Last Push

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Last Push
Episode Information
Season	Caramoan
Episode Number	14/14 (371)
Original Release	May 12, 2013
Episode Chronology
Previous	"Don't Say Anything About My Mom"
Next	"Blood Is Thicker than Anything" (next season)
Subpages

Last Push is the season finale of Survivor: Caramoan.

Story

Night 36

As the Enil Edam tribe walk their way back to camp from Tribal Council, Erik Reichenbach tells his tribe he is very dizzy. Jeff Probst comes in with the Survivor Medical Team to check Erik's condition, where Dr. Joe deduces that Erik's body could no longer cope with malnourishment and dehydration. As the medics put an intravenous drip on Erik, Eddie, an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) by profession, explains Erik his health status. Dr. Joe then declares that due to Erik's health being dangerously debilitating, he does not allow him to continue on the competition.

“	As Brenda left Tribal Council, I looked at Erik and it looked to me he's stunned by the vote because he wasn't aware of it.	”
—Dawn Meehan

“	When I looked at Erik, I saw somebody that was very dazed and looked disoriented and was kind of out of it.	”
—John Cochran

With no other choice other than accept his fate, Erik says his goodbyes to his tribemates and vice versa. Jeff reminds the four remaining castaways that despite Erik's evacuation, the game continues on. The final four castaways then continue to walk back to camp.

“	Erik's gone. There's four of us now. This opens the door hugely for me to kind of sneak myself in there and make a major play.	”
—Eddie Fox

Returning to camp, the final four discuss the evacuation, expressing sadness about Erik's sudden elimination. Cochran realizes the game is back on, and starts strategizing once again. After several Tribal Councils trying to oust Eddie, if it weren't for bigger strategic threats Andrea and Brenda, the Harvard law graduate finally flirts with the idea of working with him because he is the most likely to win the remaining challenges, ostensibly having a big say as to who goes at the Final Tribal Council. While Dawn and Sherri were already asleep, Cochran makes his move on Eddie, where Eddie agrees to make a Final Three deal with him, stating that Dawn is a bigger threat than Sherri.

“	We kind of exchanged a few sad pleasantries about the sad state of affairs, and I'm already thinking about the game. My first thought is I have to be the first person to get to Eddie. Eddie is somebody who I haven't bonded that closely but I have to be in his good graces because he is most likely to win the next Immunity Challenges and to be in the position of power to determine who goes at the Final Three.	”
—John Cochran

“	We vote out Dawn next. Sherri comes in third. Cochran comes in second, and I come in first and I win the million dollar prize.	”
—Eddie Fox

Day 37

Still not getting over the fact that Erik was pulled from the game, the remaining contestants try to get a better understanding of where they stand and who they want in the final 3. Eddie and Sherri talk about voting off Dawn while Dawn comes up to Cochran since she is worried but Cochran, once again, reassures her. However, he does consider voting off Dawn. At the challenge, it is revealed to be a Reward Challenge as anticipated but the reward is an advantage to the next challenge (the Final Immunity Challenge). Eddie was hoping the reward would be food related but he is happy with this reward because he really need to win final immunity otherwise he is likely the top target. The challenge proved interesting as the leaders continued to fall back behind but ultimately Cochran managed to win the challenge and the advantage. Since Cochran has the advantage, the others try harder to ensure that Cochran is willing to go to the final 3 with them. Eddie pitches his plan to vote off Dawn which Cochran neither confirms nor denies.

Challenges

Reward

Challenge: Teeter Tower
The castaways would use one hand to hold on to a rope to steady a balancing board. With the other hand, they would build a house of cards with wooden tiles on one end of the balancing board. The first castaway to build a tall enough house of cards to reach the finish mark would win.
Reward: An advantage in the next Immunity Challenge.
Winner: John Cochran

Reward Challenge: Teeter Tower
Result	Winner	Competitors
Castaway	File:S26 cochran t.jpg Cochran	File:S26 dawn t.jpgFile:S26 eddie t.jpgFile:S26 sherri t.jpg Dawn, Eddie, & Sherri

Immunity

Challenge: Vertically Challenged
The castaways would race up a three-story tower to retrieve a bag of puzzle pieces tied to a post and then slide down a water slide. Two more puzzle piece bags would need to be retrieved before the castaways could start on their puzzle. The first castaway to assemble their puzzle would win. Cochran had the advantage of having his puzzle bags already untied.
Winner: John Cochran

Immunity Challenge: Vertically Challenged
Result	Winner	Competitors
Castaway	File:S26 cochran t.jpg Cochran	File:S26 dawn t.jpgFile:S26 eddie t.jpgFile:S26 sherri t.jpg Dawn, Eddie, & Sherri

Tribal Council

Night 36

Removed from Camp
EVACUATED: File:S26 erik bw.jpg Erik Reichenbach

Day 38

Tribal Council 14: Enil Edam
Voted Against	Voter
File:S26 eddie t.jpg Eddie (3 votes)	File:S26 cochran t.jpgFile:S26 dawn t.jpgFile:S26 sherri t.jpg Cochran, Dawn, & Sherri
File:S26 dawn t.jpg Dawn (1 vote)	File:S26 eddie t.jpg Eddie
VOTED OFF: File:S26 eddie bw.jpg Eddie Fox

Voting Confessionals

Cochran's vote was not shown during his confessional.

