This piece contains spoilers for Yellowjackets Season 1. But you can read our spoiler-free review of Season 1 if you're not caught up yet, and our Season 2 review if you're curious about what's ahead!
In the wilds of November 2021 an unassuming show about the feral nature of teenage girls became a word of mouth smash for Showtime. Yellowjackets exploded onto the scene, inspiring thousands of fan theories and a devoted viewership who couldn't get enough of the dueling timelines, gruesome wilderness action, and cast of '90s icons and fresh new faces. But, with a story that spans decades, a massive lineup of characters, and lots of culty-goodness to keep up with, you might need a refresher before the season returns. Just like the wilderness provides for some of our young survivors, we're here to get you up to speed with the atmospheric, bloodsoaked events of Yellowjackets Season 1.
A Bloody Beginning
It all begins as a young girl runs barefoot through a snowy forest chased by unknown assailants. Her ragged-breathed quest for survival takes her deeper and deeper into the woods until she falls into a waiting trap. Soon, her killers feast on her flesh. Season 1’s primary mystery revolves around this death and the apparent cannibals who descend upon the corpse.
Time to meet the potential cannibals and victims! Part of Yellowjackets' charm is its dual timelines and cast. In 1996 a girl's high school soccer team is preparing for the National Championships. The team's Captain and obvious Queen Bee, Jackie (Ella Purnell), her best friend and sidekick Shauna (Sophie Nélisse), the enigmatic and furious Taissa (Jasmin Savoy Brown), punk outsider Natalie (Sophie Thatcher), stoic goalkeeper Van (Liv Hewson), the overtly faithful good girl Laura Lee (Jane Widdop) and the wealthy shy girl Lottie (Courtney Eaton). The core team is rounded out by Mari (Alexa Barajas) and Akilah (Keeya King).
Their journey to the competition is cut short when their plane falls from the sky crashing in the wilderness. The team are the only survivors along with the sons of their now dead coach, Travis (Kevin Alves) and Javi (Luciano Leroux), as well as hunky assistant coach Ben (Steven Krueger) and the Yellowjackets' over enthusiastic equipment manager Misty (Sammi Hanratty).
Which Yellowjackets Survived the Crash?
In the modern day, Shauna (Melanie Lynskey) is an unsatisfied housewife married to Jackie's teenage sweetheart Jeff (Warren Kole). Taissa (Tawny Brown) is a successful rising politician, Natalie is a recovering addict and Misty (Christina Ricci) is a caregiver for elderly folks. Their fragile "normal" lives are turned upside down when they begin to receive strange blackmail notes alluding to their time in the woods at the same time a journalist begins sniffing around.
These developments are the most worrying to Misty, who we quickly learn was definitely one of the alleged cannibals in a brief glimpse of her bloodstained face back in 1996. She also condemned her fellow survivors to 19 months in the wilds when she destroyed the black box and GPS from their plane within the first few days of arriving. Despite the secrets she has to hide, Nat suspects Misty of sending the creepy notes which feature a symbol from their survivor era, but the pair quickly realize that's not the case and embark on an odd couple mystery to discover the truth.
What Happened to Travis in Yellowjackets Season 1?
Speaking of unexpected pairings, after rear-ending a young hunk named Adam (Peter Gadiot), Shauna begins an affair that quickly ramps up and sets her on a dangerous path, especially as Adam is pretty shady and reminded many viewers of the youngest survivor of the crew, Javi. His brother Travis is Misty and Nat's first stop but they find him dead and, while it appears to be suicide, the pair realize a strange ritual was committed under his body. The tragic discovery of her ex-boyfriend sends the addict Nat into a spiral and pushes Misty to extreme lengths.
The mystery of what happened in the woods is a national curiosity that all the women have tried to leave behind, but that's becoming harder than ever for Taissa. She's accused of being a cannibal by the politician she's running against — revealing there are at least rumors about what we saw on screen — and her son Sammy is suffering strange and terrifying visions of a creature he calls "the lady in the tree."
Home Sweet Home
In 1996 we start to get a picture of how the survivors lasted through the winter as they discover a cabin, replete with a dead body that inspires worries of hauntings and a fateful seance that tips Lottie over the edge into believing she's possessed. It's not the first time that Lottie has been close to the supernatural though as we learn the young schizophrenic woman has a history of visions, including one that saved her family's life.
While teenage Jackie slides down the forest's new social ladder in favor of creepy survivalist Misty, Shauna becomes closer to Javi; Nat and Travis start a classic enemies to lovers romance when the group run out of food and the two take on the role of hunters thanks to Nat's knowledge of guns; and Van and Taissa continue to explore their pre-crash love story.
