IS THE MOLE THE MOST TRUSTED? - EPISODE 8 - HINTS & THEORIES - WIE IS DE MOL? - SEASON 24 - ENGLISH 

I thought the same thing during the first task that Rasario only let Rian through because he knew the pot was so low that they had to add something. It sucks because I think the show is adding more and more opportunities for the players to lower the pot that it's made The Mole's job so much easier to the point that it's now gone the other way and made The Mole's job harder. Now the The Mole needs to stop mole-ing just to keep a respectable pot.

I could not be any deeper in the Rosario tunnel 🙂 I agree with you 100% that all of Rosario's actions this episode point to him. And here are some additional counterpoints to the people that think it is an anti-Mole action to not shoot Rian. 1) If he shoots every single candidate, that could blow his cover. 2) Rian specifically says "If you shoot me, I know you're the Mole". He wanted her out of the game, because she's the only one that seems to actually try to win money consistently this season. Therefore, Rosario didn't want Rian to start suspecting him. 3) If he did have advanced knowledge of what the players had (which I suspect he did), as Mole, he would really only have to shoot the players that took the jokers. This way, the game is more fair if the Mole doesn't directly influence who has jokers and who doesn't. Therefore, he didn't have to shoot Rian since she took money. I also think that the Mole would have learned how to stack the cards in preparation for the season so that they would earn a joker if they ended up in that position. I think it is too risky to take the money and then count on the player at the end to shoot you, if you are trying to keep money out of the pot. Therefore, I don't think it is Anna or Kees. Both of them struggled to build the card house, took the money, actually told the exact truth to Rosario - and were shot anyway (because these idiots picked the Mole as most trusted!). In the boats, Rosario was clearly messing around intentionally. He must be loving it knowing that the others still don't suspect him despite his constant and blatant sabotages. I'm surprised he didn't go one step further and tip the boat over. For the Mol card hint, what I noticed is that right after they show the Mol card, they cut to Rosario saying "Me, about me". Another callback to the Mol-Ik hint. There also continue to be "reflection" hints. This time, when Rosario places his joker during the quiz, they show the reflection of the words "De Mol" on the screen. I have been very vocal and disappointed about the pot being so low. Up until now, I blamed production for making the games too difficult and having too many negative money challenges. And of course, the word game also included negative money, which made me angry. But I also think some of the blame needs to go to the non-Mole players. How can nobody be onto Rosario?!? Wake up, people! And everyone's strategy (other than Rian, who is now gone) seems to be to mess stuff up to draw suspicion on themselves (I'm looking at you, Kees and Fons). That is working - a little too well. Perhaps, Rosario convinced Fons to act like the Mole all season as part of their bond strategy. If that turns out to be the case, I'll give Rosario more credit. But I still think they made it too easy for him this year (I'll never forgive them for allowing him to take an envelope with -3,000, especially if it was not a random choice). Finally, it was interesting that they didn't declare these 4 players as the "finalists" despite there only being one gameplay episode left. I wonder if they will have another quiz in the middle of the next episode to get down to the final 3 before one last challenge.

