This article contains spoilers.
“Yellowjackets” is back after an almost three-year hiatus for its highly anticipated third season, with new episodes dropping every Friday on Paramount+. The stranded soccer team turned wilderness survivors — and their older, traumatized counterparts — return for another gripping chapter, diving deeper into their twisted past and the chaos of their present.
The third season delivers shocking jump scares, psychological torment and a push to the boundaries of sanity, proving that this series still has plenty of bite.
The season opens in the aftermath of the chaotic end to the second season. In the wilderness timeline, the girls are thriving after a difficult winter. They’ve built shelters after the cabin burned down, and Natalie (Sophie Thatcher) is leading the group. In the present, the remaining Yellowjackets mourn Natalie’s death and try to return to normalcy despite the lingering feeling that the wilderness is still after them.
In the episodes released thus far, the show has pushed the limits of realism further than ever. In Episode 3, viewers are shown three different dream sequences belonging to Shauna (Sophie Nélisse), Akilah (Nia Sondaya) and Van (Liv Hewson) after they’re poisoned by a mysterious gas in a cave they’re lost in.
The dreams are frightening, as each girl slowly faces death by drowning, burning, bleeding from the throat or being swallowed by the earth. The dreams are also unusual, featuring wacky elements like a talking llama or a slap bracelet that deeply cuts the girls, which leaves their meaning up to the audience’s interpretation.
This season delves even deeper into the characters’ identities and how their personalities evolve while in the wilderness. Shauna, the series’ central character, is so far a major focus of the third season, with flashbacks revealing significant information about her. Notably, the show finally confirms Shauna’s sexuality in a climactic moment. After a heated argument with Melissa (Jenna Burgess), the tension unexpectedly escalates into a passionate kiss.
This does not come as a shock to fans, who have speculated this aspect of Shauna’s identity since the early episodes of the first season, in which Shauna has a jealous and seemingly homoerotic friendship with her best friend, Jackie (Ella Purnell).
Despite the new romance and classic thrills of each episode, I have felt lingering annoyance with this season, particularly in the present-day storyline. It feels as though many plot holes are being dug deeper. It’s hard to keep up with numerous lingering questions from each episode. With many still unresolved, I’m impatient for answers.
At points, the show also becomes too far-fetched. As much as I’m hooked to the spiritual, supernatural elements of the wilderness, it has all become a little too impossible. The season introduces a wind that makes a piercing noise and leaves those in the wilderness utterly shaken. Instead of adding to the show’s thrill, these wind sequences just lead me to believe all the characters have truly gone insane.
While I adore some of the bold, cinematic choices that the season has made so far, as the episodes progress, I hope the show solves some of its core mysteries that have been throughlines each season. Five years later, I’m a little tired of unfinished present-day stalker plotlines and the mystery of the identity of the girl killed in a pit and eaten at the beginning of the series’ pilot.
Yet, I still have hope for “Yellowjackets.” I’ve fallen in love with these characters and their dynamics, and each weekly episode has filled my winter with something to look forward to. Despite its flaws, the third season continues to deliver gripping drama, heightened tension and just enough intrigue to keep me coming back for more.
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