Last year, there was a rapidly-growing hunger for more Yellowjackets – the dual-timeline survival drama, unfolding the mystery of what happened when an American girls’ soccer team crashed in the wilderness in the '90s and left them surviving for 19 months in the wild, while also catching up with them as adults in the present-day. It was a compelling character drama that hinted at impending depravity in its flashback sequences – and for the much-anticipated Season 2, it’s baring its teeth even more when it comes to exploring the lengths the Yellowjackets team members went to in order to survive.
“Now we’re really exploring female rage,” executive producer Jonathan Lisco tells Empire. In every sense, the new series will be pushing deeper and darker – in its character dynamics, and its decline into frenzied flesh-chomping. “In the past, it’s about the falling away of social constructs, even more than last season,” says Lisco. “In the present, I think each of these women is being forced to reckon with who they really are, which they’ve been able to deny most of their adult lives.” And entering the fray for the new series is Servant star Lauren Ambrose, who joins the cast as the grown-up version of goalie Van – hopefully coming in to bring an element of levity to the girl-eat-girl gruesomeness. “Van was always a character through which we could run a lot of humour,” says Lisco. “She hasn’t changed in that regard.” Prepare for a dramatically delicious new season.
Read Empire’s full Yellowjackets Season 2 report in the world-exclusive Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania issue – on sale Thursday 19 January, and available to order online here. Yellowjackets returns to Paramount+ later this year.