Note: This story contains spoilers from “Yellowjackets” Season 3, Episode 4.
“Yellowjackets” said goodbye to its latest major character character in Season 3, Episode 4, which ends with one of the adult characters mysteriously found dead.
Melanie Lynskey, who plays Adult Shauna, and Simone Kessell, who plays Adult Lottie, discussed the tension between the two characters as Lottie tried to take Shauna’s daughter Callie (Sarah Dejardins) under her wing. In Episode 3, an enraged Shauna kicked Lottie out of her house after she saw that Lottie gave Jackie’s heart necklace, an unwelcome reminder of their past, to Callie.
At the end of this week’s episode, titled “12 Angry Girls and 1 Drunk Travis,” Walter (Elijah Wood) texts Misty (Christina Ricci) his condolences. When she goes online, she sees the crime scene photos of Lottie, who is lying dead at the bottom of a set of stairs.
Kessell, who joined the Emmy-nominated series in Season 2, told TheWrap that she had “mixed emotions” about saying goodbye to the series. “I was kind of upset, but that’s the show. If you’re going to die. This is the show to do it on,” she said philosophically.
Here’s more of TheWrap’s conversation with Lynskey and Kessell.
TheWrap: There’s a lot of tension between Lottie and Shauna this season. Shauna lets Lottie back into their lives and immediately regrets it when she bonds with her daughter, Callie. Can you talk about the dynamics there?
Simone Kessell: It’s Lottie inserting herself into the family dynamic that was already crumbling.
Melanie Lynskey: It’s kind of Shauna’s worst nightmare, that this particular person, also the last thing she would think was going to happen, that Lottie would show up and ask to stay. The whole thing is very triggering for Shauna, very uncomfortable, and she’s very, very anxious the whole time.
Lottie is also the person, I think, who she has the hardest time with from the past and is the most representative of the worst things she went through.
And Lottie did just try to kill Shauna at the end of Season 2.
SK: Did she? That’s murky. Her daughter did shoot me. Have we forgotten about that? Little apology?
Why did Lottie choose Shauna over someone else to trust after she got out of the psychiatric hospital?
SK: I think it’s the Callie relationship. She needs to work out who Callie is. And in her euphoric mental health space, she believes that Callie is the chosen one from the wilderness. And I think she really sees her as this young girl, like they were together [in the wilderness], and so she believes that the spirit has come through Callie, and that’s why she needs to be close to her. There’s a power in Callie that is really drawing Lottie in.
Exactly what Shauna is afraid of.
ML: Yes, and Shauna is afraid, now that she has another child … she’s not doing a great job with her, but she doesn’t want to lose her, and she thinks that this person is coming to disrupt that and take her child from her.
Simone, when did you learn that Lottie was going to be killed off in this episode?
SK: I learned that before we even shot a day, I had a phone call with the showrunners and they informed me, and we kind of worked out the beats of that. I [have] sort of mixed emotions about that. I was kind of upset, but that’s the show. If you’re going to die. This is the show to do it on. I had an incredible journey while I was playing Lottie. I’m incredibly grateful for that. It’s been a beautiful experience.
“Yellowjackets” releases new episodes Fridays on Paramount+ With Showtime and airs Sundays on Showtime.
