Yellowjackets S2 Ep 1 Recap & Thoughts

You too probably watched the first episode of Yellowjackets season 2 recently. You woke up the next morning, cozy in your bed, ready for a peaceful Saturday… and then you remembered.

Let’s start from the beginning, shall we?

Young Travis and Natalie get ready to leave in the early winter morning. Lottie stops them at the door to do some sort of ritual before they venture out into the snow. “Wicca bull$hit” as Natalie calls it, has been happening for some time it appears, and it’s kept them safe so far. After they leave, Lottie draws the infamous symbol on the cold window glass.

Next, we cut to 1998 to an airport with reporters storming the girls as they get onto a plane, back in the real world. We see Misty, Lottie, Tai, Shauna, and Nat try to hide from the cameras to avoid questions. As Lottie ascends into the plane, she turns around, and screams… We learn that after returning home, Lottie doesn’t speak. She doesn’t eat or sleep. Her parents are distraught. We have to endure watching her get some sort of electroshock therapy. Did they even still do that in 1998? Cut to present-day adult Lottie. It seems she has turned into some sort of cult leader (of course). Her followers all sit and watch her talk, all wearing shades of purple. She spouts some self-motivational “you are the problem” rhetoric and everyone nods. My therapist would not approve. Next, we see Shauna being interviewed about Adam’s death. I got scared for a moment at the thought of someone finally connecting her to Adam at all, let alone realizing she was his lover. But then we quickly realize it’s Misty’s voice during a fake interview. Phew! Speaking of Misty, Christina Ricci is the perfect adult Misty. She’s got those big crazy eyes, and to be honest, her questionable, over-the-top acting skills are working in her favor with the Misty character. Adult Taissa is shopping for another dog. You know, since she killed her other one during some sort of possession ritual that she doesn’t remember doing. The employee is star-struck and wants to chat about Taissa’s recent election win. Taissa couldn’t care less, which is ironic because she let her family fall apart for this campaign and now that she won, she’s losing her marbles. Misty logs on to her Citizen Detective forum and finds that people online are looking into Adam’s death. Someone has connected the dots that Adam probably had a secret girlfriend (which we all know is Shauna). This smells of bad news for the ladies, who all know the truth about Adam’s death (and helped dispose of the body). Misty turns on her terrifying “everything is fine” facade and closes her computer.

We are again back in 1996, where Shauna is having what we assume is a flashback or daydream with Jackie. They are sitting outside in some sort of shack as they chat about their futures. We are then shocked to learn that this is not some sort of daydream at all, but in fact, Shauna is sitting. there with Jackie’s cold dead body. Things are getting even weirder out there in the woods. Back outside with Shauna and Dead Jackie, we learn about how Shauna and Jeff first started their affair. It turns out, Jeff lied to Shauna about why he and Jackie were on the rocks, and Shauna chose to believe it. She and Jackie get into a fight about it and Shauna shoves Jackie, whose dead body falls over. Shauna rushes over to sit her back up and then realizes Jackie’s ear fell off. Shauna then puts the ear IN HER POCKET. WHAT??!!! Why?? The rest of the team inside the cabin chat about how weird it is that Shauna is out there with Jackie’s corpse. We also learn that it’s been two months since Jackie’s death. Shauna comes back inside with some meat for the team, and everyone looks uncomfortable. They probably spent most of their time being uncomfortable these days.

Fast forward to the present day, we learn that Shauna has Adam’s keys and ID in her safe. What the hell Shauna, why would you keep those? This whole episode is turning into “what the heck is Shauna’s deal?!” She then calls Jeff because she just realized they have a new problem to deal with: Adam’s art studio. Who knows what kind of proof of their relationship he has in there? This scene between Jeff and Shauna reminds me how annoying it is that Malanie Lynskey, who plays Shauna, is from New Zealand and frequently portrays an American accent (quite well I might add), but Warren Kole, who plays Jeff, could not even manage to tone down his southern accent at all. They're supposed to be from New Jersey! (Side note, Warren Kole only has about 7,000 Instagram followers. Clearly, the girlies who watch this show do not care about Jeff, which makes me chuckle). Next, we go to Taissa’s son’s school, which is just letting out for the day. He runs over to her car as she introduces him to the new dog (Hi Steve). Tai’s wife Simone rushes over and tells Tai to stay the f@#& away from their son. Simone is the one who found Taissa’s creepy dog sacrifice in the basement, but Tai has no clue about any of that yet. Simone assumes Tai is lying about it and threatens to go to the press (as Tai is a congresswoman) if she doesn’t step down from office and get herself help. It’s going to be hard to get help if she doesn’t even know what she did. But on the bright side, their son Sammy finally smiled. Probably because he doesn't live with Tai anymore, who he witnessed creeping around the yard at night eating dirt. That would mess any kid up.

