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I’m really excited about this one.

The Traitors has quickly become one of those shows where the basic concept is already enough to get me watching. Put a group of people inside a Scottish castle, secretly choose a few of them to become Traitors, let paranoia slowly take over the entire group, and then have Alan Cumming casually stroll into the middle of the chaos dressed like he owns both the castle and Scotland.

What else do you really need?

Now NBC is giving the franchise a new twist with The Traitors: New Blood, an all-civilian edition premiering September 17. Instead of bringing another collection of reality-TV personalities and celebrities into Ardross Castle, this time we’re getting 22 everyday Americans selected from more than 80,000 applicants.

And I’m glad they’re doing it.

New Blood Really Does Mean New Blood

The celebrity version of The Traitors is incredibly entertaining because many of those players arrive with histories, reputations, alliances and sometimes grudges that viewers already understand.

New Blood removes all of that.

We don’t already know who should be good at strategy. We don’t know who has a reputation for lying. There isn’t a reality-show résumé telling us who might immediately dominate the Round Table.

We’re going to meet these people at essentially the same time they’re meeting each other.

NBC has assembled a pretty wild mix, too. There’s an astrophysicist, nurse, funeral director, barrel racer, pilot, physician, lawyer, ironworker, therapist, designer and even an MLB analyst among the players entering the castle.

That could make the social game particularly fun to watch.

A lawyer might sound perfectly equipped to argue at the Round Table, but does that immediately make everyone suspicious?

Does being a therapist make someone better at reading the room?

Can an astrophysicist mathematically calculate who murdered somebody over breakfast?

And I’m already curious about Joe Vanella being a funeral director. You couldn’t ask for a profession more perfectly suited to a game where Alan dramatically announces that another player has been “murdered.”

The Game Is Still The Traitors

The core game isn’t changing.

The players will work together on missions that can build a prize fund worth up to $250,000, while hidden Traitors secretly eliminate the Faithful one by one. The Faithful have to identify and banish the Traitors before reaching the end of the game.

If they successfully remove every Traitor, the remaining Faithful share the money. If a Traitor survives, the Traitor can take the prize instead.

Simple concept.

Absolute psychological chaos.

What interests me about New Blood is that the money could feel very different with civilian players. These aren’t necessarily people who already make their living appearing on television. Winning a share of $250,000 could have a much bigger impact on someone’s everyday life, which should add another level of emotion when friendships start turning into accusations.

And eventually somebody who trusted another player is going to discover they’ve been getting completely played.

That’s when The Traitors is at its best.

And Yes, Alan Cumming Is Back

Thankfully, NBC didn’t change one of the most important ingredients.

Alan Cumming returns as host and executive producer, once again welcoming everyone into Ardross Castle.

Gotta love the energy and vibe that Alan Cumming gives this show.

There are plenty of reality competition hosts who could technically explain the rules, announce who has been eliminated and keep everything moving.

Alan makes the whole thing an event.

The outfits. The expressions. The dramatic pauses. The way he can somehow announce breakfast like he’s about to reveal the murderer in an old-fashioned mystery movie.

He understands exactly what kind of show he’s hosting and completely embraces it.

You could probably remove every piece of furniture from that castle and Alan would still walk into an empty room wearing some ridiculous-but-perfect outfit and somehow make the place feel dramatic.

I’m very glad that part isn’t changing.

Meet the New Blood

The 22-player cast ranges from 23 to 65 years old, with backgrounds stretching across professions and locations throughout the United States.

Here’s everyone heading into the castle:

I’m Ready to Go Back to the Castle

I like the celebrity seasons. I don’t necessarily want The Traitors to stop doing those.

But I’m really interested in seeing what happens when you take away the celebrity element and essentially reset the social experiment.

Nobody gets an automatic target because they won Survivor three times. Nobody knows who spent years manipulating people on Big Brother. Nobody walks through the door with fifteen years of reality-TV history attached to them.

They’re simply 22 strangers trying to decide whom they can trust.

Well…

Twenty-two strangers trying to decide whom they can trust while Alan Cumming watches everything unfold and probably already has another spectacular cape hanging somewhere upstairs.

I’m glad The Traitors is coming back, and New Blood might be exactly the kind of variation the franchise needs to keep things interesting.

Let the murders begin.

The Traitors: New Blood premieres with a special two-hour event Thursday, September 17 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on NBC. Episodes will be available to stream the following day on Peacock. NBC has also scheduled another pair of back-to-back episodes beginning September 24 at 8 p.m. ET/PT.