Yellowjackets season 2 finale spoilers follow
The sight of Yellowjackets carting Javi's cold, blood-less body back to the cabin after their delirious, blood-thirsty hunt will forever be etched in our minds as one of the most horrific Yellowjackets season two moments.
It's somewhere up there with the hunt itself, Shauna's devastating labour and Jackie's ear. Definitely a top contender.
What will his death mean for the group in the past, and how will the present-day survivors escape the Adam Martin mess?
Let's tuck into the season two ending like a bunch of Yellowjackets sitting down to a Javi feast.
Too soon?
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Yellowjackets season 2 ending explained - what happened to the younger Yellowjackets?
Travis (Kevin Alves) is surprisingly chilled about his brother's fate. Well, not chilled so much as he's brought into the whole wilderness thing, is famished beyond reason and is also grateful to see Nat (Sophie Thatcher) alive and so accepts the 'wilderness chose' line with grief and anguish but also fatigue.
He's too tired and hungry and heartbroken to fight over it. So, after Travis tells Van (Liv Hewson) they should be ashamed of their actions and Van explains the realities — that they are both glad to be alive and he should let Javi (Luciano Leroux) save him — he does just that. He reaches a place of acceptance.
Do you know who's not super chill about Javi's death? Coach Ben (Steven Krueger).
He returns back from finding the secret underground hideaway, spacious enough for just two, and is horrified. He had intended to take Nat away from all problematic wilderness ideologies in the cabin. Ben thought of Nat as the only reasonably minded one left, and now he hears she feels she's worse than the rest of them.
"I let [Javi] die in my place," she explains. "It was supposed to be. You're a good person, Coach. You really don't belong in this place."
Well, he's not about to argue with that, as he's never seen with the group again.
Travis is the first to eat the Javi meat, which gives the rest permission to follow suit. Starving, they eagerly throw hunks of flesh onto the fire and wait their turn.
With their bellies full, they are ready for stories. How sweet, in a dark and twisty way.
Van starts to tell the tale of the wilderness when Lottie (Courtney Eaton) interrupts. She tells the group that she can't hear the wilderness and that it has chosen a new leader for them all — one who can help them survive for the rest of the time they're out here: Nat.
It doesn't take much for the girls to switch allegiances. After all, they're desperate for guidance, and Lottie has all but given up.
Nat is swift to embrace her new role, which may have something to do with her deep insecurities due to her outsider status pre-plane crash. Who knows? Either way, she's tentatively loving the adoration.
Coach Ben watches the 'wilderness' selection' from afar and is quite clearly rattled.
Well, it seems the joke's on Nat because the wilderness has thrown her a massive curveball on her first night as group leader. Almost immediately after accepting her new position, she's tasked with finding the Yellowjackets a new home. Because as they slept, someone — and we're not pointing fingers (*cough* Coach Ben) — fit their shack on fire.
Everyone made it out unscathed — barely — but a mixture of cold and the lack of food is about to turn these desperate teens into savages.
We have a feeling whoever was responsible for locking them in the cabin and setting it ablaze will be the first on their sacrificial list.
Again we're not blaming you, Ben… but we're also not not blaming you.
What happened to the older Yellowjackets in the season 2 finale?
When we last left this nutty bunch, Charlotte 'Lottie' (Simone Kessell) was egging them on to play her poison-Russian-roulette game as an offering to the wilderness.
Shana (Melanie Lynskey) managed to deter her from this idea by suggesting that they 'it' a hunt instead. Dicey, but okay.
She gets the others to buy into her plan to trick Lottie into organising a hunt for the wilderness 'it' like they used to — meaning they would draw cards and whoever got the queen would be hunted and killed.
Naturally, they were never going to go through with it. They were just trying to buy time by distracting Lottie with the whole setup while they waited for a psychiatric team to come and take her.
Never supposed to go through with it… hmmm. We guess Van (Lauren Ambrose) didn't get the memo.
In private, Van convinces Taissa (Tawny Cypress) to cancel the call to the psychiatric team by telling her that they owe it to Lottie not to have her locked up but to instead handle it amongst them. Taissa agrees.
When the time eventually comes, Shauna, Van, Taissa and Misty (Christina Ricci) all go through the motions of the hunt to appease Lottie as they wait for the help that isn't coming.
They draw the cards again and again until the unlucky Shauna gets the queen.
Eerily, without missing a beat, the others move towards the laid-out masks and knife.
The moment they put on their wilderness apparel, they instantly adopt the predatory attitude of their past.
Shauna is quite rightly panicked and refuses to play. But as she moves away from them, a slow pursuit ensues and quickly turns into a chase.
Thankfully, Shauna's daughter Callie (Sarah Desjardins) shows up (we'll explain her reason for being there in very soon).
In any case, Callie has the gun that she stole from Jeff (who took it off Shauna, who wrestled it off a carjacker in an earlier episode). She shoots a warning shot to stop them from killing Shauna.
Lottie then declares 'it' is with them now, as Shauna presses Misty about the psyche team's whereabouts. That's when Taissa reveals what she and Van have done.
