Ever since The Traitors proved Britain still has a raging appetite for the kind of middlebrow social experiment-style reality shows that fuse irresistibly bananas interpersonal drama with compelling psychological insight – the Medjool date to Love Island and co’s Haribo Starmix, if you will – the TV industry has been pumping out fun yet relatively classy formats. Some have been fine (The Fortune Hotel), some mystifying (The Genius Game; Destination X), some too derivative (Million Dollar Secret) and some are yet to disappoint: persuasion-based gameshow The Inheritance, featuring Elizabeth Hurley, arrives imminently on Channel 4.
Really, though, the only show currently holding a candle to The Traitors is The Jury: Murder Trial (indeed, in May, they competed for the best reality Bafta; the latter won). Following two groups of 12 strangers as they play jury during a word-for-word reconstruction of a real criminal trial, the 2024 series shone a light on the enigma at the heart of the justice system. Jury deliberations are top secret, meaning lawyers, judges and academics have little understanding of how jurors digest evidence, draw individual conclusions or – crucially – arrive at a unanimous decision.
The show’s revelations were gobsmacking: many of the pretend jurors were entirely swept up in their own psychodramas, only pausing to bend the evidence to their personal narratives and belief systems. In the dock was John (names, dates and locations were changed), who had bludgeoned his wife, Helen, to death with a hammer. He was claiming manslaughter due to “loss of control” – a plea that required the jury to believe the accused faced extreme provocation and was unaware of his actions. The defence portrayed Helen as verbally abusive; the prosecution argued his attack was deliberate regardless. Some jurors identified with Helen: did they deserve to die for taunting a partner in the past? Others related to John and – without as many qualms as you might expect – felt they might have done the same in his shoes. Only a couple refused to let their emotions cloud the facts of this violent killing. Eventually, we saw how two initially divided juries came to their (different) verdicts: in both cases, a single juror seemed to be the driving force.
Now the show returns, with a similar – albeit gender-flipped – case. The defendant is Sophie, who admits to stabbing her boyfriend and causing his death. She claims he was strangling her when she grabbed the knife, meaning she was acting in self-defence. Yet her behaviour after the incident – including a strange 999 call – casts significant doubt.
As usual, the fidelity of the social experiment is diluted with repetition: The Jury’s second series is slightly less edifying than the first. Of course, every faux-juror has something in common that their real counterparts don’t: they are all prepared to appear on reality TV. Yet, while series one had some big personalities, it was a generally civil affair. This time, we get distracting tantrums, squabbles and cliquiness. The show has also ditched the two competing juries concept, which was fascinating the first time round.
Even so, The Jury’s appeal stays intact. That’s largely because it tells us so much about how people refashion life experience into a set of values – and, depressingly, how frequently domestic abuse is still minimised and excused. Two of the jurors most vocally opposed to the self-defence argument grew up with fathers who abused their mothers: one woman views the fact that she hasn’t fallen victim to the same fate as proof you can avoid abuse, meaning she doesn’t feel sorry for Sophie. Elsewhere, empathy is in abundance. So are other rigid ideals. Forget the finer points of the law, the sweeping attitudes of individual jurors inevitably end up being the dominant frameworks for assessing guilt.
Sometimes it seems as if The Jury is designed to be a damning indictment of our legal system – that is certainly how series one was received. Neatly, it arrives just as the government is considering reducing the number of jury trials in order to ease the eye-watering crown court backlog. You may well come away believing justice in the UK has been a millennium-long farce, but the show doesn’t really delve into alternatives – while other methods seem workable in theory, it’s not difficult to foresee other problems in practice. The show does, however, provide plenty of food for thought on this topic.
In TV terms, it is a less mitigated success. Like all great reality shows, The Jury uses unusual circumstances to reveal the deeply ingrained prejudices and perspectives that shape our daily lives. Are random citizens fit to dole out life sentences? Probably not. Does the jury system double as a Petri dish for truly illuminating reality TV? Absolutely.
• The Jury: Murder Trial is on Channel 4 now
