CELEBRITY TRAITORS FINAL: Live Reaction

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2:23Be smart. Get wise. T's and C's apply. Born from the intensity of a night in the eternal city. Introducing Born in Roma fragrances by Valentino. Feminine perfume Donna Born in Roma features juicy blackcurrant, central jasmine, soft cashmere and warm vanilla. Masculine leaning but unisex Womo has notes of fresh violet leaf, aromatic sage, green vetiver and mineral salt. Shop holiday gifts at Macy's.com. Hello and welcome to this live stream Traitor's Reaction episode of The Rest is Entertainment. I'm Marina Hyde and I'm here with Tim Hinks who's made more reality TV than you can imagine and who always gives me a masterclass in it. Tim, a faithful win. Extraordinary and may I just say I'm delighted

3:17to be here. Thank you. I feel a little bit for your audience like it's turning up at the theatre saying the part of Richard Osmond is played by Tim Hinks and they're thinking oh god that's not what I paid my money for, but I'll do my best. But what a wonderful, yeah, faithful win. And I think, as we were saying before we went on air, we should really just devote this whole podcast to James Blunt. Yeah. I mean, it's, okay, first of all, we must say, you know, Bash, who became the player that all, right from the start, we sort of felt he could be because he was so sort of smart and circumspect. Romesh, who we felt the path to victory could only run through if they were to ever have a victory.

3:49But yeah, a word for our third fallen James Blunt, who just found one more way to be wrong. In the best tradition of reality shows, you know, it's not like with One Direction and so on. It's not the winners, right? It's the people who came closer. And I was thinking so many things about James. One is that at the towards the end there he said i loved trying to work it out i thought that's surely on his gravestone isn't it because he loved the trying of it and i i mean just to be confessional for a minute a few years ago marina i'm going to share this you know i had a little dog who we had to put down and on the day he was due to be put down the amazon delivery driver came and little ace ran up and started jumping up and i thought not today not today i feel like with james it was never the right day for him to go but we

4:28knew that day would come right yeah the little puppy it really and he was like a puppy it was what we will get to the end game but it was extraordinary going through that many banishments and kenny is gone no and of course, Kenny, who at a certain point, sort of three quarters of the way through, I turned to one of your producers and said, I think this is going the way that we all think it's going, which is Kenny's going to make it to the final and, you know, to the last three or whatever. And, of course, there was a wonderful twist. And the thing about this whole, as you and Richard have talked about throughout this, the thing here is that none of it's about gameplay or technical knowledge or brilliant strategy.

5:06It's about the chaos of this particular series. And they sort of won the Faithfuls as they played all the way through. Which is in utter chaos. Blindly sort of ferreting around looking for clues. And they, guess what? Sometimes you can be right even though you're very wrong. I feel like we have to, we know the destination but we better go back and see how on earth they got there. It's not entirely clear how they got there. We began, you did, they began with a sort of montage and you were like, oh my God, remember my Harlot? That seems, for them it's 10 days, but it must have felt like about three months ago. I think that's one of the amazing things about the way time works, it seems to, with these sorts of shows

5:43is that, and the task that you come to later where they had to work out who went out first and all the rest of it did feel like another series yeah it's amazing and i think you you just end up falling in love with the people who are right in front of you and so you know i let's go back to the beginning as you say but i feel now slightly bereft because i know that tomorrow night i'm not spending time with these people and i really miss that they've been they've been incredible but yeah people have people have made all sorts of fusses about this show and other people have said, no, no, that's how the game plays out. It plays out differently every time. The format is kind of flawed and croaky,

6:14but we love it. I did, yeah, we should begin actually right in the turret when right after James Acaster's bombshell and Kenny says that was absolute chaos. He was so good at one point. It's brilliant the way he says it. Some of the lines in this episode. Yeah, I think he said, we were so good at one point, didn't he? And then he talked about the chaos that they're all in. And of course, because this has been such a particularly strange series, I think, because you've never known where the centre of gravity is. And again, it's worth saying as we celebrate the final this you know the richly grant earlier You know at the very beginning it was the sort of butterfly that flapped its wings right and it carried on giving that

6:53And I feel that so there there are the traitors who've you know to some extent finally got their act together They don't have James anymore who we love him right, but he wasn't the best traitor as he was That's the whole point of James. And it just goes away from them and they can feel it. And I felt particularly in this episode, I saw Maya for the first time looking a bit lost. And not just because she later on gets some heat, but just she seemed a bit less in control of the narrative and what was happening. Yes, they were running out of choices that were any good. They had to get rid of Michael, which is what they did. But you could feel her all the way, feeling it was slipping away and that she couldn't really see a pathway for herself anymore.