The Truth About Shauna and Misty's Misdeeds
In spite of the disastrous situation, nature takes its course and all the girls' period's sync up, but one of them is distinctly left out: Shauna. Turns out that she's pregnant and the father is her BFF Jackie's boyfriend. Uh oh, that's going to end badly for everyone. While the girls are distracted by cramps, Misty is poisoning assistant coach Ben in a haunting attempt to keep the pair close. But, he quickly realizes the truth and tries to play her in order to survive. She doesn't take it well when he reveals that he's gay and has no love for the young woman and her manipulative ways. And it turns out Misty's sociopath behavior isn't confined only to the past.
See, adult Misty's response to the blackmail threat is to kidnap, poison, and trap the enquiring journalist Jessica (Rekha Sharma) in her basem*nt. But there's a problem, she's not who she says she is, as she's a private investigator hired by Taissa to check that no one was going to spill about the woods while she was running for office. Misty has no interest in letting Jessica go though, and this clearly isn't the first non-consensual guest she's kept in her home.
The Lady in the Tree
Misty isn't the only one losing her grip though. It's revealed that Taissa has been sleep-climbing the tree outside her son's room and eating dirt — something she also did in the wilderness — revealing she is the Lady in the Tree. It's a huge hint that all is not well with the most outwardly together of the group. Her trauma is understandable when we learn that on her quest to escape the woods all those years ago she unintentionally led her lover Van into the jaws of a wolf, literally. Though it seemed the brutal attack left Van dead, she survived, cementing the beliefs of the supernatural sect of the group — who believed Lottie had foreseen the attack in a vision — and decidedly freaking out Taissa and her friends.
Van's survival — and Jackie's choice to reveal to the group that Shauna is pregnant — inspires Laura Lee to enact a scheme she'd been stewing over: fixing up an old plane and trying to fly out of the woods. While it seems like it might just work, the plane explodes above the lake. To most of the girls it's a tragedy to Lottie it's a sign: the woods won't let them leave.
Who was the Blackmailer in Yellowjackets Season 1?
In the modern day, the group try to catch their blackmailer to no avail, but their plan does ultimately lead to Shauna making a shocking revelation: her husband Jeff was behind it all. He needed money to help his business and came up with the plan after finding Shauna's journals. Unfortunately, she realizes this a little too late, literally moments after murdering her lover Adam who she began to suspect knew too much about their time in the forest. Ever the planner, Shauna decides to lie to her friends and say she killed Adam because he was the blackmailer. Protecting Jeff — who she tells about the murder as the pair argue about his blackmail scheme — and roping her friends in to get rid of the body in one fell swoop.
If this seems like a bit of a criminal turn for the crew — except murderous Misty — you only need to look back to the nightmarish homecoming party the girls threw for themselves in the woods to learn this isn't their first brush with violence. The team accidentally drug themselves — minus Jackie — with Misty's mushroom poison. They then hunt, trap, abuse, and almost kill Travis, and commune with nature in a terrifyingly feral way. This is a monumental moment as it cements Nat and Travis' relationship — she saves him from Shauna slitting his throat— and sets up Jackie's ultimate demise as the group turn on her and tell her to sleep outside. It's also the last time anyone saw poor little Javi, a mystery that'll definitely continue in Season 2.
After getting rid of Adam's body in the present — thanks Misty! — the foursome head to their school reunion. It's here during the finale that we learn Jackie didn't survive her night outside the cabin, instead freezing to death. It wreaks havoc on the group and splits them into two clear groups: Lottie's wilderness worshiping cult starring Van and Misty and Taissa's more logical survivors.
Where We Left the Yellowjackets at the End of Season 1
Things honestly aren't looking much better in the present as the wider world catches on to Adam's disappearance (including Shauna's daughter Callie (Sarah Desjardins) . Who had seen her mother and Adam together. Misty murders the journalist, Jessica, with a poisoned cigarette, and Natalie gets kidnapped by people wearing cozy sweaters as she receives a call that Lottie wiped Travis' bank account. In a shocking final twist, Taissa wins the election in an upset and it looks like she might have had some supernatural help. As Taissa grins in victory, her wife finds a shrine with the head and bloody remains of their missing dog under their home.
Back in the forest, we get a tease that Lottie may well be the cannibal leader as she takes her believers into the woods, presents a bear heart — from the creature she killed earlier for the girls to eat — and uses its heart in an offering to the wilderness. As they conduct their ritual, Lottie says the final line of the season, the very cult-y phrase "Now let the darkness set us free."
And take a deep breath, you're going to need it when Yellowjackets Season 2 hits on March 24.
Rosie Knight is a contributing freelancer for IGN covering everything from anime to comic books to kaiju to kids movies to horror flicks. She has over half a decade of experience in entertainment journalism with bylines at Nerdist, Den of Geek, Polygon, and more.
