29 of the queerest moments in 'Yellowjackets' so far
| 04/17/23
rachelkiley
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Courtesy of Showtime
Showtime’s Yellowjackets has cemented itself as the dark teen girl-centric take on Lost we didn’t know we so desperately needed. Flashing back between a girls’ soccer team (the Yellowjackets) crash-landing in the wilderness and how the survivors are coping 25 years later after being rescued, the show so far is steeped in mystery, trauma, survivor’s guilt, and the bonds of female friendship.
And it is very, very queer.
Not only is there canon queerness, but the show itself has an overwhelmingly queer vibe. Not to mention the show boasts a delightfully queer cast. Together it’s the kind of representation that makes you confident a character or couple wasn’t thrown in to hit a quota, but that the story has queerness deep down in its DNA.
So while the explicitly queer moments are there, and an excellent example in and of themselves as to how easy it is to weave LGBTQ+ characters into your story, let’s take a moment to examine the ways the show is super queer in addition to those.
WARNING: This contains spoilers up through season three, episode two.
The theme song
Courtesy of Showtime
The Yellowjackets theme song is like True Blood had a gay 90s grunge baby with a hardcore YA dystopian novel collection back home. In other words, it sets the tone perfectly.
The intro to Shauna and Jackie’s friendship
Courtesy of Showtime
As of episode six, it’s not explicitly clear whether Shauna (played by Sophie Nélisse as a teen and Melanie Lynskey as an adult) is meant to be seen as having a crush on her best friend Jackie (Ella Purnell), but it’s one of those things where if it were a hetero friendship, there would be no question about it.
So when their introduction is Shauna waiting to pick up Jackie from school as Jackie’s boyfriend, Jeff, sneaks out the window, it’s hard to miss the way Shauna looks pretty devastated about it. Interpreting that to be about Jeff (more on him shortly) is understandable, but the whole scene is shot in a way that lingers on the glances between the two girls that makes you feel like you’re falling head first into a Supercorp situation all over again.
Shauna marrying Jeff
Courtesy of Showtime
By the end of the pilot, teen Shauna and teen Jeff are hooking up behind Jackie’s back — and it’s clearly not the first time. It’s also clear that it’s not about Shauna actually wanting to be with him. And when we find out that the two actually got married once Shauna and the other survivors were rescued, the fact that their marriage is so painfully devoid of emotion really makes viewers question the “why” of their relationship.
Nat's whole vibe
Courtesy of Showtime
While Shauna’s sexuality still feels like an open question, Natalie (played by Sophie Thatcher as a teen and Juliette Lewis as an adult) seems to be written and played as straight. But she’s got that leather jacket, chaotic rebel badass vibe that is often a sure sign that we’re about to get a token lesbian. The fact that she’s actually straight is almost refreshing, especially since we still get a queer vibe from her either way. And boy is she a hot mess as both versions of herself.
The lake scene
Courtesy of Showtime
A little while after the girls crash, they decide to leave the plane debris and go look for a lake. Once they find it, the scene of them all splashing around through the water reminds us that though they may have been thrown into a terrible situation, these are still teen girls, trying to live their young lives and have a good time.
The early moments at the lake give us a glimpse at the growing tension between Shauna and Jackie, who tries to make Shauna jealous by giving her attention to a different friend on the team, but it also gives us our first introduction to teen Taissa’s (Jasmin Savoy Brown) furtive queerness. Taissa doesn’t seem to be out to her teammates yet, but the way she looks at Van (Liv Hewson) makes it obvious she already knows that she’s into the ladies.
The power couple
Courtesy of Showtime
By the time she’s an adult, Taissa (now played by Tawny Cypress) has clearly worked through her sexuality and has built a family with wife Simone (Rukiya Bernard) and their son Sammy (Aiden Stoxx). Their life isn’t perfect, but the conflict comes from the same sorts of challenges a heterosexual couple with a seemingly troubled child would face. As Taissa runs for political office, her sexuality is of course relevant, but doesn’t overshadow the other issues going on in her personal or professional life — we aren’t having homophobia lazily shoved down our throats when there are other, more interesting options for conflict available.
This is meant to point out the queer vibes of the show more than the explicit queerness, but the positive representation offered by this couple without falling into the trap of being boring or too perfect is worth pointing out.
All of the clothing
Courtesy of Showtime
Half of this show is set in the '90s and is about a girls soccer team. I think that speaks for itself.
