Way back in 2000, a strange yet highly addictive show called Survivor debuted on CBS.
It's since produced many memorable heroes and villains among the hundreds of participants,
the latter of whom tried to lie, cheat, and steal their way to the top.
We bring you the shadiest contestants on Survivor.
In Survivor: Island of the Idols, talent manager Dan Spilo lasted 36 days before leaving the
island.
His tribe didn't vote him out; instead, for the first time ever, producers removed a contestant
from the competition.
The trouble started on the first day of filming, when contestant Kellee Kim accused Spilo of
"inappropriate touching."
Complaints continued weeks later, and eventually, enough was enough and a simple message appeared
on screen: "Dan was removed from the game after a report of another incident, which
happened off-camera and did not involve a player."
After the episode aired, Kim took to Twitter, writing:
"As Survivor fans know, shortly after I spoke up on camera, I was voted off the show...While
I wish many things had gone differently, I'm glad that my decision to speak up made a difference."
According to People, Spilo reportedly intended to discuss his actions at the reunion show,
but wasn't invited.
Instead, Spilo issued an apology to the publication:
"I am deeply sorry for how my actions affected Kellee during the taping of this season of
Survivor...I truly regret that anyone was made to feel uncomfortable by my behavior."
Fans might remember a similar issue from years earlier involving Survivor's first-ever winner,
Richard Hatch.
During Survivor: All-Stars, fellow season one star Sue Hawk claimed Hatch acted inappropriately
toward her.
During a challenge, the notoriously naked Hatch appeared to brush up against Hawk.
She later alleged to host Jeff Probst:
"I was violated, humiliated, dehumanized, and totally spent, Jeff!"
The situation distressed Hawk so much that she voluntarily left the game.
In contrast with Spilo, Hatch was not kicked off the show due to his behavior, and later
tweeted out in 2019 that he still had no regrets for having played so much of the game nude.
Hatch also made news when he was arrested not once but twice for tax evasion.
Hatch served time behind bars for failing to pay taxes on his $1 million earned for
winning Survivor.
After his first stint in jail, Hatch was then arrested for violating prison media-access
rules.
All in all, he spent a total of 51 months in federal prison.
When Jeff Varner, a contestant on Survivor: Game Changers, faced elimination at tribal,
he attempted to torpedo another player in order to stay in the game.
Varner openly asked why his fellow contestant, Zeke Smith, hadn't told the rest of the players
that he's transgender.
In addition to outing Smith, Varner insinuated that Smith had withheld his gender identity
to deceive the others.
Everyone at that tribal council was understandably shocked and appalled, leading host Jeff Probst
to say what everyone was thinking:
"There's no question who's going home tonight, right?"
After an immediate consensus, Probst told Varner:
"We don't need to vote, just grab your torch."
After the dust settled, Smith opened up about the scene in a guest column written for The
Hollywood Reporter.
Smith wrote:
"Forgiveness does not require friendship.
Forgiveness does not require forgetting or excusing his actions."
For his part, Varner apologized via Instagram, but was fired from his job amid the backlash.
During Survivor: The Australian Outback, Colby Donaldson had a little too much fun that got
him into some hot water.
Donaldson and fellow player Jerri Manthey won a reward challenge that let them fly to
Russell Island on the Great Barrier Reef in a helicopter for lunch.
Donaldson then brought back a few pieces of coral for those back at camp.
That trip might have been fun for Donaldson but it wasn't good for the environment.
A spokeswoman for the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority listed the infractions:
"One is they flew a helicopter around sea-bird rookeries...it is classified as a particularly
sensitive area.
And the second is the collecting of coral.
The general rule is that you cannot collect coral from any site in the Great Barrier Reef."
Luckily for Donaldson, the incident didn't necessarily hurt his post-Survivor career,
as the reality star went on to host five seasons of the History Channel's Top Shot.
Two-time competitor Colton Cumbie first participated in Survivor: One World, but was soon perceived
as an entitled racist over his comments toward fellow player Bill Posley.
In that season, the medical staff pulled Cumbie from the game over what he originally called
appendicitis, but later admitted was actually a, quote "severe bacterial infection."
Despite the early exit, his controversial reputation stayed.
Cumbie told E! Online:
"When you watch the show you think I'm evil...But in my personal life, there haven't been any
people who have attacked me...They all say, 'You're really not like you are in television!'"
Prior to his second appearance on Survivor: Blood vs. Water, Cumbie told Entertainment
Weekly:
"Last time I was completely erratic and filled with hate and anger and I had kind of adapted
this mentality of bite before bitten."
Perhaps he had a change of heart.
However, Cumbie abruptly decided to quit for a second time mid-season, which sent host
Jeff Probst over the edge.
Probst had harsh words for Cumbie:
"Lots of people like to watch adventure.
It doesn't necessarily mean they should get up off the couch.
And I'm now convinced that Colton is the guy who never should have got up off the couch."
Probst then told Colton to keep his Buff:
"I won't give you the honor of throwing that in the urn.
We'll keep that reserved for people who compete.
Grab your stuff, head out, boat will pick you up."
In the 28th season of Survivor, J'Tia Taylor built a reputation for being "bossy" and "mean,"
but she told TV Guide that she had no regrets for her style of play.
But in a moment of frustration, she targeted one of her tribemates, Garrett Adelstein,
and created an unprecedented moment in Survivor history.
She told TV Guide:
"I really wanted to hurt Garrett.
Garrett was always talking about how he wanted to eat.
And, everybody else I didn't really care about because they all just said that they'd vote
me out.
So, I threw the rice in the fire."
Yes, almost the entire supply of rice given to the entire tribe, which was its main source
of food on the island.
Amazingly, Taylor was not immediately voted off, but failed to make it much farther.
