After a break of over a year Yellow jackets returns today with a new set of episodes. Will the second season live up to expectations? In a word: no.
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Let’s qualify anyway. The new Yellowjackets season is not a bad year for that. She’s just struggling to live up to last season’s standards. This is the conclusion that stands out after watching 4 of the 10 episodes expected over the spring.
The first of these is available in the Crave app starting today. The nine others will follow at a rate of one per week.
From yesterday till today
Quick Reminiscence: Yellowjackets follows a gang of teenage girls, members of a women’s soccer team, in 1996. Their destiny, initially full of promise, takes a dark and nightmarish turn when the plane taking them to a championship falls deep in the woods crashes. where they remain for 19 months before being rescued.
At the same time, we accompany four of these women 25 years later. As adults, they obviously haven’t all been as successful in adjusting to returning to civilization.
Here we continue where we left off. Tensions between the girlfriends continued to mount in the 1990s as the cruel and unrelenting winter cold set in. But honestly, that part of the storyline seems to have resigned itself to treading water. It’s long, it’s slow, and even the acts of cannibalism – implied in season one – fail to spice up this narrative.
The break in tone between the two seasons is particularly brutal.
As for the “adult versions” of these heroines, they are now scattering to the four winds. In the first few hours we are confronted with morbid hallucinations, a mysterious sect and a far-fetched citizen investigation.
Impeccable Sophie Nelisse
Photo courtesy of Showtime/Crave
Luckily, the cast – including the impeccable Sophie Nélisse – manage to inject charisma and conviction into this toneless plot. Among the new faces of this season, we highlight the presence of François Arnaud, who, despite his obvious talent, finds himself confined to a narrative arc that, at least for the moment, seems unnecessarily embellished with the main narrative.
Episodes of Yellowjackets will be available on the Crave app on Fridays and then air on Sundays in English (Crave) and on Mondays in French (Super Ecran).