Survivor: Exile Island – Survivor Live Recap, The Finale

It’s time for the final episode of the season of Survivor Live, CBS’s Internet interview show that features the most recently eliminated contestant from Survivor: Exile Island. Hosted by Dalton Ross of Entertainment Weekly and Survivor: Amazon winner Jenna Morasca.

It’s a super-sized show this week! Our guests come in two waves – first up are fan favorite Cirie Fields and challenge master Terry Deitz. Then we visit with runner-up Danielle DiLorenzo and the winner of Survivor: Exile Island, Aras Baskauskas. Yes, it still feels a little wrong typing that, I still think all the interesting people ended up on the jury.

Let’s begin, as usual, with a trivia question. How many times have both of the final two contestants been the same age? As usual, the answer will be near the bottom of this article.

Both hosts start things off by commenting that they had a great time last night. Jenna tells us she went to bed long before Dalton did. Nonetheless, both are looking a trifle tired.

Right off, Dalton asks Terry about the rivalry with Aras. As Terry responds, we hear that he has almost no voice left! Terry says it got personal, but they were both men enough to make up at the end. He called Aras “a great competitor” and disagrees with Danielle saying on the last episode they were still fighting as they had made up by then.

Dalton asks Cirie about her dropping the torch in front of Terry. She (also a bit hoarse) says she’s mended fences with Terry as well; putting it down to stress levels in the game and Terry being upset that Shane was just voted out. Terry admits he should have kept his mouth shut, and admits that part of his frustration was indeed over losing another potential ally in Shane.

Dalton says it seemed like these two were the most fun at the parties last night. They suspect Aras was relieved to have won, and Danielle maybe a little tight after losing.

The clip is run of Cirie losing the tiebreaker challenge. The previews had made it look like Cirie had a huge fire, which was an indicator to us more suspicious viewers that she would somehow lose. Back live, Dalton says this was the first time he ever found this challenge exciting and the live audience was really getting into it. Cirie says that Jeff Probst’s comments were making her nervous and she confesses she was sneaking peaks at Danielle’s fire to get hints about what she was doing wrong. Myself, I thought it was inappropriate for Probst to be coaching Cirie like that.

Laurie in NC is the first caller. In a common theme today, she calls these two the most deserving finalists. No argument here! She asks Cirie if she ever thought she’d make it this far. No, she thought it would be six days and was so miserable the first two weeks she was almost hoping to go and when Shane told her she was next, she had pretty much accepted it. However, she got her second wind and became determined to go as afar as she could.

Caller Laurie also asks Terry, did he really expect Danielle not to lie to him again after so many previous betrayals from her? Had he given the idol to her at the final four tribal council, he thinks she would have held true. Otherwise, he hoped she would but sees from watching the show that she also had an earlier pact with Aras and it was less likely to go his way than he hoped. He now thinks she made the right decision.

Terry feels the tight relationship of the Casaya tribe made it possible for Aras to get aggressive in convincing Danielle to take him to the end, but he had to use a more mature approach. Myself, I doubt there was a single thing he could have done short of offering her the Yukon.

Jeremy of Chicago noted Cirie was considered the “tribe mother.” Would they have collapsed without her? And Terry was like his tribe’s father, did that relationship develop?

Cirie initially says she doubts she had that much influence because she was staying out of the way because she needed them to be dysfunctional so she could worm her way in. She became more of a mediator, calming Aras when he was mad at Courtney, for example. She concludes that maybe they would have had a rockier road without her.

Terry says they called him “Poppa La Mina” and “Pappy,” but he wanted to direct that role to Dan. Others such as Misty and Ruth Marie contributed leadership in early challenges, but he was forced to take a larger role as time passed.

In response to a question from Dalton, Terry confirms that the hardest part of the game for him was voting off Dan.

Jeff from Maryland asks what was not shown that contributed to Aras’s winning the game. Cirie says what he did for others wasn’t shown. There was a point where they had no water or fire for several days and he came up with the idea of drinking rainwater off of leaves. He also had them eating cut-up cactus plants like watermelon slices, and forced them to eat. He took care of everyone because he cared, not just for votes.

Terry says that after they realized Shane was not running the tribe, Aras was always a target but kept dodging the bullets and messing up Terry’s efforts. He adds that Cirie was behind a lot of that, but Terry’s talking more about Aras handling the stress.

The second segment begins with some of Cirie’s best scenes, including her scoring the first point in the wresting challenge. Then Dalton introduces “Probst’s Thoughts,” where Jeff Probst records a message to the departing player.

Probst thinks Cirie is one of Jeff’s biggest favorites ever. Initially she was just happy to be in the game, but none of the production team thought she would last. Cirie says she loved Jeff even before this season. In other media Jeff has also said many nice things about her.

Cirie says she used to be afraid of failing or getting embarrassed, and that’s why she hid in the safety of her couch. Those days are over. She’s still in awe that she made it so far into the game. She figures she’s wasted so much of her life already that she doesn’t want to waste another minute.

Dalton segues to Jenna for a rant about Terry, but it never materializes. Jenna notes Terry has taken it a lot better than Tom Westman did.

Terry has presents for the hosts. Dalton has a NYY – Joe Torre hat for Dalton, because his dad was a coach and he inspired Terry. For Jenna, he has a picture of Joe Torre because she didn’t know who he is.

So, no rant, no fireworks.