some sort of good core energy good balance stuff it's going to do well so yeah it was definitely on my radar when I was out there yeah we've got a couple more comments here I want to read Brendan saying maybe TNT should get rid of some super fans like M and recruit some people with Instagram followers do you have anybody in mind Brendan when it comes to that I feel like you already have someone in M gab says Australian survival casting has that sweet mix of fans and recruits monkey hitting back saying maybe if Brendan's memes were funny he would actually get casted on the show more beef here in the in the comment section when I when I was putting my application

1:11:00 I remember back in the day I that was a that was a thing that I was trying to balance it was like do I make my application just super funny and just gag it up and do everything a joke in there and then I got some good advice which was no just show that you're witty you don't necessarily have to have a gag because they want to know they do want to know these answers about you they do want to know what is your like deepest fear or what is like there is an aspect of it yeah you can be a bit funny with some things but if that's all if everything's a joke and they don't actually get to see any of the real you that's when you can have sort of an issue so I tried to balance that out be witty and show that you're witty but don't necessarily you have to every single answer has to be a joke or every single answer has to be a gag and I found that finding that balance is really interesting in that whole casting process Tom take notes mate before you hit the submit on the application you see I was that confident Eden I didn't know I was going to talk to the likes of yourself Mark and aen after the season I just applied like as soon as it went up I'm like I'm gonna get the video I'm gonna do it applied it put all my stuff in there I didn't overthink it like I'm a shoot from the hip kind of person that's good because at the end of the day they don't want things like it should be like your video for instance it should be like a confessional like they want someone that can just talk they don't want a highly

1:12:20 Edited chop and change sort of thing because that's not what you get on the island you have to do confessionals and you talk and you just it's just naturally what comes out so you want to keep that sort of element of it pretty loose so I think that's a really good way to approach it but the thing is that a lot of super fans fall into this category is the super fandom is them getting on the show is they identify that as who they are and you've got to think about and this kept coming back to what I was doing if you go in there and you say for instance oh I love hiking I like go hiking with my wife and it's something that we really love doing you've got to think you're probably up against a competitive hi like mountain climber hiking trainer that has been doing it for 25 years and it's the same thing with superan like you can be like I'm a really big fan you could be up against someone that's named their first kid jlp and had an entire themed Survivor wedding and has a big survivor tattoo on their back like you've got to understand that's fine but there's got to be other aspects to you and I think that's when like I don't think it's a coincidence that it's not until like I got married and I like had a kid and these other experiences and part of my story became about being a dad is really important to me now and being married

1:13:40 Committing to my wife and yeah I told the story about like at our wedding our wedding vows we had a lot of Survivor references like you're my right or die and my alliance and all that sort of stuff and I'm not sure you heard I told a story on my other one of my other podcast where I actually Rachel told me she was pregnant via Survivor puzzle so she I came home from work she's like oh I know you had a hard day at work but I've made this Survivor word like scramble that you can sort of sit down and do and I did it and I was putting it together and it spell out are you ready to be a dad and then I turned around she had the pregnancy test there and so stuff like that is like really amazing you have that in the in the audition video I did have that they did like I could see why I could see why they casted you based story alone but the other aspect of that is that is the sort of the sugar the cream on top it's you're also what sort of person are you and it always comes back to you've got to exaggerate yourself to 11 you've got to the these aspects of you that are the positive out there aspects what is the best version of that okay what is the what is the what is the best thing that you can bring to the table and it's about putting that forward and if you are you see my story on my on my video was I said listen I'm taking one for the team I'm trying to get mcky not to apply and

1:15:00 Get on the show because I know he's going to get humiliated and be voted out first so you know if you want to get a nullified take podcaster in there just choose me instead because I'm trying to be a good mate okay I've been podcasting with this guy for two years he's got no Survivor sense he's uncoordinated you know so that was like my whole identity is that I'm trying to be a good mate I'm trying to save him and I'm going out there with this bracelet that I've made for myself which is what would muy do you know when I'm out there and I'll look at it daily and do the exact oppos and I reckon I will get to the end and win the game so I don't know if there going to be as invested in that story as I am but you know if they choose Mony and he goes home first I can at least know I could sleep you know soundly at night knowing that I was trying to be a good friend you know basic this is true this is very true the other that is like you know having that story as an aspect I think you know definitely like you said it's confessional and it is quite hard for fans to know what to say because you've only got three minutes and you've got a nut down you've got to put your whole life in three minutes which is not easy to do no and I think another good thing to have is this is what I started to do and this is really helpful so you don't have to be so being a good Storyteller is really is really important but to be a good Storyteller you have to be a good story collector and you have to be and this comes from like I do comedy I write comedy

