Dee Valladares is out of Survivor 50. She was voted out Wednesday night in Episode 7, titled “That’s Not How I Play Survivor,” a quote from Benjamin Coach Wade, who delivered it with complete sincerity and zero self-awareness.
By a 9-4-1 vote, Dee became the eleventh person eliminated this season and the first member of the jury.
She is also the last former winner standing. Every champion who entered Survivor 50 is now gone.
Dee played her Shot in the Dark in a last-ditch attempt to avoid the vote. She drew “Not Safe.”
Aubry Bracco played the Billie Eilish Boomerang idol on herself, not because she needed it, but because carrying it had become what she called a “Scarlet Letter.”
Both moves happened and neither changed the outcome. The votes were in, Coach got what he wanted, and the Dragon Slayer lived to fight another day.
The episode aired on CBS at 8 p.m. Eastern. It ran 90 minutes. Episode 8 airs Wednesday April 15.
One Week After The Blood Moon Tribal Council
Coming into this episode, the game was still absorbing the shock of last week’s Blood Moon tribal council, a CBS-produced twist in which the 15 remaining players were split into three separate groups, each of which voted out one person in the same night.
Three former players left in a single episode, Kamilla Karthigesu was blindsided, Genevieve Mushaluk played her Shot in the Dark unsuccessfully and was unanimously eliminated, and Colby Donaldson went home in an emotional final tribal that even Coach called “a most honorable sendoff.”
Colby’s exit left a vacancy in Coach’s alliance, and filling that vacancy immediately became one of the episode’s central storylines.
Ozzy Lusth and Rizo Velovic had missed the entire Blood Moon chaos because they had been sent to Exile Island.
Both returned refreshed and caught up quickly on everything they had missed, which was considerable.
The game had shifted significantly in their absence, and the alliances that had existed before Exile Island were not quite the same ones they were returning to.
The 14 players entering Wednesday’s episode were Aubry Bracco, Coach Wade, Chrissy Hofbeck, Christian Hubicki, Cirie Fields, Dee Valladares, Emily Flippen, Joe Hunter, Jonathan Young, Ozzy, Rick Devens, Rizo, Stephenie LaGrossa Kendrick, and Tiffany Ervin.
Aubry was immediately under fire for not playing her idol during the Blood Moon, despite having told Devens and Christian she absolutely would.
She later claimed she forgot. Devens and Christian did not believe it, and were correct not to, it was a tactical decision, but one that put a massive target on her back.
The Star Of The Show:Coach’s Episode
The real star of the hour was Coach, and it is worth being specific about what that means. Coach was not playing a subtle game. He was not threading needles or building coalitions quietly.
He was announcing alliances, writing haikus, calling out enemies, delivering speeches to assembled players about honor and integrity, and at one point losing his mind in front of most of the tribe when his plan leaked to the people he was trying to hide it from.
After learning from Jonathan that Dee had orchestrated the Charlie Davis blindside at their first tribal council, Coach declared that “the old Coach is back” and vowed to “wage war on all these people.”
He then approached Rizo about joining his Four Horsemen alliance, presenting it as an honor while noting the vacancy had been created by Colby’s exit.
Rizo, privately, was not impressed. “Wow, thanks, I’m so valuable that I’m in your group now because one of your members is down,” he said in confessional.
He accepted, smiled, and immediately went to Cirie to reassure her that his real alliance was with her and Ozzy, a group they had privately named “Cirie’s Rizard of Oz.”
Coach’s organizational campaign hit a wall when Devens overheard him call Christian “the most dangerous person in the game besides Dee” — while Devens was standing right there.
Devens, unsurprisingly, told Christian immediately. When Christian approached Coach to ask about the vote plan, Coach erupted.
The yelling happened in front of enough people that Chrissy and Stephenie sat back and openly wondered whether Coach was trying to get himself voted out.
Rick Devens provided the line of the episode, “This is Survivor 50, nobody came here to be anybody’s lackey.”
Emily Flippen, meanwhile, suggested what a portion of the viewing audience was thinking, maybe the answer here is just to vote out Coach.
He was making himself a target, he was alienating people in the middle, and at some level everyone knew that letting him run the game would eventually create a problem.
