Recap: The Traitors US (Season 2, Episode 9)
The Library Is OPEN!
We’ve made it to another Friday, which means I’ve already watched the new Traitors and am patiently waiting for RuPaul’s Drag Race. This week, The Library Is Open, and if you don’t know what that means, I implore you to watch Paris is Burning immediately. For now, all you need to know is that while the queens of Drag Race did their best to read each other, Phaedra Parks still remains the current Queen of the Reads.
Phaedra’s first read this episode happens after Kate Chastain decides to be a “crazy-cool killer” and join her in the turret. Phaedra may not have a plan for murdering the rest of the faithfuls, but she does have a lot to say about her fellow players. Working with Dan was like “eating dry Melba toast with no butter, no jam, no nothing.” When the two traitors debate on murdering Trishelle, Phaedra implores her to “throw your notebook away with your funny little hats.”
Love it. If these are her swan song reads, so be it.
Breakfast
Things aren’t looking good for Phaedra, as suspicion still lingers on her throughout the episode. And things aren’t looking good for Kate, who is immediately clocked by MJ for acting funny at breakfast. She thinks she’s so good at this game…
Fortunately, the two traitors chose to murder Kevin and not Trishelle, who secretly had a shield and showed up to breakfast looking like a roll of gift wrap. (She can’t pull off the predatory headband like Parvati, RIP.) Our himbo Kevin is gone and Phaedra announces she is looking forward to smoked salmon. Time for another day in the castle.
The Peter Pals are down to three, but the players are giving Four-Times-in-a-Windmill the stink eye throughout the morning. He’s not making himself look any less suspicious by walking around everywhere in his little hoodie. Why does everyone end up walking like a Sim in this castle? At this point, I still had high hopes that Peter would be banished at the end of this episode…
The Mission
For the mission, all the players show up to a church where they are given the task of crossbowing (that’s a verb, right?) glass panes representing each player. The last glass pane intact wins a shield. I like this challenge because I’m over the “let’s be secretive about who has a shield” nonsense. I’m not rooting for the faithfuls. How could I? They can barely shoot a crossbow.
CT ends up winning the shield, partially because Phaedra decides to aim away from CT’s pane of glass and hit Trishelle’s. CT sees this as a sign that she’s a traitor, although I think Phaedra really shot Trishelle’s glass because she doesn’t like her. I don’t blame her for that.
The Strategy + The Roundtable
Trishelle is right about Phaedra being a Traitor, but will telling the Bravo girlies that they have blind loyalty to Phaedra work in her favor? It remains to be seen. She is able to get CT to vote with the Peter Pals, and coupled with the theory about Phaedra “sabotaging the challenge,” the love story between CT and Phaedra is over. Shame.
At the Roundtable, CT votes for Phaedra but Sandra, the Peter Pals’ other possible recruit, votes for Peter. Peter is playing so hard that it looks like he could be eliminated instead of Phaedra, and Phaedra is not having it. We finally hear her say her iconic, “This isn’t The Bachelor, and I don’t have to kiss your ass for a rose.” No notes.
The vote is 4-4 for Phaedra and Peter, with MJ as the deciding vote. Who does she write on her chalkboard? We will find out next week.
This is a good time to use the banishment as a cliffhanger. I’m dying to know who gets eliminated, and even if MJ votes for Phaedra, I get to see the Queen of the Reads on my screen for one more week.
Now if Phaedra could teach those Season 16 queens a thing or two…