7:35I think she'd had so much heat and she was so tied to him in a way. And because he'd said, I didn't spray the perfume, he'd fingered two of them. It had to be one. And there's something about Kenny that they couldn't until right at the end suspect. I think there's a theme often I watch this and think about if they were sort of representing you in court, you know. And so, as you say, James Acaster, for all the chaos and the fact he didn't want, said something very legalistic, which is, you know, and I think he said in another episode, I will never tell a lie. So it was absolutely technically true that he didn't spray the perfume. And you're right, that left a sort of big question mark. And I think you see that a few times in this.

8:15I mean, I would say, you know, later on, we were obsessed with James. Let's not jump here. But James at a certain point says, well, I think that. And he says, well, of course, I'm never actually right. And you think, imagine that was your barrister. And that was the sort of note they were giving you. Yeah, I'm on your side. But he says, well, of course, I'm never actually right. And you think, imagine that was your barrister. And that was the sort of note they were giving you. Yeah, I'm on your side. But I mean, I've no idea if I can help you win. But I think you could feel the traitors that the earth was shifting a bit in that opening turret, couldn't you? Yes. And then outside of it, there were things like quite a lot of Leanne not understanding

8:41why she was here anymore. And I'm afraid that she is an absolutely classic example of if you're asking why you're still there at the end of The Traitors right it's because you're not any threat to anybody yes if I can put it euphemistically and she is not she was not a threat to anybody but it you I mean as you said to me just before we uh came on to this finals are really hard you've made lots of these. You've got, you've basically got an hour and 20 minutes of television there. And then, and you've really got that amazing bit round the fire pit. Yeah. You've got a strange, I think, issue, which is you're extending it. It was an hour and 20, I think, tonight, wasn't it? So you normally extend the final

9:21and that's really because the final is so important and because that's what we've been waiting for. But it's sort of the one you least want to extend because actually, just want to know how is it, you know, who's won. And of course, brilliantly tonight, you had a really wonderful staggered sort of staggering towards the finish line. It worked really, really well. But finals are hard. And I think it was about 58 minutes or so that we got our round table. You know, it took a long time to get there. And there's lots of stuff going on. So, yeah, they're hard to get right, but I thought they did, I mean, I should say, throughout this whole series, they've all done brilliantly. The teams behind this made it look very, very premium,

9:55and the task, which I know we'll come to. The mandatory helicopter. You have to have a helicopter in it. If you don't, BBC helicopters can only like follow a chancellor to right like precisely one compass point from number 11 to the to the budget yeah or they can have my drama hanging out the side of them that which they certainly did which they certainly did i think we saw in a bond film if she doesn't get a bond audition after this yeah i mean i think there's close competition with james for the role ofonde, of Bond, I would say, and even Rom, but we'll come to all that. But no, the task itself, which we got to, am I jumping ahead a bit, but the task was just a bit of fun and games and really didn't take

10:36us anywhere, right, other than it was a celebration. Yeah, it allowed us to see James Blonde saying things like, Roger that, moving out. I thought the most touching moment was when Bash sort of jumped out of the helicopter into the freezing water. And James said really plaintively, he's such an action man. And I thought he really wanted to do that, didn't he, James? That's his moment, right? He can do that stuff. Yeah, he did a bit of her locker stuff with some of the explosions and what have you. Yeah, it's true. But you could tell that Maya, by this stage, was, despite all her heroics in that and all her, like, just give her a bon part already, she's so good in her master interviews. She's got more screen time than almost anyone

11:16because she understands instinctively the rhythms of this kind of television. So she knows what to say. And I know they ask you leading questions, so you say the right things that help you with the stories. But she is on screen so often because she's just instinctively brilliant at those. Yeah, and I think, you know, I would say, looking back, I would take Traitors Are Gonna Trait. Traitors Are Gonna Trait, right? One of the great... And she's just, as you say, has a way of... But I think there's no question, you know, we talked earlier about how, you know, these are big famous people, big celebrities doing a reality show, which is very hard to book people like this. And one of the reasons Traders is such an attractive or has been such an attractive pool for them is that it's a fun game and everyone loves to play.