1:16:20 With my brother I'm doing a Melbourne International comedy show at the moment and one of the biggest things to help with that process is you just write notes down things that happen to you little stories you write them down because they disappear from your mind little funny little things or little things that happen with your mates you start writing them down and then you go back and you look over it and you're like oh my God yes me and Mary were out the other night and this happened this is really funny and you just go over that stuff and it starts to help you articulate those things and then when it comes to those situations you start to be able to recall those things better and then you've got these little stories you've got these little quips you've got these things that ex that basically show not telling it's all about show don't tell you probably hear that a lot it's about you can you can tell a story you can you can say oh I'm really funny or you can tell a story where you are funny you know what I mean like where you or you say something funny that like you've got to really show that you can't just say all my mates say I'm really funny you go no I was out with my mates this happened I got on the table I did this and then this person did this it was crazy like that's how you sort of get that stuff across in a video in those regards so I think that's I think that's really important and start writing down those little stories like I went back every time I used to used to like before I had a kid

1:17:41 I would travel a lot I love traveling overse every year I would go on a huge traveling trip I'm trying to knock off all the Seven Wonders of the World I've two left to go I've just got to go to Petra and the Taj Mahal and every time I go away I Amazing Race next oh mate I te do you want another story go sorry for interrupting your flow there but I feel like Amazing Race would be perfect right like you get travel on Channel 10's budget so amazing race me and Rachel my wife applied for the first season came back and again we got all the way through to the very last round so we did we played up the thing that we subverted the normal couple Trope I was the emotional intellectual puzzly one and Rachel is the sporty no really competitive no let's crush him so we sort of had the dichotomy of that they really like that and we ended up getting to the point they rang us and they said you need your you guys are like get ready to go get your Vis we had to get our visas done to for all the countries but they couldn't tell you what countries you were going to so all they could tell you is the size of the photo that you need for the application for the Visa so we went down to get our photos taken we're like we need a photo this by this size this and they're like what countries are these and we're like we don't know they're like what is going

1:19:02 On like we can't talk about it so we did it we put all our visas in and then I Googled the sizes so I figured out we're going to Mongolia South Korea China all these places that's a great hack chat GPT go check it out so then it got down to like yep get ready and at the last stage we got cut for an influencer couple that were that had like 100,000 followers on like on Instagram or whatever and me and ra didn't have a big following on anything like that and so we just missed out but a team we were mates with in our audition did get in and we had a chat to them afterwards and they said it was such a great experience but that was the other show that we would really like to do and again to get so close and then to miss out we were like a killer but yeah really that amazing I do want to bring up this question by hello and it's one that I like to ask normally as well you know obviously is there I know that most players say they wouldn't necessarily have changed anything if they were to play the game because it's the experience that they had but if there you know is there something that you look back at now that you're like if I was to get to go out and play again this is a mistake I would avoid maybe based on your first season yeah sure no it's a really good question I've and look honestly you can go crazy with would have could have should have you can go oh if only had talked to this person oh if only had done that and it's so it's so circumstantial it's really hard and you try not to

1:20:22 Do that because there's so many different things like sliding doors moments it's ridiculous it's that whole thing if you had to play the game 100 times like I reckon that based on what I've picked up from your strategy how you've played the game the understanding the subtleties of the social game I would put money on it that more often than not you would get to the merch you'd get pretty deep in the game potentially even could go on win the game it's just you don't get 100 opportunities to play the game it's unlike playing Monopoly against your friends every weekend right yeah exactly so I think but I would there was a few things that I noticed over there so one was and this was tough to do but we did not win like any rewards out there like we got hard we got basically nothing to e the rebels at the start were getting all the reward challenges and even when we got to merge that we just didn't after with the swap we just didn't really win any and that really did start to hurt when you hadn't eaten and stuff like that so I would definitely want to try and get some of those reward challenges and get some food into us because by day 30 my brain when we I had I hadn't eaten like anything your brain slows down and you take longer and I would be up at all night going like okay running every scenario like okay if this person has an idol then we need to split it this way then we need to do this and it just took hours to like think through every because your brain was slowing down so that's something that I would be really aware of out there the other one was I did get

1:21:42 Into a habit of this is this is where it's hard to explain so sometimes if I didn't need if I didn't need someone to be in on a vote I wouldn't include them because it was a wild card and we're not voting for them they'll be okay but that does start to impact people and it does start to make people feel like so when you talk to them later they're like why didn't you include being you're like oh well we weren't sure about where you were and we weren't we weren't 100% on this and we didn't need you and we weren't targeting you because I was I was sort of a believer in I was telling people I'm not going after you and I wasn't but I was Voting off people around them and logically you're going well I'm like Alex and re like I'm not actually targeting you I don't want you guys to go home but that does end up getting to people and it does they do start to go no if you're not including me in this then that's as good as voting me out and so that does turn and so I needed to keep track of that a bit better I think the other thing that I needed to do and this is yeah this is interesting is you I got to a point where I was worried if I seen as someone that was making really good relationships with a lot of people and then burning them like straight away so I was just really aware of

