Uhhh Head’s Up, The ‘Yellowjackets’ May Be Closer To Getting Rescued Than We Think
They've (almost) made it through the wilderness.
If you’ve been keeping track of the wilderness timeline on Yellowjackets you may have noticed that there is once again a chill in the air. Winter is coming back on Yellowjackets Season 3, which is both a bad and a good thing for the intrepid tribe of survivors.
We know that the gals and guys of Yellowjackets spent two winters in the wilderness before they were rescued. They were stranded for 19 months total, between 1996 and 1998. The confirmed survivors include, but may not be limited to: Shauna, Taissa, Misty, Natalie, Lottie, Van, and Travis. And we know that the second winter is when they fully evolved into a cannibal tribe hunting and feasting on each other. The first two seasons of Yellowjackets detailed the events of their first 6-8 months on their own.
But then, to my surprise, Season 3 began with a a time jump to just after their one-year anniversary. And there are a few shots in the Season 3 trailer of the girls (and maybe Travis) running through the woods in their hand-made furs coats. That second winter–and rescue–is coming. I think it’s time for us to start paying attention to the flashback timeline as things ramp up and time *gulp* runs out. Here’s what we know so far about the key wilderness events over those nineteen months.
Spoilers ahead, obviously, for every episode of Yellowjackets that has aired so far.
Spring/Summer 1996: Flight 2525 Crashes
- The Yellowjackets team goes down in Canada on the way to nationals.
- Travis and Javi’s dad, the flight crew, and a girl named Rachel die in the crash.
- Misty destroys the plane’s transmitter.
- The survivors find a cabin further in the woods for shelter.
- Van survives a wolf attack while trying to find help/civilization.
- Shauna discovers that she is pregnant.
- Laura Lee dies trying to fly a prop plane to safety.
Season 1’s flashbacks took place in the warmer months of 1996. This was lucky for the initial survivors, in a way, because it gave them some time to adjust to living in the woods before the temperature dropped and the food supply started to dwindle. However, that does not mean that everything was sunshine and roses. The team (plus Travis, Misty, and Coach Ben) suffer losses and begin to lose their grip on reality. And their once leader, Jackie, fails to adjust to wilderness living at all with disastrous consequences.
Fall 1996: “Doomcoming”
- Misty accidentally drugs everyone but Jackie during an alternative Homecoming dance.
- Jackie freezes to death at the first snowfall.
- A bear offers itself to Lottie and she becomes the leader.
- Travis’ little brother Javi runs away.
Season 1 ends with Jackie’s chilling death and the arrival of the bear. There is a hint of what’s to come as Lottie kills the bear and with her acolytes place the its heart in an alter as an offering. But they’re not there yet, and they have over 12 months in the wilderness to go.
Winter 1996/1997: The Belt Soup Era
- Natalie finds a moose frozen in the lake.
- Crystal falls to her death thanks to Misty.
- Shauna gives birth to a stillborn baby.
- Javi returns from the caves.
- The girls do their first “draw” and the wilderness chooses Nat.
- Javi drowns & the survivors eat him.
- Coach Ben runs away to the caves.
- The girls crown Natalie as their Antler Queen leader.
- The cabin mysteriously burns down.
The second season takes place over the course of that first winter. Even after eating the bear, Jackie’s corpse, and a small flock of birds, the remaining survivors struggle to stay nourished. They boil leather belts for protein. The ritual that they will ultimately employ to choose human sacrifices by drawing playing cards starts as a chore wheel. Eventually they decide that the Queen of Hearts card denotes who “it” has chosen to die. By allowing Javi’s death to take the place of Natalie when she draws the queen, they’re immediately fudging their own rules. But they still have just under a year to go. When the cabin burns at the end of Season 2, that’s an indication that things are about to get a little more desperate.
Spring/Summer 1997: The Tent Era
- Under Nat’s leadership, the girls build shelters and feed themselves without killing each other.
- Lottie has lost her connection to the wilderness and pushes Travis and Akilah in her stead.
- Mari runs off and falls into a pit trap set up by Coach Ben. He holds her hostage.
- Melissa and Shauna start hooking up.
The first half of Season 3 represents another time of relative peace for the survivors. The first episode, “It Girl,” features a summer solstice party – that’s June. That means that just over one year has passed since the crash. Seven-ish months to go.
Fall 1997: The Trial of Coach Ben
- Mari tells the others where Coach Ben has been hiding.
- Still thinking that he set the cabin on fire, they capture him and try him for attempted murder.
- The young survivors discover that gas in the caves makes you hallucinate.
By the time Coach Ben returns to the group, the girls have already started layering up. That indicates to me that summer has come to a close and that his “trial” takes place in late August or early September. But we may be in for another time jump. Season 3, Episode 6 is titled “Thanksgiving (Canada)” a.k.a. the second Monday in October.
There’s a slight possibility that this is referring to the Jersey girls in their present day, adult timeline. However, given that the wilderness is in Canada, I think the implication here is clear. In 1997, Canadian Thanksgiving was October 13. Something tells me they won’t be eating turkey.
Most importantly, that means that by the middle of Season 3 the survivors only have two or three months left in the wilderness. Presumably a lot of characters are going to die, unless there are half a dozen survivors we don’t know about. It seems like things are going to go downhill soon and fast.
Winter 1997/1998: The “Pit Girl” Era
- An unidentified young woman runs through the woods in a white slip dress and Jackie’s heart necklace. She falls into pit covered in spikes and dies. The fur-clad remaining survivors, with ritualistic precision, immediately drain and consume her body.
- The survivors are rescued and re-integrate into society.
- Lottie’s parents check her in to a mental institution where she receives electroshock therapy.
This is what we have to look forward to, as seen in the Season 1 and Season 2 premieres. Are we going to get a whole season, or more, about how they girls were deprogrammed? Will they catch Titanic in theaters and FTFO when Jack Dawson dies just like Jackie and Javi?
I’ve long assumed that the flashbacks are eventually going to tell us the story of what happened to the surviving teenagers when they re-integrated into society… but is it really already almost time? Please, please tell me that the five season plan for this show is still on track! I’m not ready to say goodbye.
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