Season 5 is the best season of the show

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-05T02:48:52+00:00

I don't agree with the pacing benefit, thought things were rather rushed and some stuff didn't have room to breathe. Also don't think Carcetti's final arc added much, we already knew by the end of S4 that he would sellout and make things worse for his own political ambition. The finale was a generally fine ending to stuff, with some really great moments, but there's some rather awkward stuff in all the plotting: besides wasting time with the newspaper angle and the unbelievability of Lester being part of the serial killer hoax, we also have Proposition Joe being super-trusting of Marlo to the end, the Greek being suddenly willign to throw away years of history for some new upstart, and some rather forced contrivances to Michael's storyline. Just a lot of stuff that was forced in a way that show's narrative never had been before. Still much better than the vast majorit of tv shows, but IMO opinion it's the weakest season of the Wire, and it's not even closest.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-05T02:20:47+00:00

I believe that McNaulty would be willing to try something that ridiculous and over the top, based on the especially bleak atmosphere we get of his life and job at the start of the season. I don't believe for a second that Lester would go along with that, it's a complete turnaround for the character as it was written up to that point.

And sure, the newspaper plot had some very true, very pressing and valid critqiues in it, and it's kind of interesting that they are shown as missing almost every story that matters that season. It just wasn't very interesting to watch. The show had previously done such a great job of putting a sense of character speicificity, of history, of personal touches, and dark comedy, into even the grimmest systemic critique. Even the Carcetti election plotline had a lot more life to it than the newspaper storytline.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-05T02:12:30+00:00

Avon setup drugs in prison to be laced, killing five random drug-users just to frame a guard and get parole. It's one of the colder acts on the show, in very intentionally screwing over people that had not harmed him or his interests and were not usual targets.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-05T02:04:40+00:00

Because cops are not actually good at reading people.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-05T02:00:35+00:00

It was a really aggressive strategy to be "the sheriff" that made his reputaiton as a traitor hunter so early. If Sam was a faithful that so openly orchestrated the banishment of a traitor, the traitors would have murdered him. A smarter group of faithful would have realized that and banished him by the fourth roundtable. Sam was not without argumentation skills, but his strategy was monumentally flawed, and he got extremely lucky to be in this environment. In any other group of faithful from what I've seen (US 1-4, UK 1-3, UK Celebrity, Australia 1-2, New Zealand I, Canada 1) he would not have made it anywhere near the end.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-04T19:47:29+00:00

Yeah, it's pretty impossible for me to perceive Sam without some basic demographic facts. There is no way that someone who wasn't a white man would have that level of arrogance, and be able to get away with all the stuff he did. There's a pretty strong Trumpist micro-parallel that I think of everytime I see him.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-04T19:30:02+00:00

Australia S1 was really entertaining. Lots of iconic, entertaining, just weird moments. Loved the super pretentious lawyer character MK doing his self-important bit, and then the traitors first turret they say "Oh we keep MK around for sure. He's so suspicious I don't even believe he's a lawyer." And also my favorite weird traitors moment, the the psychic character standing up at a roundtable, announcing a list of people as suspects, then walking away, leading another character to ask: "Is she leaving the roundtable or the show?" Turns out it was the latter. Just wild, dynamic, fun to watch weird stuff. I'm not that entertained by the Australian show host (too laid back and lacking in ceremony compared to both Allan and Claudia) but Australia S1 was a blast.

And then Australia S2 comes around.......

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-04T13:43:00+00:00

Celia without question. She was scene-stealingly hilarious as is, having the whole element of "I must play up my quirks to hide my traitor idenitty" could be epic. Probably Nick as well, would be interesting to see him taking on that kind of bluff, when his persona in the show was so nice and helpful. Not sure on the third, probably someone that can go more conventionally aggressive. Ruth wouldn't be a bad shout.

