Season 3, Episode 6: ‘Thanksgiving (Canada)’
Let’s just start with this week’s big shocker: The girls and Travis are not alone in the woods. I’m not talking about there being spirits out there with them, though there very well may be spooky stuff hiding in the trees. I’m talking about real human people, wearing outdoorsy gear.
The man (Nelson Franklin) holds up his hand and says, “Hello.” The Yellowjackets’ faces are a mixture of joy and horror. Finally, there is some sign of civilization. But also, oh God, civilization arrived at the worst possible moment.
After all, the gang has just carved up Ben and eaten him while doing some ritualistic yelling. They can’t really hide that because their new friend sees the head and jumps back, terrified and cursing.
It’s an exciting conclusion to a jam-packed episode. Midway through, I feared it might hang on another frustrating tease involving the mysterious tape that was left on Adult Shauna’s doorstep and found by her daughter, Callie.
For the Adult Yellowjackets, the main story line follows Shauna, who has (finally!) determined that her family is at risk. The cherry that tops her suspicions is Callie’s revelation that she was keeping this retro-looking audio file a secret. So the Sadeckis move out of their house into a motel, and Shauna recruits Van, with her love of old-fashioned technology, to help her listen to the tape.
Although we see Shauna, Tai and Van all pressing play, we don’t hear the full extent of what is contained on that audio file. Instead, there’s just a lot of screaming and more unanswered questions. At least Callie is as annoyed as I am at how withholding her mom is, planting her iPhone in Shauna’s bag to record whatever was on the tape.
But as much of a tease as everything happening in the modern timeline is, the revelation that there are going to be new characters in the wilderness — and I mean genuinely new ones, not just members of the team that suddenly get heightened roles — is a thrilling prospect for the show, and I wonder if their presence and the contents of the voice message are related. (Also, knowing Franklin’s work in “New Girl” and “Veep,” his dopey onscreen persona will be an interesting match for the increasingly unhinged teenagers.)
The coda is a delightful twist to what otherwise might have been an extreme downer of an episode. Because what are the Yellowjackets doing when these travelers stumble on their campsite? Oh right, they are consuming the flesh of their former coach, whom they recently tried to kill by firing squad. Phew.
Ben’s arc is, without a doubt, brutal. After being spared death, he is not thriving. Instead, he is refusing to eat and trying to convince Natalie either to kill him or to allow him to kill himself. Natalie won’t do that. Right now, thanks to Akilah’s vision, Ben represents hope for the teens. Natalie can’t take that away from them, at least not at first.
At the same time, what does that sense of optimism even mean if it is predicated on Ben’s suffering? Can they all really look forward to a future as he wastes away? At this point, keeping him breathing is not kind. When they all realize he has been on something of a hunger strike, Misty devises a primitive feeding tube that they force down his throat so he will get sustenance. You can hear his gagging.
Eventually, in the middle of the night, Natalie resolves to once again help Ben, just as she helped him when she concealed his location for months. Travis catches her with a knife. And while he initially tries to stop her from going to Ben, he too ultimately relents, understanding that the coach’s torment is just another black mark on their souls.
The mercy killing scene is emotionally intense. As Natalie, Sophie Thatcher uses her eyes to her advantage. At first they are wide, almost petrified, and then she closes them, unable to comprehend what she’s about to do. She locks into her mission after Ben sweetly whispers, “Thank you.” When she drives the knife into his chest, there is almost a tenderness between them, enhanced by the choice of soundtrack, the elegiac “Be There” by the band Low.
Their strange peace is soon disturbed. As soon as the other teens discover what Natalie has done, there is chaos. Misty is distraught. Her brain doesn’t compute Natalie’s actions as an act of good will, and she rushes to her former crush and plants one last non-consensual kiss on his lips before saying goodbye. In the furor, Natalie abdicates her position as queen, and Lottie quickly gives the title to Shauna, who, as expected, rules with cruelty. She decides that they will send Ben off with a feast for themselves, giving the Wilderness what it wants. She orders Natalie to carve up the body.
Ben’s death feels like a turning point for the teen Yellowjackets. For most of the season, they have play-acted as if they were living in a functional society. While they are eating Ben’s cooked flesh, they turn feral again, howling into the night.
After the mysterious new people arrived on the scene, you had to wonder whether Akilah’s vision was to some extent right. Ben, in a strange way, was a bridge to the outside world — just not in the way they were expecting. That said, I can’t imagine our new friends are going to make it out alive.
More to chew on
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Akilah’s latest vision involves a stop-motion bear with three eyes. Cute, but even Akilah admits she doesn’t know what any of it means.
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Love that Mari also realizes that Natalie made the right decision. While others are growing angrier, she is mellowing out.
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Misty hums “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” by Deep Blue Something while snacking on her big crush. That’s the kind of Yellowjackets absurdism I love.
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It’s so funny that one of the recordings on Callie’s phone is “Ilana cinnamon challenge.”
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I’m not really invested in the reappearance of Lottie’s cult follower Lisa (Nicole Maines). Misty’s investigation needs to go somewhere fast.
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