After the fact, Taylor completely understood why her peers voted her off the island, but
justified her infamous rice-throwing to People, saying:
"Let me clear something up: rice was not all we were eating.
We had coconuts and bananas.
We were boiling crabs.
We weren't starving."
According to his CBS bio, Russell Hantz was quote, "one of the most notorious villains
to ever play Survivor."
This "self-made millionaire" used any means necessary to advance in the game, a strategy
that nearly led to him winning the grand prize.
Hantz made the finals in his first two seasons, Survivor: Samoa and Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains.
However, his third attempt on Survivor: Redemption Island saw him as the first of his tribe to
be voted out of the game.
Throughout his three appearances, Hantz earned a villainous reputation.
As Entertainment Weekly hypothesized:
"That might be due to the fact that he secretly emptied his tribemates' canteens and burned
their socks.
Or it could be due to the fact that he lied about being a Hurricane Katrina survivor to
garner some extra sympathy from his tribe."
Those seem like pretty good reasons to dislike him.
As the nephew of the Survivor superstar Russell Hantz, Brandon Hantz had big shoes to fill
when he first appeared on Survivor: South Pacific.
According to Entertainment Weekly, it didn't go so well.
They wrote:
"[Hantz] was portrayed as a leering pervert who could not handle his sexual attraction
to another contestant, an unstable entity that would pop off at Tribal Council for no
reason, and, finally, a rube who could get suckered into giving away his immunity only
to be immediately voted off after doing so."
In spite of this, Hantz returned for a second time for the 26th season of Survivor.
In his next attempt for the million-dollar prize, Hantz appeared to completely snap.
Hantz argued with his tribe at camp and dumped the rice and bean supply.
At the next immunity challenge, his tribe refused to compete and just wanted to vote
Hantz out.
Hantz turned hostile, prompting Jeff Probst to hold a verbal tribal council right then,
which sent Hantz home.
Ever since Survivor premiered, a standard strategy to further one's gameplay has been
lying.
But in Survivor: Pearl Islands, Jon Dalton, who's better known as Jonny Fairplay, fabricated
what may be the most sinister lie ever on the show.
Fairplay and his friend, Dan, concocted a scheme prior to filming.
During the "loved ones" episode when visitors reunite with contestants, Dan would break
the news that Fairplay's grandmother passed away.
When the episode premiered, viewers and the tribe empathized with the visibly distraught
Fairplay.
Then back at camp, the two friends laughed, and Jon dropped the bomb:
"That was a brilliant performance, sir."
Afterwards, Fairplay revealed in a confessional:
"My grandmother's sitting home watching Jerry Springer right now."
In an article penned by Jeff Probst for Watch! magazine, he named Fairplay's "Dead Grandma
Lie" in his top ten favorite moments in Survivor, writing:
"Everybody believed him, including me.
And what made it so delicious was that he was the most disliked person on the beach."
Delicious indeed, as the waterworks likely bought Fairplay extra time on the series.
Fairplay's knack for theatrics translated outside of life on the island.
After Survivor, Fairplay became a pro wrestler, but it's doubtful he could use the "Dead Grandma
Lie" again to hide from a body slam.
Peih-Gee Law, first competed in Survivor: China and made it to fifth place.
Gone but not forgotten, fans voted her back for a "second chance" on the 31st season,
Survivor: Cambodia.
This time around, Law had experience and decided to turn her hobby into an advantage.
As she explained in an interview with She Knows, producers allowed "luxury items" to
contestants during her first season.
For Law, this was a jewelry-making kit.
Though she couldn't bring the kit along during her second appearance, Law already had another
idea:
"I had taken fishhooks that I gold-plated and made them with gemstones and stuff like
that.
I had fishhook earrings."
Pretty sneaky stuff.
She even attempted to turn her clothing into functional pieces, admitting:
"I had a piece of flint that I had sewed onto my cardigan as a button."
Unfortunately for Law, the flint button was caught by producers.
Maybe it would have helped, but Law sadly became the third person voted off in Cambodia.
During her time on Survivor: China, audiences learned that fan favorite Denise Martin worked
in a school cafeteria, which earned her the nickname "Lunch Lady."
During the Survivor: China reunion, fan favorite Denise Martin shared some surprising news.
Martin implied that she'd been demoted to janitor when she returned from filming Survivor,
saying the school "didn't give me my job back."
Of course, fans were horrified by the news.
Before the live episode even ended, executive producer Mark Burnett promised Martin $50,000
to hopefully "get her life back."
It was a heartwarming moment for everyone…except those at her school district.
In reality, Martin transferred, at her own request, from the $7.35 an hour cafeteria
job to a $17 an hour custodial position before leaving to film Survivor.
When she came back, she asked to transfer back to the cafeteria, where no positions
were open at the time.
To her credit, Martin immediately asked CBS to donate that $50,000 promise to the Elizabeth
Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation.
Shane Powers earned his grumpy but lovable reputation during his appearance on Survivor:
Panama.
According to the New York Post, his mood swings, wild behavior, and villainous tendencies may
have stemmed from nicotine withdrawal.
After his run came to an end, Powers claimed that editors had altered his actual personality
during an interview on The Early Show:
"I think you gain an amazing amount of perspective from being on the show.
It's, like, you're civilized and then they turn you into a caveman."
While you contemplate whether Powers was a hero or a villain, let's catch up with the
man himself.
A Los Angeles-based radio host off the island, Powers was later photographed nude in an odd
photoshoot at the, quote, "lowest point in his life."
Thankfully doing better these days, he's since collaborated with rapper Tyler, The Creator,
appearing as an "angry golfer" in his "Tamale" music video.
He even provided backing vocals on a few songs on the Grammy-nominated album, Flower Boy.
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