Survivor: Tocantins

Survivor: Tocantins
Season Information
Version	United States
Season No.	18
Filming Location	Jalapão, Tocantins, Brazil
Filming Dates	November 1, 2008 - December 9, 2008
Season Run	February 12, 2009 - May 17, 2009
No. of Episodes	15
No. of Days	39
No. of Castaways	16
Winner	J.T. Thomas
Runner(s)-Up	Stephen Fishbach
Tribes	Jalapao Timbira Forza
Viewership (in Millions)	12.86
Cast
Opening Sequence
Season Chronology
Previous	Gabon
Next	Samoa

Survivor: Tocantins, also known as Survivor: Tocantins — The Brazilian Highlands, is the eighteenth installment in the U.S. reality show Survivor. It was filmed in Tocantins, Brazil and premiered on February 12, 2009. Once production of Survivor: Gabon was underway, CBS began casting for this season. Shooting occurred between October and December 2008. The season saw one medical evacuation and has to date produced four returning players (Coach Wade, J.T. Thomas, Stephen Fishbach, and Tyson Apostol) for subsequent seasons.

J.T. Thomas became the Sole Survivor on the live finale broadcast May 17, 2009. He finished the first "perfect game" in the history of the show, not having a single vote cast against him all season and earning all seven jury votes in a unanimous decision, beating out Stephen Fishbach. In addition, J.T. was named "Sprint Player of the Season", earning the fans' vote over Taj Johnson-George and Sierra Reed.

Production

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Twists/Changes

• First Impressions: On Day 1, Jeff Probst instructed the newly marooned castaways to make their first vote-off. Relying only from first impressions, the tribes must select which of their tribemates will be the biggest liability to their team, and these two players will "not make it to the journey." The contestants assumed that the two would be eliminated, but the "journey" was revealed to be a four-hour trek to their camps. The two people who were singled out (Sierra from Timbira and Sandy from Jalapao) will be airlifted to their camps, while their tribemates underwent a treacherous walk to their respective encampments.
• One-Time Use Hidden Immunity Idol: After being whisked away to their camps, the two left out players were given a choice between creating a shelter (to possibly change their perceptions of them) or search for a one-time use Hidden Immunity Idol that can only be good at their first visiting Tribal Council. Unfortunately, both idols were never found and wasted away in the process.
• Hidden Immunity Idol: Hidden Immunity Idols return this season, with one being hidden at each tribe and clues for the idol being found on Exile Island.
• Exile Island: Exile Island returns this season, with new twists. After a Reward Challenge, the winning tribe must send one person from the losing tribe to Exile Island, and in return, the said person must pick one member from the winning tribe to join him/her on Exile Island. Another twist is that, upon reaching Exile Island, the two banished players will get to chose between two unmarked bottles; one bottle contained a clue to a Hidden Immunity Idol, hidden somewhere at their camps. The player who gets the clue will also have the option to switch tribes at will (hypothetically, if an exiled player already found his/her tribe's idol, the player in question may switch tribes to potentially find the other tribe's idol). The person who gets the second bottle will get nothing.
  • Mutiny: The person who receives the idol clue also receives the chance to mutiny to the other tribe. However, nobody took the offer.

Castaways

Contestant		Tribe Affiliation		Finish	Votes Against
		Original Tribe	Merged Tribe
	Carolina Eastwood 27, West Hollywood, CA Bartender	Jalapao		1st Voted Out Day 3	7
	Candace Smith 31, Los Angeles, CA Attorney	Timbira		2nd Voted Out Day 6	7
	Jerry Sims 49, Rock Hill, SC U.S. Army Sergeant	Timbira		3rd Voted Out Day 9	6
	Sandy Burgin 53, Louisville, KY Bus Driver	Jalapao		4th Voted Out Day 12	6
	Spencer Duhm 18, Gainesville, FL Student	Jalapao		5th Voted Out Day 15	5
	Sydney Wheeler 24, San Diego, CA Model	Jalapao		6th Voted Out Day 18	4
	Joe Dowdle 26, Austin, TX Real Estate Salesman	Jalapao	Forza	Evacuated Day 20	1
	Brendan Synnott 30, Vail, CO Entrepreneur	Timbira		7th Voted Out 1st Jury Member Day 24	4
	Tyson Apostol 29, Heber City, UT Professional Cyclist	Timbira		8th Voted Out 2nd Jury Member Day 27	5
	Sierra Reed 23, Los Angeles, CA Model	Timbira		9th Voted Out 3rd Jury Member Day 30	11
	Debbie Beebe 46, Auburn, AL School Principal	Timbira		10th Voted Out 4th Jury Member Day 33	6
	Coach Wade 37, Bolivar, MO Soccer Coach	Timbira		11th Voted Out 5th Jury Member Day 36	6
	Taj Johnson-George 37, Nashville, TN Former Pop Star	Jalapao		12th Voted Out 6th Jury Member Day 37	7
	Erinn Lobdell 26, Milwaukee, WI Hairstylist	Timbira		13th Voted Out 7th Jury Member Day 38	5
	Stephen Fishbach 29, New York City, NY Corporate Consultant	Jalapao		Runner-Up	1
	J.T. Thomas 24, Mobile, AL Cattle Rancher	Jalapao		Sole Survivor	0

