We’ll Meet You At The Fire Pit | Traitors 2026 | Thread 13 | THERE WILL BE SPOILERS

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Thread to continue discussions of Traitors 2026 (UK Version)

If you haven’t seen the Final of this year’s Traitors then stop right there and get yourself over to iPlayer.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you!

Players, the floor is yours…

I was really happy with the result. Rachel was magnificent and I liked Stephen too. The show doesn't really show people's interactions with each other apart from when they are talking about the game so I think it's difficult to know how they got on. Rachel must have been popular in the castle to have lasted so long and I'm sure there were in jokes such as the grandma thing that viewers weren't party to.

A lot of the contestants in the show were not memorable at all and I'm really glad none of the interchangeable men won. I thought Jack and Jade and were particularly salty about not winning but they didn't contribute much to the enjoyment of the show or finding traitors. Rachel and Stephen made huge contributions to the entertainment and were deserved winners.

Jack seemed very salty about not winning. I am not sure why he thinks he deserved it after doing absolutely nothing. He was taken to the end because he did nothing.

This is a really good point. Banishing Rachel would have put Stephen in the position of having not one but two horrible betrayal moments.

I thought he looked calm and non sweaty at the firepit which reassured me he was going to stick with Rachel.

The misogyny on this thread is something else!

There's a reason it took so long for a female Traitor to win.

I felt the ending was a fitting reflection of the series as a whole. Rachel had the best strategic sense, Stephen played a great social game and adapted quickly when he realised early on he didn't have the strategic sense to play that way. Both Rachel and Stephen had opportunities to go back on their promise and didn't. Rachel had to talk her way out of a lot of suspicion and did it really well and without throwing Stephen under the bus. I'm glad they both chose to share rather than win alone, that would have soured it for me.

I don't think it is really possible to know what people are like from edited reality programmes. The production team edited hours and hours of footage to ramp up drama and tell a story not to make people likeable. Rachel was obviously popular to survive so long but we didn't really see that. Faraaz had suspicions for a long time before we saw him voice them. Stephen was obviously tempted to take all the money but we didn't see anything that would have broken the tension of that choice. It's a drama not a reflection of reality.

Having said all that kudos to Rachel and Faraaz for making it down the dam, I would have bottled it.

What binds all those people together is an intense shared experience. That may turn into friendship and it may not but it's still a real tie.

Although I felt initially miffed that there was no big surprise/betrayal between Rachel and Stephen, I’m now pleased they won.
As many have said, Rachel was a superb player, Stephen was perhaps a bit lucky to be paired with her and their loyalty to each other was ultimately the polar opposite of traitorous.
Anyone going to watch the Irish Traitors?

After spending this week yelling at the TV at the faithfuls to vote Rachel out, I am pleased that she and Stephen won. They worked hard, had nerves of steel, and their decision to stick together paid off.

If the faithfuls had won, I would wanted it to have been Jade and James. Jade, just for being so resilient and under suspician for absolutely no reason, other than being reserved.

James because he was essentially he was homselfand threw himself into everything. Even when he was totally wrong.

I loved this series overall and was glad the traitors won together.

I was the same, I wanted Rachel out but then when it came down to the final I was rooting for her and Steven & was so pleased they won
They were faithful traitors which was a nice kind of twist.

Traitful? Faitors? If we want to do a James!😀

Agreed. They both played well, Stephen wavered more, and messed up more, lied more blatantly to people, relied on his likeable nature...

But somehow people are saying -
Rachel's a conniving woman who got through on luck and would have thrown Stephen to the wolves... Despite no evidence that she ever would do that...

Stephen - fab player, loyal to the end, faultless, generous giving half "his" winnings away...

She really didn't. She played really well and did a great job of convincing the faithfuls.

We were doing predictions before the episode and none of us thought Rachel could survive. Her gameplay in the last episode of persuading Faraaz to view with her was brilliant. She saw where the cracks were and exploited them perfectly to get to the end. Obviously Stephen also played his part and could have turned on her, but the team traitors win was a great ending.

Jade messed herself up by voting Faraaz, although in the end it didn't matter. But if she actually thought Stephen would vote for Rachel, she should have done the same.