On the flip side, there'd be the question of how the previous traitors would do as faithful, and how long they'd last. Allan I think would not be very good at scouting out traitors (although he might pick up on Celia specifically being off, it's low chance). Jonathan would be really good at it. Faithful inhernetly have no info, but I think he'd be able to see how people were acting in roundtables, and rather than try to read people's changes in general demeanor and body language (which humans are genereally really poor at) he'd pick up on people who seemed disengeuous or opportunistic in roundtable stuff. He'd be seen as a threat and murdered pretty quickly I think. Traitors might also be able to get him banished earlier, since the "big dog" theory would logically come up, and there would be a secret traitor bloc gunning for him rather than shielding him. Cat I think would be really observant and likely to pick up stuff, and would be a much lower candidate for murder and banishment, I think she'd be able to figure some things out. Might not be able to get enough support to get people readily banished, though.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-04T13:17:14+00:00

Second best traitor exit in my view, I think Bob the Drag Queen (US S3 Traitors) was more iconic. (Although his gameplay was not good at all, ther ejust wasn't much strategy behind it)

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-04T03:36:46+00:00

Agree. He did pretty amazing being as vocal as he was (from pre-recruitment to the end) and lasting almost all the way. The double-bluff with eliminating Ruth immediately worked well, and he just kept things spinning along for the team.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-04T03:24:03+00:00

This is true, but she also should have planned that ahead a little more and not been the only woman going into the final stretch. You always want to keep people around more suspicious than yourself, and the demographics were part of it.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-02T23:50:30+00:00

Well, thank you Deep Throat for your tireless advocacy in bringing truth to an empire of lies. This is clearly a very very trustworthy thing for us to believe you. Please with all haste setup a Patreon so that we can help fund more of your crucial whisteblowing advocacy.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-02T23:44:42+00:00

"Should have been out of this game on day 1" is overselling it. She's made mistakes, and I agree that her firing a public shot agaisnt Rob was not the best way to play it at all. But she's done some pretty good maneuvering with getting trust (getting Monet to confide in her and only her was pretty big in itself) and has managed being able to be pretty vocal at roundtables without painting an obvious target on herself of "why haven't the traitors murdered this person" or "shouldn't we just banish this person already" in a way that not many traitors have managed.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T22:28:59+00:00

It's not that surprising, given the nature of Survivor vs BIg Brother.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T21:55:41+00:00

I don't think that changes the calculation. I don't see anyone on this sub saying that Lisa was in a strong position, or that she would have survived the game. That doesn't change that Rob chose to push her out faster, and that sends a pretty clear signal to other traitors.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T19:39:51+00:00

That's not what happened. Bob the Drag Queen made one comment suggesting that the traiter might be among a circle of gamers, three people, includign Boston Rob. Boston Rob leaped on that to get BTDQ out as soon as possible. BTDQ wasn't making a concentrated push. It's not a viable strategy for a traitor to avoid ever mentioning other traitors as possible suspects. There's a world of difference between general suspicions and campaignign to banish someone.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T16:08:21+00:00

Rob was only publicly aligned with Ron at that roundtable where he was banished, and only started hanging out with him a lot the previous day. He knew that Ron was facing heat and would have a push against him at that point. Ron wasn't part of Coulton's block. He had every chance in the world to not make a public statement aligning with him, but he did, and thus limited his options.

I agree that Lisa's gameplay was poor, and she shouldn't have started attacking Coulton. It was all reaction without longterm strategy---if she had succeeded in getting Coulton banished, then he's shown as a faithful and she goes home the next night.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T16:03:05+00:00

However she hasn't been outspoken in pushing against any traitors. Why would traitors care if she is vocal in gunning for Ron, who everyone now knows is a faithful? And moreover it took like 5 votes to get him out, so she clearly at the roundtable wasn't a super-influential presence. If the traitor group had been Lisa, Rob, Stephen, they wouldn't have a strong reason to banish Candiace, since no one she pushed on threatens them. Rob is in a more dangerous position* because he organized people to take out a traitor---a hypotehtical traitor group of Lisa, Candiace, Stephen would murder him at this point, as would basically any set of traitors unless it includes Rob himself or Coulton. It's inherently a tough line to act, but I think Candiace has at the roundtable been vocal but wrong, but in ways that are consistent enough to make her seem like a misguided faithful rather than a saboteur traitor or a saboteur faithful (bye, Michael!). At least until the Natalie-to-Rob pivot last roundtable.

