Well, how about that? Only five episodes in, and The Traitors has already seen two massive twists.
The first has been hyped for quite some while: the role of the Secret Traitor, that mysterious red-cloaked figure whose identity remained a secret from even the viewers. That is, until Hugo went and got himself banished and they were forced to reveal themselves as Welsh luvvie Fiona.
The second probably took even the production team by surprise. By the end of last night’s episode, Fiona was exchanging verbal blows with Rachel around the kitchen, while the Faithfuls looked on. And don’t get me started on the scenes in the turret later that night: the pair glaring daggers at each other, while Stephen stood off to one side, baffled (and relieved: the heat is almost certainly off him now).
I was baffled, too, frankly. What was going on?
But maybe I’m giving the production team less credit than they deserve. When Fiona pulled back the red hood in the turret on episode three, I let out a sigh of disappointment. The show’s big twist, revealed so early? What a let down.
Keeping the identity of one of the Traitors a secret from the audience added a fun extra frisson to the game – one where the audience was in the dark, and forced to work off almost non-existent clues, as much as the Faithfuls were. Taking that away would make the series boring again.
How wrong I was. Because the true genius of this twist, it turns out, wasn’t in the secret itself – but in the divisions it has sown between the Traitors themselves.
Those divisions have been apparent since the start. When the newly-minted Traitors – Hugo, Stephen and Rachel – donned their green cloaks for the first time, ready for a night of murdering, their faces dropped when it was announced there was somebody above them in the pecking order, who would be giving them a shortlist of Faithfuls to pick from.
“I do not require middle management,” Hugo snapped at one point; the Traitors quickly made it a point of order to figure out who their new mystery boss was and axe them. Then Hugo went and got himself banished, and Fiona was quickly welcomed up to the turret, amid a whole load of fanfare.
Despite all the excitement, it quickly became apparent that she – at least to Stephen and Rachel – was an acquired taste.
“What are you like, Fiona,” Stephen mumbled at one point, when she talked with relish about the joy of murdering her fellow contestants. Immediately, the to-camera chatter became all about whether the two Traitors could trust their murder-happy new friend, who was playing the game so well neither of them had remotely suspected it was her.
The three have never really gelled. Likely, that’s because of the fact that they weren’t all made Traitors together – for a while, Fiona was essentially their secret boss, and clearly loved it – but it also looks increasingly as though she and Rachel’s strategies are totally incompatible.
Fiona talks about herself as a team player. Despite that, it quickly became clear she didn’t trust Rachel, whom she claimed was “playing her own game,” and had never (Fiona observed) stood up for fellow Traitor Stephen when his name came up in conversation.
However, both she and Rachel have displayed a remarkable capacity for ruthlessness, and seem to consider themselves lone wolves in a game that, to be fair, often does reward throwing one’s ally under the bus.
For the past few episodes, it’s all felt a bit uncomfortable; now all those seeds have come to fruition in the battiest way possible. Rachel’s disclosure of Amanda’s true identity was apparently the straw that broke the camel’s back, at least in terms of Fiona’s pride.
The distrust between the two women has always been there, but Fiona refusing to accept that Amanda would not tell her about her secret identity, when she comes from a “family of coppers,” is bonkers. Her telling a group of Faithfuls that she thinks Rachel is a Traitor, just because of it, is gobsmackingly bonkers.
The irony is, Rachel’s strategy actually was a team one. By telling everybody Amanda was a police detective, she was likely betting that it would draw heat away from the real Traitors and onto the people Amanda had been suspicious of: Jade and Sam.
Now, the pair are coming to blows in a way that’s surely likely to raise red flags for every single Faithful who watched them clash. What a turn of events; it feels unprecedented. When have we ever had Traitors falling out so spectacularly? Will they even be able to agree who to murder tonight?
Where it goes from here is anybody’s guess, but one thing’s for sure: tonight’s episode is going to be must-watch television.
The Traitors is streaming on BBC One and iPlayer
