‘Survivor 48' Finalist Joe Hunter Reacts to His Surprising Loss: ‘It All Falls on Me' (Exclusive)

Survivor 48 is here! Every week, Parade.com's Mike Bloom will bring you interviews with the castaway most recently voted off of the island.In the incredibly fluid modern Survivor game, Joe Hunterwas solid. The 45-year-old hit the beach for a very unique reason, looking to play the favorite game of his late sister, as well as get some closure for her sudden death. And, in the process of honoring one family member, he found a new one out on the island, forming a bond with Eva Erickson that went beyond the game. Joe came in wanting to play honorably and loyally, not to compromise who he is. And, astoundingly, he was able to do just that, dominating the latter half of the game as part of an unbreakable majority. Unfortunately, the fire captain couldn't feel the flames that were licking at his heels by his allies, who were surreptitiously controlling him to blindside his own people. And so, while Joe made it to Day 26 in a commanding fashion on his own values, they were evidently not the values of the jury, giving him a third-place finish.In the Survivor 48 premiere, despite not being a massive fan of the game, Joe had a mindset to change it. Unlike the cutthroat behavior of modern-day seasons, he wanted to preach loyalty, and focus on getting a committed group to the end. And that first member of the group came in Eva, who revealed her autism diagnosis to him on Day 1. He also locked in with the "California Girls," and quickly cemented himself as one of the figureheads of his tribe. Unfortunately, Joe's first Tribal Council of the season provided his first shock as well, as Kyle Fraser and Kamilla Karthigesu pulled the wool over his eyes. But that strategic misfire fell to the wayside days later, when Eva suffered from an "episode" following an anxiety-ridden challenge performance. In that moment, the game faded away, as Joe quite literally crossed tribal lines to help calm down his number one ally. It was a beautiful gesture, one that had even Jeff Probst in tears. And it also proved one thing to the other castaways: When Joe says he's got you, he's got you.That may be a reason, then, why Joe became such a popular person come merge. He was quickly brought in on an alliance of the physical players by David Kinne. And they were able to carry out Joe's dream plan, picking off the outsiders while simultaneously remeaning wholly committed to one another. On top of that, with keeping everybody on lock, as well as winning four Immunity Challenges, players were declaring that, if he sat in the end, he would clean up the jury votes. Except Joe didn't realize, under the surface, there were some holes in his game, courtesy of a couple of Holes superfans. Much like they did in their first vote, Kyle and Kamilla were able to leverage their secret alliance a couple of times in the postmerge. They successfully convinced Joe to turn on some of his tightest allies not once, but twice, with David and Shauhin Davari. So Joe did succeed in his goal, making it to Day 26 alongside two tight allies in Eva and Kyle. But the bigger they are, the harder they fall. And once Kyle revealed that he was the one controlling the game, not Joe, the fire captain's winning chances were toast.The day after the finale, Joe speaks with Parade about his reaction to how the jury votes shook out, the fan response to him pursuing a more loyal and group-forward game, and being able to seek closure for his sister's death out on the island.Related: Read our Survivor 48 pre-game interview with Joe Hunter
The past few episodes, we had a few players saying that, if you got to the end, you would win based on your likability and dominant performances. And so quite a few of us were shocked to see that you only ended up getting one jury vote. What was your reaction to how everything shook out?So obviously this has been extremely difficult in terms of you're kind of the last one to get the microphone. Meaning the people that are at the very end, you hear all the other exit press. You hear everyone's perspective. But what was really difficult is you hear back, as you're watching it, people are blaming you for being there, or, "He had a part in whatever right, wrong or different." But that's their perspective, and you think, "Okay, so I've heard several people say this is why I'm here. But you get one vote." So, man, I really thought long and hard about how to handle this, because there's some things that are said in exit press. There's things that are done that you're like, "Man..." Here's my whole perspective. I just got to start with me at the end of the day. Listen, I could sit here and blame, and I have a lot to say about certain things. I could blame this person or that person. "Why did they do that? You did this, you did that." At the end