In terms of the American one, although the characters are more annoying, they do play the game more strategically and understand voting blocks better. There's an episode in US season 2 (not a spoiler) where Sandra, who has won Survivor twice, uses the snooker balls to explain how they have to vote to get their desired outcome. The UK faithful haven't really done this yet.

There's nothing the world hates more than a woman who has had the temerity to get older.

I think there were differences between them - other than being male and female which I am not going discount as a factor in how they were perceived!

Stephen wore his emotions more obviously on his face whereas Rachel had a better poker face. We know that Stephen was struggling emotionally more obviously than Rachel appeared to be.

Also Stephen was a bit more reactive than proactive - Rachel was more actively deceptive in her game play than Stephen. Which made her a brilliant player but I can see why this made her look less likeable.

I also think some of Rachel’s actions have been misinterpreted- I keep seeing “snide” used to describe comments she made which I perceived as more tongue-in-cheek. She herself said on Uncloaked that she was surprised at the reaction to things like the comment to Ross about the turret which was meant to be a joke.

Personally I think Rachel was an incredible game player and I don’t think it’s fair to judge her character on how she played the game. She’s clearly capable of being absolutely formidable but none of us know how she uses that power in her daily life.

I am another who was desperate for Rachel to go but during last nights episode was actually wanting her and Stephen to win.

I just looked back and her exact words last night were ‘I really hope Stephen has my back because, God help him if he doesn’t, I will take him down’. So we can take from that what we wish about whether she’d have thrown him under the bus but my gut is that she would had she been in the situation where she could have guaranteed he’d gone or guaranteed the whole pot her herself.

I personally found Rachel quite unlikeable even in episode one. Just very very serious and didn’t seem much fun about her. If that makes me misogynistic then obviously I am.

Will say about Rachel though she played an amazing game, kept her cool in situations where I’d have probably just passed out from the stress and is obviously extremely clever. Absolutely deserved to win.

That was true at the point when Jack was the only faithful left, but turning around Faraaz was totally down to Rachel.

I don't get why people say Rachel was ruthless but Stephen wasn't. He couldn't possibly have got to the end without being ruthless about murdering or framing his friends and people who trusted him 100%, and he was very strategic about it.

I agree Rachel was more reactive and take charge than Stephen, which some people think makes her unlikeable. I think it makes her likeable.

Personally I thought it was a perfect satisfying ending that was true to how the season as a whole played out

Jack being the expendable character left in the final 3 - no-one could really feel he had been cheated of a win!

Rachel making it through via brilliant gameplay throughout.

Stephen sealing the ending by being somewhat conflicted but ultimately sweet and generous natured.

Rachel and Stephen absolutely earned their win.

In terms of the American one, although the characters are more annoying, they do play the game more strategically and understand voting blocks better. There's an episode in US season 2 (not a spoiler) where Sandra, who has won Survivor twice, uses the snooker balls to explain how they have to vote to get their desired outcome. The UK faithful haven't really done this yet.

It's easier to do that with the American one because they have more background knowledge about each other and their game playing tactics. There was one where someone came in late who apparently had quite a fearsome record of being ruthless about how he played games, and he became a traitor. Admittedly it took them some time, but eventually they worked out that he had to be a traitor purely by virtue of the fact that he was surviving - if he had been a faithful, there was no way the traitors would have risked him staying alive.

I don't why but I seem to always want the traitors to win.

Maybe it's cos we see more of them on screen.

Still wish Minah could have won.
And still gutted Wilf didn't.

I agree. Right up to the moment he turned over his chalkboard I had no idea what he was going to do. When they got rid of Faraaz I knew Rachel and Stephen could win together, but it was entirely in Stephen's hands. Jack was bound to vote for Rachel, Rachel would never vote for Stephen so would have to vote for Jack, but Stephen could have voted for either. It's not often in life you have a split second to decide whether to get nearly £50k or nearly £100k. He made a really principled choice there.

I assume when they come back in subsequent years to appear on Uncloaked and do other interviews they get some sort of payment. Travel expenses and accommodation at the very least. I hope so, anyway!

Rachel came across as less emotional and expressive whereas Stephen was a "ruthless but still smiley" type.

Sometimes Rachel seemed to be giving dagger looks at the round table but I think she was just trying to stop her face giving anything away.

She was well liked by all the players in the castle so we clearly didn't get to see the real her at all.
I think it's a mixture of misogyny and editing that has made Rachel less popular with the viewing public.