Survivor 50's [Spoiler] Reacts To Devens' Wild Fake Idol Ploy — And Whether It Sealed Her Duo's Fate

Spoilers ahead for Episode 8 of "Survivor 50!"

Every Dragon Slayer needs a Dragon Slayer Whisperer, but in Wednesday's "Survivor 50," both of them hopped a boat to Ponderosa after a new Double Duos twist took the game by storm.

After being instructed to pair up for the immunity challenge, Jeff Probst pulled the rug out from the castaways by telling them that their fates in the game were also tied together. At Tribal Council, they'd vote as individuals, but each vote would be for a duo, thereby eliminating not one, but two players by night's end. After Tiffany and Joe won immunity and Devens made use of his cleverly planted fake idol, the pickins were slim and the controversial Coach and his partner in crime Chrissy saw their torches extinguished. (Read our recap here.)

Below, Chrissy talks to TVLine about the fake idol fiasco, her relationship with Coach, her lack of screen time, and what we didn't see about her game in the episodes. 

TVLINE | Chrissy, this is the second time a never-before-seen twist has upended your game. How are you feeling about how everything went down in last night's episode?
CHRISSY HOFBECK | This twist was different from the fire-making twist [in Season 35]. I thought it was an extremely awesome twist. It was so cool that we had no idea what was going to happen when we got into pairs, and then we found out what was going to happen and got to vote separately. I think the twist was awesome. I was on the bad end of it, but I still think that the game mechanic was really cool. And I had an amazing — I know you saw none of my game — but I had an amazing 16 days. So, yeah, my heart's pretty full.

TVLINE | How do you think things would've shaken out if your partner was anyone but Coach?
I don't know because Coach and I have talked about like, "OK, whose fault was it that we got voted out?" and we decided it really was both of us. We both took responsibility and neither one of us blamed the other person. So, yeah, Coach had all his Coach shenanigans, and he was certainly a target, a huge target, right? I was the one who decided to go after Rizo, not knowing how closely aligned he was with Queen Cirie. So, at the end of the day, I honestly just don't know. I think part of what came into the vote was how many idols were out there. There were only six teams. One was immune, and two had idols. So I guess there were really only three choices. There weren't really a lot of options.

TVLINE | So why not vote for Rick and Aubry? Did you think your Rizo/Emily plan had traction?
Realistically, I actually just really liked Rick and Aubry. I just liked them. I wanted to play the game longer with them. Particularly, I find Rick Devens [to be] an interesting player. I think he's very creative and fun in the way that he plays, and I just wanted more of that for Season 50. I didn't really have any relationship with Rizo at all. Not much with Emily. I did feel like voting for them though. Emily would have been my collateral damage. I would say it was more to save Rick and Aubry than get rid of Rizo and Emily.

TVLINE | Devens planted a fake idol at Tribal Council...
Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant, right? So great. I love it. I know that that is my downfall, but I couldn't wait to watch that moment in the season because I thought it was so great.

TVLINE | Would you and Coach have gotten the boot regardless, or do you think Rick's shenanigans pushed people off the fence?
I don't know the answer! Obviously, Coach and I went into that Tribal Council believing that Devens and Aubry were going home, but I don't want to underestimate what an amazing player Cirie is. So, would Cirie have turned the whole group against me and Coach? Maybe the answer is it probably would have been Rick and Aubry? Not that Cirie didn't want me and Coach gone, but I think maybe the timing wasn't right. I still look back and go, "It's really a surprise that they voted out two loyal allies this early in the game." Whether she wanted to cut the head off, you know, "mom and dad" of the alliance or not.

TVLINE | You caught votes from Stephenie, Joe... a lot of these people you were supposedly aligned with!
Honestly, Stephenie and Joe flipping is the part that I'm the most surprised about. But I'll tell you that until I watched last night, I did not know that Cirie was the mastermind behind that plan. I thought that Tiffany flipped Joe at the reward. I thought that she flipped Joe and convinced Joe to vote against me and Coach, and then they went and got the rest of the group mobilized for that, which didn't happen at all. So, props to Cirie! This goes to show you how great Cirie is playing because she just sort of whispers in people's ears.

TVLINE | Speaking of whispering, you're now the Dragon Slayer Whisperer! Was it hard to wrangle Coach in once you found out your fates were connected? How worried were you about that?
I love Coach so much and one of the many things that I think is so amazing about him as a human being is he's just himself. He's just himself at all times. The day before, which was the Dee vote-out episode, it was crazier than it even appeared on TV with his haiku-ing and his singing nonstop and his shenanigans and dancing and all of that. So yeah, I really did go over and say, "You need to be invisible and you need to lay down in that hammock and not get up." And he literally laid there for like five hours. So yeah, it was totally crazy. Afterwards I was like, "Shoot, maybe I should have let Coach get out of that hammock," because then maybe the two of us wouldn't have gotten voted out.

TVLINE | On the flip side, earlier in the game, Coach spoke to you about how you may have been rubbing some people the wrong way or talking too much. Even though the message may have had truth to it, it felt like his delivery of that message was rough. Tell me a bit about how you were feeling after he gave you that advice.
OK, so obviously, I cried, right? But at no part of that was I ever upset with Coach. I think Coach got a lot of online hate for how he spoke to me. He does not deserve any of that. Coach was my best friend out there. I love him. Him and Jonathan, I was really close with. Coach told me that because I think he knew we didn't have a lot of time before we were getting back to camp with other people and because he just tells me stuff. It's fine. We're like a brother and sister duo, so there was no part of me that was upset with him at all. Was I upset that it got said about me? Yes. Did I get over it? Yes. You know why? Because now I was in a tribe that actually liked me. I just got along really well with Genevieve and Colby and Joe and Aubry. The original tribe, maybe they didn't like me. It's fine. I like me.

