Shauna tries to be queen bee in both timelines, Tai and Other Tai duke it out, and Natalie Scatorccio finds a new way to break our hearts.
Recap
Melissa does in fact eat the piece of her own flesh that Shauna helpfully bit off, but then she one-ups her ex by spitting shreds of skin in her face and making a run for it in her car… which is, as her wife reminded us last week, out of gas.
At the hospital, Van has a vision of her teen self imploring her to embark on a hero’s journey like in The Goonies, so she unhooks herself from the hospital bed and rallies Tai and Misty out the door. On their way to Alex’s house, they run into Melissa, stranded on the side of the road, literally tackling her and dragging her back to her own house, where Shauna is trying to clean up the signs of their fight while neglecting to wipe the blood off her own face first. (I think it’s comforting.) Shauna and Melissa basically state their respective cases to the rest of their former teammates, who don’t appreciate having to clean up another one of Shauna’s messes; and now Melissa knows about Adam, which makes Shauna all but threaten to murder her.
In the Wilderness, Shauna’s pronouncement has predictably split the team into two factions. Tai’s clarification that they should leave at some point, just not right now since they have cannibalism evidence to clean up, doesn’t convince anyone, not when Shauna is stalking around the camp with the rifle and a scowl. So the Yellowjackets settle back in for now: putting Kodi and Hannah (sans shoes) in the animal pen, Nat conferring with Akilah and Gen, Misty trying (unsuccessfully) to play double agent to suck up to Shauna and co.
The Wilderness’ various couples confer over the dubious decision to stay. In the woods, Van begs Tai to change her mind, reminding her that they all blocked out what last winter was like. “We survived,” Tai says with a look in her eyes that indicates Other Tai might be speaking. “We ate a fucking kid,” Van grates out, becuase yes, it bears repeating. In the village, Shauna snaps at Melissa for daring to strike up a rapport with Hannah, which only gets worse when Melissa mentions Hannah’s kid. When Melissa refuses to be cowed like the others, Shauna makes an example of her, shooting a bullet to graze her sleeve and causing her to wet herself. (Ugh, the public humiliation of it all.)
In the present, Misty peels off to meet up with Walter via a helicopter ride to his lavish cabin retreat, where he makes her a chocolate martini and she swipes Lottie’s cloned phone before once again ditching her fellow citizen detective.
Melissa pulls the flue shut so that the house will be filled with carbon monoxide, but it’s unclear whether she intended to incapacitate everyone, herself included, or actually kill them. Van and her oxygen machine save the day, as she heroically drags them out one-by-one, reviving them with the oxygen; in the case of Tai, it finally banishes Other Tai (at least for now) and the real one gets to kiss her beloved before it’s too late. Because then Van cuts Melissa’s bonds so that they can be face-to-face when Van kills her as the latest Wilderness sacrifice. Yet when it comes down to it, she can’t be a cold-blooded killer… but apparently Melissa can! She stabs Van, who confronts her death alongside her teenage self back on the plane just like Nat last season.
Speaking of cold-bloodedness, Nat sneaks a knife to Hannah to cut their bonds at night and escape with them. But her fear at being caught, coupled with paranoia over whether Kodiak is who he says he is, prompts Hannah to stab him through the eye (!) and pretend like he was the mastermind of the escape.
Teen Misty’s antics as double agent between the factions pays off unexpectedly when she spots Van sneaking off to the plane wreckage looking for anything to repair the satellite phone with. Of course, only Misty knows where the transponder (that she destroyed) is; and apparently, the crucial part is left intact. A horrified Nat stumbles upon Misty’s knowledge of the transponder, but Double 0 Quigley is just beaming as she says, “I know how to get us home!”
