All-Star Survivor: Hawaii John Carroll post-game interview

Last week, John Carroll became the controversial loser in a 4-3 jury vote against Vecepia Towery at the end of All-Star Survivor: Hawaii. Why did John lose? What did he think about the final jury questions? Did he think that Vecepia deserved to win? And what the heck was up between him and Alicia? Survivor-Central's C.J. Blake sat down with the Ahi mastermind, and picked his brain for the answers.

CJB: Hi John. Damnit, I wanted you to win!!!

JC: Thank you. I wanted me to win too!!

CJB: What the heck went wrong?

JC: I tell ya, once I got stuck in the endgame deal with Alicia, and she sort of cornered me into playing her game instead of my own, I think that's what really did me in in Hawaii. Once I started messing around with the enemy, it was basically all over for me.

CJB: So you don't think you could have won the final vote?

JC: Could have? Maybe. There were definitely one or two votes up for grabs. But as to if I would have, probably not. There was simply way too much animosity towards me near the end. Even though it wasn't shown all that much on the show, Gretchen definitely wasn't that big a fan of mine.

CJB: Why not?

JC: I'm not entirely sure. You would have to ask her. She and I met earlier in the game-- at the reward twist-- but we never really hit it off or progressed much relationship-wise beyond that. I had the utmost respect for her as a person, and I still do. You know me, I'm a big fan. But we were never really all that close when it came to the game.

CJB: Do you think she just wanted a woman to win All-Stars?

JC: That's definitely a possibility. But I have no way of knowing for sure. I certainly had that suspicion at times during the game.

CJB: If that was true, wouldn't you call that sexist?

JC: Well I have no idea of knowing if it is true or not. I wouldn't want to put words in her mouth.

CJB: Did the two of you ever talk about why she voted for Vecepia?

JC: Yes. After the game, she pulled me aside and she told me why she had voted for Vecepia. She said it was because Vecepia had overcome more obstacles than me along the way, and because she thought Vee was more deserving. She claimed that she didn't make up her mind who to vote for until she walked up to the ballot box.

CJB: Do you believe her?

JC: Gretchen isn't exactly known for being a liar.

CJB: Fair enough. Did Colleen ever come up to you and talk about why she voted for you to win? Have the two of you made up yet as friends?

JC: Of course we have. Colleen is and always will be one of my favorites. We were friends the moment that the cameras stopped rolling. We are totally tight again.

CJB: Why did she vote for you to win? I thought she was supposed to be mad at you?

JC: She knew I had played the better game. She didn't respect Vecepia's game at all.

CJB: So her vote against Vee wasn't personal?

JC: No. Colleen isn't as emotional as it would appear on TV. She's young, but she's much older when you actually sit down and talk to her. I think she sort of got a raw deal when it came to the editing this season. She's a smart little cookie.

CJB: Interesting. A lot of the players said she was sort of a drama queen out there.

JC: Well, most people tend not to know her very well.

CJB: And you know her well?

JC: Of course I do, why do you think she was so mad at me?! By the way, you should ask Tina this question. She knows Colleen better than anyone. She will tell you that Colleen was the most misunderstood player in All-Stars.

CJB: Okay, so speaking of misunderstood, what about Boston Rob? Was he misunderstood, too?

JC: *laughing* No, not really.

CJB: After Marquesas, you said this in regards to Rob, "I have no grudge or ill will against him. Rob is young. I think he learned important life lessons." Do you still think that is true?

JC: Well yes and no. Yes, he learned life lessons. Although no, I don't think they were necessarily helpful for him.

CJB: Are the two of you close outside the game?

JC: Of course. I love Rob. Everybody loves Rob. He is charisma personified. Outside the game, he is one of the greatest guys in the world.

CJB: But not inside the game?

JC: Inside the game he is an asshole.

CJB: *laughing* So then why did you align with him?