1:23:02 Look do I do I good do I double down with Ry and do I really like get in really well with Ry and then just to vote him off next and people be really annoyed at me so there were some people that I was I was you know what I'm just going to step back from them a little bit and consolidate my strength whereas really I needed to be talking to everyone and trying to do it in a way that was subtle enough because I did think out there you were going to have a bit more time to have subtle conversations with people but no that scramble man the scramble is real you get back from tribal you get back from immunity and you have a certain amount of time that you have to have all your conversations and it and you see everyone walking off you see everyone going off and it's really hard like being a fan of the show that was one thing that did surprise me being a fan I thought you' have a lot of time to just walk down and be like hey let's do this it's really all happens in the scramble like it's and that Sarah vote man that Sarah vote was the best almost of any season it was the best example of the insanity of that time just before Tribal Council that you could it was the best like visual representation of that experience just run this is happening now Mark's coming in forget about that plan we're on this plan now I've got an idol just vote just vote Caroline let's do this re going what the hell's happening like

1:24:22 I'm running around going like I think Mark to something Alex is lying to us I'm like Alex the girls have just blown this up Sarah's come to me told me this Alex is like no they just figured it out I'm like I don't think they did mate I think you told them now I didn't like there was so much happening and that was wild I love that there I think the second or third time Sarah came back to you there's a moment where you see it on your face you're like I'm done with this and you sort of just walk off like you have nothing to say to her interesting with that right so what ended up happening there so Sarah the classic thing was Alex came down to the girls and said like they're actually splitting on YouTu and then Sarah goes oh I'm just going to go and talk to Eden because Eden will like let me know what's up happening I haven't heard that and then Alex is like mate don't blow it up she's like I'm not gonna blow it up she comes up to me and we actually had quite a big conversation so and this is before Mark got there and everything like that and she said to me I love Sarah I think she's too sweet for this game she's an absolute Angel and she's so lovely but she came up and she's like look Eden I've heard that you guys are splitting on me and re I've heard that we're voting for Mark I've heard that you we're voting for Caroline everyone's told me these things and they can't all be true and I'm like yeah people are lying to you Sarah and she was just like she was just like and then and then Kitty comes over and then

1:25:42 Kitty and she was just like so what's happening I'm like look we're sticking to Mark we're voting Mark and she's like okay and then Mark comes up and then we obviously couldn't say to her that we're voting mark because Mark was there so that's when you see us all just be like well we're going to stop talking and then I just disappeared and then what was funny is then I go over to Alex because this happened like we saw Alex walk to the girls and then we saw Sarah walk up to me and so I just said to Alex I'm like hey Alex the girls figured out the plan that we're splitting on them and he's like oh and Alex is just like he knows he's caught red-handed but he's just like oh man they must have they must have just figured that out on their own I was like really this is this is interesting and so and it was funny it was that point that I realized that we didn't have Alex which means we didn't have Mark which means we couldn't split the vote but I didn't have enough time to go and tell everyone so I had to do it at Tribal Council yeah so we're at Tribal Council but I known because we didn't have that we couldn't split the votes and so then I had to let Caroline Kitty and Jaden know guys we're not splitting drop them all on Sarah because I did think I had a suspicion that Mark had something and I think he wouldn't I thought that he wasn't going to play it for Sarah or re or those guys he was probably going to play for himself and he did and I like a lot of people were giving re like a lot of stick for that vote right

1:27:02 Which I don't agree with because if you look at it from re's point of view re had voted with us the round before right and she' voted Viola and the girls had got her in on that and she'd come to us and be like what's like what's happening and we had told her we're voting for Mark like that was the plan that she thought was happening and even though Mark tried to get her in on his plan again if you look at how that situation rolled out Mark had told them vote for Kitty originally like it's on Kitty and then when it came out that we' gone to Kitty because re came and told us Mark came back and said look they figured out this I've got an idol just vote Carolina now this is what we're doing if someone came up to me and just said I've got an idol this is what we're doing the plan before is all changed now this is I would also be like hang on what is going on like no I'm not just changing my plan because re felt that she had agency in this game she wasn't just going go along and how does that help her going into a 44 split and going to rocks for Sarah like I honestly she goes I felt a connection with the girls I want to get back to Kirby very similar to Jaden like she wanted to get back to Kirby if she if that means that she has to vote with the other side just to get through another round then she knows that well then Alex is probably next after that and then we can go Mark and she's can be safe for a couple rounds I think it was a little bit of that bias that happened as a fan where at that stage the middle-aged

