Yellowjackets is back, and the third season looks set to descend deeper into the supernatural and give fans some answers.
But first, a recap. For the uninitiated, Yellowjackets is split across two timelines: the first follows the lives of a girl's high-school football team back in 1996 and their battle to survive in the Canadian wilderness after their plane goes down on the way to a football tournament. The second tracks the survivors of the ordeal in the present day and the traumas and mysteries they carry with them.
Season one was a roaring success with hints of Lord of the Flies and some sprinkling of supernatural in the vein of Lost. Season two looked to continue that momentum but arguably fell a little flat. The season picked up towards the end, with a serious event closing it out and leaving a lot of room for speculation.
And so we arrive at season three, which makes its debut today (February 14 at the time of writing) and could be the perfect foil to a sickly sweet Valentine’s Day.
I got a preview look at the first four episodes of season three, and I’m chomping at the bit for more.
While there’s a lot of bouncing around between the past and the present, Yellowjackets feels like it’s back on form so far. In the wilderness, there’s a deeper sense that there could be a supernatural element involved, and that bleeds into the present day with a greater effect.
Previously more sidelined characters Callie and Jeff get more screen time, with the former diving deeper into the Yellowjacket’s wilderness story. At the same time, Jeff is both slightly goofy yet a good guy at the center of chaos. Christina Ricci is in superb form as the somewhat unstable Misty. However, I feel the relationship between her and Elijah Wood’s Warren seems less substantial, which is a shame as I do like seeing Wood playing a strange and obsessive person.
The rest of the cast is also on point, with the younger cast in the wilderness neatly threading the line between a need to survive and high-school dynamics.
There’s a lot to like here. The building of the supernatural element keeps the mind wondering what’s real and what’s not, while there are some darkly comic moments that act as a palate cleanser.
Expect answers and some big moments
One of the prevailing questions that’s been itching away at me over the past two seasons of Yellowjackets is whether we’ll get some answers to the mystery of if there’s indeed an entirety in the wilderness that’s exerting power over the past and present-day characters, or if it’s all imagined. After all, Lost went from a survival show to one that fully embraced a supernatural element.
While I don't mind the room to guess and ponder, I do feel this season will need to give at least some answers to the bigger mysteries of the wilderness to keep Yellowjackets feeling fresh.
I got a chance to attend roundtable interviews with four of the cast members – Sarah Desjardins, who plays Callie Sadeki, Warren Kole, who plays Jeff Sadeki, Courtney Eaton, who plays the teenage version of Lottie, and Kevin Alves, who plays the teenage Travis Martin – and get some more insight into where season three is heading.
For Callie, Desjardins noted she's going on a journey. “I think Callie is in a very different place,” Desjardins said. “But there’s a complete spectrum of emotions for all of us. There’s high jinks, there’s emotional moments; I really can’t wait for everybody to see it.” So that’s left me intrigued to see where her story goes, given it feels like she’s getting a bigger focus this season.
I asked Kole where he sees Jeff going, given the patriarch of the Sadeki can seem a tad bumbling and out of the loop.
“Jeff is a lot of fun. He is gullible, he is naive, he’s provincial or insulated in how he thinks. But there’s a lot of potential in an empty vessel; you can kind of fill that with anything.” said Kole. “And he is loyal and he’s really pure in a lot of his values. So to have those challenges and to have problems that need to be solved, he has to, you would imagine, grow a little bit and mature and evolve, or he’s just gonna get run over by the women in his family.”
I rather like Jeff and feel he’s a bit of an unsung hero in the present day setting of Yellowjackets, so to see him evolve gives me another reason to press on with the series.
But onto the bigger mystery, and Eaton told me: “I will say we get answers this season regarding the wilderness; whether some people decide to take that information on is another story. I think this season does a really good job of riding the line until you learn something very specific as the season goes on.”
What those specifics are, I’ve yet to glean, as the first four episodes of season three still kept me guessing. Alves added that the show still wants you to figure out for yourself what’s in a similar vein to the first two seasons: “Even though it’ll give you answers, it’ll keep you questioning where you stand with it.”
While I angled for hints on whether there’ll be a season four for Yellowjackets, the cast didn’t let that information slip out. But I inferred that season three will leave some mysteries to be solved and next steps for characters, which makes me think there’s at least another season in the future of Yellowjackets.
So, with that all in mind, it feels that this season of Yellowjackets could go places, and there’s at least one big moment in the early episodes that commanded my attention and saw some excellent performances, all of which would be well worth a Paramount+ with Showtime subscription
I hope this season can stick the landing and give me a taste of the theory crafting I enjoyed in the early 2000s with Lost; a series I think is still worth your time today.
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