Yahoo News Survivor’s Runner-Up Reacts to Those Big Final Tribal Reveals and Watching the Win Slip Away: ‘It Obviously Stung’
The following contains spoilers from Wednesday’s episode of Survivor.
Every grueling season of Survivor has to have a loser. Unfortunately for Austin Li Coon, he was the unlucky soul who watched the game rapidly slip through his fingers during a tense, yet evenly matched Final Tribal Council.
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After Jake and Katurah’s plan to cut Dee went sideways at the Final 5, Dee won the Final 4 challenge, electing to bring Austin with her to the finals. But after a couple huge reveals on her part (more on that below), Austin’s game fell apart and his fellow Reba alliance member-turned-showmance ran away with the win by a 5-3-0 vote. (Read a full recap here, plus our Q&A with Dee.)
Below, Austin talks to TVLine about his relationships with Dee and Drew, why he needed Katurah out, and what could’ve possibly happened had the plan to ditch Dee been successful.
TVLINE | So you’re sitting at Final Tribal and Jeff announces Dee as the winner. What was your instant gut reaction to the loss?
AUSTIN LI COON | Yeah, instant gut reaction was first off, it sucks to lose. I knew going in that Final Tribal was an uphill battle and she had a really big gut punch there, so I was like, “OK, it might not be looking as good as I thought.” So being able to make it so close, I felt a lot of pride in that. I obviously went into it thinking I could win this thing and seeing that kind of slip away, I was able to come to peace with it by the time the votes were read. She played a heck of a game, so it’s awesome knowing that this season, we’ve got a good winner. That was exciting, but it obviously stung a little bit.
Coming into the game as an alternate too, I felt like I had a different perspective. I couldn’t even picture myself playing the game too much or preparing for this because I knew most likely I was never gonna play. So to make it that far, to get three votes, I was just grateful and proud of myself.
TVLINE | Would you ever have turned your back on Dee or voted her out? Was that ever considered?
The one time I considered it was after the Drew blindside. I envisioned a path to the end where we take out Julie at five, then I take on Dee at fire-making and beat her there. I was never gonna vote her out. Same as I would never vote out Drew. Drew and Dee were my number ones, my best friends in the game, and I was gonna go to the end with them both regardless because we created such a good bond. Obviously, I told Dee that we were going to vote for Julie. She ended up telling Julie, who saves herself and sends Emily home. If Dee or Julie came up to me being like, “Hey, let’s vote out Emily,” then I would have, same way as I did with Dee, gone straight to Drew and I would have told Drew. We had that same connection. But I was never going to write their names down. I would only have taken them out on fire.
TVLINE | Dee revealed these two huge bombs — keeping you out of the Drew vote and her telling Julie that you guys were targeting her. How huge were those reveals for her win and did you feel a shift in the jury’s energy once those things were revealed?
Yeah. Major props to her for hiding that from me. Before Tribal Council, she told me while we were bantering with each other, she’s like, “Oh, I’ve got a secret. I can’t tell you now, but you’ll hear it later.” And I’m like, “What could this be?” What was actually interesting was she dropped that bomb much earlier in Tribal Council than what was shown. So she did that pretty early on, and once she said that it was like, “OK, I’ve got to turn this into overdrive,” and that’s when I’m really starting to go at her, and trying to attack her game a little bit because I was like, “If I don’t take some big swings at her, she’s gonna run away with it.”
TVLINE | Going to the end with Dee, what did you think your chances were, and how did that number change after the Q&A, just before the votes were cast and read?
Going into it, I put myself at maybe like 40-50%. I knew that the jury was being more receptive to Dee. You could see the positive energy, like when they’re looking at Dee when she’s answering, and when she’s coming in with the immunity necklace versus me. So I knew I was gonna really have to fight for everything. But I really was confident in being able to sit in front of the jury and tell my entire story, to share all the moves I made because a lot of these subtle, behind-the-scenes moves happened in the middle of the game. I felt like I could win and that I would win, but before the votes were read, I thought the chance of me winning was like 3%. I didn’t think I was going to win at that point, so I was actually surprised that I got three votes.