Commentary
RIP Kodiak, though I’m impressed by Hannah’s quick thinking in aligning herself with the Yellowjackets’ pack after she saw how much he and Shauna clashed. Having watched her buddy up to Melissa makes it clear that this is all manipulation; she establishes herself as an authority, praises the Yellowjackets’ survival tactics as greater than even the horny frogs, and appeals to them as a woman who made it out of adolescence and even has a daughter of her own. As a side note, I don’t think that teen Shauna takes it seriously that Hannah has a kid, but it seems obvious during her conversation with Melissa that she feels some jealousy, at the idea of this interloper gets to be a mother, gets to claim a living child, gets to be regarded as someone not grieving an empty space like Shauna is.
The Yellowjackets have historically not really respected their elders out here, but Hannah’s mix of scientific and sociological perspective is very savvy, playing an older sister or even maternal role with them. While I have my theories that she might be Pit Girl, I’m very curious to see how much she embeds herself into the group before then. Or… could she even become the Antler Queen?!
The confirmation that teen Van has been practicing sleight-of-hand with the cards adds extra weight to her and Tai’s adult selves playing Wilderness hunt games in public. It had definitely seemed as if something were going on when Tai picked the card to shoot Ben, but knowing for sure that Van could decide who to save—and who to hunt and eat—while letting the others absolve themselves by believing it was all entirely random is a gutting revelation. No wonder adult Van has looked so haunted since last season, and seems to be making her peace with death finally claiming her.
Jeff and Callie’s plotline has been a whole lot of sitting around at the motel, this week sharing a joint, but I did notice a new dimension to their interactions in this episode. Putting aside the Joels’ creepy assumption from last week that Jeff was having an affair with a younger woman, there is clearly an odd nostalgia factor in their father/daughter hangouts. Jeff gets to regress to his teen self, unencumbered by marital issues and furniture company competition, in a way that he couldn’t even as a kid when he was embroiled in Jackie and Shauna’s love triangle. Callie is like a younger Shauna (don’t make it weird), but without as much emotional baggage.
What do we think teen Van meant when she said “surviving this was never the reward”—this being the Wilderness? The past season starting with the blackmail and Lottie’s cult? At any rate, Van’s death still falls more on the side of senseless, though Autostraddle’s recap does make a keen point about the fact that poor Van has been in a bit of a Final Destination loop with several near-death experiences since the plane crash.
Melissa murdering Van didn’t really land, not least because of her convoluted wording about the Wilderness. Considering that she never much bought into the rituals, and that she was actively trying to atone for her survivor’s guilt, making a sacrifice just doesn’t carry the same weight for her. If she were worried about one of the Yellowjackets outing her to Alex and their child, she’s just ensured that they’ll blow up her life out of spite. But since she goes on the run, maybe she’s hoping the Wilderness will protect her on the road à la Lottie and the pit.
A bit of a baffling moment, that, but I’m hoping there’s a rational explanation. Like maybe she has tested out this pit before (albeit before the addition of the stakes) and knew how lightly to step. I don’t buy that the Wilderness was protecting her from becoming prey, but I also see how she could lead Travis to reinvest his belief in the supernatural through her.
What do we think Misty saw on Lottie’s cloned phone? Potentially proof that Walter murdered her, as Misty was poking holes in his story and bolted with the phone while he wasn’t looking. Though that also could have been her being so single-minded that she left after she got what she needed.
It tracks that Nat would be the one to know about Misty and the transponder, and that she would carry that secret with her throughout their adult lives. The visual of teen Nat sobbing as the first winter flurries slowly came down was devastating in how it communicated her dread and almost (almost!) dampened my enthusiasm for the next stage of the Yellowjackets’ Wilderness rituals.
Fingers and Ears
- How in the world would Misty recognize Melissa twenty-five years later and without her trusty backwards hat?
- I hope that Jeff’s stoned “ladies who lunch”/“look at this leg” bit was improv, but either way it was delightful.
- Between Van’s Goonies reference and his unhinged phone cameo in The White Lotus, now I want to see Ke Huy Quan get cast next season.
Next week’s season finale teases the hunt we saw in the pilot…!