And so … another season of Survivor has come to an end and another ultimate Survivor has been chosen. In case you have yet to watch last night’s ep and you wish to remain unspoiled, you might want to stay away from the Internets until you do so. For the rest of us, let’s get down to discussin’ who was voted the winner of Survivor: Nicaragua lat night …

Going into the finale episode that aired last night, the final 5 contestants left were Dan Lembo, Holly Hoffman, Sash aka Matthew Lenahan, Chase Rice and Fabio aka Judson Birza … then Dan got voted off … then Holly … and then there were 3:

The only reason Fabio managed to make it to the final 3 was because he managed to win the last three immunity challenges of the game … fortunately for him, the games focused on puzzles and the final endurance challenge was not a physical one. The final 3 players — Chace, Fabio and Sash — plead their cases to the jury and a winner was selected … by a very close vote.

In the end … Fabio managed to win the whole shebang … and $1 million dollars:

Time and again during “Survivor: Nicaragua,” fans of the show complained loudly that this latest batch of contestants was by far the dumbest group to ever play the game. And during the finale, the proof of that was in the win. Pretty boy Jud Birza, better known to fans as Fabio, beat Chase Rice by one vote to take the title of Sole Survivor and the million-dollar prize. He also became the youngest player at age 21 to win the game. It was interesting that it came down to these two guys — Sash Lenahan didn’t get any love from the jury — because it almost seemed like a contest between dumb and dumber. (Jury member Marty Piombo even suggested a Dumber Than a Bag of Hammers Award, most likely for Chase, whom he couldn’t stand.) The show and the contestants regularly reminded viewers how stupid Chase was in his strategy. He repeatedly befriended and earned the trust of other contestants, only to backstab and vote them out each and every time. All that flip-flopping, backstabbing and playing based on his emotions rather than his head should have made it next to impossible for him to earn any votes, yet he received four. Did he play the game that much better than strategist Sash? Maybe, maybe not. Perhaps the fact that he received four votes to Sash’s zero had something to do with the final Tribal Council. When asked what he would do if he won the million dollars, Chase replied that $100,000 would be going to charity, and that he’d be taking care of his mom. It’s hard not to want to reward good intentions. As for Fabio, he kicked off the season playing the role of “the dumb blond,” as Shannon Elkins, who was voted off the second week, said. It was hard to argue that, as week after week, the student and model did things that many would qualify as dumb, from peeing in a pool everyone had to swim in to running around barefoot in a rain forest and getting stabbed in the foot by a branch. Were it not for his three consecutive immunity-challenge wins at the end of the game, he would’ve never had a shot. Lucky for him, he did win, and it didn’t hurt that — as he reminded the jury — he played a friendly game and never had to hurt anyone’s feelings to get where he was.

Not only did Fabio do himself a lot of favors by winning the final immunity challenges but his answers during the jury questioning really helped his case … he only beat Chase by 1 vote to win the million bucks. I didn’t LOVE this season of Survivor but it was entertaining. In the end, I really didn’t care who won, to be honest. I’m glad that Fabio was able to sneak in there and win the whole thing but I would’ve been just as happy if Chase had managed to win instead.

What I was really surprised by was the fact that Fabio was VERY OBVIOUSLY on something during the live reunion special. His glassy eyes were a tip-off that he was high on … something. Then, when he tried to give answers to questions … I was sure the guy was either baked or trippin’. It was clear that Survivor producers also believed him to be out of it because after Jeff Probst asked him a few questions in the beginning (and after he gave nonsense answers), they NEVER let Fabio speak again for the rest of the reunion special. Never in Survivor history have they ignored and NOT let the winner talk on the reunion special. Now that he’s got a million bucks, I can only imagine what Fabio plans to spend all that GREEN on.

Oh and Jane Hammett-Bright won the fan favorite award of $100,000 … which was well-deserved, I think. But, yeah, as I said … this season of Survivor was fun to watch but … it wasn’t really all that exciting. Did you watch? Are you happy with this season’s winner?

[Photo credit: Wireimage; Source]