Russell Hantz Calls ‘Survivor 41’ a Disaster

YouTube Russell Hantz

Notorious “Survivor” villain Russell Hantz recently shared his thoughts on “Survivor 41,” and the 49-year-old didn’t hold back his disdain for the recent season.

Hantz made his reality TV debut in 2009 on “Survivor: Samoa,” where he lost the title of “Sole Survivor” to Natalie White. He later appeared on “Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains” in 2010, “Survivor: Redemption Island” in 2011, and “Australian Survivor: Champions vs. Contenders” in 2018.

The Texas native has been critical of the new season, often sharing his disappointment with the franchise on social media.

Russell Calls “Survivor 41” a Disaster

In a December 16 YouTube video, Hantz called “Survivor 41” a disaster and took issue with the new changes to the game.

Like many “Survivor” fans, Hantz was not impressed with Jeff Probst’s decision to restructure the format of the game. In the video, he shared that he particularly didn’t like that filming only lasted 26 days, rather than the usual 39 days. Jeff Probst has cited the shortened production time as a reason why “Survivor 41” is more challenging because it made the game faster-paced, but Hantz disagrees.

“Saying that this is the hardest ‘Survivor’ is laughable [because] it’s not close,” Hantz said in the video. “It’s not even-this isn’t harder than one of the other ‘Survivors,’ not one. So it’s the 41st hardest ‘Survivor’ at this point. That’s a fact.”

Hantz also took the opportunity to critique the new twists to the game and even addressed Jeff Probst directly, stating, “I didn’t like any of that. It needs to go back to normal, Jeff. Nobody likes this stuff.”

Hantz told viewers he understands production had to make changes due to COVID 19 but said he hopes the game goes back to the basics in future seasons.

Russell Wanted Xander Hastings to Win

After the season 41 finale, Russell took to Twitter to share his thoughts on Erika Casupanan’s win and voice his support for castaway Xander Hastings.

Russell wrote in a tweet, “I’m not even saying Erica [sic] played a bad game because she did not! Erica beat me [every] time but Xander played a perfect game for a 20 year old kid! His strategic game was great his physical game was good and his social game was amazing!”

Russell didn’t stop there. After receiving some backlash from fans who accused him of trying to “discredit female winners,” he doubled down on his original stance, telling a fan who thought his opinion was sexist to “f*** off.”

He even conducted a poll via Twitter asking fans to vote for who they think was the most deserving winner of the final three. Xander scored the highest, receiving 62.5% of the votes. Erika received 33.3%, and Deshawn received the least votes coming in at 4.1%.

“Survivor” fans replied to the poll to voice their opinion of the controversial finale. One fan replied, “Xander losing was the biggest robbery of a winner since you in Samoa,” referring to the season where Russell lost the title to Natalie White. Another fan wrote, “Xander didn’t deserve to win. He was to [sic] scared to make a move, just talked a lot to the camera.”

Season 42 of “Survivor” will air in the spring of 2022.