11:57But it's actually really intense in there. And I think tonight in the final, you could see whether it was James getting a bit snarky with Rom in the vote later when he sort of it was extraordinary it was so extreme and actually he would have convinced by that reaction alone he convinced Romesh that there was nothing to worry about with him but then he couldn't help getting in his own way for one last time I mean we should come to that we'll do that afterwards but yes so once then they've got a bit of time where they can I mean, we should come to that. We'll come to it. We'll come to it. Yeah, we'll do that. Yeah, we'll do that afterwards. But yes. So once, then they've got a bit of time where they can sort of say each other and who it might be.

12:35Maya saying to Kenny, I know you weren't fighting for me in there. Incredible. It was all foreshadowed, but you knew it was going to happen. And that's what's so brilliant about things like this they do say it and it's real and it's in the moment but people are becoming so sort of literate with the edits now that when you see that you're like oh wow he's going to vote for her and I think we were worried yesterday that there was just such an easy route through for Kenny and the question was the way through was to jettison Maya and of course as you say they tease that through for Kenny and the question was would he, the way through was to jettison Maya right? And of course as you say they tease that brilliantly. Again

13:09when you're making a show like this and they've done this brilliantly and consistently all the way through you obviously retrofit it and what are the big stories and I think they gave James Blunt as we said a brilliant ride tonight it was just a wonderful thing to watch his story and I think the Maya of it was brilliantly done as well because you could gradually see the cracks start to appear. And when she's under the cosh a bit at the round table, actually she does a thing that she hadn't done before and you should never do, which is just look a bit upset and hurt that they're suggesting that you might be, rather than come up with the evidence. I wrote in here, she talked too much. It reminded me of when I

13:43was younger and you're trying to convince someone that you're not drunk. So you just keep trying to talk in a really normal voice and actually shut up. Yeah, it was really, I found that hard to watch. She just explained too much. She said too much. And I think you had Rom who was an amazing inquisitor and really calm, and you didn't want to disappoint him. And I felt he was a bit disappointed, you had Rom, who was an amazing inquisitor and really calm. And you didn't want to disappoint him. And I felt he was a bit disappointed, you know. And so he was brilliant at sort of drawing it out. You had, you know, James, who was a sort of, made Columbo look sort of like super, super efficient and on it.

14:16There was a point where he said, by the way, I don't know the answers. Yeah, no, I know. And then another. So I've been trying to think what's going on, as you say. Yeah, no, he's, so you felt it was gradually slipping away. And as you say, one of the joys of this show is you can see yourself. I mean, they're just constantly getting into trouble with people. Yeah. And that feeling, I felt really bad for her. I mean, not quite as bad as Sharon the other night, you know, but it felt like, oh, God, I'm really losing this. And actually, when someone, she said at one point that I've been, I've had brothers, you know, so I know how to defend myself. And you're thinking, got it. But the thing is, you are, you have done wrong.

14:51Like, there is no way through this. You are absolutely a traitor. And once they can smell it, there was a little bit of the return of the herd, wasn't there? Yeah, I mean, the herd, they found it hard to shake off the herd. But there was that amazing shot of kenny and it's really amazing we talk about it as though you're watching something that someone has built up so beautifully over sort of you know six seasons of breaking bad but it's actually the shot of kenny just hesitant and you know he's writing down maya was so good no no and it was almost like that was reminiscent of what it's like when the traitors go to the turret right you don't know who they're writing suddenly out of nowhere exactly as you say you have this moment where you're thinking this is going to decide or not decide.

15:29It seemed like, again, we don't know what really happened. You know, this is what the edit meant that he hadn't said very much. So it's quite surprising people didn't sort of say, you know, I was saying he's the glider, right? I mean, he glides like, you know, and I think that he his that moment was a really key moment again I'm thinking that because a final is really hard to deliver it's hard to keep the tension going is that that was a really helpful moment for the producers because you thought oh my god the vote's gone so that Kenny you know and of course they came to him last and that was a really important moment to help you really think there's some jeopardy here and he did what we thought he

16:03would do which is yeah it was she it was an amazing exit she looked at him absolutely daggers i again you don't know what makes the edit where the other people thought oh okay right right then maybe that helps the next time you have to vote for kenny i mean kenny's interesting because he does a couple of things he later on in the show he does the let's let's stop the let's stop the end game yeah a bit like with the double dagger switch he's done a couple of things where you think, oh, Kenny. But he is so, I mean, I know you did a big shout out for Rom yesterday and declared, you know, absolutely. I've got a question, Em. And I think, I'm not going to say Kenny, like I just want to be him, right?

