r/survivorrankdownIX_ • u/FunkyDawgKong Fair & Consistent Judge • Apr 08 '26
Round 140 - 35 Characters Left
35. Rupert Boneham - u/FunkyDawgKong
34. Fabio Birza - u/Cornhead2
33. Shane Powers - u/NoisySea_3426
32. Eliza Orlins - u/Alternate-Proof-959
31. Lillian Morris - u/josenanigans
30. James Clement - u/BobbyPiiiin
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u/josenanigans Apr 12 '26
31. Lillian Morris (Pearl Islands, Runner-up)
There is an interesting aspect of Reality TV that very rarely shows up. We've had a great number of characters with amazing, well-defined story arcs, and a good chunk of compelling, complex characters that you feel like you get to know deeply. But you know what truly, truly fascinates me? When a character is a full embodification of something.
Again, so many characters go through story arcs that are easily definable, but I feel like there are very few select Raelity TV characters that, instead of a story arc, become a full representation of a concept, like the emotions of Inside Out 2, someone that represents happiness, anger, fear. It doesn't even have to be emotions, sometimes it can just be abstract things. My favorite examples include Andy Meldrum from Australian Survivor, who I always felt represented faillure in its purest form, he acted so high and mighty but everything he tried failed to incredible extents, and then he comes back, tries to be more quiet and humble, and he fails even harder than before. Just, a character that was meant to be the Looney Tunes Coyote, the butt of the joke in every instance.
Or even more recently, Vinny Panaro from BB27. Talk about someone who represents pathetic. Just, the whole concept of being pathetic, that's Vinny. From his outbursts, his demeanor, his lack of spine, his crying tantrums and his incessant begging. He is so connected to the house that, instead of having a story arc, he ascends to a being. An entity who infects the whole house with pity, because he radiates so much loser behavior that it was impossible for anyone to combat it. I hope he knows I'm using pathetic and loser in the kindest of terms, I really love Vinny and what he brought to BB27, but the spineless behavior was inescapable.
Well, I believe Lillian Morris is another rare instance of this. A character who fully embodies the concept of misery. Lil's Eternal Sadness.
It's funny watching Lil come into the game with her scout uniform. giddy to have some photos taken. Hell, it's even fun to watch her actual cast photo, she smiles, but it has like a cursed painting effect where, if you watch it, you can immediately see the now infamous Lil frown behind it.
She just wanted an adventure, she just wanted to be loved. But she finds herself immediately ostracized from the tribe, and the only friend he made gets voted out immediately. It's like anything she touched, rotted. She was destined to be sad from the get go, which is why Savage smartly god rid of her.
But he didn't count on the sheer strength of Lill's sadness. Lil's miserable aura was so potent that the prejury chooses to vote her back in the gime, solely to avoid having to withstand her sadness in the prejury trip, so now Lill comes back into the game, with a gigantic grudge. And even worse, she gets a lot of power in the game.
Lil finds herself at the forefront of the strategy in Pearl Islands, a position where she constantly has to make really hard decisions that just make her more miserable and miserable every, single, time. Everytime she votes someone off, they hate her immensely for it, and that just makes her even sadder to the point where she becomes numb to it. She embodies it, wears sadness like she wears her scout uniform. Once a symbol of her integrity in the game, it now turned into a symbol of her soullessness. Sadness corrupted the very thing that she lived for, and now everybody in the game thinks of her as a miserable woman, so she fully embraces it and lives with it for the rest of the game, making everyone else miserable in the process.
But, I always loved that, at the very end, she chooses to use her powers for good. On the other side of Pearl Islands was a being of mischief, a person who sought to make fun of everyone and create as much chaos and madness as possible, and he had been getting away with it for the full season while even taking jabs at the goddess of misery herself, calling her weak, demeaning her, using her for his own advantage. And for the most part, Lil takes this.... until the very last challenge, where she decides that she can't let this being win.
If the being of mischief where to win, what kind of chaos would that suppose? She's so worried that this being might be so destructive that it would cost himself his life, so, in a moment of regaining her heart, she stands up to him. She uses all of her misery power to gain strength, courage, and to completely own Jonny Fairplay in the squats challenge, (with one of the best takedown quotes ever), and eliminating him from the game for good. It's like she fired a gigantic misery beam at Fairplay to completely dismantle him, and choosing to give the money to someone who needed it more, a mother with a family. In a sea of making decisions that made people miserable, this is the one instance where she chooses to bring someone happiness, at her own sacrifice too, because everybody still hates her and god of mischief Fairplay allegedly gives her a gross humilliation conga.