Sending her to psyche facilities isn't right, Van declares, as Lottie goes full wilderness mode: "She's like this because of us."
Lottie starts ranting about how the wilderness has always been with them — when Shauna killed Adam and when Misty abducted Jessica Roberts (Rekha Sharma). Apparently, Lottie saw 'it' in Van's eyes too.
Most poignantly, 'it' was in Nat and has always been in Nat. "You were always its favourite," Lottie states, which seems to rile Nat up enough to get her waving a knife in Lottie's direction.
As if that weren't enough chaos in the mixing pot, Lisa (Nicole Maines) steps out of nowhere, having not followed Nat's earlier instructions to stay away.
She, too, has a weapon: a shotgun, which she points in defence of Lottie. Misty then charges in with a lethal injection she just happens to keep ready in her back pocket.
She tries to puncture Lisa, but Nat steps in to protect her and is hit with the needle instead. Nat then slips into a vision of herself on that doomed plane ride that started this whole mess.
In the vision, she's ushered into death by Javi, who tells her not to be afraid, as well as her younger self and a younger Lottie, who tells her "it's not evil, just hungry, like us. Just let it in".
It seems to calm her panic and Nat dies as Misty apologises profusely. Her death is reported as a drug overdose when the police arrive at the scene.
The others look on in shock as a dead Nat and Lottie are taken away — one in a body bag, the other led away by paramedics to be sectioned — as she tells a concerned Taissa and Van: "We gave it what it wanted. It is pleased with us, you'll see."
It sounds pretty nutty, but in Nat's death vision, she was told to "let it in", implying she was to let the wilderness take her so there could be something larger at play.
What's perhaps even more concerning is Van's hopeful half-smile. Has she been drawn back into the madness of the wilderness again?
In the confusion of ambulance sirens and grief, Walter (Elijah Wood) rushes over to Misty to declare he's "taken care of the Adam situation". How, you ask? We'll get to that in a minute.
His presence, however, is more than necessary for Misty, as the symbolism couldn't be clearer. Misty stands alone while the others are in pairs. Her actions have left her further isolated from the group, and she's going to need a real friend. She confesses Nat's death to Walter, and he hugs her in return.
How did the Yellowjackets solve their Adam Martin problem?
Before the Nat murder, Shauna, Jeff (Warren Cole) and Callie had been on their way to Lottie's retreat to collect Shauna — with the intention of running away together as a family.
However, because they're complete amateurs, they're followed by detectives Kevyn Tan (Alex Wyndham) and Matt Saracusa (John Reynolds), who have been on the Adam Martin case.
Meanwhile, Walter has arrived at Lottie's retreat in a bid to come to Misty's rescue. He's busy role-playing as a worker at the retreat when he's approached by Kevyn.
Walter gives him some spiked hot chocolate — which is pretty timely, as Jeff isn't far behind with the worst plan ever.
Jeff shows up alone (having sent Callie to find Shauna) and starts confessing to killing Adam.
Kevyn, however, barely has time to process his false confession before he's on the ground, unconscious.
A shocked Jeff is persuaded by Walter to help him move the body, which they dump in the boot of a car.
Using Kevyn's phone, they call Detective Saracusa, but the connection is bad, so he goes looking for his partner. Walter tosses the phone into the boot with Kevyn while they wait for Saracusa to arrive.
Eventually, Saracusa finds Kevyn's motionless body in the boot — but as he opens the back of the car, Walter rushes in, steals his gun and shoots Kevyn dead.
He then proceeds to give Saracusa an ultimatum under the duress of the impending police's arrival: corroborate his wild, elaborate story, painting Saracusa as the hero for uncovering Kevyn's involvement in a "police corruption scandal"... or not.
As Walter tells it, a wealth of bank and phone evidence has been set up to connect Kevyn to the murder of Adam Martin and Jessica Roberts (who Misty killed).
Saracusa could refuse, but then all that evidence will instead be pinned on him.
He has always been a bit oily, so he takes the easy way out, leaving the girls in the clear — at least for this.
There's no telling what Lisa will do with the information she has just learned, especially since Misty tried to kill her. Oh, how we can't wait for season three!
All episodes of Yellowjackets season 2 are available to stream now on Paramount+.
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TV writer, Digital Spy Janet completed her Masters degree in Magazine Journalism in 2013 and has continued to grow professionally within the industry ever since. For six years she honed her analytical reviewing skills at the Good Housekeeping institute eventually becoming Acting Head of Food testing. She also freelanced in the field of film and TV journalism from 2013-2020, when she interviewed A-List stars such as Samuel L Jackson, Colin Firth and Scarlett Johansson. In 2021 she joined Digital Spy as TV writer where she gets to delve into more of what she loves, watching copious amounts of telly all in the name of work. Since taking on the role she has conducted red carpet interviews with the cast of Bridgerton, covered the BAFTAs and been interviewed by BBC Radio and London Live. In her spare time she also moonlights as a published author, the book Gothic Angel.