16:37If I could. He is, he's so charming. He's got such a brilliant look. He looks absolutely like him, butter wouldn't melt. And they caught him in one of the cars, didn't they, coming back from the chat, when I can't remember who they were talking about him saying, if you're a traitor, you've played a great game. And he did a smile that was so... Oh, my God, he's so charming. That smile was so cool. He has become like, hi, you've just... We're aware that he's a big star on YouTube, but he's just rocketed up every category of mainstream stardom. Totally. It's extraordinary. Well, we're going to have to get to the end game after our advert break. Already? We're at a break? We're close to an advert break.

17:18But we should take a look at Maya leaving and saying, good luck, you're going to need it. What do you think? Do you think that was the dagger's look she gave and saying, good luck, you're going to need it? That was read as a bombshell by them all. I think it's really interesting, right? So one of the things you would think about when you're making this show is, what if someone says something outrageous, like James did, right? Which is, oh, by the way, okay, fine, I'm a traitor. And one of the things you would think about when you're making the show is what if someone says something outrageous like james did right which is oh by the way okay fine i'm a traitor and one of the things you think particularly it's very intense is what if they just say do you know what he's a

17:52you know and she didn't say that but she i mean i thought she was on the journey to that right she looked really angry she looked really pissed off she looked like she'd been betrayed which she had been and it felt very much like she was getting close to saying okay here's my little parting gift it was a parting gift we will return to the end game after the break this episode is brought to you by our friends at ll. Now, let's talk about movie con artists. Who are your absolute favourites? Movies, TV and book, my answer is the same. And it's Tom Ripley. I was going to say him. It's one of the greatest characters of all time. So from the Talented Mr Ripley books by Patricia Highsmith, there's five of them.

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20:30Welcome back, everybody. Now we return to the highest stakes of the end game. So after Maya had left, they had another banishment. Leanne voted for Romesh, but everybody else returned to the herd and voted for Leanne. And she was gone. At which point, banish again. They'd had the chance to banish again. They're throwing their pouches in. And Romesh says, I think it's you, James. And he is really cross. James Blunt is devastated, he is genuinely, he can't actually believe it, he's like a million memes he's definitely like a million memes, I think what's brilliant about James is that part of him you feel he's very easy to work out he's this sort of posh guy who is sort of a really good decent sort.

21:27And but there's so much more to him. And I think you saw a flash of anger and whatever that was when he said, I've done it like a true faithful. You know, when he did. Yeah. And he clearly looked. That would be a faithful act. There you go. That would be a faithful act. So he felt. But at the same time, he's willing to say, as he has throughout, I'm absolutely hopeless at this, but I'm having a jolly good go. And it is I think you said yesterday, there's a sort of class thing going on. Absolutely, there always is in the best British reality shows. And most of us might go like, well, I'm a bit rubbish at this, so I'll shut up. He's like, no, on we go. But I think there's, you know, he was a bit angry at that point.

22:01And I think that was one of the interesting things about the whole final. People were, there was anger there. Rom showed some flashes of it. Maya certainly, as we've said. James, you know, they were all, it was very, very intense. And of course, James, as we know, like lost in the way that he played all the way through. And he wronged himself to death. Yeah. Auto-wronging. Do you think Kenny, by voting in that thing to end the game, do you think that's almost a tell that it's like, oh, I'm so close, I'm so close, I can't... Do you think he sowed a seed? Yeah, I think that this is perhaps a bit like the double dagger change. Kenny occasionally does something where you sort of think, OK, he's human.