of the day, it's me. If I didn't do it, if I didn't get a vote, it's because I didn't do something. And I just got to take ownership of that. It all falls on me. And I wish that's maybe said a little more. We all have a part in our own loss. And I must have done something; maybe I'll get that feedback from them one day. But I must have done something that they didn't like.To that point, David in particular has been talking about how you lied to him, despite wanting to play a game of loyalty and honesty, even saying you swore on your family to him. Surprisingly, we didn't really see that topic get broached at final Tribal Council. Was that really the case?It gets blurry when you play it back. But to that concept, that was implied there. Yes, it's difficult when I hear that, because I couldn't disagree more. I couldn't have a harder, different perspective. And that's what I've been trying to do in this whole process. I'm like, "Joe, just try to be respectful of this. That's their perspective." But when it comes to lying and deceit or whatever, with David specifically, it's like, "Listen, that's your perspective." And I feel what happened on the island and how I was treated by that person and treated by a few others in the moment, that trust was broken before any of that happened. And I didn't play a perfect game, and I absolutely made mistakes. But I will strongly disagree that my game was deception, or that I lied. There was a lot other pieces to this that are, "Hey, that's not how it went down from my point of view at all." But I want to respect if that's how he saw it or others, then I'll respect their opinion. But I couldn't disagree more.One of the many revelations you experienced on Day 26 was that Kyle and Kamilla had not only been working closely together, but concocted a plan to get you to turn on Shauhin. What was your reaction to that bomb being dropped in the moment?Did you know how close they were in the moment?So I don't want to disrespect their game. Because it would be unrealistic to say that any of us knew the depth of their relationship. Sure, we see people talking. But I'm going to flat out say no, I did not know that the depth of their relationship. And good for them. That's it, period, end of story. Sure, hindsight, "Oh, I knew this. I knew that." No, I didn't, and I'm proud of that in a weird way. Because, listen, what makes this complicated that people can't really see is both Kamilla and Kyle shared very intimate things that are just between us, that are off-camera, that I know is real, and I know is deep. And I want to believe that. But then you're hit with lies and deception. And so what makes it complicated is, if you think about it, in your own life, if a friend told you something very personal and real, but then gameplay blindsides you with deception, that's why your head gets scrambled. You're like, "Man, I know this piece is real, so there's no way they're lying to me about this." And so, yeah, was I lied to? Yeah. Did it work? Yeah. And I think that with trust, you have to lean all into it. And that's why you get hurt, you can't be half in.And then when it comes to the Shauhin element of it, because, did they get us with Thomas? Absolutely, period, I was not ready for that. With David and Shauhin in particular, him and I had an argument. [It was] a much more intense, emotional argument that was kind of outside of just theory. We talk every day. We strategize every day. He's a great person and very intelligent, one of the best players out there. But we fought that day about just other things. Coconuts on the beach, and "What's wrong with people? What's wrong with you?" And we just fought, and they knew that, and we gave that away as a duo. And because we fought, and this might be hard for people to understand. If we don't fight, he doesn't go home. And I don't mean that like he fought, I sent him home. It meant we didn't have a normal discussion. "Why do you just ask him this? Why didn't you ask him that?" It's because we had fought like a couple. We just fought like a married couple and and we couldn't recover from it. And they were smart and bright enough players to see the crack that we created. Two days before they come up with this plan, and we're hitting like we normally do, we have a normal conversation. We hug it out. It's over in two minutes. And we had had a really big emotional disagreement, not about the game, and then it spilled into the conversation that you see. So that's kind of how my answer to it is. It's not to take away their game. But we fueled that last piece by our lack of ability to get over our disagreement.You said consistently, from the time we talked in the preseason through Day 26, about how you wanted to buck the trend and play a game about loyalty and bringing a group to the end. And, to your credit, you succeeded in doing