Warning: This review contains spoilers!
Following two highly-successful seasons, with season one rated a perfect 100% on Rotten Tomatoes and season two trailing close behind with 94%, “Yellowjackets” (2021-present) returned with a third season that is bolder, darker and more psychologically haunting than ever before. Premiering on Feb. 14 and concluding on April 11, the latest season continues to push boundaries, solidifying the show as one of television’s most daring thriller-dramas.
The series follows a high school girls’ soccer team and their coaches after a plane crash that left them stranded in the Canadian wilderness. Cut off from the outside world, the survivors descended into a harrowing fight for survival, spiraling into delusions, cannibalism and violence. Interwoven with flashbacks of the wilderness brutalities is a timeline set 25 years later, where the few survivors grapple with lasting psychological trauma and the fear that the secrets they left behind may finally come to light.
The show began with 18 girls on the soccer team, along with their coaches, Ben Scott (Steven Krueger) and Bill Martinez (Carlos Sanz), and Bill’s teenage sons, Javi Martinez (Luciano Leroux) and Travis Martinez (Kevin Alvez). Now, at the end of season three, only 12 survivors remain in the teen timeline, leaving the audience to wonder which four survivors won’t make it to the adult timeline, where only eight survivors remain.
The teen timeline of the season three premiere, “It Girl,” begins in early spring, placing the Yellowjackets in a new environment after the cliffhanger from season two, when the cabin they found and made their home was destroyed by fire. This setting sharply contrasts with previous seasons: season one captured their descent into chaos during the summer and fall, while season two depicted brutal starvation and their first desperate encounter with cannibalism, following the deaths of Jackie Taylor (Ella Purnell) and Javi.
In the months since the previous season’s finale, the teen Yellowjackets have settled into a grim routine. They’ve created makeshift tents from materials found in the wilderness, gathered farm animals in preparation for the winter and established a hierarchy, with team members-turned-leaders Natalie Scatorccio (Sophie Thatcher) and Taissa Turner (Jasmin Savoy Brown) regularly holding group meetings to assess their situation and talk about a plan for rescue.
As the season unfolds, the teens become increasingly determined to uncover the mystery behind the burning of their cabin, with all signs pointing to Coach Ben. Traumatized by the acts he witnessed throughout the group’s time in the wilderness in the previous seasons, Ben has withdrawn from the group, and his increasing isolation only deepens their suspicions.
Though Ben steadfastly maintains his innocence, the girls decide to put him on trial in episode four, “12 Angry Girls and 1 Drunk Travis,” determined to uncover the truth. As tensions rise, Shauna (Sophie Nélisse) emerges as a driving force behind the push to convict him. But, whether she genuinely believes he set the fire remains ambiguous. Her accusations seem rooted less in evidence and more in buried resentment. In a raw and revealing moment, she recalls her traumatic labor in season two, after becoming pregnant prior to the plane crash: “He just left me. I was bleeding and in so much pain, so Natalie went to get him. And he just looked at me and said ‘all I did was press play on a VHS tape’ and then went back to his room.”
Shauna’s emotional outburst during the trial offers a rare glimpse beneath her usually hardened exterior, revealing just how deeply the trauma of childbirth and the devastating loss of her baby continues to haunt her. Until this moment, much of her pain from this loss was buried under layers of defiance and anger, but her words about Ben’s abandonment show that this wound has not had a chance to heal. It’s not just survival that has hardened Shauna, it’s grief, abandonment and the unbearable memory of holding her child in her arms, only to lose him.
The girls ultimately find Ben guilty, though the verdict appears driven more by Shauna’s manipulation than any real evidence. Deciding to hold him hostage at their camp, Melissa (Jenna Burgess), following Shauna’s lead, savagely cuts Ben’s Achilles tendon to ensure he can’t escape. This represents a moment that underscores the terrifying transformation of the group: once survivors, now captors, ruled by fear and a crumbling grip on reality.
In one of the most gut-wrenching and complex arcs of the season, Ben, wounded, exhausted and stripped of all dignity, begs Natalie to kill him during her visits to his makeshift prison, desperate for any release from his torment. Her initial refusal is one of the few glimmers of humanity still flickering within the darkness of the group’s descent. It shows that, despite everything they’ve done and endured, a part of Natalie still remembers who they used to be, and who they could be again, if they ever make it home.
Natalie eventually makes the agonizing decision to mercy kill him in episode six, “Thanksgiving (Canada),” marking one of Thatcher’s most compelling and emotionally-charged performances of the series yet. It’s a devastating act of compassion in a world that has slowly eroded all traces of their humanity, and her portrayal of this raw and heart-breaking moment stands as one of the most emotionally resonant in the entire series.
Enraged by Natalie’s decision to end Ben’s life, the group turns on her, casting her out and rallying behind Shauna as their new leader, a move that marks yet another step in their unraveling descent into madness. Shauna decides to have the Yellowjackets feast on Ben’s body, yet another harrowing testament to how far the girls have spiraled into moral decay. But just as they descend into this horrifying act, a group of scientists stumbles upon them amid their feast, delivering the first real glimmer of outside contact since their plane crash.
What could have been a moment of rescue quickly turns into chaos as the scientists come across Ben’s severed head. Lottie (Courtney Eaton), whose untreated schizophrenia has quickly worsened in the wilderness, swings an axe into one of the scientists’ heads, claiming that the wilderness does not want them there.
