Brendan Shapiro was voted out of “Survivor: Ghost Island” in Wednesday’s fourth episode not because of anything he said or did, but because he had a numbers disadvantage following the tribe swap. His former Malolo tribe had four members compared to Naviti’s five. Brendan’s alliance buddy Michael Yerger was in possession of a hidden immunity idol, but he incorrectly used it on Stephanie Johnson and so Brendan was sent packing. “I would have used it on myself,” Brendan confesses to me when I ask him what he would have done if he had the idol instead of Michael. “I had a sense that it was coming my way.” Listen to our “Survivor” exit interview podcast above.
“The Naviti folks were being too obvious about hinting that they were gonna go for one of the two women, [Stephanie and Jenna Bowman],” Brendan continues. “I had a conversation with Kellyn Bechtold and I was telling her how the next day was my birthday and that I really wanted to be playing ‘Survior’ on my birthday. She is so empathetic and compassionate that it brought a tear to her eye. So I went to Michael and I’m like, ‘Dude, they’re voting it on me, this is coming to me.’ I think he just had a hard time believing that they would go for a guy that early. And sure enough, they did.”
SEE ‘Survivor’ Winners List (Seasons 1 – 35)
What does Brendan think of this season’s Ghost Island twist? “I’d love to have gone just to see it and to know what was going on,” he readily admits. “I believed that there would be the opportunity for advantages, and you always want to have a shot at that. I mean, it’s a double-edged sword. I think it hurt Jacob Derwin because he was away from all the rest of us and it gave us the chance to talk about him. Had I made it later in the game I would have liked to give it a shot.”
Also in our “Survivor: Ghost Island” exit interview, Brendan details how long he’s been applying to be on the show, what he thinks of his tribe mates naming him as the leader back in Episode 1, and what surprised him the most going from a superfan to a contestant. Only 16 castaways still remain in the game. Who will be voted out next?
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