so. But you ultimately came up short with the win. So do you think this type of gameplay is something that can lead to a winning game in a modern Survivor season?Man, great questions as usual. I mean here's what I say with that. What's hard to hear is, yes, I had a plan of getting a group to the end, or this loyalty thing. But it gets spun into, "Oh, I'm saying that [there 's] this hierarchy. I'm better." That's really hard to hear, because that's not the memo. My idea was you can't make it to the end, in my opinion, alone. At some point, you have to trust someone. And the more that you can trust, I feel, the farther you could go. And I just want Survivor fans to just be okay with letting someone play the way that [they want]. If their game is just lying, that's the difference. I'm okay with that. That's your game. And if I don't want to do that, it doesn't make me better or worse. It's just my path. And I think I want the game to stay that pure, just because I don't play it your way, it's not that I'm better than you. It's just what I wanted to do. Because I have some things in the bank that I have to remind myself there. You know what, buddy, [if] I'm 21 years old with no kids and no wife, maybe I do play this differently, I don't know. But in my life right now, with what I've been through, it's just like, "Hey, I'm gonna dive into this, try to be this person that is based out of we can trust each other." And that's not a perfect kind of algorithm, but it's the best that I'm going to do. And I think there's room for that today. Absolutely. I hate that it has to be one or the other, right. I think that you also need to read the season. David comes to me early. H"ey, I got five or six others that are down to do this." I do the math. That's a lot of people. And if I'm on a season that I land [on] and it's like nothing but cutthroat, well, guess what? I'm going to have to figure out how to move my way into that. So I also don't want it to have the perception of, like, there's only this way you gotta get there. Read the crowd, and then go, "Alright, this is what we're doing." And then I gotta make a decision. So, yeah, I think there's room.You and I spoke about how even just going out to Survivor was in honor of your late sister, who you lost to domestic violence. And we see you get a moment of closure with her after receiving your loved ones letters. Talk me through that moment.Just for anybody that knows, that was 100% real. That wasn't scripted. And I had heard that maybe that was too much for camera. And it really was that the letters from home, seeing my wife, both my kids, this ability to work my way through this and apologize, them giving me the clarity to just be courageous enough to be vulnerable. The weight of that with my sister, I've been carrying on for so long. But also domestic violence, and how many people's lives it just crushes. It destroys people's lives, and we don't talk about it enough, especially from a male perspective that was directly involved with it, meaning it was my sister. And listen, everything I do every day, every weight I lift – which I do a lot of – is in six for Joanna. The letters in her name: J-O-A-N-N-A. And we got down to six, and she was with me, and I felt that. And out there, it was just like, "This is time." And I also wanted to do it for everyone that's suffering from domestic violence or in a horrible situation, just to see like, "Man, this dude is just going to let it fly." And it is something that I will never, ever be able to explain. I'm so grateful to Survivor, to production, to everybody that allowed me to do that and then allowed it to air like that. I was just grateful.You also left the island with some new "family" in the form of Eva. What was like getting to leave the game with a relationship you never thought you'd get out there?When it comes to Eva, this is the thing that I try to focus on. Imagine I'm on a different season. Imagine I'm on a different tribe. Imagine she doesn't even have an "episode." She just works through all the challenges and it never comes up. We have the private conversation and it never comes up. It all had to align for this relationship to take off the way that it did. Sure, we'd be tight. But what happened and what she was able to able to overcome, I'm just blessed. I was along for the ride, and she put me in a position to allow me to help her without her asking. She could have asked anybody; it doesn't happen the same way. And she will always be a part of my life and my family's life. I love that girl, and I always will.
Related: 'Survivor 48' Runner-Up Eva Erickson Reveals Her Firemaking Autism 'Episode' Was Actually 'Much, Much Worse' (Exclusive)
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Top contenders to watch in the $1M Fanatics Games

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