The Traitors Are So Screwed

Warning: Spoilers for season three of The Traitors through last week’s sixth episode.

Has The Traitors’s titular faction ever been so screwed? There have been plenty of close calls, fumbles, and plans blowing up in their faces, but no situation has seemed as on the brink of total devastation as the one Rob Mariano, Danielle Reyes, and Carolyn Wiger find themselves in as we approach the midpoint of season three. Put them in the Reality TV Hall of Fame for Worst Team Ever Assembled.

After Rob’s dramatic betrayal of Bob the Drag Queen, the Traitors had to put their heads together, devise a solid plan, and execute it flawlessly in the castle. They did … not that. While Rob worked overtime to cover his tracks, Danielle and Carolyn played cat and mouse, throwing each other’s names out into every room in Alan’s castle. Derrick Levasseur mounted a convincing case against Rob at the round table, enough to get Rob sweating, but instead of helping out their fellow Traitor, Carolyn openly declared war on Danielle by dragging her name to the round table when no one suspected her. (Side note: Why is no one suspecting Danielle?) Danielle took her shot and voted for Boston Rob, who managed to turn the vote onto Wes Bergmann, wiggle out of banishment, and make his way back into the turret to lick his wounds. But for all his hard work, Danielle and Carolyn are still fighting, and Derrick is still hard on the case, spending what he assumes will be his last night planting seeds of doubt with all of Rob’s allies.

The Traitors have backed themselves into a corner and don’t seem to have many options left. “I don’t even know what to do,” an exasperated Rob says, for maybe the first time in his reality-competition career, when they meet in the turret. For her part, Carolyn is over it. “We just have to go after Danielle,” she says, exploding all pretense of the Traitors working together. Rob is left speechless, but Danielle promises she won’t take it lying down. Rob’s assessment of his situation: “It’s a shitshow, dude. It’s a disaster.”

Indeed it is. But there’s plenty of game left! So we asked Vulture’s resident Traitors obsessives to share their reactions to the moves that have been made, their best strategic advice going forward, and how they think the game will play out from here.

Is it possible for the Traitors to get back on the same page, or should they just go after each other?

Joe Reid: I’m not sure how necessary “getting on the same page” even is considering all their murders have been so low-impact. If they can go after each other without exposing themselves in the process (a big “if”!) then yes, attack.

Nicholas Quah: It’s impossible. Let chaos reign. I don’t think anybody feels motivated to listen to each other — especially Danielle!

Fran Hoepfner: I think it’s possible for two Traitors to get back on the same page, but definitely not all three of them.

Nic Juarez: Danielle is never coming back into the fold. I think Rob and Carolyn can get on the same page if they decide to align against Danielle.

Genevieve Koski: They’re not even on the same page about going after each other! They were basically the Spider-Man pointing meme at the round table.

Anne Clark: I think if Carolyn and Danielle don’t get Rob out, they’re both cooked. If they can realize that there’s a chance!

NJ: Anne, do you think it’s possible for Carolyn and Danielle to work together to get out Rob?

AC: I believe in miracles, yes.

NQ: I don’t see how Carolyn would want to cooperate at this point!

Who will come out on top in Danielle vs. Carolyn: Dawn of Justice?

AC: I think they both have to realize that Rob is bad for both of them, and Carolyn has to be willing to put her beef aside long enough for them to take him out, which I think is possible! She can always pick it back up again.

Rebecca Alter: They should team up against Rob. The position presented at the round table last week was: This is coming down to Wes versus Rob. It’s obviously Rob’s trickery. If you all vote Wes out and he turns out to be a Faithful then we KNOW Rob is a Traitor. They need to hammer that home.

AC: YES.

NJ: Carolyn is capable of forgiveness with her allies, but not with Danielle, imo. Danielle went after her, there really is no coming back.

RA: I would catch a grenade for Carolyn.

NQ: To borrow one of Rob’s favorite words: There’s already some amount of sus on Danielle, so it’s not like that seed hasn’t already been planted. Carolyn’s still pretty clean.

FH: They’re both somewhat erratic players, but Carolyn seems to have more allies in the castle at this point.

JR: Right now, Rob’s only hope is for Carolyn and Danielle to take center stage in a battle against each other. They’d be wise to let the Faithful take care of Rob first and THEN attack each other. In which case, Carolyn has the big edge because she’s sussed out way fewer people, and the harder Danielle tries to whip votes, the more inauthentic she’s gonna seem.

Does Derrick survive the night? If not, who should the Traitors murder?

JR: Derrick, unfortunately, spelled out exactly why he should be the next murder: It’s useless for Rob to avoid going after Derrick because it won’t rid him of suspicion anyway. His only argument is to say he’s being framed, which clears him to get rid of Derrick anyway. Danielle and Carolyn are too busy fighting to make a case for anyone else. Not sure who else would even make sense.

AC: Yeah, I think Rob will kill him, and then he’ll use the trust he’s built up with Dylan to insist he’s being framed. And Dylan will believe it with tears in his eyes!

NJ: I agree with that, but the Hail Mary move is to murder Dylan and try to frame Derrick and say that Derrick is a Traitor and is going after Rob’s allies.

NQ: I’m partial to the idea of Rob framing Derrick, but if it comes to pass that the Faithful end up banishing Derrick, the suspicion is still going to fall back on Rob under the broader assumption that one of the three new additions is a Traitor. So I say kill Derrick now and figure it out from there.

