I Think Yellowjackets May Have Disproved One Of My Ongoing Theories, But In A Way I Actually Agree With

Spoilers below for anyone who isn’t caught up with the latest episode of Yellowjackets via Showtime or Paramount+ subscription, so be warned!

As a general horror fanatic who very specifically adores the trials and tribulations facing the titular Yellowjackets team in the darkly comedic thriller, I probably spend more time than the average person involuntarily crafting theories about the myriad mysterious events plaguing the survivors. From Tai’s No-Eyes Man visions to the overarching Pit Girl mystery to wondering what actually happened to Crystal. Understandably, most episodes fail to resolve such theories, but they do occasionally debunk speculation.

Or at least they can appear to, and that’s more or less what’s happened so far, with Yellowjackets’ second and third Season 3 installments seemingly rendering one of my bigger ongoing theories moot. But without upending it entirely, and in a way where I’d actually be all good with being wrong.

My Previous Theory: The Moss Growing In The Wilderness Is Sentient

Now I'll admit that I knew from the jump that it was absurd (bordering on asylum-worthy) to voice the belief that the '90s timeline's tree moss had achieved a symbiotic sentience that was a root cause (pun intended) of all the bewildering events we've seen thus far. But when all else fails, you go with whatever sounds right...ish. For whatever reason — masochism or active ignorance — I rather enjoyed holding out hope for that guesswork to play out. But now I can take the first step in admitting I was wrong.

Yellowjackets Has Unfortunately Been Pretty Moss-Free In Season 3

Here in Season 3, a time jump has replaced the wet winter snow with nature's warmer tones and vibes, and the amount of moss I've seen could fit on the head of a pin. Which isn't to say it's all gone, but that nothing we've seen makes it still sensible to continue thinking that moss was really to blame for Javi's and Natalie's deaths and Laura Lee's plane crash and Shauna's pregnancy woes.

By all means, I'll continue holding strong to the notion that a small patch of intelligent moss exists somewhere in those woods, but I'm fine with letting go of the belief that it's malciious and deadly. It's probably just an innocent cutie, li'l sentient moss patch.

New Theory: Everything In The Wilderness Has Naturally Psychotropic Effects

Yellowjackets previously introduced the teen survivors getting loopy with mushrooms, even though their experiences weren't exactly in line with traditional shroom trips. But now that we've seen Lottie practically force-feeding Travis her psychoactive concoction in Season 3, despite him lashing out violently while under the influence, it seems like a good time to reconfigure some of my thoughts about this show's ecosystem.

Allow me to generalize things quite a bit: for as long as Yellowjackets characters have been subsisting on elements native to their surrounding wilderness, weird and unexplainable shit has been happening to them. And by the time they get rescued, they will have been drinking that water and eating those plants and various...animals (gulp) for a very, very long time.

So what if the entire team and its heavily bearded former coach have all been essentially microdosing on any number of psychotropics thriving in whatever they're eating and drinking? And that unwittingly imbibing hallucinations and psychoactive chemicals on a daily basis normalizes those feelings and makes the concept of mass hysteria that much easier to fall into. Which could play into the screeches and screams that everyone is hearing from the trees.

Sure, I realize that Mari and Coach heard those disturbing noises while in a completely different part of the forest from everyone else. And if you thought this would be the point where I re-introduce the idea of plantlife being sentient, you'd be right. It'd be like taking LSD that has intentions, which is frightening in and of itself.

And I also realize that the characters are still facing issues from that time in the present day, decades after the plane crash. But I think TV science would allow that eating nothing but hallucinogens for 2 years or so, with human flesh being key to that diet, could make it so the girls started producing the wilderness' psychoactive DNA naturally within their own bodies.

This theory really isn't all that far from Lottie's plainly stated beliefs about the area wanting sacrifies. But instead of a supernatural force who feeds on death, it's something far less summary-friendly. A whole-ass trippy forest that perhaps wishes to spread its branches into the outer world at large.

But if it does turn out to just be sentient moss, I can say "Aha!" while smoking the chronic out of a Sherlock Holmes pipe. Just nobody rat me out to Jeff.

Yellowjackets airs new episodes Sunday nights on Showtime at 8:00 p.m., and stream early on Fridays with Paramount+. Hopefully new cast member Hillary Swank shows up soon before I have to start theorizing that her character is in fact made out of artificailly intelligent fungi.