Why Yellowjackets Fans Think Jackie's Death Signals An Even Darker Turn For The Show

Contains spoilers for "Yellowjackets" Season 2, Episode 1 — "Friends, Romans, Countrymen" 

When facing the prospect of death, individuals can sometimes make hasty decisions that have long-lasting ramifications or deadly consequences. Showtime's "Yellowjackets" follows two different timelines, with the first surrounding a high school soccer team's harrowing plane crash and following their experiences in the remote Canadian wilderness, and the second focusing on their respective adult lives and how they have changed. Considering that there is a gap in information between these two plots, fans are often left to speculate on what has happened.

Of all of the survivors of the plane crash, team captain Jackie Taylor (Ella Purnell) quickly finds that her former position of power doesn't afford her the same liberties as before. As mentioned earlier, when faced with death, people often make some rather drastic decisions. One such decision ultimately leads to Jackie's apparently self-inflicted death after a fight with her former friends and teammates, which sees her succumb to hypothermia alone and ostracized. However, it seems as if some fans of "Yellowjackets" believe that Jackie's death is a harbinger of events to come, and several conversations have started over on Reddit.

Redditor u/srpbiz asked what the point of Jackie's death was, and u/raviolioh replied, "Her death was perfect for what they were building up. The whole idea is this: the fight they had was inevitable, it was always brewing." They added, "Her death is a turning point. She represented the society they left behind, and now, they can fully commit to this new society they're creating out there."

Reddit user u/nan_adams agreed with the larger reason behind Jackie's death, and wrote, "Jackie's death mirrors what the team does to Allie in the pilot. They freeze her out both literally and figuratively. Jackie is a symbol of civilized society, of high school social hierarchy, of everything they left behind in NJ. With her dead they can devolve into a more primal existence." Others also saw Jackie's death as a signal that the rest of the young survivors would continue their descent into an almost feral state, with one Reddit user believing that Jackie's death signals the shifting social hierarchy and that ultimately the show is about what happens when society is stripped away.

Another user named u/iwishiwasaunicorn shared their belief that Jackie's death actually foreshadows growing divisions within the survivors, noting that in the very first episode of "Yellowjackets" the coach said that without Jackie, the team would fall apart. Similarly, u/kittledeedee thinks that Jackie's death signals upcoming cannibalism of the dead among the survivors, and that's why the adult versions are laden with trauma. They added, "I can't imagine anyone could come back from that sort of thing without being seriously damaged. They were resigned to thinking they would never be rescued, which puts your values in a seriously compromised position." Finally, u/Best_Tennis8300 probably said it best when they wrote, "I'm sure most people can agree on the fact that Jackie's death is going to have one hell of an impact on Shauna in the wilderness this new season."