Survivor Final 5 Analysis: Russell Hantz

Gameplay

Of the five players left in the game, Russell Hantz has probably had the largest impact on the game and the fate of the other participants. Russell’s read on the weakness of Tyson and the planting of his ‘Russell seed’, got Tyson to vote himself off of the island, and set the stage for a sweeping up of all of Boston Rob Mariano’s alliance. He recruited Jerri and Coach to his side and sent the Robfather home short of the Jury phase of the game. After that Russell played on the assumptions of the Heroes, taking every chance to make it seem like he was on the outs and in trouble… until JT gave him his immunity idol. Since then Russell has played a more erratic game recruiting Candice successfully but also voting off Danielle which spun the lines of loyalty into new and strange formations.

There is no denying that Russell has had a major effect on the game, that much of the game has appeared to dance to his tune. It’s how he plays the music that causes him problems. Russell is one of the most dominant strategic players to ever play the game, he is very good at manipulating people, making people ignore the long term consequences of their choices and to be frank, bullying people into doing what he wants them to do. This allowed him on his original season to overturn a numbers disadvantage as well. His talent for reading people strategically, ferreting out threats and bullying will almost certainly get him to the Final Three. But we all know that when the rubber hits the road, the winner of this game is decided by the vote.

Russell’s scorched earth strategy leaves those he sends to the jury no room for pride, no room for positivity. Russell seems driven to make it plain that he beat them, that he came out on top, that he’s the best, the champ! It leaves Jury members with a bad taste in their mouths, and makes even players that have an inclination to vote for game play decisions looking for a way to deny his supremacy. Russell may be one of the best to play this game, but he will never breath the rarefied air of those who’ve won it.

Chances of Making the Final Tribal Council – 90%

Russell will most likely be taken to the Final Three by any of the remaining players. While none of those players like him, it’s clear that the jury loathes him so taking him increases your chances of winning to 50 / 50. At this point the only reason why someone would vote Russell off is that they felt personally threatened by him so had no choice, or because they don’t want to risk the .1% chance that Russell would win a million dollars. That’s happened before with Colby and Scoutmaster Lil each taking someone to the finals who beat them, just because they didn’t want to risk the object of their scorn out-arguing them. In this case that seems unlikely, as Russell’s general techniques of bluster and bully aren’t well known for convincing jury members to look his way, so that danger is remote.

Chances of Winning – 1%

You can never say that a player has zero chance to win the game, because there is always the chance that there will be a ‘Rats vs Snakes’ moment, or a ‘Pick a Number’ moment. But Russell comes close. Given what we’ve seen of the jury members (and if you haven’t watched the Ponderosa footage, you should), it seems pretty clear that they hate him and not in a small way. If he was in the finals with Danielle and Parvati he might have been able to make the argument that he was always loyal, that he’d made all the major moves and that they’re there because of him… but he took that option off the table when he turned on Danielle. To win, he will have to give the best final Tribal Council speech / answers ever, and keep his cool when people confront him… which isn’t a Russell strong point.

Optimum Final Council

For Russell to have any possible chance of winning he has to sit at the Final Tribal Council with players that the jury has no respect for, deservedly or not. That seems to suggest a Jerri / Sandra / Russell final three works best. Parvati can, and will, talk rings around Russell and Colby will get too many votes from the Heroes for Russell to beat him. Even this scenario is risky for Russell because Sandra can make a case for making it to the finals after her alliance was eliminated and Jerri can honestly say that she’s cast most of the decisive votes in this game.