If reversing curses were so easy, I’m sure there would be less curses in the first place, right? This season on Survivor: Ghost Island, the motto has not necessarily been “Outplay, Outwit, Outlast” and his instead been replaced with the catchy but over-used “reverse the curse.” But just as this current crop of players struggles to get out of the shadows cast by mistakes of Survivors’ past, some “curses” are just unavoidable. For example, every time the game has introduced a tribe swap or tribe shake-up – or every time Probst has uttered the famous phrase “drop your buffs” – someone has gotten their torch snuffed. Every. Single. Time.
This time around, that unfortunate “drop your buff” victim was James Lim, the 24-year-old Business Analyst from Los Angeles, who found himself on the minority alliance on the Malolo Tribe, following the most recent tribe shake-up. And the Malolo Tribe is not a place you want to find yourself in general, having now appeared at five of the season’s six Tribal Councils.
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James began the game in what appeared to be a good spot, and his first two targets ended up leaving the game – Stephanie Gonzalez and Jacob. He survived the first tribe swap that took him away from the losing Malolo tribe for a few votes, with the one time he did go to Tribal resulting in the ousting of Morgan (in which James also played a hand in voting out).
His game was more of a “kind” and “honorable” one, you could say, but being a good person on Survivor can only take you so far. Whether or not James could have become more of a cutthroat player, we’ll never know, because on Day 17 the game shifted again, and for the first time James found himself in the minority alliance at his new Malolo tribe. His only former tribe member, Michael, was a guy that James had never really bonded with, and while Michael was also in the minority, he had at least had time to bond with Kellyn and Desi during the last week or so in the game which gave him the leg up over James. When Malolo was sent to Tribal yet again, James’s only remaining hope was to see if he could get Angela to flip, but in the end she didn’t. Even Michael went along with voting out James, ending his time in the game as the sixth person voted out of Survivor: Ghost Island.
I had the chance to speak to James today on the FilmSurvivor Podcast (the full audio of which you can find and download at the bottom of this article). But here were some highlights from the interview:
JAMES LIM INTERVIEW
On what he had called a blindside last night:
James Lim: So it was a blindside in the sense that, well, I knew I was one of the big targets going in. I mean, I was on the minority alliance, whatever way you cut it, it was the worst spot possible for me. But I thought I had flipped Angela pretty successfully so I was expecting to see a 3-2 vote for Desiree. So that’s really where the reaction came from. I guess if I had to pick one person [to blame], I guess it would have been Kellyn. She was the one that was on the other end of Angela against me playing this tug-of-war game…so in that sense my game-plan and Kellyn’s game-plan went head-to-head.
On one of his Survivor inspirations, former winner Yul Kwon, and his hope to be a positive TV portrayal for Asian-Americans:
James: I think it means a lot of me, as the sole person representing Asian-Americans [this season]. I’ve stuck with this my whole life, but it’s not really a burden to me, to be honest. I just wanted to go out there and show my best self, and i have full faith that if I do that, it will be a wholesome chance to represent all Asian-Americans out there…I hope to show Asian-Americans, and all Americans, that we can achieve the American Dream, and that hopefully my story – the concept of the American Dream – is far from dead and we are the land of opportunity, and I really meant that. And looking back I hope I was able to partially achieve that goal, of bringing a positive representation. Setting that all aside, I don’t think that this was something that was conscious on my mind [while in the game], it was more a natural thing that I’ve always done.
For much more from James Lim, including my full interview, please listen to the latest episode of the FilmSurvivor Podcast below or by clicking here.
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Photo Credit: CBS/Monty Brinton/Robert Voets/Timothy Kuratek/Jeffrey Neira/Michele Crowe