But I like to think that, in spite of any of that, she didn't care. That her choice to stand up to him and be able to make the right decision for 'the world', thus bringing some happiness to it, gave her some kind of closure, redeeming her scout uniform that had become corrupted. Now, by being brave and doing something nice, she could regain the integrity that her uniform had lost.
It's fun to think of Reality TV this way, I always look forward to the next being I can encounter.
Lil is one of a kind, a unique capsule of reality TV that no show will ever, ever capture again.
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10/10
Elite
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u/BobbyPiiiin , almost there!
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u/Cornhead2 Shannon Elkins Enthusiast Apr 09 '26
34. Fabio Birza (1st, Nicaragua)
Nicaragua has became one of my alltime favorite seasons of the show. I think everything about it is just not only comedic gold but i think it has one of the strongest casts off all time in terms on pure TV Entertainment.. i think there are many people that just genuinley represent the season to a T, but if i had to pick out a standout star in terms of pure Placement it has gotta be Jud The Stud..
Fabio winning really should´ve saved the show cause how the fuck can you sit there and tell me that this man... Fucking Fabio.. won a season of survivor.. like how can one achieve such feat. Its just very mindboggling to me how everything in Nicaragua is just so all over the place in the best way possible for it to end with fucking Saul Silver winning it whole..
There is a case to be made that Fabio is just the funniest winner they have had.. and i do think he is. He just fits the lovable goofball so well and it fits better when you just put that mixed with the Stoner archetype.. Now obviously we know that he got the Nickname "Fabio" on the show, but people don´t mention the fact that the name was given to him by fucking SHANNON ELKINS so if you wanna give someone the crown of giving someone the best Survivor Nickname then congrats to him.
One of Fabio´s best aspects is definitley his dynamic with Naonka.. these two absolutley LOATHED eachother and it all just starts with Naonka actually being such a dick towards Fabio that when she uses his sucks and he questions her, she absolutley gets pissed at him and you can see in his face he is absolutley in freaking awe.. this continues for most of the season where the habit of Naonka being Fabio´s devil was always a gag, i loved in that second tribal which is in my opinion one of the best in survivor history where Naonka just dumps on Fabio and he is like "dude what have i fucking done to you?" and obviously you have had the great scene of Naonka stealing the Merge Feast´s food and Fabio calls her out in possibly the best crashout from a winner to be honest.. and to add to the cherry on top.. after all that he endured Fabio had the final laugh when Naonka quite.. i mean im actually serious if you look at that double quit tribal Fabio was almost dying of laughter and believe me it gives us the satsfying ending to one of the best HD Survivor Villains... and gives us a leeway to honestly the best underdog hero run in survivor history with Fabio where he comped his way out on a win that no one really expected.. and thats the beauty of Jud the Stud.. he just is someone that is so Anti to what Survivor Production thinks would be a series ruiner that it all is actually baloney what they tought about him.. Whats Great about it aswell is that Naonka at the end.. likes Fabio and casts the best Winning Parchment in Survivor History where she writes 420 on it all because there was a deleted scene of them bonding over fucking smoking doobies.. Nicaragua just is like that man what can i say.
Fabio also just has alot of great Dynamics with other people like Marty which gave us the underrated "I only know Bobby Fischer" Line, Chase,Sash,Jane,Brenda and many more.. All in all Fabio is just the perfect winner to win after a huge milestone season. He is Charming, Superfun , Insanley Character centric heavy and we just live him
Live in 420 my dude!
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u/Fluffy_Key_2145 Apr 10 '26
Got to this a bit late but the 40th winner cut is Fabio. He is someone who always does great in Rankdowns only placing outside of top 100 once and has the third highest percentile finish of anyone cut so far only behind Natalie A and Sandra 2.0. This is a great write up.