1:28:23 Mafia was seen as the group that was in control and that was running that tribe so fans wanted the move more than I think blaming her for making a bad move because she was a part of that Underdog group with Mark and the rest so I feel like it was like a bias fan reaction to wanting to see the underdog kind of upset the power structure that was in control of that tribe I think more than anything but I yeah I don't yeah I don't blame her for doing that yeah at that point I thought that she and you know what's frustrating with that and this is again just getting pretty deep into the game but like Caroline and kitty was the ones that built the relationship with Sarah and re which was awesome they were very good at that point of the game bringing those girls in but what ended up happening was so because re had that relationship with them re was talking to them and saying like oh Mark has just done this like blah Mark's blowing up the game and kitty originally thought that she was lying and then I'm talking to Kitty and Kitty goes oh no reeze just told me this but she was lying about she's just trying to like sabotage us and it's really hard for me as a player to ascertain whether someone is lying through someone else so it's really hard for me to go oh Kitty are you sure about that because that's could be true when you haven't talked to because you're not picking up on social cues you're not picking up on is someone looking nervous when they're talking to you like those

1:29:43 Physical cues you're not picking up on those non-verbal cues so that's really hard and because she kept going to Kitty and then Kitty for whatever reason wasn't trusting her wasn't sure about her it means that Ray's so that riri's like truthfulness didn't get through and ironically the one time that she did talk to me the vote that I went out where she's like I'm going to go talk to Eden about it and I talked to her and I said look the votes are actually going to be on you and Valeria so yeah play your idol and you'll be okay and then Val will go home and that was actually the plan that was that original plan before I coralled everyone to try and get on to Ray so I telling her the truth at that point which is so funny because all the other times that she gone to the girls the girls hadn't believed her and been like no mate this isn't happening so it's funny how those relationships sort of form and whether you've got relationships through other people or not because you're really relying on that conduit point which was something that I just found very interesting yeah I've got a question I want to ask about Ferris and you know working with Ferris as Alliance Eileen and Ray for that one vote obviously Kitty and Caroline had that we saw more of them talking to Ferris than probably you directly talking they Kitty and Caroline that entire connection that was all them that was awesome because they because if you remember the vote before the Scotty the Scotty quit yes

1:31:03 Kitty was actually going home we found out later that kitty was 100% Going Home that vote and that was that was the impetus for those girls to be like you know what we've got to make something happen and they went out there they talked to everyone and I remember talking to Mark and it did feel like they were scrambling and they were talking to everyone and there was a bit of like okay that's not a good look if you're going to every single person but ultimately paid off because they got into Ferris year and they built that relationship with Ferris and Ray and that's became that next that next voting block so good on them for doing that and then I got I got pulled into that but in that situation we had a big chat about who the target should be and I was like I think it should be Valeria she's done this and we were sort of all openly talking but then Ferris and Ry were very much like no we want winner's got to be the target and it was at that point that in this group in this current group I realized I didn't have enough agency to control or manipulate the vote into how I wanted it to be and I had also picked up on the fact that Kirby and Ferris were not targeting each other and all we had heard pre merge was oh it's a ferris versus Kirby war two sides of the D they were both fighting each other when we got to merge and they didn't immediately like if that was true if that this was actually happening

1:32:23 F would have said to us oh Now's the Time to get Kirby this will be great we'll get Kirby or Kirby would have come to us and said we're going to get Ferris the fact that they didn't come to us and say that told me without telling me that they were in a sort of a fomy sort of situation and they wanted to keep each other in the game so that gave me the ability to go okay well if we're gonna stick with this group Ferris Ray Eileen Alex all these guys then and they're not going to turn on Kirby which means Kirby's not going to turn on Riri which means I've only got two maybe two or three votes before I'm next and that's really what I felt I felt like they'd probably get rid of Valaria Ferris had a good relationship with Mark because of the key thing yes again they built an unspoken Bond just because Mark did find the Box Ferris had the key and they couldn't quite make it work but they formed a relationship there so I knew Mark was probably safe with that FIS group and then it became well what it's Jaden and then after Jaden it's either Kitty me or Caroline and probably because Caroline and kitty had made more of a relationship it was probably going to be me so I could see that in three votes I was probably going home and that is why I made that move in that situation to in the next one to try and Corral everyone together and change the game up for me I don't blame you at all in that regard I mean Gabe's got a question here about how Kirby

