Let's talk about that crazy 'Yellowjackets' season finale

***SPOILER ALERT: Avoid reading if you have not seen the finale or the show yet.***

After the events of Yellowjackets' penultimate episode of Season 1, “Doomcoming,” the party kept going into the season finale as the adult survivors gathered for their 25th high school reunion. Directed by Eduardo Sánchez (The Blair Witch Project) and written by series creators Ashley Lyle & Bart Nickerson, "Sic Transit Gloria Mundi" did what all great season finales should do: It left audiences with some definitive answers, some new questions, and a clearer sense-ish of where Season 2 will go. 

"Sic Transit" featured cliffhangers galore for both the 1996 and 2021 storylines. In 2021, after getting rid of Adam’s (Peter Gadiot) corpse, the Yellowjackets survivors — Shauna (Melanie Lynsky), Natalie (Juliette Lewis), Taissa (Tawny Cypress) and Misty (Christina Ricci) — then went all-in on experiencing the almost equally distasteful nostalgia of their high school legacy. When the night comes to a close, each of them are left with some very problematic threads to deal with alone. 

In 1996, the frightening, mushroom-induced hysteria was over, but there were still plenty of very uncomfortable repercussions facing everyone in the morning light. In particular, Jackie’s (Ella Purnell) seduction of Travis (Kevin Alves), and then her leaving the shelter of the cabin to sleep outside when no one comes to her defense. 

Yellowjackets has been picked up for a second season by Showtime, so there are still plenty of mysteries left for the show to reveal, or at least address. But a few of note have us particularly piqued for some answers:

1. Where is Javi?

With so many of the team tripping on Misty’s stash of mushrooms, the inhibitions were gone and a pack of them, including Shauna, chased Travis into the woods after he escaped from their attempted orgy with him inside the cabin. Seeing his bewildered little brother, Javi, (Luciano Leroux), Travis tells him to run and that’s the last anyone sees of him.

So will Javi prove to be a victim of the local wolves that attacked Van (Liv Hewson)? Is there someone who lived in the cabin still observing the survivors and they have taken Javi? Or maybe the elements and the snow got him? It’s certainly going to be one of the major outstanding mysteries to solve in 1996 when Season 2 continues.

2. Are Natalie’s kidnappers the Cult of Lottie?

As if watching older Natalie attempt to take her own life with a shotgun wasn’t traumatizing enough, our already frazzled emotions were messed with even more as a group of neutral-wearing kidnappers burst into Nat's hotel room and threw her into a sketchy-looking van.

What does Lottie (Courtney Eaton) have to do with this? According to Nat’s former sponsor’s frantic call, the person who cashed out Travis’ bank account after his demise was seemingly none other than Lottie Matthews. Yes, the same former Yellowjackets player with the freaky-accurate visions, who ends the episode by sacrificing a bear’s heart to... something... in the woods while muttering, “I let the darkness set us free.” We know from the events of episode 9 that Lottie is indeed the Antler Queen from the pilot, that presided over the premiere episode's ritual cannibalism. 

So, now we ask: After possessing that kind of power, does she choose to stay in the woods once the rescuers find them, or does the team leave her behind? And in either of those scenarios, does she then form a cult who uses the symbology of the runes in the woods to keep doing what she was doing out there? The questions are endless! And maybe just as terrifying as the answers. 

3. Was Adam telling the truth about who he really is? 

Photo: Credit: Showtime

Killing off Shauna’s hot boy toy in Episode 9 was quite the ta-wist, but we still don’t know if his seemingly-befuddled defensive arguments to his lover about not being her stalker are true.

He did have a book about the Yellowjackets survivors in his possession, but as he said, he Googled her so that’s not proof of anything outside of curiosity. However, in light of the new season finale reveals, could Adam also be part of the cult? Was he monitoring Shauna to do to her what was done to Natalie in the finale? Or was he just an opportunist?

Also, we hear on a news broadcast that Adam's friends and family are worried about him. Who are his friends and family? And what fresh hell or drama will they bring upon our survivors should they come looking for him in Season 2? Go ahead and chew on all of those options during hiatus, because he’s certainly coming back into the story with the police now looking for Adam as a missing person.

4. How the hell did that altar get into Tai's basement?  

And poor Simone (​​Rukiya Bernard)! She’s just trying to mother her very weird little boy and navigate being married to Taissa when she discovers the gnarliest voodoo altar ever in her own basement. RIP, Biscuit.

Now the mystery is discovering whether little Sammy (Aiden Stoxx) made that thing (highly unlikely), or most likely, which version of Taissa put that little display together? Is now Senator-elect with the evil smile Taissa behind it to get the win? Or did the “bad one” Taissa do it during her night time, dirt-eating (and hand-gnawing) romps in the garden? The evidence evidence looks pretty damning for the latter. 

5. Who is this guy?!

Photo: Credit: Showtime

During Shauna’s nightmare, where she welcomes Jackie (Ella Purnell) back into the cabin for cocoa and forgiveness, several dead faces show up — including team mates who perished in the fuselage, their very religious friend Laura Lee (Jane Widdop), and then this weird guy above. 

The first time we saw him was in the opening credits; he's been there all season and fans have been like "who the hell is this guy?!" He is the last person to address Jackie in the dream, before Shauna wakes up. He says: “So glad you’re joining us. We’ve been waiting for you.”

Is that the ghost of the dead guy they found in the cabin attic? Or is he the heavy-footed person heard in that attic but never seen? Or is he the spirit of the pilot of the plane that Laure Lee tried to fly away in? Or: Is he the guy responsible for all or some of the runes decorating the woods? Maybe he’s the leader of the cult, or someone who speaks to Lottie in her new path as the Antler Queen? (He gives off major Grady-from-The-Shining vibes, when he speaks to Jackie.)

Here's to plenty of fun conversations until Yellowjackets Season 2 finally fills our eyeballs!