Survivor: San Juan Del Sur

**Survivor: San Juan Del Sur** is the tenth season of *PM Survivor​*. Alec Richardson learned from his past mistakes and used his social game to align with the powerful women of the game. His subtle leader position earned him the win over Lanka Patel in a 6-3 vote. To date, it has produced two returning players (Belle Hoang and Paxton Ferreira) for subsequent season.

## Production

The season would take place in May under a new format. Two episodes will take place in a single day. The season would last a total of seven days.

## Twists

* **One Returnee per Tribe:** Two former contestants return for another chance to win. The tribes will partake in their first *Hero Duel* to determine the returnee's starting tribe.
* **Hidden Immunity Idol:** A Hidden Immunity Idol will be hidden at both camps. Both idols are usable until the Day 36 Tribal Council.
* **Hero Duels:** At every reward challenge, the castaways must nominate one player to play in the reward challenge. The two will duel in a challenge for the winning tribe.
* **Tribe Switch:** At the final fifteen, a tribe switch took place putting the tribes at 7 players each.
* **Exile Island​:** At the final fifteen, one person was sent to Exile Island because of not being placed on a tribe. They would join the losing tribe following their tribal council.
* **Early Merge:** This season merged with twelve castaways in the game.
* **Double Elimination:** On Day 30, Votan was subjected to a double elimination, where two castaways would be eliminated after two rounds of voting.

## Season Summary

Sixteen new players were divided into two tribes named Nakon and Yopaat which were the names of Mayan Gods. The two tribes competed in a challenge for which returnee they wanted on their tribe. Yopaat won the challenge and choose Aubrey Anderson from *Vanuatu* and Alec Richardson from *Gabon*. Yopaat had early success winning the first two immunity challenges.

After a Tribe Swap on Day 10, original Yopaat was put on the bottom of the new Yopaat tribe which saw the rise to alliance of four consisting of Fayola Swanson, Francisco Rivera, Elisa Hale and Blake Jordan. The new Yopaat lost every challenge post-swap which gave way to many of the vote offs to original Yopaat members excluding Elijah Mathews who flipped on his allies to be in a majority position.

At a large merge of 12, Nakon had the numbers of 7 original members against Yopaat's number of 5. However, Belle Hoang provided the first major blindside of the season when she turned against tight group of four, blinding Elisa. With the help of a rogue, Valo Gold, Francisco was blindsided the following tribal leading to a tie in numbers 5 against 5.

Instead of tying the vote, the original tribes had different agendas leading to a messy vote, but ultimately original Nakon took control to vote off Naya. Following her vote off, Nakon took out anyone who wasn't with them. Elijah and Paxton Ferreira managed to find Hidden Immunity Idols and use them successfully to take out original Nakon member, Blake, and returnee, Aubrey. However, they were consequently voted out following after each other afterwards. Alec and Belle turned against biggest threat Fayola in the final four. Alec won the final immunity challenge and took out his biggest threat, Belle.

At the Final Tribal Council, Alec Richardson was praised on his challenge wins and his achievement of returning and making the final two. Lanka Patel was commended on her ability to stay on the right side of the vote in a majority of the tribal councils. However, Alec's returnee status paved his story that the jury respected ultimately earning him the win a 6-3 vote.

## Trivia

* This is the first season of *Survivor* to include both new players and returning players.
	+ This is the first season of the "one returnee per tribe" format.
* This is the first season to have the starting tribes to not be completely formed prior to Day 1.
	+ The would be completed with Alec Richardson and Aubrey Anderson joining their tribe after the first hero duel.