22:43And I suspect what he was thinking was like, this is tense, this is difficult, I'm carrying this on my own, I've already murdered my best friend, and I think I'm home. And I think it's a bit like when you do the marathon or something, those last few yards you can go to pieces, right? We see people collapse. And I think he slightly collapsed as he could see the finish line. And, yeah, that was a mistake. So so they then there's another banishment vote and it's split between um james blunt and kenny um and finally they bash has stopped herding i thought oh my gosh he's going to hurt now as well but he didn't and james's reaction was so extreme that I think I think it would it was enough to sway Ramesh like it was he couldn't yeah I don't think he's a good enough actor to

23:33have created that um and so then the vote for Kenny yeah I mean I think I think the Kenny twist let's is yeah was wonderful because again you felt that you knew which way it was going to go. And then you got this wonderful turnaround with, you know, in a way. See, this is why I think, I mean, like lots of these traitors, which has been so wonderful. What we know is if I could take it back to Julie all those years ago, she was on Traitors Uncloaked. So what do you think? And what do you think about your experience? And she said, you know what what you know nothing in this life that was what she said and i thought that is the thing traitors if traitors tells us about life which of course all the best reality shows do right and it's like how should you live you know should you be quiet

24:19and go quite should you make your point and risk being you know as we know being voted out as it were and then you the other thing you take from it is everybody's a hero sometimes. This is what I think. Everybody has their moments. And Bash had his moment, right? I mean. But right from the start, we've always thought it's very, it's miles more hard for the younger players, for people who come from shows that might have been popular with a much younger demographic, but are not like, oh, I'm an established big star that everybody knows. Yeah. with a much younger demographic but are not like oh I'm an established big star that everybody knows and they have to and Kenny had a little line about it

24:48earlier in this episode where he said I've been trying to build confidence build trust and build alliances because he knew yes we've seen that you know the YouTubers last time Nico got picked off really early because it was like who is this guy I don't really know who he is it doesn't matter he feels expendable and you know if you're a young person from a kind of world that isn't their type of fame got picked off really early because it's like, who is this guy? I don't really know who he is. It doesn't matter. He feels expendable. And you know if you're a young person from a kind of world that isn't their type of fame, that that can happen to you. So those two both had to work really hard to just kind of be there on their own terms.

25:16And they aced it. But it was interesting watching Bash finally sort of become, you could tell right from the start that he was clever and really switched on. And he managed to become that in the final episode and i think you're so right i think that if i can take you back because i knew you'd want to to fame academy celebrity fame i know you want me to do and it when we're getting the what was called the student vote which is celebrities had to look each other in the eye and say i'm voting you out because this they all there was a there was a revolution at the beginning they didn't want to do that you know and in the end we made you know that they agreed that it was helpful to the format. But that was back then.

25:48Celebrities telling each other, it's still kind of the case. Saying to Romesh, who's a huge star, that I think you might be a traitor. This is what James was so brilliant at. He was so brilliant at sort of, I think you're a traitor. And someone's basically saying, do you? He said, no, no, no, no, I'm probably wrong. And even he found it sort of somewhat intimidating. So it's really hard to take those big dogs out as you've said many times. But Bash had his moment for sure and I think that, as we say, that whole end game, complicated though it is on one level, as these things always are when you explain it, it worked like a dream actually because it allowed this shifting landscape, didn't it? It was so good this time and you've seen other times where it can end up being

26:28yeah i don't say a damp squib when there's a fire pit there but you know what i mean yeah but this time and you knew it was going to happen that bash would vote to end the game robert should vote to end the game and then oh my gosh he would have to vote to continue and say i'm so sorry well he did it he looks variously like a sort of Tory MP who's sort of saying, like, I really didn't do it. And, you know, you sort of think, well, maybe you didn't do it. And he's sort of he's incredibly puppyish. And it could only be, you know, if anyone was going to basically be at the finish line and said, just before I get to the finish line, I'm just going to shoot myself in the head. Is that OK? You think, oh, God, oh God, that sounds like James for sure.

