Claudia Winkleman with finalists Harry, Evie, Molly, Jazz and Andrew Photo: BBC
Spoilers ahead, but the traitors won. In a nerve-wracking finale to the popular cloak and dagger competition on Friday night, wily young lad Harry Clarke walked away with the spoils of the castle.
“Harry, you've played the game of your life!” said presenter Claudia Winkleman as the 22-year-old army engineer stole the £95,150 prize money from under Faithfuls' nose.
How did Harry manage to deceive his rivals so successfully? Why didn't they reveal the evil plans of the panto villain? Here are five fatal mistakes they made in the 70-minute series finale…
1. First let's expel Eevee
The first of the last five deaths was veterinary nurse Evie Morrison. As demonstrated by her muttering “I'm fucked” in the previous episode, Evie knew her head was on the chopping block. She clashed with Jasmine Bosun at the penultimate Round Table. Accusations began to fly, and when Jasmine was banished, Evie knew that suspicion would now fall on her. And so it turned out. All four of her fellow finalists voted for her, and she left the castle midway through the finals.
Evie was the first to vote for her. will be ejected during the finals. Photo: BBC
This weakened the position of the Faithful. Not only that, Evie was one of the two Faithful who suspected Harry (the other was Jazz, about whom a little later). She also had knowledge that could put pressure on the baby-faced killer. Evie was the only one who didn't know that Harry had secretly pocketed the immunity shield last week. Of course, she also knew that she was Faithful, so she could correctly conclude that no one tried to kill Harry after all.
Thus, the night without killing was the result of Harry's scheming, not his shield. Once Evie was gone, the Faithful's chances of making that connection diminished. Harry's position was strengthened once her name was written on those boards. At least they spelled it correctly, unlike Jazz/Jazz and Molly/Molly. (Don't get me started on last week's Charlotte. Harry should be stripped of his prize money for that.)
2. Assuming there was only one Traitor
The more the field shrank and the breakfast table became smaller, the Faithful never guessed how many Traitors might be hiding among them. They managed to capture five of their bloodthirsty adversaries – Ash, Miles, Paul, Ross and Andrew – although this was usually more due to the traitors throwing each other under the bus than due to the detective skills of the Faithful.
Traitors Andrew and Harry Photo: BBCWhen they kicked out Welsh man-mountain Andrew Jenkins in the final, complacency set in – mostly Molly (again, more on her in a moment). They should have looked into the history of the show. The two traitors, Kieran and Wilfred, made it to the series finale. When Kieran was exiled – he was the equivalent of Andrew turning to the dark side – the remaining three Faithful wouldn't have caught Wilf if Kieran hadn't hinted with his infamous “parting gift”. Andrew was too much of a gentleman to pull such a stunt.
Of the last three, Harry clearly knew that he was a traitor. Jazz suspected that this was true. However, Molly convinced herself that there were no traitors left. She wanted a happy ending so much that she ignored the warning signs.
3. Failed to merge your data
There was all the evidence to nail Harry. If only the Faithful would share this. Time and time again throughout the series, the Round Tables focused less on rooting out traitors through hard detective work and more on personal feuds. The proceedings escalated into mutual mud-slinging. Believers voted based on friendship and personality, not facts. Once the fighting started and the Faithful blamed each other, the Traitors could sit back and smugly enjoy the spectacle while the Faithful did their job for them.
Even with only three Faithfuls players remaining in the final, this disappointing trend continued. Jazz had slight doubts about Harry due to his connections with Darth Paul. Evie also smelled a rat in Harry's form, and Molly witnessed his shield tricks. Even Andrew, attacking his accomplice, noted that Harry knew too much about the traitors' plans, suggesting that he, too, was there in the tower. They also had to realize that Ross would never have killed his mother Diana, so must have been recently recruited, making a night without murders seem even more doubtful.
All of this should have been enough to anger Harry. However, the quartet never came together, let alone united at round tables to put the feisty squad in the spotlight. Harry played a great game, but rode too easily.
4. “Jazata Christi” leaves too late
Jazata Christie. Jazzika Fletcher. Hercule Jazot. Canny Mancunian account manager Jazz Singh has become a cult hero on social media, earning a number of nicknames based on the sleuth. His talk of “hard evidence” and “caged tiger” theories made him Jazz viewers' best hope of unmasking Harry in the home stretch. So why didn't this happen?
Jazz became a cult figure thanks to his detective skills. Photo: BBC
The castle-dwelling detective has kept Harry on his radar for five episodes, mainly through his conversational connections with Paul. However, Jazz didn't want to voice his suspicions in case they became a target on his back. After all, he had waited too long. By the time he voiced his suspicions about Harry in the finale, Evie wasn't there to support him and Molly's emotions got the better of her.
If only Jazz had joined forces with Zack and Jasmine in the semi-finals, or with Evie early in the final, he might have caught Harry off guard. Instead, he was so reticent at roundtables that when he did speak out, his fellow believers could not listen to him, let alone support him. Jazz had the potential to beat Harry, and for a few tense minutes it looked like he could do it. He mentioned the Traitors' tendency to attack each other, which put Harry and Andrew's conflict in a new light, but snake-like Harry escaped the conflict. There was no satisfactory resolution to this story of Jazata Christie.
5. Molly changed her mind
The last and most unpleasant mistake of all. When we got to the final three, disabled model Molly Pearce was scratching her head over who to vote for. Staggering and crying, she first wrote Harry's name on her board, then looked across the fire at her best friend and couldn't follow through. She asked Winkleman if she could change that. Her voice was not recorded. She switched to Jazz and it was game over.
In the end Molly chose poorly Photo: BBC
Even then, Molly still wasn't sure, adding that she didn't believe either of them were traitors. By this point we were already howling at their TV screens. If Jazz was a traitor, why would he vote to exile again? The simple-minded Molly, under pressure, lost her ability to think logically and was blinded by her close connection with Harry. As he said earlier in the series, “Me and Molly are the kids of the band. We're both young, stupid and fun, aren't we? Molly repeatedly said that Harry was the only one she trusted, and viewers slapped themselves on the forehead. Last week, the alarm didn't even ring when he assured her, “You'll be safe. I mean, I think it will.”
When Molly learned that she had been cruelly betrayed, her worst fears were realized. “Oh my gosh,” she said before running out of the room in tears. Harry vowed to regain her trust. She has since admitted that he played the game masterfully, but damn Miss Molly. You could have cracked the case wide open, but you blew it.
Interview with Traitors winner Harry Clarke: 'When I saw Molly, I thought she was going to hit me with a right hook. More details
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