1:33:43 Played the game when she went into the merge sort of trying to play a bit more in the background in the first couple of days before striking but obviously Kirby's situation was very different to your situation even going into the merge where she probably felt like she had a little bit more game to play before people were going to look at her what was the you know you mentioned that Kirby and Ferris both were sort of seen as people that were going to go after each other what was I guess Kirby's reputation going into the merge like you know were you seeing her as a threat because the show definitely showed us that she is a threat very early on but was that the perception of the players who playing the game so not everyone yeah like Alex did that classic thing of like Kirby's playing the best game she's going to be the big Target I knew that Kirby was a big player just this is going back to the challenges I knew she was looking at challenges really differently and in unique ways and the perfect example of this was the challenge where you had the two Idols tied to you and you have to get off the other person's Idol and I noticed she did this the classic move and for someone that doesn't know Survivor it was really it was really impressive she did the classic move of she acfic one of her Idols just to run straight to the other ones and then pull that second one off and she won like that and that just showed me that she was able to think about these games and challenges

1:35:03 In really unique ways and from that point on I was like Kirby's a really smart player and she's really physical and she's got a lot going on so in my mind she was always a massive Target honestly I probably could have done I could have St on the radar no one was bringing up my name I had good connections like across the board like I had some connections with Bri Alex's obviously was a little strained at that point because of how he didn't go home but I was still in with the Carolina Kitty Mark I still had Mark I still had all these sort of connections so no one was really bringing up my name and I probably could have sat on my hands for a couple more tribals and sort of got through you could have gotten Raymond's advantage and it could have changed the whole game well I would have eaten the popcorn that would have been my popcorn mate being a cinema manager that's my Mo I would have loved it but and that is there is part of the game this is like just survive long enough but guys I wanted to make you're not a Sandra fan you're not anybody but me strategy I wanted to make good tele I wanted to do things I if even if it was subtle behind the scenes I wanted to try and do things if it was bombastic like in this one this last round I was like you know what I feel like the shield mentality is in full force and if people think I'm sliding under the radar too much I could actually be one of the people that is seen as the as the second in

1:36:24 Command to a Mark or to a Caroline and they go oh no don't get rid of Caroline now don't get rid of Mark let's get rid of an Eden or a kitty and so I was like you know what I've got to do something at this point to pop my head up sort of like gaer you want to pop your head up you want to make some big moves and then you want to get back down and manipulate people from the background have you have you spoken to the gaer the gaer man himself he's a big Australian Survivor fan by the Way's I have not I have not spoken to him but I did like yeah I did really enjoy some of the other guys have and they're like he's actually a champ he's a really goody yeah we've had him on the podcast before oh really oh good's a goody so I think in that regard I could have probably done nothing and stayed around a bit longer but I'm thinking longer term and I'm seeing where the cards are falling yeah and I'm seeing that it's going to become very difficult for me moving forward because I didn't have that relationship with Ferris like Mark had the relationship with Ferris the girl said relationship Ferris he was a big player and it's funny how all these connections happen because viola sorry Valeria had a really strong connection with Kirby so if you told Mark something mark would tell her then she would tell Kirby and then Kirby would tell Ferris so it was really hard for me to maneuver anything at that point without it getting back to them again this was not going to be good when we got to a point where I had to try and make a move and you saw

1:37:44 Ray got sort of put painted in a position where it was like it was hard for Ray to make a big move like he had to have this huge this huge advantage which was great and he played it perfectly which was awesome but it was harder and harder for him to make a big move because everything was so like fluid and everyone was sort of doing their own thing and a lot of that came down to sort of Ferris and Kirby but yeah look I could have would it have been a winning strategy for me to not to do anything over here maybe not but getting through a few more rounds it could have been very advantageous for me to try and establish but and you know what would have been good for me actually would have been if through whatever reason a Carolina or a kitty actually going home because I feel like once I went home I feel like Caroline Kitty's Threat Level definitely dropped because they stopped being seen as this big group same with Mark I think if Mark still had all the v's with him I think Mark would have been seen as a much bigger threat and that and so the fact that he did lose Viola actually lowered his Threat Level a bit and then when Valeria left as well Mark just became the flooding man you saw Mark was one challenge away from winning the whole thing so there is there is something about having those other people fall away and then being able to manage your Threat Level and then get through and Mark did a really good job at that

1:39:04 But again you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't like you've got to ask yourself the question like if I was to go home would I feel good about the game that I played and did I try and win the game was I making the moves at that point that seemed right to me to get deeper in the end in the end and win the game and I feel like you followed your gut it didn't work out in this case but you know that's those are the things that you said earlier in the podcast it's hard because you can you can go down that rabbit hole and sort of stay down that rabbit hole for a long time right yeah and you know what you would have been worse is probably going through another two rounds and then they're being me secretly getting blindsided and I have no idea and I'm just sitting on my hands being like oh wow so I just okay I just went home and I didn't get to I didn't get to do anything I didn't get to try at least and pull something off and like at least I went out trying to do something and look it didn't turn out didn't work I would have loved to have been in the jury because I feel like then I could have experienced the whole show so that's the only thing maybe I should have wait and you know another rule another good rule is you always you always make moves on odd numbers that's like a classic survival rule you try and do the switches on odd numbers and this was a 12 and it was too late that I realized I was like oh my God I'm doing something on an even number oh no that's why near went to rocks but yeah no it's all