I am a meanie but I am glad Rian went home this week. Not because I didn't like her (quite the contrary, she was frequently hilarious when they bothered showing her), but because now we have one of the most suspicious final 4 in recent WIDM history. I can't wait to see if they'll eliminate someone next week or if it'll just be all 4 in the finale. I kinda hope they get rid of someone just because I need the help, but I can't deny the fun. (I still remember last year and how boring it was. What a nice change of pace this year.) Random Thought #1: They're in a van for 6-7 hours, and none of them are wearing a seat belt! Thanks I hate it. Let's be honest, the most interesting thing this week was the first challenge. Let's start with the trust list: might this be a peak into suspicions? Probably, but I'll be brutally honest; even if I'm a contestant and I know Fons' isn't the mole, he'd probably still be bottom of my trust list. Like the mole will sometimes not mole to earn trust, but Fons has been either a numpty or a selfish player in nearly every challenge that would call for it. (Can't find his necklace in the first episode, can't figure out the Olympics task, goes for jokers in the bicycle/market challenge, opens extra piñatas after the 15 minute mark, moves the rocks in the Mayan math, can't count flags, opens the future questions envelope, etc etc. Like I don't think he's the mole but boy howdy is his case for it strong. Anna roasting him for being surprised he was voted least trusted by the group by telling him to have a little self knowledge was perfect.) Setting that aside, feels like we're entering a Anna vs Fons finale. Anna puts Fons as her least trusted and Fons does the same for her. Kees is interesting, because all we know is he doesn't trust Rian and he does trust Rosario. We don't really get his info on Anna or Fons, which I find raaaaaather interesting. Rian we should probably pay attention to, because she trusts Rosario and Anna, less so Fons and Kees. (I don't really see how Kees can be the mole after this elimination.) Rosario is also interesting, because the only person he really mentions as trusting is Rian. Although later he says she is more trustworthy than himself, Kees, and Fons. He says nothing about Anna, which could mean he trusts her too, or maybe she's his mole pick and just excluded her. Random Thought #2: When Rik announces they're playing a laser game (Rosario's already left the group), both Rian and Kees look genuinely excited, Fons looks weirdly disappointed, and Anna has no reaction. Curious. Especially when you see her in a confessional looking excited about it later. For the actual game, seems like Anna does a lot of conniving to only go for 1 money amount and the rest jokers. And she loves to throw back in Kees' face that she doesn't trust him after the exemption win last week. It's lucky everyone but Fons is bad at building card houses, otherwise this could've gone rather poorly. Fons getting his just desserts and proving why he should be the least trusted was delicious. Anna did a poor ass job of trying to convince Rosario she had money. Kees seemed to try a lot more IMO, by at least explaining how he would have gone for jokers if he could build the card tower. Rosario for his part (if he's a player) made a smart move in letting Rian go when he already had a joker and trusts her. She says in her confessional that if he shot her she'd suspect him as a mole, but we don't see her say that to his face. I know a lot of people here are in the Rosario tunnel, but I'm not yet convinced. Random Thought #3: Heeeeeeeey Macarena! I found the down time between the 1st and 2nd tasks more interesting than the 2nd task itself. I always find it very contestant-like when players don't want to share answers about personal life stuff. Like I don't know why a mole draws attention to themself by keeping it secret. Fons was being too cryptic at the table and kept getting roasted for it (still deserved). Rosario was a bit secretive too, although maybe was less obnoxious about it. I don't want to bother with the second challenge. I just found it sooooo boring. AND IT COULD HAVE LOST THEM MONEY. Seriously, we get it already producers! You're short on money this season! The only thing I liked about it was Fons being in the least sabotage-able place, and it serves him right, the little stinker. And I guess I'll say it: calling Anna's moment an anti-Mole action feels a bit strong when it earned them all of 80 euro. It's not like they need ANOTHER challenge to lose money in. Keeping it a meager 80 euro doesn't really save the day here. It sort of sounds like I'm entering an Anna tunnel? I might be. I think Fons is just playing like a goober contestant. I know everyone's in the Rosario tunnel, but I just...don't know if I see it? I think it's mostly due to the fact that I think Babs went all-in on him and got eliminated, then gifted the pot to him. That's my take on it anyway. If it's Kees he needs an award. Like pronto. He's not been a stellar contestant but he's I think tried his best in most of the challenges. Rian voting for him when no one else really seems to also means it really can't be him. If someone gets eliminated next week I won't be surprised if it's Kees, although I will be sad to see him go.

I can't believe how many Dutch fans are convinced it is Anna. If it is her, she's not doing a very good job. If you "follow the money", Anna has added the most to the pot, while Rosario has the least (in fact, quite a bit negative).

