Palau

Survivor: Palau · Season 10

Episode Guide

How Survivor: Palau unfolded, week by week.

  1. 1“This Has Never Happened Before!”Feb 17, 2005The premiere breaks the format before the game even begins: all twenty castaways have to pick their own tribes schoolyard-style, and when the dust settles, two players are left standing unchosen. Jonathan Libby is sent home on the spot without ever joining a tribe. The two tribes, Koror and Ulong, hit their beaches, and when Ulong drops the first immunity challenge, they vote out Jolanda Jones, capping a premiere unlike any the show had done before.
  2. 2“Love is in the Air, Rats Are Everywhere”Feb 24, 2005The other unchosen castaway, Wanda, gets a brief shot to stick around but is ultimately sent home too, closing the book on the premiere's odd-one-out twist. On Koror, sparks fly as Gregg and Jenn strike up a quiet showmance, while Ulong's beach is overrun with rats and dysfunction. Ulong loses immunity yet again, and Ashlee Ashby is the next one voted out.
  3. 3“Dangerous Creatures and Horrible Setbacks”Mar 3, 2005Ulong simply cannot win, and the constant losing is starting to fracture the tribe as the beach throws dangerous wildlife and one setback after another at them. Bobby Jon and Stephenie emerge as the only two truly grinding to keep the tribe alive. When Ulong drops another challenge, Jeff Wilson is voted out, and the bleeding doesn't stop.
  4. 4“Sumo at Sea”Mar 10, 2005The sumo-at-sea challenge, players knocking each other off a padded platform into the water, gives Ulong another shot at finally notching a win. They blow it again. Back at a beach where morale is running on fumes, the tribe turns on Kim Mullen, who's voted out as Ulong's freefall rolls on.
  5. 5“The Best and Worst Reward Ever”Mar 16, 2005For the first and only time all season, the mighty Koror tribe drops an immunity challenge and finds itself at Tribal Council. Forced to cut someone at last, Tom and the others decide the older Willard Smith has become their weakest link. Willard is voted out, the only member Koror would lose all season.
  6. 6“Jellyfish 'N Chips”Mar 23, 2005The challenge is a misery of jellyfish-infested water, and Ulong, predictably, comes up short once more. Stephenie fights to keep her friend Angie, the tribe's tattooed punk-rock outsider, but the numbers just aren't there. Angie is voted out, leaving Ulong down to a battered group of four.
  7. 7“The Great White Shark Hunter”Mar 31, 2005Ulong is running on fumes now, and even a shark-hunting adventure can't change their luck when it counts. Down to their last handful, the tribe loses again, and James Miller is voted out. Just like that, Ulong is reduced to three: Bobby Jon, Ibrehem, and Stephenie, still somehow standing.
  8. 8“Neanderthal Man”Apr 7, 2005Ulong's nightmare run keeps going, and the tribe of three heads to yet another Tribal Council with almost nothing left to give. Ibrehem Rahman is the one voted out this time, and when his torch is snuffed, Ulong is down to its final two: Bobby Jon and Stephenie, the last two standing from a tribe that has lost nearly everything.
  9. 9“I Will Not Give Up”Apr 14, 2005Down to just Bobby Jon and Stephenie, Ulong heads into a challenge that, against all odds, they lose one more time. But at Tribal Council, with only the two of them left, Probst declines to force one to vote out the other and simply sends them both back to camp, leaving Ulong improbably alive. Stephenie, refusing to quit, sums up the whole tribe's spirit in four words: she will not give up. For once, nobody goes home.
  10. 10“Exile Island”Apr 21, 2005Bobby Jon and Stephenie lose immunity yet again, and this time there's no reprieve: the two of them face a fire-making duel, the loser finally bringing Ulong's long, brutal story to an end. Stephenie gets her flame going first, and Bobby Jon's run is over. She becomes the last member of Ulong standing, completely alone, before being folded into the all-powerful Koror, the sole survivor of a tribe that lost it all.
  11. 11“I'll Show You How Threatening I Am”Apr 28, 2005Stephenie joins Koror expecting to be the obvious next target, but the tribe has its own drama brewing. Coby, who's been running his mouth about Koror's tight inner circle and stirring the pot with Stephenie, has made himself a problem for Tom's group. At Tribal, Coby goes out swinging, but it's his torch that gets snuffed, sending him out as the first member of the jury.
  12. 12“We'll Make You Pay”May 5, 2005Gregg wins a luxurious yacht reward and brings Jenn and Katie along, and the group lines up to finally vote out Stephenie. But the night takes a strange turn at Tribal Council when Janu, drained and emotionally checked out after a rough stretch, stands up and announces she's quitting the game. She walks away on her own terms, sparing Stephenie for a few more days and stunning the tribe with one of the show's great walk-offs.
  13. 13“It Could All Backfire”May 12, 2005The finale opens with the Koror majority closing out unfinished business, voting out the beloved Stephenie, whose against-all-odds run finally ends in seventh. Then the alliance turns on one of its own: Gregg, the strong half of the season's showmance and the biggest remaining threat, is blindsided when Tom and Ian decide he's grown too dangerous to keep around. Gregg is voted out 4-2, never seeing it coming.
  14. 14“The Ultimate Shock”FinaleMay 12, 2005Caryn is voted out at the final five, setting up a wild finish. At the final four, the vote deadlocks 2-2 between Jenn and Ian by design, forcing a fire-making tiebreaker, and Ian builds his flame faster to send Jenn home in fourth. That leaves the famous final immunity: Tom and Ian balancing on a buoy out in the ocean for nearly twelve hours through the night. Wracked with guilt over how he's treated his friends, Ian finally steps down and concedes, asking Tom to take Katie to the end in his place. Tom honors it, Ian heads to the jury in third, and the jury rewards Tom Westman's commanding, stand-up game, crowning him the Sole Survivor 6-1 over Katie.