27:07Oh my God. And Claudia said, you have been, she told everyone else they were brilliant. And this is not, she's not throwing shade, but she said, you've been the most extraordinary player. Credibly, we could not use a word that could imply any form of skill. He said, I love the moments where I got something right. Well, I'd like to see a supercut of them. It's so rare that you could think. Of course, he did occasionally alight on, right? As we know, he's sort of alight on people. But he never quite. The trouble with James in this game is he didn't believe himself. So that's the slight. He couldn't convince himself that he was right. But it was an absolutely perfect way to end. And as I said to you before, this is not really relevant to the story or anything,

27:47but I am obsessed that James, part of his attraction to me is that he sounds like a podcast that sometimes speeds up. He has a way of speaking that he's usually on one times and then occasionally he's on 1.8 and he'll just suddenly talk like this, just talk very quickly. And you're not aware why or how. I think it's when he's a bit under pressure, maybe he does that. But he's the most lovable. I mean, I don't know him, but on this show, the most lovable and the most memorable character in a way of the show, of the end anyway. But he left it all out there on the floor. And actually, I thought it was quite interesting that Maya said, I'm proud I've been composed throughout, which I thought was,

28:24given how much the noise around this series has been that there has been and I do think we should actually talk about this a bit because it is such a and I think there'll be more stories coming out in the papers at the weekend about you know how much sort of drama that we didn't see there was. It's difficult for a show like, by the way this is rated beyond anything yeah completely and it's done and people saying oh they've ruined it it's like yeah you'll all be back in january and so will i and you'll be back for this celebrity version next october but what there's a thing with any format is you know you'll tell me even you'll know even better than me but when the audience starts becoming literate and they start realising, hang on a second, that was a weird edit or I didn't see something there. And I think in this series,

29:08people have just felt like there have been lacunae, there have been missing, did I miss a page? Did I miss a meeting? What happened here? And I think that it is tricky if people think that they, because it doesn't, as you say, it doesn't it doesn't try to be big brother. You know, you're not trying to get a sort of 24 hour or I'm a celebrity where you're sort of supposed to be able to get the true rhythm of the day. They do leave stuff out. But I do think that some people feel like, well, I've been hoodwinked here and I'd like to, you know, and they've taken stuff out. Yeah, I think that's right. I think that, as you say, you know and and i know you've mentioned many people in this this this podcast and relationship there's

29:49mike cotton and sarah faye who are the two execs on this yeah show and i think honestly they've done an amazing job and so i think as we're about clearly i'm about to say something that sort of raises a couple of questions that's why i'm giving them lots of praise but they deserve it it's been fantastic huge hit and i think it will get bigger in January. You know, it'll keep growing. What's interesting to me is that you could always see it one day in a galaxy far, far away. This show will not be working suddenly. Right. So it happens to all shows. I mean, I'm talking about years ahead. Right. And you'll still be doing your podcast, Richard. But other than that, the world will be a very, very different place.

30:24And you can see some of the seeds of it now. And that's what those producers will be thinking about, how to make sure it lasts for a moment. And so there are certain things about it, whether it's Richard E. Grant, whether it's a traitor who says, I'm a traitor. We're in love with the show at the moment. We're in love and we're having a great time in the show. So we're forgiving it everything. And so it allows for huge amounts of entertainment, partly because we want it to be. One day, there'll be a Richard E. Grant moment in years to come and he'll go like oh it just doesn't this show's a bit weird because he's just said he's a traitor that's not right you know but at the moment it's all working

30:52you're right that one of the things about this it's not even live you know i was thinking that if the if you retrofit if the bbc said now if kate phillips and the team there said right this is what we want we want a reality show that can be a celebrity as well as a civilian version we want it to go out at eight o'clock um we want it to go on for sort of three or four weeks and by the way we're talking about breakout we're not interested in drag race we're talking about like 10 million people you'd be thinking come on like seriously there's so many things that are wrong with that bbc doing reality is really hard you know because reality is generally dating sexual you know inter because reality is generally dating, sexual intercourse.

31:26Did I just say that on the podcast? I just said it, Marina. I just said it. And so you're thinking, OK, BBC, what's it about? Buying a house? What could it be at eight o'clock? And yet it turns out, oh, my God, they've absolutely struck gold. This works perfectly. And you're right. There are so many imperfections. I know you and Richard have talked. I mean, you've talked about the sort of what's the point of voting out traitors, which is true. And of course, the flaw really is that it needs to go on for eight, nine episodes, because if you just waited till it finished, it would. You know, but it's got to fit a TV schedule or something. So so there's all sorts of issues. And one of them, you're right, is that every now and again you think, sorry, is that the rule?

32:02You know, even in the end game there, is, could Rom and Bash, could they have separately voted and then just got rid of the other two and left those two? I don't know the answer to that. Well, we live in a conspiracist era and people are more suspicious of the hidden hand of everything. And I definitely think that because people know that there were sort of off-camera meltdowns on the show that they have asked, like, you know, what else happened? I think it was such a... It seems strange to say it was a very peculiar series of the show because they're all peculiar and that is the nature of the format. It plays out in a different way every time. But it had a real mood. Yeah, that's true. Yeah.