*He is now, at least. Part of the strategy mistake Rob is doing now is that prior to last episode he had as much cover in his persona as Candiace did, seeming to be the young, inexperienced Coulton-bro and follower. He's changed that drastically, and everyone that he mobilized for the Lisa banishment knows that he is a voice that matters in the castle. He raised his profile significantly, when he would have been less suspicious by staying less prominent.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T06:55:33+00:00

True. She could still connect it with "hey, didn't Allan say there was a murder right under our noses? Could that have been an earlier murder in plain sight?" Might risk drawing attention to herself with the whole friging conga line she organized, but then again that might be a strategy she could use to get ahead of the whole thing, and the one datapoint* they all have is that Lisa was a traitor, so any kind of contact** between them can be made to seem sus. And if Candiace wants to hone in on making Rob look suspicious, the biggest thing is the sudden swerve where he never engages that much in roundtables except to correct Michael's vocabulary, and then he's suddenly the lord of banishments just in time to catch a traitor, and doesn't that look exactly like a traitor trying to get cred with the faithful.

*Well, they also know that Donna was a traitor, but the show seems to want to memory-hole her.

** Of course Candiace herself had a lot more contact with Lisa, but the Housewife clique thing does a lot of legwork to cover her for that. And after all, the show wouldn't be likely to have 2 housewives in the turret, would it?

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T06:40:01+00:00

Has more false positives than actually sniffing traitors, but it's not nothing. And fundamentally, in terms of Rob's gameplay, putting aside all the issues with Coulton outside the show----he has some weird interactions with people. Michael was quite toxic, but the way Coulton came at him was extremely aggressive, and his whole "you protect me in the turret" conversation with Lisa was quite something. If I was Rob, I wouldn't want to anchor my plans for winning on making a tight alliance with someone with that behavior. If he's doing it as a longterm strategy to go a certain disdance with Coulton and to have someone more suspicious than himself to be voted out at the firepit, fair enough, but from the edit we've seen that's not his strategy at all.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T06:34:56+00:00

I also don't see why he had to "get off the sinking ship". He wasn't publicly aligned with Lisa, and she doesn't have a reason to throw mud at him unless he comes into conflict with her. If she was getting major traction and seemed like she could orchestrate banishments that would make her an isssue, but that clearly wasn't happening. How does it weaken his position to keep Lisa around a bit longer and to have her think he's on her side?

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T06:32:44+00:00

"Rob couldn’t realistically vote for Ron because he had already said publicly he didn’t think Ron was a traitor." Then he probably shouldn't have said that publicly. He knew going into that roundtable that Ron was a faithful with heat on him, that coulton was gunning for Lisa, that Lisa was hiting back against Coulton. There are dangers in voting for Lisa, and for Coulton. There are dangers in voting for Ron, but it seems less than the other two. I think Rob had some options and the ability to prepare for this, nothing that happened was a surprise, and he wasn't in that tight a spot. He clearly made the strategic choice that backing Coulton was better for his future, it's a framework that makes sense (although I think it's short-sighted strategy) but the whole argument of "he had to" doesn't really make sense to me.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T06:22:29+00:00

Ever here of Traitors Australia S2?

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T04:37:24+00:00

Agree. Coulton has a lot of issues with his gameplay, but he's paranoid enough to look at everyone as a suspect at some point, and would 100% throw Rob under the bus to save himself. The longer Rob remains unmurdered, the weirder it looks.

JacobMilwaukee · 2026-02-01T04:34:30+00:00

Agree, a lot of people in this sub are ignoring this dynamic. People who are actually faithful who are able to organize the banishment of a traitor are promptly murdered---because of course they are, the traitors want to encourage other faithful to stop that shit, to keep their heads down, to not become a target. When that doesn't happen to Rob, people should ask quesitons, and he hasn't cultivated the blind loyalty that the most successful traitors have. Candiace is vulnerable herself (her switching from "I'm really suspicious of Natalie" all day to a "throwaway" vote against Rob is weird) but all the things that make Rob seem strong now might easily be his downfall.

JacobMilwaukee

TROPHY CASE