The Celebrity Traitors winner Alan Carr has wished the traitors “good luck” ahead of the new series of the show’s standard edition.
The 49-year-old appeared in a trailer for the BBC reality gameshow The Traitors, which was broadcast before Saturday’s Strictly Come Dancing semi-final, and showed him writing a letter to them.
He said: “Dear new traitors, look after the place won’t you, because you’ll never guess what Claudia’s (Winkleman, the show’s presenter) got planned this time, it’s big.
“Good luck, you’re definitely going to need it.”
The first episode of the new series will air at 8pm on BBC One and iPlayer on January 1, with the second airing on January 2.
It will see Winkleman return to the Scottish Highlands to front the show, which sees a new batch of faithful civilians attempt to weed out the murderous traitors before the prize pot is snatched away.
Some 22 contestants will try to win up to £120,000 and the BBC has promised “even more twists, turns, secrets, epic missions, deception, banishments and, of course, murders aplenty”.
It comes after the first series of The Celebrity Traitors, which aired in the autumn, was a cultural touchstone and a ratings winner for the BBC, and saw Carr snatch victory from faithfuls, historian David Olusoga and actor Nick Mohammed.
It made a TV star out of former rugby player Joe Marler, who became a fan favourite for his analysis of the game and his friendships with comedian Joe Wilkinson and Mohammed.
Viewers were aghast when Mohammed voted to banish Marler in the final episode, unwittingly handing victory to traitor Carr.
The official visualised companion podcast is returning alongside the new series.
The Traitors: Uncloaked will start on BBC Two immediately after the main series on January 1 at 9.05pm.
The show will then move over to BBC One for the remainder of the series from January 2 at 9pm onwards and will also be available on BBC Sounds and BBC iPlayer.
Host Ed Gamble will be joined by celebrities and players from previous series to analyse and react to developments in the castle.