Survivor: Palau

Survivor: Palau is the tenth season of Survivor. It was filmed in the island-country of Palau in the Micronesia subregion of Oceania. The main theme of the season was the Pacific Theatre of World War II.

This season ended with New York City fire lieutenant Tom Westman defeating advertising executive Katie Gallagher in a 6-1 vote.

Survivor ' s 10th season earned the show a nomination in 2005.

Production
Applications were due June 22, 2004. Around 800 applicants were selected for an interview between the latter part of July and August. Out of these 800, 48 were chosen as semi-finalists for an interview in Los Angeles during September. From these semi-finalists, 20 were chosen to participate the show between October to December 2004.

Twists/Changes

 * Expanded Cast: This is the first season to feature twenty contestants.
 * Schoolyard Pick and Elimination: The contestants start the game by competing for two individual Immunity Necklaces awarded to the first male and the first female to reach them. The winners then pick one member of the opposite sex to join their tribe and add another contestant to it. The last male and the last female who are not picked are eliminated from the game.
 * Double Tribal Council: On one occasion, both tribes have to vote somebody out of the game following a Reward Challenge.
 * Tiebreaker Challenge: A fire-making contest is held in case of a tie at the final four or if there are only two people left on a tribe.
 * No Merge: Ulong was absorbed into its rival tribe, Koror, after being reduced to one member following an unprecedented losing streak.
 * : Exile Island is introduced for the first time. Used only once as punishment for the first one out of an Immunity Challenge, the exiled contestant is sent to a remote location with minimum supplies to live there for a certain period of time.

Season Summary
The twenty contestants began the game by rowing to the beach they would live on, with the first player of each gender to reach shore winning immunity. However, once ashore, they received no additional instructions nor were they divided into tribes, and began to work on a common shelter. The next day, host Jeff Probst announced that they would now pick tribes via a Schoolyard Pick, with those who had won immunity, Ian Rosenberger and Jolanda Jones, getting to choose first. The last male and female remaining would immediately leave the game. Eventually, Jonathan Libby and Wanda Shirk did not get picked, and were sent home. The two tribes, Koror and Ulong, then participated in the first Reward/Immunity Challenge, with the winner, Koror, deciding to leave their present beach to another one they had not seen.

On paper, it seemed that the young and athletic Ulong tribe had an advantage over the old and slower Koror tribe, but Ulong's lack of teamwork resulted in them losing every Immunity Challenge in the first 21 days, decimating them to a paltry tribe of two: Bobby Jon Drinkard and Stephenie LaGrossa, who faced each other off in a fire-making challenge, with the latter emerging victorious. After spending the night alone, she was instructed to travel to camp Koror, and was given a Koror buff, thus having no merge.

Koror developed a core group of five: Ian, Gregg Carey, Jenn Lyon, Katie Gallagher, and Tom Westman, and those on the outside saw them as a threat but were not able to break them. Despite making an immediate strong impression on her new tribe, Stephenie was targeted due to her strength and tenacity. She was able to buy herself some time when the Koror Alliance briefly turned on each other, and when Janu Tornell quit, but was eventually voted out.

With only Koror members remaining, they were forced to turn on each other, with Ian and Tom taking control of the eliminations. Ian later considered betraying Tom, but was thwarted by the latter's immunity wins. At the final four, Tom found out that Ian was targeting him, which caused him to turn on Ian, though Ian won the fire making tiebreaker challenge against Jenn. At the Final Immunity Challenge, which ran for almost 12 hours, Ian decided to step down after being burdened by his numerous deceptions and gave Tom the win. He asked Tom to vote him out, making him the final member of the jury.

At the Final Tribal Council, Tom was lauded for his leadership that led Koror to a clean Immunity Challenge sweep, but was barbed for his machismo. Katie, on the other hand, was appreciated for her honesty, but was more heavily berated for her poor challenge performances, being gossipy and mean towards others besides Tom and Ian. In the end, Tom won the title of Sole Survivor in a 6-1 landslide.

Trivia

 * The font used for the tribes and Palau subtitle is "Stencil".
 * This is the only season where the pre-jury]] boots outnumbered those who reached the jury phase.
 * This is the first season of US version of Survivor to have a cast of twenty.
 * Palau is the first season to eliminate three castaways (excluding losing finalists) in one episode. Jonathan Libby and Wanda Shirk were eliminated in the Schoolyard Pick, while Jolanda Jones was voted out the day after in a standard Tribal Council scenario.
 * Palau is the first season where contestants were eliminated before Day 3.
 * For the first time in the series' history, one tribe "conquered" the other by winning every single Immunity Challenge and absorbing the other tribe's last remaining member. Had Koror and Ulong merged, the merged tribe's color would have been green.
 * With this season having no merged tribe, Palau has the fewest number of tribes, with two.
 * This season marks the first time to have a tie since due to the players' concern regarding the controversial purple rock tiebreaker. In, host Jeff Probst confirmed that the rock drawing tiebreaker only applies to votes outside the final four, whereas in a final four situation, the contestants are to compete in a fire-making challenge.
 * This season ties with and  for having the most tie votes, with three.
 * Palau is the only season to have two fire-making challenges occur.
 * Palau is the first season to have . However, Exile Island was only used for one episode. was the first season to use it as a full season twist.
 * The season's Tribal Council set was a decorated with actual World War II relics such as fallen aircraft, weapons, bags of cement, and barbed wires. The set took eight weeks to build, took 25 tons of cement, 14 tons of rubble, and a thousand bags of sand.
 * Ulong and Koror's camps would be used by the Malakal and Airai tribes respectively years later, in.