Yellowjackets EPs Answer Our Burning Questions About the Antler Queen, [Spoiler]'s Deeply Unsettling Altar, That Dude in the Dream and More

Warning: This post contains many spoilers from Yellowjackets‘ Season 1 finale. Proceed with caution.

OK, fellow citizen detectives, we’ve got our work cut out for us.

Sunday’s season finale of Yellowjackets answered a bunch of questions (how did Jackie die? did Tai win her state senate election? what became of Biscuit?) but posed a lot more. Where’s Javi? Is there any way in hell that Shauna will get away with killing Adam? Did Lottie survive, and is she a cult leader? And for the love of the Antler Queen, who’s wearing those pink Converse in the flashbacks?

Fortunately, series co-creators Ashley Lyle and Bart Nickerson were willing to become our own personal subreddit regarding their buzzy Showtime drama, which already has been renewed for Season 2. Read on for their answers. (And make sure to check out our finale recap here.)

yellowjackets-finale-questions-season-1-episode-10
yellowjackets-finale-questions-season-1-episode-10

TVLINE

| I’ve loved the way the show highlights things like Dateline and the citizen detectives of the world, but also plays with the idea that some things just don’t make sense, that there’s not some master plan or conspiracy. How do you know when to hit one or the other?
BART NICKERSON
| We do talk a lot about clues, and we’re trying to create a coherent narrative. But I think, in the end, the thing that is the most important to us is the emotional content of a scene. So ultimately things are being planted, and we’re attempting to structure something that gives that certain kind of experience when it’s finally all deployed, as opposed to having someone step back and be impressed by the analytical tightness.
ASHLEY LYLE | Yes. It’s been really, really interesting watching viewers respond to the show. I will fully admit that Bart and I just took a little vacation, and he had to, like, bodily take the phone away from me, at one point. [Laughs] I’m sitting by the pool, just looking at Twitter, and he’s like, “You have to stop.”

It’s been really interesting because there were certain breadcrumbs and clues that we put in the show. There were other things that were honestly just little tidbits or nuggets that entertained us. I thought one in particular that was really interesting was that we mentioned trigonometry a bunch of times, and honestly, I just hated trigonometry when I was in school. [Laughs] And to watch people go down that particular rabbit hole. I’m like, “Oh no, guys! That’s just an inside joke from the writers’ room!” And there were, honestly, a few little breadcrumbs that we threw in there that nobody’s picked up on, so it’s been really interesting to see what people are latching onto, what they’re not noticing, what they are noticing.

yellowjackets-finale-questions-season-1-episode-10
yellowjackets-finale-questions-season-1-episode-10

TVLINE

| Jackie meets a frosty end in the finale. Is Ella Purnell going to be around in Season 2? Will Jackie have a presence beyond the finale?
NICKERSON | It’s tricky with Season 2 spoilers. I’ll just say: We definitely have an idea for a way to continue to use her, and she’ll certainly be a presence, probably throughout the run of the show at least. The gravity of her character will be felt throughout the constellation, no matter what. And we would love to specifically use her for a few things that we have cooking.

TVLINE | Jackie’s getting ousted from the cabin seems like a harbinger of further splintering of the group. Now that that first fracture has happened, what might divisions among the girls look like moving forward? And can you say whether the divisions will stick, or might they be more dynamic in nature?
LYLE | I think, as is so often the case for things to take a turn, it happens very slowly and gradually… and then all at once. So I think that we’ll see something sort of similar play out in Season 2.

TVLINE | OK, awesome. If it’s OK with you, we’ll do a lightning round of questions.
LYLE | Yeah!

TVLINE | Lottie, who may or may not be the Antler Queen, moves into a power position toward the end of the season. When she brings that really big heart to the altar, how much time has passed since Jackie’s death?
LYLE | That was the bear heart, and that was meant to be the same day.

TVLINE | The guy in the shadows when Jackie dies: His face is in the opening credits of the show. I’m assuming that means he’ll have some importance as we move forward?
LYLE | He will. You know, I am not entirely sure if we should talk about this or not, but I think… Bart, why don’t you do it?
NICKERSON | What I was going to say is that we definitely know who he is, yeah, and we have a whole thing [planned].

TVLINE | In the very first episode, one of the masked characters is wearing the Co-ed Naked Soccer shirt that we’ve seen Van wearing. And the girl who is running and lands in the pit is wearing the same necklace Jackie and Shauna have worn. Can you speak to how communal property might be by that point?
LYLE | Communal property is something we very much planned and wanted to see through the season. So for instance, we very much made sure that multiple characters are wearing those pink Converse [sneakers] over the course of the first season. To my mind — and Bart’s mind, as well — but as a teenage girl, you know, sharing clothes is the most [normal] thing. I did it all the time with my best friends. So, to us, it was both a great way to kind of nod to that experience of female friendship, as a teenager, but also be able to hide the ball a little bit in terms of some of those clues.

TVLINE | The group that grabs Natalie at the end, we don’t see their faces. Have we met any of them already, or are they new characters?
LYLE | These are all new characters.

yellowjackets-finale-questions-season-1-episode-10
yellowjackets-finale-questions-season-1-episode-10

TVLINE

| And the shrine in Tai’s house — that’s Biscuit’s head, I’m assuming, that we see on the altar?
NICKERSON | Yes.

TVLINE | OK. Is that also Biscuit’s heart?
NICKERSON | Yes.
LYLE | And also, it’s hilarious because Dave Binegar, who is one of our executives at Showtime, he has a dog named Cheddar, who looks exactly like Biscuit, and it was very traumatizing for him.
NICKERSON | Yeah. [Laughs]

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