TVLINE | There's been some discourse this season about the women being under-edited. Angelina spoke on it during her exit press. I've seen some of your posts on social. I wanted to give you the floor in case you had anything to add.
I do definitely think that the edits have certainly turned around. Mine never did, but it's fine. I did not come out here for followers or to become an influencer. I'm glad to see that they're starting to show more well-rounded edits of the women, though. It just was a little bit of a surprise that, for example, Rizo gets called lazy, but then we get to see Rizo talking about, "Heck yeah, I'm lazy. That's not part of my game. I'm not doing anything," right? Or people don't like him, and then you hear, "Oh, he's actually pretty awesome," right? Angelina and me, they're like, "Oh, Angelina's lazy." That's the end of that story. "Chrissy's annoying." That's the end of that story. So, I'm glad to see that we're starting to see more from some of the other women. But yeah, I would have liked it to be a little different for her and me, but I guess that's what we get.

TVLINE | Everyone keeps talking about "the people in the middle," but if Christian, Emily, Aubry, and Devens are "the middle," who's the other side? How did you see things out there?
I have literally no idea why they were "the middle." There was a majority alliance, which we believed was seven. Clearly that was wrong because Cirie, Ozzy, and Rizo [are] over here doing a master class of "Survivor" playing. Who would be the bottom? Maybe we thought Rizo was on the bottom? Who else is there?

TVLINE | Tiffany.
Yes! Rizo, Tiffany, and Dee. Probably they were the bottom people, with the middle tier, in our "Survivor" minds, which are unclear after not sleeping and eating, and everybody's lying to everybody else. I'm giving everyone else major props. They totally outplayed me.

TVLINE | How did you know that Rizo held on to an idol for a majority of Season 49? Who leaked that info?
I can't remember. My guess is either it's possible that Savannah told someone on her original tribe who then told us, or it's possible Dee... Dee has admitted now that she and and Rizo FaceTimed and talked and sort of got together before the season. So it's possible that the information came from Dee, who maybe told someone who told me. I don't know. But we did know that he rode to the end with an idol.

TVLINE | What was the hardest part of competing in Season 50, and was "50" more difficult than Triple H ("Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers")?
They were totally different. The first time that you play, there is so much beauty in the entire thing. You're like, "Oh wow, I'm sleeping outside. I'm sleeping on bamboo!" This, Day 1, we literally go to lay in the dirt, and I'm like, "I'm too old to lay in the dirt. I can't believe... what am I doing here? Literally, what am I doing here?" So, I would say the physical aspects, really just the sleeping. Honestly, the lack of eating did not bother me, and wearing the same clothes and never looking in the mirror is kind of glorious. Just waking up, that's kind of great. So that was worse, but I have always said the feeling I felt the most playing Season 35 was loneliness, and I never felt that way playing "50." I always had someone come over to give me a hug, like an unasked for hug. Or bring me something or help me with something. That part was way nicer. If I could go back and play either one again, I'm playing Triple H again because I just did way better.

TVLINE | What else didn't viewers get to see on TV, or just in general, is there anything you want viewers to know?
Yeah, so I wasn't just this random person hanging around in the back of the frame, or off the side of the frame, or who wasn't even in the frame, right? This is what happens when you don't go to Tribal Council for the entire pre-merge. You never have to actually make your moves. But yeah, what I would say is there was a lot of love in that game. Oh! Let me tell you this: I made the fire every day, and I could make the fire in like 10 seconds. I was teaching people how to make the fire because I thought if I get to Final 4, I'm winning that Final 4 fire-making challenge, if it exists.

TVLINE | I actually voted "No" for fire-making on your behalf!
I voted "No" on my behalf, too, thank you so much! But I thought if they have it, I better know how to make this darn fire, and I was really, really, really good at it. I wish they at least showed me making some fire there. What else? Oh, this I will tell you. All of my pre-season press, I said that I was not winning the first individual immunity challenge. And we're standing up there in the Blood Moon, we're standing in the [endurance challenge] and I literally said into my microphone, "It's just me and Stephenie up here? Alright, I could play the short game, easily win this thing. My feet don't even hurt. I could win this thing and make it to tomorrow, but then they know that I'm still good in challenges. I think I have to play the long game." I literally said all this, I can't believe they didn't actually show me saying this. I was whispering into my microphone. "Or I could play the long game, which is, put on the elderly lady act. 'I can't do it anymore,' and not turn on the gas until much later." And then I stood there for a minute and I said, "OK, I'm playing the long game." That's when I said, "Steph, you can take it," and I stepped down off my thing and gave that to her. They didn't know that I did [that] because then I went back and played the old lady act, but I wish that made the edit.

TVLINE | So are you up for a Round 3 some time down the road?
Nope! I'm done. I am totally done. My heart is full. I am so grateful for everything "Survivor" has done for me. I had two great experiences. I do not need to sleep in the dirt another day. I am happy to watch it on my television and root for everybody else who goes out there, but I feel completely fulfilled.