The 'Rizzoli & Isles' reference
Rizzoli & Isles/TNT
Rizzoli & Isles may never have jumped into the realm of the canonically queer, but it toed the line so closely that it’s definitely got a permanent place in the queerbaiting hall of fame. As such, Natalie casually name-dropping the titular characters (“I hate to break it to you, but we’re not Rizzoli and Isles. I don’t need you.”) while telling off perpetual odd girl out Misty is automatically pretty gay.
Misty’s sabotage
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Misty (played by Sammi Hanratty as a teen and Christina Ricci as an adult) does a whole lot of sabotaging throughout both timelines. The show has crept slowly from making us feel kind of bad for her to realizing that the girls have good reason to be wary of this one, no matter the age. The biggest hint to this was when teen Misty realized that being in the wilderness meant that the other girls finally needed, and therefore might appreciate, her due to her triage skills and calm in the face of catastrophe. So when she alone discovered the black box and smashed it to pieces, ensuring no one would know where they crashed, it made a demented sort of sense for her character. She echoes this decision repeatedly throughout the early episodes, secretly causing damage to make people rely on her.
And while Misty herself seems to be pretty straight, there is something chaotically queer about taking such extreme measures to try to make a place for yourself in people’s lives rather than simply talk about your feelings and problem solve like a well-adjusted human being, especially as a teen. But unfortunately for Misty, she doesn’t seem to have grown out of this as an adult.
Taissa’s political opponents trying to “out” her
Courtesy of Showtime
Adult Taissa may be out and proud, but she’s got plenty of other secrets — namely, whatever went down in the wilderness for the months the girls were lost. Some murder and cannibalism, to start, although we’re still light on the details. And the way everyone in her political orbit seems set on uncovering those secrets is reminiscent of the way closeted public figures could be targeted for their own secrets — especially considering the hints we’ve gotten that Taissa herself may be struggling to keep her secrets in. And once again, this version is the much more interesting choice.
The seance
Courtesy of Showtime
Queer women love the occult. Everything from tarot to crystals to straight up seances, there’s just something about it that resonates. Maybe it’s the secrets, or maybe it’s the way witches were persecuted. Maybe it’s just diving headfirst into everything we were raised not to involve ourselves in all at once. Regardless, when the girls decided to hold a seance to try to communicate with ghosts in the spooky cabin they found, that fell directly into queer vibes.
That Daria reference
Daria/MTV
Another queer culture reference came in the form of Lynksey’s Shauna yelling at her teenage daughter that “the people who matter recognize Daria,” after said daughter disparaged her would-be Halloween costume. Sure, it’s also a ‘90s reference, and the single instance of LGBTQ+ rep in the show is pretty negative, but it’s another one of those characters that queer girls latched onto all the same, so we’re claiming this one.
Taissa and Van kissing
Courtesy of Showtime
Okay, this is another one that is explicitly queer, but Taissa and Van sneaking out to the lake while everyone’s asleep to get naked and kiss and trace words on each others’ backs is so great it’s worth mentioning all the same. It’s unclear what happens to them, and to Van, but getting us invested in their secret rendezvous at the same time as we get invested with adult Taissa’s attempts to keep her family together is cruel and wonderful. It’s as queer as it gets.
Taissa cutting her hair
Courtesy of Showtime
While short haircuts are, of course, historically readily linked to queer women, it’s the dramatic act of Taissa emotionally chopping off her own hair in a mirror in the wilderness that really sells this moment as extra gay. Who doesn’t love a hyper-dramatic hair cutting scene?
Laura Lee trying to fly a whole plane
Courtesy of Showtime
The brazen confidence Laura Lee (Jane Widdop) showed in deciding she was qualified to fly a dead man’s plane out of the wilderness after reading a manual about it has some kind of queer vibes to it. Maybe not as queer as all her scenes with Lottie (Courtney Eaton), but still good — until it wasn’t. RIP, Laura Lee.
Doomcoming!
Courtesy of Showtime
Nobody throws a post-high school faux homecoming quite like the LGBTQ+ community, but the Yellowjackets team gave us a run for our money with their Doomcoming. Actually, it seems like a safe bet that knockoff doomcomings are totally going to become a thing any day now if they haven’t already. Although hopefully without the accidental hallucinogens in the stew.
Jackie's death
Courtesy of Showtime
The girl was literally buried by the falling snow as she died, leaving her BFF who we all know was secretly at least a little bit in love with her screaming over her dead body. Do we really need to elaborate on why this is gay?
