WhenYellowjacketsfirst premiered on Showtime in 2021, there was no indication that it would eventually spark the level of buzz it has among viewers and critics alike. From dissecting each and every compelling episode to discussing every type of theory under the sun, audiences were eager to dive into the mysteries surrounding the 1996 plane crash that strands a girls' soccer team in the Canadian wilderness. At the same time, 25 years later, the survivors of that plane crash are all grown up, but the mysteries just happen to look a little different for them — including the wrong kind of people sniffing around some of their deepest, darkest secrets. It’s no surprise, then, that show was quickly renewed for both a second and third season, with Season 2 set to premiere later this week. With the return ofYellowjacketsalmost upon us, you might need a bit of a refresher on everything that happened back in Season 1, so read on!
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The Plane Crash That Changes Everything
In 1996, soccer team captain Jackie Taylor (Ella Purnell) and Shauna Shipman (Sophie Nélisse) are best friends in their senior year of high school. Jackie suggests Shauna should get with her boyfriend Jeff’s repulsive friend Randy, to which Shauna takes offense. After the party, Jeff drives the two girls home, dropping Jackie off first. Jeff and Shauna then have sex in his car. The next day, the girls board a private plane for nationals, paid for by the wealthy father of their teammate Lottie Matthews (Courtney Eaton). They’re joined by several of the other members of the Yellowjackets, as well as team manager Misty Quigley (Samantha Hanratty), Coach Ben (Steven Krueger), Coach Bill Martinez, and Bill’s two sons Travis (Kevin Alves) and Javi (Luciano Leroux). The plane flies over the Canadian Rockies and suddenly crashes into the wilderness. Misty bursts into action, finding Coach Ben with his leg trapped under debris. She amputates his disfigured leg herself. Coach Bill is found to have died during the crash, leaving his sons Travis and Javi alone with the surviving girls. Misty also takes charge of the survivors, having them collect all their resources. At the campfire that night, she overhears the girls admitting how screwed they’d be without her, and, pleased to no longer be made fun of, she destroys the plane’s black box, prolonging her fantasy of being the popular one.
Tensions are running high as the group is forced to ration scarce food and water, so they write an S.O.S. message on the side of the wreckage and head down to the lake. There, Lottie spots a reflection in the mountains and upon investigation, the team finds an abandoned log cabin. They make camp there, but Lottie (having run out of medication for her undisclosed condition) says she has a bad feeling about it. Sure enough, Lottie then finds a rotten corpse in the attic. They bury it the next day, but it doesn’t appease Lottie much. The girls decide to perform a séance in the attic after hearing noises from above despite burying the man’s body. Out of nowhere, Lottie starts screaming and the window smashes.
The girls later find a small abandoned plane in the woods, overgrown with foliage. They deduce this plane must have belonged to the man in the cabin, to which Lottie murmurs “it didn’t want him to leave.” She also finds a strange carving on a tree in the woods. Lottie is revealed to have a history of seeing visions, even preventing her parents from being involved in a fatal car crash during her youth. Fearing her hallucinations are proof she’s crazy, Lottie confides in the religious Laura Lee (Jane Widdop), who tells her that visions are messages from God.
The Survivors Begin Hooking Up
A positive development from finding the cabin is the discovery of a gun. Coach Ben helps the camp practice shooting, although the two who are strongest with the rifle are Travis and Natalie Scatorccio (Sophie Thatcher). This triggers flashbacks for Natalie, however, who is revealed to have threatened her abusive father with a gun before he accidentally shot himself with it. Natalie and Travis bond over hunting, developing a relationship. The camp becomes hungry, which Jackie blames on the fact that Natalie and Travis are spending their hunting trips making out. Travis and Natalie aren’t the only ones hooking up, though; teammates Taissa Turner (Jasmin Savoy Brown) and Vanessa “Van” Palmer (Liv Hewson) secretly are too.
Meanwhile, Misty goes to wake Coach Ben, transfixed by his morning wood. Ben wakes up and yells at Misty for crossing the line. Later, Ben projectile vomits from the tea given to him by Misty. He is furious with her, insistent that she’s exhibiting Munchausen’s Syndrome to keep him under her care. She professes her feelings for him, and he decides to lie to her that he feels the same way, but that as his teacher, he can’t allow anything to develop. This appeases Misty enough to back off slightly. Ben later confides in Natalie that he’s gay. Later on, the girls' menstrual cycles have synced up, and it’s their time of the month. The only girl who isn’t experiencing her period, however, is Shauna, who is pregnant with Jeff’s baby, so fakes her period using deer’s blood. Taissa witnesses this and assures Shauna that she will keep her pregnancy a secret. Later, Taissa finds that the wire is missing from Shauna’s bra and rushes to stop her from performing an abortion on herself.