Season Summary

The players were split into two tribes, Timbira and Jalapao, prior to the game beginning. Timbira won the majority of the Immunity Challenges, and was dominated by an alliance led by Coach and Tyson. Both the Hidden Immunity Idol and Exile Island twists were in play, with the clues to the Hidden Idols available at Exile. The winning tribe of each Reward Challenge would be able to select one member of the losing tribe to be exiled, while the exiled player would be able to choose a member of the winning tribe to join them.

On one of these occasions, Brendan from Timbira and Taj from Jalapao formed a secret cross-tribal alliance for the merge, bringing in Sierra and Stephen, respectively. The alliance members saw several repeat visits to Exile, securing both Immunity Idols by sharing the clues. After J.T. accidentally stumbled upon the Hidden Immunity Idol in Stephen's pocket, Taj and Stephen agreed to bring J.T. into their own alliance, and the three decided to share the use of the Idol. Timbira was able to win the last three Immunity Challenges before the merge.

While Timbira had the numerical advantage entering the merge, they were fractured due to lack of trust; with Coach and Tyson recruiting J.T. and Stephen into their alliance to overthrow Brendan and Sierra. With Taj and Stephen deciding to betray the Exile Alliance and Brendan neglecting to play his Idol, he was voted out. With the dissent among Timbira exposed and through recruiting Erinn, J.T., Stephen, and Taj managed to navigate between the two Timbira factions to eliminate them all. At the final 4, J.T. and Stephen opted to blindside Taj for being a jury threat. When J.T. won the Final Immunity Challenge, he brought Stephen to the Final Two.

At the Final Tribal Council, the jury unanimously voted for J.T. to be named the Sole Survivor, believing he played a stronger and more strategic game compared to Stephen.

Episode		Air Date	Challenges		Exiled	Eliminated (Vote)	Finish	Viewership (in millions)	Rating/Share (18-49)
			Reward	Immunity
1	"Let's Get Rid of the Weak Players Before We Even Start"	February 12, 2009	Timbira1			Sandy (6-1-1)	Sent to Jalapao Camp Day 1	13.63	4.4/13
						Sierra (6-2)	Sent to Timbira Camp Day 1
						Carolina (7-1)	1st Voted Out Day 3
2	"The Poison Apple Needs to Go"	February 19, 2009	Jalapao1		Brendan	Candace (7-1)	2nd Voted Out Day 6	13.59	4.5/12
					Taj
3	"Mama Said There'd Be Days Like This"	February 26, 2009	Jalapao	Jalapao	Brendan	Jerry (6-1)	3rd Voted Out Day 9	12.05	3.9/11
					Taj
4	"The Strongest Man Alive"	March 5, 2009	Jalapao	Timbira	Sierra	Sandy (5-1-1)	4th Voted Out Day 12	11.85	3.8/10
					Taj
5	"You're Going to Want That Tooth"	March 12, 2009	Jalapao	Timbira	Brendan	Spencer (5-1)	5th Voted Out Day 15	12.82	4.1/12
					Stephen
6	"The First 15 Days"	March 25, 2009	Recap Episode					N/A	N/A
7	"One of Those 'Coach Moments'"	April 2, 2009	Timbira	Timbira	Joe	Sydney (3-2)	6th Voted Out Day 18	11.27	3.6/11
					Erinn
8	"The Dragon Slayer"	April 9, 2009	None	Tyson	None	Joe (no vote)	Evacuated Day 20	11.24	3.5/11
9	"The Biggest Fraud in the Game"	April 16, 2009	Brendan, Debbie, J.T.	Tyson	Stephen	Brendan (4-3-2)	7th Voted Out 1st Jury Member Day 24	11.64	3.6/11
10	"It's Funny When People Cry"	April 23, 2009	Debbie, Erinn, J.T., Tyson	Debbie	Stephen	Tyson (5-3)	8th Voted Out 2nd Jury Member Day 27	11.30	3.5/11
11	"They Both Went Bananas"	April 30, 2009	Stephen [J.T., Taj]	Coach	Erinn	Sierra (4-2-1)	9th Voted Out 3rd Jury Member Day 30	11.73	3.6/11
12	"The Ultimate Sacrifice"	May 7, 2009	Survivor Auction	Stephen	Taj	Debbie (4-1-1)	10th Voted Out 4th Jury Member Day 33	11.99	3.8/12
13	"The Martyr Approach"	May 14, 2009	J.T. [Stephen]	J.T.	Coach	Coach (3-2)	11th Voted Out 5th Jury Member Day 36	12.18	3.8/12
14	"I Trust You but I Trust Me More"	May 17, 2009	None	J.T.	None	Taj (3-1)	12th Voted Out 6th Jury Member Day 37	12.94	4.2/11
				J.T.		Erinn (1-0)	13th Voted Out 7th Jury Member Day 38
			Jury Vote			Stephen (7-0)	Runner-Up
						J.T. (7-0)	Sole Survivor
15	"Reunion"							11.59	4.1/10
Notes: ^1 Combined Reward and Immunity Challenge.

