Get your "Yellowjackets" on while you can
With season 2 currently in production thru February 2023, it's the perfect time to meet the Yellowjackets, part fearless soccer champs from 90's New Jersey and part possibly possessed cannibals.
Way back when I first gave the hit Emmy nominated Showtime show, Yellowjackets a try, it wasn’t because of the fanfare at the time, but more so the 90’s female casting reunion fait accompli. Christina Ricci (Casper, Now and Then, The Opposite of Sex), Melanie Lynskey (Heavenly Creatures, I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore) and not to mention the headlining“edgy” actress of the 90’s Juliette Lewis (Cape Fear, Natural Born Killers, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape?) all had a marked presence in my formative years and as a fully fledged adult, I’m loving them even more, as women that are living out the trauma of their teenage years well into their adulthood. The main trauma catalyst being, that as high school soccer girls’ champions en route to a national tournament, their plane takes a dive and they spend the next 18 months trapped in the wilderness with very little to survive and one adult in the mix. What could and should have been a very positive memorable experience for the girls becomes a tragic nightmare all in a split second.
The show’s main theme explores how each teenage female character responds to this trigger and how identities take shape and are transformed. The unpopular girl in the pre-crash timeline who can’t get noticed to save her life (Ricci), all of the sudden has purpose in the wild. She’s read up and turns out she’s handy as a medic and in thinking quickly on her feet - skills that make her invaluable to the team. Conversely, the popular pretty girl/head of the soccer team, Jackie (played by Ella Purnell) is out of sorts in the wild and can’t be liked to save her life. In fact, she’s hated by everyone, because she does despicable things, she can’t find a way to be useful and doesn’t want to get her hands dirty.
The show’s inspiration is Lord of the Flies, Stand by Me (well, naturally), and J.J. Abrams’ Lost. The depths of depravity that some of the characters stoop to (Ricci’s Misty and Lottie, the Antler Queen) in the name of self-preservation is something to behold, while others like Lynskey’s Shauna play it cool and close to the chest, never trusting others but at the same time building credibility and a safety net. Then we have Taissa (Tawny Cypress, Heroes) who as an adult may or may not be killing and eating animals and hanging out in trees at night scaring her son, but she’s also a high-powered politician running for State Senate. Are the two mutually exclusive or can they co-exist? Well, in Yellowjackets, all is fair game. Natalie (played by Juliette Lewis) is by far the most rockin’ and sympathetic character and despite or maybe because of all her addictions, you are rooting for her to overcome them. She and Misty as adults play a great crime-fighting, detective sleuthing team, even if Misty is batsh*t crazy (think Ben from Lost).
So post-crash timeline, with the introduction of the supernatural, characters seem possessed, there’s supernatural elements, and then there’s science. You want to cling to the science and what is “real” - But then there’s scary demon looking characters with no eyes appearing in random mirrors, and you’re like “yeah, but no…”
The show features a jumpy but well-tied together non-linear timeline, so it’s able to explore both the fallout of the events in the wilderness of the 90’s coupled with the adult versions of the soccer players reckoning with their past and unable to escape it. The going back to the 90’s is a sensory delight - inundating us with a playlist that’s beyond stellar and even bringing up novelties that only adolescent girls of the 90’s would know about.
Misc. “Supernatural” Observations:
The element of horror or the supernatural is not scarier than what humans are willing to do to each other given dire, desperate circumstances. The thing I’m really intrigued by is a comment that was made on The Prestige TV podcast around the horror/supernatural elements of the wilderness is really a secondary subplot. Whether or not these ominous powers or forces exist (woman in the tree, guy in the cabin in Jackie or Shauna’s dream) is not as important as what the characters are willing to believe and stake their lives on. That perception of what exists is more intriguing. It seems like such a simple statement and a “duh” moment but it’s very true and can apply to really any story which invokes supernatural or horror elements as a device - I find this power of convincing yourself of a “truth” to the extent of purporting false convictions, creating alliances with people you wouldn’t necessarily, and at the same time justifying immorality to be so intriguing and this show does that so well.
Comparisons with Lost and Misty being the Ben of the show. Ruthless, no moral compass but live by their own compass which is to survive at any cost and to be loved and accepted. Misty fell in love with Coach Scott who was not attainable and she wasn't really apart of the team but she wants to badly to one of them.
Betrayal is not happening at the hands of external forces but from within the group
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