There was only one moment of real tension in the second series of The Celebrity Traitors, and it came in the finale. It was Endgame round the fire pit, Romesh Ranganathan had just been convinced by Bash Croft that James Blunt was a Faithful, but Blunt, taken aback by Ranganathan’s initial accusation, had retaliated and voted to banish again. His face grew redder and redder, he shook his head in panic as he realised he had sabotaged himself. These are the mistakes, the gambles and the leaps of faith that make this programme so brilliant.
For the five weeks before that, though, I didn’t feel a thing. I did not observe anyone really wrestling with their banishment votes, I did not see anyone conflicted about committing murder, I did not witness any moments of shock, devastation upon slipping up or feelings of betrayal, even when James Acaster announced at the Round Table that he was a Traitor. Things only got spicy when the Faithful got defensive, Traitors couldn’t even be bothered to come up with decent defences when they came under scrutiny, and then they just chucked each under the bus with little more than a shrug.
Maya Jama was such a composed Traitor it felt like she was passively ticking her victims off a list. Acaster was so fixated on being a Faithful he wouldn’t even properly participate in the game and left his would-be team-mates to fend for themselves. Too many of the actual Faithful – Joe Lycett, I’m looking at you – were so desperate to be Traitors and play the main character role conceived in their imaginations that they may as well not have been there, for all the good they did to progress the Faithful forward.
And as for Richard E Grant, that early cock-up was far less a marmalade-dropper than a complete anticlimax. This cast was astoundingly good. But it simply didn’t feel like all of them sincerely wanted to embrace the chaos and unpredictability of the game. There was no-one to root for because the stakes were not low – they were non-existent.
Betrayal and murder are not the same thing. The reason The Traitors is so good is because everyone taking part is forced into situations, whether it is the intensity of the castle, the exposure of the Round Table, or the physicality of the challenges, in which they are vulnerable, and must rely on the bonds they build with others. They have to make friends and form alliances not only to suss out Traitors (or deflect suspicion), but to make it interesting to watch.
It was a thrilling novelty to see celebrities in this surreal environment last year and to observe the factions that formed among them, and especially the contrast between Alan Carr cosying up to his close friends during the day as he bumped them off by night. It made for unmissable and totally delightful TV. But this year, every move the Traitors made was delivered with indifference.
James Acaster’s confession felt confusing and inconsistent (Photo: Euan Cherry/Studio Lambert/BBC)We were told about their friendships, of course, over and over – we just weren’t shown them. Maya and Kenny were close, she claimed in the turret as she considered him for recruitment. Miranda Hart and Joe Lycett formed a lifelong bond that left her bereft upon his banishment. Michael Sheen was leader of the pack. Romesh and Bash had a deep trust as each other’s “100 per cent Faithful”.
Every episode, it seemed, another member of the cast was declaring their closeness to someone else out of the blue or describing someone’s inherent character trait. But we, watching at home, had been privy to none of it. It felt inconsistent, unearned, and in the case of Acaster’s confession, just plain strange, as his calm words, the muted reactions and then the formulaic votes just didn’t seem to add up to the enormity of what had happened.
We were treated to a few flashes of good comedy, of course. Jerry Hall taking Romesh and Rob Beckett under her wing or describing Blunt as having “a face redder than a fox’s ass at gooseberry time”, Ross Kemp’s paranoia and the yawning murder in plain sight. My series highlight – and a moment of real, sweet compassion that came back to bite her – was when Leigh-Anne Pinnock taught Miranda Hart the dance to “Touch” by Little Mix to cheer her up, because it showed us that these people really must be bonding behind the scenes. But why not show those bonds developing, rather than leading us to assume most of these players were operating in silos. There isn’t much compelling about that.
We all know that “the edit” of any TV programme is brutal, and most of the character-led, human scenes outside of pure plot will always end up on the cutting room floor. (The edit can also be brutal for any celebrity taking part, with no say over how they are portrayed, and James Blunt and James Acaster are already committing the unedifying faux pas of criticising the edit in interviews since the show went out, stressing how much the audience “don’t see”).
But on The Traitors, the “plot” and what happens at the Round Table has no meaning to the viewer unless we see how the characters interact with one another away from it.
Good detective work and ritual killing aren’t what make this such engrossing TV, but the study of human instinct, judgement of character, decision-making, deception and trust. The civilian version brings together a group of strangers who have no choice but to form tribes and hierarchies, but all of that becomes especially intriguing when it concerns celebrities, with existing bonds and reputations, and who are otherwise so much more controlled, popular and accustomed to wielding the most power in a room.
It’s not betrayal if there’s nothing to betray in the first place. Strip away all of what gives this moral tension and The Celebrity Traitors is just a castle full of big egos. The audience will not remain Faithful to that, 100 per cent.
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