Voting History

		Original Tribes						Merged Tribe
Episode		1	2	3	4	5	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14
Voted Out		Carolina	Candace	Jerry	Sandy	Spencer	Sydney	Joe	Brendan	Tyson	Sierra	Debbie	Coach	Taj	Erinn	Stephen	J.T.
Vote		7-1	7-1	6-1	5-1-1	5-1	3-2	No vote1	4-3-2	5-3	4-2-1	4-1-1	3-2	3-1	1-02	7-0
►	J.T.	Carolina	—	—	Sandy	Spencer	Sydney	—	Sierra	Tyson	Sierra	Debbie	Erinn	Taj	Erinn	Jury Vote
►	Stephen	Carolina	—	—	Sandy	Spencer	Sydney	—	Brendan	Tyson	Sierra	Debbie	Coach	Taj	None
►	Erinn	—	Candace	Jerry	—	—	—	—	Sierra	Tyson	Stephen	Debbie	Coach	Taj	None		J.T.
►	Taj	Carolina	—	—	Joe	Spencer	Sydney	—	Brendan	Tyson	Debbie	Debbie	Coach	Erinn			J.T.
►	Coach	—	Candace	Jerry	—	—	—	—	Brendan	Sierra	Sierra	Taj	Erinn				J.T.
►	Debbie	—	Candace	Jerry	—	—	—	—	Brendan	Sierra	Sierra	Coach					J.T.
►	Sierra	—	Candace	Jerry	—	—	—	—	Coach	Tyson	Debbie						J.T.
►	Tyson	—	Candace	Jerry	—	—	—	—	Sierra	Sierra							J.T.
►	Brendan	—	Candace	Jerry	—	—	—	—	Coach								J.T.
►	Joe	Carolina	—	—	Sandy	Spencer	Taj	Evacuated
	Sydney	Carolina	—	—	Sandy	Spencer	Taj
	Spencer	Carolina	—	—	Sandy	Taj
	Sandy	Carolina	—	—	Sydney
	Jerry	—	Candace	Erinn
	Candace	—	Sierra
	Carolina	Sandy
Notes: ^1 Joe was evacuated from the game due to a severely infected wound; therefore, the Tribal Council scheduled for that night was cancelled. ^2 Erinn and Stephen did not vote as they could only vote for each other. By virtue of winning the Final Immunity Challenge, only J.T. voted.

Trivia

• Tocantins marks the third country (Brazil) to be revisited as a location of filming, following Panama and Palau, though it became the first country to host two seasons in two separate locations. While The Amazon was filmed in the Rio Negro river, this season was shot in an entirely different province of Brazil, at the Rio Novo river.
• Tocantins is the only Survivor season with "Outwit, Outplay, Outlast" entirely on the top of its logo.
• Tocantins is the first season since Panama to follow the original format that was used during the first four seasons (a pool of sixteen contestants, with ten making the merge, a Final Two, and a seven person jury).
  • Tocantins is the most recent season with 16 contestants.
• Thus far, Tocantins is the only season to feature black as the color for a starting tribe. Black has otherwise only been used as the color of the merged tribe.
• Tocantins is the first season since Thailand to feature an all-male Final Two.
• Abi-Maria Gomes, who eventually competed on Philippines, was originally recruited for this season. However, she was cut due to her possibly having an advantage as a Brazilian, since she is originally from Goiás, a neighboring state of Tocantins.
• Tocantins has produced the most returning players, all of the same gender, with four, all of whom being male.
  • All four returning players from Tocantins have reached the Final Tribal Council at some point in their Survivor careers.