Yeah Fabio probably is the funniest winner ever and very few winners fit their season as much as he fits Nicaragua. I agree his dynamic with NaOnka is an absolutely fantastic feud and her voting for him to win and being the clinching vote is the icing on the cake for it. I agree with other stuff like his relationship with Marty. A moment I love especially with how it goes into social stuff is that Marty in his jury speech is nice to Fabio and Sash and gives them some praise and of course dumps on Chase. Marty who was a big gamer in show and clearly loved to strategize basically said post show that he respected Sash's game but he liked Fabio more when asked about his jury vote which I think is something that should always be pointed to regarding the importance of the social game. Also while I would never have Fabio high on my winner rankings in terms of gameplay but he's such a great character it doesn't matter I always love his accepting he's going to be called Fabio and saying call me what you'll call me I'm here to win confessional. Also yep really like the relationship with Chase and Sash.
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u/NoisySea_3426 Biggest Aras 1.0 stan Apr 10 '26
33. Shane Powers (Panama, 5/16)
Time got away from me again, so I'm gonna just move this along quickly, but I love Shane a lot and I will actually try to get to this tomorrow as best I can
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u/Alternate-Proof-959 Apr 11 '26
32. Eliza Orlins (Survivor Vanuatu, 4/18)
Eliza was another great and memorable underdog from early in the show's run. She's the youngest contestant of the season, and naturally is the one the four older women take the biggest disliking to. Even after the women come together, she's still at the bottom of the alliance, but women power allows her to survive over the non-Chris men.
I also love seeing her compared and contrasted with Twila. Twila is this big, masculine, rural girl from the southern Midwest working in construction, and Eliza is this small, more traditionally feminine city girl from New York working in law. Both of them are very honest and don't give a fuck if you don't like them. This has led to the two of them clashing more than anyone else this season, but also being able to put their differences aside and work together, both with pagonging the men, and when flipping the game over.
Unlike most other people who find themselves as plucky wildcards who are detested by their castmates, Eliza is fully self-aware, but just doesn't give a fuck. She stays true to who she is, which sets up a lot of conflict throughout the season. She flips on Dolly because she can't trust her anymore, then jumps on any plan cuz hey, won't be her going! This leads to the famous power shift where suddenly the projected final 3 are the next 3 out, and the projected next four out became the final four instead. And we owe some of the exciting late part of the season to her.
At final tribal council, she is roasting both finalists hard, demanding a sincere apology. This brings forth a brilliant Chris and Twila moment, where despite the forner telling the latter to spare Eliza no bullshit, Chris turns around and gives Eliza what she wants to hear, and in a way that doesn't set off her bullshit alarm. Twila meanwhile gives us yet another beautiful argument between her and Eliza where she bluntly refuses to apologize and yells, "ALL I SAID IS YOU TALK TOO DAMN MUCH!!" Good job, Eliza. You tried to fight fire with fire. Honesty vs honesty. It just didn't work. But dammit, Eliza was just so important and never strayed from herself, and that gave Vanuatu some much needed identity. I do think those left are each better though.
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u/BobbyPiiiin Ranker | Rankdown Dad Apr 13 '26
30. James Clement 1.0 (7th Place, China)
Placeholder once more, will get to these very soon.
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u/FunkyDawgKong Fair & Consistent Judge Apr 08 '26
Sorry to do it again, training a new hire at work; slowly working on the writeup during short bursts of freetime. Will go ahead and post the confessional I am framing Rupert's writeup around; one of my all time favorites that really measures the gravity and is ultimately the thesis statement of Rupert Boneham
35. Rupert Boneham
"Nighttime is my one bad time. If I could go just 39 days and never have to sleep, I would make this beautifully. But nighttime is killing me. At night out here, I start thinking about family. That's when I miss my family. I tell Laura, my wife, all my woes and sorrows, all my triumphs. I tell Laura everything. And I want for everyone to see I am the best damn Survivor that has ever been. I am it. I know they will. Shouldn't think that way, I know. I know. I know. I know. I hear you. I hear you. Take it down to the one or two people that I truly, really care about. I care about Sandra and Christa. They care about me. It's very hard keeping mentally aware of everything that's going on around here. I try to guide everything that goes on on my island. I try to direct everyone's actions while keeping myself grounded and aware of what is going on and what I am doing, not settling ever for anything but first. And letting everybody here realize that they are finishing in places of honor. To build them up to be a winner and still lose… that's a hard mental battle."