1:40:24 Good it's all good I do have a question so obviously you leave at this point you don't get to go to the jury Villa in your mind leaving the game who was the person you thought front runner to win the game at this point you know prior to leaving and what was your reaction when you found out who actually did end up getting to the end and ultimately who won the show yeah so I when I left I actually said they actually asked me they said who do you think's going to win and I said there are three people that I think can win at this point and I think they are the people that can Correll votes I feel like the people left in the game Kirby Ferris and Mark they all have the ability to either forcefully or manipulatively get people to vote for who they want to go out and that's not saying that people like eileene and Ray couldn't have won the game and played an awesome game I just felt at this point people that could get people to vote with them had a much better opportunity to win and so I did say that them I said not there's only three it's only Mark it's Mark Kirby and Ferris game right now to win and ultimately they all you earned the money very yeah and so I had quite a good read on where the social dynamics were at that point when I heard how it turned like when I saw and experienced how everything turned out it wasn't surpris I was surprised with that no one bothered to flush Ferris Idol for so long because we all knew

1:41:44 That he had it and I really felt that it's some point that should have been a bigger Narrative of like let's get rid of this Idol now it's too it's too powerful but again it comes back to the point that if you've got Valeria is mates with Kirby who mates with ree who mates with Ferris whose mates with Ray who's met with eile suddenly that's all these people that don't really want Ferris to flush their Idol because they're sort of working through Ferris so unless you turn around and you really sold it to Kirby like Kirby Ferris has an advantage over you need to even the playing field so you guys are both even by getting rid of his Idol so let's try and do something and that would have been sort of a narrative to try and flush his I was really surprised that didn't come up more as a bigger issue yeah I'm not surprised Ferris I thought Ferris was very charismatic I feel like he got people on board I feel like he also had the ability more so early in the game but there was a feeling of like oh if you cross Ferris he'd be really angry with you and so people were less were less wanting to take those shots but I was always the thing well if you get rid of Ray then who's Ferris got at that point he's E's going to jump ship probably if it's just Ferris left and then you can go back and try and flush his Idol there so really you destabilize

1:43:04 Someone it doesn't matter if they're angry with you it's going to be very hard for them to get like back into a position of power but yeah so Ferris look I think he's a great Ambassador for the for our season and a great winner and I think he's doing I think he's doing great stuff so I am I'm really pleased with our winner and how Ferris put his game together because he was doing a lot out there and he was he played loyal game to Ray like was really on top of him I would have loved to have this is going to sound really bad I would have loved to have seen him have to vote out someone close that he like I know I know he voted out Kirby but I think you always have to vote at Kirby because Kirby was gonna beat you yeah whereas it would have been really interesting if he if it got to a point where it was like him eileene Ray like a Garrick and all this stuff and then like okay well who do who do you turn on then and that's when it's really tough that's when the game is really like for me I find I found it very satisfying seeing Kitty turn on Caroline and the rest of the mafia and I was like the last person she was like all about loyalty and this trustworthy woman and then I was like look at what survivor's doing to you're turning against Caroline I couldn't believe it and it was so sweet and it's interesting because obviously talking to Ferris after the season he said he went in thinking he could betray and backstab anyone and then when he actually played the game it becomes harder and harder because you get closer to these people and you know you're kind of relying

1:44:25 On them so he never had to do that but I agree definitely a great winner and definitely a great Ambassador I think for the season which has been one of the best seasons that we've seen in Australian Survivor I've got a couple of quickfire questions I'm going to end you off on so these ones here you just you know throw out whatever comes to mind for you first one here if you had to cast someone in your season as a Star Wars villain in the next movie who would it be and why honestly Darth Raymond Darth R I think I think Raymond would be such a good villain I think he would be great he'd be manipulating people he'd be pretending to be weak and frail but actually come out and attack you like yeah I think okay so if you had to cast someone as Titanic Kate Winslet's role for Titanic who would it be from your cast Okay this is great I love it you know you know Kate WS okay would actually go is it Rose I think her name was Rose in the movie wasn't it Jack and Rose I'd actually go I'd actually go I'd go Riri probably Riri I didn't that coming yeah I think Riri because Riri is very like she's very personable but she's a bit s she's you know Kate win's a bit standoffish at the start and then she sort of finds