In a rare moment of hope, Natalie urges the others to bring the remaining scientists back to camp, hoping they would be able to be rescued at this point. But that hope quickly fades as Shauna, Lottie and Taissa refuse to leave, convinced they no longer belong in the outside world. While the three only make up a quarter of the remaining twelve survivors in the wilderness, their influence on the group is profound — their rescue hinges on their willingness to cooperate and come together as a group.
All of this buildup and resentment toward Shauna for her negative influence on the group and her insistence on remaining in the wilderness culminate in the final episode of the season, “Full Circle.” The animals the group collected in order to survive the brutal winter have mysteriously all died, causing Shauna and Lottie to propose a new hunt: whoever draws the Queen card will be hunted and eaten.
But paranoia derails their plan as Shauna, convinced the others are deliberately setting her up to draw the Queen card, abruptly switches spots at the last moment, altering the course of the draw. Instead of Shauna, Mari (Alexa Barajas), who has violently clashed with Shauna all season, draws the Queen. The result is chaos: Mari runs from the group, causing Shauna to chase her throughout the woods. In her desperate attempt to escape Shauna, Mari falls into the spiked pit constructed by Travis earlier in the season, instantly killing her.
This event truly does make the episode full circle, as the audience finally gets the long-awaited reveal of the infamous “pit girl,” a mystery that has loomed since the chilling cold open of the 2021 pilot showed a dark-haired girl in a white nightgown savagely chased through the snow.
The teen timeline continues to remain riveting as ever, serving as the emotional and narrative backbone of the show. The writers’ deliberate, slow-burn storytelling immerses viewers in the harrowing day-to-day survival of the girls, allowing tension and dread to simmer just beneath the surface.
However, the adult storyline continues to feel markedly less compelling than its teenage counterpart: more inconsequential, more disjointed. The remaining survivors are coping with the sudden, accidental death of Natalie (played by Juliette Lewis in the adult timeline), who was fatally injected with phenobarbital by Misty Quigley (played by Christina Ricci in the adult timeline) in season two’s finale during a misguided attempt to protect her. Though unintended, the loss marks a pivotal shift for Misty, deeply impacting her and altering her character’s trajectory throughout the season.
Natalie and Misty have had a complex relationship throughout the show, which is developed much more throughout the adult timelines of the first two seasons. At first, their bond could be chalked up to convenience: Natalie was the only one who gave Misty the time of day, and her investigation into the death of Travis gave Misty a chance to feel useful with her Citizen Detective skills. But as the series unfolds, it becomes increasingly clear that Misty is willing to risk almost anything for Natalie. This loyalty likely stems from the fact that Natalie protected Misty’s secret, where she sabotaged the plane’s transponder in the pilot episode, effectively sealing their fate in the wilderness and eliminating any hope of rescue.
The first few episodes of the newest season explore Misty’s grief over Natalie’s death, which reveals itself through her complete immersion into Natalie’s persona and behaviors. She begins wearing Natalie’s iconic black leather jacket, and her coping mechanisms blur the line between tribute and identity crisis as she begins to mirror Natalie’s previous actions, downing straight shots of whiskey and picking fights in dive bars, desperate to keep some part of Natalie’s memory alive.
However, with Natalie’s death at the end of season two, the storyline loses one of its emotional anchors that has been present since the first episode, and her absence leaves a void that the show has yet to adequately address. Rather than serving as a catalyst to the adult timeline’s emotional development, her death is quickly acknowledged only in the premiere before being forgotten, with only Misty shown expressing genuine grief. This rushed handling diminishes the impact of what should have been a devastating loss and instead raises concerns about the show’s narrative direction without one of its most nuanced and beloved characters.
Additionally, the show’s choice to add an eighth survivor, Melissa (played by Hilary Swank in the adult timeline), only adds more confusion to the direction they’re taking the adult timeline. Previously a background character with no significance, until her relationship with Shauna began this season during the teen timeline, Melissa is suddenly thrust into the spotlight of the second half of the third season, taking up space once occupied by central survivors like Lottie (played by Simone Kessell in the adult timeline) and Van (played by Lauren Ambrose in the adult timeline), both of whom are unnecessarily killed off during the season.
The decision to give Melissa such a vast storyline while eliminating characters that have been built up and carefully developed since the first season feels unearned. Instead of enriching the story, it further fractures an adult timeline already struggling to find cohesion. Developing Van and Taissa (played by Tawny Cypress in the adult timeline)’s reconciliation and relationship so thoroughly in the adult timeline before killing her off feels like a squandered opportunity to showcase a successful, satisfying queer relationship on television.
Van’s final scene, in which she watches her own death unfold on a screen and incredulously laughs, saying “What? I died? That’s it?” feels like an ironic commentary on the show’s handling of her arc. Even Van appears disappointed by how her story ends, despite everything she has endured over the past 25 years.
Additionally, the show raises more questions than it answers during the adult timeline: Why is Taissa’s impeachment merely mentioned in passing, especially after so much focus in the adult timeline was placed on her Senate race in the first season? Why didn’t the series focus on the details of her downfall, her separation from her wife or estrangement from her son?
The series consists of a strong cast across both timelines, delivering suspenseful and intriguing storytelling that keeps the show gripping and binge-worthy. However, while the teen timeline thrives, it’s clear that the show is struggling to find a clear direction for its adult characters. Hopefully, if the show is renewed for a fourth season, we’ll see more development from Melissa and uncover some long-awaited answers about what happened to the girls after their rescue.
While season three wasn’t without its flaws, it still sets up an exciting foundation for what’s to come with the remaining adult characters. Here’s hoping for a season four renewal and that “Yellowjackets” avoids the common fate of streaming shows with diverse, queer characters being unfairly cancelled too soon.
Final Score: 7.5/10.