JC: I never aligned with HIM. I aligned with Vecepia (and to a lesser extent, Colleen). In my mind, Rob was just the fourth part of that package. He just came as part of the deal. Even after I hooked up in the same alliance, I still wanted nothing to do with him.

CJB: Why not? Do the two of you just not get along that well?

JC: Here's the analogy I will always use with Rob. It's the story of the scorpion and the frog. I am sure you have heard it before?

CJB: I think so.

JC: One day a frog was hopping along a stream and all of a sudden she heard someone speaking to her. "Hellooo Ms. Frog!" called a scorpion about three feet away, "Would you be so kind as to give me a ride on your back across the river?" "Well now, Mr. Scorpion! How do I know that if I try to help you, you wont try to kill me?" asked the frog hesitantly. "Because," the scorpion replied, "If I try to kill you, then I would die too, for you see I cannot swim!" Now this seemed to make sense to the frog. But she asked. "What about when I get close to the bank? You could still try to kill me and get back to the shore!" "This is true," agreed the scorpion, "But then I wouldn't be able to get to the other side of the river!" "Alright then...how do I know you wont just wait till we get to the other side and THEN kill me?" said the frog. "Ahh...," crooned the scorpion, "Because you see, once you've taken me to the other side of this river, I will be so grateful for your help, that it would hardly be fair to reward you with death, now would it?!" So the frog agreed to take the scorpion across the river. She swam over to the bank and settled herself near the mud to pick up this passenger. The scorpion crawled onto her back and the frog slid into the river. The blue water swirled around them, but the frog stayed near the surface so the scorpion would not drown. He kicked strongly through the first half of the stream, his flippers paddling wildly against the current. Halfway across the river, the frog suddenly felt a sharp sting in his back and, out of the corner of his eye, saw the scorpion remove his stinger from the frog's back. A deadening numbness began to creep into her limbs. "You fool!" croaked the frog, "Now we shall both die! Why on earth did you do that?" The scorpion shrugged, as the kind frog began to drown. "I could not help myself. It is my nature."

CJB: So then Rob is the scorpion.

JC: Yes. And that is why I would never align with him. Even if it is not in his best interest, he will always be a scorpion in the game. Sometimes we are who we are no matter the danger before us.

CJB: Does that mean that Vecepia will always be under the radar and boring?

JC: *laughing* Hey, you said that. I didn't say that. I think Vee played a heck of a game. Like Colleen, she is a hard player to capture on TV. She tends to be misunderstood.

CJB: But she will always be a sneaky, quiet player, won't she?

JC: See the scorpion and the frog story above. We are who we are.

CJB: Is it true that you are still the world's biggest Survivor fan? Even after you've played the game twice now?

JC: I am a HUGE fan. I applied to all four seasons. I almost made Africa, but was pushed back until Marquesas. And now I have been fortunate to play the game twice. I couldn't ask for anything else. I still think Survivor is awesome.

CJB: Yeah but let's be honest. It would be better if you had won.

JC: Well I guess that depends on if I was considered "the good guy" or not. There are still a lot of John haters out there. So I don't know. Maybe it was better that Vecepia won. I don't know. I suppose it all comes down to what you are looking for.

CJB: I certainly didn't want Vecepia to win.

JC: Well then that makes two of us.

CJB: Okay, well I am running out of questions but I wanted to fire a few quick ones at you before you sign off. Because there are a few important issues we haven't touched on yet. Sound good?

JC: Sure. Hit me.

CJB: What did you think of Alicia's blackmail deal towards the end? Did you ever come close to snapping and just punching her in the face?

JC: *laughing* Of course not. I wouldn't take a swing at Alicia. She would kill me.

CJB: Did the two of you make up after the game?

JC: Of course. There's no reason to hold grudges afterwards. Once the game is over, it's over. You all become family. Alicia has been out to my house. Besides, you have to remember, from a certain perspective Alicia WAS correct in being angry with me. I would have been voted out earlier if she hadn't saved my butt. She had a reason to be furious with me.

