Survivor 51's [Spoiler] Says Alexis Was The One Throwing Names Out: 'She Spun It To Make The Story Work For Her'

The following contains spoilers from Wednesday's episode of "Survivor."

Serious injuries threatened to remove two players from the game Wednesday, but it was Ana's gift of the gab that wound up sealing her fate. 

After Brady sliced a portion of his thumb off and Kristin sprained her foot during a blindfolded challenge, Savu lost the immunity challenge and immediately went into strategy-mode. While Eric was seen as an annoyance to the tribe (a "layup," if you ask Ori), Ana's decision to throw names around willy-nilly rubbed her tribemates the wrong way. When supposed ally Alexis overheard Ana recapping their previous conversation to others, all trust went out the window and the game was on. Alexis then shared some keen intel to Sharonda and Linnea — that Ana wanted Sharonda out — setting the stage for another classic "Survivor" blindside (despite Rob doing the most to try and get himself voted out of the game — read our recap for all of those details). 

So what was Ana thinking and what didn't we see in the episode? TVLine caught up with the latest "Survivor" boot to break down all of that and more.

TVLINE | That second vote came in, and it seems like you knew right away what was coming. What was going through your head when the votes started piling up?
ANA SANI | These expletives! No, I was really shocked. And look, I'm not gonna lie, I clocked the moment that I made the comment about the decoy vote. I clocked their reactions. During the popcorn conversation, I was like, "Oh, I think I'm in trouble here," and it was a lot of spiraling out of control. It's such a long story, but basically, I went into Tribal thinking, "OK, I feel like I've made enough ground in trying to fix these relationships and hopefully I've built enough trust with people." I also had Carter and Rob who I trusted 100%, and they were like, "We're good, we have the numbers," and they were very adamant on that.

And Christian, who they didn't show, he also was very adamant that he was gonna be on the Eric vote, so I felt like even if these other people aren't particularly trusting of me, I thought I had the numbers or the majority to get out Eric. So when I saw that first [vote], I was like, "Oh, something's off here," and then when the names kept coming, I was like, "Oh, I'm done. I can't believe this is happening. What the f**k?"

TVLINE | We saw you throwing a lot of names left and right...
No! No, no, no. Nick, that is not true!

TVLINE | Explain yourself!
If you rewatch the episode, Alexis was the one who brought up Sharonda's name. She's the one who says, "Hey, Sharonda's a threat," and I said, "Sharonda's really smart." And I was like, OK, it's clear that Alexis is trusting me enough to tell me that. She wants to work with me. Then Alexis asked me about Linnea, and I was like, "Linnea is very strategic," but the whole popcorn conversation? If you also rewatch that, it was me trying to save Carter because Carter was the one talking about Alexis. Carter was like, "I don't trust Alexis, I want her gone." And then Alexis walked in and I was like, oh my gosh, I have to say something. So I talked about popcorn trying to save Carter, which was really stupid, and that's when Alexis didn't trust me and she went and spun the story and was like, "Ana's targeting you and Linnea" to Sharonda, but I wasn't exactly targeting them. The name was thrown, so I went with the name to cause a little bit of chaos. Alexis was the one who threw out the names, but you know what, good on her. She spun it to make the story work for her, and for some reason, the girls believed her hook, line, and sinker.

TVLINE | In your final words, you admitted to playing too hard, too fast. If you could do it all over again, what would you do differently?
I think I would trust my gut when it came to talking to specific people. I had had conversations with Alexis previously and I was like, something feels off here. I don't know. Does she trust me? Does she not? But that conversation that we had at the fire was actually our fourth conversation about a similar thing where she was asking me, "Have you heard any names? Do you know what's going on?" And I was like, OK, I feel like she wants to work with me because she keeps coming and asking me these things. So I was like, let me take this leap and do it. But I think the next time that I play, if I were to get that chance, I'm not throwing any names, and if people say names to me, I'm gonna go and tell them that this person said this about you, and it'll be my vengeance, because I did not do that. And yes, I got painted that way, and it sucked and everybody believed it. I guess I'm just shady. But I made some really stupid moves, let's be so for real, like, what?

