In the Survivor fan community, there are people who are figuring out which seasons to watch first and others who’ve been around for years. Those people who’ve loved Jeff Probst’s beloved reality show for years are likely to know who was medically evacuated first and which players refused to return. Since they know facts like that, the most passionate Survivor fans also tend to have opinions on how to rank the seasons, who the legendary players are, and which winners are the best.

Despite many Survivor fans being so well-informed, many of them don’t know how amazing Eva Erickson’s life was before the show. It also seems like many Survivor viewers don’t realize how underrated Eva is as a player.

Why Survivor Fans Seem To Be Sleeping On How Great Eva Erickson Has Been On The Show

When people agree to compete on Survivor, they are taking a huge risk in many different ways. After all, those players know that they could be putting their health at risk, they are taking the gamble of putting their life on hold, and they could suffer embarrassment.

On the bright side, there are a lot of great parts to competing on Survivor. Of course, Survivor players can get rich quickly, earn international fame, and go on the adventure of a lifetime. Survivor players also have the potential of earning the respect of millions of people if they play well.

Sadly, however, there have been some Survivor players who’ve played the game well and have still not been given the credit they deserve. In my opinion, Survivor 48’s Eva Erickson is a perfect example of a player who doesn’t get nearly enough credit.

As Survivor 48 has been airing, some of the show’s viewers have grown to be very frustrated with many of the season’s players. Unfortunately for Eva, there is no doubt that she is one of the people who has faced a backlash. Not only is that backlash incredibly uncalled for, based on what fans have seen Eva accomplish, she deserves a lot of credit.

The main reason why she deserves the fans’ respect is that Eva has accomplished almost everything that a Survivor player could possibly want to do in the game. Anyone who questions that needs to look at the results of what Eva has pulled off.

The most important thing that a Survivor player must accomplish in the game is to build strong bonds with their castmates. Without doing that, players will have very little chance of making it to the end. Worst yet, even if a player makes it to the end while angering everyone else, they will likely become a zero-vote finalist.

Throughout the history of Survivor, there have been very, very few players who’ve built bonds as tight as Eva has. Of course, the most obvious example of that is Eva’s relationship with Joe Hunter. After all, Joe has repeatedly stated on camera that he would sacrifice his game to Eva’s benefit. Whether Joe ever follows through on those comments or not, he certainly seems to be sincere while pledging to protect Eva and that proves how successful she has been.

What some fans seem to be ignoring is that Joe is far from the only Survivor player that Eva is aligned with. In fact, even though Eva openly spoke about not trusting Charity Nelms during the game, that didn’t stop Charity from seemingly wanting to work with her.

As a Survivor fan, I sometimes sit in my comfy chair and pontificate about how the show’s players are getting things wrong. Putting aside the fact that I’m sitting on my couch and have no idea how well I would or wouldn’t do in the game, fans like myself need to remind ourselves to consider substance over style. If a player is behaving in a way that viewers are convinced is wrong and are getting great results, maybe fans should remind themselves to learn from what that player accomplished.

In addition to being successful as a social player, Eva has proven herself to be great during challenges too. Clearly a very determined person, Eva has done incredible during several challenges and won individual immunity.

Fans also forget the context of Eva’s most memorable moment of the season. When Joe memorably came to Eva’s aid after a challenge, that was after she did something amazing. Despite struggling during the challenge, Eva used that determination that has helped her win in life to persevere. If fans don’t respect that Eva kept going despite clearly being distressed, there is shocking.

Finally, Eva pulled off something else that has to be on every Survivor’s bucket list, she was able to get both an advantage and an immunity idol. Not only that, Eva got caught while sneaking off in the middle of her night in her battle to get her advantage and kept her social game intact.

Again, it has to be stated that Eva has done far more in the game than viewers have given her credit for.

Eva Erickson Continues To Prove She Is An Impressive Person After The Game

As this article previously touched on, Eva Erickson has faced a backlash from Survivor viewers. As anyone who has seen how brutal social media backlashes can be, they often go way too far. While Eva shouldn’t have had to deal with that, the way she has responded is admirable.

On April 29th, 2025, Eva posted several images of herself from Survivor on her Instagram account. In each of those images, Eva had what can only be described as a huge smile on her face.

Amazingly enough, all of those smiling images were part of how Eva decided to react to the backlash she’d been facing.

Alongside those images, Eva included this caption that revealed that she was still being true to herself in the face of the backlash.

“I’m happy as hell to be on Survivor!! The internet is mean but I’m just gonna keep smiling at the haters 🙂 Watch me keep cheesing for episode 10 on @survivorcbs Wednesday 8/7c!!”

As admirable as Eva’s response was, the fact that she was facing a severe backlash at all was uncalled for.

Survivor

Release Date

May 31, 2000

Network

CBS

Showrunner

Jeff Probst

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