CJB: What would have happened if Alicia HADN'T blackmailed you?

JC: If I get voted out that night instead of Colleen? Gosh, I don't know. I would guess it would have been a final two of Gretchen and Alicia. Which, if you look at it, would have been no better for Alicia. She was screwed either way (against Gretchen or Colleen), and she knew it.

CJB: Do you think Alicia is misunderstood too?

JC: Ha. Well if you don't understand her at first, she will MAKE you understand. She has quite the personality. She is very much over the top and dramatic, but I love her.

CJB: What was your strategy going into All-Stars? Did you specifically go in planning to play differently this time?

JC: Oh yes, very much so. I had a completely different strategy this time. I went in expecting to hide behind the much more dominant personalities. Because the problem was that in Marquesas I never had that luxury.

CJB: You were a leader from day one back then, weren't you?

JC: Yes. My style is always to the point. I'm a strategist by nature. I'm always looking to capitalize. But the problem on Rotu was that everyone tried to lay back and not be noticed. On Rotu I wished there was another one of me that I could have hidden behind a little bit to take some of the heat off of me. But sadly, everyone else was pretty docile. Tammy was the closest to being a leader, but she's a journalist so she had the ability to be more detached. I wasn't able to do that.

CJB: But there were more players to hide behind in All-Stars?

JC: Absolutely. All you had to do was set one foot in camp Ahi and you would see that Lex was our leader. It was obvious, and that took a lot of heat away from me. Having Lex on the tribe was the best possible scenario for me.

CJB: Until you took him out.

JC: Yes. It was regrettable, but unfortunately it had to be done. I love Lex, we all did. But he would have slaughtered everyone.

CJB: Vecepia basically said the same thing as well, in one of her interviews.

JC: Well there you go. Vecepia may be a lot of things, but she's certainly not stupid.

CJB: Do you have any regrets about the way you played All-Stars?

JC: I regret that I didn't win. But other than that, not really. Although I do feel bad about the way Colleen went out of the game. She has a beautiful spirit, and she deserved a lot better. I didn't handle that situation very well. I don't know. In the midst of the game, it just seemed like the right thing to do. Who knows, maybe it was. If she had made it to the final two, that's not somebody you want to be up against.

CJB: Are you content with the fact that you have now lost to Vecepia twice?

JC: I am as happy as a non-winner can be, I guess. I have no regrets. I was simply outplayed.

CJB: You don't think you deserved to win?

JC: I certainly played a better game than I played the first time around. But as to who really deserved to win, that's not really up to me to say. That's up to the jury. They said that Vee was better. Who am I to say otherwise?

CJB: At the start of the game, would you have ever predicted Vecepia as the Sole Survivor in All-Stars?

JC: NEVER. Vee not only was the sole Survivor, but she also came through the worst situation that any Survivor player has ever faced in five seasons. This game was TOTALLY designed for a former winner to be dead meat the minute they stepped onto that island. In the end, she won because I think people acknowledged that.

CJB: No one expected her to win, yet she did. That's amazing.

JC: Hey, what can I say? First I set a landmark for running the first majority alliance (Rotu) into the ground, and now I'm famous because I lost to a former winner in a jury vote. I guess I'm just destined to go down in infamy one way or another!

CJB: Are you embarrassed by that?

JC: Not really. I mean, come on, I got to play Survivor twice. I think it is just a kicker that this dude from Omaha has been a part of all this!

CJB: If you had been given final words after the last vote, would you have cried again?

JC: *laughing* Thank you, Ms. Blake. Good bye. This has been a fun interview.

CJB: Okay, seriously. Last question. Survivor is truly the standout in the "reality-tv" genre of programming. How long do you think it can survive?

JC: Until everyone in the country has had a chance to outwit, outplay and outlast each other, I hope!!!

CJB: Thanks John. It has been fun talking with you. Best of luck with the publicity junket and with law school. I still wish you had won.

JC: Thanks a lot! I wish I had won too. Thanks for the interview!

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