TVLINE | You mentioned the popcorn, so what's your favorite kind of popcorn? Are you a butter girl, or do you go for the gourmet goods, like a salted caramel or a cheddar?
Here's the dumb thing, I don't even like popcorn! I literally go to the movies every Tuesday and I never get popcorn because I used to work in concessions, and the way that the popcorn's made in concessions made me feel sick. I only sometimes eat [it] and just because of yesterday, because I knew it was coming, I did pop some popcorn for myself. See, I didn't even eat it. I don't like it! But yeah, I don't know why that came to my head. That was so stupid.

TVLINE | As T-Bird would say, get your popcorn popped! We need to talk about Rob. As someone who wanted to stay in the game, was it frustrating to see all the shenanigans he was trying to pull last night?
Oh, just watching it back was wild. I remember him being in the booth for so long, and I was like, dude, it's four letters. Why are we taking so long to write this name? And then he came out and he just gave me a wink, like everything's good, which in his brain, I guess he was like, "Well, Eric's going home anyway, so yeah, you're safe." But looking back, I'm like, dude, if your plan went through, I still would have been voted out. Then what? So that was crazy.

TVLINE | What didn't we see out there that people should know?
So somebody had told me that Sharonda and I had beef. And I was like, what? That means Alexis told Sharonda. So what they didn't show was I pulled Alexis aside to try and make amends with her, and I was like, "Girl, I know that you are completely talking about me with other people. Why are we doing this because I want to work with you." And she was like, "You're right, I am doing that," and she was completely honest with me and said that she was talking about me. So I saw that as, OK, I think she actually wants to work with me, and we pinky swore on it, and I was like, I got you, girl. I wanna protect you. I wanna work with you. And then I started pulling her into all of my other conversations as well to try and make amends. I was really trying to fix this trust that was broken with a lot of the castmates because I could feel it. I'm very attuned to that. When they're talking to me, I'm like, "This feels really disingenuous right now. I know you don't trust me." But they just couldn't get back.

TVLINE | Eric was really annoying everyone on your tribe. What was it like actually living with him out there?
You know, Eric... Eric was having a lot of fun, and I'm gonna give that to him. He is himself through and through, and I actually really love Eric because he's not afraid to be who he is. And yes, sometimes there were moments where it was like, OK, maybe socially he should have read the room a little bit better, but I can't ever fault him for having a great time out there. He wanted to try new things and keep the spirit of the tribe alive, even though all of us were very tired and very hungry, and maybe didn't want to improvise with him. But it was fine. I love the kid. I love Eric.

TVLINE | That challenge looked fierce. How difficult was it dragging that whale through the water?
I was useless during that challenge. They had sandbags underneath to help for the shorter people, to help you hoist it up. Even on the sandbags, I couldn't get it up. The whole time, I was like, "What do I do?" I was like, do I climb on top of the whale and try to pull it over, but then Linnea went up and Linnea was like, "No, you stay down." And Sharonda was like, "Get over there, get over there!" Sharonda was just trying to command the whole thing, and I was just trying to listen. It was so bad! Sharonda and Rob did amazing on that challenge though. They were really holding it down. But yeah, it was horrible to watch.

TVLINE | Any final words on your "Survivor" experience, Ana?
Leaving pre-jury is really hard. People don't talk about it enough, but you come in wanting to play this game, and then in pre-jury you're kind of taken away from the game entirely, and you have to go through your own kind of game out there in Ponderosa. I wanna put a huge shoutout to my Pondy roommate, Aaliyah, who really held it down for me, because I was a mess out there, and she's very strong. I left everything to play this game. I was coming in in a very transitional period, so for me, this game meant a lot to me. I really wanted to play hard, so to be voted out early was very heartbreaking for me and I really struggled with that. To go through the Ponderosa experience was a game of "Survivor" on its own, and I think it should be talked about more. I was devastated, but I loved my time out there, and I hope I was entertaining for all the mess that I was. I wanted to play a chaotic fun game. I think I did, not in the way that I intended to, but I'll take it.