I t all began on a Dutch trading ship in 1628. No, really. When the Batavia set sail from Amsterdam, it crashed and the shipwrecked survivors were left stranded on a tiny island off the coast of Western Australia. As mutineers eyed the Batavia’s stash of silver, shipmates, friends and families turned on each other. About 100 people were brutally murdered, making it one of the most violent chapters in maritime history.

Nearly 400 years later, in 2015, creative entrepreneur Marc Pos had a lightbulb moment while reading about this “adult Lord of the Flies” atrocity. It gave him the idea for a reality TV show – the game of trust and treachery we now know as The Traitors . It was originally envisaged to take place on a boat, with banished players jumping overboard into the sea.

Co-creator Jasper Hoogendoorn joined Pos to develop the idea, The Mutineers. After 20 rejections, they fine-tuned the game further.…