1:45:45 Herself and I think as the game went on I think Riri sort of really came into her own in that regard I think yeah I think she'd be good okay now you have to cast someone in your cast as the next Indiana Jones who would it be oh love it love it oh this is a good one I could see we'll go male or female on this one you can go either way oh yeah go either way go either way I actually think who'd be a good one you know who looks who looks the part Tobias bias looks theart but you know what I'd love to see I think Mark I think Mark would be great I think Mark's really smart he's got the he's got the paleontologist Vibe I think I just and he loves wearing a hat he loves wearing a hat so get him in the I've got I've got my official Indiana Jones hat here somewhere as well that's amazing yeah I that you look at Tobias is he's a wild chart he'd actually be really good 100% okay Survivor do you like I think we spoke about this a little bit earlier about 26 days or 39 days no 39 or every day of the week all right this one's going to be tough but I'm going to have to make you choose GIF propes or jelp oh mate you kill me okay I'm going to say something controversial I love I love Jeff Pro because he's original JP now I think he is he's the gold standard he is doing so well I think if you go pre

1:47:05 Propes being executive producer I think that's strong propes I well I think jlp at the moment is like he's awesome he's awesome out there his ban is great and he's doing a really good job so right now so you and aen have got exactly the same answers so let's see how far we can go with this next one here if you had to choose the king of Australian Survivor is it George or is it David gut oh well oh I you know what I love George and I think George is the best but if you're gonna be the king you've got to you've got to win you've got to win like he hasn't won yet and I think George is awesome and he's really he's changed the game in a lot of ways but he still hasn't he's fallen at that last hurdle and David just he played a magnificent game and he ended up winning and yeah look some people say that back end of All Stars was a bit of a steamroll and no one was really looking to get rid of him but I still think he won at the end of the day and he was a very good winner so until George wins I think he needs to win George is up there I think we all agree definitely mad respect of course of course but I agree with you definitely for me as well next one you might go down the same sort of rad but Queen Haley or queen shie I actually

1:48:25 I know people are going to people going to hate me but yeah I'm a I'm a Haley supporter I think Haley really understands the game I think shaie is great at making social connections with people I just don't think she has the Strategic chops that Haley does I don't think she understands the game at a level that Haley does and it Super Fan yeah exactly yeah exactly and I can see that in her style and how she approach the game whereas sh's realized that okay a big part of this game is social connections and she's great at that and she can talk to people and she makes people fre welcome but I think you need another layer of that and the perfect example is last season where she let George get the better of her and yeah that like I don't yeah that was just I agree yeah two good answers there so next one here Exile island or classic Survivor oh so ex are you talking yeah okay so last couple I like this is going to again be controversial the winners at War concept with XR I think I think there's a version of that works because I love those Char I thought the boot order was not the most desirable one in at War which we can all agree with

1:49:46 My boy my boy Ethan got done bad and you oh my god them oh dude know I think what you do I think the best scenario is you play it like that until merge and you give one person an opportunity to get back in at merge and then you kill it and it goes back to regular Survivor I think that's the best version of that but ultimately I prefer classic survivor without it yeah no I totally agree I'm a classic Survivor person as well I'm not a big fan of Exile Island but I guess if they had the longer 90-minute episodes maybe cuz I felt like they were focusing too much on exile Island instead of what was happening in the main game which I wanted to know more of on that season but yeah totally with you on that one I think I think with that as well someone coming back into final six it's just not the game it's not game it's not Survivor I'm sorry it's too it's you're coming back in too late it's ridiculous I agree well just the fact that you had two Exile Island seasons and both times the person who came back at the final six ended up going to the final Tribal Council it shows you it's overpowered who's your favorite winner of all time any franchise oh favorite winner of all time I love oh man this is yeah this is really tough it's hard because there been so many seasons right but if you if you had a gun to your head and you had to choose one you know oh okay I

1:51:06 Really oh yeah it's just winners it's really hard you know what I'm gonna say I'm gonna say somethingone that's really well-rounded I'm gonna say Jeremy I think Jeremy Collins he's really well-rounded I think he's a lovely guy he's a family man he's a firefighter he's really strategic and he's really gets on with people I think he's that good perfect look maybe not the most entertaining winner but that's a different question I think he's probably one of the strongest allround winners out they did really well but man dude for entertainment value Tony it's got like yeah definitely entertainment value Tony two time Winer still can't believe we live in that world to me it's just Insanity Ton's talk about Kings Tony is the king yeah the next one is your favorite player so this could be anyone from any again I have to go back to Jonathan pan and Rob two people that I've abely loved watching over the years I think they're both really good narrators and that's something that's a big part of the season for me now if you were to go back on a season and the twist of the season was it's called Destiny's tied so you're tied to this person their fate in the game if they go home you go home which person are you calling from your cast to go back with you like who would you not mind being tied to in a return e season oh that's a good one that's a good one I think

