Joe Lycett’s bid to turn an apparent setback into a route to the traitors’ side instead intensified suspicion among the faithfuls, ending with his banishment from Celebrity Traitors.

The comedian had told the castle he wanted to be recruited, a tactic that he later acknowledged gave the traitors an advantage. Lycett’s calculation was that fellow contestants might believe he was still faithful but ready to switch sides — or conclude that an obvious recruitment would be too conspicuous to be real.¹

Under pressure at the round table, he argued that recruiting him could alter the game’s balance. “There’s a good chance that I’ll go tonight, which means that they will then have to recruit again tonight, denying them of murder.”¹ But James Blunt interpreted that argument differently, saying it appeared to imply that Lycett was already a traitor.¹

After his exit, Lycett maintained that he still wanted the role change. On The Celebrity Traitors: Uncloaked, he asked for what he described as an unknown contractual clause that could bring back a banished faithful for recruitment: “I’m there if they want me!”¹

That proposal was not granted. Lycett told the remaining cast that he had hoped to “start as a faithful and end as a traitor,” but left the game still a faithful. The contrast was clear: he presented his approach as an attempt to reshape the game, while others treated the same manoeuvre as a reason to remove him.¹