Kamen Jackson

***Kamen*** was a castaway on Essential Survivor: Japan. He later competed on Essential Survivor: All-Stars.

## Japan

For someone who was constantly on the majority of the numbers, Kamen's game doesn’t get as much recognition as it deserves. He may be a somewhat quiet player, but for someone to say he didn't deserve the win had he made the FTC is ludacris.

During the pre-swap, Kamen had an easy time. From the jump, he found the first idol of the season, coupled with the fact that he was included in two main alliances before the swap. Kamen’s positioning here was top-tier, but someone by the name of Richard began to ruin it. When Furui had lost their 2nd straight challenge in a row, the plan was to split the vote 4-3 between Richard and Luke. Everyone including Kamen agreed that this was the most beneficial move then. But not everyone trusted Kamen. This was because during the last vote, Richard had told everyone that Kamen was relaying him info on certain topics. Knowing this, everyone (mostly Josiah) was worried that Kamen may use an idol and switch his vote to cause a rock draw. Thankfully, he remained level-headed and stuck to the plan, booting Richard and maintaining a now rocky position.

Fast forward to the swap and a 4-4 split is obviously not the greatest spot to be in. And to make matters worse due to an advantage Geo had received during the challenge, he stole Enrique away from his camp. Leaving Kamen, Ace and Cheren in the minority as they were going to Tribal Council. At first, it seemed like the Furui trio would go for Vincent, trying to get either Tommy or Travis to flip (who reported back to their alliance while doing so) but nothing was working. Then, Zent arrived. Feeling bad and not wanting to leave them in the minority, Zent told Kamen that the vote was Cheren. But not wasting the opportunity, he told his allies to switch the vote onto Zent, also playing his idol on Cheren. Needless to say, by the end of this Tribal, plenty of shocked reactions were present. Not too much else happened post-swa besides pagonging the Wakai, so let’s move onto the merge!

At the merge, a clear 7-4 split in OG tribe numbers was clearly apparent with Furui leading. So as the foursome that threw challenges reunited with Jack, Josiah and Luke, they had expected nothing but unbreakable loyalty. Mind you, before the merge, this same foursome made a pact to keep everything that happened on Swapped Furui on the down-low. Welp, safe to say Enrique had broken that rule, telling Josiah EVERYTHING. And the four definitely paid the price for it as Jack and Josiah flipped on them, taking out Cheren for his idol.

Next round, despite feeling betrayed by the Double J’s, the Furui Foursome knew that realigning with them was their only choice to make it far in this game. And when Enrique won immunity, Ace and Kamen were met with a tasty proposition, courtesy of X and Geo. Essentially doing some of Theodore’s dirty work, the two Wakai asked Kamen if he’d be willing to blindside Josiah with them. As retaliation for what he did to them the previous Tribal. But after several hours of consideration, Ace and Kamen had decided it’d be best for them to stick with Furui, so they lead Wakai on. And thankfully so, because it saved Theo from using his idol, blindsiding Josiah regardless.

At the Final 9, things were pretty simple. Geo put a HUGE target on his back by attempting to pit Furui against each other, coupled with the fact that he had simply ‘given up’ on his game. Seems like an easy vote right? Wrong. Turns out Geo was playing all of Wakai with his over-the-top behavior. And in doing so, he managed to take out Jack. Someone who all of Furui were planning to blindside earlier anyways. But in memory of Jack, Geo was voted out 5-3 next round, so all was well in the Keiko Camp. Now things began to get spicy…

As the Final 7 came around, Ace and Kamen were ready to make a big move… they were going to flip to the Wakai and take out the biggest threat left, Josiah. But when Josiah won immunity, all plans were scratched and everyone teamed up to take out Enrique. Things didn't end there though because Enrique played his idol, negating all votes cast against him and taking out Luke with one vote. At the Final 6, there were three clear duos left. Acemen, Jorique, and Jax. Jay won immunity, which gave Jax and Acemen options on who to vote out. They had decided on Josiah, which worked perfectly as he went home AND Enrique wasted an idol, all in the same tribal.

Now we’ve arrived at the Final Five and things couldn’t have gotten any better for Kamen. Enrique won immunity, which meant a huge and clear threat was still in the Final Four, he also had an idol, which put himself in the Final Four with Enrique. And they somehow convinced Enrique to side with them over the Wakai. So while Ace was doing Kamen’s dirty work and making sure the two wakai wasted their votes by putting them on Kamen, Kamen locked in Enrique as a vote for them. So even with Ace’s rogue vote, the vote count was 2\*-2-1. Allowing Jay to be snuffed out of the game. At the Final Four, Enrique had won immunity, so it seemed clear that X and Kamen were going to firemaking as Ace was never a threat to anyone. But knowing that he was always seen as the #2 man to Kamen, Ace betrayed him, sending Kamen to the jury, 3-1.

## All-Stars

Even in Season 4, it was always a debate on whether or not Kamen was a contender to win by the time of his boot. So heading into All-Stars, while Kamen wanted to prove why he should’ve won, he also wanted to be a lowkey under-the-radar player. But achieving that comes with risks, one of them being that your perception won’t be as good at the Final Tribal Council. A risk Kamen faced head-on.

On the Nicobar tribe, Kamen began to make a name for himself as he single-handedly won the first Immunity Challenge for his tribe. On the downside, he wasn’t able to make many starting connections, but was still included to a 6-person majority nonetheless. But besides his great tribal challenge performances, there wasn't too much going on for Kamen. At the swap however, things did pick up as the crazy Payton vote went down and Kamen was thrown into a meditator position between his allies. During the swap phase, Kamen was self-aware that he was most likely on the bottom of the totem pole in his alliance. Although he took it with grace, as never wanted to be in a frontrunner position unless it was crucial.

Now we’ve hit the merge and Kamen is in his best position thus far, noticeably bottom of the majority alliance. Of course, most people can’t win without showing much of any assertiveness, and although Kamen did push for some votes here and there, he knew it wouldn’t be enough to pander the jury. But as the game went on, Kamen got more and more buys, to the point where the tribe collectively agreed that he was the driest person in DMs. So by the Final tribal Council and he’s there with Ben and Zach, the jury felt like Kamen didn't have anything to his name, even being referred to by one as ‘an alliance goat’. Nonetheless, Kamen left India as a 2-vote Finalist, but also left with his head held high, which you gotta respect.