In the chaos of Winter Storm Benjamin, many hopeful college students at the University of Connecticut may have been disappointed but unsurprised to see that most local businesses closed DoorDash delivery for a few days — myself included. Amid a wintery landscape and facing the necessity of plunging into the storm towards the nearest dining hall, my mind turned to a different set of student survivors: the Yellowjackets.
Welcome back to the Modern Monster, a biweekly column about everything horror, including its history and the way it’s written. This time around, we’re discussing one of my favorite television shows of all time and the clever ways it fills a narrative with ghosts.
“Yellowjackets” is the fictional story of a high school girls soccer team in the ‘90s. After their plane crashed into the Canadian wilderness on the way to that year’s national competition, the girls are forced to survive by — you guessed it! — eating each other. To make matters worse, it seems there’s some mysterious entity in the forest granting them visions and forcing them to stay trapped.
The first two seasons of “Yellowjackets” are available to stream on Netflix, and all three are on Paramount Plus. This is your last chance to start your next binge session, because spoilers start now!
“Yellowjackets” is one of the best pieces of media you’ll find today that can haunt a narrative. The idea of “haunting the narrative” isn’t a new one. “The Picture of Dorian Gray” by Oscar Wilde is an excellent example — after Dorian kills the artist Basil Hallward, Basil’s work (the picture) begins to haunt him. All Dorian can think about is the portrait Basil made of him, especially since killing Basil can be seen as Dorian’s “point of no return.” He’scommitted a great sin, and there’s no going back.
“Going back” is a central theme of “Yellowjackets.” The teenage girls in the woods are, of course, incredibly fixated on finding a way to return home. In season one, this hope manifests in Laura Lee (Jane Widdop), a very religiousgirl with a basic understanding of planes. When the girls find an old plane in the woods and a flight manual, Laura Lee makes it her mission to fly out of the wilderness and fetch help for the team.
Laura Lee is one of the most fascinating characters of “Yellowjackets.” She is the only character shown to have a strong relationship with God, and she’s doubtlessly one of the more moral characters in the show. Interestingly enough, while her faith is placed in God, the faith of the Yellowjackets is within Laura Lee. She is all of their hopes made human.
Unfortunately for the Yellowjackets and fortunately for fans who wanted more seasons, Laura Lee’s plane catches on fire and explodes during her flight, killing her and any hope of rescue.
Laura Lee becomes the show’s literal Basil Hallward — with her death, the Yellowjackets literally cannot return home, and hope naturally dies alongside her. For the rest of the show, any atrocity committed and any suffering experienced is directly the result of Laura Lee’s death. It becomes impossible to forget the girl in the plane.
Any “Yellowjackets” fans currently reading know that I’m dancing around a much angrier ghost: Jackie Taylor, portrayed by Ella Purnell.
As captain of the soccer team, Jackie is the emotional regulator for the Yellowjackets while they’re still in their home state of New Jersey. She not only leads the team but also solves conflicts and builds bridges between the girls. If they ever made it to nationals, she likely would’ve been a major tipping point in their success.
Within the wilderness, Jackie is unfortunately outmatched. She struggles to adapt to the wild in the same way her teammates have, and eventually her own turmoil and depression over the situation leads to her shirking important duties. Jackie and her best friend Shauna (Sophie Nélisse) have a major blowout fight, and Jackie decides to sleep outside of the cabin the group had found. Unfortunately, a blizzard arrives in the night, and Jackie freezes to death.
Much like Laura Lee and Basil Hallward before her, Jackie and her death symbolize a point of no return. However, instead of a loss of hope or a loss of redemption, Jackie symbolizes a loss of sanity.
The Yellowjackets’ decision to let Jackie sleep outside is the very first step they take down the road of inevitable cannibalism — foreshadowed in the pilot. It’s the closest thing they’ve committed to a murder, and it’s a stain they won’t be able to wash off their hands.
A unique aspect of “Yellowjackets” is its usage of timelines — the teen girls are one timeline, and the show swaps between them and a timeline 30 years in the future, featuring the survivors. This includes Shauna, whose adult counterpart is played by Melanie Lynskey.
For the entirety of the show, adult Shauna is constantly haunted by Jackie. Jackie can be seen in Shauna’s daughter, the photos in her house and the objects she keeps from her time in the woods. Shauna’s even reminded of Jackie in her own husband, who happens to also be Jackie’s high school boyfriend.
While “Yellowjackets” is some of the best horror on television right now, its strength comes not only from its incredible actors and special effects, but also in its ability to haunt both the characters and the viewers with reminders of the horrors in the woods.