“	(voting for Dawn) Sorry Dawn, me or you.	”
—Eddie

“	(voting for Eddie) Please go home.	”
—Dawn

“	(voting for Eddie) I think you're the only person out there that could beat me, so you gotta go.	”
—Cochran

Final Words

“	I think Sherri has a 0% chance of winning, which is why she is going to the final three. I feel like if I would've gone to the final three, first place was mine for the final taking. So, to be honest as much as, you know, it sucks, I'm pretty happy with how I ended up. The fact that it's a Fans vs. Favorites season and that I made it to fourth really speaks a large volume to how I played, and I really wish I was gonna be there in the morning, but I'm out tonight, that's-- that's how it went today.	”
—Eddie Fox

Final Tribal Council

Tribal Council 15: Jury Vote
Voted for Winner	Voter
File:S26 cochran t.jpg Cochran (8 votes)	File:S26 andrea t.jpgFile:S26 brenda t.jpgFile:S26 eddie t.jpgFile:S26 erik t.jpg File:S26 malcolm t.jpgFile:S26 michael t.jpgFile:S26 phillip t.jpgFile:S26 reynold t.jpg Andrea, Brenda, Eddie, Erik, Malcolm, Michael, Phillip, & Reynold
File:S26 dawn t.jpg Dawn (0 votes)	None
File:S26 sherri t.jpg Sherri (0 votes)	None
RUNNERS-UP: File:S26 dawn bw.jpgFile:S26 sherri bw.jpg Dawn Meehan & Sherri Biethman
Sole Survivor: File:S26 cochran t.jpg John Cochran

Voting Confessionals

Malcolm's vote was not shown during his confessional.

“	(voting for Cochran) Cochran, my Intelligentsia Attaché, you did a wonderful job. I'm very proud of you, and thanks for joining Stealth "R" Us and doing right by the Fans and the Favorites.	”
—Phillip

“	(voting for Cochran) This is not the name I thought I'd be writing down tonight.	”
—Malcolm

Final Results

Francesca 20th File:S26 francesca bw.jpg	Allie 19th File:S26 allie bw.jpg	Hope 18th File:S26 hope bw.jpg	Shamar 17th File:S26 shamar bw.jpg	Laura 16th File:S26 laura bw.jpg	Brandon 15th File:S26 brandon bw.jpg	Matt 14th File:S26 matt bw.jpg	Julia 13th File:S26 julia bw.jpg	Corinne 12th File:S26 corinne bw.jpg	Michael 11th File:S26 michael bw.jpg
Phillip 10th File:S26 phillip bw.jpg	Malcolm 9th File:S26 malcolm bw.jpg	Reynold 8th File:S26 reynold bw.jpg	Andrea 7th File:S26 andrea bw.jpg	Brenda 6th File:S26 brenda bw.jpg	Erik 5th File:S26 erik bw.jpg	Eddie 4th File:S26 eddie bw.jpg	Dawn 2nd File:S26 dawn bw.jpg	Sherri 2nd File:S26 sherri bw.jpg	Cochran Winner File:S26 cochran t.jpg

Reunion

During the Survivor: Caramoan Reunion, the present pre-jury eliminees were seated alongside the audience than onstage, which was a first in Survivor history. The only castaways who were featured on stage were the Final Three and the jury. The only member of the jury who was not present was Brenda Lowe, who could not attend because she was in the advanced stages of her pregnancy, and was instead contacted via satellite in Florida. Brandon Hantz, who was also absent during the show, was banned from attending the reunion, to prevent any in-show altercation given his explosive elimination several weeks prior. Jeff Probst explained that the reason why the pre-jury eliminees were not given a seat onstage was because the new set could not accommodate them all, but in a Facebook post, Survivor: The Australian Outback and Survivor: Philippines contestant Michael Skupin revealed that the studio for the finale was the same set used in Philippines, and it was able to accommodate all 18 contestants from that season, the same number of contestants present at the Caramoan reunion show.

The Reunion was universally panned by fans and contestants alike, with many fans showed their distaste at the pre-jury contestants being left out and Jeff Probst addressing only six of the ten contestants allowed on stage. Erik Reichenbach, who was present but not acknowledged at the show, called the reunion "a farce", criticizing how the show left many questions on the season unanswered and how the pre-jury contestants were left out in favor of former contestants Rob Mariano and Rudy Boesch during the show. Corinne Kaplan and Allie Pohevitz posted rants on Twitter and Facebook respectively, expressing their disappointments about their being informed by their exclusion in such short notice, and wasting their families' time since the pre-jurors wouldn't be able to sit onstage, much less speak (in said post, Allie revealed that each contestant was entitled to bring six family members at the live show).

Malcolm won the Fan Favorite Award over Brenda.

Trivia

Other

• This episode aired on Mother's Day.
• The Teeter Totter challenge was a throwback of the penultimate challenge in Survivor: South Pacific, which was Dawn and Cochran's original season. However, Dawn and Cochran were already eliminated from the game when the challenge was administered in that season.
• In this episode, Erik Reichenbach becomes the first person to be medically evacuated in the finale episode of a season.
  • His evacuation is the latest evacuation in Survivor history, occurring on Night 36.
• This is the only episode post-merge to have someone be voted out unanimously.
• Cochran became the twenty-sixth Sole Survivor.
• This is the second consecutive finale episode to have someone be tied for runner-up after Survivor: Philippines (first were Lisa Whelchel and Michael Skupin who both received one jury vote, then Dawn Meehan and Sherri Biethman who received no votes).
  • The very first season to have someone be tied for runner up was in Survivor: Fiji when Cassandra Franklin and Dreamz Herd tied with 0 Jury votes.
• This is the second consecutive finale episode to have a Reward Challenge at Day 37.
  • Same as the Reward Challenge from last season's finale, the reward for winning the challenge is an advantage at the Final Immunity Challenge.
  • However, had Erik Reichenbach not being pulled from the game on Night 36, it would've been an Immunity Challenge.
• This episode is currently the last finale episode to feature the Rites of Passage.
• This is currently the last season to feature the Fan Favorite Award.

Episode Title

• This is the only episode of the season that doesn't receive its title based on a direct quote from the episode itself.

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