‘Yellowjackets’ Season 3 Finale Recap: The Wilderness Is Hungry | USAEMALL.com

Season 3, Episode 10: ‘Full Circle’

We’ve made it back to the beginning of “Yellowjackets.”

The season finale gives us the extended version of the moment that hooked us from the pilot: A dark haired girl running through the snow as she is chased by a group of mask-wearing teens. She falls into a stake-filled pit and dies.

Now we know for sure who the deceased is: It’s Mari, as many long suspected. After the survivors decide it is time for another hunt to appease the angry Wilderness, Mari draws the Queen of Hearts. Tai and Van’s attempts to make the newcomer Hannah the target are thwarted by a vindictive Shauna. Mari is the victim of Shauna’s meddling.

While some suit up and join the chase without compunction, for others it’s painful to watch, as it is for the viewer. Mari is their close friend and teammate. Gen even tries to distract Tai in order to buy Mari some time. But the conclusion is predictable because we’ve seen it before. Mari dies, her fingers twitching as she bleeds out.

Still, this familiar sequence is paired with something completely new, a cliffhanger that reshapes what a fourth season might look like. While Shauna is distracted, Natalie and Hannah outwit her. Hannah disguises herself as Nat, while Nat takes the almost-repaired satellite phone to the highest peak she can find and dials. At first, no one responds. But eventually, as Aerosmith’s “Livin’ on the Edge” cues on the soundtrack, she hears a voice. “I can hear you,” it says.

Now there’s a real chance of rescue.

Natalie’s moment of heroism, however, contrasts sharply with Shauna’s absolute descent into madness in both timelines. Teen Shauna is drunk on her own power, and it’s hard to know whether she truly believes in the Wilderness or is just out for blood to prove her dominance. Her cruellest moment comes when she demands to have Mari’s hair to affix like a medal to her robes. (She never really liked Mari anyway.)

In the present, we get a glimpse into this mentality. Adult Shauna is done trying to bury the past or make apologies for it. It’s a bit of self acceptance that comes in the wake of this week’s other big revelation: Callie is Lottie’s killer, meaning that Shauna is not only a murderer but also the mother of a murderer. (I did not see this one coming at all.)

Misty clocks that Callie is the culprit after seeing a photo of Callie on the cloned version of Lottie’s phone that Walter stole. But when Callie tells Misty the full story, she is more sympathetic than not.

Lottie essentially lured Callie, stealing Hannah’s tape from Callie’s bedroom. In the basement of her father’s apartment, Lottie then tries to convince Callie that she is a child of the Wilderness, a child whose mother fears her. “She can’t love you because she’s jealous,” Lottie says. “You’re just like her, but more.”

Hearing this, Callie pushes Lottie. The action is rooted in anger but also fear. She doesn’t want to be like her mom. And she really doesn’t like the sound of Lottie confirming her worst fear: that Shauna can’t feel any true motherly affection.

But after Misty outs her, Callie does something extremely unlike her mother. She goes to her father and confesses everything. And Jeff and Callie, to protect themselves, abandon their house and disconnect their phones, leaving Shauna alone.

It’s a move that, in a way, frees Shauna to embrace her true self. Home alone, Shauna finds the note that Melissa wrote to her and had sent with the tape. It had fallen under the fridge; Callie had never seen it. And, it turns out, Melissa wasn’t lying. The letter really was about forgiveness and letting go of the past. It triggers something in Shauna. She rips it up and flashes back to all of her recent misdeeds, crying over the kitchen sink. (Credit to Melanie Lynskey for making us feel anything for her at this point.)

But those tears are not for her daughter or husband. And so, wearing a sick Throwing Muses shirt, she sits down to compose her own manifesto. The intended audience is not clear, but the sentiment is. She realizes why for so many years she buried what happened in the wilderness. It wasn’t because of guilt or trauma. “I think we can’t or won’t remember it clearly because we recognize deep down that we were having so much fun,” she narrates.

In the woods she wasn’t a wife or a mother. She was a warrior and a queen, clad in her perverse battle armor.

That is true, but Shauna is also rewriting history to fit her own narrative. Shauna’s story has been one of self-delusion. This is just a different kind than the one that blinded her previously. Because, yes, while she has had moments of basking in her supposed strength in the wilderness, she has also had a pretty miserable time out there.

Let’s not forget the beginning of the season, when all the other teens seemed to be having a relatively nice time and she was hiding in her hut sulking. Shauna is happy only when Shauna is blatantly disregarding the desires of others.

It’s a trait that Tai and Misty recognize as they meet at a diner and form an alliance against her. Tai blames Shauna for Van’s and Natalie’s deaths. She isn’t wrong.

Shauna, in many ways, began “Yellowjackets” as the audience surrogate. If Jackie was the pristine queen bee, she was the relatable character — the regular person thrown into this mess. Quietly, all along, however, the show has been revealing her to be the Big Bad. Her monstrosity was not made by some mystical forces. It was in her all along. The Wilderness just helped it emerge.

More to chew on

• Clearly, Natalie’s phone call doesn’t result in an instant rescue. After all, we know Hannah dies out there. So what fresh hell will Shauna unleash before they are saved.

• Tai ate Van’s raw heart after dumping her body in the woods. That’s true love, I guess.

• I’m really not sure I see the point of Walter.

• “Yellowjackets” has yet to be renewed, but I think this sets us up perfectly for a final season, with rescue imminent.