The suggestion gained traction, especially with Tiffany, who had been furious since the Blood Moon and was looking for any avenue to strike back.
The Journey Nobody Wanted
Nobody wanted to go on the episode’s journey, so the group drew names from a bag.
Stephenie LaGrossa Kendrick was selected, boarded a boat, competed in a challenge, and won a Steal-a-Vote advantage.
She told Cirie, who told Rizo. The Cirie-Rizo connection is increasingly looking like one of the most functional alliances remaining in the game.
For the immunity challenge, the 14 players split into two teams. The Blue team of Christian, Ozzy, Devens, Emily, Dee, Stephenie, and Joe faced the Purple team of Jonathan, Cirie, Chrissy, Rizo, Tiffany, Coach, and Aubry.
Blue won the team phase, earning a reward of Chinese food and the right to compete individually for immunity.
The second phase was an endurance challenge, stand on a balance beam while balancing a pole on the head with a ball on top, shifting to narrower sections of the beam as time goes on.
Ozzy won, beating out Joe in the final stretch. He has been a dominant physical presence this season, consistent with everything viewers who watched his three previous seasons would expect.
Among the Blue team losers not eating Chinese food, the talk immediately focused on Dee and Aubry.
Coach and Jonathan pushed hard for Dee to go home. Coach’s plan called for a split vote, Dee gets the majority, Tiffany gets the backup votes in case Dee successfully played her Shot in the Dark.
Tiffany pushed back, arguing that Dee as the only remaining former winner was a useful shield. Aubry acknowledged that she had backed herself into a corner and committed to playing her idol this time to remove the target from her back.
Tribal Council And The Vote
The 14-person tribal council was the largest in Survivor history. Jeff opened by noting the tension, and Emily confirmed that there had been “fights and conflicts of varying degrees” since the Blood Moon.
Dee acknowledged she was on the chopping block but warned that “the people that feel safe tonight, they should be scared.”
She then did what she could, standing up and beginning to whisper to Aubry and Ozzy that she had the votes to take out Coach and that they should join her.
The tribal turned into full live chaos, with multiple side conversations happening simultaneously.
Coach remained unmoved throughout. He sat there, reportedly composed, while Dee worked the room.
When it came time to vote, Aubry played the Billie Eilish idol on herself, burning it deliberately rather than carrying it another week.
Dee played her Shot in the Dark. Jeff opened the parchment and read “Not Safe.” The votes came in. One for Coach from Tiffany, four for Tiffany from Coach’s coalition, and nine for Dee.
Dee Valladares was eliminated. She walked to the jury bench. She was the last winner in the game.
Who Is Dee Valladares?
Dee won Survivor 45 and is widely regarded as one of the best winners of the show’s modern era.
She is Cuban-born and known for her aggressive social game and ability to play multiple sides simultaneously.
She came into Survivor 50 as a genuine threat and was treated as one from the beginning. Her critical mistake this episode was telling too many people about Rizo’s idol.
She told Emily, who told Rizo, which destroyed the trust Rizo had in her at precisely the moment she needed his support. She also told Tiffany and Jonathan, further underscoring how widely the information had spread.
Who Is Left And What Comes Next
Thirteen players remain. They are:
-Aubry Bracco
-Coach Wade
-Chrissy Hofbeck
-Christian Hubicki
-Cirie Fields
-Emily Flippen
-Joe Hunter
-Jonathan Young
-Ozzy Lusth
-Rick Devens
-Rizo Velovic
-Stephenie LaGrossa Kendrick
-Tiffany Ervin
Coach is currently running the dominant alliance with Jonathan and Joe as his Four Horsemen alongside Rizo, who is quietly playing a double game.
Cirie’s coalition with Rizo and Ozzy may be the most underestimated force left in the game.
Tiffany is on the outside and angry. Aubry is still standing, idol burned, target still present. Christian and Devens are firmly in the middle and aware of it.
Jeff Probst has teased that Episode 8 will feature “another twist” with “double the consequences.” It airs Wednesday April 15 at 8 p.m. ET on CBS and streams on Paramount+ the following day.
