In an age where reality TV can be found on all channels, during all hours of the day, you would think that we’d all have reached saturation point by now. But then the BBC go and release The Traitors, and we can’t get enough.
Forget Love Island and Married At First Sight, this Claudia Winkleman hosted reality show/ televised social experiment is what everyone needs to be watching.
And we’re not the only ones who think so, everyone – and we mean everyone – has been raving about the series on Twitter with one user commenting, ‘I have spent most of the day drinking tea in bed whilst binge watching The Traitors on BBC iPlayer. I don’t think I could have spent the day doing anything better.’ Another fan tweeted, ‘The Traitors is the best TV at the moment.’
For those of you not in the know, the premise of The Traitors is that 22 strangers take on challenges in the hope of winning up to £120,000. However, hidden amongst those regular competitors, known as The Faithfuls, are The Traitors whose job it is to secretly ‘murder’ a player each night – removing them from the game - without getting caught. It’s up to the Faithfuls to try and detect who the Traitors are and banish them from the game. Only those who survive to the end will be in with a chance of winning the prize pot. Think wink murder, but AMAZING.
The show has everything: backstabbing, allegiances, lies, genuine street smarts and it’s completely addictive. And sorry to those involved, but it's also unintentionally often hilarious.
But just in case we haven’t yet convinced you to watch the show, here’s a definitive list of why The Traitors should be topping your ‘What To Watch’ list…
It’s Hosted By Claudia Winkleman
Naturally this is the reason that tops the list because Claudia Winkleman is iconic. When you combine her love of a smoky eye with her quick wit, you get the perfect host for an eerie but competitive reality show.
Her wardrobe – which she’s described as ‘a cross between Princess Anne and Ronnie Corbett’ - is also exactly what we need for a series set in the middle of the Scottish Highlands. She’s definitely the woman who can give fingerless gloves the comeback they deserve.
The Betrayal
Oh, there’s so so much. Honestly, the opportunity to win a life-changing about of cash really does bring out the worst in people.
In theory, the three ‘Traitors’ aren’t allowed to reveal their identities to the other players but in a recent episode, fingers started getting pointed and things started getting heated when one of ‘The Traitors’ accused another at the Round Table.
N.B. The Round Table is a very dramatic setting where all the participants come together to decide who they want to accuse of being a ‘Traitor’. Whoever gets the most votes is immediately sent home and thus loses the opportunity to win the prize money.
It was a VERY tense moment but to find out exactly what happened… you’ll have to watch the show!
The Twists And Turns
Nothing can be taken for granted in this show. In fact, in the first episode alone, Claudia gets the participants to line themselves up in order of how well they think that they’re going to do.
What the participants – and us as the viewers - don’t expect is that she’ll take them at their word and thus the two individuals claiming that they don’t think that they’ll do very well are immediately sent home without even setting foot in the castle. BRUTAL.
We’d love to tell you more, but we can’t do that without revealing some HUGE spoilers, so you’ll just have to trust us when we say that you NEED to watch The Traitors on BBC One.