The Traitors review – A mischievous new twist sets the fourth series off with the perfect rug-pull

The BBC’s hit show faces down the risk of overfamiliarity by adding a hilarious hierarchical dimension to its murderous treachery

What makes The Traitors so fiendishly compelling? Is it the emotional betrayals? The schadenfreude? The Machiavellian skulduggery? It has all that, and some. But for all its diabolical genius, there’s the risk of it going stale. Plus, how do you top a recent celeb edition that had everything? Celia Imrie farting! Tom Daley learning the word “flabbergasted”! Alan Carr murdering his friend Paloma Faith with a poisoned lily!

Not helping matters for the arrival of this fourth series is the fact we haven’t actually had time to miss it. Barely eight weeks since Carr’s triumph, and here we are again for the common-or-garden edition. Familiarity breeds contempt and all that. Still, Claudia Winkleman and the producers clearly know they need something fresh. So before we even get to the usual palaver – that same steam train arrival, that same amazement at the castle accommodation – Winkleman unveils a devilish twist: a secret fourth Traitor. How I laughed when the chosen three discover there’s another one in their midst, and they’re suddenly reduced to mere middle-management, only permitted to eliminate Faithfuls from a shortlist handed down by their faceless overlord. Even murderous treachery has a chain of command now. “It’s supremely annoying and frustrating,” moans Hugo, the 51-year-old barrister and one of the selected three. “The whole point of being a Traitor is having perfect information and now there is someone above us in the chain.”

It’s a clever idea. But, of course, The Traitors is only as good as its cast. In this opening instalment, we meet the two other Traitors: the impeccably dressed Stephen, a 32-year-old cyber security consultant from the Isle of Lewis, and head of communications Rachel, 42, who “can’t wait to murder people”. Among the 18 Faithfuls – a crime writer here, a ghost-hunting builder there – a few stand out. Most notably, Amanda, a retired detective presumably in her element. What a rug-pull it would be if she turned out to be the secret Traitor, having spent the series dispensing crime-solving wisdom purely to throw everyone off the scent. Surely the producers have thought about that?

Then there’s sales exec Ross and nursery teacher Netty, who have history: friends of friends some 15 years ago who apparently haven’t clapped eyes on each other since. How that dynamic plays out could be fascinating. Will it help or hinder? How far does old loyalty stretch when there’s money on the table?

I’ve always found the tasks to be filler, really – an admission that it’s not quite enough to just stick people in a castle and watch them scheme, spiral and slowly lose their minds. Tonight’s effort at least yields a comic moment: when one team, attempting to tow a coffin to shore, finally clock their boat is anchored to the thing. It’s the sort of slapstick you couldn’t script.

But can this series match the highs of what’s come before? Will we get another Wilfred, cold-bloodedly recruiting Kieran only to sacrifice him? Another Harry, delivering that devastating firepit confession that left poor Mollie in tears after she’d scribbled his name off her chalkboard? While it’s a shame we didn’t get a breather between celebrities stabbing each other in the back and watching civilians do the same, the ingredients are certainly there for the fourth series – the secret Traitor twist has real mischief, and Winkleman remains the perfect mistress of ceremonies for this theatre of cruelty. It’s already gloriously twisted enough to have me hooked. There goes my next few weeks.