The Survivors Split Into Two Groups
Taissa sets out to venture south with a group consisting of Van, Misty, Mari (Alexa Barajas), and Akilah (played byKeeyah King, butannounced to be recast for Season 2 withNia Sondaya). Lottie warns Van of her dream in which they encounter red smoke and a river of blood. Sure enough, they come upon a red creek too toxic to drink. Afraid of wolves, the camp sleeps while skeptic Taissa offers to keep watch. Next thing she knows, she awakes high up in a tree with a flare gun. Rushing back to the ground, she finds the girls defending themselves from wolves. Van, however, is being brutally attacked and after firing a flare at the wolves, Taissa finds that Van’s face has been horribly mutilated. The group return to the cabin where Van’s face gets stitched up.
After being confronted by Jackie for being emotionally distant, Shauna reluctantly admits to being pregnant but tells her it’s Randy’s. Jackie later finds Shauna’s journal though and discovers that the baby is really Jeff’s. Jealous, Jackie sets her sights on Travis, stirring the pot by telling him about Natalie’s previous sexual experiences. Travis and Natalie subsequently break up and Jackie makes an enemy of Natalie. Meanwhile, Jackie pressures Shauna to announce her pregnancy to the group. Between this and Van’s injuries, Laura Lee decides to put her plane manual reading to the test and fly away to find help. She takes off successfully, but a fire mysteriously appears inside, and the plane explodes over the lake with Laura Lee inside.
In the aftermath of Laura Lee’s death, Mari reveals she has a jar of poison berries that have fermented into booze. They agree to cheer themselves up by throwing a Homecoming substitute, “Doomscoming.” Van is self-conscious about her face so Taissa makes matching masks for them both, and they openly reveal their relationship during the dance. Misty plans on drugging Ben with some magic mushrooms she’s been keeping under wraps. When Mari finds the mushrooms, she thoughtlessly includes them in the stew.
The Camp Gets High on Mushrooms
While high on the stew, the girls become animalistic. Natalie has a moment of clarity and decides to make amends with Travis, only to find that a sober Jackie has just taken his virginity. When word gets back to the camp that Jackie “took something that doesn’t belong to her,” they all begin taking turns touching Travis' body. It’s a teenage boy’s dream until the mushrooms take hold, and he sees just how demonic and cannibalistic these girls' actions really seem. Shauna seemingly readies to kill Travis, until eventually, he is rescued by Natalie. Javi, meanwhile, runs away terrified.
The next morning, everyone turns on each other. The bickering then stops when a bear appears. It’s uncharacteristically calm and walks up to Lottie before lying down. Lottie grabs a knife and stabs it in the head, killing it. The camp is shocked albeit thrilled that they finally have food. Travis and Natalie go out in search of Javi, and despite not finding him, they reconcile when Travis tells Natalie he loves her.
Later, at dinner, Van suggests they say a prayer of thanks for whatever provided them with a self-sacrificial bear. The room all agrees, except for Jackie who has had enough. She asks if that’s who they are now — “people who howl at the moon and have orgies?” Shauna urges Jackie to calm down but Jackie snaps, telling everyone that Shauna is having Jeff’s baby and that she’s leaving. She goes to sleep outside. Shauna considers going out to retrieve her but decides against it. The next morning, however, the camp is covered in snow, and Jackie has frozen to death outside. Unfazed by this, Lottie takes the bear’s heart and, along with Van and Misty, places it in a hollow tree stump, ceremoniously stating, “let the darkness set us free.”
Where the 2021 Story Begins
Reporter Jessica Roberts (Rekha Sharma) approaches a middle-aged Shauna (Melanie Lynskey) at her house. She offers Shauna a book deal in exchange for her side of the story regarding the mysterious and heavily speculated 19 months the girls spent in the wilderness. Shauna tells her where to stick it, stating she doesn’t keep in touch with the other survivors. Shauna is now married to Jeff (Warren Kole) and the two have a teenage daughter, Callie (Sarah Desjardins). In a safe, Shauna keeps her journals from her time in the wild, and contact information for the other survivors.
Taissa (Tawny Cypress) is running for Senator of New Jersey, married to Simone (Rukiya Bernard) with a son named Sammy (Aiden Stoxx). Shauna warns Taissa about Jessica, worried her campaign is what triggered Jessica’s investigation. Taissa is also taking care of Natalie (Juliette Lewis) by paying for the rehab she was just discharged from. Natalie pays a visit to Misty (Christina Ricci) asking why she received a Rockies postcard with the mysterious symbol from the woods drawn on the back. Misty didn’t send it, though. In fact, she received one herself.
Misty and Natalie begin investigating the issue, having found the reclusive Travis' driver’s license and phone number. They run into Natalie’s best friend from before the crash, Kevin (Alex Wyndham), who is now a detective. He is interested in catching up with Natalie, but she is reluctant. The next day, Misty and Natalie go visit Travis. They break into Travis' house, but a cop arrests them for trespassing. Misty calls Kevin, pretending to be Natalie, and the two are bailed out. They then go to Travis' place of work only to find him dead, hanging from the ceiling with a note that reads, “tell Natalie she was right.”
