The Traitors is undoubtedly the most talked-about show of 2026. And from Claudia Winkleman’s iconic knitwear to fan theories around this year’s contestants, the BBC reality show continues to make headlines.
The popular game show sees 25 contestants compete for the £120,000 prize, with two secret teams (‘Faithfuls’ and ‘Traitors’) working against each other to murder and banish players each night.
And with the season four line-up including a secret barrister, a retired police detective and an FBI-trained traitor, season four is bringing the drama.
It was The Traitors’ unlikely origins that got the world talking this week, as the surprising story behind the series resurfaced. And being the most popular show of the moment, it has of course since gone viral.
The Traitors famously started in The Netherlands, with the original Dutch show, De Verraders, created by Mark Pos. And according to the Dutch writer, the series was actually inspired by a real story, and more specifically, a 17th century Dutch shipwreck.
The Batavia was the flagship of the Dutch East India Company, but in 1629 it crashed on the Houtman Abrolhos Islands, with approximately 300 passengers making it to shore.
According to historians, Deputy captain Jeronimus Cornelisz had been planning a mutiny. And when he was left in charge of the survivors while the captain sought help, he and his henchmen plotted and murdered the survivors on the opposing team.
“I bought a book in 2014 about a vessel that crashed into some islands near Australia,” Pos has previously explained to GQ. “The story is not about traitors or loyalists – it’s about mutineers on an island. But when [the ship’s passengers] crashed on the island, they didn’t know who was in favour of the mutiny or not. They all lied to each other, because they didn’t trust anyone.
“When I was reading this, I thought, what happens when there is a group together on an island, and they need each other? What does that human behaviour look like?”
(Image credit: BBC)
The show was so inspired by the historical event that the original pitched version of The Traitors was actually called The Mutineers, set onboard a ship and seeing contestants forced to jump overboard when they were eliminated.
“I pitched it for five years, and nobody wanted to buy it – I probably pitched it 40 or 50 times to broadcasters [in the Netherlands],” Pos recalled. “Some of them said to me, ‘Oh no, not The Traitors again’ But when we made the first series in November 2020, I had a feeling that this was something really special.”
The Traitors season four is available to watch now, with new episodes released on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Friday each week.