‘Yellowjackets’ Season 2 is a Thrilling Descent into Cannibalism, Madness, and More

Yellowjackets Season 2 is exactly what hardcore fans of the show want it to be: a pulpy, propulsive descent into cannibalism, mysticism, and ’90s nostalgia. In the first four episodes of the new season, co-showrunners Ashley Lyle, Bart Nickerson, and Jonathan Lisco have doubled down on everything that made the first season such a decadent treat. Melanie Lynskey once again leads a devastatingly good ensemble cast through scenes of perversion, pitch black humor, and gore. Yellowjackets Season 2 is the rare sophomore effort that not only understands what made viewers obsessed in the first season, but hits those beats harder the second time around.

Showtime‘s Yellowjackets is split between two distinct timelines. The first follows an elite girls’ soccer team after their private flight to Nationals crashes in the wilds of the Pacific Northwest. Left to fend for themselves, the teen girls (along with their closeted gay assistant coach and their deceased head coach’s two sons) find themselves increasingly pulled into the supernatural energy that seems to be either haunting or protecting them. The season ends with the girls rallying around Lottie (Courtney Eaton), the teenager with the strongest link to this magical force. The second timeline looks at a handful of those survivors as they attempt to dodge questions about their past in the present day. At the end of Yellowjackets Season 1, adult Shauna (Melanie Lynskey) mistook her lover for their blackmailer and stabbed him. Newly-elected state senator Taissa (Tawny Cypress), recovering addict Natalie (Juliette Lewis), and squirrelly sidekick Misti (Christina Ricci) helped her dispose of the body. The season ends with Natalie being kidnapped by adult Lottie’s (Simone Kessell) acolytes.

Yes, Yellowjackets Season 2 finally introduces us to adult Lottie. She does indeed run a cultish “collective,” but she’s far less conniving than you’d might expect. We learn that young Lottie struggled the most after their return to civilization and spent years being treated with electroconvulsive therapy in mental hospitals. She claims her followers didn’t kidnap Natalie out of malice, but to save her from dying by suicide in the last scene of Season 1. While adult Lottie graciously inhabits the regal spirit of “cult leader,” teen Lottie is far less confident in her burgeoning position as “Antler Queen.” She seems unhappy when fellow survivors like Mari (Alexa Barajas) hype up her “powers,” and only insists on leading strange rituals to protect the group.

In addition to revealing more about Lottie, Yellowjackets Season 2 also explores the rest of the girls’ descent into mystically-inspired cannibalism. In both timelines, young Taissa (Jasmin Savoy Brown) and her older self are struggling with the alter ego they transform into while sleep-walking. It’s not just that these second selves are responsible for atrocities like slaying the family dog, but they might be even more connected to the mysterious wilderness powers than Lottie is. In the past, a heavily pregnant Shauna (Sophie Nélisse) is hallucinating full on conversations with deceased bestie Jackie (Ella Purnell), while her latter day self is trying to stay ahead of the cops. In an echo of her present day storyline, teenaged Natalie (Sophie Thatcher) refuses to accept Lottie’s ritualistic “help,” to the chagrin of the rest of the group. And young Misty (Sammi Hanratty) finds a friend in humming theatre kid Crystal (Nuha Jes Izman) just as her older self teams up with a citizen detective played with giddy aplomb by yet another iconic ’90s face, Elijah Wood.

One of the best things about Yellowjackets Season 2 is it wastes no time getting down to business. Rather than rehash played out relationships or stretch the story for time, Lyle, Nickerson, and Lisco cut to the chase, revealing both adult Lottie and the girls’ first act of cannibalism early in the season. (Warning: Lauren Ambrose’s adult Van doesn’t show up until mid-season, but she’s extremely worth the wait.) Even better, because the pacing is so brisk, the characters quickly fall into both the terrifying and hilarious rhythms that are the show’s hallmark. You will laugh watching Yellowjackets Season 2 as much as you will flinch.

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Yellowjackets Season 2 also continues the first season’s obsession of what it meant to some of us to come of age in the ’90s. I’ve discovered this disturbing trend on dating apps lately where college-aged guys and men skirting ever closer to retirement age alike tag “’90s Kid” in their “hobbies” section. I don’t know what these guys mean by that, but I know that Yellowjackets is a “’90s Kid.” Garbage, Tori Amos, and The Breeders appropriately dominate this season’s needledrops and the show’s very cast — Ricci! Lewis! Lynskey! Ambrose! Wood!!! — is a testament to the hold that decade still has on elder millennials and younger Gen Xers.

Speaking of the cast, Melanie Lynskey once again dazzles as the older Shauna Sadecki, a woman who uses her suburban housewife aesthetic to mask her genius for violence. Christina Ricci’s Misty is pushed out of her comfort zone by Wood’s Walter. What seems to unnerve Misty is the idea that she might have finally met her match! Tawny Cypress excels playing an unravelling Taissa while Juliette Lewis gets to show off Natalie’s deep levels of empathy when she gets closer to one of Lottie’s young followers. The younger cast continues to exquisitely mirror their older counterparts all while believably selling their descent into depravity.

If Yellowjackets Season 1 was your jam, then you are going to devour Season 2 with gusto. Yellowjackets Season 2 has all the ingredients that made the first season a cult favorite plus actual cults.

Yellowjackets Season 2 premieres on Showtime on Sunday, March 26.