Welp, another episode, another one of my predictions proven to be completely wrong 🙃 Ugh, this show makes me feel really dumb sometimes! No Rian in the finals, apparently. Rosario remains my top (and only) suspect since episode 5, although I am starting to get nervous now, since I have been wrong about everything else so far. Is he a red herring? Is the person that I have been calling the trademarked “Fake Mole” actually the mole? If I HAD to choose a backup suspect, between Kees and Fons, I guess I would say Kees. I still don’t suspect Anna at all. I have a serious question for people in the Anna tunnel. I have been seeing comments for the last few weeks saying that if Anna is the mole, then episode 1 assignment 1 made it too obvious. What about that assignment made it obvious? I rewatched it yesterday, and I still can’t figure that out; I didn’t see her do anything particularly weird or suspicious. Is there a hint that I’m missing? Now, some thoughts about this week’s episode: Pre-First assignment/Trust Rankings: Seeing everyone discuss their trustworthiness with Rik was interesting. And yes, seeing Rosario with a big grin on his face saying that he can’t be trusted was pretty funny. But something else stood out to me even more than his response to that question…his hearing aid. I had no idea that he even used one. Now, suddenly, we get comments from multiple candidates about Rosario’s hearing aid. Rian saying that it was making all sorts of noise while the other candidates were talking to Rik. Anna telling Kees that she thinks Rosario can hear more than he lets on, etc. Now…stay with me here…what if he actually WAS somehow listening in on the other candidates’ conversations with Rik? What if, just for that particular task, he had some sort of additional earpiece that was letting him listen in, and the others thought that it was just his hearing aid? Maybe the reason he was able to so confidently say that everyone trusted him was because he heard what they said? And yes, I know, I feel like a horrible person for suggesting that someone would use a hearing aid to help disguise a mole action. But this is what this show does to me, lol. And I just think it’s weird that everyone was talking about it all of a sudden. I also want to point out that the best way for the mole to influence the “most to least trusted” ranking (and therefore to influence who gets key positions for both upcoming assignments) is to write his or her list last. That way, if two candidates are tied for first or last place, the mole can then use their own list to break the tie, if necessary, in a way that is most favorable for them. Anna wrote her list first. Rosario wrote his last. First assignment: This one…wasn’t my favorite. It felt very easy and boring for a WIDM laser opdracht. All they had to do was run from one safe zone to the next, and the consequences for getting shot were very minimal. All of the mini-assignments were identical, and building a single-level house of cards is not hard. And then, they gave the mole the ability to shoot everyone who tried to earn money (ALTHOUGH that was 100% worth it just to see Rosario trick Fons into doing the Macarena at gunpoint 😂😂😂). I really think that Rosario may have shot Rian if she hadn’t literally said “No more bulls**t, if you shoot me you’re the mole.” Remember, when she first walked up to him and said she had 2000 euros, he kind of sighed and said something along the lines of “Darn it Rian, you were the only person I actually trusted, and now I can tell that you’re lying to me.” He was setting up an excuse to take the shot, but she bullied him into accepting the money instead. It was giving me Lieselot from De Mol 2023 energy-I wish candidates would do stuff like that more often! Second assignment: This one was more fun for me to watch. Seeing Fons try to put sentences together was kind of giving me flashbacks to my Dutch lessons on Duolingo 😂. Anna saved this assignment single-handedly. Yes, she pulled several unusable words out of the water, but her telling Fons to use “book” as a verb is the only reason they didn’t end up owing Rik money here. I think the best place for the mole to be in this assignment is in one of the kayaks, rather than making the sentences. It was 30 euros per correctly used word, and -100 per incorrectly used/unused word. It’s much easier to sabotage by failing to pick up words that are needed than it is to try to sabotage the sentence-writing, especially with everyone watching and shouting out ideas at the end. If they had given Fons a couple of verbs, he could have used all of the words, even if it was in short, 3-word sentences that didn’t make sense. The missing “mol” is intriguing. I had noticed that both kayaks pulled the word “mol” but didn’t realize that one of them was missing at the end. Picking up a word and then dropping it overboard is actually a great way to sabotage, because then it can’t be used in a sentence but it still counts as -100. Did the mole actually use the word mole to mole? Maybe Fons should have used “mol” as a verb, lol! And on that note, I think it’s time for me to get some sleep. So yeah, I am still comfortably in the Rosario tunnel. It seems like Anna and Fons suspect each other. If Kees was voting for Rian, he might actually have a chance to outscore Anna and/or Fons on the next test. That would be pretty funny, since he talks about how horrible his memory is. And…if the next test is the final test (still not sure how they are going to do episode 9 this year)…does that mean Kees could actually win?! Not gonna lie, part of me kind of wants to see that happen now! Yes, I have gone from wanting to exchange Kees for Babs at the end of episode 1 to being OK with the thought of him winning. This season has been quite the journey.