I had assumed that Travis and Nat has tracked out into the cold early that morning to hunt or look for food, but it turns out they are actually looking for Javi, Travis’ younger brother. Javi has been gone since the night before Jackie died two months prior. During the team’s shroom-induced Doomcoming hysteria where they almost killed Travis, Shauna told Javi to RUN. He listens well apparently, and they haven’t seen him since.

Next we see Adult Misty threatening the motel employee because she wants to know what happened to Natalie. She doesn’t know yet that Natalie was kidnapped by some purple-clad weirdos in the middle of the night. She eventually gets it out of him that Natalie took off in the middle of the night, and left cash and the key in the room. Jeff and Shauna go to Adam’s art studio and things get really weird real quick. They discover Adam has paintings and drawings all over the place of Shauna. Some are of her sleeping or half-naked. To distract Jeff, she seduces him using a story of how jealous she would be if she knew he slept with someone else. They have rough sex on top of Adam’s artwork and I am very uncomfortable. Afterward, they use paint thinner to ruin Adam’s paintings so that they are unrecognizable as her face.

Back at the cabin, we learn that the team is punishing Misty for drugging them with shrooms. I don’t blame them. They make her go outside for water again, even after doing it all week already. They have no sympathy. Nat and Coach chat about how unlikely it is that Javi is alive, but they know that Travis can’t accept that yet. We learn that on their daily outings, Travis and Nat are also surveying the land and making a map of their forest.

Misty is crying in Nat’s old motel room, hurt that Nat would leave without telling her. But she then notices some signs of a struggle at the doorframe and has hope that Nat would not just leave (what she doesn’t know is that Nat was ready to kill herself right before she was kidnapped, so all is definitely NOT well with Nat either way). We cut to Nat at her kidnapper’s holding cell, where a young woman in purple comes in and delivers some food. Nat convinces her to uncuff her one hand so she can eat. This ends up being a bad decision, as Nat later stabs the woman in the face and escapes. Adult Jeff and Shauna burn Adam’s drawings and ID, along with Shauna’s old journals, in their grill outside. They use WAY too much lighter fluid and almost set a tree on fire. I have no idea how they plan to get away with murder. Tai finally discovers her weird dog sacrifice altar in the basement. She cries in disgust. Steve the new dog runs in and probably wonders what the hell he’s gotten himself into. Adult Shauna and Jeff are eating dinner with their teenage daughter Callie. After making silly jokes about hotdogs, Callie gets up and states she is going to grill herself a veggie burger. Jeff jumps up and says he’ll do it for her, because he’s just a loving traditional dad, but we all know they just don’t want her near that grill until they can clean it out after their evidence bonfire.

Young Nat and Travis are sitting by the fire. Travis has a panic attack about Javi’s probable death. Lottie helps calm him down, and it appears that she magically showed him a vision of a tree and candles (???). The vision and panic attack subside, and he gets a boner. She tells him his brother is alive. She knows so because she saw a vision of some candles by a tree (duh). Natalie yells at Lottie for giving him false hope. Lottie says there’s no such thing, only hope. I disrespectfully disagree. I am on Nat’s side here.

It cuts back to the present day when Nat has escaped from her kidnapper (who she just stabbed with a fork). She is running away through the woods and turns up on some sort of naked old man sacrifice by Lottie’s purple people. She confronts Lottie with a big stick. Lottie claims she has a message from Travis (who is recently dead). We don’t get to find out what the message is. I don’t believe anything Lottie says at this point anyways.

Tai bites Van’s lip during a sleepy possession back in the past. They say I love you for the first time, and it’s all very cute but probably some foreshadowing about how Taissa is losing it and also a reminder that gay characters in TV never get happy endings. At least they haven’t buried any gays yet (though they did almost burn Van alive last season. Whoops!)

Shauna and Jeff’s daughter Callie is seen rummaging through the ashes in the grill and, conveniently for the plot, finds a chunk of Adam’s unmelted ID. Callie is going to be a problem, we know that already. She already tried to blackmail Shauna last season about the affair. Who knows what she’ll do with a murder case.

Shauna is upstairs back at the cabin. She is holding Jackie’s ear, staring at it intensely. After a few moments, she puts it in her mouth. HER MOUTH. We hear a crunchy sound as she bites into it. The camera cuts to black. I had a FEELING they were going to eat each other. I bet they’re going to start eating Dead Jackie. It’s still early in the winter, they’ve got months left. Is this the big secret that the adults are trying to hide? Do you think they’ll end up eating Shauna’s baby? I almost hope that’s not what the big secret ends up being. That’s almost…. acceptable? Well, unless Lottie does some sort of baby sacrifice. I wouldn’t put it past her.

Join me for the next however many weeks while we watch Yellowjackets Season 2.

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