32:40Well, I think it had... I think exactly. And I think, you know, as you say, there's lots of talk of who melted down and all the rest of it. I think we know, you know. And I think, you know, as you say, there's lots of talk of who melted down, all the rest of it, and I think we know, you know, and I think there was a really intense shoot this one. And, you know, as you say, every series needs to be different. You need the one that nearly fell off air. You need the one that was perfect, you know. So I think that's all par for the course. And the format is so good, it can withstand it. But I think what happened, as you've discussed on this podcast, what happened is the Richard E. Grant was the moment that the butterfly that flapped its wings it just basically never

33:09i'm gonna say never recovered i mean it got big better and better but it never quite was able to to find its feet it was sort of bambi on ice i i do believe i know everyone knows about the richardy grant moment i know we all know it and we talk about it but i sort of feel i mean i don't know if i'm this is this could work marina you know lots of people in high places i sort of believe andy burnham might go for this which is i think every hour on the hour we should show to the british public like one of those emergency things on your phone just the clip of richard e grunt because it makes me so happy when i watch it it's so brilliant he does a double because he because um uh because he's asked you

33:43know first of all are you you know what do you know well what are you a traitor double because he's asked, you know, first of all, are you a traitor? By Joe Lycett. By Joe, well, what are you, a traitor? And then there's a moment, he says, say that again? And he says, yeah, a traitor. And you look at, it's like looking at the Mona Lisa. You can't quite tell what is Richard thinking. It's like, are you doing this deliberately? Are you out of control? He takes a drink when he's doing it, you know. So I think we should, honestly, to your viewers and just keep watching that because it gets better the more you watch it. I think it's a bit like, I'm going off piece here, Marina, but it's a bit like we should also show the moment.

34:10The other best thing that's ever happened is Keir Starmer saying, release the sausages, not the hostages. Again, we all know that, but you just need to watch these things again and again to really understand how good they are. And the Richard E. Grant is astonishing. But the show never quite found its feet after that in the best possible way it became totally irrational alright quick rundown before we we have to go the breakout stars of this series and some of them are super obvious I mean Kenny I would love to see the office his agent is currently fielding yeah I mean I think you can see already the press are all saying so you know, Maya's going to get a million, may get a million pounds off his,

34:48yep, she may, may not, may get more than that, you know, whatever. So it's everyone's favourite sport, but you're right. There'll be some proper winners. Maya's been a winner, Kenny for sure. Particularly, it's a bit like sort of trending, you know, on social media. Like if you start from a relatively low base, as in Kenny's big on YouTube, but to most BBC viewers, they don't know. so he's suddenly like oh my god this guy is amazing so he's been very james i mean who knows where that's going to go james will probably be offered i get the feeling he doesn't need to work well i think so i quite you know he's he's you know he's a gentleman amateur yeah i think also if he's if he is offered a hollywood movie he'll

35:23sort of say it doesn't feel right and turn it down in a very James Blunt way and get it completely wrong but yeah I mean I think by the way one of the lovely stories which I know you've is Miranda you know although it seems like years ago you know it was lovely to see Miranda yeah exactly it's Miranda being playful and reminding us you know of the wonderful person that she is so I think that's I personally I mean I know Michael Sheen's a controversial character, but one of my favourite episodes was last night. God, it really was last night. When, for the first time ever, really, in a show like this, he said, this is what I'm going to do, this episode. And he did it. The whole way through. He said, I'm going to cause hell.

36:02I'm going to make sure... Because we were laughing watching it. We called it Michael Sheen's House of Pain. Absolutely amazing. He delivered. And then you, and normally, as we saw today, you see people saying, well, I'm really going to get it right now. I'm really going to think, I don't know what you're talking about. And also, you're not. Hardly any of them ever got it right. But they were incredibly watchable. So wonderful. Thank you so much for joining me. It was so fun. What a series. Faithful win. Well done to them. Amazing. See you next Tuesday. Coca-Cola. For the big. We'll be right back. For long-distance love. For introverts and extroverts. The thinkers and the doers. For old friends and new.

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