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The Survivor 44 cast features a geeky NASA student who’s a secret hunk, and Gay Twitter™ is losing it
'Survivor 44' has a historic number of LGBTQ+ cast members... plus a secret twunk, and the internet's losing it.
Ever since Richard Hatch waltzed his naked ass all the way to the million-dollar prize in Survivor‘s first season—nearly 23 years ago!—the CBS reality competition show has been for the gays.
Sure, the game of outwitting, outplaying, and outlasting has been met with its fair share of controversies, but that’s not stopped millions from tuning in, week after week, to see whose torch Jeff Probst will snuff next.
More recently, Survivor has gone to great lengths to ensure a more inclusive, safer, and more equitable competition (though the less said about this most recent season’s winner, the better).
And we’re seeing that pan out in exciting ways, like the fact that Season 44 will have six queer contestants!
Here’s a quick overview of who we’ll be rooting for…
- Yamil “Yam Yam” Arocho, 36: A salon owner from San Juan, Puerto Rico (he’s the first contestant from a U.S. territory), Arocho names going to the beach with his husband as a favorite hobby.
- Matthew Grinstead-Mayle, 43: A barbershop owner from Columbus, OH, Grinstead-Mayle says his proudest accomplishment is the family he’s built with his husband and son.
- Frannie Marin, 23: A research coordinator now living in Cambridge, MA, Marin is proud to be a queer woman working in STEM.
- Claire Rafson, 25: A Midwest-born tech investor currently located in Brooklyn, NY, Rafson is a self-proclaimed “queer Black Jew.”
- Josh Wilder, 34: A gay surgical podiatrist in Atlanta, GA, Wilder is already a survivor, having beat cancer at a young age.
- Carolyn Wiger, 35: A Hugo, MN based drug counselor who has had her own journey with addiction, Wiger is proudly pansexual.
But, because Gay Twitter
’s gonna Gay Twitter, there’s one more Survivor 44 who stands out from the pack who isn’t queer, and that’s 20-year old NASA engineering student Carson Garrett from Atlanta, GA.
Garrett is a loud and proud “space nerd” who tells Entertainment Weekly that he’s more than ready for the competition because he has “obsessively studied the evolution of game theory within Survivor,” and is eager to see how “unique thought process and strategic background fare on a game built upon the idea of adaptability.”
Honestly, he might be a real threat for the win!
Almost immediately, fans were comparing the young contestant to Harry Potter, which he appears to welcome since his Twitter bio reads “Harry Potter lookalike.” But there’s one other thing Garrett has in common with “the boy who lived”—or, Daniel Radcliffe, at least—he’s secretly ripped.
The contestant shared a shot from his first day marooned, humbly pointing out the “gigantic zit smack dab” on the middle of his nose. But Carson, babe, no one is looking at the acne, we promise!
Naturally, the internet has no choice but to stan its new twunk king:
DM from one of my students
pic.twitter.com/Fk9UWpBUxT — Owen Knight (@TulaneOwen) February 3, 2023
So, how will this real-world Clark Kent/Superman fare on the beaches of Fiji’s Mamanuca Islands? Will the six queer contestants team up and give us our first-ever gay alliance? (We sure hope so!) We’ll have to wait until March 1 to find out, when Survivor returns to CBS.
In the meantime, here’s a few more photos from Garret’s Instagram…
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