‘The Traitors: New Blood’ EPs Break Down NBC Premiere, Sweetening the Pot for the Faithful and Why the Civilian Cast ‘Played Hard Straight Away’

SPOILER ALERT: This post contains spoilers for the two-hour series premiere of NBC’s “ The Traitors : New Blood,” now streaming on Peacock.

“The Traitors” castle isn’t just for the rich and famous anymore. Peacock’s Emmy-winning franchise has arrived on NBC, with “ The Traitors: New Blood ,” a new season composed entirely of civilian players in the game of murder, mayhem and more money than ever before.

In the show’s two-hour series premiere, host Alan Cumming welcomed 22 appropriately bloodthirsty competitors to his Scottish castle and immediately threw them into the deep end of the loch. Because of the show’s international popularity, the players walked into the castle knowing exactly where to go and what to investigate. Feeling right at home with the game is exactly what the creative team wanted.

“To have a sense of familiarity meant they felt comfortable in their surroundings and they played hard straight away,” executive producer Sam Rees-Jones tells Variety of the premiere.

At the first roundtable, with a sly tap on the shoulder, Cumming chose Tomica Adams (a pilot from Boston, MA) and Joe Vanella (a funeral director from Wantagh, New York) as his first Traitors of the season. But during their midnight confab in the turret, he informed them a third Traitor was incoming, and that they had to pick the person. In addition to their first murder (RIP faux college basketball coach and real lawyer Kim Daily), the Traitors chose two “accomplices” to audition to become their fellow chaos agent.