NJ: Yeah, he’d have to try to throw enough suspicion on Derrick to keep votes off himself while also having Derrick around long enough so that it’s not revealed that he’s a Faithful. And hope that Danielle vs. Carolyn takes center stage, like Joe said earlier.

GK: Regardless of which order Derrick/Rob go, I love the poetic justice of the “not down with the Housewives” cage boys self-destructing, and at the hands of an offhand comment by Bob the Drag Queen, no less.

AC: I do feel like being a known game player is something everyone on this show should consider a bad thing they need to get rid of quickly, given how last season ended!

NQ: I mean, is there a possibility they can’t come to an agreement, and there’s no kill?

NJ: Alan should make them stay in the turret until they come to a decision. Actually a cool wrinkle would be if they can’t come to a decision, then one of them randomly dies.

NQ: TIME BOMB!

How does Rob survive the next round table?

AC: Four words: Dylan Efron’s Sweet Face.

FH: By escalating the drama between Carolyn and Danielle.

NJ: Teaming up with Carolyn and Brittany to go after Danielle is his only hope. It would be very funny if Brittany played a hand in getting Danielle out again.

NQ: The issue isn’t surviving the next round table. I think there’s a plausible way to execute a Derrick frame job. The question is the rounds after that. If he can pull off killing Derrick and redirecting blame on another Traitor, that’s a path forward …

JR: He needs to provoke Danielle and Carolyn into a fight that exposes them both as Traitors and hope that the Faithful take the bait. I don’t even know if that will work because, after Wes, it is SO obvious that Rob is a Traitor. His other best option was to approach Derrick and Wes and maybe Dylan with an offer of them keeping a known-Traitor around until the end for their own gamer benefit, but I think, as Genevieve said, Bob TDQ successfully drove the wedge in between the cage boys and made it so they couldn’t all three work together and survive.

NJ: Joe, who has been Rob’s greatest foe? Russell or Bob TDQ?

JR: Phenomenal question. Russell voted Rob out, but Rob could always say that Tyson’s error was the real culprit. Bob forced Rob to out his own game.

How are we feeling about the Bambis Alliance?

JR: I need Chrishell to start making some correct calls or get Tom banished out of spite or something. I’m very pro-Bambi, but I need them to make one (1) successful game move to keep that torch lit. Gabby is obviously a star and should host future Traitors U.S. reunions in place of Andy Cohen, who doesn’t care enough.

FH: I respect the Bambi Alliance’s commitment to using an alliance as an excuse to hang out all the time versus acting as a voting bloc. But I do think they need to start acting as a voting bloc, ideally with Gabby leading the charge and not Chrishell.

NJ: More than anything, I hope they’re having fun.

FH: What Nic said. How I feel about the Bambis Alliance is ????

NQ: Agreed with all of the above. Also, maybe useful allies for Carolyn?

NJ: As a Boston Rob defender, it pains me to say that I think the Bambis could turn it around if they woke up and went after Rob. If he goes down, I hope they are the ones to do it.

JR: Unfortunately, I think they’re more useful allies for Rob since Chrishell seems to gravitate towards him anyway (derogatory).

Jasmine Vojdani: Agree, it’s time for Gabby to pair Danielle’s erratic behavior with the fact that she heard her voice outside the wine cellar, and Chrishell needs to stop reporting to Rob.

NQ: I relate to them tremendously, though. If I were on the show, I’d probably prioritize hanging out with my homies.

JR: Also, I would like Chrishell to acknowledge that she is an All My Children alum and thus knows a thing or two about murders in opulent mansions. “This reminds me of the time my TV mom Janet committed a bunch of crimes, and then I got framed for them.” Something like that.

Danielle wants to recruit new Traitors — but will there be new Traitors? If so, who are we eying for the job?

FH: Sandoval!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

AC: Carolyn and Sandoval alone in that turret would be maximum comedy. Imagine how good his breakfast reactions would be, so much sweating!

NQ: I believe other versions of Traitors had up to two recruits, so it’s possible!

JR: I will be very bummed if there are no more recruitments. Watching someone go from Faithful to Traitor is one of the great pleasures of this show, and without a recruitment we won’t get that at all. Recruit Dolores and watch her spring to life. Plus I think we might be embarking on a run of Traitor banishments, so the producers might not have a choice.

NJ: There might be too much heat on Chrishell, but going into the season, I wanted to see her be a Traitor. Imagine Rob and Chrishell running the game.

GK: I think this is the perfect time for Dolores to go Traitor — the “a Housewife has to be a Traitor” narrative has died down after they all got banished, and Sandoval got so thoroughly smacked down when he broached it at the round table, I feel like no one is gonna want to jump on that theory because it would mean admitting Sandoval is right.

Any final predictions for this week’s episode and/or the rest of the season?

FH: I believe we’re seeing a Traitor go home this week and maybe also next week.

JR: Whomever the Traitors recruit (if they indeed do recruit) will end up winning the season.

NQ: I truly believe Carolyn has the best shot of winning the whole thing.

AC: I’m really worried that somehow Rob will cause enough chaos to get to the end, at which point he will kill the precious and perfect Dylan Efron in the most heartbreaking of scenes.