TVLINE | Can you explain to me your decision to give Julie an idol, and also your reasoning for not asking for it back?
So at Final 9, in my perspective, I didn’t need two idols. I felt like I had several paths to the end and what was way more useful for me was to maintain 100% loyalty with the Reba 4, as opposed to a second idol. I had to give her the stronger of the two idols because the amulet that I had was non-transferable. So I had to give her the more powerful one. And we did ask for it back the next day. Drew goes up to her and he’s sort of like, “Hey, so, Austin’s idol…” and she’s like, “What do you mean? This is my idol.” At that point, we’re like, “OK, she doesn’t want to give it back.” The fact that I already had another idol, it’s really hard to be like, “Hey, I just want to hold two idols. I don’t trust you.” We knew asking for it back straight up would raise so many red flags in her head and be like, “OK, they’re trying to come for me now. I’m not going to give it back and now I’m going after them.” So the only way to get it out of the game was to vote for her. Flush it out.
TVLINE | You offered to make fire against Katurah. Why were you and Dee so adamant about needing her out?
Katurah played a very interesting game. She was very similarly under the radar, but she was so good at talking with people. She was an amazing liar, amazing at sussing people out, amazing at forming relationships and she was really confident too. So I was worried that I was missing something about her game. We don’t see everything. I didn’t see anything at old Belo. There’s so much to her game I didn’t fully understand and that kind of scared me because we all knew she was a great talker. We all knew she could form really good relationships with people. So bringing someone who can speak well, whose game is kind of a mystery and who has friends in the jury? That was scary for me. It was more of an unknown. We felt like we knew Jake’s game better and how we could position ourselves when we argue against his game. But it was hard to prepare for that specifically against Katurah just because we weren’t really sure.
TVLINE | Did you feel that you needed an extra boost to your game by winning a fire challenge in front of the jury?
Yeah. I think that would have really helped and I knew that the jury was kind of against me at that point in the game. That could have helped steer things a little bit. So I 100% wanted to go to fire, but obviously I wasn’t allowed to do so.
TVLINE | Let’s play a little Survivor hypothetical. If Katurah had voted Dee out and Dee left the game, do you win Survivor 45?
See, that’s tough. I think I have an easier time and a higher chance of winning. But I mean, you have to think. At that point, that would be an awesome move on Jake’s resume pulling this off, saving Kuturah, voting out Julie. And he was really close at that Final 4 immunity challenge. Without Dee there, there’s a good chance he wins. He puts himself in fire probably against Julie, and who knows if he wins that? Then Jake goes into Final Tribal with two epic moves right at the very end to steal the thunder away from Reba. It would have been another really tough Final Tribal. Who knows how the votes would have gone? I hope obviously that I would’ve won, but you never know.
TVLINE | Pivoting away from the finale for a second: Please tell me what that huge, gross fisheye tasted like.
You know, it really wasn’t that bad! I was starving. It didn’t have too much flavor. I mean, watching it back, it’s like, “Wow, that is disgusting,” seeing it goop and everything. And the texture was the worst part. I was chewing on that for like two minutes straight. They sped up the chewing, but I was going at it. It was really, really, really chewy. I’m glad I ate it before watching someone else eat it because that would have made it harder for me.
TVLINE | I have to ask, Austin, because the people want to know: What have the post-game vibes been like with your showmance Dee?
I know this isn’t what the fans want to hear, but we do want to keep this private for now just because things are so crazy. I don’t know if I’m capable right now of dealing with all that, so we’re just gonna keep that private for now. Sorry!
TVLINE | Do you have any regrets from your time out there? Any moves you wish you had done differently?
No regrets. It’s really easy to get stuck in “what if this, what if that,” but at the same time, we were out there, we were living the game, deprived, starving, doing all these things. I feel like it’s unfair to hold myself to — now that I’ve been home for seven months — like, “This might have been the ideal thing.” There’s no way to assume that I could have made those decisions back then that I can now. So no regrets at all.
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