1:52:27 That well that time he this time hopefully he can't backstab J unless he want I don't know he may he's like Hang on we're both going home oh no I think I think it would have to be Mark I think I think me and Mark had a really good understanding of the game and I think we both came at it I would have loved to us both to have come back at the end and battled it out so I would actually love to be like version like with Mark you know what's funny before went out like a couple years ago I played my this guy that I knew put on a real life Survivor like over a long weekend for like 4 days and one of the twists they had was you got put into pairs with someone for One Challenge and if you won the challenge you were both immune but then that Tribal Council if one of you got voted out your partner also got voted out as well and they did a similar thing like that it's a great it's a great little twist it's wild have you seen survivors of Africa at all South Africa I've seen some of the South African ones yeah but immunity Islands the season called immunity Island they had tied Destinies as a Twist in that season as well for around and an actual Survivor franchise so but they were not the first one ever to do it the first Survivor franchise to do it in my understanding is that it was Survivor France who did it before anybody else so that's where it gets a little bit difficult because obviously it's hard to follow some of those Seasons it's if you don't understand the language you know but I've got a fan

1:53:47 Who listens to the podcast who's from France who actually at the time told me actually this is from I think it's called different but it's Survivor France and that TST happened first I Bel Survivor South Africa took it obviously L who's the executive producer for Survivor South Africa is a big fan of the franchise and also keeps an eye on all the other franchises so sometimes bring some of these things into the game yeah love it love it yeah amazing well the last thing I wanted to ask you know and I always like asking players this is what would you know you had a notebook which is great because it means you've written down all these different moments while you were out there so you can always look back at that and sort of remember the time that you were on the island but let's say you don't get to play the game again and you've only played it this one time you know do you have a Bo a boy or a girl Phoenix little boy little boy Phoenix little boy 10 years from now 12 years from now you know when you talk to Felix about your experience what's going to be your fondest memory of the game it could be something that we saw in the game maybe something that didn't happen on the show I think one yeah one thing for me was there was a couple of nights where I think one of the first nights where I was in this crappy shelter it was one of the worst the Titan shelter was one of the worst shelters ever made and it was like pouring down with rain I was sitting there in a ball huddled up and it just really hit me I was just like I am playing Survivor like this is a dream

1:55:07 23 years in the making and I'm literally here like soaking wet cold in the middle of the night playing Survivor and I couldn't be more excited to do it and I just had this overwhelming feeling of like this is absolutely this is amazing the other one was the tug of war where me and Charles were losing and we managed to like inch it back like a little by a little over like what was 45 minutes and we got it back and we won and then I was just like are you not entertained and it was so like it was such a cathartic moment hey it's Mary MK and it was yeah that was such an like an amazing moment for me and Charles to win that and for someone that's not physical like that's not my thing so to win something like that was really sort of out of my bag and that was really fun as well yeah listen Eden we had so much fun talking to you tonight I mean this is the this is the longest that we've actually got at any of the interviews and we thank you for the time no we really thank you that you were willing to you know share as much as you did about your experience out there and we're very grateful that you jumped on the podcast you know you're going to be welcome anytime you want to jump on the podcast reach out to me if you just feel like hey I want to talk about Survivor users this season clearly you've got some great insights we'd be happy to have you on if you wanted to do it and if you know Rachel was kind enough to share you with us again for a podcast in the future we'd be very happy to have you on board but you know do you have anything currently

1:56:27 Going on that you would like people to check out anything you want to PL on the podcast if there's yeah if there is any Melbourne listeners out there I am doing the Melbourne International Comedy Festival with my brother Game Boy comedy is our group and we've got a show escape to the megaverse we open next Thursday on the 11th we play for two weeks it's at N9 o' come on down it's really fun it's a mix of like 90s Nostalgia and pop culture references and AI we do a big thing about what if AI took over a Comedy Festival show and stuff like that so it's really it's really sort of fun sketch like comedy so come on down and check us out I think you guys will really enjoy it so straight after this live Eden please send me through a link to that so I can also put it into the description of this video and I'll make sure to post it everywhere we can on our socials and I should definitely as someone that's in Melbourne come around and come check it out so I will definitely I'll definitely come check it out you know an excuse to go out I love comedy and standup as well so you know be a good night out but for anybody else that have sort of been in the life tonight that have taken part in the conversation and have asked questions we thank you it's been great it's been a great season we should have some more guests hopefully from the season coming on to talk to us about the season as well so stay tuned for that more will be revealed soon we may even have some somebody very chaotic and who we wanted to return from the pre merge coming onto the podcast I think it's going to be

1:57:47 An absolute Delight when we talk to this person you're back you're back with me on that one I'm getting you back into the chat as long as it's not Caroline no we've got to get Caroline we've got to get you to meet Caroline because I reckon that'll be a lot of fun as well but no listen if you all have checked this out and if you enjoyed the content so far please consider subscribing it helps us grow the channel and gain credibility where we can bring more and more people onto the channel hit the like button put the notification Bell on but for now grab your torches head back to Camp we'll catch you guys next time