It turns out that Jessica Roberts is working for Taissa, checking for any potential leaks from the other survivors. Simone feels that Taissa’s campaign is distracting her from family issues like Sammy’s odd behavior. Sammy has been sticking disturbing drawings on his window “so the woman in the tree can’t see” him when she “watches” him at night. Later, the word “SPILL” appears painted on Taissa’s front door. When she finds matching paint under Sammy’s bed, she scolds him, but he says the woman in the tree did it.
Shauna Begins an Affair
Shauna gets in a fender bender with a man named Adam (Peter Gadiot). She later finds Jeff’s phone has a message from someone named Bianca, which implies Jeff is having an affair. She follows him to a hotel, hoping to catch him in the act, only for Adam to appear, claiming to frequent the hotel’s bar. When she finally sees Jeff leaving the hotel with an attractive blonde, Shauna accepts the situation and gets a hotel room with Adam, starting an affair of her own.
Telling Jeff and Callie that she’s at “book club,” she continues the affair with Adam, joining him at a nightclub on Halloween. While there, she is spotted by her daughter Callie. Disgusted by the affair, Callie suggests that Adam only likes her because of the Yellowjackets interest. Shauna refuses to believe that since Adam claims to have no knowledge of it.
The Survivors Are Being Blackmailed
Natalie goes for dinner with Kevin to thank him for bailing her out. She is convinced Travis was murdered, not suicidal, so Kevin pulls the toxicology reports. Travis was sober when he died, and when Natalie gets her hands on crime scene photos, she works out that candles had been placed at the scene in the shape of the mysterious symbol. Natalie and Taissa then both get texts with the symbol, demanding $50K in cash. They call Shauna to join them, and Shauna tells them she didn’t get a postcard.
Natalie sells her car to get the money. Later, she and Kevin go back to her apartment. That night they get a second text to drop off the money at 2 AM. Natalie takes Kevin’s gun for protection while he sleeps. The text wakes Taissa up from a trance, revealing her to be the woman in the tree outside Sammy’s window, just like the night Van was attacked by wolves. Taissa tells Simone about her trance state episodes, and that she’s afraid she accidentally let their missing dog Biscuit escape. She makes Simone take Sammy and leave, afraid she will hurt them since this hasn’t happened since she was in the wilderness.
Shauna, Taissa, and Natalie place a tracker in the bag of money, and after the drop, they track their blackmailer. He makes a run for it through a clothing store where he falls into some glitter. Natalie fires two shots but they miss. He gets away with the money, ditching the tracker, but they know to look for a man covered in glitter. When Shauna gets home, Adam is there waiting for her. He can’t stop thinking about her and they go inside to sleep together. When Jeff returns home, Adam hides in the closet until he can sneak past Jeff. Meanwhile, Kevin wakes up to find two shots fired from his gun. He is furious at Natalie and they break up.
The Truth About Adam
Shauna calls Adam’s old university, only to find that no such student exists. When she later looks in the closet where Adam hid, she finds glitter. Not only that but her safe, where she keeps her journals, is empty. Shauna then appears at Adam’s apartment and confronts him. While rummaging around his apartment looking for her journals, she finds speculative books and magazines about the Yellowjackets, realizing he’s a fanatic. She grabs a knife, and as Adam walks towards her, Shauna stabs him.
Shauna returns home to lock the knife in her safe but when she opens it, the journals are back. She asks Jeff if he knows anything about it. It turns out Jeff was blackmailing the other women to help keep his company afloat, hence why Shauna never got a postcard. Jeff was never having an affair. Bianca was his loan shark. Shauna is disgusted and tells Jeff about Adam’s murder. Jeff offers to take the blame for Adam’s death and play the part of the jealous husband, but Shauna stops him. Instead, Shauna calls Natalie and Taissa, sticking to the story that Adam was the blackmailer.
Misty joins the girls at Adam’s apartment with cleaning supplies and takes charge of chopping up and disposing of his body. They all do as instructed, and after Shauna mourns her lover, she pulls it together. The four arrive at their high school reunion and all eyes are on them. Later, while awaiting the results of Taissa’s election, Shauna, Jeff, and Callie awkwardly watch as Adam is announced on the news as a missing person. Taissa wins the election, but when Simone returns to the house, she finds that Taissa (in one of her trance episodes) killed their dog. Natalie, having finally accepted that Travis killed himself, is about to take her own life. Suddenly, three people burst in and kidnap her, leaving her phone behind. Meanwhile, Suzie is calling to warn Natalie that someone named Lottie Matthews was the one who emptied Travis' bank account.
