Yellowjackets Should Be No More Than 3 Seasons Long

Yellowjackets is the most fun I’ve had watching television since I watched Lost, which I did for the first time last year. How could it not be? To me, it is the sicko version of Lost. It has a plane crash, young girls eating each other (something they unfortunately never got around to doing during Lost), and it stars the coolest underrated white women from the ‘90s. Throw in a fun potentially woo-woo element, and I couldn’t ask for anything more satisfying.

The show has been a runaway hit, and was renewed for at least another season. This is great news, as there are so many questions that remain unanswered: Which of the survivors are alive? Who kidnapped Natalie? When do we finally get to see them eat a person, and which one of the girls is the meal?

In a recent post-finale interview with Vulture, co-creators and showrunners Ashley Lyle and Bart Nickerson do their best to answer many questions without giving away too much — Jackie is very much dead and will never come back to life, and Adam absolutely isn’t involved with the group that kidnaps Natalie. With a show like Yellowjackets, one that involves so much mystery — much of which can be stretched too thin.

Speaking to Vulture, when asked how many seasons the showrunners imagined it to be initially, Lyle says it was originally pitched as five seasons, which is typical when you’re pitching a show. “When buyers are hearing ideas, particularly at a network like Showtime, they want to know that you have a plan and there’s more than one season worth of story,” She explained. And while she expressed regret for giving that number because, “people really latched onto it,” Lyle also said they had no interest in dragging out the story longer than necessary.

Thank God, but also I am praying, begging and hoping this show will not be longer than three seasons. I love the idea of watching these wild girls do more stupid things just because I enjoy seeing them on screen — but by next season the story will probably be tenuous. It’s already annoying that the other survivors are a mystery to us, when we know everyone else on the show knows who has survived and who has died. It’s hard to see how much further the mystery can be taken without getting into ridiculous territory.

Nothing more should be happening to these women. We don’t need to see them in college or and we also shouldn’t have to wonder who the “pit girl” was for any longer than a few more episodes in Season 2. The show has done a fantastic job at building tension, but it would be a shame for it to rely any more than it already does on what the audience doesn’t know. At a certain point, you have to put a pin in it. Let it be good, then let it die.

I understand a hallmark of American television is squeezing out as much as possible from anything remotely good (think How I Met Your Mother, Homeland, Pretty Little Liars, and even Vanderpump Rules) — but please spare these crazy bitches from getting annoying. I don’t want to still be watching Yellowjackets in 2027.