Immunity Insight with Amanda Kimmel of Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains

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by Troy Rogers

After surviving the gameplay of Survivor: China, Amanda Kimmel took her tribal A-game to Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains as a member of the Heroes tribe. Although Amanda was allied with her former Survivor: China tribe mate, James, Amanda managed to last until the merge between the Heroes and Villains where Kimmel found herself divided between Parvati and Russell and the rest of the Survivor Heroes.

When Amanda won last week's reward challenge with Colby and Danielle, Amanda made a move that sealed her fate when Kimmel made a play for a hidden immunity note that Danielle had already found. Despite trying to hang on to the Survivor advantage, Amanda quickly fell victim to the alliance between Parvati, Russell, Danielle and her Heroes tribe mate, Candice, who flipped to the Survivor Villains.

The morning after Amanda Kimmel had her torch extinguished on Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains, we caught up with the Survivor all-star to find out what went wrong, how she would have played the immunity differently, and what she thinks of the gameplay of Survivor Villain Russell Hantz.

THE DEADBOLT: What do you think would've happened between you and Danielle if Colby wasn't there?

AMANDA KIMMEL: Oh ,it would've been a brawl. I wouldn't have given it back to her. [laughs] I don't know what she would've done, but I would've ripped that thing to shreds and flushed it to get rid of it.

THE DEADBOLT: Well, with that being said, why did you listen to what Colby told you to do?

AMANDA: Well, he made me feel really bad. They didn't show some of it, but he said some things that made me feel bad about it. So my conscience kicked in for a second and kind of destroyed my plan. [laughs]

THE DEADBOLT: At the time, nobody on the show knew about the previous season with Russell. Looking back now, what do you think of his style of gameplay?

AMANDA: What I think of Russell and what I think about his gameplay are two different things. [laughs] His gameplay on Survivor, I think he's really good. He`s really good at getting people afraid of him and keeping people on his side. I mean, he`s good at the game. He`s really really good. He`s probably the best liar I've ever met. [laughs] As far as Russell in person, that's a totally different story, but I won't go into that.

THE DEADBOLT: I noticed that after James left, you didn't seem to be as into the game anymore. How did it change for you after James was voted out?

AMANDA: Well, it was just like each game I've played I had a wing-man. I've gone to the end with them and you need someone. I don't care who you are in the game, it is impossible to do well alone. After James left, I kind of felt like I lost my guy, my wing-man.

He was the guy I was going to strategize with and if he was there on that challenge with me, he would've stuck up for me. He would've held Danielle back. He would've done whatever he could to do what we needed to do to get the clue. So it was just like you always need someone on your side to trust enough to strategize with and to play the game with, and I kind of felt like I lost that when James left.

THE DEADBOLT: The Heroes were coming up with great strategies to get rid of the Villains after the merge, but nothing worked. What was the biggest mistake you guys were making at the time?

AMANDA: Well, as far as my own gameplay, I was making too many mistakes. You can only make so many mistakes in this game and then you're gone. So that was my problem. It was kind of just not being secretive enough. We would have a strategy and someone would mouth who we were voting, Russell would see it, and then we would have to change our vote. It was just stupid mistakes.

THE DEADBOLT: What did it feel like to finally get voted out at tribal council?

AMANDA: Oh, it was awful. Honestly, it was not fun. I'm a fighter. I fought all the way to the end. There's only so much you can do when you have nothing to work with, so it was bad. I didn't want to get voted out but I knew I was going to be. You know, they weren't going to keep me around with what I pulled with Danielle. [laughs]