Suspend Disbelief and Drop In To ‘The Traitors’
Season 2 of the absurd “reality” series is even better
A Former Survivor player facing off against a former Bachelor for $250,000? Alan Cumming parading around a Scottish castle? Cumming buries them alive, covers them in bugs, and forces them to scour for shields to protect from “murder” in this 10-episode series. I would sum up Peacock’s The Traitors in one word: absurd — and obviously, it hooked me immediately.
Based on the Danish show of the same name, The Traitors pits reality TV stars against each other in a game show version of Mafia. The show taps a handful of players as the titular traitors, and the rest need to root them out to win the prize money and survive their murderous wrath along the way. The second season is airing now, and I implore you to suspend disbelief and check it out.
Respect to Alan Cummings as a host & to his wardrobe! 👏 #TheTraitors pic.twitter.com/oNBj2soVqQ
— Myriam 🌊 (@maximusmom13) January 13, 2023
Traitors is OK with feeling manufactured: the challenges have no ties to the Scottish landscape or the recurring murders, other than feeling vaguely spooky. Cummings’ outfits are outlandish, and he fully commits to the bit, announcing gross sequences like a stage actor delivering a Shakespearian soliloquy and trashing the portraits of murdered contestants with surprising cruelty. But it all comes together to create one fun, madcap game show. Who doesn’t love to watch famous people fight over nonsense?
Nothing about Traitors feels like a reality show, despite its cast: this season premiered January 12, and features familiar faces from Big Brother, Survivor, many Real Housewife franchises, Love Island, the Real World, Ru Paul’s Drag Race, and the Bachelor, alongside boxer Deontay Wilder and a former member of Parliament.
And everyone acts like a main character: in a scene where the traitors must murder a fellow contestant by tricking them into drinking from a poisoned chalice, Survivor winner Parvati Shallow says to the camera with a straight face, “I am a full-on trained assassin. There is zero adrenaline running through my body right now,” in a sentiment that I’m gonna need on a t-shirt.
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I’ve never been a Bravo TV fan, but Real Housewives of Atlanta star, Phaedra Parks is so fun on this season. An attorney-turned mortician-turned Real Housewife has stolen my heart.
“The best part of my week is when I get to watch Phaedra from Real Housewives flirt with C.T. from The Challenge in the midst of every mission on #TheTraitors,” tweeted one fan. “She has her priorities and I respect it!”
Perhaps capitalizing on last season’s success, Peacock is dropping one episode per week of the second season, which feels a little off-brand. What is this, a prestige drama? Inject this nonsense directly into my brain in a steady stream, please. You cannot slow burn a fast-and-loose show like this, where every episode ends on a cliffhanger. At the time of this writing, I must know if a Big Brother star gets outed as a traitor thanks to a guileless Love Island sweet baby. I must!
Happy traitors day to all who celebrate pic.twitter.com/aQNHqQMeWt
— amy ♓︎ (@Amy__A_) February 1, 2024
Join me on this very silly journey through the Scottish Highlands, airing now through the end of February. Unless you hate it, then I don’t want to hear your opinion.
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If you like reading about real spies and liked The Traitors you’ll love reading a psychological roller coaster about a real secret agent running in the fields and if you think the likes of Ian Fleming or any of the Cambridge Five lived exciting lives think again! In an article published last week it was revealed that the spy Bill Fairclough (MI6 codename JJ aka Edward Burlington) who was unceremoniously refused an Oxford University scholarship survived 50+ known near death experiences including over two dozen “attempted murders for want of a better expression”.
You can find the article dated 7 August 2023 in the News Section of TheBurlingtonFiles website (which is refreshingly advert free). The reason he survived may well have been down to his being protected by Pemberton’s People in MI6 as explained in another fascinating article dated 31 October 2022. It was for real. It is mind-boggling as is that website which is as beguiling as an espionage museum in its own right. No wonder Bill Fairclough’s first novel Beyond Enkription is mandatory reading in some countries’ espionage or intelligence induction programs. If you reckon you can track down real traitors try your luck with this thriller: odds on you don’t clock the lot!
Beyond Enkription is an enthralling unadulterated factual thriller and a super read as long as you don’t expect John le Carré’s delicate diction, sophisticated syntax and placid plots. Nevertheless, it has been heralded by one US critic as “being up there with My Silent War by Kim Philby and No Other Choice by George Blake”. Why? It deviously dissects just how much agents are kept in the dark by their spy-masters and vice versa and it is now mandatory reading on some countries’ intelligence induction programs. See https://theburlingtonfiles.org/news_2023_06.07.php and https://theburlingtonfiles.org/news_2022.10.31.php.