The Big Twist? MrBeast Didn’t Ruin ‘Survivor: 50’

As an elder millennial who typically assumes the word “YouTuber” is an insult rather than a profession, I’ve been dreading the much-hyped MrBeast/Survivor crossover. Not because I feel any particular way about the dude, but because I don’t want to feel any particular way about him. I don’t want to care about this person, and Jeff Probst can’t make me! So I guess the good news is that the MrBeast guest appearance last night was fine. Actually, it was pretty darn great, for two reasons: MrBeast’s actual involvement was fairly unobtrusive, and game mechanics “he” (or the producers) introduced led to the best tribal council I’ve seen in ages.

I suspect MrBeast’s screen time was edited judiciously after the disastrous “Zac Brown goes spearfishing” episode and the resulting backlash. This season is supposed to be all about the fans, and the fans have made it clear: we don’t want the celebrity guests soaking up all the screen time when we have starving, conniving castaways we could be watching! There may even have been some additional last-minute cuts to the episode, after news surfaced last week that MrBeast’s production company was being sued by a former employee for sexual harassment and toxic workplace complaints. See, I already know more about this person than I want to! Of course, he couldn’t be edited out of the episode entirely - he had to introduce that mysterious briefcase from all the promos, after all. And introduce it he did — a “Super Beware Advantage” that would only be revealed to the players at Tribal Council. It’s enough to know that his appearances were generally brief, mostly quiet, and other than his repeated prayer-hands gratitude to every compliment he heard, he was mostly just… there. He didn’t even get a single confessional. It could have been worse.

That advantage, though? It was pretty major! So let’s skip right through recapping the Survivor Auction (where MrBeast first showed up with his big scary luggage) and the Letters from Home, which everyone got this season (meaning it was boring for longer than usual) and jump to the end. Tiffany had won individual immunity, and everyone else was scrambling to pick a target for the vote, knowing full well that the Super Beware Advantage could toss all those plans to the wayside. Rick Devens, who had already revealed that his “idol” was a fake, was the “simple plan” - until everyone started jockeying to make a bigger move. And at Tribal Council, before the Super Beware Advantage was even revealed, Devens decided to blow up absolutely everyone’s spot by revealing the play-by-play of the various proposed targets (Ozzy, Stephenie, Cirie, and Rizo) and who was gunning for them. He then argues that Stephenie, alongside Jonathan and Joe, are working together to either vote out or exclude everyone else on the tribe, so why shouldn’t the rest band together and vote one of them out?

With confusion in the air, it was finally time to reveal the Super Beware Advantage: one player would get to call a coin flip. If they lost, they’d go home with no vote. If they won, they’d be safe at tribal, earn an additional immunity idol, and the prize money for the season would double to $2 million (courtesy of MrBeast). If the tribe couldn’t agree on one person to do the toss, they’d go to rocks and somebody would be selected at random. Obviously, Devens volunteered - he was already on the chopping block, so the 50/50 chance didn’t scare him, and he thrives on chaos. What was surprising was that nobody tried to block him, probably because they weren’t so sure he was the obvious vote anymore anyway. If they’d really wanted him out, they’d have moved to ensure he didn’t end up safe twice over.

I should be annoyed that the big twist was a coin flip, when I’ve railed at Survivor for inserting random chance into a game of strategy before, but the pay-off here was far more entertaining than their last “historic” tribal, the Blood Moon. Here, the unknown of the advantage lead to real strategic maneuvers, and the reveal of the advantage had the players weighing their true desires. Suddenly, the people who were willing to write Devens’ name down are actually rooting for him, because of the prize money - which will make the future of the competition even more heated.

Anyway, Devens won the toss, securing his safety and an idol for later, and leading to a live tribal where everyone whispered strategies in each other’s ears until it was time to vote. Stephenie lost by a landslide - even Joe and Jonathan flipped on her, which says everything you need to know about their “honesty and loyalty” gameplay. But the bigger story is that, once again, Cirie saw someone gunning for her boy Ozzy and said, “Not on my watch!” Devens may have tossed that grenade at tribal, but Cirie is the one who set it all in motion back at camp - and people still don’t seem to realize she’s pulling their strings. You love to see it.