Teen Lottie's witchcraft and adult Lottie's cult
Courtesy of Showtime
Lottie is really upping her spooky vibes this season, harping on the pagan rituals and whatnot in the wilderness, and running a full-fledged cult disguised as a "wellness retreat" of some sort as Simone Kessell takes over the fan favorite role in the present. You know who else likes dark, dramatical rituals, twinning, and fleeing to the woods under the guise of mental health? Lesbians. The cult portion of Lottie's dual journey also gets a major bonus for the brooding sapphic vibes Nicole Maines is bringing to the floor.
Crystal asking Misty to harmonize
It seems like teen Misty may have a new friend in Crystal (Nuha Jes Izman) this season, although the girl definitely seems a little sketch every now and again. But the moment where they first bond and Crystal offers to teach Misty how to sing so that they can harmonize makes you believe we could get the deranged wilderness version of that Pitch Perfect shower scene at any moment.
Ben's internal fantasy world
Courtesy of Showtime
Yes, Ben (Steven Krueger) is canonically gay, and the presumed combination of memories/fantasy world he spends most of his time drifting off to show him with his boyfriend (François Arnaud), but the mere act of rejecting a miserable reality in favor of an untouchable dream world is in and of itself so in line with a closeted queer experience.
Misty screaming "I'm fine!"
Courtesy of Showtime
Misty’s decision to give Shauna the gift of performance for her baby shower is already toeing the line, but her flare for the dramatic gets an extra kick when she reaches the point in her Steel Magnolias monologue that just has her screeching “I’m fine! I’m fine! I’m fine!” Sally Field may have originally popularized this moment in the film, but who amongst us hasn’t unwittingly reenacted it on far too many occasions? Oh God!
The theme song update for season two
Episode four of season two saw a shift in Yellowjackets’ intro, not only bringing the adult versions of the characters into the opening, but having the song itself covered by ‘90s queen Alanis Morissette. Gayyyy.
Van fingers a rainbow donut
Courtesy of Showtime
Listen, not all metaphors are subtle, OK. In the opener for season three, we catch up with grown-up Van in her VHS shop. In our first shot of her, we see her fingering a rainbow donut while For Non Blondes’ “What’s Up” ’ plays and she looks off yearningly. This is the most lesbian-coded moment of the whole show — along with everything that follows including her restocking a copy of Welcome to the Dollhouse on VHS, to gushing over Parker Posey and recommending Watermelon Woman and that’s all before Taissa appears on Van’s doorstop dragging along all her lesbian drama baggage. Gay, gay, ghey.
Ben’s gay fugue
Courtesy of Showtime
Ok so this may not be playing into the best gay stereotype, but we’re not here to judge just to document. But when Coach Ben goes into a full gay fugue of him playing charades with this boyfriend and gay crew at the site of Shauna’s V, we’re like we see you Coach Ben, we see you. The fact that it’s set to Madonna’s ‘Rescue Me’ is just the cherry on top.
Van’s pocket contents
Courtesy of Showtime
When Taissa and Van arrive at Lottie’s cult compound they have to empty out thier pockets and we get a peek at what Van is carrying around: Bayer, chapstick, and a naked lady novelty pen.
Misty’s musical theater vision
Courtesy of Showtime
It’s well-established that Misty is a musical theater nut, but when she enters the isolation tank at Lottie’s compound we get an insight into the inner workings of her mind, and its bizarre, camp, and queer AF — thanks in part to a cameo by John Cameron Mitchell as an anthropomorphized (and pretty sociopathic) version of Misty’s bird Caligula.
Grown-up Van and Taissa kiss
Courtesy of Showtime
The moment we’ve all been waiting for since Taissa darkened the doorstop at Van’s video store! The two hunker down with a bottle of booze at Lottie’s cult compound and Sapphic nature takes its course. Hey, just a couple of drinks and “sacrifices to the dirt” and you're making out with your ex? Who amongst us hasn't been there?
Misty sniffs Nat’s leather jacket
Courtesy of Showtime
When Misty cleans out Nat’s storage locker she finds Nat’s prized leather jacket. Yes, she's deep in her grief but that moment when she smells the jacket just hits home. Misty’s connection to her “friends” has always skewed toward being pretty queer.
Shauna and Melissa get knifey/kissy
Courtesy of Showtime
Another overtly queer moment that had fans screaming, was seeing Shauna threaten Melissa, and Melissa responding with a big kiss. Not only was the culmination of all Melissa’s sly observing of Shauna (no seriously, go back and watch, the clues have been laid) but also added more fuel to the Jackie/Shauna shipping fire.
